The Cletus Chronicles

I can't help but think that K-Fed [or K-Foo] is basically an STD that has assumed human form and now walks among us.

His single claim to fame thus far has been to knock up a Mouseketeer and sponge off her savings while sparking up a phatty blunt, yo.

For anyone else it would be enough to live the simple, lazy life in an expensive mansion; trick out some hot rides; tap one's shorty; set a record for the consumption of Cheetos; host the odd poker nights wid the boyz, ya know -- a seven day weekend. And no one does nothing quite as well as K-Fed, who's shirking of soap and lack of hygiene is as well-known as his lack of talent.

But then K-Fed had to get greedy: suddenly walking around with an 'undeserved sense of accomplishment' wasn't enough. He felt the need to accomplish something, and may the Lord have mercy on our souls.

Soon to be unleashed on an unsuspecting public will be K-Fed's debut rap album, Rearranged. In many former Soviet countries, the release of a rap album by an individual lacking any talent was considered a crime against the State and punishable by death. We should be so lucky.

However, while the thought of such a punishment is appealing, this writer believes society would be poorer off without K-Fed's album. Sure, don't get me wrong -- this album is likely to set white people back at least a quarter of a century. Maybe more. However, think of the endless comedic value of such an album! How many late-night TV punchlines will be birthed from this demon seed?

It has already begun ...

Late Night with Conan O'Brien gave James Lipton the opportunity to put his own spin on the lyrics of K-Fed's first shitty single, PopoZao.




For more K-Fedfoolery, check out the collection of links at Boing Boing.


K-Fed

Britney, Cheetos; Cheetos, Britney.

This is one of those surreal paintings that you cannot turn your eyes from ... before realising it's far too late as your orbs have been irreparably damaged and the sandwich sitting on the desk next to you has suddenly lost its appeal. In short, it's hilariously brilliant.

[Gallery of the Absurd] << click for more pics.

The 100x100 Hamburger Beats the Hept Whopper

Holy shit. The 100x100 hamburger [from In-N-Out Burger] in all its glory.

Now I thought my friend, Baker, was an impressive chap when he sauntered into a Hamilton Burger King back in 1996 and calmly ordered a Double Whopper with cheese ... and five extra 1/4 pound patties and accompanying cheese slices. Pandemonium erupted in the kitchen that day as the staff assembled the King of all burgers, with the help of the manager who bravely stepped forth from his office to take control of the operation. It was a memorable afternoon.

But this beats the Hept Whopper.

Holy shit, and they actually laid the cheese slices between the patties. The BK staff just put seven slices of cheese on top of each other, thereby creating the world's first processed cheese pattie.


According to the dude's blog, this burger cost $97.66, and only one person spewed while eating it, which is an acceptable loss considering there were eight eaters. And they finished it as well, but were dismayed to find a couple of raw patties near the end [which they also ate]. Better to find a raw pattie at the end than at the start, though.

[Link]

Eight Years and Twenty

Today marks my 28th birthday. Here's some non-interesting facts about twenty-eight to get this post rolling ...

Twenty-eight is the atomic number of nickel. This is ironic, as all I have in my wallet is a nickel.

Twenty-eight is the sum of the first five prime numbers. It is also a perfect number.

Twenty-eight years is the length of time Robinson Crusoe spent on his island, dodging cannibals and chatting to an imaginary friend called, Wilson.

28 Days Later is the title of a very cool horror film.

28 Days is the title of a very un-cool Sandra Bullock film.


I'm sure there are more facts that involve the magical twenty-eight, but I can't be arsed finding them.

As a gift, my wife gave me a copy of The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho. Thus far it is most excellent. We also went out to dinner tonight for some fantastic sushi, which my stomach always finds agreeable.

Sushi was our second choice, as our original pick [Sublime, an amazing vegan restaurant down in Ft. Lauderdale] is closed until March while they repair their hurricane damage, and take the opportunity to do some refurbishing.

So really it's been a relaxing first birthday in the US, which is a nice little milestone to have reached. Thanks to Kelv and Renee for the email, you included some very interesting information there, including the enlightening piece about a certain ex-school chum of ours selling sexy lingerie on trademe.co.nz. For the sake of anonymity we shall refer to this individual as Matt L. No, no that's too obvious; how about, M. Loveridge. Er.

So if you want some crotchless panties, Matt's your man.

Oh, and as an added birthday surprise, my social security card arrived in the mail. Unfortunately it was a left-handed gift, for they have misspelt my surname [apparently I'm Mr. Turrell ...]. Yep. I have to send it back with a new application, and wait for them to post me a new, correct card. Just keep swimming, just keep swimming ...

Hell Hath No Fury Like an Oprah Conned

I’m not much of an Oprah-watcher, but Gawker tipped me off yesterday that she would be grilling author James Frey on her show. And she did.

For those of you unaware of the hoopla surrounding this, basically James Frey wrote a memoir, A Million Little Pieces, that Oprah picked for her book club [her book club being one of the largest on the planet, and any book she picks is guaranteed to shift bazillions of copies, thereby making the writer and publishers insanely rich].

However, The Smoking Gun set about debunking some of the tales presented as truths in the memoir, including questioning Frey's claim that he spent a three month stretch in the big house, when in truth TSG revealed that he only spent a couple of hours in jail.¹

Frey went on Larry King to defend himself over the Smoking Gun allegations, and was joined by an incorporeal Oprah, who phoned-in to help defend him [an act she later admitted was a mistake]. All well and good, you might say.

Nope. As it turns out, the Smoking Gun website was right, and this brings us back to Oprah’s Wrath™, which was turned not only on the author, but also his publisher, Doubled’oh!

It was slightly uncomfortable to watch, because I was scared Oprah was going to unleash her Hamster-style ninja moves on Frey, and I could tell she was also visibly embarrassed about the whole affair. It’s true she probably had no choice but to do yesterday’s show, as to be honest her integrity was at stake, especially when you consider the articles written in various newspapers in the past fortnight.

Is it a big deal, though? Well, I guess if you paid to read Frey’s memoir and were inspired by the so-called true events in the book only to find out much of it was either fibs or massive embellishment, then yes, it probably is.

Of course, with any memoir or autobiography [biographies, too] one has to expect a modicum of embellishment, considering there is a natural absence of objectivity from the author when the subject is himself. How much is too much, though? A male author might mention that his wang is eight and a half inches uncut, when in reality it’s probably only six inches, and cut. That’s to be expected, as everyone lies about their knob.

But when an author says he was in jail for 87 days, but later admits it was really only a couple of hours, that’s a massive jump on the truth-o-meter.

Or when the author says he had two root canal surgeries without any Novocain, and all dentists [including his] say that’s improbable, then that is again asking a great deal of the reader to accept that event as truthful.

I have no doubt that what readers have said of the memoir, that it was inspiring and uplifting and they responded to the message in it, is genuine. However, marketing the book as a memoir was false advertising, and it should have been marketed as fiction.

However, while Doubled'oh! waits to slip in an author’s note before the next printing, it’s very clear that A Million Little Pieces is a license to print money regardless of the scandal, as that will make it more alluring to curious buyers, and they'll be far too busy rolling around in it to really give a shit.

I guess there is the argument that if A Million Little Pieces had not been an Oprah Pick, then it's likely the whole affair would have registered as a tiny blip in the publishing world, a clichéd storm in a tea cup deal. But with Oprah, everything is multiplied by a factor of a shit load. This is no tea cup; this is a Biblical Tempest on live! TV.

I'm sure the whole experience will make for a good book that Frey can write, and he and Doubled'oh! will make even more bling from it. Just don't expect to see it as part of Oprah's book club.

¹ Jail of course being a small cell stapled on the end of a Sheriff’s building; prison being that penitentiary-looking penitentiary where one sports the latest in orange jumpsuits while some scary-looking crim called Bubba marks you as his bitch. Frey was only briefly a guest of the former.

James Frey

Garden and Eye Toons

Not much has been happening today, chaps. I did spend a little time in the garden helping out by digging holes, trimming palm tree fronds, carrying flagstones around, all that good manly stuff. Quite.

Anywho, one of the coolest Christmas gifts I received from my wife was a $25 iTunes gift voucher. Prior to Jesus' birthday, my poor immigrant status meant I could only press my nose against the iTunes Music Store window and pine away as some great music taunted me with cockteasesque 30-second clips.¹

But then Christmas came.

I haven't been greedy as thus far I still have $11 left to grab any new releases that tickle my fancy; which is good, because it would have been stoopid of me to splurge it all at once, especially without any regular income.

So I figure that if I use my previous experiences with my work permit as a template, allow for the long-awaited arrival of my soc. security card next week, and adding to that timeframe a couple of weeks to get a job, carry the one then divide by two ... drag this remainder over here ... I should have a regular disposable income in 47.43 weeks! Yeah! ;-)

Pardon? Oh, you want to know what songs I downloaded from iTunes? Aww, alright.

Disclaimer: You will probably feel inadequate if you do not own any of these frickin' cool songs.

Change Your Mind -- The Killers
You Only Live Once -- The Strokes
Perfect Situation -- Weezer
I Predict a Riot -- Kaiser Chiefs
Heart in a Cage -- The Strokes
So. Central Rain [I'm Sorry] -- R.E.M.
Evil -- Interpol
On the Other Side -- The Strokes
Cooper's Lament -- Arlo Guthrie
Leviathan -- Manic Street Preachers
Float On -- Modest Mouse
Forget the Flowers -- Wilco
The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonite -- R.E.M.
Jesus of Suburbia -- Green Day

They're all very cool [of course I'm being subjective here, but there you go], especially the Interpol track, which reminds me very much of The Pixies. I'm also holding out for more Arctic Monkeys on iTunes, as their debut album came out this week and seems to have the NME all lathered up.

That is all.

¹ Yes, I suppose I could download songs from eMule, etc, but I feel far too guilty doing so. I know, I'm a wimp, but what ya gonna do?

Hollywood Nanny Reveals All!

This type of book cracks me up. If it isn't Diana's butler/dog walker/ tarot card reader coming out with a tell-all book, then it's someone else's help spilling the beans. And the truth of the matter is, these books are never as salacious, or scandalous, as they claim to be. They're actually a waste of paper and should be pulped, but where there's demand there's supply, I guess.

The latest help cashing in and jumping on the celebrity gossip monorail is ex-Supernanny to the Stars, Suzanne Something-or-other. Her book is titled, You'll Never Nanny in This Town Again: The True Adventures of a Hollywood Nanny, and inside you can read all the dirty gossip on Nicole Kidman's parenting skills, or what it's like to work for former CAA head, Mike Ovitz.

Sigh, I guess it's only time before we have a book from a Hollywood colonic technician ...


We here at Pluperfection are very proud to bring you an exciting excerpt from the forthcoming novel, You'll Never Give a Colonic in This Town Again, by Hubert P. Estefan.

I've given many a Hollywood star a colonic over the past ten years. Surprised? You shouldn’t be, because Colon Hydrotherapy is as common as a bikini wax, or even Botox, darlings. The last client who came to me to have their colon irrigated is one of the hottest young things in the biz today.

I’m not going to name names, I owe him and his rectum that much, but I will say he’s definitely A-List, and had two movies in the top 10 last year. He’s a marquee name, but when I heard him go on Leno and talk about what he likes to eat, well, I just had to come clean: too many people are getting hurt by his lies.

Sure, you might be sitting there and reading this thinking, ‘Hey, what’s the big patootie?’ But it is big, people; it is big. Too many young stars are cut down in their prime by engorged and obstructed colons, which lead to delays in shooting which leads to increased production costs. Everyone loses because of someone’s hard, impacted fecal matter.

I was good at my job. The best. Many amateur col-techs are too rough with the hose –- they like to jam in it as fast as they can in order to get through as many clients in a day, thereby maximizing profits. But I was never profit-driven; I was about quality, darling.

The best way to insert the hose into an A-Lister’s rectum is with a gentle twisting motion. It’s natural for the sphincter to constrict and try to prevent your passage, so lube is essential. As the sphincter relaxes, get the A-Lister to say, ‘Ahhh.’ It sounds funny, but it really works. Like yoga.

But I digress. So when this A-Lister, who I cannot name, went on Leno and said he only ate lentils, corn, and a high fiber diet, I was speechless. It was like a part of me died. My profession had been slighted, and I could not go on living a lie.

And here’s the truth. The A-Lister ate nothing but Twinkies and Ding Dongs. If he was ever acquainted with corn, then he must have been seeing another colonic technician, because from where I was standing there was no corn floating past. No lentils. No fiber, either.

So the reality to his fantasy was Twinkies and Ding Dongs. How do I know? Nothing clogs a colonic hose more than a Ding Dong, and the only way to un-clog it is to scrub the rectal clamp and fitting cup with an old toothbrush. Not pleasant, but that’s why we’re well paid for what we do.

By coming clean I know I'll never irrigate an A-Lister's arse again, but the truth is worth my sacrifice. If there's any moral in all this, it has to be this: never believe what a celebrity tells you they eat. It's a lie.

Look for it in book stores this Spring!

The Wonders of Soy

Thanks to the wonders of modern science, it is now possible to replace the beef in chili with a soy-substitute. I assure you, this is no fanciful theory, because I succeeded today where so many others have failed: I concocted the finest, chilist-tasting chili in the land, sans beef.

Yes, Kelvin, I can hear your laughter from here but it really was breathtaking, you ought to try it ...

In case anyone is remotely interested, the reason why I have turned to the soy side is because I have decided to tackle my cholesterol prob with diet and not meds. Basically the pills I was popping made me feel like shit; I could feel the dirty fuckers rooting my liver 24/7.

24 days into my diet everything has been running fine, and thus far I have only thrown my toys once [and to be fair, it was a mild tanny, nothing to write home about, really] so that has to be a good sign.

The soy bus is coming, people!

Sounds Simply Shite

Londonist reports that crooner Mick Hucknall, of former chart sensation Simply Red, is to be the subject of a new musical called, Simply Cuban. I wish I was making this up.

Yep, apparently the musical's plot revolves around a love story set in the sultry air of Cuba's past, while in the background all of Simply Red's, er, hits will sally forth over the PA -- but they will do so with a subtle twist: they will be Simply Red songs re-worked into Latin numbers. With salsa. And Doritos. Possibly.

I think they'd have better luck sticking him in a re-imagined Annie.

[Link]

The Non-Silly America at 24 frames/second

I've decided to give the meme a serious whirl, so here we go.

Again, the 10 films are in no particular order, but those of you with sharp eyes might spot that the most recent film is, The Natural. Hm.


The Godfather, Part II [1974]

To Kill a Mockingbird [1962]

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb [1964]

M*A*S*H [1970]

The Natural [1984]

American Graffiti [1973]

Casablanca [1942]

Apocalypse Now [1979]

On the Waterfront [1954]

It's A Wonderful Life [1946]


I couldn't find any room for other films like, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid; Taxi Driver; A Christmas Story; All the President's Men; The Day the Earth Stood Still; National Lampoon's Animal House; Guess Who's Coming to Dinner; Chinatown; The Godfather; Citizen Kane; The Graduate; Goodfellas; One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest; and many more.

Inside the Starfuckers Studio

Inside the Actors Studio [with James Lipton] has to be running out of subjects to starfuck. Of late I've seen ads promoting upcoming interviews with, er, actors who have barely a handful of roles in their body of work.

Personally, I think it's all a drive to rustle up some names that lend the programme street cred. I'm looking forward to watching a gangsta rapper sit down with Lipton and shoot some talk about their acting skilz ...

Lipton: My next guest is quite definitely the finest actor of his generation. His only film thus far found him co-starring with the comic genius that is Jimmy Fallon, surely the progenitor of the latest generation of SNL graduates graduating to the top of the domestic box office with films of such class and importance that, if we truly believe, will one day cure cancer.

My guest has starred in seventeen rap videos, and has been nominated fourteen times for an Urban Grammy, which he has failed to win: surely a crime against humanity. His wit and verve is evident in the genius crafting of rhyme matched only perhaps by Byron himself.

My guest on Inside the Actors Studio is, Mad Joint.

Mad Joint: See this fucka I knew from the projects, Byron, he be tryin' to tap mah shorty. I said, I says to 'im, 'Yo! Byron: you tap I gotta cap, dig it?' Muthafucker backed real down. Heh.

Lipton: Delightful! But I was referring to Lord Byron, quite definitely one of the finest poets of the ... early nineteenth century if not ... any century.

Mad Joint: Never heard of 'im; I'm better way better ways, check it.

Lipton: Wonderful! I want you to cast your mind back to a wonderful time in your past. It's December the fourteenth, four am, 1995. You are laying down the final vocal track for your seminal rap release, Itz Way Tough, Yo. Who is with you?

Mad Joint: Uh, some hoes I think, they were always tryin' to tickle my change, dig? Hey, tha only place for hoes be the garden shed! Heh, tools. Uh, my posse, definitely, they were sharin' sum blow around. I think there was this dead hooker stuffed under the sound board, or was that ...?

Lipton: I will refresh your mind. It was your guru, DJ Methodinz.

Mad Joint: That fucka? I hate, hate, and hate that bitch. I'll put a cap in his ass, double-time!

Lipton: But in 1995 you were, how shall I put this, sympatico. He was your main ... dawg? Your kaiser bun to his sloppy joe.

Mad Joint: You saying he tap me in the ass, bitch?

Lipton: Of course not, I am merely trying to get with the homies.

Mad Joint: You one crazy saltine, cracker.

Lipton: Delicious! Let me remind you of this line from your debut album, and I quote, Hit them niggas high/Hit them niggas low/Hit them niggas like they just don't know.

Mad Joint: Yeah?

Lipton: Magnificent!

Mad Joint: So? I know that, you think ah don't fuckin' know what genius is, fucker?

Lipton: You're dead, and have arrived at -

Mad Joint: You fuckin layin' down a throw-down, bitch? I ain't dead, you fuckin' dead, foo!

Lipton: Stupendous! No, no -- this is a hypothetical question: what would God say to you when you arrive at the pearly gates?

Mad Joint: Hm. He probably be all star-struck an' all at first, like dribblin' and pissin' his pants in mah presence, coz I have that way wid people. Hm, I think he'd probably say, 'Where them bitches at, nigga?' Then we'd party, an' no one throws a bigger party than me, yo. Plus there'd be some fine trim up in heaven, you know? All them desessed shorties, yeah! And the crack! Man, you know the crack is supa coo, yo -- in heaven it’s the purest, finest un-cut Columbian eva. Shit.

Lipton: No words in the English, Yiddish, or Maori language can describe your greatness, so I am forced to make one up. Namblaswoopstic.

Mad Joint: Yeah!

And there you have it. It will happen.

Halleh-frickin'-luiah!

Today's mail brought good tidings for your fearless author. Tidings in the form of a confirmation letter informing moi that I have been granted a social security card! Oh, man -- I am so stoked that I do not have to go back to the office for a third time now.

Anywho, the letter said my social securitah card should be arriving within the next couple of weeks, and then I can dust off my Barnes & Noble application [among others] and get the job-hunting rolling.

So yes, you could say I'm happy to finally get some traction going as far as employment seeking is concerned. Considering I will have been here a year in April, and my bank account currently has barely enough bling in it to qualify as spare change, earning some money would be nice [Ya think?! -- Ed].

A Big Day Out

It looks like a lovely summer's day in Auckland right now for the Big Day Out music festival, although I hope people have slapped on some sunscreen lest they fry in the ozone layer-less sky we have downunder.

I know of one person at the festival today [big shout out to Paul!], who is probably parked in front of the main stage watching Steriogram's set; or maybe he's in the boiler room trancing out, although it's probably too early in the day for that.

The only Big Day Out I've been to was back in 2000, which included Foo Fighters, Chemical Brothers, Nine Inch Nails, Blink 182, Shihad, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Not a bad line up, really.

So if anyone else I know is attending today, all neatly dressed in your best moshing outfits, I hope you have a fantastic time!

[Link] to Auckland 2006 line up.

Loo loo loo, I've Got a Titlescorer

The Lulu Titlescorer is so hot right now. Use it to see if the title of your book is either going to be so hot right now, or will consign your book to obscurity.

Most of the titles I have for my short stories hovered around the low 40% mark; however, when I changed one title to an obscure phrase from within one particular story, it jumped up to nearly 70%, so go figure.

From the website:

The Lulu Titlescorer has been developed exclusively for Lulu by statisticians who studied the titles of 50 years' worth of top bestsellers and identified which title attributes separated the bestsellers from the rest.

[Link]

Expedition Disney

Earlier this month my wife and I took my family up to Orlando for three days of Disney [well, two days of Disney and one day of Islands of Adventure]. The first day was pretty much a write-off, owing to an unfortunate blow out on the turnpike. The car we were using was not our own, so we were dismayed to find the spare was one of those silly little donut tires that resemble the tire of a motorcycle. Yep, welcome to 50 miles per hoursville on the turnpike.

The two service plazas we stopped at were about as useful as a bucketful of busted arseholes when it came to having tires. However, to be fair the SUV does have a larger tire than one's standard car, and with the multitude of SUVs on the roads, service plazas probably have a limited supply of these uber tires [and those probably get gobbled up double-quick time].

Eventually we were able to stop at a Goodyear service centre, and within 10 minutes they had a brand-spanking new tire on and we were on our way! Yes, we can go faster than 50 mph! Except, and this was ironic, the Goodyear service centre was in Kissimmee, so once we hit the exit for Disney World [practically down the road], the speed limit was ... 50 mph. The speed we had been travelling at since, well, ages away.

So one could even argue that by stopping at Goodyear, we were actually slower in arriving at Magic Kingdom than if we had kept on going with the donut tire. Since we arrived at Magic Kingdom after 2 pm, I kept this little thought to myself lest my travelling companions not see the funny side and ditch me at the Mad Tea Party.

Arriving at Magic Kingdom in the afternoon is, in theory, not as bad as it sounds. Typically we prefer to get to a park as it opens, around 9 am. That gives us enough time to go on everything at least twice, and enjoy something to eat at a counter service spot or a restaurant, do some shopping, etc. Magic Kingdom was scheduled to be open until 11 pm, which certainly kicked ass, especially as January [being winter] is supposed to be Disney's slow season, with park numbers on the low side. So we figured fortune was back on our team.

However, and you can probably guess where I'm going with this, the park was a seething mass of humanity, with souls squeezed shoulder to shoulder as they ran headlong from one ride to the other, succumbing to the call of Mickey and his Sirens. So it was quite full.

How full? Splash Mountain¹ = 75 minutes in line. !. The last time I was at Magic Kingdom was July 2003, and it was so full everyone was stacked up on top of each other as the temps were nudging 90 F [about 32 C]. Yet the longest line we waited in was for Space Mountain, and that was only 45 minutes, iirc.

Now it could be that Splash Mountain was experiencing technical difficulties [although when asked, park employees maintained everything was chipper and running smoothly [although would they really tell otherwise, unless smoke was belching out of a ride?]], which might explain the long wait. Who knows? All I know is I lost my freakin hat. To this day I don't know why I did not take it off, but when we went over the money shot drop my hat decided it had finally had enough of life perched atop my head, and would take its chances in the wild world. It's probably working as an attendent at Epcot now, riding around on its very own Segway. Fucker.

So yes, by the time we got to our hotel at night everyone was practically dead on their feet, and your fearless writer was feeling woozy from the spinning tea cups. Well, it was either that or the double cheeseburger I had at Cosmic Rays ...

However, the next two days were funtastic, so they nicely cancelled out the false start on the first day. Hurrah!

¹ Splash Mountain also has a reputation of being known as Flash Mountain. Apparently, certain persons like to expose their breasts on the money shot drop, which has a camera situated to take photos of people's excited expressions. And boobies, it would seem. There is even a website with photographic evidence of this phenomenon. [Check it].

Random Thought of the Day

If one lacks medical insurance it is probably not in one's best interest to contract rabies. Rabies is not cool.

I, on the other hand, dear reader, do not have rabies nor would I wish to contract it. I am merely thinking out loud that having rabies would put a dampner on my day.

Keep safe. Don't get rabies.

Spoiling Your Film With The Trailer 101

Welcome to a new year, class. I trust you enjoyed your holidays. Well, enough with the natter -- let's get straight into it, shall we?

Right, the subject we will be studying today is the trailer for, When a Stranger Calls. Pardon? Yes, this was originally made back in the 1970s but some enterprising chap knocked out his front teeth and blew like he had never blown before to get this remade. And the trailer really, really blows. But, hey -- in the current climate of remakes this was bound to happen so we should not be surprised.

I won't spoil the plot of When a Stranger Calls for you, but essentially the plot boils down to this: wholesome, virginal teen of the female persuasion picks up a babysitting gig. Parents leave for the night, Wholesome Virgin starts getting phone calls from some Creepy Guy whom really knows an awful lot about, well, everything: including the Wholesome Virgin!

Naturally the poor lass freaks out and calls the cops, who kindly start a trace. Whew! Thank goodness the cops are tracing the calls; when they find out where he's holed up they can zoom off to wherever that is and arrest him.

The cops call her back.

They tell her the calls from the Creepy Guy have been coming from ... INSIDE THE HOUSE! AAAAAAH! RUN! RUN WHOLESOME VIRGIN! The Creepy Guy bursts out and chases her around the house, the end.

And the trailer spoiled the entire film by including the part where the aforementioned keystoners inform Wholesome Virgin she's not alone in the house.

It was like watching a 30 second film, with the start-middle-end all neatly wrapped up with a bow. Why bother marketing a film when you include the punch line that the whole story is balanced on? Gosh!

Sure, many people have probably seen the original, or have even been reading up on their Snopes, but come on, Hollywood -- at least try, or look like you're trying.

The Amateur Surgery Hour

A scan through Fark this evening led me to spy two stories of people performing surgeries they were not qualified to perform.

The first is about a man, upon discovering he had been shot in the chest, attempting to remove the bullet himself with the sharp end of a meat thermometer.

The second is about a woman dentist allowing her unqualified boyfriend to perform dental procedures on patients. You know, procedures like drilling out cavities without anaesthetic. Painless little shit like that.

[Link] to medium-rare bullet in the chest story.

[Link] to Dr. Nick's School of Dentistry story.

Mizrahi's Golden Grope

Scarlett's bust makes even the most ardent screamer want to cop a feel, it would seem.

'Hello, I am a gay fashion designer: I am now going to touch your boobies, but only because I am interested in ascertaining the quality of your couturier's prowess with a needle and thread. Yes, this all looks about -- Oh! Oh, my. Boo-bies. Bah, bah, boobies. So soft and supple, yet strong and supportive, like the finest pair of goose down pillows this side of -- No! No, I must ... fight the mams: the mams shall have no power over me ... must not crack a chub ... Tom Cruise in Risky Business, Tom Cruise in Risky Business, Tom Cruise in Risky Business, Tom, ahh.'


Now that's conflict.

[Photo Link]

Tom, the Dark Side, and Oprah

My wife came across this frickin' hilarious video of Tom Cruise using some Sith lightning on Oprah last June, and decided to send it my way, bless her kind heart.

Many of you have probably seen it, since I gather it was floating around the internet not long after the ... well, I guess one could call it a very public brain implosion. But if you haven't seen it, then by all means clicky-clicky the link below.

[Link] to iFilm video.

Columbus After Chinese?

Did Chinese mariners circumnavigate the world in the early 15th century, thus beating pre-eminent European mariners to such lucious finds as the Americas?

If the discovery of an 18th century copy of a map drawn in 1418 has anything to do with it, then the answer is probably yes.

The copy, shown above, has been sent to Waikato University [my alma mater, whoo!] for some mass spectrography, with the results to be announced in Feb. Groovy.

Of course, everything about this could all turn out to be fake.

However, even if it is fake, there is no doubt that Chinese mariners were zooming all over the ocean back then. After all, Polynesians made epic journeys in outrigger canoes across the Pacific before the 15th century, so it seems feasible that Zheng He and his fleets sailed just as far; maybe even further.

What I found interesting, and the Economist mentions this in the last paragraph, is why didn't the Chinese, after making all these discoveries, dabble in a little colonisation? Europeans, upon discovering a new land, could not wait to get ashore, plant the flag and shoot a few natives. Apparently this was not the modus operandi of the Chinese.

To learn more about ancient mariners, make a voyage down to your public library; it's all in books!

[Link] to Economist article, via Warren Ellis.

Vampire Running for Office in Minnesota

How interesting.

Hey, if Jesse 'The Body' Ventura can make it into the Governor's mansion, maybe a vampire can, too?

[Link]

American TARDIS

Well it seems the new series of Doctor Who has been picked up by the Sci Fi Channel, and they will commence broadcasts in March. Excellent.

I keep hearing rumours¹ that Auntie offered Sci Fi the series last year, yet the latter network turned it down for some inexplicable reason.

Although with Sci Fi it's not surprising -- how they managed to produce a fantastic Battlestar Galactica mini-series and greenlight a continuing series [along with Lost, the best show on TV, imo] on a network that churns out shit like Boa vs. Python, and Mansquito, defies belief. It should not have happened with their track record, but let us thank a higher power for the miracle.

Still, I have to give them some props for actually bringing Doctor Who Stateside, and I for one look forward to finally seeing it.

Oh, and the DVD release for the US has been pushed back to later in the year now, instead of the Feb release that had been announced. There you go.


[Link] to press release.

¹ And seeing as most of the rumours were posted on the internet, they have to be true, right? :-p

Spring Cleaning

Gave the blog a little bit of a shake up today, although it was nothing too drastic, just a little cosmetic enhancement. First up was a re-ordering of my sidebar content, including a little link deletion and addery. All cool stuff.

I've also been meaning to add a 'what I'm reading' style of picture link in my sidebar, mainly because it seems to be all the rage this year; it's so hot right now. Actually I have no idea what's all the rage. Me and rage, while not exactly no longer acquainted, are at least in a sort of seperation stage. I have no idea what I'm talking about.

But if you like the subtle little changes then I'm very pleased. If you don't, well, tough shit.

The Dreaded Lurgy

Just before Christmas I was given an early present. What I thought was a heavy dose of the common cold turned out to be a heavy dose of sinusitis. So, being the enterprising chap that I am, I decided to document some events while the shit was going down, with the intention of turning them into an illuminating blog post. Here is that post.

It all happened as the year of 2005 was drawing to a close …

The dreaded lurgy made me feel like shit; I had it on good authority that I also looked like shit. This was unsurprising: the lurgy is quite the bastard. It was easily the worst case of the ‘flu that I’ve ever had … except what may have started out as a mere case of the ‘flu, eventually evolved into something more violent: sinusitis [cue, lightning strike].

Every time I sneezed it felt as if the top of my skull would explode in a shower of snot. I was also convinced that the pressure behind my eyes would force my orbs to bulge out of their sockets. Reading was out of the question; it took me a day just to read the first couple of pages of vol 6 of The Sandman. Even someone downstairs microwaving something sent pulses of agony through my noggin. Dudes, it sucked arse.

My normal strategy for surviving sickness is to dose myself up with some good shit one can by over the counter at the chemists, and then wait for my body to sweat the sucka out. Unfortunately, with my family here and all, I was on a rather tight timeframe as Christmas was fast approaching, as was our trip to Disney. I needed to be better faster, so Medical Science was going to have to take a more dominant role in my recovery. I went to the doctor.

Not having a general practitioner yet, we strolled off to one of the local walk-in clinics before 8am, figuring an early arrival would guarantee an early consultation. How wrong we were.

We eventually did see someone of the white-coated variety, but we had to sit in the clinic for four frickin’ hours. Oh, and if one lacks insurance they like to receive their payment in cash and upfront, thank you.

Anywho, as I sat in the doctor’s examination room I gave the usual answers like, ‘Well first off it was all green and thick, but now it’s running clear’; and, ‘Yeah, one usually hangs lower than the other.’ All very medical, you understand.

Somehow the conversation ended up on cholesterol, as I mentioned I took meds for mine. They had never heard of the brand of meds I pop daily, and the measuring scale for cholesterol is slightly different here in the US than it is in NZ. So of course they gave me a blood test to determine my cholesterol level in a figure we could all understand. I love blood tests.

Drawing blood is an artform, and as with any art there are different artists practising different styles. There is the Trickster, who will get you to talk and think of anything else and quietly stick it in your arm and have it out before you even know what’s happening. I love the Trickster.

There is the Freight Train, usually a bull of a person who’s put up with far too much shit in their blood drawing career, and has given into the slightly-sadistic impulse to inflict as much pain as possible with their dainty needle. They laugh at your suggestion that you might like to lie down while it’s happening, and they jam that needle in your arm so fast you will have a bruise there for a week. Avoid the Freight Train.

Then there is the Newbie. The Newbie is, obviously, new at drawing blood. They like to make sure your vein is positively popping before they go anywhere near you with the needle – which is fair enough, because there would be nothing worse than possessing weak veins, and having the dude stab around your arm like he was playing solo pin the tail on the donkey for 20 minutes.

Anyway, once the Newbie has decided the vein is just right, in goes the needle.

While the needle was in the big vein in my right arm, I was looking around the room trying to concentrate on anything else other than the needle in the big vein in my right arm as the blood began to leave my body.

The blood, after some persuasion, is now departing my vein. Departing. Still departing. Very slow now, but the needle is still in me so the vile must not be full otherwise he’d take the needle out of my arm now and give me a lollipop. Why is the needle still in my arm? Okay, don’t panic, look around the room and concentrate on something to take your mind off the needle that is still in your arm. Oh, flu jab poster! Not too late to get one, huh? Well, it’s a little late for me but I appreciate the irony. Needle still in there? Should I look -- what if I see my blood? No, it’s there; I can feel it, sharp little fucker that it is. How fucking long does it take? Okay, it’s coming out; it’s out, no more needle, no more … blood. Oh, poocakes -- I feel kind of woozy. Room is spinning, can’t feel wife’s hand on my own. Her voice is sounding further and further away. My arm hurts; I think I might be sick, if I had any food in my tummy.

About this stage my mind just went, ‘Screw you guys, I’m going home.’ And it went. All I can say of the experience is that the sensation of one’s mind departing looked and felt like being dragged very fast backwards through a narrow, white corridor.

Or maybe I was like Edward Norton in Fight Club, trying to get to my cave; or maybe a plug at the base of my skull had been pulled and my brain was draining out around my ankles. Whichever is the best description of what I experienced, it seems that Richard’s Body engineered a little stratagem involving syncope to get the big guy’s consciousness out of the hot zone. Cheers.

It must have been interesting to watch my little reaction from the outside. My wife said that when the nurse tried to put a plaster on my arm, I dragged my arm away from him and tucked it into my chest. Then I started pitching forward and my tongue started protruding [the fuck?!] from my mouth. It was at this moment that one of the doctors came rushing out to administer some treatment, and it was also my wife’s voice that brought me back from my comfy, fantasy cave. I’m not sure what her question was, but my answer was, simply, ‘What?’

The med people decided my response was reason enough not to dump my ass on the floor in the recovery position, so they pushed me back into my chair and plied me with coke; the sugar was wonderful.

After five minutes of sitting and sipping, I slid out of my seat and we settled the tab and moseyed on home. Not a bad adventure for four hours in the walk-in clinic, huh?

And if anyone wants to question the author’s masculinity, I’d like to reply with a very hearty, fuck you. Sure, I don’t know how to strip an engine with my bare hands, nor do I like to kill small animals with high powered rifles: but just because having blood taken from me is my kryptonite, it doesn’t excommunicate me from the Penis Club. It might put me on the outer at all of the social events [can’t wait to tackle the hoagie at the club picnic!], but I prefer being on the periphery anyway.

Remember, many great dudes throughout antiquity have had one great weakness: Achilles and his heel; the Fonz and his fear of liver; Indiana Jones and his fear of snakes; and without Synergy, Jem and the Holograms could never have beaten the Misfits in a battle of the bands.

Question: So how did I get better, then?

Answer: Drugs.

To be specific, I was administered antibiotics of the amoxicillin kind. Thirty of those bad boys cleared that fucker right up, and some. Whoo!

And there you have it, my pre-Christmas sickness spectacular.

Also, before I sign off with this post, I want to give a big thank you to my wife who put up with my whiny ass while I was sick. She was brilliant. Awwww, I’m all verklempt!

An Eventful Month

Well I'm back on board this good ship blog, so I'm sure that comes as a relief to my many hundreds [nay, thousands!] of readers. Or all two of you.

As the title says, it's been an eventful month that has seen the arrival and departure of my family; a bout of sinusitis; another rejection at social security [yay!]; Christmas; Disney; and, finally, the new year.

All of the above will undoubtedly make for exciting reading and I shall be firing it off to a blog near you ASAFP.

Keep your eyes peeled for new updates, homies. Same bat-channel, same ... you get the idea.