Bring on the PSLs

That's Please. Stop. Losing.

Merry Bloopers!

Seasons greetings from Emmett Otter and the Jug Band!
(And Arielle)

Domo Arigato, Google

As the birthday of our Lord and Savior approaches (I'm referring, of course, to Jimmy Buffet and Larry Csonka, respectively), I'm moved to celebrate a Rolling Bones milestone.

This humble blog is now the #1 Google search result for "drunk karaoke songs."

For this honor, I must thank T. Perl, for his tenacious insistance on prolonging the life of "Funky Cold Medina."

So now folks from as far away as Bourbounnais, Ill., and Perth, Australia, dutifully searching for how best to inflict pain upon their drunken comrades, discover this ridiculous list atop 431,000 results. As if someone really needed prompting to join in the glorious splendor of "Sister Christian."

But since 'tis the season for more spiritual sustenance, I offer this throat-choking bit of pure beauty: Leon Russell, Willie Nelson and an ailing Ray Charles singing Russell's "A Song For You" at the Beacon in New York less than a year before Charles died.

It's no "Mr. Roboto." But please forgive me my tresspasses.

Coolest Muthafucka on the Planet

By TPerl

Obama: The College Years

Paleolithic Pricks

Ever since the letters DVR marched so triumphantly into my life, TV commercials have become something of a distant stranger.

And while this might spell disaster for networks in much the same way the internet and a tanking economy has been speed-typing the obituary of newspapers, I'm enjoying this golden era, when "The Office" runs right into "30 Rock" in a tight 44 minutes without stopping to hear about some failing car company's new 0.0% financing plan with nothing due at signing (which until last year I had always heard as "do-it signing," which, considering it's a meaningless phrase, left me quite confused).

Anyway. For the most part, I still watch football live. So it caught me a little by surprise when, in the midst of watching the Jets prove just how crappy a team they are, I ran, once again, into this asshole:



Didn't this offensively overplayed, moronic ad campaign beget a still-born, offensively moronic ABC sitcom America embraced about as gladly as a festive case of herpes? Hasn't the country voted for change? What's it going to take to end this monstrosity?

I just can't believe it's in an insurance company's best interest to inflict unending pain upon potential customers. But then these are the same people who find boundless delight in the cavorting of cockney gecko.

I'm reminded of the seemingly decades-long Energizer bunny campaign, which was only briefly interrupted by the battery company's criminal decision to inflict upon America the barking madness of Ausie rules footballer "Jacko." And yeah, I think he got his own sitcom, too.

Don't Let The Shoes Hit You On the Way Out

It's not hard to gain some enjoyment from the sight of a bitter Iraqi journalist firing not one, but two shoes at the still-president of the United States.

One must truly admire the president's ability to duck projectiles, thrown hard, from close range, and with great accuracy.

And it might be easy, as it appears for our still-president, to laugh off the incident as just one of those things a president must endure. Everyone has critics, right?

But throwing shoes is a gesture of the highest disdain in the Arab world. And as he cursed George Bush for the crimes he's committed against his people, one might wonder if Bush really comprehends what he's done.

It's too easy to psychoanalyze a sitting president from the comfort and distance of my desk chair. But it's hard not to see a smart, but simple and incurious man blinded by the black-and-white comforts so easily swallowed by recovering alcoholic religious zealots.

And yet, how can a moral man of any stripe justify the conclusions reached by this recently released bi-partison Congressional report.

The president of the United States authorized torture. Plain and simple. Just like him.

OJ to begin 9-to-33-year search for real killers in Nevada prison

It's beyond pathetic.

First morons and incompetents aquit OJ for the near decapitation of his ex-wife and the brutal stabbing of a luckless bystander.

Some 14 years later a bunch of low-lifes set up OJ to commit a crime he probably had no intention of committing.

And now there's a decent chance he'll spend the rest of his life in jail.

I'd be lying if I said it didn't put a smile on my face. But the watch the video of his rambling pre-sentencing statement and it's hard not to feel a twinge of sympathy. Just a twinge. It's worth watching just to hear him say "garnishable."

But then I remember who he is. And it doesn't matter who he has become since then. How low he has fallen into self-delusion and waste. A pathetic murderer is still a murderer.

Holiday!

By Arielle

No, not that one.

According to the Associated Press, the powers that be in Perry County, Alabama, have officially declared "Barack Obama Day" a county holiday. It will be observed on the second Monday of November and "highlight the Democratic president-elect's victory as a way to give people faith that difficult goals can be achieved."

All 40 county employees will get the day off, paid.

I found this a bit hasty. I'm all for commemorating important historic moments and clinging to whatever optimism we can wring out of the present state of the world, but aren't there proper waiting periods for naming things after people or declaring holidays? Like waiting five years after retiring from football to be eligible for the Hall of Fame, or having to be dead to be considered for sainthood. Or at least waiting for the guy to do something as president.

Besides, can you just declare holidays - the paid, day off from work kind - so casually?

Then I read on: seems the state of Alabama has way more holidays than the rest of us. There's Confederate Memorial Day. That's in April. The state observes Jefferson Davis' birthday in June. Alabama marks the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr. like the federal holiday that it is, but he's got to share the date; the Official State of Alabama Calendar lists the holiday as the "Martin Luther King, Jr./Robert E. Lee Birthday."

So what's one more holiday? Commemorating something that happened since 1865? 

I'll be expecting my Barack Obama Day card next Nov. 9.

And That's the Tooth

Josh Levin at Slate examines Rick Reilly's peculiar oral fixation.

"P"

Looking back (you know, without the future of the world at stake), the 2+ years we spent deciding on a president was damn entertaining. Time to appreciate the sublime absurdity of Sarah Palin.