The World Wide Weird
Inside Out Teddy Bears
Friday, January 25th, 2008via Scalzi’s Whateverettes: Inside Out Teddy Bears
What else is there to say, really?
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An Inevitable Attraction
Monday, January 21st, 2008This is a couple of weeks old already, but I still find it fascinating:
A pair of twins who were adopted by separate families as babies got married without knowing they were brother and sister, a peer told the House of Lords.
“They were never told that they were twins,” he told the Lords. “They met later in life and felt an inevitable attraction, and the judge had to deal with the consequences of the marriage that they entered into and all the issues of their separation.”
Here’s the most surprising part: I didn’t even know Mark Hamil and Carrie Fisher were dating, nor did I know they were British.
Go figure…
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What am I doing here? What are YOU doing here?
Wednesday, January 9th, 2008You can’t help but chuckle at a story like this:
Man spots wife during visit to brothel
WARSAW, Poland – A Polish man got the shock of his life when he visited a brothel and spotted his wife among the establishment’s employees.Polish tabloid Super Express said the woman had been making some extra money on the side while telling her husband she worked at a store in a nearby town.
“I was dumfounded. I thought I was dreaming,” the husband told the newspaper on Wednesday.
The couple, married for 14 years, are now divorcing, the newspaper reported.
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Hava Nagila Goes Pop
Saturday, December 29th, 2007A pop singer named Lauren Rose has released a version of the traditional Jewish folk dance, “Hava Nagila” in England. The song, apparently, had a shot at being the #1 song in the country on Christmas Day. No word (yet) on whether or not it actually got there, but still: Hava Nagila – a pop song?
Behold:
The (English) words she’s singing, by the way, are not even close to a translation, with the exception of the “Baby, let’s dance” which is somewhat close to Hava Nagila (“Let us rejoice”).
Anyone who’s ever attended a Bar/Bat Mitzvah will probably find this amazing…
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Weird Holiday Gifts
Thursday, December 27th, 2007Returned that tie you got for Christmas and don’t know what to do with the resulting gift card? Know someone who’s birthday is December 27th and frustrated by the lack of items on the shelves in the recently ransacked stores? Have no fear – Matthew Baldwin is here with his 2007 Holiday Christmas Survival Guide for Slackers Cultural Warriors. I encourage you to click through, and peruse the whole thing, but allow me to call out some of the highlights:
There’s the Electronic Rock, Paper, Scissors Keychain (pictured) for when you just can’t be bothered to make a decision and change the shape of your hand all at the same time.
Then there’s a series of exercise bikes and treadmills connected to video game controllers, so your kids can get some actual exercise while playing video games, helping them to narrowly avoid the whole “go outside and play actual sports” thing.
Oh, and if you have a dollar but can’t find a match to burn it with, you can always send someone a GIF image of a Christmas gift and Facebook will take the dollar off your hands for you.
Moving on, we have the Viag-Ring, which is a plastic ring that holds a single Viagra tablet underneath a piece of glass (I’m guessing plastic, but whatever…) that says, “In Case of Emergency, Break Glass” (also pictured).
And finally, since we are approaching an election year, there’s the Hillary Nutcracker. I think this one pretty much speaks for itself.
So there you have it, my favorite items from Matthew Baldwin’s list of his favorite items available for purchase this holiday season. Happy Exchanging, everyone…
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The Dog Ate My Baseball…
Thursday, December 20th, 2007After the final game of the 2007 World Series, catcher Jason Varitek gave the gamee-ending ball (a strikeout) to relief pitcher Jonathan Papelbon. Papelbon claims he doesn’t have it anymore because his dog ate it.
Seriously.
Here’s what he told the Associated Press:
“[My bulldog, Boss] plays with baseballs like they are his toys,” Papelbon told the Hattiesburg (Miss.) American. “He jumped up one day on the counter and snatched it. He likes rawhide. He tore that thing to pieces. Nobody knows that. I’ll keep what’s left of it.”
Red Sox spokesman John Blake says, “the ball was in the hands of one of the players and we take his word at what happened to it.”
OK, John, but I think you’re going to be the only one…
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The Handcuffs Don’t Fit – He Only Has Four Fingers!
Wednesday, December 5th, 2007From Jeff Porten via e-mail:
Tweety, Donald Duck Summoned to Court
An Italian court ordered [Tweety Bird], along with Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and his girlfriend Daisy, to testify in a counterfeiting case.In what lawyers believe was a clerical error worthy of a Looney Tunes cartoon, a court in Naples sent a summons to the characters ordering them to appear Friday in a trial in the southern Italian city, officials said.
Instead of naming only the companies and their legal representatives, clerks also wrote in the witness list the names of the cartoons that decorated the toys and gadgets the man had reproduced, said Fiorenza Sorotto, vice president of Disney Company Italia.
The Naples court will have to rewrite the summons, although this will probably delay the trial, said Disney lawyer Cristina Ravelli.
Ya know, first the baseball players are all on steroids, then the pop singers are going to jail for DUI, and now Mickey & Donald are found counterfeiting. What’s a kid to do for heroes these days?
Personally, I think I’m going to steer my kids away from Italian Court Clerks…
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Abbott and Costello Meet Wall Street
Tuesday, December 4th, 2007Computer services consultancy BearingPoint has replaced their CEO, Harry You, with their COO, Ed Harbach. The article’s headline?
Who, me?
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Suggestive Sporting Goods Merger
Saturday, December 1st, 2007From the Pittsburgh Business Times:
Dick’s Sporting Goods Inc. said late Monday it agreed to acquire privately held Chick’s Sporting Goods for about $40 million in cash and assumption of about $31 million debt.
Careful research has been done on this topic, and extensive studies have proven that there exists no way in the modern world to comment on this story without making a sexually suggestive reference.
That is all.
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Have a Politically Correct Christmas!
Saturday, November 17th, 2007Here’s one from the PC crowd that just takes the cake:
Aspiring Santas have been told not to use the term “ho, ho, ho” because it could be seen as derogatory to women. Thirty trainees at a Santa course in Adelaide last month, held by recruitment company Westaff, were urged to replace the traditional festive greeting with “ha, ha, ha”.
Two Santa hopefuls reportedly left the course after the trainer’s edict.
The term “ho” is also American slang for a prostitute. “We were told it (ho) was a derogatory term for females and can upset people,” said the Santa, who did not want to be identified publicly. “As far as I’m concerned, a hoe is something you dig the ground with.”
Critics have branded the instruction for Santas to use “Ha! ha! ha! Merry Christmas” as nonsense and madness.
The silver lining to this story is the near universal agreement that such a suggestion is insane. That said, it doesn’t seem like Political Correctness is about to burn itself out in the flame of public opinion any time soon…
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