Low Standards in High Definition

It's Day 4 of the 14 days of Super Bowl. Did you know there are two black head coaches in the game? It sounds like a song, but it's more like a tiny little torture device cooked up by people who know a lot about torture - Televsion executives. Two weeks gives them enough time to examine and re-examine every silly little detail of all the Super Bowl participants and their kids. It's ridiculous to the point that Campbell's soup spokesman Donovan McNabb will be holding a press conference, presumably to talk about soup.

One of the ancillary effects of America's greatest secular holiday is that it spurs sales of wide-screen high-definition televisions. Apparently, people want to see Prince in high definition. As for me, I'd prefer to see him with the sound off, being blind-sided by Tank Johnson - but I digress.

It seems that those high-definition TVs are pretty good for sports, but lousy for porn. That's right, I said porn. A story in our local paper today clued me into a major problem with the TVs:

Adult film producers have discovered that the technology is sometimes not so sexy. The high-definition format is accentuating imperfections in the actors — from a little extra cellulite on a leg to wrinkles around the eyes. Hollywood is dealing with similar problems, but they are more pronounced for pornographers, who rely on close-ups and who, because of their quick adoption of the new format, are facing the issue more immediately than mainstream-entertainment companies.
Producers are taking steps to hide the imperfections. Some shots are lit differently than they would have been before high-def, and some actors simply are not shot at certain angles, or are getting cosmetic surgery, or seeking expert grooming.

Expert grooming? Wow, another career path for people who are too stupid to be proctologists. I can't wait to see high-def pubic hair. And all I need to do is shell out three-grand? Sign me up, dick pump.

"The biggest problem is razor burn," said Stormy Daniels, an actress, writer and director.

That's right, Stormy Daniels. Probably left the Weather Channel for a lucrative career in porn. It's razor burn, just in case you were wondering. I'm sure it was the next question you were thinking of. You probably thought the biggest problem would be genital warts or some kind of vaginal fungus. That's what I would have thought. But, you know, we men (us) can't resist the latest technology, even if it means sacrificing the joys of porn.

"Men are all about outdoing each other, being up with the times, being cool, having the latest technology," she said. "They're willing to sacrifice our vanity and imperfections to beat each other" to high-definition.

Make up your own joke over that one. I'm still reeling from that State of the Union deal.

But, you know, porn isn't the only thing that might not look that great in high-def:

AMSTERDAM (Reuters Life!) - The Netherlands, the country that has pioneered reality shows like "Big Brother," is planning a new first - a dating program for the visibly disfigured. The broadcaster SBS 6 is seeking candidates for its "Love at Second Sight" show due to be launched on February 20.
"Do you have a visible serious handicap and are you looking for a partner?" says an appeal on its Web site.

Do I ever! Hoo-boy, when are the auditions? Suddenly, I'm looking pretty hot over there in Amsterdam. The show was originally set to be called "Monster Love", but that offended the Dutch. It's nice to know that they have their standards.

I might have wanted to call it "Fucked-Up and Horny" or "The Amazing Face"

Or ... "The Prize is Fright"

How about "Below-Average Joe"?

"Wheel of Misfortune"

"Dancing with the Scars"

"Fear Factor" oh ... that's taken.

Something to Lighten the Mood

Comics. Everybody loves the comics. Light, funny and something to take your mind off the stress of the everyday world ... or a cheap excuse for a post when my mind is a blank? You decide.

OK, so as I write this, the Shrub is in Washington working on his pronounciation for his big speech. "Nuc ... Neuc ... Nuck... Newcl ..." Atomic. Fucking vowels.

He's ready to inform us as to the State of the Union. As if we didn't already know. Another year of this nitwit, then we're done. The speech should be on the Cartoon Network.

So ... who's next?

That seems to be the "popular" opinion, although I'm not so sure she would be the wrong choice. She lived in the White House for 8 years, so you can't argue the "no experience" deal. She's bright, well-spoken and out of the rest of the field, she's clearly the standout. However, having said all that, I don't think the country is ready for (a) Bill's wife in the White House or (b) a woman president.

Although, something tells me that there are plenty of countries around the world who look at us and wonder why we have such odd ideas about who our president can and should be. It would be nice to be able to lay the job on the most qualified individual, but in the age of TV, Internet and form over substance, it will probably never happen.

More on that, later, but as for now, I'm kinda going with Hillary. As for these two...

Models display a creation by Colombia's fashion designer Renzo Gaviria during the Colombiatex show in Medellin, Colombia, Monday, Jan. 22, 2007.

Really - that's what the caption said. I'm at a loss. Anyone care to guess what the "creation" is?

Odds and Ends (mostly odds)

Switzerland's Martina Hingis in action during her fourth round win over China's Li Na at the Australian Open tennis tournament in Melbourne, Monday, Jan. 22, 2007. Hingis won in three sets 4-6 6-3 6-0.

I could enjoy women's tennis a lot more if it weren't for all the grunting and screaming. I thought Maria Sharapova was giving birth on the court until I looked and saw that all she was doing was hitting a tennis ball. Geez. I wish I could find it, but I remember reading a magazine article that said it was a bad idea to yell and scream while lifting weights. Something about the pressure it puts on some delicate body parts...I forget exactly. Tennis coaches must be teaching it at an early age, because it's pervasive and unbearable. If the golfers start with it, I won't have any peace.

OK, so it's a week and six days from America's greatest secular holiday (a.k.a. Super Bowl Sunday), and already I'm up to here (pointing at my throat) with the "two black head coaches" stories. As I said before, it shouldn't be a story if we really want to have racial equality, but I suppose we do not, hence the constant harping on racial differences and milestones - Super Bowl notwithstanding.

So....
Because of failed batteries, poor lighting and other vagaries, all the clocks in my place are displaying a different time. As I move from room to room, I feel like I'm in an H.G. Wells novel. I have to keep my eye on at least one clock so I don't miss my favorite Monday night comedies. I need to laugh, you see. Dubya is going to recite his State of the Union address on Tuesday night, and I fear for my life, sanity and other fragile bodily functions. I'm ready for Old Broad's Blogger Drinking Game. Stop by and imbibe.

Meanwhile...
Paris Hilton is proving why it's better to be rich than (anything) smart. You may remember that she was pulled over for Driving Under the Influence some time ago. Well, it seems as though our girl has plea bargained down from D.U.I. to reckless driving, which requires a modest fine and some community service (the Poor Community she's designated to serve - God help them). There's a lie in her story as big as a Chi Chi's margarita when she said she only "consumed only a single margarita at a charity event that evening." Her blood alcohol level was .08, which would make for one Hell of a margarita. Oh, to be rich and stupid. Maybe in the next life.

And ladies ... I implore you...
PALOS HEIGHTS, Ill. - Nine months pregnant and married to a fervent Bears fan with tickets to Sunday's NFC Championship game, Colleen Pavelka didn't want to risk going into labor during the game against the New Orleans Saints. Due to give birth on Monday, Pavelka's doctor told her Friday she could induce labor early. She opted for the Friday delivery. "I thought, how could (Mark) miss this one opportunity that he might never have again in his life?" said Pavelka, 28, from the southwestern Chicago suburb of Homer Glen.

Yeah, geez ... a once-in-a-lifetime football game vs. what....the birth of your child? The nerve of that kid getting in the way of your football game, Mark. I hope, for the kid's sake, that it's a once in a lifetime event for his parents. And how about that doctor? Hey, what's a little induced labor when there's a football game to watch?

Smoking or Non-Smoking?

I don’t smoke, and I don’t hang around with people who do, but I have to imagine that it’s difficult to be a smoker. Not just the breathing part, which has to be difficult, too, but the social part as well. There is a stigma attached to smoking, and it gets worse every day.
It’s a strange thing, the smoking. No nutritional value, no physical benefits of any kind to themselves or the people around them and no societal use – yet it continues.

Last summer, our legislators in New Jersey finally got around to passing anti-smoking laws, which ban smoking in public, except on casino floors, where, as we know, smoke isn’t harmful. Slowly, other places are joining us. Last week, a milestone was reached when more than half the states had passed similar laws. In parts of Ohio, you can't even smoke outdoors. Come out smokers, we’ve got you surrounded!

It’s cold here in the Garden State. Cold enough that the smokers have to put on their winter gear. Most of them are bitter about having to go outdoors to do something that, up until six months ago, they could do indoors, but for those of us who like going home without the stench of Marlboro, we say “thanks”. At the bar, they miss big chunks of games and their drinks get warm and their food gets cold, but they don’t stop puffing. If it were me, I’d have to think that anything that is so reviled by society that they would chase me outside to do it must be a horrible thing. It might even be enough to get me to quit, but if I was addicted (as the smokers are) then I suppose it’s easier said than done. But the smokers don’t seem to be affected enough by being social outcasts that they consider stopping. Huddling them up outside only serves to give them a united voice, as they shiver and smoke. Maybe the menthol keeps them warm?

Now, New Jersey lawmakers want to ban smoking in cars that are occupied by children. Their little lungs are more susceptible to the smoke than their parents’. How they would go about enforcing that is anyone’s guess, but it would be yet another place where smokers are chastised. Pretty soon, I suppose they’ll have to rope-off a section of their home as a “Smoking Area” and start watching out for the black helicopters.

I feel sympathy for them, in a “Let Freedom Ring” kind of way. I don’t really want to inhale the smoke or have my clothes infested, but they are addicted, and to banish them to the back alley and separate them from the public won’t accomplish what most of us want, which is to get them to quit.

They can’t quit, because the government allows an addictive substance to be sold to people. They are addicted to the cigarettes, and their addiction is easily satisfied because the product is available. They justify it by making laws banning its use in certain areas and not allowing its sale to minors, but it is easy to get. If they had to sit in a Denny’s parking lot waiting for their friend to score them a carton while they craned their neck looking for cops, they might give it up. But something tells me that they still might do it, even though they faced being a horribly addicted loser with yellow teeth and jittery hands from nicotine withdrawal. We have already forced them out of our restaurants, bars and offices; so what’s one more public humiliation to people who are already pariahs? They’d be out there with the pot smokers and glue sniffers, looking to score.

So where are we? We have a product that is so hideous that we make laws restricting its use, because it kills everything in its path. We tax it to the point where the tax is as big a part of the price as the product. For another couple of bucks they could be smoking dope. For a variety of reasons, we can’t make it illegal, so we do what we always do – we make new laws, and turn otherwise regular people into criminals. In the last 25 years, smoking has gone from being “kinda cool” to social anathema.

We’re going about this the wrong way, folks. Don’t turn people into criminals. We have enough laws. Corporate America and our federal government collaborated to make cigarettes what they are today. You convinced them it was cool (and even named a product after it); sold them the product and now you spend most of your time chasing them around. It doesn’t make sense. The government gets into bed with tobacco and then makes laws against it.

Make up your mind.

No Accounting for Tastes

When the Deathmobile is heading toward the parade grandstand at the end of Animal House, Dean Vernon Wormer stares blankly into the screen, and to no one in particular, quietly proclaims, "I hate those guys."

That's the same way I feel about the people running American Idol.

In the end, they're going to win, because money goes to people who appeal to the masses. But I don't have to like it (and I don't) and neither do I have to approve of their methods for attracting audience or running what they refer to as "entertainment". Here's what the people running the show had to say about the ramifications of what I posted on Friday:

PASADENA, Calif. - The Fox television network chief on Saturday dismissed talk of unusual cruelty by the judges on "American Idol" this year, saying he's heard from people who think the show has been toned down. "I think it's part of what makes "American Idol" "American Idol,'" Peter Liguori, Fox entertainment president, told television writers.

Toned down? How is it possible that something that is so popular has been toned down? And who has he heard from? Fox executives, I'm guessing. Meanwhile, here is the simple truth:
The show is more popular than ever, which attracts more people than ever to those initial talent searches. The producers, realizing that people love listening to the judges being judgmental, parade the delusional in front of them, hoping that they will make spectacles of themselves. People seldom disappoint when the standards are low. In other words, if they didn't think that the weirdos would appeal to the masses, they wouldn't put them on TV.

The show is a ratings giant and a franchise that is bigger than even the dopes in charge realized it could be. Hundreds of thousands of people are whittled down to a select few in an alleged nationwide talent search. The only thing "nationwide" about the search is the search for freaks and weirdos for the judges to ridicule. Otherwise, the outcome has likely aready been decided. It is only up to you (not me) the viewer, to tune in, cast your meaningless vote and play along with the Fox executives who are raking in the money while you debate your meaningless opinions about which of the pre-determined singers will be the winner. Trouble is, the winner has already been determined, and your only job is to wait until the end of the show so that the Fox executives can maximize their profit at your expense. Enjoy the show.

Has it been toned down? No, not if you consider the machine that American Idol has become. Average singers are thrust upon the public in what they are led to believe is a blind search for the next superstar.
The truth is, we don't need another superstar, and the search isn't blind. The only superstars are the judges, and the viewers are the only ones who are blind.

Cooped Up

Outside, the wind sounds like Superman taking off in the old TV show. Whistling and howling. 25 miles per hour, with gusts to 40. At least I'm not in Texas.

I spent some time on the Internet, over at Ticketbastard, and picked up a ticket to see Blue Man Group, coming to the Taj Mahal (no, not that one) in Atlantic City in March. More fun awaits.

Then, speaking of fun, I switched on the TV, and there's C-Span, my favorite reality show channel. There was a live feed from Wichita, Kansas and former Miss America 2001 Angela Perez Baraquio of Hawaii was introducing Sam Brownback, as he formally declared his run for the 2008 presidency. I'm not sure what Miss Hawaii has to do with a Senator from Kansas. Maybe Tara Dawn Holland is either a Democrat or too smart to get involved, but I'm not sure why he's running to begin with, so I'm at a loss. I decided to watch Dirty Jobs with Mike Rowe. If I'm gonna feel dirty watching something on TV, it may as well be real dirt.

I was further thrown when I heard Brownback say that "my policies are at the heart of the Republican party." Geez, I don't even think the Republicans like hearing that.

As if Republicans had a heart to begin with. Sorry ... I should have left that for the Old Broad or Pam to say, but I couldn't resist.

I gotta get out of the house.

Just Some Junk

Overheard at the Wawa earlier this evening, while waiting for my sandwich:

A kid was ordering a sandwich for her too-hip-to-order-it-himself boyfriend (complete with knit skull cap and pants around his hips), when she stopped in mid-order to ask him if regular pickles were OK, because they didn't have "summer pickles". Why did she think they would have summer pickles in January? I can't imagine being so picky about pickles that it would matter, but the kid seemed to be pondering the question, when the sandwich artist behind the counter told her that "the pickles are all the same". Whew! A narrow escape.

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I'm getting a lot of Google searches from my Michelle Manhart post the other day, along with the usual Britney Spears up-skirt no-panties and our old pal Cecily Tynan. I also got a page hit from a search for "2006 salary and compensation for Zoe Cruz". Looks like somebody hired a new tax accountant.

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There was a story on the front page of our Inquirer sports section today about the NFL playoffs, and how it was possible that, if Indianapolis and Chicago won on Sunday, that two black head coaches could wind up in the Super Bowl. I suppose it's news (of some sort) but I really wonder why it is such a big deal. I sent an e-mail to the sports editor:

A feature article on the front page of the sports section about two black head coaches who are a step away from making it to the Super Bowl. Historic? Yes, but I think the real historic threshold will be crossed when something like that happens and we don't notice. When we stop writing about it and talking about it, we will have achieved true equality.

At that time, the proper treatment will be given to the accomplishment itself rather than the race or color of the participants. Isn't that what racial equality is supposed to be about?

I suppose they won't print my letter, but I really think it's about time we stopped making such a big fuss over racial issues. I think they only serve to divide us, and for most people (me included) who really didn't give it a thought, bringing up the issue doesn't contribute to anything positive. I thought it was odd that the newspaper would run such an article (written by an Associated Press writer) until I saw an article on Yahoo's front page tonight, which is the same article that ran in our newspaper today.

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You can watch this ridiculous television show if you want (40 million people do), but as for me, I stand vindicated of the nonsense they perpetrate. It looks like it's getting cruel, and this is an example of just how cruel and silly. This is supposed to be entertainment? It is said that nobody ever lost money underestimating the intelligence of the American public. Case in point: American Idol.

You can read this too, if you'd like.

Another Inconvenient Truth

Woodlyn, Pennslyvania - A Delaware County family narrowly avoided injury after a chunk of ice came crashing through their home Wednesday evening. The incident happened shortly after 8:00 p.m. in the 1300 block of Donna Drive in Woodlyn, PA.

Ed and Penny Myers said they were getting their 4-year-old daughter ready for bed when the icy object tore a 3-foot hole through the roof. "There was this explosion in the room. At first I thought it was the TV shattering and glass, then I looked up and saw the hole in the ceiling and I was afraid the whole ceiling was going to collapse," said Penny.

Wow, this global warming business is really getting out of hand. As if it wasn't bad enough that the Arctic Circle was melting, now we have to keep your eyes on the skies, too. Holy shit, Hannah. Chunks of iceberg are flying around. Watch the kids.