My Sick Mind

NEW YORK - In the sensitive post-wardrobe malfunction world, some are questioning whether a guitar was just a guitar during Prince's Super Bowl halftime show. Prince's acclaimed performance included a guitar solo during the "Purple Rain" segment of his medley in which his shadow was projected onto a large, flowing beige sheet. As the 48-year-old rock star let rip, the silhouette cast by his figure and his guitar (shaped like the singer's symbol) had phallic connotations for some. NFL Spokesman Greg Aiello said that the NFL has received no complaints. " We respect other opinions, but it takes quite a leap of the imagination to make a controversy of his performance," Aiello said. "It's a guitar." Of course it is. But it's a guitar because you KNOW it's a guitar. Suppose you just cut to it after a play or something; then what would you think it is? Phallic symbols are nothing new. They are present in our everyday lives. Here a...

LOS ANGELES - You knew this was coming. The strange saga of the astronaut who traveled 900 miles to allegedly try to murder a rival for the affections of a fellow astronaut will be turned into a movie. Granada America has optioned the film rights to a New York Times article on Lisa Nowak , 43, who was arrested Monday and charged with attempted murder. These are the same people who brought us "Nanny 911" and "Hell's Kitchen", so you know that quality will be their first priority. Right. There's an old saying that goes: Nobody ever lost money underestimating the intelligence of the general public. It's also true that they don't lose money when they capitalize on others' misfortune. Books, movies and TV shows. And that whole O.J. nonsense.... "The chronicle of Lisa Marie Nowak has had a global impact and contains almost every dramatic element possible," Granada America CEO David Gyngell said Friday. "One could not imagine a more...

Stop Global Warming

A post over on Sparky’s blog about banning the use of headphones at street crossings made me think back to the Marketing class I had at good-old Widener U . Really. Marketing is an interesting area of business, and it changes with the times. One thing that does not change are the people to whom we sell products. Here’s the theory we learned [drum roll] : The Everett Rogers Diffusion of Innovations Theory . For any given product category, there are five categories of product adopters [Hold your applause until all the honorees have been introduced] : Innovators – venturesome, educated, multiple info sources. Early adopters – social leaders, popular, educated. Early majority – deliberate, many informal social contacts. Late majority – skeptical, traditional, lower socio-economic status. Laggards – neighbors and friends are main info sources, fear of debt. End of marketing lesson. What I’m getting at, in my own odd fashion, is that consumers have adapted ...

A pair of human skeletons lie in an eternal embrace at an Neolithic archaeological dig site near Mantova, Italy, in this photo released February 6, 2007. Archaeologists have determined that the skeletons were sharing a Snickers at the time of their death. NASA Astronaut Lisa Nowak (C) with a jacket over her head, is moved from a bail bond office in Orlando, Florida on February 6, 2007. I never really figured out the whole "jacket over the head" bit. Besides, it's not like everybody doesn't know who you are. Show your face, stand up and be proud. Your self-worth now has a dollar sign in front. I'm betting that the Depends people are going to start a whole new marketing campaign soon, and you could be their new spokes[person] ... spokes[jacket]. Somebody buy me one of these , so I never have to get up while blogging ... Roto-Rooter's 'Pimped Out John' in an undated handout photo. Roto-Rooter says its 'Pimped Out John' is designed to 'fulfill...

We got a quarter inch of snow last night, so it's panic time in New Jersey. The side streets are a mess. People bitch about property taxes, and when the roads aren't salted and the intersections are skating rinks, they have every right to bitch. Meanwhile, the groove that's worn from the car tires is making me drive on the shoulder. Slowly, I realize I'm way over on the right. And the light is turning red. Jesus. Even the Goddammed roads are Republican. HIGHWAY RULE #1 - The big triangular sign says YIELD . It's for the people on the on-ramp, not the people on the expressway. We're doing 70mph and the guy in front of me gets on the brakes to let somebody in. I'm multitasking. High beams and horn. If I could have gotten my shoe off, he'd have gotten "the toe". Tire spew from the wet highway kept my wipers and washer fluid going for almost the entire drive. I needed to have one of those Air Force re-fueling planes riding beside me, fi...

Over at Kate's , she asks the question “What’s the secret to happiness?” She asks many good questions, and reminds me of myself when I was half my age. My automatic reaction was to say I have no clue, but really, I do. I posted this comment: I always felt like the mentally handicapped were happier than most people. They generally aren't saddled with the stress of responsibility and the wants we have been told we want. Their needs are basic and met. Food, shelter and people. It's a simple existence. I'm not saying I envy their life or anything, just that maybe we'd be happier if our lives were simple. To us, It’s sad that they have to live that way, but are THEY sad? I suppose we don’t really know if they’re sad, or if they find themselves wishing they were like us, but I am like us (kind of) and I find myself wishing I was less like us. Really. I see them in the food court at the Mall, being happily led around with a content look on their...

I'm a child of the space age. My parents called my pacifier SPUTNIK , after the Soviet satellite that began orbiting the earth shortly before I was born. As a kid, I lived to watch the launches and generally idolized the astronauts, whom I believed (and still do) that they were the best and brightest of their time. They're still called astronauts, even though the requirements for spaceflight are not as stringent as they were in the 1960s, when you pretty much had to be an aviator or pilot (Neil Armstrong was a civilian pilot) to even apply. Now, there are mission specialists that go up on the Shuttle, and it would seem that the astronauts of today are not as highly qualified as their predecessors. That's why, when I see the word "astronaut" in the headline of a news story, I cringe a little, because I still have those childhood images of the astronauts who went to the moon. So, when I saw this story, I got that little creepy feeling: ORLANDO, Fla . - An astronaut...

Anybody can get one of those cheezy Colts Super Bowl hats. Find a store ... there's thousands of them. The one I want is that one, with the big C - and I think I know how I can get one. STEP ONE: The facts. As we learned from this New York Times article, 288 “Super Bowl XLI Champion Chicago Bears” hats and T-Shirts were shipped to places like Sierra Leone as part of the NFL’s effort to get rid of inaccurate merchandise and help people who don’t know that they’re wearing a tainted hat. Otherwise, they'd just throw them away, so they donate them to people who don't care about football. STEP TWO: The issue. I want a hat. STEP THREE: The Plan. I go to Sierra Leone – it’s a nice vacation spot, from what I’m hearing – and make a nice offer to one of the natives. I’ll buy them a cow, goat or some chickens for their farm in exchange for a hat or three. They can have my hat. I have a nice one with WIDENER on the front. It will perform all the same hat duties as the ot...

Complete domination by the Colts, as predicted by Sparky and myself. The score, however, did not bear us out. Stats-wise, (and an opening kickoff runback notwithstanding) it was one-sided. Close enough for jazz. As far as the TV, it was a bunch of lame commercials. The only ones that made me laugh were the Letterman/Oprah promo and the beard comb-over guy. $2.6 million for 30 seconds. Otherwise, I think they came up short. I never figured out why advertisers would want to spend so much for so little. Who's writing this junk? Two auto mechanics kissing over a candy bar? WTF? Suddenly, I don't think Pam is the biggest automotive idiot out there. Comparatively, you're a genius, dear. Got any candy? And by the way, um ... FedEx ... you're not weightless on the moon. For less than half of the $2.6 million, I could have told you that. Lame-Ex. I gained a new found respect for Prince, though. Not only did he do a nice half-time set, but he did it in the rain as well. I...

Once I got started, it was all downhill. Kinda. After writing yesterday's post, something went horribly awry. The template got all goofy on me, and the blog started to look like it took too many hits of the brown acid. I got comments from Kimmyk and kara , wondering if there was something they should know about, or some three-digit phone number they should be calling. Nope. All it would take is a little nap and some Internet balls. Telling somebody they have a screwy template is a little like telling them they have a booger on the end of their nose. You feel like you really should tell them, but you don't want them to feel bad about the booger. In the end, it's best for everybody to get rid of the booger and carry on. I've resisted the temptation to move the booger, having given into horror stories about lost posts and ugly incidents involving passwords and whatnot, but I figured that the Blogger Team would be there to help - even if I don't know if they really exi...

I buy wine based on the label. There, I said it. I'm a wine idiot ... sue me. The last one I bought had 3 mooses on it. If it has a cool label and it's less than $15, I'm all in. White with fish or red with meat? Who gives a . ... Give me a hopping kangaroo or a lot of colors. I'm a kid in a liquor store. "Look, mommy! Moose!" What a jackass. I bought one of those cat grass things last week. So, now I'm growing cat grass on my window sill. Will the cat eat it? No. What the Hell am I going to do with all this cat grass? Anybody know if I can smoke that junk? Hey ... if the cat ain't gonna eat it... Those Volkswagen commercials with the guy from Fargo doing the German accent really irritate me. Who thinks that a thick German accent is going to sell cars in America? When I hear it, all I can think of are Nazis and concentration camps. But, I drive a Ford, so what do I know? There was an ad in the newspaper for the Philadelphia Auto Show, and there a...

Sunday is the Super Bowl . America's greatest secular holiday. Since I don't care about the game or who wins, I'll be taking it in at the local sports pub. I'm thinking epic blow-out ... like that 49ers-Bengals game or the Cowboys-Bills. So, here's the guess (with a pologies to Bears fans ): Colts 37 Bears 14 Strangely, I'm rooting for the Bears, but my gut feeling is that it will be all downhill for Peyton Manning, and the Bears defense isn't all it's cracked up to be. If th e Bears win, good for them. They'll prove me and some skeptics wrong about the inadequacies of the NFC, but I'm thinking that it ain't gonna happen. By the way, my numbers in the office blo ck pool are Colts- 0 , Bears- 7 , so root for the quarter scores so I can afford those Blue Man G roup tickets. ------------------------------------------------------ I can't believe that there isn't something better to run cars on than gasoline. Pam put up a YouTube...

"Good things don't end in 'eum,' they end in 'mania' or 'teria’ ." - Homer Simpson They also end in "Bowl" - as in Super or ... Wing. Thank whatever God you pray to that some heathen invented the CD player. Why? I’m glad you asked. Today, WIP and my favorite morning radio show is hosting something they call the Wing Bowl , (the 15th one, really ) an eating contest where 20 endomorphs sit on a big stage and try to throw down as many chicken wings as they can in an hour. In today’s Inquirer , columnist Frank Fitzpatrick called it a “rodeo for the repulsive” and a “bacchanal for bozos”. Good ones, Frank. Somehow, it became a radio show, and every year for the last 15, the Friday before the Super Bowl is Wing Bowl day in Philadelphia. The station’s ads call it a “Sporting Event”. Uh-huh. If eating is a sport, then sex should be in the Olympics. That, at least, is something I’d watch. I’m not a big fan of eating contests to begin with. I l...

On this date in 1960, four African-American students from North Carolina A&T College began a sit-in at a “Whites Only” Woolworth’s in Greensboro, North Carolina lunch counter. By February 10, the action had spread to 13 southern cities. This is a testament to how much the United States has changed in my lifetime. Racially, we are light years ahead of where we were in those days, but in other ways, we are not. There are still great hurdles to overcome on many fronts, and it will take heroic actions for some to approach them. Sadly, the present gang of idiots in the White House would never allow anything as revolutionary to happen, so we are forced to wait until at least January of 2008. All these people are interested in now is fostering a war that people do not understand and promoting their so-called War on Terror – whatever that is. It is so typical of the narrow-mindedness that comes out of Washington. They fight wars on ideas while squelching real ones in science, technology an...

You're Gore-Obama! As Al Gore, you are really tired of letting history decide. Known for having great potential in all sorts of fields, you are mostly remembered as falling just shy of that potential. Even when you've been exceptionally popular, you've managed to find ways of getting nothing done. Lately, you've become completely obsessed with making things cooler. Many have long suspected that your deep affinity for trees is inspired by the fact that you relate to them and their inability to move. You select Barack Obama as your running mate so he can write your speeches. Take the 2008 Presidential Ticket Quiz at the Blue Pyramid . You're Lolita ! by Vladimir Nabokov Considered by most to be depraved and immoral, you are obsessed with sex. What really tantalizes you is that which deviates from societal standards in every way, though you admit that this probably isn't the best and you're not sure what causes this desire. Nonetheless, you've done some pre...

No, not that one... This one... Over on Pam's Musings , we were treated to her voyage to the dark side - namely the Wal -Mart. A lively little tale of her reluctant visit to a store that she reviles. So, leave it up to me to pour a little kerosene on the fire. One of the things that surprised her (and me) was that the Wal -Mart sells organic vegetables. Cool, right? Wrong . This cool little article was linked from the Huffington Post , and details how the boys from Arkansas (pronounced are-can-saw) are under investigation over trying to pass off non-organic foods as organic. Hoo -boy! How 'bout them prices! It's a shame, because some people were excited by the prospect, only to find out that they were duped. Sorry to burst your free-range bubble, but something in the ba ck of my sick mind told me that I should do a little web search over " Wal -Mart organic vegetables". Viola (pronounced woa -la!) ... there it was. And here's the ... ahem ... meat of t...

Writing is like farting. Your own always smells pretty good, no matter how much it might stink to other people. So, in that spirit, thanks for letting me stink up the place while ... (a) This headache and mild feeling of uneasiness goes away... or (b) It graduates into the full case of the flu that I suspect is coming, flu shot notwithstanding. Meanwhile... The Ice Balls are Coming. And you thought I was goofy last week , didn't ya? TAMPA, Fla. - Raymond Rodriguez was changing a tire when an 18-inch chunk of ice plummeted from the sky with a piercing whistle, then a metallic crunch. The ice chunk crushed the roof of a nearby Ford Mustang on Sunday morning. No one was hurt. "It's not an act of God," said Carlos Javage, whose son's car was wrecked by the mystery ice. "This came off an airplane." Aw, c'mon Carlos ... airplanes are made by God, right? If you're really religious, like the Bible says we are, then isn't everything an act ...