This made me laugh a little too hard.

In which I weave a cautionary tapestry

Go make your own.

Daily dose of awesome...right here.

Pop goes my brain

And here you thought Men Without Hats only had one song...

Stay safe.

I'm in the middle of moving to the new Siftin' headquarters, so while I'm boxing up everything, you enjoy this video.

Or else.

Friday night video: I bet he was testy about this.

For tonight's video entry, I have painstakingly hand-selected this short piece that would very well be a segment on the show "Ow, My Balls!" from Idiocracy.

Ten chocolate layer cakes!

This was just added to Hulu, and it made my day.

Do you like my mullet?

OK, so recently, I shared with you, my close personal friends, the literal version of "Take On Me."

Here's the follow-up: the literal version of Tears For Fears' "Head Over Heels."

October = Halloween = Scary = This

I know it's not Halloween yet, but to get you in the proper frame of mind, I bring you not a standard slasher flick, not and old-school thriller, but something that may just break your brain.

Do you dare watch...

Turkish Star Trek?

Don't be a brick teaser

Because hey, who doesn't have 60 grand just lying around collecting dust--especially these days?

Well, if that pesky money is bringing you down, you can buy a lifesize replica of yourself built of Lego bricks.

I'm all into self-indulgence; I do write a blog, after all, but dear God; does anyone really need one of these? Do you get to approve it before you have to make the final payment?

"Looks good, but it needs some more bricks in the crotchular region. I hope you've got the factory on round-the-clock production..."

Or what if you get one made, and you've got a giant ass or something? Do you have to pay more? Would I get a discount because I have no hair?

There's a party in the hizzouse!

Well, actually, that was earlier today, but that's okay. I go to a fair number of birthday parties for the youngsters, and consequently, I see a lot of toys.

And while my cousin's son got some pretty sweet swag for his first birthday, I didn't see anything that had a cool-ass commercial like this:



But on the up side, I did go home with an edible Curious George head, thus leading to a number of inappropriate jokes.

And the number one reason I'm still bitter is...

Many, many moons ago, I used to try my hand at coming up with pithy ideas for the Late Show with David Letterman Top 10 List contest on the show's Web site.

Week after week, I'd try my best, only to not make it among the top 10 submissions. Until one week, I finally did. The category: Top Ten Least-Popular Halloween Costumes.

Not only did I get on the list, but I was at the top spot. Numero uno! For my awesomeness, I earned a Late Show Online T-shirt.

Earned.

Note that I didn't say received. Somehow, my beloved T-shirt never made it to my house. And though this was years ago--to give you an idea, I'm using Netscape on a Mac (Took the screenshot at work at the time)--it bugged me that there wasn't really a way to prove to my friends that I did it.

Aside from saving a printout of a screenshot and then finding it years later while packing. And now, I'm ineligible to win whatever prize they give away now, because I'm technically an employee of CBS. Sigh.

So to properly preserve my place in lame-o history, here is my winning submission (click to embiggen):

OK, so I'm a choosy mother.

Being a Superman nut as a kid meant that I was automatically interested in anything remotely to do with the character, whether it was Underoos, toys, or peanut butter.

Yes, Superman Peanut Butter graced shelves for a few years in the 1980s, and after pestering my mom, we got some. Being a choosy mother, she usually chose Jif.

I don't remember what it tasted like other than I liked Jif better despite the Superman connection. But every now and then I kept asking for it, in the vain hope that it had improved since the last time.

It was sorta like begging for Smuckers Goober Grape, the peanut butter that had jelly stripes already in it. It was good for one sandwich before reality set in and you realize it tasted like ass.

Anyway, it wouldn't be a Friday night without a video, so here's a commercial or two for Superman Peanut Butter:

All in all, it's just another checker at the wall

As I get older, I realize that when you are a kid, you're half-crazy. Things that wouldn't make sense to someone with two brain cells to rub together are everyday occurances for kids.

Eighth grade:

Very early on in English that day, one of my friends earned 15 minutes of detention; I don't remember what for. Now, my other friend was getting a ride home with him, so he figured he may as well do something to earn detention, too.

Talking was almost always good to get your name on the board as a warning, but he needed a check by his name to earn full-fledged 15 minutes of infamy.

I know, I know. You're asking, "Why didn't he just stay without doing anything to earn detention?" But as I said, that's what sane adults wonder. Kids figure, "Hey, I have to stay anyway, I may as well do something fun."

I have a tendency to be in the wrong place at the wrong time; my first day of school when I moved to Livermore, I got brought into class with a few other kids for making noise in the bathroom. I was innocent, of course, but dumb enough to hang around. This will come into play shortly.

Now my pal needed a check. In a moment of inspiration, he spied a checker on the table of games on the wall nearest our desks. His plan was to throw the checker at the chalkboard.

Yeah. That made perfect sense.

Now by the wizened age of 13, I knew better than to be in the general vicinity of anyone even thinking of doing something detention-worthy. To that end, I made my way to the back of the classroom to get a drink of water from the fountain at the sink.

Unfortunately, my friend had already launched his projectile. The checker hit me square in the chest, bounced off the wall, off a table, hit a desk, and finally came to rest on the floor, but not after making more noise than a dinosaur passing a kidney stone.

My teacher looked to see the source of the ruckus, noticed my friend looking guilty and noticed me at the sink. She added a check by my friend's name on the board. He had achieved his goal.

But then she wrote my name on the board. I wasn't worried; I knew that sometimes you had to take one for the team.

She added a check by my name.

Yes, through no fault of my own--aside from being naturally stupid--I managed to get detention for something I didn't even do. I charley-horsed my friend in the arm--the same one that got stabbed with a pencil in another classroom incident--and expressed my dissatisfaction.

You can probably just fill in your favorite swear word here.

It look a lot of convincing on my friend's part after school when we all remained for our punishment, but my teacher relented and gave me a full pardon. I thanked her, gathered my stuff and hit the road.

As I cleared the school ground, I checked my watch and did a little math. Factoring in my explanation plus my friend's, and then some cross-examination, I was still only--

16 minutes late.

I am not a coffee achiever

In the grown-up world where I spend part of my existence, I feel I start the day at a disadvantage because I don't drink coffee.

So generally speaking, you'll never hear me say, "God, I'm beat. I need coffee." More often than not, it will be something like, "Oh God, I think I got beaten up by little men while I slept. Is today over yet?"

See, coffee drinkers have hope that there is a cure to their listlessness. Me, I have to rely on Pez.

Which, judging from some of the looks I've gotten from co-workers, is not a breakfast food.

An ass full of pipe wrench

My friend Karyne sent this to me today, and I had to share it. This is the best version of "Take on Me" you're likely ever to hear and see.

Don't you know about the word?

I'm addicted. It plays into an already extant failing of mine, and now it's getting worse.

I got sucked in to playing Word Challenge on Facebook. I was fine just playing to kill time, but once friends started challenging me, I felt obligated to maintain my word nerd cred, you know?

I'm not normally a competitive person, but now that I'm getting better at it, it's hard to stop. My friend Jean is probably going to kill me soon, since I complained that I sucked and then a half-hour later beat my all-time best score (and hers).

That said, if you're on Facebook, challenge me. Half the time I get crappy letters and consequently, a crappy score.

The Price is Retired

As a game show nerd, I found this interesting. It's a video showing pictures of every retired pricing game from The Price is Right. Plus, it uses the classic TPIR background cue music, which is pretty pimptacular.

Nobody will ever know

I didn't submit this picture, but I could have:

Seriously, Mr. UPS Dude, why even make this half-assed--nay, quarter-assed gesture? Is that really going to keep someone from swiping my package?

I wish I'd have taken a picture of it, but one time we got a package delivered, and it was a pretty sizable box, like about the size of a medium U-Haul box, and I shit you not, it was on my doorstep, UNDER THE MAT.

Thanks for nothing, douche.

(via FAIL Blog)

Friday night video fun

It's that time again. This week, I'm feeling like checking out some old TV commercials, so here you go.

Movies that made you cry

Okay, now because we're such close pals, I'm going to share something with you: the first movie that made me cry.

Summer of 1980. I'm 5 years old, at the drive-in with my parents. Generally, when we went to the drive-in, I was already dressed in my pajamas, because I'd be fast asleep by the time the previews ended.

But this particular trip, I wasn't the least bit sleepy. I wasn't really interested in the movie my parents went to see; it wasn't a comedy or a cartoon, so I didn't give two craps. But as they kept trying to discourage me from watching it, I figured that it might be worth checking out.

Plus, while I could make out the Cheech and Chong movie on the nearest screen, I couldn't hear any of it, so it was pointless.

As it turns out, we were watching the first Friday the 13th movie, which explains why my parents wanted me to be asleep. Once it became apparent that I was going to sneak looks every now and then, I got a quick briefing on how while this may look scary, it's all pretend; like a cartoon, so if I get scared, I should just laugh it off.

And amazingly, it worked. And I'm sure I didn't see a whole lot of gore. I kept being offered popcorn and distracted by other questions at key point in the movie. I guess they gave up near the end, because the big battle is the only part I vividly remember seeing.

I remember the sense of relief I felt when the heroine defeated the killer. I could finally relax now, as was the character, floating on the placid lake in a boat. Here, check it out:



Yeah, right until mangled seaweed-infested Jason popped out of the water and grabbed her out of the boat. That scared the living crap out of me, and for a minute or so, I cried.

I had a grand total of one nightmare (Jason was trying to get me, but instead of looking like a drowning victim, he looked like a mummy wrapped in multicolored gauze), and after that point, horror movies never scared me much. I'd get startled from time to time, but not actually scared. Even now, alas.

What was the first movie that made you cry?

Not a complete loss of a day

Woke up late. Felt like crap. Got bored.

So I packed some stuff and decided to fix my desktop computer, which has been ailing for quite some time. After various attempts proved fruitless, I backed up my important data, reformatted the drive and reinstalled Windows.

Now I have a lot of space free on this computer, and it's working just fine. I haven't had to do a spring cleaning like this in a while, but it's almost always cathartic.

Oh, and I played a little more Lego Batman. But work calls, so it's back to the rat race tomorrow.

It's like distilling poo

My friends often ask me after long drunken-sounding tirades, "Sparkman, why do you have such a hate-on for Batman and Robin?" The movie, not the characters.

Really, it's hard to point to just one thing. I spent much of Batman Forever defending its cheesiness to my friend Meredith. And let's face it; there was some asstacular content in that flick.

But the point at which I had to physically restrain myself from leaving the theater was when George Clooney whipped out the Bat Credit Card and said "Don't leave the cave without it."

If you want to experience the pain without sitting through the whole movie, check out this video, which I saw over at Topless Robot.

Why was I envious?

When I was in elementary school, I envied my friend Adam because he was an only child. Not so much because he didn't have a little brother to deal with, although there were some days...

No, I envied him because, as an only child, he tended to get the cooler toys. Like all three colors of Magic Sand, which we combined and somehow thought we could use coffee filters to return each color back to their rightful bottles. Or like the castle Lego set, or the Ewok Village playset, etc.

One of the games he had was a handheld Pac-Man clone called Epoch Man, which, not surprisingly, was made by Epoch. I remember being a little jealous because while I as playing Mattel's Electronic Football, he had this gem.

In retrospect, I had the better game, but I was young and didn't know any better.

Leggo my Lego Batman!

At the request of my son, we exchanged some old games we never play for the new Lego Batman, which he's been jonesing for since he saw the preview on Lego Indiana Jones.

I haven't finished it just yet, but it's pretty fun, just like the other Lego games. Okay, enough writing. Gotham City needs me.

"I'm good for about twice a year."

My friend Karyne shared this with me the other day, and I just had to share with you. It has some NSFW language, so use your headphones.

And I'd hold off on watching this if you're planning on eating chocolate pudding any time soon. Watch it before it disappears.

Hug a copy editor today

Most of the time, you don't notice copy editors. A lot of people don't know what they even do. But I assure you, they're important. Not only do they try to keep all the L's in reference to Public Storage, but they also are responsible for finessing the copy; making it the best it can be.

And they have to do it in such a way that it doesn't look obvious to the reader (or to the writer). It's not a glorious job; that is to say, there's not a lot of attention paid to what they do.

So, given that I am both a copy editor and an incredible affection whore, I created a group on Facebook for copy editors and fans of copy editors. It's called Hug a Copy Editor. Like many Facebook groups, it's fairly pointless but fun to participate in anyway, so check it out.

As of this post, we've already got more than 30 members, and there's a burningly important question on the poll, as well as some copy-editing-related pictures.

Author, author

I've now been to two book signings. The last one was quite a while ago, when I saw Beverly Cleary. Today on my lunch break, I saw Brad Meltzer, whose latest book is Book of Lies. I held off buying it till today, just for the signing.

He talked about the book for a little bit and answered a few questions from the audience before getting to the actual signing. He seems like a cool cat; very mellow and self-deprecating. We talked for a little bit while he was signing my book, and I mentioned that it was nice to meet him in person, as we'd traded e-mails a few times.

"Oh, what's your e-mail address?"

I told him.

"Oh, you're Sparkman! Yeah, we e-mailed each other just a week or so ago."

So that was pretty cool. Plus, he's a Superman nerd like me, so we have that in common.

I haven't finished the book yet--I only got through 125 pages on the train ride home--but I'm digging it so far. Again, here's a little bit about the book. Check it out.

More reasons why Natalie Dee rawks

I mean, really, how can you not love Natalie Dee?


nataliedee.com

Seriously. Love.

Wharrgarbl.

 

This never fails to cheer me up. I offer it to you on the off chance you need a little cheer.

Head over heels for the Monkees

OK, so now Brody and I are working our way through various episodes of The Monkees. I'm working up to my favorite episode as a kid, "Monkees Get Out More Dirt," which guest-starred Julie Newmar.

I don't know how many of my fellow 5-year-olds back then developed a crush on her because of the one-two punch of this episode and various turns as Catwoman on Batman, but it sure worked on me.

And in other Monkees items, I found this while poking around on the Intarwebs. It's the Monkees' feature film Head. While it has gained a cult following, I can only imagine the puzzled looks from the young girls who loved the group when they saw this for the first time. It's odd, but it's got some cool tunes in it.

As for the movie's title, I heard a story (apocryphal, I assume)that it was named Head with thoughts of a possible sequel in mind so they could use the immortal tagline, "From the producers who gave you..."

You know, I think you can just do the math on this one for yourself. Enjoy.

If only it were always this easy...

"Hey Dad," my son said.

"What?"

"I wanna play the Indiana Jones game."

"This one?" I pointed to the PlayStation 2.

"Yeah."

I don't know why he wanted to, but I wasn't about to say no. Keep in mind that when he plays Lego Indiana Jones, that actually means I play it while he watches and provides a running commentary.

"That's Indiannie Jones!"

"You found a treasure chest!"

"You broked the man!"

And even more amazingly, he fell asleep watching. I think he just wanted to unwind, but it was fun for us to share the time. Even though he didn't have a controller in hand, he was telling me the story, so in a way, he was playing, too.

And he already told me that we have to get Lego Batman.

Soon. Very soon.

Hopefully he won't hold it against me

This morning I shared a show from my childhood with my son. I hadn't seen an actual episode since I was a kid, and it had aged even worse than I'd anticipated.

He seemed to like it okay, but he wasn't asking to watch more episodes, if you know what I mean. See what you think:


Online Videos by Veoh.com

Ace of Base rawks your face!

It's Friday, and the air is just right for having a good time. What better way to kick off your Friday night festivities than by enjoying a rendition of a popular song from the 1990s?

Arrrr.

I decided to be a day early in celebrating "Talk Like a Pirate Day" and said "Arrrrrrrrrr" for a really long time. I'm feeling better now, but while I recuperate, check out this creepy-ass toy.

The hole truth

The folks over at Nature.com have an interesting story about the history of the anus.

Yeah. You read that correctly.

I thought this was the most interesting part:

"So he and others have suggested that over time, the mouth elongated and then separated into a mouth and anus. Once the body included a gut with two ends, the anus could migrate to the far end of animal."

So now, I think, we have an explanation for the phrases "talking out of your ass" and "You know about real life like my ass chews bubblegum."

And while this article explains the origin of the anus, it still doesn't explain how so many of them end up in front of me on the freeway.

(via Monkeyfilter)

Isn't technology grand? If yes, go to Page 37.

My buddy Ken passed this along to me today, and I just thought it was slicker than snot on a doorknob.

All you fellow old people who have fond memories of Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books will at the very least grin when you see this.

Yoicks and away!

I have some stuff to do, so in lieu of actual content, here is one of my (and my son's) favorite cartoons: Robin Hood Daffy.

Evil...like it's the fru-its of the dev-il

Somehow despite being a nerd of the highest order (we were first online with Q-Link, for crap's sake), I had not yet made my way into the wonderful world of MMORPGs.

How did this happen?

Well, I'm just about as socially inept in cyberspace as I am in meatspace. I'm getting better, though; building up eptness, I guess you could say.

Anyhow, I broke down and decided to try City of Villains, partly because if I was going to try an MMORPG, it would involve superheroes and supervillains, and partly because I found it at Big Lots for only $6.99 (with the first month free).

What can I say? I'm socially inept and cheap.

I've just barely started, but I'm kinda digging it so far. I tried not to spend too long creating my first villain, because I didn't want it to be like playing The Sims, where I'd spend so much time designing the house and furnishing it that when it came time to actually play, I was over it.

My villain has mostly electrical-based powers. I thought I had the perfect name: Sparkman. Alas, it was taken. As was damn near every vaguely electricity-related name I could think of in the span of a few minutes.

I eventually ended up calling him Con Edison.

Hey, at least it wasn't already taken.

You Goonie!

I went with friends to a showing of The Goonies out in Modesto. It was the first time I'd ever seen it on the big screen, so it was kinda cool. Plus, hey, it's The Goonies, so it was cool anyway.

Something I hadn't really thought of before that I noticed this time was how many times you see up Andy's skirt throughout the movie. I mean, I know I noticed when I was an adolescent, but still.

Not a complaint, mind you; just an observation.

As a bonus, here's a YouTube vid of the excised octopus scene:

Friday night video time

One thing I liked about vacations when I was a kid: different city = different TV offerings.

When visiting relatives once in Southern California, I scoured the TV Guide to see what different shows they had. We were leaving in an hour, and it was the first chance I had to check out the prime cartoon time.

I saw the listing for the Fantastic Four cartoon (the first one, not the one with the robot). At the time, I hadn't seen the show in ages. My favorite episode wasthe one that told the team's origin.

I turned the TV to the right channel and waited for the show to come back from the commercial. And then this came on. I felt like Babe Ruth calling a home run.

FIlling a programming hole

Japanese game shows are made of pure awesome. So I was curious to see how well this translated over here. You decide.





Me, I'd be curious to see if "Silent Library" would be as cool as the original.

Crossword puzzling

I picked up The Biggest Book of TV Guide Crossword Puzzles Ever recently, and while doing a puzzle yesterday, I had the distinct impression that I'd done it before.

Sure enough, I had. For this blog, no less.

But I noticed something weird. The clue for 31 down in the old TV Guide I had was "Adjective for Cher." The answer was "exotic."

In the reprinted version, the clue is "Possible adjective for Indian food."

I doubt many people aside from me would catch such a thing, but why did they make the change?

The wartful dodger

Wow, you just don't see advertisement for wart removers like this anymore (from 'Teen, Sept. 1972):



This ad is just begging for remixing with new dialogue...

Happy birthday, Star Trek

The first episode of Star Trek debuted on this date back in 1966, a full 8 years before my birth.

I know, I'm as amazed as you that the world existed before me.

So to honor the anniversary of one of my favorite shows, and because I played game on my Nintendo DS way too long since the kids went to sleep early, I'm rounding up some Star Trek-themed posts that have appeared here.

Remember, if you haven't read them, they're new to you:

I refuse to believe in the no-win scenario and end up buying a collectible book for a pittance.

Not only am I overlooked to participate in the Star Trek Experience at Universal Studios, but it gets worse.

Remembering James "Scotty" Doohan.

Go, Fish!

You know, not only was Barney Miller a funny show, but damn if the theme song didn't have one of the coolest bass lines on TV.



And Abe Vigoda is still not dead. Go, Abe!

A cross (stitch) to bear

As part of my biggest nerd credentials, I showed off a Super Mario Brothers cross-stitch picture I made for my friend Karyne.

But if you want nerdy, we'll have to go back a little farther to when I was about 8. Having been dragged to stitchery store after stitchery store, I noticed that there were no cross-stitch patterns with a superhero theme.

Clearly this was unacceptable to me, so I decided to do something about it. I begged some graph paper from my mom, sharpened my pencil and set to work.

I wasn't going to draw any actual figures; that wouldn't translate to the blocky cross stitch style very well. But the superhero logos would do just nicely.

I knew Superman would be the focus of the picture, since as we all know, I have been and always shall be a Superman freak. I just drew smaller logos from other heroes around it.

With a little help from my mom on the outline backstitching, it wasn't too long before I had finished it:


Keeping in mind that I was 8 when I designed this, it's not too bad, I suppose. Clockwise from the top, it's Green Lantern, Aquaman (my redesign, as I considered the other one boring), Wonder Woman, Batman, Flash, Robin, and of course, Superman in the middle.

It's a little uneven in a few places (Batman, particularly), and my redesign of the Aquaman logo--if you mirrored it, it looked vaguely like a squid--still doesn't do anything for me. And the "P" in the text doesn't quite match the rest of the letters.

It's a little dirty now; apparently being kept in a box in the garage all these years wasn't quite the archival system I should have used.

But I still like it, just for the sheer nerd love it represents. Like it wouldn't have been nerdy enough to draw that; no, I had to sketch it on graph paper and then stitch it up.

And the chicks loved it.

Oh, wait. Never mind.

Joker...joker...underwater basket-weaving

It's another hair-raising Friday night here, so that means I've combed through YouTube to find something that really shines.

And how much cooler can you get than the first episode of The Joker's Wild?









My thanks, as always, to the awesome people who take the time to share this content. My hat's off to you.

Taco...grande!

I had a big post all ready to go, but then I went to pick up a few things at the store and discovered that Frito-Lay has brought back taco-flavored Doritos.

So I'm rockin' out to a late-night snack. I promise, actual content tomorrow.

In fact, I never understand these things I feel

Dammit.

I've wanted to go to visit North Carolina for a number of years now, but in this particular case, I'd give my left nut to be in Chapel Hill on September 18.

Why?

Because for the first time in 10 years--for a one-time-only show--Ben Folds Five is performing. Specifically, they're playing The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner in it entirety.

It's the inaugural concert in a new series from MySpace, believe it or not, called Front to Back, in which artists play an important album of theirs from beginning to end.

I miss Ben Folds Five. A lot. Even now, when I see people talk about their BFF, I have to stop for a second and remind myself that it stands for Best Friend Forever.

Alas, short of me winning the lottery, it seems unlikely that I'm going to be able to fly across the country to catch the show.

So I will crank up my CDs and sulk at home, I guess. Bah.

Ben Folds Five

Look, up in the sky...

Sometimes it seems like there's a book that was written just for me. And while we haven't met, it seems that Brad Meltzer had me in mind with his new novel, which is in stores now, The Book of Lies. What makes me say so? Here's the blurb:

In 1932, Mitchell Siegel was killed by three gunshots to his chest. While mourning, his son dreamed of a bulletproof man and created the world's greatest hero: Superman. And like Cain's murder weapon, the gun used in this unsolved murder has never been found. Until now.

Here's the trailer:



And if you haven't read any of Brad Meltzer's books or comics, here's a brief video that might help you decide:



I'm going to check it out, just based on his previous novels, which I enjoyed. Well, that and the fact that it involves Superman in some capacity. I'm a sucker that way because Superman is important to me.

Yeah, I know people think Superman is corny; that he's a big blue Boy Scout, but to me, especially growing up, he was my hero. I went into more detail in this post. He became even more important to me when my son Harry died at 7 weeks old. On top of everything else Harry had to deal with, he also had what, the doctors informed us, is sometimes called "Superman Syndrome."

So now it might make a little more sense why tonight I'm deviating from the normal retro-themed pop-culture-obsessed blather. There's this project that just kinda hit me in the right way, not just because of its first goal, but because of its mission. It's, well, let me give Mr. Meltzer the floor briefly.



In addition to the launch of OrdinaryPeopleChangeTheWorld.com, today is the official launch of The Siegel & Shuster Society, with a celebrity charity auction that'll raise money to preserve the home of Jerry Siegel, creator of Superman, along with artist Joe Shuster.

The items up for bids are about eight different kinds of awesome, but if it's not your deal, you can buy a Siegel & Shuster Society T-shirt (designed by the legendary graphic designer Chip Kidd), or you can just make a flat donation to the cause. All proceeds of the auction go to the restoration of the Siegel house.

It would be amazing if someday, I could take my kids and show them the spot where Superman was created. And even barring that, just to show them evidence that indeed, ordinary people can and do change the world.

I'm cynical and pessimistic as a rule, but there's a part of me that embraces the optimism and good will inherent in humanity. That's the part of me that will always like Superman, who does all the great things he does, not because he should, but because he can; he just wants to help.

If you want to help, then by all means, go to www.OrdinaryPeopleChangeTheWorld.com, and you can get even more detailed information.

Ridin' the rolly coaster!

What was the first roller coaster you rode? Do you remember?

I was 10 (a late bloomer in my opinion, but I was a short kid), and my parents took my brother and me on a trip to Great America, which at the time, had recently changed from Marriott's Great America to just plain old Great America.

Now I wish I'd have been able to compare that 1985 version to the classic version of my early youth, but since, as I said, I couldn't ride much of anything, everything was fairly new to me, except for The Demon, which I decided I would ride as soon as I was able.

But The Demon wasn't my first coaster. My first coaster was The Whizzer, formerly Willard's Whizzer. It was a fairly pedestrian family coaster with a spiral lift and some nice twists and turns.

I'd have to say that it was the perfect coaster for me to start with; not too scary, not too boring. From there, I went on The Demon and anything else I could legally get on.

Here's a video of The Whizzer at Great America's former sister park in Gurnee, Illinois:



I've been thinking about theme parks, and old-school Great America in particular because I've been writing a story in which a theme park plays a role. But in my not-even-humble opinion, Great America hasn't been a true theme park for years now. Now it's just an amusement park.

Oh sure, there are some great rides, but there was something cool about how you knew where you were based on the names of the rides or the style of decor. I mean, some of the names were cheesy as hell, but at least there was a theme, you know?

Now, it's California's Great America, which to me, sounds a bit odd, but they've got some new stuff planned, and it would be awesome if there was some effort made at some actual theming for the rides since they have to change the names anyway now that they aren't a Paramount park.

What particularly frosts my Popsicle is that my two favorite rides were Loggers Run and Yankee Clipper, only one of which still stands. Back in the day, the rides were like conjoined twins; at a few points, the tracks were close enough to see the other riders. In one spot, you were close enough to fling water at them if you happened to bring a cup with you.

But Yankee Clipper departed this plane a year before Joe DiMaggio so they could put in Stealth, the "flying" roller coaster. Don't get me wrong, Stealth was a cool ride--though my already long wait in line was made longer to rig a camera for some chucklehead from 98 Degrees to get pics taken for Tiger Beat or somesuch and they made me take my glasses off, so I saw a whole crapton of blurry nothing--but after only a few years, they took it out and moved it to another park. My Yankee Clipper had died in vain!

I know, I should just chill. Loggers Run is still there, I know.

But my brother and I had our own little name for the Yankee Clipper; one that I'm not at liberty to divulge, but should I finish and publish this novel I'm working on, you will discover. We had alternate names for most of the rides, as we had a lot of time on our hands with season passes in the summer of 1994. And we were dorks.

Good thing I grew out of that.

"If we'd have known you was comin', we'd have baked a cake."

To get you prepared for Labor Day hijinks, here's one of my favorite Three Stooges shorts, Cash and Carry.



There are a lot of little moments in this one that just kill me.

Math is for eggheads!

Every now and then I share stuff with my son that I enjoyed a lot when I was a kid. His newest favorite is Donald in Mathmagic Land. I remember seeing this in school fairly early in my scholastic career--it was on a film reel rather than a videotape.

He's quoting it already, which is very cute. His favorite parts are the billiards demonstration and the "doors of the future."

Check it out for yourself.

Today is canceled due to illness.

Nothing like a little food poisoning to kick off a three-day weekend. Hopefully I'll be over it soon. Blech.

Once you've had extra-crispy...

Saw this on Topless Robot, and it was too good to pass up.



Really? This got signed off without anybody thinking it was a trifle peculiar to have an action figure set where the characters are facing imminent death? Maybe they just thought, yeah, it's creepy, but at least it's not this:

Exercises in frustration

OK, so back in the day, I played craptons of games on my Commodore 64. One that used to just drive me nuts was Aliens.

I eventually got decent at it, but it took forever and a day to get past the first level, which was the spaceship re-entry procedure. You had to maneuver through a series of rings that, I assume, represented the safest trajectory for your ship through atmospheric re-entry.

At first it seems pretty easy, but once you run into turbulence, the rings are farther apart, and more scattered. Miss a ring, and you're pretty much screwed because you'll have to start over from the beginning.



This particular gameplay "feature" would come back to bite me in the ass with Superman 64, a game that I actually asked for. On purpose.

How bad is it? Ask the Angry Video Game Nerd. He pretty much says it all. But if you doubt his opinion, try looking up "Superman 64 sucks" on Google.

There's always room for cello

When I was in fourth grade, we had a music assembly in the multipurpose room. It was their annual orchestra recruitment assembly where they'd tell us that we could have fun in the orchestra, bla bla bla.

Naturally, piano wasn't one of the options (I played a mean electronic organ at home), so I wasn't paying that much attention. For some reason, fourth-graders could only play stringed instruments such as the violin.

They gave us a demonstration of the various instruments, and still, I wasn't interested.

Until the guy with the cello showed up.

I was intrigued by the fact that, unlike most of the other instruments, to play the cello meant you got to sit down.

Hey, I'm lazy.

But what really sold me was when he started playing the theme to Star Wars on it. How badass was that? I'd be the life of the party in no time.

Now there were a few obstacles in my way here. The instruments, I'd heard from friends, were very expensive, and being a total klutz, I knew there was no way I could convince my parents to buy me a cello outright.

Oh, and there was the small matter of me never having played the cello or any other stringed instrument, unless you counted the Mousegetar I had when I was 4.

There was essentially one way for me to be able to play cello in the orchestra. There was a district-wide music test that would be given in all the schools, and the top students would be allowed to use the district-owned instruments.

And out of all the students interested, only two in our school would get the cellos. So the odds weren't exactly in my favor.

The day of the test came, and we musical wannabes filed into the multipurpose room and did our best.

As it ended up, the two students who got the district's cellos were my friend Erin and me. Don't ask me how I was a top scorer. To this day, I have no idea.

And while I never learned how to play Star Wars (apparently you can't just start with that; who knew?), I was still excited to play in a school recital.

How excited?



Yep. About that excited. How I ever ended up getting married is beyond me.

Stupid Internet. Bah!

As I spent most of the night trying to revive my Internet connection, I'm fresh out of time to regale you with a pointless tale from yesteryear.

But I don't want you to go away empty-handed, so here, providing just about the same level of maturity, is an episode of Jackass.

Let's be careful out there

With school starting for the youngsters, I thought it might be a good idea to review some basic rules of bicycle safety.

Since I fell off my bike almost every time I rode, I thought maybe I should leave the safety tips to someone else more qualified.

Like YouTube.

Actually going out somewhere

No big blogging for me. This is where I'll be:

Using my great brain

I'm sure I've mentioned it before, but one of my favorite book series as a kid was John D. Fitzgerald's The Great Brain books.

I read all the books a billion times, but as a kid I chanced upon an old paperback version that read something like "Soon to be a major motion picture starring Jimmy Osmond!"

In all the years since then, I've still never come across that movie. I'm sure somehow, someday, I'll track it down, but for now I'll have to settle for a clip on YouTube of Jimmy performing the theme to the movie.

This is the first time I've heard the song, and wouldn't you know it, the damn thing is stuck in my head already.

I'd love to see even a TV movie of these books made in the future.

Blinded with science

Staying abreast of the latest gadgets

I've said before that when it comes to products, names are very important. Some products sound like all of 30 seconds was used to come up with the name (Head-On, Active-On, etc.). But sometimes a clever or funny name gets the customer halfway to buying without even looking at the product.

Case in point.



What more can you say abou tit?

There should be a version for guys that's like a bird instead of a bear. You'd get the pirate market for sure. You could call it the Parateat.


I look forward to seeing the Great Balls of Fire Refrigerated Athletic Supporter. I mean, come on...where do you go from the Tiddy Bear? Geen-frickin-ius.

A work of genius

Found a blog today written by a certifiable genius. I can't put my finger on why he's so awesome, but I just had to share.

Now *that* is a memorable obituary

During my tenure as a newspaper copy editor, one of my many duties was to write the obituaries. Our paper, as a community service, printed obits for free. If the family wanted, they could also buy an ad, in which they could write all the flowery prose they wanted.

I mention this because our free obits were written pretty straight--you know, like a news story. This doesn't seem too difficult until you realize that sometimes deciphering what came in on the obit form was like translating stereo instructions into Aramaic. In the dark. With off-brand crayons that didn't so much write as they did crumble and smear in more or less of a line.

One of the first obits I had to write was for one of my teachers in junior high school. That was kind of a bummer. The last obit I wrote was after my newspaper days, for my son, Harry, and it was the hardest thing I've ever written. But remembering how things would come in from funeral homes, I wasn't about to take any chances.

As I said, we had a straight news format for our obituaries, and it was not uncommon to get calls after they ran, admonishing us for not phrasing it exactly how it was on the form. In news obits, generally speaking, people die. They don't pass on, pass away, or as one form put it, "jumped into the arms of Jesus."

I took great care in writing the obituaries, though, as you can imagine, it was a hell of a way to start the day. I had to call the local mortuaries every day to see if I should be hovering around the fax machine for anything.

"Hi, this is Jeff. Just checking to see if you had anything today."

"Nope, none today."

"I guess everyone felt like living today."

"Looks like it. Talk to you tomorrow."

Yes, it's true. You can't deal with these day after day without developing a bit of gallows humor. Not to the families, of course.

In fact, I tried not to bother them unless absolutely necessary. They had enough to deal with, and part of the cost of funeral service is going over next of kin with the funeral director so you didn't have to talk to some schlub from the newspaper.

That said, after being burned enough times by less-than-stellar transcription from our sources, we ended up calling the families more often than not.

It's awkward talking to the bereaved anyway. Especially if you're a stranger. And extra especially if you are uncomfortable talking on the phone to the point that you don't even order pizza.

But we had a duty to double-check any names that were spelled out of the ordinary, confirm any discrepancies in service times, that kind of thing.

I was talking to the son of someone who'd died, and I was trying to verify the time of the Mass, as it was on there both ways.

That's another thing you learn. Depending on religion, the deceased could have a Mass of Christian Burial, services, Trisagion services, or remembrance.

Every time I asked about the Mass (as it was written on the form), he'd tell me the service was at 2 p.m. Usually, the Mass would be early in the morning, and that's why I was asking. Eventually we got to the salient point:

"No, I don't under--it's just a service. My dad wasn't even Catholic."

This also meant that the service was not, in fact, going to be at the local Catholic church.

Reading the forms was often like reading a really interesting story, or part of one. The universal thread in every obit I wrote was that the person who died would be missed by their family. Not once did I come across one that was "Mr. X was a right bastard, and in lieu of flowers, attendees are asked to line up early to urinate on the gravesite."

This obit, which I found on Fark.com, comes pretty damned close, though. As the original obit link disappeared, they've pasted the text of the obit in the discussion thread.

Ouch.

OK, there's *not* always room for Jell-O

At least, there's no room if it's something like this:



Dear God, this makes head cheese look appetizing by comparison. I may have posted this before, but this really deserves another look because you should avoid this at all costs.

Public service announcement

Saw this today, and it struck me as important enough to share with all of you, especially if you, like me, are a fan of The Office.

Won't you think of Jenna?

Friday night freakout

I stumbled across this today. Back in the early days of VCRs, we must have rented every Disney title on the market. Not just The Parent Trap or Alice in Wonderland. I'm talking Snowball Express, Condorman, and The Black Hole.

This movie weirded me out a little as a kid; it was awfully dark for a Disney movie (aside from the black hole, which for some reason was red). And I was fine throughout the bulk of the movie, but it was the ending that got me. I could never tell exactly what was going on.

Even now, I'm a little fuzzy on what is happening. You watch the ending here, and you tell me what happened. The bad guy goes to hell, but the good guys in the spaceship are led by an angel through Heaven and out into open space?

Ad fail?

I giggled when I saw ads for the DC Superheroes cartoons while perusing Marvel.com.

It's a small world, after all

So what with all the various social networks around, there are a lot of ways to contact me. The most popular one is Facebook, where people I didn't know even remembered me are getting back in touch. For a social pariah, this gives you a warm fuzzy.

I decided to jot down the ones I could think of off my head, and this is what I came up with:

Become a fan on
Facebook

Become a follower on
Twitter
Plurk

Become a friend on
MySpace
Facebook

See what weird crap I listen to
Last.fm
In the interest of disclosure, I should point out that the Richard Marx song that is in the playlist played while I was away from my desk. So when you see that, it was just a pee break.

Now I marvel at some of my co-workers, who have legions of fans and followers, and I wonder how much time they're able to devote to sifting through all that stuff.

Fortunately, this is not something I am currently burdened with. But hope springs eternal, right?

Sometimes you just need a musical number

First day of school

I was happy to see my son looking forward to attending his first day of kindergarten. He's really jazzed about going to school, and I'd like that sentiment to last as long as possible.

If you check the picture below, you can see that he has inherited my inability to keep my eyes open for pictures. Apparently plaid is also hereditary; who knew?

Another successful hunt

Hit a few local thrift stores today, and not only did I come away with an armload of books, but I managed to snag -- for $2.99 -- a working, in-the-box and Styrofoam Bandai Electronics Gunfighter game.

I love old-school handheld electronic games, but not enough to spend exhorbitant sums of money on them. This price was more my speed.

Here's a video I found on YouTube that gives you an idea of what it's like:

We are currently experiencing technical difficulties

Translation: Something got boned on my computer and I have to fix it. Meh. Will be back as soon as I exorcise the demons.

What's invisible and smells like carrots?

Long day + happy hour after work + tired = another YouTube clip. But hey, it has a bunny rabbit!

Why my son sometimes calls me Dave

My son had finished watching the Alvin and the Chipmunks movie when I had an idea.

"Hey, Brody," I said as I rummaged through the bin of records in the living room, "Check this out." I pulled Chipmunk Punk out and showed it to him. His face lit up as he recognized Alvin, Simon and Theodore on the cover.

We listened to that and then Chipmunk Rock following that. He sat mesmerized, listening to the whole thing. He studied both album covers.

He pointed at Chipmunk Punk and told me, "Those are the old-school Chipmunks." I had to ask him to repeat that because I wasn't sure that I heard him right.

But I had. He seems to prefer the old-school Chipmunk design, apparently.

He can also be heard running around the house singing "I Love Rock N' Roll" in his best chipmunk voice from time to time. It's weird how much like me he is. Kinda scary when I think about it.

For him.

Does this creep anyone else out?

For some reason the addition of a baby to the cast of the Plastic Man cartoon creeped me out as a kid. I mean, look at Baby Plas.

Random thought before bed

A year ago tonight, I was a little nervous. My daughter was to be born the next day, and I had no idea how things were going to transpire.

But a year later, I can honestly say that I couldn't be happier about our addition to the family. Unless, you know, she came out with bundles of money or a PS3 or something.

Or a Slurpee machine. But that might have hurt.

Get the point?

Having just watched the Indiana Jones trilogy the past few nights, I noticed something and thought, well if I noticed it, and I'm pretty slow, someone else surely noticed it as well.

Someone did, but the page has since gone. But since we're dealing with an archaeologist, I thought it fitting that I use the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine to resurrect it.

Warning: This may distract you the next time you watch a Harrison Ford movie. If you don't mind, then by all means, check out the finger gallery.

Let them eat cake

The birthday girl (technically not till this week) enjoyed her party as far as I can tell. She was very smiley. This picture was just a few minutes before she got a bath.

I'm still freaking out. My son will start kindergarten in another week or so and my daughter is already a year old. Where does the time go?

Hurrrrk.

Now I have to be honest: my grandmother used to work for Golden Grain, so I'll always have a special place in my heart for the company's products. I could eat a box of chicken Rice-A-Roni all by myself.

But this one...I just...I dunno.

Get back, Chococat

My house is slowly turning into a Sanrio store. Hello Kitty's visage is emblazoned on many a decoration hanging up.

We're getting ready for Ramona's first birthday party. Yeah, I can't believe she's 1 already, either.

I'm looking forward to seeing what she does to her cake. Fortunately, we got a deal where if you buy a first birthday cake, they give you a stunt cake for free. That's the small one you give to the kid while everyone else eats the main cake.

There's a joke in there about having cake and eating it, too, but I'm just too tired to bother. Let's just pretend I did, okay?

I'm so jealous of this hairstyle.

I always had a hard time explaining exactly what I wanted when I got my hair cut. I saw this picture, and I wondered, wow...how do you ask for that?

Yeah, it's like if Iron Man modeled his helmet after Wilford Brimley?

Oh, brother

I think I know what I'm going to work on in this writing workshop. And since I can't bring all of you with me, I figured I'd give a brief synopsis.

Two brothers (fraternal twins) decide to go on a road trip in California to get out of their respective ruts. As with many brothers, they're very much alike but very different at the same time.

How far into their journey will they get before they want to kill each other?

My kingdom for a time machine

Seeing this makes me want to go back in time and stay up late:

Group therapy

Well, for the first time in ages, I'm part of a writing group. I'm pretty jazzed about it because we all write different types of stuff, so it will be interesting to see different voices and points of view.

I will always have a love for creative writing classes, though it would take a while for there to be a good reason for it.

When I was in my first creative writing class in the first semester of junior college, I was not exactly inspired by some of the feedback.

I wrote a story about, of all things, a guy going to his 20th high school reunion. Keep in mind that I had only graduated high school a few months prior; heck, I was still 17.

While much of the feedback was positive, the one that sticks out is someone who was in the class to write Literature, and anything that didn't have a deeper meaning was a waste of her time.

Which, I should add, is perfectly fine. Different strokes for different folks, right? However, you can be more diplomatic about your disdain for humor-based pieces.

"The part at the end with the phone call was funny, but the rest was crap unbelievable."

This, by the way, was criticism from someone in her early 30s directed at a 17-year-old. I shouldn't have let it bother me, but it soured me so much that for the remainder of the class, I just used stories I'd already written.

It wasn't until the next year that I took another writing class, this time with a different instructor. While not entirely enthusiastic about my writing--the thing that stuck out to her was that it appeared to be meticulously proofread--the class was inviting enough for me to actually want to share my writing.

At the end of the semester, we could, for extra credit, compile a list of 10 markets to which we could theoretically send our work and choose one to actually submit a piece to.

I just did it for the extra credit and promptly forgot about it. But August rolled around and I got a manila envelope in the mail. Inside was a magazine, a letter of congratulations, and a check for $10.

I fully expected to get the first of many rejection letters. Instead, I got published on my first submission. Score!

So I rested on my laurels until a creative writing class at CSU Stanislaus. The instructor and I didn't agree on very much, but I met a cute brunette in that class, so in the long run, it was time well-spent. I think so, anyway. My wife may disagree.

I was getting prolific again at that point, and it seemed like I was churning out almost as much stuff as I was in high school.

But one thing pissed me off, and as typically happens with people like me, I focused all my energies on something that didn't warrant the attention.

I had turned in the first draft of a story in which there's a mention of how one of the characters loves the breadsticks at a certain restaurant. I wrote that shortly after gorging myself on breadsticks at Olive Garden.

The corrected version of my draft came back from my teacher, and he had crossed out breadsticks and written "garlic bread?" I meant what I wrote, and left it as such in the final draft.

Sure enough, he "corrected" me again.

So in the next story, I included a page-long conversation between two characters about the difference between garlic bread and breadsticks.

In retrospect, I think I may have crossed the line a teensy bit with one character asking the other in exasperation, "How the hell can you have lived on this planet for this long without knowing what a friggin' breadstick is?"

The only comment from the instructor was "This is not amusing."

How quaint.

It's funny to see an ad for a video game system that basically has to explain what it is, but that's just how it was in the dark ages of 1978.

I didn't get my Atari 2600 until a few years after this ad; I was only 4, after all. And yes, we had a black-and-white TV (in my parents' room). Do they even make those anymore?

And while technically true, claiming over 1,300 variations is a bit misleading, don't you think? It's not like all those different levels were completely different games.

Admittedly, the Pong version of Combat was my favorite because no matter where my brother positioned his tank, I'd always ricochet a shot and nail him. How many people played the invisible version of Combat? Yeah, that's what I thought.

Because Spanky was already taken, I guess

You gotta love some of the old-school He-Man figures.

Hey, this guy has a groovy beard, a giant armored hand and wears a Speedo to battle. Let's call him ... Fisto!

Yeah, nobody could take that the wrong way...

Great moments in cinema

As a Friday night treat, here is my favorite part of the blaxpoitation epic, Black Belt Jones.

If you're watching this at work or in front of the kids, this was rated R, so be warned.



Here's the trailer:

One of the best things about TV Guide

I recently nabbed a 1984 Fall Preview TV Guide off of eBay, and I noticed that the infamous Turbo Teen premiered that week. I scanned the page so you wouldn't think I was making this up:



"Debut: Teen-ager Bret Matthews turns into a turbocharged racer whenever his temperature rises."

How many times did they have to try to summarize this without sounding like they were on drugs? By using the phrase "turbocharged racer," one could think that he was able to run really fast instead of turning into a friggin' car.

For some reason, ABC debuted its fall offerings this week, while CBS and NBC waited until the following week, hence the teaser ad for The Snorks also on this page.

Even when we were kids, we recognized The Snorks as a shameless ripoff of The Smurfs. Sure, they came in different colors and had phalluses on their heads (yeah, I know they were supposed to be snorkels, but come on), but still, we knew this was weak sauce.

Of course, we all thought Turbo Teen was badass, so maybe we weren't the best arbiters of quality programming...

Just one of those days...

The answers revealed!

So how did you do on the crossword? Too hard? Too easy? Too pointless?