Today in Extraordinarily Odd




With the memory of Virginia Tech still fresh, the inevitable paranoid hysteria and over reaction to nuance is about due and to kick it off, Cary Grove high school student Allen Lee was just arrested for writing a graphic and disturbing essay and he was also dropped from the Military. With the recruitment standards slipping to pathetic levels – where recruiters are allowing older, less abled and insane people into the military to fight in Iraq because less sane people actually want to sign up – it seems like nothing more than a PR stunt, catering to public paranoia. The assignment given to Lee was to write an uncensored statement, essentially stream of consciousness writing which was not to be edited. He did that and the principal called the police and had him arrested. Of course, it certainly can’t be a small coincidence that not only did his statement ring hysterical alarm bells but that he’s also of Asian descent. It all looks so similar so it really must be exactly the same thing. Why exercise mature, professional, rational thought as a principal of a high school when you can drum up you 15 minutes of fame by having a student arrested for writing an essay? [source] Lee’s essay and explanation are available here.




Sleepless nights spent tossing and turning, racked with panic that your pet is stressed – just generally stressed about understandable things like the war in Iraq and the influence of the religious right on the White House, you know; the usual – are now possibly to be a thing of the past with the introduction of a tiny stick on patch, from the Japanese, which you can put on the paw of your cat or dog and it will indicate if the pet is sweating too much. This is actually great news for both pets and owners because now it’s possible to know when you should immediately pump your pet full of prozac – thus numbing the pain for them and at the same time, you get an excuse to up the amount you fret over your dog’s emotional health so you can stop thinking about the fact that you’ve been working as an executive assistant for three years and really need to make some kind of life decision. [source]




Perhaps inane, control freak Iranian lawmakers have been watching American Idol and have identified that the source of sparkling western power is centralized in one’s hair because all of a sudden, now that it’s Spring, barbers in Iran have been warned not to offer Western style haircuts or eyebrow plucking to Iranian customers. It’s all part of an effort to boost “ethical security” which, as far as causes go, is one of the most specific and important causes the Iranian government is facing and should be really taken extremely seriously. Eyebrow plucking among men, as everyone knows, induces demonic possession/womanly ways among men. [source]

Now that Rosie O’Donnell is leaving the View there’s a desperate gap on the show for someone who makes it resemble a living breathing idea with cultural relevance. After all Barbara Walters may be clinging to live by the smell of an oily rag and a viscous matron like stranglehold on the show but Rosie kept the kids talking about the show by picking fights with people who would fight back. There is, apparently, nothing more attractive to the American housewife demographic than bickering celebrities – that is after they’ve had their fill of paternity test mystery talk shows and the fear based Entertainment Tonight.

The New York Post reports, “It's going to be hard for them to follow Rosie," says an industry insider. "Roseanne could be the only one capable of pulling it off."

Roseanne is not as conniving as Rosie O’Donnell who seems to maintain a ying yang, Jeckyll and Hyde, good cop/bad cop routine remarkably well with her sparkling, kid friendly “Remember how I played Betty in that shite film remake of the Flintstones that Spielberg directed over the phone while directing Schindler’s List” smile brushed across her face as she takes the kids of family focused lesbians on cruises and all the while secretly plotting to take over the world via television with a list of her nemeses carved into her stomach with a razor blade.

No, Roseanne’s a little more overt with her motives. She still has that same agonising need for attention and spouts opinions that every now and then veer away from rational thought because she’ll get fixated with a tangent. America is used to that with Rosie. Plus, she has the added bonus of a uniquely jarring voice that has a certain punishing quality about it not to mention that white trash manner of speech where she uses incorrect grammar. But, let us not forget, that was one of the central components of George W Bush’s persona that made him identifiable to the average person so should prove to be no liability.

Plus, if they did go with Rosie, Americans would be less visually shocked than if they chose someone like Joan Rivers or Connie Chung. Roseanne Barr and Rosie O’Donnell are more or less the same size and shape so people could sit there and just block their ears, squint and pretend like nothing has changed. The rest of the woman at The View could also feasibly keep the stationary and party invites printed up which of course means that they’d save money and time too so, that's also good.
[source]

Most of the time, on American Idol Paula Abdul manages to scrape together enough of her conscious mind to put together a few comments that are at least clear even if they lack any kind of real critical edge. It becomes increasingly clear, however, that those few moments of smiling fluffy innocuousness on national television are all the coherence she can possibly muster up. Who could forget this little gem of what ended up being, thanks to the Internet, a national appearance last year?

Oh, heavens…good times, good times…


Is it too much to point out that every other time she steps out of the house she’s pepped up on so much whatever the hell it is she takes that a sentence is, apparently, out of the question?

Promoting her own jewelry line on QVC on the weekend was, it seems, no exception to the "I only stop medicating for the few hours surrounding American Idol" rule either. As with the Fox News interview above, what’s even more horrifying/enchanting than watching Paula completely fail to form specific, pre-considered thoughts and sentences, is watching the clearly traumatized host sit there and try to light heartedly brush off the drugged out freak show. But, at the end of the day, until Paula Abdul actually vomits uncontrollably, looks up at the camera, wipes the puke out of her eyes and starts screaming at person X for robbing her of a childhood/sense of hope/that last valium, people will probably still buy whatever she wants them to. No big deal.[source]

Week # 17 in Review

The White House Press Correspondent’s dinner proved that it could be as much about flash in the pan celebrity as actual White House, Press and Correspondents as attendees including Elliot Spitzer lined up to meet Sanjaya Malakar and Sheryl Crow and Laurie David managed to invoke a response to a plea for face time from Karl Rove that removed all lingering doubt that he remains fundamentally sheltered from and socially awkward when in front of regular people.

Rosie O’Donnell announced she will be leaving The View due to contract negotiation failure with ABC prompting Donald Trump to immediately announce that she was actually leaving because she was fired and also that he probably had something to do with her firing. The basis for both statements remain unsubstantiated and were considered to be more than likely the result of his desperate need for attention than anything else.

Not one person that he’s worked with in the past came forward to defend the reputation of frighteningly dark music producer Phil Specter in the murder trial he is currently involved in, photographs of Britney Spears showed to have possibly lost some of the weight she put on while not working and hammering down booze and junk food but it was later revealed that she more than likely had undergone Lippodissolve surgery in Las Vegas and any real personal couldn’t possibly be measured by how good she suddenly looked and Corey Haim and Corey Feldman announced that they will be guest advice columnists on MSN.com and will be starring in a reality TV show called The Coreys: Return of the Lost Boys.

It was rumoured that Queen Elizabeth II was planning to grant her husband, Prince Philip the title of Prince Consort on their 60th wedding anniversary, a title rarely given out by reigning monarchs to their husbands or wives, Bjork announced that the music video for her single “Innocence” from her forthcoming album “Volta” would be directed by a member of the general public who wins a competition and a phone message from Alec Baldwin to his daughter, Ireland, in which he called her a rude, ignorant pig, was released to the general public causing Baldwin to embark on a guilt assuaging appearance on The View and meetings with Dr. Phil.

Jonathan Rhys Meyers went into rehab, Richard Gere was accused of public obscenity when he kissed Bollywood star Silpa Shetty in public, a warrant was out for his arrest and pictures of him were burnt in the streets of India and it was also speculated that CNN anchor Anderson Cooper showers at the Time Warner Center’s Equinox gym in his underwear to protect against people secretly grabbing naked photos of him with their cell phones.

An old male bulldog named Riggs beat out 50 other bulldogs when he won a bulldog beauty contest in Des Moines, Iowa, it was revealed that 85% of Chinese people share one of a hundred names and that there are 88 million Chinese people with the last name of “Wang” which means “king” and cheddarvision.tv, the site which features a real time web cam of a static block of maturing cheddar cheese clocked up a million hits.

Students in Sacramento, it was officially decided, are allowed to wear t-shirts that say “Sodomy is Sin” as long as they put a piece of electrical tape over the word “Sodomy”, a disgruntled AC Milan fan put goalkeeper Dida up for sale on eBay after he failed to perform at peak level during a recent game against Manchester United and a dead man rode around on a train in Java for half a day until someone noticed him.

Because religious law forbids the role women generally play in then, Saudi Arabian tribes were readying their camels for a beauty contest, people were buying sex toys for their dogs to deal with overly sexual leg humping canines and a German man and his horse went to sleep in the foyer of a bank when the man decided he was too drunk and tired to brave the cold and the night on his journey home.

A two year old boy in Essex got his head stuck in his toilet training seat so his mother walked him down to the local fire department to get him unstuck, restaurant goers in Taipei were given the option of a hospital themed restaurant where drinks are delivered through an IV tube and a stripper in Aberdeen who dresses in the tarted up uniform of a policeman was arrested for wearing it. A teacher in India was in trouble for attempting to purify lower caste students by pouring cow urine on their heads and 40 year old office clerk named Roberta went swimming naked in Rome’s famous Trevi Fountain and was arrested for public exposure.

“The water is everyone’s,” she said. “I was hot.”

Today in Extraordinarily Odd



It would seem that police in the English town of Aberdeen need slightly more work to do because if they did then they wouldn’t have insisted on busting a stripper dressed in a police uniform for allegedly impersonating a police officer. According to pictures published by the BBC, the outfit included the word STRIPPER on the back where the word POLICE would have been, making it even less like the crime he was accused to committing. It’s nice to know that the officers went to the trouble of watching the young stripper actually do his act in its entirety before calmly taking him to the station to book him too. That’s a sign of thoroughness. [source]



A frustrated AC Milan fan decided it would be a good idea to put goalkeeper Dida up for sale on eBay after the goalkeeper didn’t perform so well in a game. What great about this is, as in, apart from the idea that you could potentially buy a person (and not just a Chinese baby this time, a real life, fully functioning adult) is imagining just how clever the clever young fan really thinks he is. It’s not entirely out of the question to suggest that the resentful emasculated fan is, in fact, the funniest, cleverest guy in the office. Everyone probably says so. [source]


A dead man rode around on a train for a half a day in Indonesia until people noticed he was actually dead. He apparently was found sitting in a locked lavatory and had just been going back and forth between the cities of Tegal and Jakarta. No specific word on the cause of death but it seems like it was either the result of his recent stroke or he crapped himself to death. Because you can do that. You can crap yourself to DEATH.[source]

We’re really at a horrifyingly exploitative and fascinating point with the Anna Nicole story. It’s pretty clear that even with a good old reliable gay rumour coming out about Larry Birkhead, no one really cares that much now that we know for sure that he’s the father. Hell, it was a real ask waiting for the results anyway because the story is so utterly lackluster that it was obvious who the father was from the moment Birkhead stepped onto the scene. Anna diaries didn’t sell for anything near what they were expected to sell for, there’s less in the actual news about it, not that many people really seem to care except Entertainment Tonight and the glossy mags like Us Weekly who seem to be covering the story out of ego, until it's truly dead in the water.

So now, with no one really that interested, and also with no real plot developments, it seems like the players are getting frustrated and are losing all sense of reality – or what little sense they had in the first place. Virgie Arthur still seems on the verge of plummeting through the earth’s crust due to her colossal size (Hey! That’s mean!) – and so, having lost most of her footing in her battle for the kid she was never going to get, she’s filed a frivolous request to make sure Larry Birkhead not be able to leave the Bahamas which was almost immediately denied by Bahamian courts. What a surprise. 98% of the kids who read TMZ.com voted she should stop doing anything at all and go home and if that’s anything to go by she’s really shooting herself in the foot by not responding to ratings.

Entertainment Tonight, on the other hand, are investing a lot more time in covering the MOVIE of the story rather than the story itself. That means we can more or less repeat the entire thing again, but with stage lighting and makeup and hypothetical interviews and more paid for exclusives. Willa Ford, the F-List actor playing Anna Nicole was quoted as saying,

"I think I understand her a lot, in the sense that you come out as a sexpot, but deep down inside you're not exactly that person,”

Oh, wow, spiritual and human authenticity! Hooray! Who knows, maybe we’ll find out a little down the line about how Ford really invested a good 3-4 years prior to this role as a truck stop ho too. Seems fairly likely if her desperate, soft core resume is any indication. The similarities might just be uncanny! Better watch ET relentlessly to find out!

ET are hammering it out that they have the exclusive footage from behind the scenes as though it’s actually just the real story – again. Hello? What the fucking hell is wrong with just about everything? This is on par with Bill O’Reilly and Rush Limbaugh posing as journalists. Oh, who are we kidding, the people watching ET with no irony ARE the people who prop up Bill O and Rush Limbaugh. [source] [source]
[source]

While dashing charismatically about the publicity circuit for his new film The Hoax, Richard “I just want to say…this is my FAVOURITE show” Gere explains that the complaints made against him were made by a tiny conservative group and that they happen all the time – because of this group – and that no one goes to jail because of these inane obscenity arrests. He also apologized for kissing Ms. Shetty in public.

Yes…indeed. Let’s, actually wait and see how this really pans out for everyone involved. According to Access Hollywood, this wouldn’t be the first time an uprising in India based on a conservative group self righteously screeching about inappropriate behaviour has benefited Ms. Shetty, the actor Gere kissed. She went on Celebrity Big Brother and fellow UK housemate Jane Goody caused outrage after saying something racy and Shetty went on to win the competition.

Conservatives seem incapable of understanding that their disapproval is really something you only dream of when you want attention. Gere is banned from China and, at least at the moment, India, and he was cheered relentlessly when he walked on the set of Jon Stewart. Well, that could be because Jon Stewart audiences are beaten into submission and fed dehydrating Kool Aid that weakens their will, not to mention the electrified seats they sit on that buzz them so they’ll roar with applause anytime a guest delivers a complete sentence, no matter what the point, with conviction. There is that to consider yes, but he’s still working and has staying power.

If Oprah owns South Africa, Madonna owns Malawi and Angelina Jolie has a diversified portfolio of mixed interests, then despite the fact that tired old Meg Ryan has a Chinese kid, she hasn’t really milked it enough so Richard Gere most certainly owns China and probably soon he’ll own India. And good on him. Paul Krugman and Tom Friedman at the New York Times have been writing about how India and China are the superpowers of tomorrow for years. Not only has Gere got staying power in movies, he’s also got global foresight. [source]

Alec Baldwin is awfully upset about this:





So much so that he’s left his management company, CAA because they represent the people who back and create the site upon which it is hosted. Is Alec Baldwin actually just having a good old fashioned Britney Spears esque meltdown? First he states he wants out of 30 Rock to concentrate on the cause of “Parental Alienation” which reads as an attempt at absolution about as clearly as Lindsay Lohan going into rehab – particularly seeing as you just know that he’s not leaving that show. Now, post appearance on The View and also, Dr. Phil – both shows with a largely middle aged woman following making it clear that he’s attempting to appeal to his female fan base (the people who have the capacity to sympathize and absolve) he is specifically gleaning maternal support. Actually, both are also TV shows too, so you know, let’s not forget that this is essentially him getting therapy selectively, in the public eye too. Leaving his management company makes it interesting though. How far will he now go to flagellate and prove that he acted out of long term emotional strain. Is it unreasonable to suggest self inflicted baldness? No, it most certainly is not, now get shearing. [source] [source]

Astoundingly, a warrant has been issued for Richard Gere and Shilpa Shetty’s arrest after they appeared on stage, kissing and hugging and rightly so. It was in FRONT of other people! How utterly impure! Thank goodness SOMEONE stepped up to the plate and started burning images of the two of them. Touche!

There’s nothing like a good old fashioned obscenity trial to really polarize and enflame everyone and to really renew a sense of rage. There’s the inevitable winning combination of self righteous religious conservatives to the bellowing about the inappropriateness of such provocative behaviour in public while going to extreme lengths to disguise their own proclivity for sexual contact with rodents and opium bender weekends. There’s total disbelief from the rest of the world that a trial like this is even vaguely viable. There’s the potential for international diplomatic intervention and the lucrative free publicity conveniently occurring in the exact week or so during which Gere’s film is released. Is there anyone that doesn’t win in this kind of situation? [source]

In an attempt to align himself with the emotionally driven housewives of the world and to drum up sympathy based support after he tore into his kid, Alec Baldwin is scheduled to appear on the View tomorrow, having taped the segment already. Sources who have read transcripts says he’s even said he would give up his clearly lucrative role in 30 Rock to spend time with the issue of parent alienation. Also, he says he really meant to yell at his ex-wife to whom he is legally denied access.

Is this the abusive parent equivalent of saying the word “faggot”or having a teenaged fan base and getting drunk in public? You scream abuse at your kid, it gets leaked to the universe, every mother in the universe hates you so you go on the View, wimper and then pledge to quit your show to spend time healing – the universe – of parental alienation issues? Firstly, genius damage control move there in quickly quarantining the purpose behind his rant as a specific thing. “Parental Alienation”. It sounds better than “Pompous, egotist, control freak, unmanaged rageaholic” and, for the most part, is stops people from speculating further than they would if he didn’t name it.

And the thing is – it seems to be working. Not only is the issue really just anecdotal at this point, people are even suggesting he take over from Rosie’s on the View. [source]

Well now, isn’t the grimly named Phil Spector turning out to be the poster boy for Any Mother’s Pride and Joy magazine? The New York Post reports today that not one person he’s worked with over the past 784 years (because he IS a vampire who will not die…isn’t he?) has raised a hand to defend him in his current murder trial.

And, systematic public denigration of everyone around him through his book aside, it’s no wonder. Even with his new haircut designed specifically to humanize him and take focus away from the fact that his hair, prior to its re-styling, clearly proved that the universe’s supply of evil actually comes from inside him and it seeps out through his skull – styling it naturally as it oozes, he still looks like the embodiment of squealing anti-social freakdom that rivals even the standards achieved by the freakishly hallowed Karl Rove. His name, people, is a couple of letter away from the word Specter. A Specter is a weird, undead thing. Think about it. [source]

Today in Extraordinarily Odd


Saudi Arabian tribes are gearing up to put their camels through the ringer and find out which is the most beautiful in the land in a camel beauty contest and it’s certainly about time. After all, religious laws state that women can’t compete so the next best thing IS a camel. Could there be anything more alluring for camel enthusiasts and laypeople alike than watching a full grown camel hobbling out on stage in a bikini, Vaseline on the teeth, innocuous general-use answer to inane question about the Third World ready and unique thigh slapping talent routine ready?

Well, there could be yes, actually. If only they had a camera backstage to capture the scene when the young camel contestant didn’t want to go out on stage because she was tired and fed up and her show mother camel, with vicious angry vicarious ambitious jealousy flashing across her tense face at the sign of reluctance in her daughter raises a be-jeweled hoof to strike her but then remembers that not even spackle can hide facial scars from the camera under those skin baking stage lights so she controls herself. Those moments are priceless and endearing. [source]

Every now and then there’s a report in the news updating the entire world about how popular this cheese webcam website (http://www.cheddarvision.tv/) is in the UK. Sometimes it appears to be a new story, other times it’s not and they’re just letting us know that yes, inexplicably, months and a million hits later, the interest in a live webcam showing a block of cheese maturing in real time is still interesting (Oooooh, hooray for ironic fascination!). And no, it’s not a web based reality TV show based on the daily life of Celine Dion (ha!). So, great…now we all know…again… that people like logging on to watch cheese mature. Thanks SO much Reuters, why don’t you write a book about it? [source]

Inner city dwelling dog owners who are sick to death of their small, chronically anxious, heart pill laced shih tzus constant attempts at breeding with the furniture can finally breathe a sigh of relief because the good folks at Feel Addicted have come out with a new product that is more or less a sex doll for animals. Thanks to a strapping young French designer (yeah, not a German…who knew?), rather than having to rapidly and energetically shriek an offer of more tea and take control of the conversation in a loud, distracting manner when guests are in the parlour and little Schnoopsy von Rape the Chair starts to actually rape… the chair, you can maintain the calm visage and simply usher the little canine nympho into the next room with the genius lifelike squishy object and close the door. Because, just like with needlessly prescribed Prozac and Christianity, there’s nothing more comforting than knowing that unsightly evidence of organic life can be controlled and effectively made innocuous with a product. Product requires regular washing. With soap. [source]

Just when we thought Britney Spears was getting back into the swing of things and burning off all that fat she put on while more or less creating foie gras out of her liver by relentless shoveling shitty food and alcohol into her gullet to numb the agony of her marriage breakdown, it’s revealed that not everything is as it seems.

Sure there are fabulous new photos of her svelte new bod that follow on from numerous emphatic gossip items placing her in Japanese restaurants eating raw fish and sipping water calmly with friends and no toxins in sight but apparently that’s all just PR fluff. If new reports are to be believed she’s either been having the unmarketable chunks of fat that remain hanging off her cut up, vacuumed out or, rather fascinatingly, through a totally dangerous procedure called Lippodisolve that involves being injected hundreds of times with a compound (probably Lecithin) designed to dissolve fat forever. Of course there's very little research that proves Lippodisolve works or is safe, but why let that stop Britney and indeed, now probably all of Middle America from paying through the nose for it. Thin is all that matters.

So, at the end of the day, it’s a brand new Britney on the outside but the same old white trash, emotionally distraught human foie gras guts within.

[source]

Today in Extraordinarily Odd


Some kid in Essex, UK apparently became far too passionate and fascinated about his own fecal matter and stuck his head too far into his toilet training seat and it got stuck. An alternate explanation, as in, apart from the 2 and a half year old is a scatological freak” one I just gave is that the mean 2 and a half year old bullies from day care actually flushed his head but he didn’t say anything because he wanted them to think he was cool. Regardless, firefighters helped get the kid’s head free. Because when in doubt about what to do with your toddler whose head is stuck in a toilet seat, take your kid to see the men who put out fires. Well, why not – they get cats out of trees apparently. [source]



Obviously no charges were filed by Berlin police who were alerted to the presence of a sleeping man and horse who had shat all over the ground of an ATM foyer at 4:15am. What exactly was the crime? Getting drunk? Wallowing around in a space where your face is inches from freshly laid dung? All seems pretty run of the mill German to me. [source]

Understandable shockwaves rebound throughout the blogosphere with the report that CNN anchor Anderson Cooper, after working out at the Equinox Gym in The Time Warner Center, makes sure to wear boxer briefs while in the shower. The initial report came from Janet Charlton who explained that Cooper was afraid he’d be photographed in the gym by one of those cell phone cameras that can easily be snuck in and used discreetly. BUT – shock horror – Andy Towle reports that in fact, a friend of his sees Anderson in the change rooms at Equinox and Anderson SOMETIMES just wraps a towel around his waist and does that awkward underwear changing with one hand thing popularized in the locker room in High School. For anyone outside New York, here’s some footage that sort of falls into the same genre of what you’d see if you were in the showers with Anderson. Actually starring the Coopmeister. Shirtless.



It’s really difficult to know who to trust on this but the facts remain as such:

1) The Time Warner Center Equinox gym is now bound to be inundated with an entire PANIC of gay men (isn’t that funny? Because a group of lesbians is called a “protest” of lesbians so a group of flaming gay men has got to be called a “panic” of gay men) hoping to get a gimpse for themselves.
2) Maybe this is actually the same kind of thing as the teachers in Sacramento who are now allowing kids to wear a t shirt that said “Sodomy is Sin” as long as the word “Sodomy” is covered up or to that subversive teacher who let the class watch “Name of the Rose” but emphatically fast forwarded through the sex scene involving Christian Slater. Just as Anderson is still in the closet but not really, so too is he bringing blog wide attention to his crotch by awkwardly covering it.
3) Keith Olbermann’s theory that Anderson Cooper’s schtick is the personal life he performs but refuses to talk continues to ring true. How many people talk about Rob Marchiano or Sanjay Gupta in the showers at Equinox? And who has a higher profile on CNN?

[source] [source] [source]

Rosie O’Donnell announces she will leave the View due to a contract negotiation failure with ABC. It’s astounding to notice how emotional The View can actually be. While Barbara Walters is clearly a gorgon matron behind the scenes, she always professes love and concern like a mother hen – because after all the show is her baby. Rosie’s announcement that she is leaving was done in the same way that you’d expect a mother to tell her kids that “while we’re not going Disney Land next weekend as promised we will be going at the end of summer and in the meantime I’ve bought you all ice cream.” The urgency with which she reassures that she will be back to do specials on autism and depression is remarkable. Just in case everyone went into anaphylactic shock over the news. Massed wailing and gnashing of teeth were, thanks to Rosie’s sensitivity, averted. Meanwhile, what will happen to The View now? Perhaps Ann Coulter? [source]

Meanwhile, (and it’s not even perceptive to say “predictably” anymore) Donald Trump quickly chimes in with a publicity grabber, claiming he was probably responsible for Rosie being fired from the View. It’s interesting to listen to the way he actually speaks because his tone of voice indicates that he’s really just saying words that come to mind rather than stating a considered fact or idea. He obviously knew he wanted to repeat his mantra “Rosie’s a loser” (what happened to “Rosie’s an animal”?) but the rest he’s just making up as he goes along being sure to (albeit fraudulently) insert himself into the drama but isn’t that just the entire point? [source]

Today in Extraordinarily Odd


Relentless ropes of bubble filled dog saliva were apparently not a deterrent for Riggs, a 3 year old male bulldog who just beat out 50 other bulldogs and won a bulldog beauty contest in Des Moines, Iowa. For an outsider to dog show culture (startling as it is to consciously admit that there could be such a thing), one of the most appealing things about the shows is watching the owners. Or at least, gauging the kind of people they must be through their pets. Anyone who names their dog Sir Grizwald Snorzalot, Napoleon Underbite or Crazy Legs Da Moose should look forward to an afterlife of relentless mauling. [source]






Students in Sacramento who wanted to wear a t-shirt reflecting the view that Sodomy is a Sin that they more than likely inherited from a dominating adult, were originally suspended due to the fact that the language on the t shirt was considered offensive. Now they’re back at school and they’re allowed to wear the t shirts but they have to cover the wording up with duct tape which is great because clearly the point was actually to try out a new fabric softener so, the students probably won’t mind having the wording arbitrarily covered up just as long as they can experience the difference in fabric softness. Similarly, if you’ve got a bunch of kids wearing t shirts with duct tape on them only because the word sodomy is written under it then the word may as well not be there. It’s really just like with global warming, evolution and reality; once you cover up the surface evidence, the rest of the conflicting argument vanishes too. Problem solved. [source]






Contrary to the redneck cliche, Chinese people don’t actually all look the same. They are, however, highly likely to be named the same thing according to a recent survey that has ascertained the 85% of people in China share 100 different names. There are 88 million people in China who have the last name “Wang” and that means that it is also highly likely that there’s a huge amount of schoolyard name calling as well. Like, as in, an overwhelming amount of kids who go home crying due to “potty mouth teasing”. Oh forget it. The name Wang means King so perhaps it indicates that China is full of socially aspirant people [source]

In an effort to mobilize the young babysitting cash earning teenaged girl contingent (once again) for their new reality show, the title of which, The Coreys: Return of the Lost Boys may just be the most brilliant part, MSN is granting us all the opportunity to get to know Corey Haim and Corey Feldman by asking for advice online. Is this some kind of trap? Clearly the conflict behind the concept is, “Oh goodness, but what advice would Corey Haim be able to (coherently) give my daughter besides how to shoot up an 8 ball covertly on a subway, how to make a little cash by selling autographed pork pie hats, hair gel and vests on ebay and how to score a quick 100 bucks by dancing around in an LA motel room in her underwear for a salivating, fat, balding pederast.” So, let’s just get this little recollection:



and, just for fun, this:





…out of the way immediately and then move on.

But the thing is, the Coreys were and in some ways still are a truly enchanting concept. They work as a good natured, married couple esque duo. If he keeps the padding off, Haim is the hot one who can’t quite keep his life together or manage to manifest the same freak success of his past and Feldman is the weirdly troll esque one who more or less can. They balance each other out and what they share is a desperation for cultural relevance that is a relief for viewers to see manifest on the screen rather than in their own daily lives. Plus, the sadistic tension created by waiting to see if Haim will fall into drug use any moment now should be a real treat at dinnertime.

Actually, this is a genius idea. There’s really nothing wrong with it besides the horror and cheapness. Unless you’re talking about the historically accurate reality shows like The Edwardian Manor House, there’s really nothing of any worth in Reality TV except the viewing equivalent of obesity inducing corn syrup anyway. Why not go with a throw back to the 80s and check in with the Coreys. Haim, despite it all, is still actually kind of hot and only mildly haggard. Feldman has had to learn to be clever because he’s still not magazine hot so the combination of hot and groggy meets average looking and acidic should prove to be top quality viewing. There is almost nothing wrong with this new show and column idea. It’s perfect. . [source]

Celebrities entering rehab isn’t really a story anymore as much as it is an indication of who is desperate for attention, who is desperate to buy edgy credibility and who is trying to maintain face with the public. Plus, the magic of rehab itself is quite telling when it comes to what America tolerates culturally and why. So, now that Jonathan Rhys Meyers has gone into rehab, the point of rehab itself seems to have shifted.

He’s not really hanging for a career boost in the sense that his roster of work seems chock full – and it’s quality work too – not to mention his principle role on The Tudors, which is being marketed to the bullshit everywhere and honestly isn’t bad at all. Apart from Chris Martin who just seems to reek of a heavily managed God complex. So, his publicist said:

"After a non-stop succession of filming, Jonathan Rhys Meyers has entered an alcohol-treatment program," rep Meredith O'Sullivan says. "He felt a break was needed to maintain his recovery."

Which makes it really sound like he just needed a hard core three weeks of isolated focus on not drinking alcohol – not that he’s crippled with addiction. Kind of like when you have been out for four nights in a row and you start to wonder if you’re an alcoholic but you know, deep down that you’re not so you just consciously stop drinking. Of course, with JRM, it’s all hyped up to movie star level so everything becomes a specific gesture that has to be considered. Indeed, the only addiction he seems to have is to stunningness, slightly unbridled overacting and hammering home that he’s not gay by performatively making out with women in front of other people and mincing about town to squash any idea that he’s got a masculinity issue. Of course, if it were a regular person you’d just replace the word “rehab” with “inner cleansing program with no alcohol”. “Rehab” just grabs headlines easier Plus, let’s be fair, this is really just another excuse to post photos of him. [source]

Bjork announced on her website that she is letting the general public enter a competition to direct the music video to the single, "Innocence" from her forthcoming album "Volta". While it seems like a really progressive and edgy way to infuse an innocent authenticity into professional art, there's an undeniably calculated creative marketing tactic behind this that is designed to be passed off as pure art.

Sort of like distressed jeans tha't cost 450 dollars and water with a name.

The thing is,currently, many of the most successful and stimulating commercial ideas and inventions are more often than not, a product of one of two things. One, you get a product and simply add caffeine. Two, is somehow infusing reality TV type culture into the product – ie. blurring the line between the access normal people have to the inner workings of heralded celebrities by televising everything celebrities do, or simply making average people celebrities in their own right by whacking them on TV. It’s this weird way of capitalising on the journey through averageness. Profiting from average people’s lack of conditioned talent. That’s not to say that there isn’t undiscovered talent but the theme really seems to reek of calculated marketing being passed off as art. Still, at least the public are being prompted to interact with Bjork. Other components of the marketing campaign include multiple international tour dates and Saturday Night Live. All timed down to the last second. [source]

Today in Extraordinarily Odd



After a 40 year old office clerk named Roberta took her clothes off and swam naked in Rome’s famous Trevi fountain, the fountain featured in Fellini’s La Dolce Vita, she was quoted as saying, “the water is everyone's. I was hot,". What was more than likely left out of her statement was the incoherent rant that followed – a direct result of actually simply BEING a 40 year old office clerk. How the hell long can someone be expected to do glorified data entry before they snap. Kudos to you Roberta. Swim away the crippling horror you see when you’re alone at night with only your closet of stolen post-it notes to console you. [source]




Taking a leaf out of Prince Philip’s book on common etiquette, a newly appointed upper caste school teacher in India ordered that the lower caste students be purified by having cow urine poured on their heads. Apparently, parents were complaining but, as is the custom with lower caste people in India, they were more than likely beaten for hours and then told to take out the garbage. Oh well. [source]





While the multiple layers of sincere joy that could have been brought to thousands of visitors to Taipei was obliterated due to a heartless few who were culturally intolerant of a Holocaust themed restaurant a few years ago, the chance to be distracted from over priced, average food by gimmicky hospital themed decorations and sexually provocative waitresses dressed as nurses who serve drinks that come in an IV bag and the toilet is called the “Emergency Room” (it’s simply about owning up to what your strengths and weaknesses are, in Taipei, apparently) is up and running and thank goodness it is. Look, seriously, what’s really annoying about this story is that the reporter used the word “tipple” in the title. God damn it, never say that word again. [source]

Queen Elizabeth II is rumoured to be planning on granting her husband, Prince Philip the official title of Prince Consort – a title given rarely – as part of their 60th wedding anniversary celebration this year for what one commentator says has been his “outstanding work during her reign”.

Examples of the Prince’s outstanding work include publicly stating the follwing:

“If it has four legs and is not a chair, has wings and is not an aeroplane, or swims and is not a submarine, the Cantonese will eat it."

when visiting China in 1986, he told a group of British students, "If you stay here much longer, you'll all be slitty-eyed"

and to a traditionally attired President of Nigeria, "You look like you're ready for bed!".

Rather than give him a meaningless title, might I suggest to Her Majesty that he be strongly urged to run for public office or become a diplomat? Perhaps she should employ a group of yes-men to follow him around and really prop up that ego, repeatedly letting him know that not only do the public identify with him but that they actually need a voice like his out there.

Indeed, there's really nothing more soothing than listening to a senile old racist who is simply incapable of ever learning that he's just plain out of date address the public, a YOUNG public and better yet the media. Sadly, shrill activism aside, what we learned with Don Imus is that you can't really do much to stamp out or promote that kind of pure racist mentality, it will just basically die out - you can't do much about it. After that, who will we take delight in being horrified by? Oh, yeah. Everything else, that's right.

From the sounds of things, the White House Press Correspondent’s Association dinner managed to combine enough celebrities from the corners of the earth, each with a different take on reality, to warrant a top quality reality TV show. Sheryl Crowe touched Karl Rove’s arm, he recoiled as though she had thrown holy water on him (and probably hissed) thus outing him as the freakish, pasty, balding, mastermind introvert control freak evil genius we already knew he was. Sanjaya Malakar was actually there as the guest of People magazine, a move obviously orchestrated for publicity purposes but when you consider it, it’s interesting to just say out loud the words, “Sanjaya Malakar was at the White House Press Correspondent’s Association dinner”. It really is equal parts unusual and genius. His first public engagement at a high profile political dinner not out at a club with some b-list hack being chased by TMZ.com. But, then, on the flip side – what the fuck do you do when you’re America’s most endearing joke and you’re at the White House Press correspondent’s dinner apart from look at yourself in the bathroom mirror once the guy at the urinal has finally stumbled out, you go all serious and dark and say aloud to yourself, “You’ve come a long way baby, now just don’t screw it up…” then go back out there and shake your sparkling locks in slow motion and sign an autograph for Eliot Spitzer.

If you think about it, Rove recoiling in freaked out, anti-social panic isn’t really THAT much of a surprise. On the most basic level Rove’s face, in fact, quite closely resembles that of a weirdly afflicted 13 year old boy, his body, of course, moving on in years. Karl Rove looks like he could easily be the political equivalent of one of those coddled computer genius brats who started earning half a million dollars a year at the age of 13 in Silicon Valley in the mid nineties. Except in later life.

So, all in all; Sheryl Crowe touching, Karl Rove hissing, Sanjaya Malakar mincing, signing autographs and plotting. No word on the menu as yet. Otherwise: Great. Done. [source]

Week #16 in Review

32 people were shot when a disturbed student walked through the halls of Virginia Tech University and open fired on students and teachers and then shot himself making it the largest massacre in modern American history. Days after the shooting, NBC received in the mail, a package from the killer which contained a video statement, written material and photos explaining the killer’s actions. After playing the footage, people close to the victims requested that it not be played by the media any more.

Hillary Clinton, during a phone interview on radio, was asked what she thought America should do about American Idol’s Sanjaya Malakar, to which she replied, “that is the best question I’ve been asked in a long time”. Meanwhile, Maxim magazine voted Sanjaya their woman of the day and David Spade declared that Sanjaya was “sexy”, confirming to a degree that Sanjaya’s gimmick had worn thin and then, finally, Sanjaya was voted off American Idol.

Richard Gere was in trouble with conservatives in India who burned effigies of him after he kissed a famous Bollywood star in public, Britney Spears made a rambling public statement in which she proclaimed that America is just “so nice” fluctuating between a Valley girl accent and a southern one and Donald Trump attempted to reignite his feud with Rosie O’Donnell by sending Barbara Walters the underwear Rosie wore in her mid-nineties film Exit to Eden.

Anna Nicole Smith’s diaries did not sell online because people weren’t sure if they’d been stolen and also because America is suddenly less interested in the Anna Nicole story, Alec Baldwin was publicly shamed when a ranting, bullyish phone message he left for his daughter, Ireland, where he referred to her as a selfish, ignorant pig was released to the media, Lindsay Lohan was reported to have fallen over in public, made the statement that she felt everyone she knew was not safe unless near her at all times, and to have hooked up with boyish looking DJ, Samantha Ronson.

David Beckham posed for naked photos that were published online.

180,000 bidets in Japan were offered free maintenance after 26 of a certain model were found to have caught fire, people were treating psoriasis and eczema by sitting in large ponds filled with ravenous little fish who ate the dead skin from their bodies, washing their bodies with soap laced with the equivalent of two cups of coffee worth of caffeine that was absorbed through the skin and inserting inflatable breast implants into their bodies.

A boat was found off the coast of Australia with a dinner table set, all flotation devices on board but no actual people and no evidence of where they had gone. New Zealand airport officials quarantined a bag suspecting it to contain a bomb, but it was later revealed to actually contain a sex toy with complex wiring, a man in Israel had his tongue bitten off by a woman during a particularly aggressing make-out session and German soldiers were being told to imagine the target of their aggression was a team of black men from the Bronx, New York.

New Mexico’s entrant for the Miss Universe contest was found to be wearing a dress that was too violent after it was ascertained that the mural depicted on it was of the 1920 Roman Catholic riots and included images of people being hanged, The Berlin Zoo’s famous orphan polar bear Knut was sent a death threat and a man named Jose de Jesus Miranda was banned from three South American nations for claiming to be the Anti-Christ.

President Bush, while on a visit to Ohio where he was speaking about terrorism started making random off-topic statements.

_"There are jobs Americans aren't doing,” he said. “If you've got a chicken factory, a chicken-plucking factory, or whatever you call them, you know what I'm talking about."

And yet, factory owner or not, it was ascertained that few people did.