Thinking Inside the Box

Apparently, suicide and domestic violence aren't the only things sending people to the hospital for the holidays. According to this Washington Post story, the amount of packaging on consumer products is also causing a lot of pain and suffering to add to the general rising depression level.
Quote: According to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, injuries from plastic packaging resulted in 6,400 visits to emergency rooms in 2004.
So this year, when you're cutting the 5,123 small plastic and wire ties holding your Barbie doll in the box, for god's sake, be careful.

Hot for Teacher

So I've got this stupid Van Halen song stuck in my head because I came across this story, which puts it in an entirely new light. There's also a lot of unanswered questions here. At least from my perspective, the biggest one is, how the hell did this chick manage to star in a series of porn films in the first place if she's in Paducah, of all places?

Where Are We Now?

So, making fun of the Daily News got me feeling all nostalgic, so I tried to track down some of the old gang who were there when I started this madness. Here's what I can find out:

First of all, the obvious. I'm still here.

MC Ganyez is still working at the Daily News. Last time I saw him, I kind of put my foot in my mouth by making fun of the stupid fast food reviews they were doing, which turned out to have been his idea. Oh well. They were stupid.

Razzles is now working public relations in Nashville.

Tollbooth Willie is shuffling papers in an office at Western.

Frantic1 is a sales rep for Yellow Book USA and lives in Nashville.

I can't find CC, and neither can Google, although I did find this Chicago-area realtor who has the same name (at least as far as I know she still does) and looks a little like her.

Same goes for KC. If the two of you happen to see this, drop me a line and let me know how the hell you're doing.

Getting Back to Our Roots

I haven't made fun of anybody for a while, and this week's Daily Snooze has some real gems. Here's a few:


First, we have this edition of Elderly People with Alicia. A taste of the <SARCASM>extremely strong</SARCASM> fragmented quotes with which this riveting piece is peppered:

“But I have never been seasick,” he wrote in the journal.
The next day he “was at the wheel when the sun came up.”

Then there's this lede from Burton Speakman, which manages to be both awkwardly phrased and redundant:

Many law enforcement officers throughout the area say that, compared to other times of the year, they respond to more family disturbances during the holidays.

Finally, there's this, which, at least according to the web site, is an entire story:

Students in Pamela Connally’s kindergarten class at Dishman-McGinnis Elementary School had a lesson on Tuesday about holidays, how people explored and settled America, and Indian cultures in the United States.

I'm awfully glad they're keeping us apprised of the goings-on in the city's kindergarten classrooms. Also, I'm pretty sure they mean Native American cultures, not those of Indian immigrants, but I could be wrong.

NetFlix prize

This is an incredible idea. I have no idea how to start solving it, but it's a great contest. If you have any ideas, a passing acquaintance with math and/or C++ and a desire to be $1 million richer, we should collaborate.

This space is my space,...

So I went to MySpace.com today. First time. I was looking for bands my cousin, Meredith, plays in. Found two of them, The Debutantes and The Fervor. The Fervor, as it turns out, put out an album last year that is available on iTunes, so I downloaded it.
But anyway, what I wanted to talk about was that while I was browsing, MySpace kept giving me helpful, if a bit random, messages. Like, on Meredith's page, a white rectangle at the top of the page informed me that "Meredith is in your extended network." When I saw that, I thought, "Thank God." After all, I didn't even know I had a network, but apparently not only do I have one, it's extended, which has got to be better than just a plain old run-of-the-mill network. Anyway...
Check out the bands. They're cool. And this has nothing to do with the fact that my cousin plays in them. Well... maybe a little. But still. Just sayin'.