Month: March 2009

You Missed It: The mighty have fallen edition

It’s Friday, and by now your NCAA tournament brackets are messed up. Well, that’s what you get for gambling. You do know that it’s illegal, right? At this point, you are probably looking to find some sort of diversion from thinking about the massive losses you have incurred. If you were busy getting stalked by a guy on the set of “Dancing with the Stars,” odds are you missed it.

Everyone get ready for another bracelet campaign
Lance Armstong fell in the first stage of some bike race in Spain, breaking his collar bone. Along with it, Armstrong shattered the hopes and dreams of young Americans everywhere who dream of growing up and pedaling really fast professionally. Luckily, he did not break his Twitter, as evidenced by the fact that he continued tweeting leading up to his surgery. Still being investigated: if tweeting and riding caused the accident in the first place.

Gun gun be gun, gun gun be gun gun
Things are not good for Rihanna. Even though she’s now 21, a year by rights she should not have to remember, she is got a boyfriend who allegedly hits her, she is catching heat for staying with him anyway, and um, Jay-Z probably has something to say about all of it, too. Clearly, it is time for some image recovery. Rihanna knows this, that is why she got a tattoo of a gun  near her right armpit. Perfect! Now we can no longer associate you with violence!

Nobody lies to Congress but Congress
Major League Baseball’s Miguel Tejada was sentenced to one year of probation, a $5,000 fine and 100 hours of community service for lying to Congress about his use of performance enhancing drugs. That’s right folks, let the word go our hence forth that if you want to do illegal drugs and then lie about it to federal lawmakers, all it takes is a fraction of your annual salary, some “Kids, don’t do drugs” public service announcements and a year of double-secret probation. Take THAT! Tejada will probably also have to buy his team, the Houston Astros, all lunch or something, too.

Who will cry for the boob jobs?

There’s no doubt about it: there are plenty of women out there who will do anything for bigger boobs. And why not? They get attention, make you seem smarter, help balance heavy loads on laundry day and can steer the car while applying mascara.

Take, for example, Annabel Newell, who upgraded from A’s to C’s because she didn’t like her body. Fair enough, it’s a free country and God bless her.

So what’s the problem? People are asking about them, often because they look so unreal:

  • “When did you get them?”
  • “Are they real?”
  • “Can I touch them?”
  • “Can they heal my canker sore, and how can you be so sure without trying first?”

Sure, they’re rude questions. People are jerks. End of story, right?

“‘We’ve sensationalized the whole plastic surgery industry with shows like Extreme Makeover and Nip/Tuck, so now people feel they can discuss it, even with complete strangers,’ [Newell] says. ‘But it’s none of your business, and it’s extremely offensive to pry. What if I was a cancer survivor?‘”

Ah, yes. Let’s blame television. Of course, it’s television’s fault that women with clinically recorded lower self-esteem and body issues get very obvious cosmetic surgery for attention, and then get upset because people can’t help but notice that they’re unnatural. Let’s blame everyone else and the boob tube (sorry) because people like this believe that we’re not born a complete person without huge knockers. (Not that The Guys haven’t tried eating more.)

And why can we say this kind of crap? Because Newell’s not a cancer survivor.

We don’t judge breast implants here at SG (we merely evaluate them for weight and texture); but, we do have a mean spot for neurotic whiners who compare their condition to having cancer.

Another win for intelligence! We did it!

The big meanies up in Utah decided to create a little thing called HB 353. What is HB 353, other than the worst nightmares of Satan, Hitler and John Lennon all rolled up into one? It’s a video game and movie bill brought about originally by Jack Thompson, in which stiffer fines to video game retailers and movie theaters that gave minors access to games or movies rated above their age level would be added. Also, it’s a giant leap in logic that doesn’t actually look for true accountability (i.e., most parents). So what’s the big hub-bub?

It breezed through the Utah House and Senate by wide margins and it was expected that Governor Jon Huntsman of Utah would back it as well. Not so.

“While protecting children from inappropriate materials is a laudable goal, the language of this bill is so broad that it likely will be struck down by the courts as an unconstitutional violation of the Dormant Commerce Clause and/or the First Amendment,” explained Huntsman. “The industries most affected by this new requirement indicated that rather than risk being held liable under this bill, they would likely choose to no longer issue age appropriate labels on goods and services.

“Therefore, the unintended consequence of the bill would be that parents and children would have no labels to guide them in determining the age appropriateness of the goods or service, thereby increasing children’s potential exposure to something they or their parents would have otherwise determined was inappropriate under the voluntary labeling system now being recognized and embraced by a significant majority of vendors.”

It’s a well known fact that I’m a bit of a major spelling and grammar nazi. Nonetheless, I’ve never been more happy to see sloppy writing. Well, that and some major lobbying by the video game industry. A big and hearty congratulations to everyone who helped knock the bill proposal down. You’ve earned it.

We missed our calling

In an effort to further prove why we should start adapting foreign policies in sports, Australia’s rugby leadgue officials have stood by a $1,000 per player alcohol bonus because of a scholarship. That’s right kids, if you train hard and play for the Kangaroos World Cup team, you will be given $1,000 to blow on booze.

Australia, you don’t need to explain, we get it. You work hard, you play hard, and you want to drink even harder. Just remember, our Booze News collection compliments any night of hard drinking.

We need to keep their numbers down

It’s spring time, and that means only one thing: doing it in public. (No, not you, SG will not endorse your risky and technically illegal fornication.) Animals. They are doing it everywhere and in full view of the public.

In China, gerbils are doing it way too much, and the wild gerbil population (Side note: so that’s where they’re from!) is getting out of hand. Luckily, China doesn’t have the whiny liberal-commie-carp-kissers that we have here in the U.S., so they’re giving gerbils abortion pills to keep their numbers down. Normally, this blog would be all for having fewer animals to worry about, but giving gerbils abortion pills will only send the message to them that it’s OK to have sex, when in reality it isn’t. Animals can’t marry, and you’re not supposed to have sex before marriage, so that means animals shouldn’t mate. How’s that for some population control?

Speaking of population problems, in Northern Ireland, grey squirrels have taken over a woman’s home and are likely holding her hostage. The squirrels showed up in Oonagh Nutt (Yes, teehee, her last name is “Nutt.” HAVE SOME DECENCY YOU BASTARDS!) several years ago but in the past year and a half have gotten into the house and are tearing it apart.

“I’ve had pest control round putting poison down in the roof space and travel routes through the house. But then they died inside the cavity walls and the house is infested with flies. It’s a nightmare,” she said. “We’ve had squirrel catchers, traps, lights, sonar. Everything but the kitchen sink.”

Mrs. Nutt, we have a suggestion for you.

MasterChugs Theater: ‘Glengarry Glen Ross’

“Coffee is for closers.”

Glengarry Glen Ross is one of the best films about salesmen ever made. As a story and a work of art, it ranks right up there with Death of a Salesman and the Maysles Brothers’ 1969 documentary Salesman. Coincidentally enough, these are essentially the only movies about salesmen. And it’s not even an original screenplay, it’s an adaptation of David Mamet’s theatrical play. Who would’ve guessed? Continue reading MasterChugs Theater: ‘Glengarry Glen Ross’

In this metaphor, a subwoofer is a dog

So I says to Mable, “Mable,” I says, “He’s a bum. Pimp him.”

Admit it: you’ve seen homeless people on the streets and wondered what they’d look like with killer rims and a Blaupunkt. (They’d look like Go-Bots, the unloved vagrants in this Transformers world.)

Thanks to the father-son marketing team of Kevin and Sean Dolan, respectively, you may wonder no more.

The Dolans have installed a lift kit onto Timothy Edwards, a panhandler in Houston, Texas. After seeing him and fellow homeless people begging for donations with cardboard signs, they decided to “insult people’s sensitivity or appeal to their humor” [their words] with PimpThisBum.com. They pay Edwards $100 a day to use signs with the URL, and when people log in to the site, they can donate money, gifts and services.

“Visitors seeing the sign flocked to the site and in less than two months Dolan received $50,000 in donations and pledges through the site for the man, including a five-week alcohol treatment program donated by Sunray Treatment and Recovery based near Seattle, Washington.”

We, here at SeriouslyGuys, hope this idea takes off. We’d like to see a competition grow out of this, eventually resulting in magazine covers with low-rider legless war vets.

GAMES. IN. SPAAAAAAAACE.

OK, this the big moment-you’re a grade schooler, you live in DC and you’ve got the opportunity to talk to the newly elected President Barack Obama. Most probably, your life will never get as exciting as it is now. What can I say? Reality sucks. However, it gets even better-you get to call an astronaut at the same time.  What do you ask? WHAT DO YOU ASK?

“Can you play video games in space?”

That’s exactly what the first kid said. No questions about the majesty of space, or about the grueling selection process involved in becoming an astronaut, or about the wonders of being able to just pick up a telephone and speak to somebody in space. It was “Can you play video games in space?”, and to be honest, that’s pretty awesome. What was Mister Astronaut’s answer?

We can, in fact. And in fact a few years ago when I was up here for six months I had a video game that I used to play in my spare time. Unfortunately, we don’t have much spare time.

So we can, we have a lot of laptop computers. But for the most part we stay real busy doing real work.

Lame, space dude. As we all know thanks to wonderful documentaries, playing video games is the only way to find the chosen one to save us from an alien invasion. Add some lasers onto the space station and you’re set. Get on it NASA.

Looking to change their gay jeans

It appears that at least a portion of British therapists believe that they can cure homosexuality, because, it’s a disease, not a choice. Duh, don’t any of you watch the Bible Network? It’s totally treatable with a combination of Advil, Marlboro Reds and a case of Budweiser. And Britain has never had anything remotely homosexual come from their part of this marble.

The amusing part about all of this is that homosexuality has not been recognized as a mental illness by the World Health organization for the past 17 years. Apparently not long enough to get British therapists off of their homophobic high horse.

Landing strip: Still legal in 39 states

Jerseyites, which is what we call people from (New) Jersey, can breathe a sigh of relief this morning. Then again, they might do well to just hold in that breath because some hot wax is about to get ripped off of their genitals.

The New Jersey State Board Cosmetology and Hairstyling Board (yes, it is a real state agency) has nixed its proposed ban of bikini waxing within the state. Why would they consider such a thing? Because two people ended up getting some nasty infections (we assume on their lady parts, which are prone to infections anyway) after having the wax job done.

Because two people ended up with infections possibly because of the procedure, they wanted to ban it, which makes sense because we all know you can never get an infection from a cut, much less one from a razor you use to remove hair from the location of your choosing.

Fun fact: “Technically, genital waxing has never been allowed in New Jersey — only the face, neck, abdomen, legs and arms are permitted. But because bare-it-all ‘Brazilians’ weren’t specifically banned, state regulators didn’t enforce the law.”

Which begs the question, how would they inforce it in the first place. (“Put the wax down and step away from the crotch! We have you surrounded!”)