A Bowl of Stupid

My buddy Desho Bernard (Desho needs a hug), who produces comedic video clips for Guru Bangkok (i.e., The Bangkok Post), just made this lastest clip — about Facebook addiction.

And while I don't refer to myself in the third person (except during sex, of course), I am also one of the legion of Facebook addicts. Ahh, we laugh because it's funny, and we laugh because it's true — Desho can't go on!!

Damn, this shit is funny.

I'd like to be able to say that I contributed to at least a portion of the brainstorming that came up with this clip. But given that the concept — unlike myself — is REALLY funny … I think we all know that I had absolutely nothing to do with it. Dammit!

Share This

For obvious reasons (i.e., the entire election process is about as interesting — and just a likely to make me vomit — as naked pictures of Amy Winehouse), I haven't been paying much (read: any) attenton to the American Presidential race for the past 2 years.

From what I've seen tho, apparently there's finally a black guy running this time — which is pretty cool, I guess.

Anyhoo, thanks to Chez ove at Deus Ex Malcontent, I've become much more informed about the entire process. Thanks kid … I think.

I thought this YouTube clip (which Chez also wrote about on his site) was both hysterical AND informative. It's about an apparent (ahem) 'rift' between John McCain and his wife:

Share This

As everyone knows, in ranking of importance with other major issues of the day — the 5 year anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, the U.S. Presidential race, and the Chinese crackdown on Nepalese protesters — right up there is the seemingly ceaseless debate as to whether or not women are funny. (Yeah, I know, apparently I've got this alternating feminist/misogynistic theme going this week, but I leave for Indonesia in 2 days and I'm trying to get in all my reading under the wire).

If you're not aware, Christopher Hitchens wrote an article on the subject last year, in the January 2007 issue of Vanity Fair magazine (cleverly entitled "Why Women Aren't Funny"). I'll give you 2 guesses to figure out his stance on the issue.

I'm not going to waste my time rehashing Hitchens' extraordinarily long-winded attempt to avoid having sex for the rest of his adult life. However, if you're interested in sacrificing an hour of your life you'll never get back, the original article, as well as a decent compilation of some of the more vocal 'responses' can be found HERE.

Now, more than a year after Hitchens wrote that staggering work of dribble, Vanity Fair has seen fit to resurrect the whole sordid affair by publishing in its latest (April 2008) issue a rebuttal by writer Allessandra Stanley.

Like the original, this new article — sporting the less-than-convincing title: "Who Says Women Aren’t Funny?") — is yet another piece of inspired comedic genius:

Dissecting the nature of women's humor, or supposed lack thereof, is a joyless and increasingly moot subject, but it boils down to the point Virginia Woolf argued in her essay about Shakespeare's sister in A Room of One's Own, and it's analogous to the case Larry Summers made so clumsily with regard to women in the sciences that it cost him his job as president of Harvard: namely, that society has different expectations for women. Summers sealed his fate by also suggesting that women's innate aptitude for science and math might be weaker. The nature-versus-nurture argument also extends to humor. It's a shame that Margaret Mead never made it to that tribe in Papua New Guinea where women tell the jokes, and men pretend to find them funny.

Virginia Wolfe? Margaret Meade? Papua New-Fucking Guinea?

Good grief, what in the name of everything holy is this broad even talking about?

I thought that articles about humour — especially one written by a woman arguing that women are funny — should at least be mildly amusing. That would be the reasonable approach, doncha' think?

Apparently not, since the only things to be learned from either of these two articles are that: (1) neither Hitchens nor Stanley will be headlining at the Improv any time soon; (2) Vanity Fair pays its contributors by the number of words used, not coherency; and (3) reading ANYTHING in Vanity Fair with the word 'funny' in the title will make your eyes bleed.

What the hell is going on over at Vanity Fair, anyway? I mean, if they're trying to piss off their readers, then by all means, I'm pretty sure there's a used 'Mission Accomplished' banner they can pick up on the cheap. But if, on the other hand, VF is trying to publish some funny and engaging articles about contemporary pop culture … yeah, not so much.

Share This

It's 4:00 a.m., I'm up all night in another random airport for the second time in 3 days, and I'm jacked up on a whole boatload of Nescafe instant coffee. This is the part of traveling abroad that they never tell you about on National Geographic Explorer.

Welcome to my fucked-up little corner of the world.

Share This

(MC Hammer, on left, and one of his neo-hippie fashion disciples, on right)

First off, no … I don't have any actual pictures here from India to upload, since I lost the USB cord for my camera somewhere in the Philippines. Sorry.

Second off, I'm not sure I would want to put any pictures of the many, many MANY hippies roaming Kerala in their 'Hammeresque' Indian 'harem pants.' These pants are ostensibly used for yoga practice, but it seems that just about every Westerner here wears them at all times of the day, despite just how fucking silly they look.

It's a bit baffling, considering that even the hottest of girls can ruin all that beauty simply by wearing pants that make her look like she's wearing a big set of diapers. It's really hard to tell if someone's got a nice ass if she looks like she's carrying around a load of shit in her pants.

And if the cute girls can look absolutely awful in these things, imagine — really imagine — just how unappealing all the aging, new-age, hippie wannabes look in them. It's just …

just … wow.

I understand the concept of wearing comfortable clothing. Trust me, I haven't worn a pair of shoes or pants in months. It's hot and humid out and things can get hot and sticky (and stinky) really fast, so thongs (flip-flops) and shorts are obviously a necessity for maintaining any semblance of comfort (and dignity). That being said, I don't see how wearing a big bulky diaper can make one MORE comfortable in this heat and humidity. To the contrary, I'm guessing there's a bit of 'hippie chafing' going on right now.

In addition, apparently nobody has told these guys that parachute pants went out when Jim Carry and Jennifer Lopez were on 'In Living Color' and Micheal Jackson was still black (well … sorta). Even then, they looked silly … and MC Hammer could DANCE in them.

These hippies in their yoga-parachute pants, though? Who are they kidding. C'mon buddy, just put on a pair of fucking shorts. Please?

Seriously, I knew MC Hammer, and you sir, are no MC Hammer.

Share This

(map of Sri Lanka — for your reference and files)

I've thought long and hard about how to begin this particular post, given the fact that my sister may eventually read it, and she in turn will eventually tattle on me to my parents (just like when we were kids … man, some things never change). The easiest way is this:

I will never NEVER hesitate to ask for directions again. EVER!

As mentioned previously, I headed up here to Kandy to get my Indian Visa - boarding a train in Mirissa (Matara) in the far, far south, that I was told (repeat: TOLD) went through Colombo and then straight on to Kandy.

Yeah, not so much.

I probably should have first noticed something was wrong when the train hit a military checkpoint set up by the Sri Lankan Army to the north of the town of Vavuniya, Sri Lanka. It was only then that I learned — through a series of conversations in broken English, Singalese and Tamil — that I was not on the train to Kandy. Rather, I was on the train to Jaffna.

As in Jaffna, Sri Lanka's northern-most peninsula that is mostly under the control of the Tamil Tigers, the rebel insurgents fighting the Sri Lankan government. As a quick background for anyone not following the latest news on this (i.e., mostly all Americans, myself included until recently), Sri Lanka has been squeezed in the grip of a bloody civil war for the past 20 YEARS — the Sri Lankan Government on one side and the Tigers ('LTTE') on the other. There had been a toothless 'cease-fire agreement' in place for the past couple of years, but that too was formally dissolved just weeks ago after a string of violent clashes between the government forces and the LTTE.

Now, it appears the country is heading back to war. A civil war. A bloody, nasty, unnecessary, ridiculously over-extended civil war.

Fortunately for the surf-tourists, the violence has, for the most part, not extended into the island's southwest area — at least the far southwest, where I was surfing. In contrast, from all reports, the northern area is a cauldron of violence not suitable for tourists or locals alike.

So, through my own ignorance and stupidity, where did I wind up taking a train ride to? You got it — the absolute heart of the Tamil rebellion. Man oh man, sometimes I really do live up to the title of this blog.

Don't get too riled up, sis — I didn't stay there for long. In fact, my stay in the north can be counted in seconds, not even minutes. Shit, I didn't even actually make it into Jaffna proper. Instead, the absolute SECOND I realized where I was — when someone who read English pointed it out for me on the map, at which point I promptly flipped out — I literally jumped off at the next stop, ran across another set of tracks, and jumped on the nearest train heading back in the other directions. No, I'm not kidding. In fact, I may have been screaming like a little girl at the time, but I can't quite remember.

I didn't ask where that southbound train was heading. Frankly, I didn't care.

I had seen how some of the other (ever-increasingly Tamil) passengers were looking at me as I was trying to glean our location, and I had visions of the next days headline:

"In other news, an American tourist was taken hostage today in the Jaffna region. Officials are unsure why this tourist was even in that war-ravaged region, despite warnings …"

So yeah, I ran away like the little bitch I am. And yeah, I'm okay with that.

Any of you war correspondents out there who want to size up — okay, you win the big brass balls award. I'll give you that right now.

No kidding, being in a war zone while you're actually at war is fucked up enough (although I've been prepared to do it). But heading into a war zone just for the hell of it? Man, that's just nucking futs!

Luckily, the trains here in Sri Lanka run almost 24 hours a day, so I eventually found another train heading over to Kandy from the ridiculously obscure area I eventually found myself back down in the south. But what should have only been a 5-6 hour train ride instead wound up taking me about 12 hours.

I'm now in Kandy, but I have to wait a full week to get my visa due to the national holiday on Tuesday. So I've been walking around the lake, up the hills, and around the town. The city is beautiful, despite the massively overt military presence (everyone seems to be carrying an automatic rifle — I've an absolutely comical picture of a sign at an ATM stall with a circle and slash through it, prohibiting not cigarettes … but automatic rifles. I shit you not).

And instead of Tigers, Kandy seems to be infested with monkeys and bats (and the occasional elephant). And I got bit by some guys dog (he was kind enough to run inside and show me the vaccination documents, tho). Hey, the dogs, monkeys and the bats ain't carrying automatic weapons or munitions, so I'm cool with 'em.

They say that every adventure isn't an adventure while you're going through it. Yeah, maybe. But I'm guessing there are easier ways of having an adventure than by inadvertently wandering behind enemy lines.

Jiminy Crickets, can't we all just get along? I mean, really, I only came here to surf. To hell with this, I'm heading back down south until my visa comes through next week.

Share This

'The more you know who you are, and what you want, the less you let things upset you.'
-Bob Harris

I know who I am, … And I know what I want, …

And it was called yellow.

Share This

We will bring the world of normals to its knees! We will build an empire so brilliant, so glorious, we will be the envy of the whole planet!

He has returned! The Anti-Christ has returned! (via Best Week Ever)

Share This

As I mentioned a few days ago, I haven't watched cable television for the last couple years.

As such, I'm a couple months behind on this thing, but this Starburst ad I saw this morning is quite possibly the funniest disturbing commercial I've ever seen.

Much like The Exorcist, I've watched it about 100 times now, and it keeps getting funnier every time I see it.

Share This

As I may have mentioned before, although I owned a 55″ HDTV, I got rid of my cable about 2 years ago in lieu of renting movies, reading books, and playing on the interwebs.

As a result, during that time, I generally have not been privy to the outstanding network news produced in the U.S. (and in particular, the fantastic coverage of Anna Nicole Smith's death), nor have I had the luxury of watching the 2-3 actually good cable channels out there.

But now I'm hanging out at my friend's house. And he's got cable. A lot of cable.

Fuel TV is obviously one of the few channels I've been watching religiously since I got here (duh).

G4 TV is another (although I don't play video games).

Although G4 is generally dedicated to maintaining the everlasting virginity of the "video-gamer" croud, they often have some interesting internet links and video clips.

This extremely gay video madness that I just saw on G4's "Attack of The Show" is one of them. It's abvsolutely brilliant! (Tom Cruise as a gay unicorn? … Priceless!) It's also fucking hysterical.

Not that I advocate such stuff, but I would also assume that smoking, drinking, ingesting, or otherwise subjecting yourself to some type of mind-altering substance would greatly enhance your viewing pleasure (not that I've ever engaged in such activities personally).

Planet Unicorn (NSFH - Not Safe For Homophobes)

Share This

From the twisted mind of Seth Rogan, the man behind to 40 Year Old Virgin, comes this new movie Superbad.

What the plot of the movie? I've watched the trailer about 5 times now and I still have no freaking clue.

But what I do know is that if the film is as funny as the trailer — I may have a new favorite movie (just edging out Super Troopers).

Share This

While sitting here waiting for the hallucinations from the typhoid fever and malaria immunization shots to kick in, I was perusing VH1's Best Week Ever, which itself was referencing the latest article from Premiere Magazine entitled "The 100 Greatest Movie Lines."

The Premiere article purportedly describes … well, the best movie of all time (to which Adam Winer has added his own jocular commentary).

While all the quotes set forth in both the respective articles are fine enough, given my affinity for the more "colorful" aspects of the English language, I thought it appropriate to list the best of those movie quotes as I think they were originally intended (prior to interference by the now-deceased "Satan's Cocksucker"), in no particular order:

• "Fuck you! I'll be back." — The Terminator (Arnold Schwarzenegger) in The Terminator (1984)
• "Life is a banquet, and most poor cocksuckers are starving to death." — Mame (Rosalind Russell) in Auntie Mame (1958)
• "I see motherfucking dead people." — Cole Sear (Haley Joel Osment) in The Sixth Sense (1999)
• “I gave her my heart, and that bitch gave me a fucking pen.” — Lloyd Dobler (John Cusack) in Say Anything (1989)
• "You fucking assholes! You're tearing me apart!" — Jim Stark (James Dean) in Rebel Without a Cause (1955)
• "You're gonna need a bigger fucking boat, you asshole." — Brody (Roy Scheider) in Jaws (1975)
• "Come back, Shane! You owe us child support, you cheap motherfucker!" — Joey Starrett (Brandon De Wilde) in Shane (1953)
• "Bond. James Fucking Bond." — Sean Connery in Dr. No (1962)
• "Of all the motherfucking gin joints in all the god-damn towns in all the fucking world, she walks into mine." — Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart) in Casablanca (1942)
• "Pay no attention to that asshole behind the curtain." — The Wizard of Oz (Frank Morgan) in The Wizard of Oz (1939)
• "I'm the king of the motha' fucking world!" — Jack Dawson (Leonardo DiCaprio) in Titanic (1997)
• "Here's looking at you, you cheating whore." — Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart) in Casablanca (1942)
• "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a shit." — Rhett Butler (Clark Gable) in Gone With the Wind (1939)

Yes, I know - this post is prime material to add to my writing portfolio, right next my legal CV and that picture I have of Rachael Ray and a goat (c'mon, how the hell did you think she got that cooking gig?).

If I've missed any good ones, your additions and suggestions are welcome.

(Via Best Week Ever … sorta)

Share This

Continuing with my current fascination of mindlessly posting pre-produced videos — most of which I just realized are unsettlingly relating to Star Wars — I give you another video from the same twisted geeks at Robot Chicken who brought you this last piece of brilliant Star Wars dementia.

I'm lazy and I'm trying to postpone typing out the pages and pages and pages of long-handed notes I made about my surfing trip while I was down in Costa Rica. (Mental note: Bring laptop to Indonesia, and no more god-damn longhand)

(Thanks to Dan at Pajiba for bringing this one to my attention. Bravo sir, bravo).

Share This

Oh. My. God.

That's all I've got to say. Indeed, words couldn't possibly describe the majesty and grandeur that is … Whiplash the Dog Riding Cowboy Monkey!

And he's just turned 18, so you know what that means — hard riding monkey hookers in Vegas!

Thanks for this beautiful monstrosity goes to Karabee … who, although quite lovely, apparently needs a new hobby.

Share This

I'm doing the rounds again after a long absence, and I found yet another Star Wars CGI parody. This one's actually kinda clever, though (and it doesn't appear that they're trying to make money off of it, unlike countless others):

As aptly noted by Adam over at Best Week Ever, the best part of this video is that the guy who gets choked looks a lot like Dane Cook.

The power to strangle Dane Cook from afar? Ahh, if only it were that easy.

Share This

Once again, news of yet another incident here in Florida that makes me wonder if there really is something in the water, and which further prompts my hasty departure before I find myself among the afflicted.

MELBOURNE, Fla. — A Brevard County doctor dressed up in a Captain America outfit was arrested with a burrito in his tights.

On Saturday night, when a costume party full of medical professionals stopped at On Tap Cafe, police said Adamcik had a burrito stuffed below the waistband of his costume and was asking women if they want to touch it. When one refused, he allegedly took out the burrito and groped her.

Money quote:

"[T]he officers wrote in their report "there were so many cartoon characters in the bar at the time, all Captain America's were asked to go outside for a possible identification."

Yeah, I got nothing. Sometimes the jokes just write themselves.

(Via QuizLaw and WFTV News)

Share This