Cookies make me stronger. Call me a liar, I dare you!

Y'all have heard of "poop creek," right?
Well, not actually "poop" creek. It's a different word, I just don't like to use it unless there's a really good reason.
Anyway, I just found out that "Poop" Creek is a real place! For really real! It's in Indiana, and it's called Poop Creek for a reason: the obvious one. Also, it turns out that almost all those "poop creek" expressions you hear people use have basis in real fact. Really real fact! For instance, "up 'poop' creek without a paddle" originally came from a story about a Poop Creek ferry operator (back in the olden days) who dropped his paddle in the water (I guess it was his first day) and had to paddle after it using just his hands. His hands got pretty gross from doing that. And the paddle wasn't great either, I guess.
Or what about "Take a long drink from poop creek?" That one is in reference to the poorer people in the village of Poop Creek, who were forced to get their drinking water from the creek instead of the town well. I read that there actually was more than enough water for everyone in town in the well, but the wealthier people didn't want to share the water with people who smelled so bad. Kind of a catch 22, when you think about it. Still, I can't blame them - I don't let poor people drink from my well either. It's kind of a status thing.
"Dead in poop creek" is another one. They used to toss dead animals into Poop Creek. And sometimes people would just pass out from the smell while they were taking a drink -- those people would usually die too.
Isn't history amazing? I mean, none of this speaks very highly for Indiana, but it's not as if Indiana was exactly in the running for "Best State." So let the research continue!

Oh, also, Cripple Creek is a real place too. But it's not called that for the reason you probably think.

The King is Dead. Long Live the King.

Well, Oscar season is upon us, and I think it's high time we pay our due respects to the dearly departed.
"The dearly departed" is, in this case, a singular. I can't imagine caring less if that old harpy from Driving Miss Daisy died again. No, I'm referring, of course, to Jack Palance.
I'll bet a lot of you didn't know that he was dead. I can't blame you, really -- who thought he even could die? We all thought he would just keep going on and on, growling and squinting, until he just faded away, hopefully on horseback, and in the arms of a very leathery woman.
Alas, fate is too cruel a mistress to allow King Jack this final, dignified departure from mortality. No, Jack Palance, on November 10, 2006, was killed by his own chimpanzees, bleeding to death after having his genitals torn from his body.

Jack Palance's "Jungle-mania" chimp sanctuary is more or less common knowledge, I think. The name can be misleading, however: "Jungle-mania" was, more than anything else, simply a large cage containing three chimps, located near the back of Jack Palance's compound, or "Rancho Jacko," as he called it.
Anyway, he loved those three chimps, and made sure to visit and feed them several times a week.
But November was a bad month. Rancho Jacko is in Montana, and a cold chimp is a grumpy chimp, and Jack himself had been battling the blues for some time, after the less than spectacular DVD sales of Prancer 2 and The Incredible Adventures of Marco Polo. My personal theory is that Jack was afraid that he might have to sell the chimps, his friends, and he was displacing anger on them.
Reports from the neighbors have him throwing himself against the outside of the chimp cage, late on the 10th, and screaming insults at them. Unfortunately, Jack Palance's insults and obscenities eventually became so slurred that the neighbors were unable to discern exactly when they must have changed from shrieks of rage to howls of agony. The police were not called until the next morning, and by then it was far too late.

The chimps, it seems, must have siezed Jack by the nightgown and battered him against the bars of the cage. Jack Palance was significantly tougher than the average man, but chimpanzees are many times stronger than any human, and he was very badly roughed up. It was Jack's exceptionally leathery skin that kept his 6' 4", 86 year old body from being wholey dismembered, but the chimps must have exerted special force against the genital region, for they were ripped off, right out from under the nightgown.

Jack Palance's remains, in accordance with his wishes, were disolved in acid during a small service of family and friends. His genitals, however, were never found, and are presumed to have been eaten by the chimps. Many have found this little detail to be somewhat ironic, as Jack Palance's autobiography, "Strength in Anger," states that "Eat my balls" was perhaps his favorite shouted challenge.

It should be noted, as well, that Jack Palance's twin brother, Duke, the star of City Slickers 2, died the very next day, November 11. It seems that he was hit by several stray tranquilizer darts as he attempted to pull Jack's body away from Jungle-mania. The animal handler who fired the darts claims they were meant for the chimpanzees. A criminal investigation is pending. Duke Palance's remains, in accordance with Jack's wishes, have been sent to the Pennsylvania mining country of their birth, and sunk in an abandoned coal mine.

Jack Palance was born Volodymir Ivanovich Palahniuk, and once fell asleep in his square during a taping of Hollywood Squares.

Media Filth

Tonight I saw a sports mascot who appeared to be a condom.
No, not appeared to be, it was a condom. A condom with leaves coming out of its head. If it were born that way, it would be excusable (I knew a kid who was born with a gross hole in his chest, and I didn't judge him), but I know that it was just a person who had chosen to wear a horrible, offensive costume.
Unbelievable. What if a kid had seen that? That kid would be even more screwed up than all kids already are.

The Land of Broken Dreams

Man, when it rains, it pours. First the dirt on Ron Howard, and now, well, you'll see...

Today was Valentine's Day, so of course I went to the Science Museum again. I made the usual rounds -- I shouted at the dinosaurs, I saw "Gentle Ben" the dead bear, I inquired in the gift shop about buying a real human skeleton, etc. It hadn't been a bad trip, but it was really nothing special, until I saw the man himself, John Stamos.
Now, any celebrity sighting at the museum is a sure sign of a red-letter day, but Stamos was something special. I thought it was great seeing Cecil Fielder there a couple years ago, but John Stamos had always been something of an idol to me. I know the last few years have probably been kind of rough for him, what with Rebecca Romaine-Stamos and him splitting up, but to me that's all small-potatos. He will always be Jesse Consapolis to me, the coolest uncle in the world to cute little Michelle, beautiful DJ, and skanky Stephanie Tanner. He was by himself, too, so I followed him around the museum.
It was really great at first -- I pretended that Uncle Jesse was giving me a personal tour of the museum. It was neat just watching him, even if I didn't really understand some of the things he was doing. When we were down in the Weather Gallery, though, the day just went down hill. He was "standing" by the big Tornado Machine, and a museum security guard came up to him, and sort of pulled him away from the display. Naturally, I ran over to help him out.
"Sir," the security guard said, "I'm afraid I have to ask you to leave the museum."
I told the guard that "sir" was entirely inappropriate. "Sir Stamos" would be better. John and the guard just looked at me, but they didn't do anything. I took that as acknowledgement that my input was appreciated.
Anyway, John Stamos just sort of stammered in a very suave way, and asked why he had to leave the museum. The guard said that he's rather not say why out loud, but I insisted that he did, for the honor of John Stamos. I just got looked at again, but the guard said that he had seen Mr. Stamos rubbing up against several of the exhibits in what he had deemed an "inappropriate" manner, and when Mr. Stamos rubbed against the Tornado Machine it was the last straw.
John Stamos said that he never had done that, and I said that it didn't matter if he did, because it is a free country, and the guard said that there were aproximately forty-five minutes of security camera footage of John Stamos rubbing against exhibits. I asked, then, what was so inappropriate about rubbing up against a Tornado Machine, and what was it for if not that. So I started rubbing up against the machine in the same way I had seen John Stamos do.

Have you ever done this? I thought I was being both noble and logical, like that Down's Syndrome alien on Star Trek, but when I started rubbing against that Tornado Machine, it wasn't like that at all. While it wasn't entirely unpleasant, it sure as hell wasn't entirely pleasant either. And it was still warm from John Stamos, which was very upsetting to me. I never thought someone could fall so far so fast from my good graces. But John Stamos did.

"He's all yours," I told the security guard. The guard tried to grab John Stamos again then, but ol' Uncle Jesse pulled away from him and ran to the other side of the Tornado Machine, where he started rubbing again. And then he kind of started crying, and he kept saying, "But it's Valentine Day! Valentine Day! Rebecca! Rebecca! It's Valentine Day!" And then another guard showed up, and they pulled him away. He was still rubbing away at thin air when they got him to the elevator.

I'll bet that's the last time I'll see John Stamos outside of a rerun. If I wasn't so upset by the Tornado Machine experience, I sure would feel bad for the guy. I mean "Rebecca! Rebecca!"? That's pretty rough. I just wonder if he was talking about Rebecca Romaine-Stamos, or Rebecca, his wife from Full House. Because he and TV Rebecca always had such chemistry together.

Well, goodbye John Stamos, until we meet again at the big Beach Boys concert in the the sky (and, Brian Wilson, keep him away from the amplifiers!)

And to the rest of you, Happy Valentine Day!

The Den of The Red Lobster

Doesn't that sound scary? It does! "The Den of the Red Lobster!" But you don't know the half of it. It's not just the lobsters there that are scary (lobsters are scary, alive and dead), but the people at Red Lobster -- they're skinheads!

I'd always thought that the skinheads were all dead -- all that anger is bad for your heart, so your average skinhead has a life expectancy of about thirty days -- but was I ever wrong. They're all at Red Lobster. I don't know if it's a breeding population or what, but they're there, and they all wear those lobster-print shirts, and they're mad as ever (which probably has a lot to do with the shirts).

I was at the Red Den this weekend, using a gift card I recieved from my great aunt. I was wondering just what the menu meant by "surf and turf," so I started yelling for a waiter. Along comes this shining-headed young man, with a lobster-red face. He had a lot of pins on his shirt, most of them swastikas, or at least alluding to naziism. I mean, how many ways can you interpret "Nobody's Perfect, But I Keep Trying!"?
Anyway, I asked the little facist my question, and right away he says, "It's steak and lobster, bitch." And that was a weird thing to say, because I'm not any kind of bitch. I tried to tell him that I knew it was steak and lobster, but I wanted to know exactly what it was, when he interupted me to say "We don't serve your kind here."
Now, I assumed that by my "kind," he meant "aristocrat." That's obviously an oxymoron, because we are served everywhere. I tried to explain this, but his face just got even redder, and he practically shouted (it was hard to tell, because everybody shouts in Red Lobster) "No! I meant... Koreans!"
I don't know exactly where "Korea" is, but I'm pretty sure that's not where I'm from (unless it's in England -- Chesterton is an old and respected English family). Nevertheless, I was very indignant, and I took my giftcard and left. I left that little goosestepper sweating and spitting all over the table. I think he might have been having some kind of seizure, but after everything that had happened I felt no obligation to help him out. Plus, I realized that the giftcard was homemade, and it was for a batch of my great aunt's "famous" sugar cookies, so I figured I should get out of there.

Let this be a warning to everyone, though. The skinheads are alive and well, and they are canoodling with lobsters in every major city. Bring your crucifixes, bitches.