Wallet full of teeth

* Drew Peterson may be willing to box his girlfriend’s ex.  The best part will be the weigh-in, when we get to see ol’ Drew in his skivvies.  Of course, those weigh-ins get pretty testy.  Usually a lot of trash talk.  I expect Drew to say something along the lines of, “I’m gonna hit you so hard, you’ll fall down and I’ll smother you with a pillow and put you in a giant tupperware tub and drive you out to the middle of nowhere and bury you and tell everyone you just ran away.”

Seems like something he’d say.

* You can only have between 6-12 close friends.  (Bonus item from the article: the wealthiest among us had the most friends in school.)  Based on my number of school friends, I guess I should anticipate unemployment any day now.

* Dubious research!  We enjoy experiences more when they’re interrupted.  So the theory goes, you have more fun watching a TV show with commercials.  The article says people report being happier when receiving a massage that’s interrupted.  I will keep this in mind should I ever get “alone time” with a lady.  Mid-deed, I’ll just get up and start reorganizing her closet or something.

* Goofball Colorado Congressman tells bloggers they’re killing old media and the change is ”mostly for better.”  Yeah.  Who wants those stodgy old newspapers informing us and keeping an eye on corrupt politicians and corporations?  Certainly not me.

* Who wants to see New York Governor David Paterson in really short running shorts?  Not you.  No!  Don’t click there!  I said not you!

* Bong Cat Update!  The guy put his cat in the bong at least twice before.  Some pot head out there is taking this theory to the next level, assembling giant bales of weed in his living room and putting his mouth on his chimney to calm the toddlers inside.

* Some moron legislator in West Virginia is attempting to ban Barbie doll sales.  He claims they encourage girls to focus more on beauty than intelligence.  Yeah?  So?  Don’t we want girls to be pretty?  Maybe he doesn’t.  (Let’s all guess why this guy doesn’t care about beautiful women, shall we?) 

Besides, Barbie has a pretty awesome resume, including paleontologist, astronaut and President of the United States.  Hell, I wanna grow up to be Barbie.  Ken, on the other hand… that guy is a lazy jerk.

* Rachel Ray defends her FHM spread.  Wait.  Rachel Ray had an FHM spread?  Can something be hot and creepy at the same time?

* Every time I visit NBCChicago.com, the “most popular” box always features something called “Trucking Duck.”  I have never clicked on this story because it just looks to be video of some truck driver who drives around with a duck in his cab.  What’s perplexing is that this story has remained in the most popular section since the site’s relaunch several months ago.  Do we ever clear the decks on that tally or is this duck trucker story so compelling that it is consistently the most popular thing on the website?  I’m not even going to link to it because that will give it needless publicity.  I’m declaring war on you, Trucking Duck.  And I have a hankering for foie gras.

* 5 reasons the smartest people have the toughest time dating.  Because we spend more time on our blog every morning than attempting to talk to the opposite sex?

* From the Institute of Made-Up Science: the smell of rotten eggs turns men on.  So roll around in garbage, ladies!

* GE CEO Jeff Immelt just bought 50,000 shares in our company to show his confidence.  Bear in mind 50,000 shares of GE currently cost a grand total of $1.48, so it’s not a huge investment.

* Remember the minor league baseball player who was traded for ten maple bats?  He’s dead.  Guess the team with the bats ended up with the better end of that deal, huh?

* If you drive a mid-90s green Ford Escort, there’s a guy in Oregon who plans to set your car on fire.  Cop quote: “I think this person really doesn’t like Ford Escorts.”

* If you’re buying a wallet from Wal-Mart, make sure you check to make sure it comes with its ten complimentary human teeth.

* Today, I finally diagnosed Zoraida.  She has Terminal Honesty Disease.  This morning, when interviewing an author, she came right out and said, “I haven’t read the book.”  On other occasions, she’s read a story and declared on the air, “That story doesn’t make sense” or, “That’s not what we reported yesterday.”  There is no cure for Terminal Honesty Disease.  Please wear a purple ribbon to raise awareness.

* Working the night shift puts you more at risk for obesity, diabetes and heart disease.  Coincidentally, dying from one of those things is the only way to escape the night shift.  (I’m coming, sweet oblivion!)

* Men’s sex lives suffer as they get fatter.  While manatee-shaped ladies have no shortage of suitors, I assume.

* “Kill my wife.”
“How much are you gonna pay me?”
“A thousand bucks.”
“No.”
“Two thousand bucks.”
“No.”
“Two thousand bucks… and a gift card to Westshore Pizza for $13.06.”
“When do you want her dead?”

* Based on the top 36 of “American Idol,” I think we can safely put Lil Rounds and Danny Gokey in the final.  Lil wins.

Bong Cat

* Today is 3/3/09.  That’s a Square Root Day. They only occur nine times a century – about as often as I can talk to a woman without her Macing me.

* I woke to the sound of a jackhammer yesterday around 1 p.m.  It continued to drone for at least nine hours.  What the heck is going on outside my building?  Unless someone’s digging for the Ark of the Covenant, I don’t know what’s so important that a crew would be drilling in the dead of winter.

* Today Zoraida called me a “selfish slut.”  I’m having business cards printed tomorrow.

* Get elected, defraud your state, get tossed from office… and land a six-figure book deal. Makin’ money the Blago way.  (Previously: Blago rap.)

* How do we feel about the word “meh”?  I’m a fan.  It expresses indifference pretty darn well.  Some people are not fans.

* Is it possible to learn to be naked without shame? Scientists think so.  But I’m gonna say a lot of people deserve to be ashamed of their bodies.  Not everyone can have the physique of Andy Avalos.  (Bonus: click the video on that link to see whether women prefer shaved or hairy chests.  Ladies, weigh in with a comment.)

* What’s up with dudes wearing tight pants? I cannot.  For one, the anaconda refuses to be smothered.  Secondly, I have massive, womanly thighs that will not fit in such Jagger slacks.

* Remember my hero’s quest to eat nothing but bacon for the entirety of February?  The final day brought this shocking development…

* Don’t update your Facebook status to let everyone know how boring work is.  You will be fired for it.

* This morning I had the unfortunate experience of standing between three women discussing their respective experiences with childbirth – specifically where they got stitches.  I am typing this in the fetal position.

* A story sure to hit home with those pot heads from last week: A guy trying to calm his cat shoved it inside his bong. Upon emerging, the cat asked (with poor grammar) for a cheeseburger.

* Spastic kindergartners grow up to be gamblers. When I went to Gull Road Elementary, most of my class was huge into Russian Roulette.  I lost friends, but I won a bundle.

* If you rename vegetables something exciting, kids are more apt to eat them. Kinda like how “Detroit Lions” sounds more exciting than “Group of Weak, Clumsy Men.”

* Young German people would choose their cell phones or internet access over their cars or romantic partners.

But 100% of them would give up everything to watch David Hasselhoff sing “Hooked on a Feeling” in person.

* Enjoy 5 mistakes job seekers make. The biggest mistake is the same one I make when seeking a date: Hope.  Don’t bother.

* God’s telephone number in the Netherlands is +316-4424-4901.  Why does an omnipresent being require voicemail?

* From the Stuff I Never Knew Department… You can’t recycle a pizza box if it has cheese or grease on it. But if you get a pizza and the grease hasn’t infiltrated the cardboard, I don’t know why you’d even bother eating that garbage.

And speaking of grease, I need to say that the most annoying thing a human can do is to dab a napkin on their pizza.  Eat the grease.  Eat it.  Even if it shaves a day off your life with every slice.  Eat the pizza, you big jerk.

“Germans love David Hasselhoff.”

* Over the weekend, I took in two movies.  “The Wrestler” is good but not great.  It has a compelling main character in Mickey Rourke’s Randy “The Ram” Robinson.  Marisa Tomei is good as a frequently topless stripper.  But the movie seems unsure what to do with its main characters.  The end is needlessly vague.  I enjoyed it, but I don’t know how many replays it will get should it find its way into my DVD collection.

“Coraline” is beautiful to look at, and the story is cool, but the voice acting is uniformly awful.  And the flick seems to be missing huge amounts of music.  It feels needlessly sparse for something so visually inventive.  Still, it’s nice to see stop-motion animation survive in a world of computer generated images.  (I would not take a kid younger than 12 to see this.  It’s pretty dark.)

* Women are more religious than men.  Especially the ladies on Cinemax late at night.  They’re always screaming, “Oh, God!  Oh, God!  Oh, God!”

* Racial harmony is finally here… in TV commercials.  This is the part where you straighten up in your chairs and say, “Some of my best friends are black.”  (Your doorman is not one of your best friends, by the way.)

* Will Jerry Springer leave Chicago for Connecticut?  More important, will he leave all the crack addict trailer folk behind?  They mull around the NBC Tower and it makes it tough to get in and out.

* Do you want Michelle Obama’s arms?  Put down the hedge clippers and step away from the White House fence, psycho.

* Thanks to the Blog Typo Squad for pointing out that “of” and “if” are different words.  In my defense, I added that to the blog in a delirious haze right before I went to sleep at home.  Then again, there’s never an excuse for typos.

* Women do not respond to sexy advertising… unless the item advertised is presented as a gift from a committed man.  Hence all those sappy diamond commercials about Jared and kisses beginning with “Kay” and diamonds being forever.  You never see a commercial that says, “Diamonds: Because your mistress is more likely to keep quiet this way.”

* Best Dad Ever: This guy spends every lunch break drawing on his kids’ lunch bags for the next day.  Awesome idea.  I hope his kids appreciate the art.  Those are some darn fine drawings.

* Hey!  You shoving the placentas down the sewer!  Knock it off!

* Los Angeles bans cussing this week.  The latest Tarantino movie will have to shut down for a while.

* Did you hear about the Irish airline that’s gonna charge people to use the toilet?  It’ll be cheaper just to aim out the window.  Just be careful not to be sucked in the engine.  (Unless you’re into that sort of thing.)

* Ever wonder about the people behind the counter at your local Comic Book Store?  Wonder no more!  Choice excerpt…

On a Wednesday, a regular customer came and bought a ton of comics as per usual.  Then the next day he came in he was completely scab-covered and bruised on his face.  We were like, “Dude, what happened to you? Are you okay?”  Turns out he started falling down on a escalator while holding his comics and rather than protecting his face he protected his comics.  But they still got a little bent, so the next day he came back and re-bought them.

* Germans would rather talk about death and sickness than sex.  How would their hero, David Hasselhoff, respond?  Probably with an awesome music video like this one…

(What says “freedom” more than endless car stunts?)

* The annual convention of newspaper editors has been cancelled for the first time since WWII.  Once newspapers fall, TV news won’t be far behind.  We’re total parasites.

* No wonder newspapers are dying.  The best story the New York Times can come up with is sending a guy to Times Square wearing a Snuggie, just to see what happens.

* Study: McCain voters are porn freaks. 

Viewer mail about that story: Nancy is mad!

“I was offended by Rob Elgas’s off the cuff comment following the story about red-state use of internet porn. The story in itself illustrated the liberal slant of NBC, but I’m used to that and the slant is not often shown by the local reporting. Rob followed the story with the comment insinuating that anyone with a McCain bumper sticker uses internet porn – this was offensive and insulting. “

Hey, Nancy.  The story came from ABC News.  So feel free to shut up.  But I understand you might be upset if your DSL is slow and you haven’t been able to download any new material for a while.  Perhaps you can hook up with the pot heads from last week to mellow out.  EVERYBODY CHILL!

* Chief porn freak Joe the Plumber held a book signing this weekend.  Eleven people showed up to hear him.  Joe sold five books.  Back to obscurity, Plumber Man.

* Is masturbating cheating?  Am I going to get in trouble for looking at that article at work?  Wait.  You mean the article is on NBCChicago.com?  Brave new world.

* Danica Patrick has a tramp stamp.  Yet it’s not there in the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue.  Wha’ happened?  (Take it easy, Typo Squad.  I really do mean “Wha’ Happened?”)

* Louis CK illustrates why we should stop being so uptight.  Everything’s amazing!

GINGER ZEE IS HOT AND SMART !!!!!

* In an effort to decide if Bobby Jindal really does sound like Kenneth the Page, I put together this video this morning.  (Required viewing.  Do not read further until you have completed this crucial task.)

* Candice’s employer blocks the blog.  Not to worry, sweetheart.  The blog will be migrating to the mothership soon.  And if your boss blocks nbcchicago.com, you might as well quit.

* Yesterday, two Bulls greats died – Johnny “Red” Kerr and Norm Van Lier.  And this morning, I was treated to the name Johnny “Red” Kerr – in its entirety – about 7,000 times.  Not once was he referred to as “Kerr” or “Red.”  Instead, he got the full four-syllable treatment from a chorus of coworkers.

“Hey, did you hear Johnny ‘Red’ Kerr died?”
“Yeah, I can’t believe that about Johnny ‘Red’ Kerr.”
“We should do a story about Johnny ‘Red’ Kerr.”
“Yes, I agree about Johnny ‘Red’ Kerr.”
“Boy, I have so many memories of Johnny ‘Red’ Kerr.”
“Yeah.  Johnny ‘Red’ Kerr was a pretty impressive guy.”

For the love of God.  Reminds me of the script one of our writers cranked out that referenced “Massachusetts Senator Edward ‘Ted’ Kennedy.”  Who refers to him like that?  (“Hello, Senator Edward ‘Ted’ Kennedy.  Tell me about your brother, Assassinated President John F. ‘Jack’ ‘JFK’ Kennedy.”)

* Executive Producer Wendy and Highlander Producer Carol are starting a petition to bring back the short shorts of the 1970s NBA.  Carol refers to them as “shawts.”  If this came to fruition, it would be the worst thing ever.

* Times Square is being turned into a pedestrian mall. Good call.  Last time I was there, so were the Jonas Brothers.  It was like someone had triggered a preteen girl avalanche.  Cars were trying to plow through the bubblegum pink crowd to no avail.

* The going rate for two human children is one cockatoo and $175. That’s also how much it will cost to ride the CTA when it comes time to fill the budget gap.

* Overheard this morning: “I can feel it scrubbing out my colon now.”

A comedic black hole.

* “American Idol” seems pretty lame this year.  So few people are worth watching.  Then there’s goofball idiot Norman Gentle/Nick Mitchell. Thankfully, he got voted off last night.  I hated that clown.  He thought he was funny in that drag queen way, where if he was loud enough and vulgar enough, he assumed people would laugh.  He was like the hideous offspring of a prop comic and a child rapist.

* Chicago plans to $10.5 million to come up with an Olympic mascot. How about a robot?  Cool.  Glad you like it.  Make the check out to “Ben Bowman.”

* Your buttocks’ desire for soft toilet paper is killing planet Earth. If you really want to save the planet, let ‘er air dry.

* Samuel L. Jackson is about to sign up for nine superhero movies. NINE?  And yet, no “Snakes on a Plane” sequel.  Sad.

* Higgins the baboon loves HDTV, specifically “Little House on the Prairie” and “Walker, Texas Ranger.”  I am not making that up.  (Damn, I want a monkey.)

* Viewer Hate Mail!

I watch NBC news every morning and in my opinion you should pink slip the following !

Wiggles I don’t know his name but he the one who thinks he can dance he should be replaced with the HOT SARAH JINDRA she does a better job explaining the traffic report !!!!

Serita just show her face and not anything from the neck down, she has skinny legs and NO CHEST !

ROB- I think he is a GIRL !!

Andy Jobo being he is so cheep the man comes out of his home with less then two dollars in his pocket, I do not trust someone like that. REPLACE HIM WITH GINGER ZEE !!!!!!!

GINGER ZEE IS HOT AND SMART !!!!!

I agree that Ginger is hot and smart.  Beyond that, this guy is on his own.  This is why I pay no attention to viewer e-mail.  The only difference between this idiot and the pot heads from Wednesday is his affinity for the caps lock key.

* Be careful if you go on a national reality show.  You could end up like Stephen Fowler.  Observe his jackassery here.

The nation has mobilized against this jag-wad.

Avert Your Eyes

* Zoraida to me this morning: “You are officially boring.  What the hell is wrong with you?”

* I have kind of a delicate matter to discuss.  It’s been bothering me for a while.  So I think it’s time someone spoke up…

It’s about the insane amount of hair that ends up on the NBC5 urinals.

I am not accusing any one person.  It could be several.  In fact, it could be the remnants of guests to our office.  But every day, there are at least two thick strands on each urinal.  That’s kind of a lot.

First, I question how much these men are unsheathing from their pants.  Depending on your choice of undergarment, you don’t really need to bring all the bits and pieces out to relieve yourself.  Are these guys just airing it out?  Is there stretching involved?  I wonder how much activity is required to dislodge a hair from its follicle.

Second, these hairs are pretty long. Like, unnecessarily long.  Do the ladies in their lives appreciate such man-shag?  Are they attempting to camouflage their parts?  Are they just really big fans of Fidel Castro, but too timid to grow a tribute beard on their faces?  As children, were they enchanted by the story of Rapunzel?  Is there some sort of aversion to manscaping the undercarriage?

Third, if you somehow wrestled a hair from its home, wouldn’t you direct your stream to push it discreetly toward the flush zone?  Or do you find pride in your curly contribution, content to leave it there for all future witnesses as a sort of pubic time capsule?

I understand these things will happen from time to time.  Maybe there’s a similar issue in the ladies’ room.  But it’s just disheartening when I make a pit stop in the mornings to find “Cousin It” staring back at me.

Let us never speak of this again.

* Octo-Mom is offered a million bucks to star in a porno.  For some reason, all I can envision is someone playing the triangle.

* Sweet merciful Lord.  The Snuggie Pub Crawl is getting mainstream media attention.  Part of me hopes this will get out of control so the police will have to open up with the fire hose.

* Apparently you could sorta, kinda, barely see part of Beyonce’s nipple during the Oscars.  Titillating.

* The musical “Chicago” has taken over “Wicked’s” old theater.  I considered going until I remembered seeing the movie version.  When Richard Gere plopped Rene Zellweger on his lap to do that ventriloquist song, I nearly walked out.  I was there with a friend.  And I almost walked out and left her there alone.  It was so over-the-top cheesy, it was offensive to me as a man.

* Fifth-graders who work the most at jobs such as baby-sitting and newspaper routes are the most likely to smoke, drink and get into fights.  Man, it’s rough to hear so many fifth graders are cooler than me.

* People are pitching a fit because the First Lady wore a sleeveless dress to her husband’s national address this week.  Honestly?  Whose life is that empty?  (Besides the people who write 214 words about marijuana, then send them to a TV station.)

* I didn’t see Bobby Jindal’s GOP response to Obama’s speech, but apparently it was totally awful.  Some people are comparing it to Kenneth the page from “30 Rock.”  Was it really that bad?  Now I want to see it.

Okay, now I’ve seen it.  It is pretty bad.

* Enjoy the 99 greatest things in internet history.  (Yes, “Boom goes the dynamite” makes the cut.)

* Don’t you hate it when you get a sex change operation and then you realize you made a mistake, so you get another operation to go back to your original gender?  Yeah, I hate that.