What's Up Doc?

Both MK and I had appointments to see the doctor today. Nothing is actually wrong, they just insist on seeing you once a year to make sure you're still alive. If you fail to do this, they cut off your drug supply. Medicine...I mean medicine.

The following is a transcript of my discussion with the physician.

Doc: "So, how's it been going fatty?"

Me: "Excuse me?"

Doc: "I said 'How's it going, fatty?' What's wrong? Is the fat clogging your ears too?"

Me: "No I-"

Doc: "Fine. Whatever. How are you doing on your medicines?"

Me: "Good. Everything's good. They work very well and..."

Doc: "Look at that!" Pokes stomach "What's going on here?"

Me: "What? I'm sorry. I know I've gained some weight, but can't you just ease up a little?"

Doc: "How about if you ease up on the Big Macs, tubby."

Me: "Look, I understand I need to lose weight. I just want to get my medicine refilled."

Doc: "Fine. Here's your prescription. Just get out of here. I want to see less of you around here, and I don't mean I want to see you less often."

Me: Runs out sobbing like a little girl.

Sadly, this wasn't even the end of the ordeal. After the visit at the doctor's office, we both had to go and get blood drawn to complete the checkup. This isn't too big of a deal, except that I am very anti-needle. Believe me, there is no worry that I will ever become a heroin addict. Forget legality, danger, expense, addiction or any of the other usual issues; I'm not going to be able to stick a needle into my own veins. It's just not happening.

While we were at the lab getting blood drawn, the phlebotomist (I really just told this story so I could use that word) was a bit too chipper for me. Something about the constant happy humming while you are stabbing and then draining the life from patients seems scary to me. She first began searching for the best spot to begin stabbing MK on the left arm. After a few moments, MK said, "You know, I think they usually have to use my other arm, because it's easier." The response? "Yeah. That doesn't surprise me. There was nothing there that was really lifting my skirt."

I only wish I was making that up.

Until later...

Son of Jor-El, Kneel Before Zod!

Seriously, I don't know what else to say other than I know who I'm voting for. Kneel, Earthlings!

The Contest

The stories are now posted. Read. Decide. Vote.

Don't forget to vote in the ongoing story contest. The entries, rules, etc. can be found on this site. You have through October 6th to vote.

Total Entries: 6 fiction. 2 non-fiction.

Trivial Tuesday

I was very disturbed recently to see on the McDonald's website (long story) that Ronald McDonald's shoe size was in fact not quite as large as my own. I don't really believe it; not those red monstrosities. Anyway, according to McD, what size shoe does Ronald wear?


Usual rules, blah, blah, blah.

While you're at it, finish up the stuff from last week's gigantic Trivial Tuesday.

Until later...

Update: This was a bad question because it's not really common knowledge and you can find a bunch of different answers depending on where you look. Sorry.

The answer (according to the official McDonald's site) is 14 1/2. Not a chance that is true, IMHO. Those shoes are much, much bigger.

Yeah, You Know What This Is. It's A Celebration...

...of the fact that we reached 15,000 hits. That's right, since I added Stat Counter to the site, all of you out there have had nothing better to do 15,000 times. The 15,000th pageload was a person in Sugar Land, TX searching for information about Ethan Rom.

To celebrate this momentous occasion, please hum a few bars of Cool and the Gang's "Celebrate Good Times" to yourself.

Until later...

I'm Back, Baby!

We are now officially in the new house. Even better, we now have our internet access and cable hooked up. Thank you, Charter. I didn't even miss the season premiere of Lost. (If we didn't get hooked up fast enough, I was gonna have to head back to the old house and watch it on the 13-inch TV. )

Of course, just because I'm back doesn't mean I'll be able to post too much. I have a feeling I'm going to be quite busy settling in, unpacking and working on various things around the new place. With that in mind, I'll just give a few updates on a few random things:

1. I still only have three entries in the story contest. Please people, don't leave me hanging. Make the contest a success. Enter your story. Tell your friends. Pimp the contest out to random people on the street. Help me...help you. Help me, help you.



2. The Jerry Maguire reference makes me think: It's very sad that Renee Zellweger and Kenny Chesney split after being married for only 4 months. Reportedly the reason given on the annulment paperwork is "fraud." This made me wonder: Do you think that the fraud was that she told him that she didn't always squint like that? I'm just asking.



3. I think I'm getting sick. Probably a combination of stress, lack of sleep and running out of prescription allergy medicine all at the same time. It's not pretty.



4. We're rapidly approaching (ok, approaching) 15,000 hits since I added Statcounter to the site. I'd say that we'd have some sort of exciting celebration when the counter reaches 15K, but I'm just too lazy to do much of anything.



5. Cap'n Crunch for breakfast...never again. Not ever.



6. If you haven't done so already, take a look at Trivial Tuesday and answer as many of the questions as you can. We'll make this a community exercise in useless information.



7. I've been composing a post in my head about the pros and cons of moving and of house 1 vs. house 2, etc. With any luck and a little time, I'll get it together and post it pretty soon.



8. Dreamworks recently announced a few movies in development in their animation studios. One film on the slate is Kung Fu Panda featuring the voice of Jack Black. I can think of a few thousand reason why this will not work and why I shouldn't go see it. Unfortunately, I can also think of one reason why I should go see it and that one reason will almost certainly outweigh the others. From the plot description: "a lazy, irreverent slacker panda, Po (Voiced by Jack Black), must somehow become a Kung Fu Master." Pandas performing Kung Fu? I'm there. How could that be bad?



9. I need a nap...badly.

Until later...

Trivial Tuesday (Super Size Edition)

Ok, things are going to be a little different this time. Since it's almost moving time, I'm probably not going to be able to update much. I figured why not try to make this week's Trivial Tuesday a little more time consuming to keep everyone entertained while I will be without net access and without the time to post anything for a bit.

The usual rules will apply with a couple of revisions: To get credit, you must answer all 21 of the questions correctly. Even if you don't know the answer to all of them, post as many as you do know, but the game is still open until someone posts a comment with all 21 answers. I normally don't implement the no google (or other versions of cheating) rule, but for this week it is in effect (hopefully that will help keep this going).

Yes, I realize that I just mentioned moving in the first paragraph and that I had promised earlier that I would talk about that. Sorry. Get used to disappointment.

Movies:

Actually, that last sentence is a good starting place. It was taken from the following exchange in a movie:
"I must know..."
"Get used to disappointment."
"Okay"

(1) What was the movie and who were the two actors involved in that scene?

Since I have referred to this as the Super Sized edition: (2) Who made the amusing and informative 2004 documentary "Super Size Me"?

Movie quote fill in the blank (3) "Was it a dream where you see yourself standing in sort of Sun God robes on a pyramid with a thousand naked women screaming and throwing _____ at you?" "No..." "Why am I the only one who has that dream?"

Identify the movie by the quote (4): "When you have to shoot, shoot, don't talk!"

As you probably remember, Alfred Molina played Doc Ock in Spiderman 2. You may even remember that in my review, I discussed that he really needed to keep his shirt on throughout the movie. But do you know (5)what Alfred Molina's first credited movie role was?

Because you can never have enough Star Wars trivia, (6) George Lucas adopted many themes from this Akira Kurosawa film when making the original Star Wars, specifically in the portions of the Star Wars plot dealing with the two droids. Name the movie.

Television:

Joel McHale is the host of the always amusing television recap show "The Soup" on E! (7)Joel can also be seen in television commercials for what fast food franchise? (8)What former host of the previous incarnation of the show, "Talk Soup", went on to get an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor?

In the animated television show Futurama, a prominent politician plays himself, or rather he provides the voice for his head which has been preserved in a jar. (9)He did so because his daughter was a writer on the show. Who was this politician?

On Family Guy's not-as-amusing companion show, American Dad there is an alien living in their house. (10)Who served as the inspiration for the voice of Roger the alien?

(11)The mind behind such gameshows as "The Newlywed Game" "The Dating Game" and "The Gong Show", this man claimed to be a CIA operative and wrote the book (later made into a movie) "Confessions of a Dangerous Mind". Who is he?


Sports:

We all know that I have a fascination with amusing mascots for sports teams, so let's see how well you know some of them. (12)The University of California-Irvine has an interesting mascot for their athletic teams. What is it? (13)What about UC-Santa Barbara?

The all-time home run leader in Major League Baseball is Hank Aaron, followed by Babe Ruth and Barry Bonds. There have been prolific power hitters in other leagues who are not as well known. For example (14) there was a player in Japan who hit over 800 home runs. In addition, there was a (15) catcher in the Negro Leagues of the 1930's who is considered by many to have potentially been the greatest power hitter of all time; unfortunately, his life was cut short by a stroke a few months before Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier. Name these two non-MLB power hitters.



Music (Videos):

The video for Fat Boy Slim's "Weapon of Choice" was directed by (16) this man (who was married to (17) this fellow director) and starred (18) this actor, who may or may not be running for president according to a spoof website, dancing around in violation of the laws of physics.


Word Play:

It's looking like I'm going to have 21 questions in this Trivial Tuesday. Don't worry, I'm not even going to mention the appropriate 50 Cent song for fear it will get stuck in the heads of my readers.

What I just did has a name. (19)What is this word that means to bring attention to a subject by claiming not to mention it?

Despite appearances, (20) pantophobia does not mean a fear of Levi Strauss. So, what does it mean, then?

Final Question:

(21) Clowns: Funny, scary, creepy or secretly planning to kill us all and take over the world?

Good luck to you all.

Update: After a couple weeks, it's time to put this thing to bed. Most of the questions have been answered, but there are still a few open. Posted below are the answers to all of the questions.

1. The Princess Bride, Mandy Patinkin and Cary Elwes

2. Morgan Spurlock

3. Little Pickles

4. The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

5. Raiders of the Lost Ark

6. Hidden Fortress

7. Burger King

8. Greg Kinnear

9. Al Gore

10. Paul Lynde

11. Chuck Barris

12. Anteaters

13. Gauchos

14. Sadaharu Oh

15. Josh Gibson

16. Spike Jonze

17. Sofia Coppola

18. Christopher Walken

19. Apophasis

20. The fear of everything

21. Any answer other than funny is acceptable.

Congratualtions to everyone who got one right. See the comments section to find out who answered what.

Until later...

Who You Gonna Call?

I saw a little bit of Ghostbusters II on TV this weekend, and that got me wondering...Is it wrong that I've been holding out hope for the past 15 or so years that they would make Ghostbusters III, as a form of apology for the second one?


Until later...

It's A Comedy Goldmine

Just when you think inspiration has left you, it strikes twice in one day.

The long-awaited progeny of the Spears-Federline family has arrived. Britney Spears had her baby boy. Where to start? There are just all sorts of things to deal with here.

First, the reports that Britney claims she will be a "hot mom", wearing halter tops and Daisy Dukes while pushing the stroller. I'd say this was supposed to be a joke, but I've seen how she dressed when she was pregnant. And the "MILF in training" shirt she wore. Somewhere out there is a therapist with dollar signs in his eyes when he thinks about this poor kid.

They have also reportedly chosen a name for the bouncing baby boy: Preston Michael Spears. You know the rules about looking at initials before naming? Might want to revisit those, Brit (In fact, check out all sorts of things not to do when naming your kid.). Or not, I'm sure no one will notice the kid whose monogram will be PMS. Nothing to make fun of there. Nope, nothing at all.

No word yet on how Kevin Federline is responding to being a father rather than simply a baby-daddy.

If you would like to purchase a gift for little K-Fed Jr., the family has registered for infant clothing at Von Dutch and Flying J Truck Stops. They are requesting manpris, white tank-top undershirts and sandals.

In honor of the new child, the happy couple, the two kids Kevin already had and Shar Jackson, the mother of those two children, here is a little snippet of a song. And another. Enjoy.

Until later...

Because You Can Always Use Another Tool to Find Fun Stuff Online

Need to find out what other people are saying on a subject? You can now use Blog Search a new feature from Google. I love this you can search for blogs about anything using Google's engine.

For example what if you wanted to find out about bloggers who might be run contests because they are low on ideas? You could find such shameless self-promotion here or by running a search like this.

You could find...say, information about Hindus and elephants, or maybe hair products like cute little clippies and bows, or even the adventures of a mouse named Pennywhistle. Blog Search can help you find all of that and so much more. Isn't it fun?

Until later...

Trivial Tuesday

In the original Star Wars Trilogy, Episodes IV, V and VI, Mark Hamill plays Luke Skywalker. I'm sure that this came as a surprise to none of you. While that is by far the most famous work he has done, he hasn't been sitting idly by since then. In fact, Hamill has spent quite a while voicing a famous comic book villain on an animated series. What is that role?

Update: MC Etcher came in with the correct answer and identified The Joker as the comic book villain voiced by Mark Hamill on Batman: The Animated Series. For the second time in three weeks, MC Etcher gets to brag all he wants.

Until later...

The Disco Ball in My Mouth Insinuates I'm Ballin'

I opened up iTunes this morning and was frightened by what I saw staring back at me from the New Releases section.

I'm not saying anything about his music. I'm not saying anything about him personally. But I really think this might be the most disturbing album cover in history. Forget the "platinum grill". Forget the facial hair that looks more like an oversight than an intentional fashion statement. Do we ever need a picture that close up, much less to someone with that expression on his face? What is that expression anyway? Pride: Is he happy about showing off the teeth? Pain? Perhaps he's thinking about how much the teeth cost him and how much drilling and filing his dentist had to do. Constipation? I don't know why one would use this as an album cover, but that certainly appears to be the most likely cause for the expression. That's my guess. Well, either that or he's passing a kidney stone.


Until later...

Because It Came on After The Simpsons

Last night was Season Premiere night on Fox. Immediately after The Simpsons (a Season Premiere before the Treehouse of Horror episode? It's like Christmas in September), Fox premiered a new show called The War at Home.

The basic premise of TWAH is that the dad, played by that guy that played the cop that date Phoebe on Friends until she dumped him for shooting a bird that was singing outside his bedroom window, has to deal with raising three kids and having a working wife. The show uses the interspersed direct-to-viewer commentary much like the cancelled Fox sitcom, Titus. Sadly, this just served to remind me of how much funnier Titus was than this show.

The show hardly breaks new ground in style, concept or subject matter. It does, however manage to be remarkably offensive. Not in the pushing boundaries and causing you to think way of being offensive, but truly offensive in the racist, homophobic, crass and just plain dull way. Unintelligent and not even remotely humorous, The War at Home will hopefully meet the fate of most new Fox shows and be cancelled before we have to endure a full season.

I think it might actually be the worst sitcom I have ever seen, and considering some of the shows on TV, that's saying a lot.

Until later...

Running on Empty

I've been having a lot of trouble coming up with ideas recently. Sure I can post occasional movie or book reviews, but I've hardly said anything interesting. I've even resorted to posting online quizzes to keep filling space. I don't know what the problem is. I do know that I have a half-written draft post saved that is titled "Perhaps It's Time to Retire".

Since I do not want to retire from my illustrious blogging career just yet, I've got to come up with something to talk about. So, we're going to have a new contest. For the next couple of weeks I'll be accepting entries for a story contest. You may submit stories that are completely fiction or stories that really happened to you. At the end of the contest I will post all stories and allow voting for a 1 week period. There will be one fiction and one non-fiction winner. Here are the official rules.

1. You do not need to be a regular reader. Anyone not related to me is free to enter.

2. You can submit one entry to each category, for a total of two. Submit non-fiction stories here. Submit fiction stories here.

3. Entries must be post-marked (emailed) by 11:59 PM September 25th.

3. Stories must not have been previously published on your blog (or anywhere else).

4. I will not edit the stories for you, correct spelling or grammar. I'm lazy, and have enough issues editing my own work.

5. Winners will be decided by comments posted by readers.

6. In case of a tie, I will cast the deciding vote.

7. You don't really win anything.

Hopefully this will be fun and interesting for everyone. Please enter the contest. If no one enters, I'll just look like a fool. More than usual, that is.

Until later...

What Type of Funny Am I?

Of course, this is all assuming I'm any type of funny at all.

Take the quiz, what kind of funny are you?

the Wit (61% dark, 30% spontaneous, 31% vulgar)

your humor style: CLEAN | COMPLEX | DARK You like things edgy, subtle, and smart. I guess that means you're probably an intellectual, but don't take that to mean pretentious. You realize 'dumb' can be witty--after all isn't that the Simpsons' philosophy?--but rudeness for its own sake, 'gross-out' humor and most other things found in a fraternity leave you totally flat. I guess you just have a more cerebral approach than most. You have the perfect mindset for a joke writer or staff writer. Your sense of humor takes the most thought to appreciate, but it's also the best, in my opinion. You probably loved the Office. If you don't know what I'm talking about, check it out here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/theoffice/. PEOPLE LIKE YOU: Jon Stewart - Woody Allen - Ricky Gervais The 3-Variable Funny Test!

My test tracked 3 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender: You scored higher than 72% on darkness You scored higher than 11% on spontaneity You scored higher than 34% on vulgarity

Life on The Pharm: Aren't We Clever

It was training time today at work. I had a computer based training module that had to be completed by tomorrow, so I made some time in the afternoon to sit down and work on that exclusively. As with most training, it was boring and almost completely pointless. The training focused on how to use a new computer system to locate documents and procedures we might need. See, exciting stuff.

I finished the main part of the training and continued on to the quiz section that you must complete to get credit for the training. The quiz was actually an activity where you had to use the program to search for a few fictional procedures. For the first step, I was required to locate a procedure by number. The procedure number: 8675309. I kid you not. Somebody in our IT or Training department probably had a good laugh at that. It's not everyday you get a Tommy Tutone reference at work.

Until later...

Cross That Bridge When You Come To It

I find it completely hilarious that someone took the time to figure this out and post it on the web. I find it even more hilarious that other people responded by pointing out potential flaws and giving their own theories.

The answer to one of life's great questions: What is the average airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow? Just for good measure, he throws in the capitol of Assyria too.

See, there are people out there who are even bigger nerds than me.

Until later...

Trivial Tuesday

Since the first season of Lost was released on DVD today, I'll ask a Lost related question. This will probably be quite easy for people who watch the show, but can still be answered by those who have never watched. The creepy bad guy from season 1, Ethan Rom, was played by William Mapother, the cousin of creepy famous guy, Tom Cruise. There was something special about Ethan Rom's name. What was it?

As a hint for those who have not seen the show, think along the lines of Hester Mofet.

Update: Congrats to Gail, who knew than Ethan Rom was an anagram for "other man", which can be taken in with a capital "O" meaning that Ethan was one of "the Others" or with a lowercase "o", simply signifying that Ethan was the person in the group that was not on the plane that crashed, thus he was the other man. (For those who missed the other reference Hester Mofet is "The Rest of Me", one of the clever anagrams given to Clarice Starling by Dr. Lector.)

Bragging rights are yours Gail. Do with them what you will.

Until later...

Bipolar Movie Rentals: The Sequel

Building on the last edition of BMR, I returned to Hollywood Video for another couple of dissimilar movies. This time it was Hitch and Fulltime Killer.

Hitch:

This Will Smith-Eva Mendes rom-com focuses on the "Date Doctor" (Smith) who helps the helpless. These particular helpless happen to be guys that he helps get the woman of their dreams to go out on a first date with them and helps make sure that it's not the only date she goes on with them. Enter Albert (Kevin James of King of Queens "fame"). Albert is an accountant who wants to get the attention of one of his clients, socialite Allegra Cole (think Paris Hilton with a personality, but without the home videos). Despite the fact that Cole is far out of Albert's league, Hitch takes the case. Along the way, Hitch meets and falls in love with gossip columnist Sara Milas (Mendes). Of course when a date doctor trying to preserve his anonymity is dating a gossip columnist while also setting up an accountant with a socialite who is always in the gossip columns, hijinks are bound to ensue. They do.

More fun, and more amusing than it has any right to be, Hitch is a pleasant surprise. That is not to say that it's good, but it is enjoyable.

Fulltime Killer:

A Hong Kong action film in the vein of the John Woo/Chow Yun-Fat films of the late 1980's, Fulltime Killer tells the story of two competing assassins working out of Hong Kong. One, a O, is a Japanese assassin who is the most highly sought after killer (by both Interpol and those who wish to hire him), the other, Tok, is a Chinese up-and-comer looking to make his name by taking out his more famous counterpart. Caught between them is Chin, a housekeeper and video store clerk, and two police detectives on the trail of O. We follow the competition between the assassins and the attempts to catch them by the police up to the inevitable showdown.

The movie is exciting and well done, but ultimately fails when compared to some of Woo's Hong Kong action films (but that's a difficult comparison for anything). The story is narrated by four different characters in various parts of the movie, which may not cause confusion, but does cause distraction. If you are the type of person who enjoys a good action film, and especially if you like Hong Kong action films, I would recommend checking it out.

Until later...

What Day Is It?

I was at the grocery store last week, and one of the new seasonal displays caught my eye. Wait...before I continue: Yes, I am aware that almost every story I've told recently has centered on going to the grocery store or Wal-Mart. I'm sorry. It's not intentional, it's just that at the moment my life consists of get up, go to work, go home, go to bed. The only changes are on the days when I have to stop to pick up something from the grocery store or the rare occasions when I manage to watch a DVD. I'm becoming more boring, but it's not my fault. Really, it's not. May I continue? Thank you.

I was at the grocery store last week, and one of the new seasonal displays caught my eye. It wasn't that the display was particularly eye-catching in and of itself. It's more that it's really hard for me to miss a display of candy. I might walk right past flashing lights and ringing bells advertising something useful, but I always have to stop to see what sort of candy is available. There were bags and bags of candy on sale, but this was no ordinary candy. It was Halloween candy.

That's right Halloween. I looked at the candy, looked down at the date on my watch to confirm. August 31st. Two months before Halloween and the candy is already out in the stores. Why? Shouldn't there be some sort of law passed that says that you cannot have Halloween items out for more than a month and then that Thanksgiving things are available after Halloween, Christmas after Thanksgiving, etc.? If we can regulate that whether or not prunes (which are dried plums) can be labeled and sold as dried plums, we can regulate how early seasonal items are on display.

While it may seem that this rant was actually the point of this post, it's not. My real point is simply this: Who can buy candy on August 31st and still have it to give out to Trick or Treaters on October 31st? We've had to stop buying Halloween candy until the 30th of October. Otherwise, there's nothing left to hand to the kids. I have a feeling that the only people who can buy their candy this early are the ones that give out the candy no one likes anyway...no willpower required.

On a slightly different, yet Halloween candy related note: we might actually have more than 5 Trick or Treating kids this year because...we're moving. More on that another time.

Until later...

Searching for The Samurai

I mentioned a while back (in the comments of my review of Kung Fu Hustle) that finding less famous and/or foreign films to rent in Kalamazoo can be difficult, as evidenced by quest to rent Seven Samurai. This is one of the most famous films of all time. It has inspired a host of movies from The Magnificent Seven to A Bug's Life. It comes in at number 5 on the IMDB's list of top 250 movies of all time. If I can expect to find any foreign film at my local video store it would be this one. No problem right? If it were that simple, there wouldn't be a story for me to tell.

A couple of years ago, I decided that, since I had never seen it, I should rent Seven Samurai. Easy enough in concept. I go to the video store. Find the movie, rent it, take it home and watch it. I started looking around the store trying to determine which section would be most likely to house my quarry. Action? It makes sense. I look and no such luck. How about drama? Sure why not. Not there either. Classics? Could be, but it's not. Maybe Western? It's a bit of a stretch (even though it's a very similar style and several of Kurosawa's movies inspired Westerns), but it's a better guess than either musical or comedy and that's all that's left. After an exhaustive search of the premises, I decide to go against my better judgement and ask for help. They've got a computer up there. They can look things up.

I walk up to the counter as the employee looks confused because I am not laden with rentals and purchases. "Hi. I was wondering if you could help me. I'm looking for a movie, and I didn't know if you carried it and I was just overlooking it or what."

The employee perks up. Surely, he'll be able to point me directly to the entire section of Resident Evil, available on DVD, VHS, Laser Disc and BetaMax. "Ok, great what can I help you find?"

"I'm looking for Seven Samurai." The smile on his face is replaced by bewilderment. This only gets worse as I continue. "It's a Japanese movie."

"Huh? What?" Confusion has rendered him more articulate than ever.

"Seven Samurai. It's a film directed by Akira Kurosawa?"

"Who?" It was at this point that I realized I was fighting a losing battle.

"Akira Kurosawa. He was a Japanese director. You know what, do you have a section where I might be likely to find it?"

"Umm...well we have section of foreign movies in the back in the room through those doors." I look back toward the room that only adults can enter. "Is that the type your looking for?"

"No," I said and with a heavy sigh, walked off to go home and start a Netflix account.

Until later...

His Career Certainly Has Gone Downhill

One day last week, we stopped by Wal-Mart after work to pick up a couple of things. We wandered around, doing our shopping as usual, paying little attention to the people on the PA system. Eventually, however, one announcement caught our attention: "Wal-Mart associate Michael Bolton, please call 1-2-3. Michael Bolton call 1-2-3."

Oh, how the mighty have fallen.


Until later...