2004/12/09
Marketing Ploys That Work On Me
Labelling the product Imported From:
-Denmark
-Chile
-Ireland
-Luxembourg
-The really rude part of France, wherever that is
-Mommy’s Kitchen, with hugs and kisses
Using one of these geographic descriptors as all or part of the product name:
-Yukon
-Kootenay
-Swiss-inspired
-US-invaded
-Country-fried
Inserting one or more of these adjectives somewhere on the packaging:
-Bold
-Dark
-Bitter
-Spiteful
-Hint ‘o Jalopeno
-Cheese-infused
Applying one or more of the following colors on the packaging and/or product:
-Forest green
-Burnt orange
-Sepia
-Whiskey-hue
-Beer-tinge
-Peroxide blonde
Sweetening the transaction with one or more of the following:
-99% off!
-A complimentary 6oz. tumbler
-Tenth one is free!
-Three or more Air Miles
-Free membership in a club or secret society that excludes minorities
-A "rub and tug"
Airing a commercial depicting:
-Big SUVs flying along untamed trails
-Pretty ladies admiring their balding dork husbands
-Any extreme sport, excluding half-pipe skateboarding
-Puppies licking faces
-Spontaneous good times in a restaurant, bar, or pool hall
-People expressing orgasmic pleasure while tasting potatoes
|
Labelling the product Imported From:
-Denmark
-Chile
-Ireland
-Luxembourg
-The really rude part of France, wherever that is
-Mommy’s Kitchen, with hugs and kisses
Using one of these geographic descriptors as all or part of the product name:
-Yukon
-Kootenay
-Swiss-inspired
-US-invaded
-Country-fried
Inserting one or more of these adjectives somewhere on the packaging:
-Bold
-Dark
-Bitter
-Spiteful
-Hint ‘o Jalopeno
-Cheese-infused
Applying one or more of the following colors on the packaging and/or product:
-Forest green
-Burnt orange
-Sepia
-Whiskey-hue
-Beer-tinge
-Peroxide blonde
Sweetening the transaction with one or more of the following:
-99% off!
-A complimentary 6oz. tumbler
-Tenth one is free!
-Three or more Air Miles
-Free membership in a club or secret society that excludes minorities
-A "rub and tug"
Airing a commercial depicting:
-Big SUVs flying along untamed trails
-Pretty ladies admiring their balding dork husbands
-Any extreme sport, excluding half-pipe skateboarding
-Puppies licking faces
-Spontaneous good times in a restaurant, bar, or pool hall
-People expressing orgasmic pleasure while tasting potatoes
2004/12/07
Back In Black, Baby!!!
S**T SANDWICHCINEMATELEVISION
THIS EDITION:
Nick and Jessica’s Christmas Special!
Dear readers, I know that I have departed from the format. This feature is supposed to be all about the worst of cinema. Where is the challenge in writing about the worst of television? Isn’t all television awful?
Oh dear, not this kind of awful.
Months ago, when it still looked like Nick and Jessica were bankable stars, the suits at ABC signed them up for a few variety specials. People liked the Sonny and Cher Show, after all, so why not Nick and Jessica?
Except it’s not 1976, and people watched Sonny and Cher because there were only three channels back then, and Cher hated Sonny and the show and she took off and married the Doobie Brothers. Oh, it was the Allman Brothers? Oh, just one Allman Brother? And he actually died before they got married? Wow, that’s depressing. Moving on…
So now it’s 2004, and we have eleventy-billion channels, and we all know Nick and Jessica’s marriage is running on fumes. In fact, I’ll bet they’re staying together simply to honor the many contractural obligations they were suckered into by their greedy agents. That, and Nick would be hanging on because these obligations represent the only showbiz-related income he’s got left. One more television special means one more month he won’t have to manage a Sunglass Hut in Bismarck.
I programmed a reminder into the television menu so I wouldn’t miss the trainwreck. Unfortunately, the reminder popped up on the screen just five minutes prior to airtime. Knowing I could not get through the next hour sober, I scrambled for my fix. I could have pounded back seventeen beers, but the buzz wouldn’t have hit until the second half hour. I could have guzzled the stuff that comes out of my homemade still under the stairs in the basement, but I would have been rendered blind before the opening credits rolled.
Finally I settled on the can of spray paint in the garage. Combined with a paper bag, self-hatred, and a vodka chaser, I huffed my freak on, so to speak.
It turned out to be a wise move. The opening five minutes unfolded like the drive-thru menu in Hell.
Nick and Jessica will be joined by 98 Degrees! Ashlee Simpson! Brian McKnight! Hey, that guy still has a career? How? It’s like when you flick channels and realize J.A.G. is still on the air. How does this happen? And the Simpson and Lachey families! Fantastic, I always wondered what Jessica’s great-aunt from her mom’s side looked like…
Nick and Jessica show us their “house”. It’s actually a soundstage in Hollywood, but let’s pretend, okay? Alright. The house is magical, you see. Nick demonstrates you can clap your hands, and presents will appear under the tree. Super cool! You can snap your fingers, and a gospel choir materializes on the stairs. Super-duper cool!
Jessica demonstrates that when you flick this switch on the wall up and down, the lights go on and off. Get it? Jessica’s so stupid she doesn’t understand electricity! And she knows people think she’s stupid, so she’s trying to be in on the joke! And she would be, if only the joke was clever. But, it’s not. Poor Sh*t For Brains.
As if to get away from the stench of the last joke, Jessica breaks into song (or as the Simpson family calls it, a technician cues up the vocal track), accompanied by a big band. Jessica lip syncs a generic Christmas carol and we head to commercial.
Fooled you! It’s a spoof of a commercial, performed by a towel-clad Nick! In response to his wife’s edible cologne, Nick is selling his own lickable deodorant. Nick applies the product to his underarms, and well, the rest of the commercial plays out as you can imagine. Wait, you can’t imagine how bad it was. Some guy who looks like porn star Ron Jeremy licks Nick’s pit and says “mmm, tastes like waffles!”. God help us all. I threw up a little bit in my mouth.
Back from the real commercials, we learn that Jessica has wrapped Nick’s present and put it under the tree. Except it won’t stay under the tree, because it’s a dog! Get it? Jessica is so stupid she wrapped a living thing! And she knows people think she’s stupid, so she’s trying to be in on the joke! And she would be, if only the joke was clever. But, it’s not. Poor, poor Sh*t For Brains.
We head to commercial with the promise that Ashlee Simpson will be skulking by in the next segment.
But it’s not a commercial! It’s a spoof promo for The Apprentice, with Nick dressed as Donald Trump dressed as Santa, and Jessica playing that cold blonde b*tch in the boardroom, and it’s long and drawn out and none of it’s funny and I pound the table saying someone should pay for this, damn it!. We need a Nuremberg Trial for bad TV.
Back from the real commercials (are advertisers proud to be associated with this show? Why aren’t we boycotting companies that endorse this sh*t?) we see that Ashlee has indeed stopped by. I suspect this special was taped before Ashlee’s ass clown antics on Saturday Night Live. Otherwise, wouldn’t she be embarrassed to be seen in public? Oh wait, I forgot, there is no shame, anymore.
Anyway, Les Souers Simpson warble another forgettable holiday classic. I give Jessica credit for at least looking classy. Ashlee, on the other hand, looks like that record store clerk that just sits behind the till chewing her cuticles and ignoring the customers. I guess it gives her some of that street cred we all seek in life. Still, a dress, or even some nice culottes might have been nice, you know?
Brian McKnight shows up to sing with Jessica. The rest of what was 98 Degrees got time off from their jobs at the mall to come and sing with Nick. Afterward, Jessica heads outside to spontaneously sing another generic Christmas carol. Then her tongue gets stuck to a metal pole, because she’s so stupid! But she knows people think she’s stupid, yada yada yada…Sh*t For Brains. Damn, it feels like the spray paint is wearing off…
Now it’s time for the big finale... the waxing of Nick’s scrotum!
No, it's actually something more painful to watch, as the Simpson and Lachey families parade onto the stage. Wow, I haven’t seen this many uncomfortable and unattractive people since that time I rode an overbooked Greyhound bus from Vancouver to Regina with the Saskatchewan Roughriders cheerleading squad. Drink till they’re pretty, whispered my Croatian seatmate Vlastimil as he handed me a flask full of butterscotch schnapps. It didn't work...
Sensing the audience can still be sickened further, Nick and Jessica lead their parents, siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents in another generic Christmas carol. The camera pans across the horrid mélange of Simpsons and Lacheys, and it appears lip syncing runs rampant in both families. But I’ll bet if you asked any of them, they would actually admit they can’t sing, unlike two or three of their more famous family members, ahem…
Nick and Jessica say goodnight, and the palpable tension lifts as the studio audience finds a reason to hang on for just one more day. The credits roll and we are actually treated to a blooper reel for some unfathomable reason. How was it decided that some content wasn’t good enough for this show? I have no idea.
Anyway, the blooper reel is very lame. It depicts lots of giggling and schlepping around, the kind that makes a floor director eat a gun at the end of the day after being shitcanned for all the overtime that had to be paid out to the stagehands. Awful, dreadful stuff, perfectly in sync with the entire hour.
If you ever get a chance to watch it (assuming you find yourself in a pique of self-loathing) don't forget to pick up a can of Tremclad, and make sure it's the rust-eating type. You won't be sorry!
Huff-Meter: *********1/2 out of **********
|
S**T SANDWICHCINEMATELEVISION
THIS EDITION:
Nick and Jessica’s Christmas Special!
Dear readers, I know that I have departed from the format. This feature is supposed to be all about the worst of cinema. Where is the challenge in writing about the worst of television? Isn’t all television awful?
Oh dear, not this kind of awful.
Months ago, when it still looked like Nick and Jessica were bankable stars, the suits at ABC signed them up for a few variety specials. People liked the Sonny and Cher Show, after all, so why not Nick and Jessica?
Except it’s not 1976, and people watched Sonny and Cher because there were only three channels back then, and Cher hated Sonny and the show and she took off and married the Doobie Brothers. Oh, it was the Allman Brothers? Oh, just one Allman Brother? And he actually died before they got married? Wow, that’s depressing. Moving on…
So now it’s 2004, and we have eleventy-billion channels, and we all know Nick and Jessica’s marriage is running on fumes. In fact, I’ll bet they’re staying together simply to honor the many contractural obligations they were suckered into by their greedy agents. That, and Nick would be hanging on because these obligations represent the only showbiz-related income he’s got left. One more television special means one more month he won’t have to manage a Sunglass Hut in Bismarck.
I programmed a reminder into the television menu so I wouldn’t miss the trainwreck. Unfortunately, the reminder popped up on the screen just five minutes prior to airtime. Knowing I could not get through the next hour sober, I scrambled for my fix. I could have pounded back seventeen beers, but the buzz wouldn’t have hit until the second half hour. I could have guzzled the stuff that comes out of my homemade still under the stairs in the basement, but I would have been rendered blind before the opening credits rolled.
Finally I settled on the can of spray paint in the garage. Combined with a paper bag, self-hatred, and a vodka chaser, I huffed my freak on, so to speak.
It turned out to be a wise move. The opening five minutes unfolded like the drive-thru menu in Hell.
Nick and Jessica will be joined by 98 Degrees! Ashlee Simpson! Brian McKnight! Hey, that guy still has a career? How? It’s like when you flick channels and realize J.A.G. is still on the air. How does this happen? And the Simpson and Lachey families! Fantastic, I always wondered what Jessica’s great-aunt from her mom’s side looked like…
Nick and Jessica show us their “house”. It’s actually a soundstage in Hollywood, but let’s pretend, okay? Alright. The house is magical, you see. Nick demonstrates you can clap your hands, and presents will appear under the tree. Super cool! You can snap your fingers, and a gospel choir materializes on the stairs. Super-duper cool!
Jessica demonstrates that when you flick this switch on the wall up and down, the lights go on and off. Get it? Jessica’s so stupid she doesn’t understand electricity! And she knows people think she’s stupid, so she’s trying to be in on the joke! And she would be, if only the joke was clever. But, it’s not. Poor Sh*t For Brains.
As if to get away from the stench of the last joke, Jessica breaks into song (or as the Simpson family calls it, a technician cues up the vocal track), accompanied by a big band. Jessica lip syncs a generic Christmas carol and we head to commercial.
Fooled you! It’s a spoof of a commercial, performed by a towel-clad Nick! In response to his wife’s edible cologne, Nick is selling his own lickable deodorant. Nick applies the product to his underarms, and well, the rest of the commercial plays out as you can imagine. Wait, you can’t imagine how bad it was. Some guy who looks like porn star Ron Jeremy licks Nick’s pit and says “mmm, tastes like waffles!”. God help us all. I threw up a little bit in my mouth.
Back from the real commercials, we learn that Jessica has wrapped Nick’s present and put it under the tree. Except it won’t stay under the tree, because it’s a dog! Get it? Jessica is so stupid she wrapped a living thing! And she knows people think she’s stupid, so she’s trying to be in on the joke! And she would be, if only the joke was clever. But, it’s not. Poor, poor Sh*t For Brains.
We head to commercial with the promise that Ashlee Simpson will be skulking by in the next segment.
But it’s not a commercial! It’s a spoof promo for The Apprentice, with Nick dressed as Donald Trump dressed as Santa, and Jessica playing that cold blonde b*tch in the boardroom, and it’s long and drawn out and none of it’s funny and I pound the table saying someone should pay for this, damn it!. We need a Nuremberg Trial for bad TV.
Back from the real commercials (are advertisers proud to be associated with this show? Why aren’t we boycotting companies that endorse this sh*t?) we see that Ashlee has indeed stopped by. I suspect this special was taped before Ashlee’s ass clown antics on Saturday Night Live. Otherwise, wouldn’t she be embarrassed to be seen in public? Oh wait, I forgot, there is no shame, anymore.
Anyway, Les Souers Simpson warble another forgettable holiday classic. I give Jessica credit for at least looking classy. Ashlee, on the other hand, looks like that record store clerk that just sits behind the till chewing her cuticles and ignoring the customers. I guess it gives her some of that street cred we all seek in life. Still, a dress, or even some nice culottes might have been nice, you know?
Brian McKnight shows up to sing with Jessica. The rest of what was 98 Degrees got time off from their jobs at the mall to come and sing with Nick. Afterward, Jessica heads outside to spontaneously sing another generic Christmas carol. Then her tongue gets stuck to a metal pole, because she’s so stupid! But she knows people think she’s stupid, yada yada yada…Sh*t For Brains. Damn, it feels like the spray paint is wearing off…
Now it’s time for the big finale... the waxing of Nick’s scrotum!
No, it's actually something more painful to watch, as the Simpson and Lachey families parade onto the stage. Wow, I haven’t seen this many uncomfortable and unattractive people since that time I rode an overbooked Greyhound bus from Vancouver to Regina with the Saskatchewan Roughriders cheerleading squad. Drink till they’re pretty, whispered my Croatian seatmate Vlastimil as he handed me a flask full of butterscotch schnapps. It didn't work...
Sensing the audience can still be sickened further, Nick and Jessica lead their parents, siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents in another generic Christmas carol. The camera pans across the horrid mélange of Simpsons and Lacheys, and it appears lip syncing runs rampant in both families. But I’ll bet if you asked any of them, they would actually admit they can’t sing, unlike two or three of their more famous family members, ahem…
Nick and Jessica say goodnight, and the palpable tension lifts as the studio audience finds a reason to hang on for just one more day. The credits roll and we are actually treated to a blooper reel for some unfathomable reason. How was it decided that some content wasn’t good enough for this show? I have no idea.
Anyway, the blooper reel is very lame. It depicts lots of giggling and schlepping around, the kind that makes a floor director eat a gun at the end of the day after being shitcanned for all the overtime that had to be paid out to the stagehands. Awful, dreadful stuff, perfectly in sync with the entire hour.
If you ever get a chance to watch it (assuming you find yourself in a pique of self-loathing) don't forget to pick up a can of Tremclad, and make sure it's the rust-eating type. You won't be sorry!
Huff-Meter: *********1/2 out of **********
2004/12/06
Tim Allen Cannot Fail
Yes, I’ll be parting with eight dollars to see Christmas With The Kranks. The critics say I’m a fool, and I agree with them. In a free country, I, along with disgraced MP Carolyn Parrish, can make utterly foolish decisions.
This movie is another Tim Allen vehicle, and I would follow Tim Allen to hell if he was bringing his latest production with him. It doesn’t hurt that Jamie Lee Curtis is there, providing able support. I have lusted for the scream queen going on twenty-five years, from Hallowe’een to Perfect to True Lies, ever since I was young enough to be scared of my own erections.
I know that Santa Clause, Santa Clause 2, Joe Somebody, Big Trouble, and For Richer or Poorer (and coming soon The Shaggy Dog and In The Pink) are not going to be shown in any retrospectives at the 2024 Academy Awards. That is fine with me. I tried to sit through The Piano and nearly hanged myself, so critical praise is not always the panacea it promises to be.
Oh, and I know that Galaxy Quest was hailed as a good film, but I didn’t catch that. I don’t want to see Good Tim Allen.
I watch Tim Allen’s movies for reasons I cannot pinpoint, but I suspect they are all at once sophisticated and inane. Tim Allen would haunt me, were he not so one-dimensional.
I say it over and over, but in the end, all we are left with is our delusions and our gin. I would have sneered at a Tim Allen movie ten years ago, but now, it looks like he’s having so much fun, like he’s really not taking himself too seriously. I’d like to have as much fun as Tim Allen appears to be having, but I suspect that won’t happen in my lifetime, so I’ll head to the cineplex and pay the eight bucks.
* * *
Invest In Magic-Cuts
After sixteen months of doing it myself, I’ll be letting a real barber cut my hair in a few weeks.
It was quite a run. Cutting your own hair, any time you feel like it, for free, provides an adrenaline rush few can appreciate. In one small way I had gotten out from under The Man. No more appointments for me, no more waiting and reading old crappy magazines, no more forced small-talk in the chair. It was liberating.
I want to thank all of you in advance for just not noticing or caring, or feigning surprise that my haircuts were anything other than professional. You had to think something was up from time to time, what with the uneven and constantly changing length in the front, sides, and back, the infamous Summer 2003 bowl cut, the even more infamous Christmas brush cut, and the general sense that something was detracting from my otherwise brooding, sultry good looks.
Consider this a heads up, for within days I shall go back to being the most handsome man in the room. Gentlemen, you all had your chance to catch up. Ladies, I encourage you to resume your quiet, unspoken yearning. Nevertheless I am still unavailable, so please accept this while you slowly burn. Noting more than the usual furtive, longing glances can happen between us.
* * *
Still on the subject of my gorgeousness…
This next story was inevitable, I suppose. When your child inherits your genes, she is eventually going to notice she is blessed with gifts other kids admire..
Last week, Sydney told me “lots” of the boys at pre-school like her.
“Why?” I asked.
“I think because I’m so pretty,” she said.
Parental instinct nearly took hold, and initially I wanted to advise her that she should only worry about the boys that like her for who she is, not for what she looks like. But I held back because a) she is too young to understand that idea, and b) it’s pure bulls**t.
I give her credit for recognizing early that it’s all about style over substance. There is a free lunch, for the beautiful people. It comes with salad, dessert, and a bottomless soft drink. When you’re beautiful, you don’t have to worry about getting into a good school, or achieving good grades.
In fact, who needs university at all when you’re beautiful enough to work as a spokesmodel/presenter at Boat & RV Shows, probably well into your late forties? If things go just right, her booth is situated right next to the autograph table, and she marries some washed-up hack who starred in The O.C. for a time. Of course his teen idol status fades, and he gradually drifts out of the mainstream and into dinner theatre. They live off his residuals from television. Then his closeted gay lifestyle is exposed in the tabloids, and she ends up penniless, forced to work as a celebrity endorser for Depends undergarments. The remainder of her life is spent in quiet desperation, wondering where she would be had she finished Grade 10.
Hmmph. I guess I should resume teaching her the alphabet.
* * *
Irrelevance and everything after
The citizenry has voted, and Tommy Douglas is The Greatest Canadian.
What a wonderfully pointless, utterly meaningless tidbit! But it deflects attention from the embarrassing revelation that Canada has to import Eastern European women in order to deal with its shortage of exotic dancers.
While the government and mainstream media cringe at this story, I am saddened by this development. When did a life of high pay, few working hours, exploitation and drug abuse become so unappealing? Has the PC agenda finally denied women an easier way to degrade themselves for a six figure income?
Let me tell you, if you take away the strip clubs, where else will women go for that kind of cash? Blind servitude in the corporate world? Marriage to Conrad Black? How bleak for any of today’s underachieving ladies burdened with low-self-esteem.
Now, back to those Eastern European women. On a positive note, I expect them to revolutionize our exotic dancing industry the way Wayne Gretzky advanced the sport hockey. Except naked, right?
* * *
Wow, those new Air Canada commercials are powerful!
When Celine Dion belts out You and I were meant to fly, I close my eyes and imagine Celine and I holding hands, and flying…right off the ledge of a building.
Memo to Air Canada: you're supposed to make people want to fly on your planes, not formulate elaborate plans to crash one of your jets into Celine's theatre in Vegas during one of her performances. I have no idea how I'll get my Christmas shopping done while I'm cribbing ideas from the Al Qaeda guys. It takes forever to decipher chicken scratch Arabic...
|
Yes, I’ll be parting with eight dollars to see Christmas With The Kranks. The critics say I’m a fool, and I agree with them. In a free country, I, along with disgraced MP Carolyn Parrish, can make utterly foolish decisions.
This movie is another Tim Allen vehicle, and I would follow Tim Allen to hell if he was bringing his latest production with him. It doesn’t hurt that Jamie Lee Curtis is there, providing able support. I have lusted for the scream queen going on twenty-five years, from Hallowe’een to Perfect to True Lies, ever since I was young enough to be scared of my own erections.
I know that Santa Clause, Santa Clause 2, Joe Somebody, Big Trouble, and For Richer or Poorer (and coming soon The Shaggy Dog and In The Pink) are not going to be shown in any retrospectives at the 2024 Academy Awards. That is fine with me. I tried to sit through The Piano and nearly hanged myself, so critical praise is not always the panacea it promises to be.
Oh, and I know that Galaxy Quest was hailed as a good film, but I didn’t catch that. I don’t want to see Good Tim Allen.
I watch Tim Allen’s movies for reasons I cannot pinpoint, but I suspect they are all at once sophisticated and inane. Tim Allen would haunt me, were he not so one-dimensional.
I say it over and over, but in the end, all we are left with is our delusions and our gin. I would have sneered at a Tim Allen movie ten years ago, but now, it looks like he’s having so much fun, like he’s really not taking himself too seriously. I’d like to have as much fun as Tim Allen appears to be having, but I suspect that won’t happen in my lifetime, so I’ll head to the cineplex and pay the eight bucks.
* * *
Invest In Magic-Cuts
After sixteen months of doing it myself, I’ll be letting a real barber cut my hair in a few weeks.
It was quite a run. Cutting your own hair, any time you feel like it, for free, provides an adrenaline rush few can appreciate. In one small way I had gotten out from under The Man. No more appointments for me, no more waiting and reading old crappy magazines, no more forced small-talk in the chair. It was liberating.
I want to thank all of you in advance for just not noticing or caring, or feigning surprise that my haircuts were anything other than professional. You had to think something was up from time to time, what with the uneven and constantly changing length in the front, sides, and back, the infamous Summer 2003 bowl cut, the even more infamous Christmas brush cut, and the general sense that something was detracting from my otherwise brooding, sultry good looks.
Consider this a heads up, for within days I shall go back to being the most handsome man in the room. Gentlemen, you all had your chance to catch up. Ladies, I encourage you to resume your quiet, unspoken yearning. Nevertheless I am still unavailable, so please accept this while you slowly burn. Noting more than the usual furtive, longing glances can happen between us.
* * *
Still on the subject of my gorgeousness…
This next story was inevitable, I suppose. When your child inherits your genes, she is eventually going to notice she is blessed with gifts other kids admire..
Last week, Sydney told me “lots” of the boys at pre-school like her.
“Why?” I asked.
“I think because I’m so pretty,” she said.
Parental instinct nearly took hold, and initially I wanted to advise her that she should only worry about the boys that like her for who she is, not for what she looks like. But I held back because a) she is too young to understand that idea, and b) it’s pure bulls**t.
I give her credit for recognizing early that it’s all about style over substance. There is a free lunch, for the beautiful people. It comes with salad, dessert, and a bottomless soft drink. When you’re beautiful, you don’t have to worry about getting into a good school, or achieving good grades.
In fact, who needs university at all when you’re beautiful enough to work as a spokesmodel/presenter at Boat & RV Shows, probably well into your late forties? If things go just right, her booth is situated right next to the autograph table, and she marries some washed-up hack who starred in The O.C. for a time. Of course his teen idol status fades, and he gradually drifts out of the mainstream and into dinner theatre. They live off his residuals from television. Then his closeted gay lifestyle is exposed in the tabloids, and she ends up penniless, forced to work as a celebrity endorser for Depends undergarments. The remainder of her life is spent in quiet desperation, wondering where she would be had she finished Grade 10.
Hmmph. I guess I should resume teaching her the alphabet.
* * *
Irrelevance and everything after
The citizenry has voted, and Tommy Douglas is The Greatest Canadian.
What a wonderfully pointless, utterly meaningless tidbit! But it deflects attention from the embarrassing revelation that Canada has to import Eastern European women in order to deal with its shortage of exotic dancers.
While the government and mainstream media cringe at this story, I am saddened by this development. When did a life of high pay, few working hours, exploitation and drug abuse become so unappealing? Has the PC agenda finally denied women an easier way to degrade themselves for a six figure income?
Let me tell you, if you take away the strip clubs, where else will women go for that kind of cash? Blind servitude in the corporate world? Marriage to Conrad Black? How bleak for any of today’s underachieving ladies burdened with low-self-esteem.
Now, back to those Eastern European women. On a positive note, I expect them to revolutionize our exotic dancing industry the way Wayne Gretzky advanced the sport hockey. Except naked, right?
* * *
Wow, those new Air Canada commercials are powerful!
When Celine Dion belts out You and I were meant to fly, I close my eyes and imagine Celine and I holding hands, and flying…right off the ledge of a building.
Memo to Air Canada: you're supposed to make people want to fly on your planes, not formulate elaborate plans to crash one of your jets into Celine's theatre in Vegas during one of her performances. I have no idea how I'll get my Christmas shopping done while I'm cribbing ideas from the Al Qaeda guys. It takes forever to decipher chicken scratch Arabic...
