A series of godless tornadoes attacked Arkansas yesterday, sending razorbacks flying, and knocking out the electricity in three counties. Now, I know what you’re thinking: “Arkansas has electricity?” But, yes, it appears they do. I believe it was originally installed by godless socialist Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1936, as part of his commie Rural Electrification Administration. A typical liberal socialist redistribution of wealth, if you ask me.

Speaking of pigs, a new study (in Australia; thank goodness this isn’t one we had to pay for) finds that there’s a sixth taste. Or at least that some people can discern the taste of “fat.” Apparently it isn’t a good taste, though, ‘cuz people who are sensitive to it tend to eat less of it. I bet they don’t get out to Burger King much.

Bill Gates is no longer the world’s wealthiest dude. That distinction now belongs to Mexican native Carlos Slim Helu. Great, now we’re even outsourcing out billionaire jobs to Mexico.

There’s been a little too much man-on-man grabass in the news lately (and, for the record, I disapprove of this willy-nilly groping – not to mention willy groping – of other people’s parts, without at least a tacit agreement between the parties involved; it also seems to show that, even though, during his Naval service – which brings a rather disturbing image to mind – nobody may have asked Eric Massa, I think they could kinda tell). So, I thought I’d try and balance it out with a story from – not surprisingly – Florida.

Now, as I understand it, a woman who only a day earlier had been convicted of DUI and driving on a suspended license was driving her Chevy pickup truck on her way to visit her boyfriend. Understandably, she wanted to look her best for her boyfriend, so she asked her passenger – who happened to be her ex-husband, Charles – to take the wheel while she shaved her hoo-hoo. You wouldn’t think this would be a problem, but apparently she slammed into the back of a 1995 Thunderbird that had slowed down to take a left. I guess Chuck wasn’t keeping his eyes on the road.

So, anyway, to talking on your cell phone and texting, add shaving your naughty bits to the list of things you shouldn’t do while driving. I mean, would it set your schedule back that much to pull over and take care of business? ‘Cuz if you’ve got that much to take care of, you really need to set up a personal grooming schedule (though I have to confess, I really don’t get the obsession with shaving that there stuff; it’s kind of nature’s fig leaf – though I suppose fig leaves are nature’s fig leaf).

Oh well, I guess it’s about that time.

Meet the latest candidate for NYS Governor, Kristin Davis, who is prepared to throw her, um, hat into the ring.

Davis built the most successful escort service in world history. She had more than 100 girls and operated in 5 countries, with a call center in Uruguay. She could dispatch a $1,000-plus-an-hour call girl to a hotel or residence in Paris, Berlin, Gstaad, Rome, New York, L.A., Miami, Dubai, Montreal or elsewhere within minutes. She personally recruited her girls at bars, clubs, resorts and restaurants.

Presumably, that’s Rome and/or New York, not Rome, NY. I don’t think there’s much call for $1,000 an hour hookers over there these days. Except for maybe when Tiger Woods is in the area, playing at the Turning Stone casino.

I think Davis would be a fine choice. Since we typically elect whores to office here in NY, I think it’s about time we elected somebody who has experience managing them.

Speaking of those wild and crazy NY politicians, it appears that Eric Massa has gone nuts. Massa was the representative of the district next to mine, and was a strong proponent of single payer health care. Unfortunately, in an interview with Glenn Beck (where Massa actually did what I thought was impossible: he made Beck look sane by comparison) Massa admitted he was less than a perfect boss.

In a one-hour interview with Beck…Massa offered a series of bizarre, even inexplicable explanations for his abrupt departure from office. Coming just hours after news broke that the he was under investigation for groping multiple male staffers, Massa insisted that the interactions were playful in nature, though inappropriate in retrospect.

“Not only did I grope him, I tickled him until he couldn’t breathe,” he said.

Now, I like to have as good a time at work as the next guy (or gal), but if my boss ever tries groping me and tickling me until I can’t breathe, it’ll be the last friggin’ thing he ever tries (I was gonna say, ‘if he tries that, he’s goin’ down,’ but I thought that might be misconstrued). I mean, c’mon, Eric, go to your office, close the door, and spend some quality time with your Tickle Me Elmo doll. Kinda creepy.

Speaking of creepy, creepy li’l Markos Moulitsas got more face time on Olbermann’s show last night, telling Larry O’Donnell that Dennis Kucinich better stop pushing for health care reform that doesn’t suck, or he’ll face a primary challenge next election.

Watch out, Dennis, or Markos will tickle you ’til you can’t breathe.

I went to the grocery store after work yesterday, which wasn’t the way I wanted to cap off a pretty sucky Monday. I’m not that crazy about going out in public these days, mostly because I think people should be taken in moderation, and definitely in groups of three or less. The store, of course, was packed with brain-dead idiots, their grubby, shrieking spawn running amok, daring me to crush them under the wheels of my cart. Fortunately, I only needed some Schinkenbrot and beer (which reminded me of a guy I used to know who for some reason would often say, “oh dear, bread and beer. If I were dead, I wouldn’t be here.” In fact, he isn’t here, ‘cuz he’s been dead for quite a while now), but it was still a challenge to get what I needed and get out again without giving in to my desire to ram somebody with my shopping cart, or run their bratty little kids over. No offense, but can’t you leave them home or lock them in the trunk or something? I mean, do I bring my dogs and let them run loose?

Rather exciting news (for us yokels, anyway) this morning. It seems that John Malkovich and his production company will shooting a movie here this summer. The film – to be titled, “Hotel Syracuse” – is a psychological thriller about a math professor who attends an international math conference in Syracuse (who wouldn’t pay to see that). While staying at the – you guessed it – Hotel Syracuse he encounters people from his past and realizes he is not hallucinating.

I hate it when I realize I’m not hallucinating.

This Mac laptop of mine (or that I’ve been using, anyway) crashed last night. Just locked up and told me I needed to restart, which isn’t all that unusual (contrary to urban legend and the Apple marketing machine). I was on my way to bed anyway, but when I started the thing up this morning, it turned out that the touchpad “click” no longer works. I don’t typically use it, except when the OS crashes, and I have to select the user to log in (once my profile loads, I don’t have to use that). Fortunately, I figure out how to get around it, but it’s still kind of a bummer. Here I thought Macs were indestructible perfect little machines that never crashed or locked up or any of that other stuff. Doesn’t seem to be that way, though. I can see why the TCO of these things is a lot higher. I like the touchpad, though. Even if it no longer clicks.

It’s still basketball season but, beleive it or not, baseball’s spring training has begun, kicking off the start of the 8-month baseball season. Baseball is one of those sports you don’t actually have to watch (hence the appeal to our soon to be ex-Governor). You can get just as much excitement out of reading the box scores in the paper as you can from watching the games. Baseball is so exciting that, when somebody swings really, really hard, but misses the ball, the crowd goes, “oooooh!” And then fifteen minutes of scratching, spitting, head shaking, and checking the runner at first ensues. If the batter actually hits the ball and gets on base, he typically calls an immediate timeout, having exhausted himself by running 90 feet. If the team starts getting a few hits (in other words, something is actually happening), the other team’s manager comes out and talks to the pitcher for a while, presumably to calm down the crowd, who has gotten all riled up from seeing action at a baseball game.

Not that I don’t respect the players’ abilities, mind you. I’m lucky if I can hit a slow pitch softball, and really wouldn’t want to get beaned with a 90 mph fastball. And I don’t think I’d be beating out many singles these days (I wasn’t exactly Speedy Gonzales when I was young; now, I think I’d need to take a break about halfway to first). Plus, I just wouldn’t want to poke myself in the ass with steroids.

Although, I could use a shot of something to get myself going this morning.

This whole Monday thing gets tougher every week.

Tonight is the 82nd Annual Academy Awards ceremony. This used to be a big deal back when I was running movies. I seem to recall we’d have Oscar parties, and get together to watch, though I’m not sure how we managed to do that, since we all had to work on Sunday nights. I guess we probably taped them (yes, tape; this was a long time ago) to watch after work. Now, though, I don’t much care one way or another about the things, though I’ve at least heard of most of the films and actors that were nominated, unlike the Grammys. But I supposed that’s just how it goes when you get old. Back in my day, music was music, you could make a decent living as a working person and have health insurance for your family and a pension to live on when you retired. We walked 100 miles each way to school (but we had fun doing it), never had to lock our doors, and let our dogs roam freely about the neighborhood (in fact, mine would follow me to school in the morning, then make her rounds about the neighborhood getting handouts along the way, and be there waiting to walk me home at the end of the day). Now we have the Internet, cell phones, and HDTV though, so I suppose it’s a fair tradeoff.

So, who will the big winners be tonight? For one, I’m guessing the dual hosts of Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin will go over well. Especially if they let them have a little fun, and don’t stick them with a bunch of schlocky material (which I guess is kind of the definition of Oscar-hosting material, but some is worse than others). I mean, you’ve got Steve Martin for us old-timers (and who doesn’t like Steve Martin), plus Alec Baldwin, for all us, um, old-timers. And it seems like a good match, since Steve is a smart alec and Alec is smart (not that Steve isn’t smart).

For best picture, the only one I’ve seen (on DVD) is District 9, which I thought was pretty good. If you listen to the WTF podcast, you know the disdain that Maron has for James Cameron’s Avatar, which is also up for best picture. I haven’t seen it, personally (other than some extended clips back in October before it came out), so I can’t really comment on it. Maron’s big problem seems to be that, well, for one, it’s Sci-Fi, which he doesn’t like, and also that it cost a lot of money to make. I guess you can always argue whether it’s worth it to spend lots of money making a movie (or paying an actor or an athlete – or even a comedian), and that the money would be better spent on something else. No doubt, it would be.

But I personally don’t care whether it cost $1 million or $1 billion to make a movie. It’s either a good movie (IMHO), or it sucks. From what I’ve seen of Avatar, it looks to be somewhere in the middle. Kinda neat, but not that great. And I’m not sure that Avatar was really all that expensive to make. I’ve seen people throw out estimates like half a billion dollars (which, by the way, if you adjust for inflation, is what it cost to make War and Peace – though, to be fair, that’s like 8 hours), but I’ve seen it suggested that it’s more like $300 million. That’s still a lot of money to a schlub like me, but it’s grossed about $2.5 billion worldwide (and we’re not even talkin’ all the merchandising and whatnot), so while it may not have been “worth it” to produce in terms of its having a positive affect on society, I reckon it was pretty much worth it to investors.

Another movie up for best picture is The Hurt Locker, by James Cameron’s ex-wife, Kathryn Bigelow. I haven’t seen that one, either. It isn’t the kind of movie that makes it up my way (unless it wins an Oscar, and then we’ll see a wider distribution). It sounds pretty interesting, though.

Also nominated are “The Blind Side, An Education”, “Inglourious Basterds”, “Precious”, “A Serious Man”, and “Up in the Air”.

My prediction is that The Hurt Locker will win. It’s the kind of movie that lets us get behind our troops over there in Iraq (which we’ve pretty much forgotten about), but it’s also been on NPR a lot, so it’s got the liberal Hollywood elite seal of approval, and the cast and director were on the Today Show the day the nominations came out (and GE isn’t even an investor in it), which I think pretty much seals it.

Best Actor nominations are Jeff Bridges in “Crazy Heart”, George Clooney in “Up in the Air”, Colin Firth in “A Single Man”, Morgan Freeman in “Invictus”, and Jeremy Renner in “The Hurt Locker”.

Well, as you might have guessed, I haven’t seen any of these. I like George Clooney, and Morgan Freeman has been great in everything I’ve seen him in, but I think I’ll have to go with Jeff Bridges on this one. I hear he was good in this flick (and the Academy loves it when they do their own singing, which he did), plus, let’s face it, most of the voters these days grew up watching Sea Hunt, and everybody knows Lloyd Bridges should have gotten an Oscar for his work in Airplane, so I think Jeff gets the nod here.

For Best Actress, the nominees are Sandra Bullock in “The Blind Side”, Helen Mirren in “The Last Station”, Carey Mulligan in “An Education”, Gabourey Sidibe in “Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire”, and Meryl Streep in “Julie & Julia”. Okay, I didn’t see any of these, either (except a few clips of “Julia”). Meryl Streep is always hard to bet against, but since Dan Aykroyd gave the consummate performance of Julia Child that nobody can possibly outdo, I think Streep is SOL this year. Old broads are usually a pretty good bet, too. But Helen Mirren has already won an Oscar, and, besides, she’s British. This is America, and I don’t think we’re in the mood to be handing out our awards to foreigners this year. For that reason, I think I’ll go with that all-American girl in that All-American, Horatio Alger kinda story (true, even) of homeless boy makes good and plays football, Sandra Bullock. After all, she dyed her hair blonde in this movie, which is quite a stretch for her.

Best Supporting Actor nominees in movies I haven’t seen are Matt Damon in “Invictus”, Woody Harrelson in “The Messenger”, Christopher Plummer in “The Last Station”, Stanley Tucci in “The Lovely Bones”, and Christoph Waltz in “Inglourious Basterds”. I can’t help but be a fan of anybody who’s a hemp advocate, but I don’t think this is the year of the Woody. It may only be Canada, but Christopher Plummer is still a foreigner (and the Academy wouldn’t want to be seen as advocating for universal health care by giving an Oscar to a Canuck). Creepy child molester murderers aren’t really the “feel good” kinda characters the voters are looking for this year, so I think Tucci is out of the running. I think Quentin Tarantino scares the bejesus out of the Academy, and they don’t want to totally ignore one of his films. Plus, who can’t get behind a little bit of Nazi-killin’? That’s why I’ll go with Waltz to take this award.

For Best Supporting Actress (again, haven’t seen any of these), there’s Penélope Cruz in “Nine”, Vera Farmiga in “Up in the Air”, Maggie Gyllenhaal in “Crazy Heart”, Anna Kendrick in “Up in the Air”, Mo’Nique in “Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire”. I just saw Penélope Cruz in a movie whose name I can’t remember the other day with Ben Kingsley and Dennis Hopper. I have to admit, I was impressed with her, um, talents. But, again, “foreginer.” I’ve always liked Maggie Gyllenhaal, but she looks too much like a regular human being to win an Oscar. The smart money would probably be on Mo’Nique, who would be (I think), only the second one-name actress to win an Oscar (Cher won for Moonstruck in 1987, IIRC). But I’m going with a bit of an upset here, and go with fellow SU Alum, Vera Farmiga.

The Best Director nominees are Avatar’s James Cameron, The Hurt Locker’s Kathryn Bigelow, Inglourious Basterds’ Quentin Tarantino, Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire’s Lee Daniels, and Up in the Air’s Jason Reitman. I’m going with Bigelow on this one.

As for all the pissant little categories that nobody gives a shit about? My guess is Avatar will rack up a bunch of these so it can be branded as “Winner of 5 Academy Awards” or whatever, and have a second release to make another billion dollars or so before the DVD sales kick in.

Whatever happens, I’ll have to read about it in the paper, ‘cuz I won’t be watching. I’ll be watching the season finale (crap! It’s over already?) of Big Love.

Have a good one.

Now that President Obama has successfully reformed health care, ended the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, closed Gitmo, ended Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, restored bipartisanship to Congress, reformed the financial industry, solved Global Warming (by calling for more nuke plants), tackled the whole federal government Styrofoam cup controversy, and turned the unemployment situation around, he’s taking on immigration reform. Good idea. He needs something to get all the teabaggers wound up again. They’ve been kinda losing steam. It was either that or gay marriage.

Saturday is the best day of the week, because it’s the only day where I don’t have to work today, and I don’t have to work tomorrow. There should really be more days like that in a typical week. At least two, I think. Sunday is OK, but you have Monday hanging over your head all day. Friday is nice, ‘cuz you don’t have to work the next day, but you still gotta get up and go to work. Of course, it certainly beats being unemployed. The only thing worse than working is not working. And the only thing worse than not working is looking for a job. Or maybe being a prostitute.

It’s been kind of a long week here (and without any snow shoveling), and I’m pretty happy that it’s finally Friday. Other than that, I haven’t really got much of anything to say. But this song has been stuck in my head all morning for some reason, so what the hell. Maybe I can get it stuck in your head, too.

Our governor is facing calls for his resignation because he got free tickets to a NY Yankees World Series game (valued at $450 per ticket). Yankee tickets? Really? That’s the best you can do? Now, I’m not exactly a huge David Paterson fan, but, come on now. Maybe it’s against “the rules” but on the NY State scale of political corruption (aka, the “Boss Tweed Scale”), this doesn’t even register. Look, I’m not a Blinky apologist or anything, but the guy’s already not running for a new term, and on the list of things that need fixing around here, the Blinkster’s pretty much at the bottom.

I actually feel bad for Paterson. I mean, here Eliot Spitzer comes a-callin’, saying, “yo, Dave, I need a black guy on the ticket. Plus the whole blind thing doesn’t hurt, either. So, you up for it or what?”

And Dave’s like, “hmm, let’s see. Lt. Gov. you say? That sounds like a pretty cushy do-nothing job with no real responsibilities. I bet I can even get free Yankees tickets out of it. Sounds good to me, El. Just don’t make me drop the opening puck at some backwater shit hole Upstate.”

Then Spitzer turns out to be one of the dumbest smart guys in history, and BAM! Paterson gets stuck with a multi-billion dollar deficit and a dysfunctional state legislature (that he was pals with just a few month ago). He’s supposed to be going to baseball games and opening shopping malls, and now he’s stuck with this big pile of crap. And while he seems like a nice enough guy (though a little on the goofy side), he’s just not up for the job. But, hey, at least he isn’t out driving drunk.

Speaking of which, California State Senator Roy Ashburn (your typical married, father of four, all-American family values Republican gay basher) got pulled over and charged with DUI on his way home from a gay bar the other night. While the dude that was with him wasn’t charged, he no doubt went home very disappointed.

Thank goodness Prop 8 passed in California. Otherwise, the sanctity of Ashburn’s marriage might be in doubt.

Great picture of Charlie Rangel on the Huff Post to accompany the story about him apparently giving up his Chairmanship of the House Ways and Means Committee (or is he? To sum up the story, yes he is, no he isn’t, yes he is, no he isn’t. UPDATE: Yes he is, but only “temporarily”). He’s wearing a black jacket, but it makes him look like Satan (or at least an old-school vampire – you know, before they got all ‘Lost Boys” and Twilight in the Loafers) wearing a black cape standing amidst the flames of hell. I always got a kick out of Charlie, but it appears he was bad, so I think he needs to go. I’m getting tired of politicians on the take (and, yeah, I think pretty much all of them are) – especially in New York State (the worst ones always seem to be from NYC; I guess Upstate politicians aren’t considered worth paying off – or maybe their prices are so low they fly under the radar). Except for our former mayor, Lee Alexander (best mayor Syracuse has ever had, except he got a kickback on every piece of business the City did), but he was from Jersey, so whattya expect?

The Senate has finally passed stop-gap legislation to extend unemployment benefits and keep highway dollars flowing, now that Jim Bunning (seen in this photo on the RMS Titanic, shortly before putting on a dress and jumping into one of the last available life boats) has stopped doing whatever the hell he was doing to prevent it. They’re calling it a one-man filibuster, but it was some other sort of bullshit than what we’ve come to know as a filibuster (even though the Senate defines a filibuster as an “Informal term for any attempt to block or delay Senate action on a bill or other matter by debating it at length, by offering numerous procedural motions, or by any other delaying or obstructive actions,” which I guess does make it a filibuster after all) . It finally passed 78-19, which show you what a load of crap the Senate rules are. But, nothing we can do about it, of course. The Democrats are too afraid of the Republicans saying mean things about them, and, besides, they want those rules available to them when they’re in the minority (not that they’d actually use them, of course, ‘cuz they’d be too afraid of the Republicans saying mean things about them).

The tea baggers are trying to recall NJ’s US Senator Bob Menendez. It doesn’t actually appear they have the right to recall a federal legislator, though. According to Menendez’s lawyer, there’s nothing in the US Constitution that allows a recall, although NJ is one of 18 states (plus DC) that has a recall procedure in place (along with Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, North Dakota, Oregon, Rhode Island, Washington and Wisconsin). The tea baggers want to see if they can get the required 1.3 million signatures required under the NJ rules. Or something.

Some Air Traffic Controller brought his little kid to work at JFK, and let him clear a couple of flights for take off. The pilots in question didn’t seem to care, but apparently the FAA does. If Ronald Reagan was still around, he’d get this all straightened out (namely, by firing all the Controllers and hiring child labor at slave wages instead). Just one more reason to stay the hell away from airplanes.

Crap, it’s getting late. Time to fly. Sorta.

I think I may move to Kentucky, just to show my support for Jim Bunning, US Senator, Hall of Fame pitcher (not surprisingly, he was a righty), and the USA’s honorary crazy uncle (shown here entering the size of his tallywhacker into the Senate record). Despite his rather apparent senility, KY voters (fun fact, KY is best known for its jelly) returned the Bunster to office back in 2004, where he plays Valentin Arregui to Mitch McConnell’s Luis Molina in Kentucky’s version of Kiss of the Spider Woman (OK, sorry; I realize that’s a pretty obscure reference). His latest feat is not only blocking (repeatedly) unemployment and COBRA extensions for people out of work (which only encourages them to sit on their asses and not look for a job, according to Krazy Jon Kyl of AZ. Question: in poker, does Arizona’s pair of crazy uncles beat Kentucky’s crazy uncle and closet queen?), but at the same time triggering a 21 percent Medicare cut, putting thousands of Federal employees out of work, and killing construction and transportation jobs for tens of thousands of people. Well done, Senator. You’re a credit to your party.

Speaking of a credit to her party, the AFL-CIO is backing Arkansas Lt. Gov Bill Halter’s primary challenge against Blanche Lincoln – pledging at least $3 million to unseat the DINO. Additionally, MoveOn.org and the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, among others, raised nearly half a million dollars for Halter in less than 24 hours after he announced his challenge. Getting AFL-CIO backing is huge – not just financially, but for the man and woman power it brings to the race n manning phone banks, handing out literature, and getting out the vote. You’re a traitor, Blanche, and I hope you go down (on Jim Bunning). And I hope in his victory speech over Lincoln, Halter declares: ‘Sic Semper Tyrannis.’

Oh, crap. Time to go to work again.