Posts

OK, Stinquers — a quick contest for big money AND fabulous prizes:

Tomorrow, as Nancy Pelosi hands off the gavel to John Boehner, Agent Orange will give a speech outlining what he intends to do with the next two years.  We all know what he’s going to say, sort of.  But the big question is…

AT WHAT POINT WILL HE LOSE CONTROL OF HIMSELF AND START WEEPING?

Rules are simple.  When the handoff happens, invariably there will be a standing ovation.  As soon as that standing-o stops and he starts flapping his gums, the clock starts.  “Weeping” defined as (a) actual tears or (b) unplanned stoppage in speech for more than two seconds as he tries to collect himself COMBINED WITH acts incidental to weeping (deep breath, sniffling, etc.).

Put your predictions — quoted in minutes and seconds — in the comments.  The Price Is Right scoring rules are in effect: closest to the actual weeping time, without going over, will win.  (Addendum: taking a competitor’s time and adding one second would be frowned upon, yet be totes hilarious at the same time.)  Example:

A — 4:30 // B — 5:30 // C — 5:31

Actual weeping time 5:15 — A wins… and gets to play PLINKO!

(No actual prizes, of course.  So there.)

As I will be judging, I will throw out an obviously wrong answer and declare that he gets through the speech without shedding a single tear.  Not even so much as a manly sniffle.  The rest of you: put some real responses in there.  Bonne chance!

[CNN]

The Day the Seventies Died: Stuck in the Middle with You? Baker Street? Oh, now you remember.

Gerry Rafferty dies aged 63 [Guardian UK]

“Health officials say hundreds of people may have been exposed to hepatitis A while receiving communion on Christmas Day at a church on Long Island, N.Y.” [AP/WaPo; image via Worth1000]

“Twain himself defined a ‘classic’ as ‘a book which people praise and don’t read.’ Rather than see Twain’s most important work succumb to that fate, Twain scholar Alan Gribben and NewSouth Books plan to release a version of Huckleberry Finn, in a single volume with The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, that does away with the ‘n’ word (as well as the ‘in’ word, ‘Injun’) by replacing it with the word ‘slave.'” [Publishers Weekly]

  • 40 years ago: Dad finally relents and lets us read Mad magazine. Worst parenting mistake he ever made.
  • 38 years ago: Do you do the Rich Little Nixon or the David Frye Nixon?
  • 37 years ago: Fucking Watergate hearings. Bring back the Match Game!

Read more »

The college football game tonight pits Virginia Tech against Stanford at the Orange Bowl in Miami. Bettors are giving The Tree a 3-1/2 point edge over Los Hokies.

Not taking the field tonight is The Leland Stanford Junior University Marching Band (LSJUMB), described by the Miami Herald as the “most outrageous marching band in the land,” as Orange Bowl organizers decided they didn’t want to risk the band doing something scandalous at the halftime show.  Instead, the band will be limited to a six minute pre-game show, which LSJUMB has announced is entitled “Recent Events in the Pro Sports World in Miami.”

Kick off is at 8:30 pm Eastern, but it’s unclear whether the networks will show the performance beforehand.  LeBron James may be breathing a sigh of relief.

[MSNBC: Stanford Band Banned from Halftime Tonight]