There’s an old rule in journalism that you can’t call an event “annual” until it reaches its third installment. Something about not taking organizers at their word, and waiting for actual results.

That’s right, kids: Journalists used to have standards!

Unlike, say, us.

But since, to apply another ironclad rule, eighty percent of success is showing up, and we’ve somehow managed to show up three years running, we’re happy to announce — officially, mind you — the Third Annual Stinque Awards for Achievement in Infamy.

If you’re not familiar with the Stinque Awards, we’ve adopted a Unique Methodology that distinguishes us from the flood of blogfill other year-end awards clamoring for your attention: You do all the work!

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George Plimpton sold Oldsmobiles?

This is the plea of thousands of bloggers, pundits, and late night comedians to Michael Steele. Politico reports that Steele said he’s going to make some sort of announcement tomorrow with regards to the chairmanship of the RNC, but nobody knows if he’s going to step down or announce his run for reelection.

Besides, if he steps down, what excuse would I have to run this photo?

Think good thoughts:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsyaFlVlmCg

Even Whoopi Goldberg couldn’t ruin it ….

[ Flash video not available. ]

Metrodome Roof Collapses [NFL Fanhouse]

Title: “The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead”

Author: Max Brooks

Rank: 59

Blurb: “100 line drawings.”

Review: “The information given might as well have been in bullet points.”

Customers Also Bought: “Dismember-Me 12″ Plush Zombie,” by ThinkGeek

Footnote: It’s our first Stinque Book Club rerun! Yes, it’s a slow week in the Amazon Top 100. But it was last holiday season when this showed up, and we’re fascinated by the idea of a zombie book as a Christmas perennial.

The Zombie Survival Guide [Amazon]

Buy or Die [Stinque@Amazon kickback link]

A San Francisco transgendered woman has filed a damages claim against the California DMV after a clerk at my local office told her when she was trying to change her name and gender on her driver’s license in October that she was going to go to hell for her acts of homosexuality.

Oh, and then he sent a threatening letter to her home four days later begging her not to change her gender, and gave her address to a wackadoodle church that sent her DVDs warning of eternal damnation for homosexuality.

The punchline? He’s been suspended with pay since October.

The second punchline? This is the second time he’s done this in two years.

[SF Chronicle: DMV Clerk Suspended for Sex Change Admonition]