Robin Williams dead at 63 [Entertainment Weekly]

Title: “The Official Scrabble Players Dictionary”

“Corporate Author”: Merriam-Webster

Rank: 16

Blurb: “Updated to include new vocabulary such as fracking, hashtag, and selfie.”

Review: “This was sent to a state prison and they love it.”

Jeremiad: “Of course, what is urgently needed is a book that claims 75000 (or whatever the number turns out to be) REAL Scrabble words, in accordance with the pre-1976 rules that made the game wildly popular; in accordance with those rules, such a book would be based entirely on 21st-century dictionaries. It’s overwhelming likely that you do in fact play with the classic rules. The 1976 changes were implemented by a group of New York City ‘experts’, predecessors of today’s North American Scrabble Players Association (NASPA), who invented a game unpopular even with New Yorkers (the second-largest bridge club on Manhattan has more members than NASPA does throughout the continent, even though all polls show Scrabble to be slightly more popular than bridge!). In coming weeks, I’ll modify this review to show just what the impact of the degraded rules has had on the game.”

Customers Also Bought: “Oregon 54-026 Chain Saw Bar And Chain Oil”

Footnote: Chillax, dude.

The Official Scrabble Players Dictionary [Amazon]

Buy or Die [Stinque@Amazon Kickback Link]

Should’ve let ’em try an electric one as well:

Title: “The Day the Crayons Quit”

Authors: Drew Daywalt and Oliver Jeffers

Rank: 16

Blurb: “Poor Duncan just wants to color. But when he opens his box of crayons, he finds only letters, all saying the same thing: His crayons have had enough! They quit! Beige Crayon is tired of playing second fiddle to Brown Crayon. Black wants to be used for more than just outlining. Blue needs a break from coloring all those bodies of water. And Orange and Yellow are no longer speaking — each believes he is the true color of the sun.”

Review: “I read it to my first grade class and they got hung up on the fact that one of the crayons was naked. I had them illustrate their favorite part and about 80% drew the naked crayon. So although it is a great book, I would use it for grade 2 and up; the first graders really couldn’t grasp the theme.”

Customers Also Bought: “A Day With No Crayons”, “The Crayon Box that Talked”, and “Harold and the Purple Crayon”

Footnote: Four out of five first-graders agree: Trolling the teacher is fun!

The Day the Crayons Quit [Amazon]

Buy or Die [Stinque@Amazon Kickback Link]

They just can’t let go of the charming old racist …

The president of conservative pro-family group Faith2Action last weekend announced the pre-launch of ReaganBook, a social networking site described as “the Facebook for patriots,” according to Right Wing Watch.

Faith2Action President Janet Porter told attendees at the Ohio Liberty Coalition’s “Reload 4 Liberty” event that Facebook has been censoring people like anti-gay activist Peter LaBarbera.

Title: “Minecraft: Essential Handbook: An Official Mojang Book”

Rank: 82

Blurb: “You’re alone in a mysterious new world, full of hidden dangers. You have only minutes to find food and shelter before darkness falls and the monsters come looking for you. What do you do?”

Review: “I have learned more about Creepers and spider jockeys than I ever wanted to know!”

Customers Also Bought: “Minecraft Iron Golem Action Figure”

Footnote: What we do is quickly head home, because clearly we’ve found ourself in the Gaslamp District during Comic-Con.

Minecraft: Essential Handbook [Amazon]

Buy or Die [Stinque@Amazon Kickback Link]

We did it … we really did, 45 years ago: