This is what Memorial Day has boiled down to...

I did not do a damn thing over the Memorial Day weekend, other than work the Saturday and Sunday at my B.S. job, then watch the Cubs blow two straight ninth-inning leads to Pittsburgh, of all teams, before settling in to do some work on the websites and watch the Law and Order marathon on TNT Monday. What can I say...it's a simple enough existence at present. Of course, like a huge chunk of the country, I can ill afford to go anywhere other than the aforementioned B.S. job, as if I could afford to take a day off in the first place, let alone a weekend to meander through the Midwest. Why not lounge around the apartment all day and work on some rants while the reruns are on?

With that in mind...I give you the "staycation."

Yeah, I hear you. What in the damn is a staycation? Glad you asked. Damn glad you asked. According to the Associated Press, a staycation is a vacation you spend at or near home. We actually needed someone to come up with a word to describe staying at home. Like simply saying "oh, I stayed at home, thanks for asking," is no longer sufficient. As dumb as the concept of "mancations" was/is, this cranks up the dial to 11, and then snaps it off and throws the dial away.

Yep. This is exactly how little there is going on in the world today. I pondered this over my first cup of coffee. And then my second cup of coffee. By my third and final cup of the morning, along with some strategic deep breaths, I had come no closer to unlocking the mystery of the staycation. Then again, it wasn't like I needed the 65-year old Indiana Jones or his $185 million budget to help me solve it. Then again, I wouldn't mind even a couple points of that box office gross when it is all said and done.

Near-miss great moments in customer service history

It could have been a great moment in customer service, but... A plumber in Takasaki, Japan was arrested for calling a food company's toll-free number 500 times over a sixteen-month time-span. The man did this because the woman's voice on the automated system apparently tripped his trigger, if you follow.


Wow. I'll never hear the phrase "Your call is very important to us, please continue to hold. Your call will be answered in the order in which it was received" in the same way again. If this poor guy hit his peak, so to speak, in the middle of the sentence, would that mean the date ended badly?


The company turned the police loose on the guy because the fascination with the automated voice racked up an extra 4 million yen (19,500 pounds- like 10 or 11 grand American) on their phone costs.


I'm sorry, but I call bull on this one. This guy makes the equivalent of one call a day, everyday, for sixteen months, to a toll-free number. While that's probably stalking by any definition or stretch of the imagination, how would it apply in this situation? A company opens a toll-free line, as they want their customers to be able to call, but what if every single customer called once a day, every singles day? Would the company expect the police to arrest all of their customers?
Not to mention the $10k or so over the sixteen months? That's like $625/per month. If the company is running that close to the line, maybe they should just torpedo the toll-free line and use the world-renowned, time-honored "one bad apple" excuse. As for our friend, the plumber? I think he deserves a spot in the Cheap Phone Sex Hall of Fame - Innovator Wing. I wouldn't doubt a bit if there actually was one tucked away in some corner of Tokyo somewhere.

It’s official...the worst thing they did to "reality" was televise it...

Same old story, same old song and dance?...reports have Aerosmith lead singer Steven Tyler in rehab now, and of course, the same rehab where Dr. Drew shot Celebrity Rehab- Encinas Hospital. Rumor has it Tyler is seeking treatment for a painkiller addiction. And I wonder, are we on our way towards a Celebrity Rehab: Rock and Roll Hall and Fame Edition? Ugh...probably so.

Meanwhile, whatever passes for the print media in Britain is all over the story purporting that Hell's Kitchen host Gordon Ramsay ate a dish containing the tip of a contestant's thumb during the taping of a recent episode. While I understand accidents can happen, what concerns me is the mainstream media is not picking up on the big detail, and that is...Gordon Ramsay has now acquired a taste for human blood! Man, oh gosh, oh gee, oh freakin wow. While I absolutely and without question loathe reality shows, and most anything connected to them, I can't help but feel sorry for future contestants. You thought getting a dressing-down from Britain's most profane master chef was bad enough, wait until he literally takes a bite out of someone's ass...betcha it happens during the next sweeps period.

As for American Idol, it wasn't like I gave two shits and a fuck about the winner (or any of the losers, hopefuls, fans, production crew...all the way down to the schmuck that brings them coffee and percosets during tapings) or all the inexplicable hype paid to the season finale. Like it's over. Like it is ever freaking over. Sure, the new episodes are over, and now all these drooling simps who watch this crap have to fall back on is the reruns. Me, I like to get in on the betting pools trying to figure out when Paula Abdul is finally going to go "all the way" crazy, resulting in her being out of a tree with a tranquilizer dart sticking from her ass like a lost bear in the suburbs. As for David Archuleta, the runner-up (as in you didn't fucking win!), I wonder if he's going to figure out his nutcase father is the reason his career isn't exactly soaring. I mean, he got booted from Star Search (which, if memory serves, you lost too) and now, after getting barred backstage at Idol, are you starting to notice a trend here? Maybe Archuleta will buy his dad a fat (I mean heavy fat) Zoloft script or something when he inevitably scores a record deal for being the second-best in the fans' eyes. Here's to hopin he lasts as long as what's his face, you know, the schmuck that won last year...only to fade quicker than the grip on reality the many, many pills (no doubt) provide for Paula.

But there is still hope. People recently polled as a part of Museums and Galleries Month picked the worst ideas of all time. Their choices?:

1. The atomic bomb.
2. Reality television.
3. Capital punishment.
4. Plastic bags.
5. The credit card.

Finally, a poll I can get behind. #3 is the only slot in the top 5 I can not agree with. Capital punishment is a fine idea, but to excuse the pun, the problems start with the execution of the concept.

Now that at least some small segment of the world's population-at-large feels reality shows are the happy medium between a lethal injection and a radioactive firestorm of death, I think maybe we have turned a corner, here. Forget global warming...no one is really all that interesting in saving the planet at this point (I think they are just trying to score hippie chicks), and ditto that when it comes to peace...no one is buying into that prospect, either. Maybe, however, just maybe, we can end reality TV in my lifetime.

I would suggest looking to the heavens, but you never know the answer you're gonna get anymore...

Okay...let me see if I got this straight...according to Rev. Jose Gabriel Funes, the director of the Vatican Observatory, believing in the possibility of extraterrestrial life does not contradict one's faith. Funes also says in a recent interview that the Bible "is not a science book," and that science, especially astronomy, does not contradict religion.


Huh? When the hell did this happen? From most outward appearances, at least in the mainstream, science and religion are presented as the cobra and the mongoose, but now it's all good? I'm sure there's some kind of motive in here somewhere on down the road. Oh...I'm sorry. I guess I should say I believe in the possibility of ulterior motives somewhere in this mess.


What I would like to know is just how arrogant is the Catholic church gonna get? You can believe in alien life forms, but not in condoms? While I'm no doubt sure one could, if they really applied their minds, come up with at least a hundred or so "sci-fi or science geeks not having to worry much about birth control in the first place" punchlines, could someone sit me down, whether from the Vatican Observatory (nothing touchy feely), or NASA, or some other big-time science concern or major organized religion, and explain to me exactly how this is supposed to make sense again?