Saturday, February 24, 2007

Hold on to your Hogwarts...

Daniel Radcliffe the star of the Harry Potter movies is scheduled to appear in a revival of the play Equus and as the young people say, he will “let it all hang out, man”. Hold on a moment please…I’ve just been informed that young people do not say that anymore. Well then, to put it plainly, the guy will be naked on stage.

It has been reported that not everyone connected to the Harry Potter franchise is happy about this, but I have it on good authority that J. K. Rowling, wearing a disguise and armed with binoculars, went to one of the rehearsals.

It would seem that Rowling was very “inspired” by what she saw. So much so in fact, that instead of ending the popular series as she had announced she would, Rowling is already at work on a new book and has plans for many more, including these…


Harry Potter and The Power of the Ivory Wand

Harry Potter and The Lair of the Enchanted MILF

Harry Potter and The Chamber of Consensual Bondage

Harry Potter and The Magic Bush

Harry Potter and The Return of Queen Burningloins of Clitonia

Harry Potter and The Buttocks of Adonis

Harry Potter and The Secret Shagging Society


So there you have it, the inside scoop on the future of Harry Potter, but if J. K. Rowling should happen to ask…you didn’t hear it from me.


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Tuesday, February 20, 2007

One day at a time...

Celebrities aren’t the only ones who go into rehab. Why, I myself once spent several weekends in the Minor Addiction Wing of the Betty Ford Center. The little monkey I had on my back was salt; I was using the salt shaker so much that I nearly developed a repetitive stress injury. Some of the other problems that people were getting help with included caffeine, video games and in one very sad case, Vicks VapoRub.

We all knew that the other people there with “serious” drug and alcohol problems were always making fun of us…referring to us “amateurs” and “minor leaguers” but we ignored them and bravely fought our tiny demons.

Although today I am salt free, it has not been easy. As recently as six months ago I nearly had a relapse. If not for dedicated people like my counselor (who I’ll just call “Rick”) I would surely have descended back into that white, crystalline hell. Here is a transcription of the late-night phone call that saved my life…

A telephone rings

Rick: (in a groggy voice) Hello?

TDB: Hey Rick, it’s me.

Rick: TDB? Do you know that’s it’s almost 3:00 am?

TDB: Yeah, I know and I’m sorry, but I’ve hit a really rough patch. I can’t even sleep, the craving has gotten so bad it’s causing me to have these weird…almost erotic dreams.

Rick: What are you talking about?

TDB: Ok, take the last one for instance. I was walking away from the smoldering ruins of an ancient city when I run smack into Lot’s wife…

Rick: Wait, you mean that woman from the bible who was turned into a pillar of salt?

TDB: Yeah, that’s the one. Anyway, there she was, a beautiful, female shaped block of salt glittering in the sun…

Rick: Well, that doesn’t really sound all that erotic…

TDB: That’s because I haven’t told you about the licking yet…

Rick: Ok, Ok! I get the picture!

TDB: If you think that’s freaky you should have seen who was in my dream the night before. Do you that girl on the Morton Salt label?

Rick: Uh…yes…

TDB: Her mother.

Rick: Well, that’s a relief.

TDB: I’m an addict Rick…not a pervert.

Rick: Yeah, ok. Look, have you got any Mrs. Dash in your apartment?

TDB: I always do.

Rick: Good, that should get you through the what’s left of the night. Come by my office around 7:00 and we’ll talk then. Alright?

TDB: Thanks Rick, by the way, did you hear about Freddy?

Rick: The guy with the NyQuil problem? Did he fall off the wagon again?

TDB: Big time. After binging for three days he stopped by a pharmacy to buy more and he tried to pay for it with those “coins” you get at Chuck E. Cheese’s.

Rick: Listen, just because Freddy had a relapse doesn’t mean you will. I’ll see you in the morning.

TDB: Goodnight Rick.

So I hung up the phone and somehow made it through the night. Thankfully, there haven’t been any close calls since then. I’m working on a screenplay based on my experiences. It will be called either “The Devil’s Condiment” or “Please Pass the Salt…to Someone Else!”…I might even make it a musical.

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Sunday, February 18, 2007

The week in review...

And what a week it was. It seems as though not only nature, but the entire world is out to show me that reality is just weirder (not to mention funnier) than anything I can make up. Take for example the following genuine news items…

RIVERSIDE, Calif. - An exotic animal with a long snout, bear-like claws and a tail like a raccoon scared the heck out of some narcotics investigators searching a home for drugs.
It was eventually identified as a coatimundi, usually found in the forests of Central and South America.

Possessing a coatimundi is illegal in California without a license. Fish and game official Kyle Chang said the animal's owner, 29-year-old Norman James Vollan, will have to give it up to a zoo or to someone with an exotic animal license.

He "was pretty much crying in jail" when he learned he would lose his coatimundi, Chang said.

Now, I’m no expert on these matters, but I really believe that having to explain to your fellow inmates that you’re crying because someone took your coatimundi…is not a good thing.


WHITE PLAINS, NY - A man who was fired by IBM for visiting an adult chat room during the workday is suing the company for $5 million, claiming he is an Internet addict who “deserves treatment and sympathy rather than dismissal.”

Then with all the solemn dignity he could muster, he pulled his pants up from around his ankles and left the building.


PETA red in face over TV lobster treatment
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals is boiling mad over a recent episode of "Iron Chef" in which Graham Bowles ripped the tails off two lobsters.

PETA members protested in front of the Food Network's Chelsea offices yesterday. One demonstrator dressed as a giant lobster held a sign reading: "Iron Chef Mean Cuisine."

Where’s a giant pot of boiling water when you really need it?


Pennsylvania chocolate maker Hershey is moving a bigger chunk of its production to Mexico, officials said yesterday. The company said it will cut 1,500 jobs and close some plants
"Whenever they move something out the country, that's not good news," said Dennis Bomberger, of Chocolate Workers Local 464.

As of yet there has been no comment from the Lollipop Guild.


Peanut butter & a jam in salmonella outbreak

Peter Pan peanut butter got the hook from New York store shelves yesterday after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention linked it to nearly 300 salmonella poisoning cases nationwide.

Mmm…peanut butter and salmonella sandwiches. Just like momma used to make!


Oh well, at least I’ll always have snide comments to fall back on.


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Wednesday, February 14, 2007

It's a family affair...

From time to time on this blog I’ve offered up a glimpse at some of the blossoms that can be found on my family tree.

Today I take a fond look back at an uncle of mine who was a “beatnik poet” back in the 1950’s. His real name was Willard, but he always insisted on being called “Turk”. My siblings and I just referred to him as “Uncle Ashy”, because he was constantly chain smoking contraband Canadian cigarettes.

Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg called him "Captain Oregano" because of the really crappy marijuana he was always trying to sell them. In an interview many years later, Ginsberg would say of my uncle: “Turk who?”

To give you just an idea of my uncle's work here are just a few titles from his “oeuvre”…

Atomic Bongos

Straight Out of Squaresville


You Couldn’t Dig Me with A Shovel, Daddy-O


Black Beret Blues


Love Poems, For Like…Real Gone Chicks


Thumb and Thumber: A Hipster’s Guide to Hitchhiking


The Smoldering Goatee


Unfortunately, uncle Ashy never got around to actually writing those books…or any others for that matter. His entire literary output consists of this single poem...

Coffeehouse Lament

The sax is blowin’ hot
Cups and saucers rattle around
Like old arthritic bones
Clickity Clack…Clickity Clack!

Even “Mary Jane” is making the scene
When in busts the fuzz to douse her fiery kiss
Like an ice water enema
Splish, Splash…Splish, Splash!


Well, the fifties gave way to the sixties and my uncle tried to keep pace with the changing times. Sadly, before he cold find his place in this new counter culture, he was killed in a tie-dying accident in Jerry Garcia’s basement.


Uncle Ashy was of course, cremated. It just seemed so fitting that his earthly remains should be transformed into the very substance we most associated him with…it’s like, almost poetic, daddy-o.

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Saturday, February 10, 2007

I got ya numbers right here...


Of all the different, quasi-mystical, pseudo-scientific fields of “learning” out there, I find numerology to be the most annoying. Perhaps it’s because it involves math, which was the bane of my existence all through school.

However, lately I’ve been wondering if I’ve been too hasty in my judgement. After all Jim Carrey has taken the trouble to make a movie about it. Remember, this is the same actor who probed the deepest theological and metaphysical questions of our time in his film “Bruce Almighty”.

So, with your indulgence, I thought I’d dabble in a little numerological study of my own. Let’s start with the year that we are now in, 2007. If you add the first and last digits you get 9. Now, 9 is the number of calories that the average fashion model consumes in a month. There are 4 weeks in a month and 52 weeks in a year. 52 plus 4 equals 56, which also happens to be the combined IQ scores of the TV executives who thought that the “Tony Danza” show was a good idea. But wait, there’s more…

Tony Danza was a cast member on a show called “Taxi” that went on the air in 1978. If you multiply 19 by 78 you get 1,482 which is the number of times that I’ve overheard someone singing the song “Fergalicious” in the last 36 hours. If you divide 36 by 2 you get 18, which is exactly how old that young woman claimed to be on the night the police keep interrogating me about.

Fascinating, isn’t it? Well, if you’ll excuse me, I have to get this information to my lawyer and find out if it’s admissible in court. If not, I have a feeling that the numbers 10 to 20 could be looming large in my future. Bruce Almighty don’t fail me now!

*The Drive-by Blogger assumes no responsibility for any errors in the complex mathematical computations contained in this post.

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Saturday, February 03, 2007

Trump versus the ladies...

Not long after I started this blog, Donald Trump was involved in a public feud with Martha Stewart. In recent weeks he has been involved in a public feud with Rosie O’Donnell. Both feuds brought plenty of the media attention that he desperately seems to crave.

As a result, my sources tell me that “The Donald” has decided to carry this even further by hosting a TV show in which a psychic will channel the spirits of famous women from the past and Trump will attempt to start feuds with them.

Thanks to my connection to a well placed mole in the Trump organization (by the way, I don’t mean a person, I mean a literal mole on the back of Trump’s neck. It talks to me whenever I’ve swallowed enough cough syrup) I have obtained the following excerpts from the first show. Have a look at what the “hardest working comb-over in show business” had to say to these well known women…



To Cleopatra: “Great Queen of Egypt my ass. If it wasn’t for the fact that you were boinking both Julius Caesar and Marc Antony, no one would even remember you. And what’s the deal with committing suicide by snakebite? Only a loser would die from that. I pour snake venom on my cereal every morning just for fun. If I ever wanted to end my life I’d just force my heart to stop beating with the sheer force of my will power…that’s how a person with class commits suicide.”

To Eleanor Roosevelt: “Its called dentistry, Eleanor and you should have looked into it when your husband was president. No one wants a first lady who looks like she’s part beaver…speaking of which, I read some of your letters to Lorena Hickok. Pretty hot stuff for the time, did FDR know that you were a “Friend of Rosie”? That’s a euphemism for lesbian that I just came up with, soon everybody will be using it…it’s gonna be huge.”

To Eve: “Way to go and get all of humanity kicked out of paradise. An entire garden of great things to eat and you have to go sink your teeth into the only forbidden piece of fruit in the whole frickin’ place. If I had been in Adam’s shoes, and I would have made a pair of shoes out of that stupid serpent, I would have negotiated a deal with God for a younger and better-looking woman…that hates fruit."

To Helen of Troy: “The face that launched a thousand ships? Yeah, in the opposite direction. Trust me sweetheart, you wouldn't stand a chance against any of the girls in my highly successful and popular beauty pageant. Ok, so maybe it’s true that no one really knows what you looked like, but my gut instinct…the same gut instinct that has made me one of the most successful people on earth, tells me you probably looked liked seven miles of bad road."

To Susan B. Anthony: “ Suffragette? More like insufferable. Listen, the Susan B. Anthony dollar was a disaster. Most people kept confusing it with the quarter. When my face is eventually put on a coin it will be unmistakable. It will be large, made of solid gold and have a full frontal portrait, none of this just a profile crap.”


There’s also a rumor that Donald is writing a book called “The Art of the Celebrity Feud”. Look for it in a trash can near you.

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