SLOW NEWS WEEK:

Greeting Citizens! Well we've spent another glorious fortnight in service to the Emperor and reveled in the protections and benefits that come from our continued loyalty. GLORY TO HIS NAME!

(Just go with it and don't make any suspicious moves, he's always watching!)

Seeing as there have been no uprisings, no acts of sedition, no talk of rebellion and zero examples of blatant free will, I am pleased to announce that absolutely NOTHING worth reporting has happened in the last ten days.

(Simply sit there and stare at the screen. If he even catches you blinking wrong he'll send the Personality Wolves to devour your ego and shit you out the other end as a mindless skin bag!)

So in light of the current state of bliss we seem to be enjoying thanks to His benevolence, here's some random and harmless news items and opinions from around the Empire. And again… GLORY TO HIS NAME!

(I curse the day Seacrest got so powerful. We're all damned! Damned I tell you!)

So this is how liberty dies… with extreme handsomeness.

HARMLESS ITEM #1:
There's a big deal being made these days about rude people texting while others are talking to them. Seems like I can't go seven good seconds without hearing some in-bred Luddite crying about technology killing the social graces and making polite conversation a thing of the past. Well of course ya thunderhead, who the hell wants to talk to you if all you're gonna do is whine about how no one wants to talk to you?

"Because textin' is like readin'…
and readin' leads to Satan."

But to a certain extent I agree. If you and I are in the middle of a conversation and I whip out my phone and start twiddling on it, yeah… I'm a jerk, my bad. No excuse for that, no matter how f@%king boring I might find you to be.

However, that being said, the same applies when it goes the other way. If you see me all alone, minding my own business, happily tapping away on my phone, checking Facebook, Twitter, playing Angry Birds, downloading music, porn or even porn music, (some pretty catchy tunes in skin flicks) then it's likewise as rude to start yapping at me about your… your… well whatever banal shit you feel the need to yammer on about while I'm otherwise engaged. Like just this morning I was checking results from the Stanley Cup Playoffs and this guy comes up to me and… all right, put your f@%king phone away! I get it, touché, you don't care about hockey. Fine, moving on.

HARMLESS ITEM #2:
One of the younger guys at my job lost his grandmother last week. And in a show of ultimate compassion, our boss advised him to throw himself into his job, not let grief keep him down, put in some extra hours and let work help him to move on. Also told the kid that it would probably be best if he didn't take a whole day off for the funeral.

Now all that shit is true, no joke, really happened and raises an important question: What the f@%k is wrong with young people today? I ask this because that shit happened and there was no ass-whuppin' as a result. I may not be much of a fighter — Not that much of a lover either if you were to ask my wife. Seriously, why you talking to her anyway? — But in my day, back when my grandmother passed, if my employer had said some shit like that to me, cops would've been involved because a hate crime would've been committed. Not a racially motivated hate crime or anything like that, just simply me hating that asshole enough to beat him into a liquid state with a desk lamp, all the while crying for my Nana.

"Sorry boss, thought I saw a Volkswagon roll by. But please,
do continue talking shit about my dead grandmother."

Yet in the here and now, it didn't go down anything like that. My boy just politely thanked the boss for his advice and walked away leaving the bastard to douche another day. Probably the grumpy old bastard in me talking, but I just don't understand kids today. I blame the Mormons though. No real reason, I just blame them for everything.

Especially for that.

HARMLESS ITEM #3:
The other night I was at CVS and a woman at the pharmacy counter got charged $576 for some medicinal cream that her insurance wouldn't cover. Now I have no idea what she's trying to get rid of, and I was too busy staying far away from her to ask. You know… in case it was contagious or something. But for that price it might be easier to just drop $10.59 on a tube of Mary Kay Cosmetics concealer, (and with her complexion I'd recommend Beige #2) cover up whatever she's got growing on her epidermis and simply learn to live with it.

And never mind how or why I know so much about concealers, all right?

Unless of course the stuff she was buying had something to do with her boobs. You wanna be keeping that area free and clear of all blemish as a public service. Or maybe it was some kind of breast enlarger type stuff. Do they make creams that promote boob growth? Then it'd be totally worth it, whatever the price. That shit's important! And what kind of world do we live in where a product like that wouldn't be covered by insurance?

Oh my God, they totally do make this stuff!
Does it come in different flavors?

HARMLESS ITEM #4:

That looks like it would be the
greatest theme park attraction ever!

Saw Cabin in the Woods last weekend. Good film, lot of fun, if you have any interest in seeing it at all then get to the theater now before some jackass spoils the twists for you. Shit happened to me a few times in the past. Some nutcup spilled about the chick having a dick way back in The Crying Game, couple years later another asshat tells me about Bruce Willis being dead the whole time in The Sixth Sense. I realize that technically I should've have thrown up a SPOILER ALERT before I said anything about those two flicks, but really, they're like 20 and 14 years-old respectively. If you hadn't seen them by now then you were never gonna so most likely I ain't spoiled shit. Not like I'm spilling that the titular cabin in the woods turns out to be a mental institution for alien abductees run by the Church of Scientology. I mean that would be… oh shit.

Kidding… really. But that would be a good movie though.
(Note to self: Call my agent.)

Not spoiling anything though by mentioning that Chris Hemsworth stars in this film and it's just one of three that he's got going on this summer movie season. (Even though Cabin in the Woods came out two weeks ago and it's not really summer yet… I know and SHUT UP!) In about another week Hemsworth the Hunk will officially help kick off the season as Thor in The Avengers. Then about a month later he'll keep it rolling in Snow White and the Huntsman as… well as the Huntsman. I don't think the character even has a name.

Meanwhile Will Smith who used to rule the summer movie season is starring in just one film, Men in Black 3. First movie he's put out in like four years in fact. Been pretty busy I guess, turning his offspring into tiny cash machines and shooing Marc Anthony out of Jada Pinkett's skinny ass.

But don't worry, Will's gonna be back on the cinematic horse soon enough with the release of several just announced projects sure to recapture the crown from that Hemsworth punk. Let's see, he's making Bad Boys 3 and I, Robot 2 and… um… Hancock 2 and probably a bunch of other films that are sure to make us sad for many summers to come.

It's all right Will, you were dreaming about Independence Day
again. Go back to sleep for a few more years. Chris has got this.

HARMLESS ITEM #5:
Actress Sofia Vergara — star of the show Modern Family as well as a frequent guest star of dreams that cause me to wake up in a puddle of my own shame — was denied admittance to a cast party for Ghost: The Musical at New York's Ava Lounge a few nights ago. Reason for this was that she had no ID and couldn't prove that she was over 21 even though she's actually 39.

"Rrrrronald, Mi vida, I wan chu to come over here and…"
That's as far as I ever get in the dreams before… puddles.

Now while that's all well and good and as unreasonably hot as Ms. Vergara may be, I think the thing we really need to focus on here is… HOLY F@%KING SHIT! THERE'S A MUSICAL BASED ON THE MOVIE GHOST? WTH?

Yup, this shit's really happening.

This news is an even bigger cause for concern when you consider the fact that Ghost joins The Color Purple and Sister Act as Broadway musicals with lives that began in the fertile womb of Whoopi Goldberg's film career. Now… (Urrp!) Excuse me… mentioning Whoopi Goldberg and womb in the same sentence has made me a little queasy. (Beeelch!) I'll be okay.(PHHHHFFFFTTTTT!) I sharted.

Anyway, please God, in your infinite wisdom and with your awesome power, put a stop to this trend before someone gets it in their head to produce musical versions of other Goldberg gems like Jumping Jack Flash or Clara's Heart or Star Trek: Generations or… actually God, let's not be so hasty on stopping that last one.

Yeah I'd see this at least twice…
a month… for like a year.

SHAMELESS PLUG:
Lastly, got this little comic strip my friend Terri and I are kinda putting out there as part of our court-ordered community service. Not really sure how this actually helps the community at large but that's the kind of decision that gets made when you sell your kidney for money to bribe a judge. Hey, it keeps us out of prison and serves me right for letting Terri drive the van. Six trash bags full of weed in the back and she cuts off a cop at a Dunkin Donuts drive-thru looking to get her munch on.

But I don't hate her… anymore. Still, we have fun doing it and hope you'll enjoy reading it. If you dig it, check back for more as I'll be posting them here as fast as Terri can pump 'em out. Also, you might wanna check out Terri's personal blog at http://dearassjack.blogspot.com where she'll be posting these as well as other bits of crazy wonderfulness that fall through the cracks in her mind and hit the web with a sickening splat.

Of course if you don't like what we're doing then keep that shit to yourself. No one likes a Negative Nellie.

Well this now concludes our broadcast day. Stay tuned for a message from our Luminous Leader followed by the Imperial Anthem. You'll then have 30 seconds of personal time before the Iron Matrons come to force you into bed and administer your sleep injection. So until next time, good night and…

SLINGS AND ARROWS

I know, I know… I've been neglecting you. You're feeling abandoned and forsaken like most of my natural children. (And those little bastards are legion.) You're probably also starving because I forgot to leave food out before I left. Sorry, my bad. Couldn't be helped, been out of touch, down in Maryland trying to get my hands on that "misplaced" Mega Millions lottery ticket. But don't be thinking I wasted my time searching through every McDonalds in the state looking for the thing based on that bullshit fable that loon Mirlande Wilson has been spreading. No, I went right to the source, the horse's mouth so to speak, tried to get it straight from Wilson herself.

The trucker cap says it all my friends. "Sweet Swine" indeed.

She made me do… dirty things, I ain't gonna lie. Some things were worse than others, some of the things were pretty degrading and other things were downright illegal even in Amsterdam. But there was no pot of gold at the end of that dark, disturbing rainbow, only failure and lies. When it was over I was just happy to get the hell out of there with the few pints of blood and what little dignity I had left in me. I'm kidding of course, I didn't have any dignity before I went down there. Alas, it wasn't meant to be between Mirlande and me but we'll always have Paris. Paris was this transgendered friend of hers and the three of us… you know what, let's just move on.

So have you seen The Hunger Games yet? Have you read the books? Do you even know what the hell I'm talking about? Well if you don't then you're alone in the world because the books have been read by some thirty million people, the flick's raking in the dollars and little girls all over the world wanna be like the story's bow slinging heroine Katniss Everdeen as played by Jennifer Lawrence.

"What does Marsellus Wallace look like?
Does he look like a bitch?" 

And by "wannabe" I mean that the number of girls signing up for archery classes in the United States has seen a pretty significant jump from like whatever it was before to whatever the hell it is today. Now I can't give you actual figures… because I don't know how to count good. Also as you could tell from that last sentence, I don't talk english good either. (I am not a smart man.) But whatever that number is, it's sure to get even higher in the summer when Disney/Pixar releases the animated feature Brave with its CGI, flame-haired mistress of the bow, Merida. 

Is it just me or does it look like
she's lining up for a crotch shot? 

Even the recent release of Wrath of the Titans got in on the act with the character Andromeda — played by that sultry bit of Brit hotness Rosamund Pike — picking up a bow and… well going completely unnoticed since no one really saw that film because they were still packing the theater next door to make The Hunger Games number one for a third straight week. 

"I have a bow too! Care to come watch me shoot stuff?
Please? No? Sod off then you wankers!"

But even though Rosie and the Titans failed to grab any headlines this week, the rule of threes still applies. Three movies, three chicks with bows, three reasons to be afraid. (See, there's three things right there. Scared yet?) Or perhaps I'm just overreacting since this is not a new phenomenon. Movies and television shows of such a nature as the action/fantasy genre have often handed the bow to the ladies when there's a battle to be fought. Gives them something to do, keeps them out of the way, lets them feel like they're making a contribution to the fight. And it's just so gosh darned cute. 

I have got the weirdest boner right now. 

Probably one of the most famous bow chicks of the genre is that blonde honey Legolas from the Lord of the Rings trilogy. That movie franchise raked in somewhere close to a gazillion bucks and didn't spawn any kind of female archer apocalypse. And if a gal like Legolas couldn't inspire women the world over to turn their bra straps into bow strings and storm the halls of authority in some sort of Girl Powered revolution then I'm probably just worrying much over nothing because… Wait, what's that now? Legolas was a dude? You sure? Played by Orlando Bloom? Wait… Orlando Bloom is a dude? Really? 

Well that boner just got a lot weirder. 

And while that last exchange was uncomfortably horrific, it does serve to segue us to a very good point, men have been shooting pointy sticks at shit for far longer than women have even been allowed to leave the house. In fact, I'm pretty sure it was a dude that invented the weapon in the first place, probably to impress a chick. But that just goes without saying. I mean really, what don't we do to impress chicks? Hell, trying to impress a woman is why I write this damn blog in the first place. YOU WILL NOTICE ME SOMEDAY, HILARY CLINTON! 

Oh she acts like she doesn't see me, but behind those
sunglasses… sexy eye roll.

Not as if archery is like field hockey or the balance beam or synchronized bathroom trips or any of the three or four other sporting events that are strictly the purview of the fairer sex. Katniss and Merida can be as badass as they want to be, they'll never get anywhere near the popularity of the most famous fictional archer of all time. Yeah, that would be Robin Hood. In fact, I think he might even be more well-known than any real archers that are or have ever been. Quick, name an actual archer… GO! Can't do it, can you? But the legend of Robin of Loxley's been around forever, been played by dozens of dudes, sometimes even when we didn't want them to. Talking to YOU Russell Crowe! 

A grand legacy of robbing from the rich and giving to the poor.
But then the poor just go out and spend it all on booze.

And though there's no cinematic trips to Sherwood Forrest being made anytime in the foreseeable future, the Y-chromosome set will be represented well this summer amidst the Amazon hoards when Jeremy Renner takes to the silver screen (Can we still call it that in the digital age?) as Hawkeye in The Avengers. 

"Hey Scarlett, I got this. What say you make like the 60's
and go fix Daddy a drink? There's a good little girl." 

So you girls wanna pick up a bow and a quiver (that's the little backpack thingie where you keep all the arrows) and learn to shoot like the boys, whatever. It's all good, we ain't threatened by it. Bring it on ladies. Get as good at it as you want to, doesn't matter, cause at the end of the day you're never gonna look as cool doing it as my man Burt Reynolds did back in the day when he was rockin' it in Deliverance. That's the pinnacle right there, dude was the motherf@%king Mack! 

"If the arrow don't kill it then my awesomeness will
because I'm Burt Reynolds, dammit." 

Guess that settles that. Now we can all just get back to… hold up, what have we here? Seems that little Jennifer is back playing Katniss again. And look, she's got herself a leather jacket this time and… and… and… Shit, that is pretty cool right there. 

"Hey Ron, when you're done being wrong, go make Mommy
a sandwich, would you? There's a good little idiot." 

Stupid, stinky girls gotta go and ruin everything!