George Washington Bathed Here

I'm a big fan of bathing; I try to do it at least twice a week. But in this day and age, with our high-falutin "running water" and "indoor plumbing," we forget that bathing was once an event.

But they don't forget at Berkeley Springs! That fine West Virginia town (est. 1776) was the Vegas of the late 18th century, only with fewer hookers and less organized gambling. It's billed as America's first resort town. Water comes out of the ground at a delightful 74, so they slapped some spas on the main drag and let people revel in the sumptous, vaguely sinful experience of not smelling like sweat and horses for a few hours. It was an experience enjoyed by no lesser a man than GEORGE WASHINGTON.

We've all heard the stories about the Father of our Country being impervious to dirt and stains, but they might have been farfetched: George definitely took a soak. They even have his favorite bath marked!

The word you're looking for is "underwhelming." Your eyes do not lie; it is a small ditch, just a few feet deep, with a sign attached. There's no way George fit in that thing on horseback, and he wasn't doing snuff off any busty wench's bosom while the jets worked his lumbar region. They don't even have jets. There are minnows swimming along in February (courtesy of the warm water), but there's nothing to truly capture the majesty of an 8'3", mostly naked and glistening George washington emerging from the waters, trident in hand. You know, history.

George first came to the region as a young surveyor, and he returned several times in part for the alleged healthful benefits of a hot soak. He might have been onto something. Me and three intrepid friends tried out the Roman Baths on Saturday: you enter the bathhouse, pay the teens at the desk, and they fill up a 6 1/2 foot Victorian-style bathtub (the water is heated an extra 28 degrees to 102). Then you "let the magic happen" for about half an hour. I was skeptical at first, but in only 30 minutes my sore knee, dry skin, heart disease, social anxiety disorder and financial illiteracy were totally, completely gone. It's science! From the Berkeley Springs web site, here's the mineral content of the water and my general understanding of what each mineral does.

Sodium Chloride -- skin bleaching
Silica -- takes the gout down a shade
Strontium Carbonate -- 52-inch vertical leap
Calcium Sulphate -- lustrous coat, cold nose
Sodium Sulphate -- improves ability to detect sarcasm
Sodium Nitrate -- lowers romantic standards to more realistic levels
Potassium Sulphate -- gives an incresased appreciation of jazz music
Ferrous Carbonate -- strengthens credit scores
Magnesium Carbonate -- draws out all feelings of guilt about not calling your parents
Alumina -- X-ray vision
Ammonium Chloride -- softens
Albuminoid Nitrogen -- toughens
Organic Matter -- allows you to absorb the knowledge and power of those who bathed before you

That stuff works wonders, I tells ya. We had some photo documentation of the whole magical event. That's because we, as beautiful people, were singled out by a reporter and photographer of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review:

They cropped the case of Cristal out of this shot, because it's a family publication. Oddly enough, my bathing was NOT the newsworthy event of the day. The reporters were just fleshing out their story about the Berkeley Springs International Water Tasting, where the elite meet for discreet water treats. It's an annual showdown to determine the best-tasting water in the known universe, and it involves a bunch of judges sitting at a table, drinking water for a few hours. You're thinking: no WAY you got into this event, Chris. It's too high-profile and exciting, even for a high-roller like you. Guess again, chump. We totally rocked the municipal water tasting event. What's more, we even TASTED WATER! They had samples of the aqua fina from a wide number of place, and you could just go right up and ask for it! They were giving away water LIKE IT WAS WATER!

I don't have a refined palate, so I can't tell you what makes for good-tasting water. But I can tell you that everyone on Long Island, New York, would be perfectly justified doing their laundry with Dasani. That water was disgusting, and it almost made me and my friends gag. There's no way it could have made it to the finals without the help of mafia bribes. You want to think that the world of competitive municipal water tasting is pure, so the very presence of that foul swill upset mea great deal. Still, my opinions don't count on a tasting contest (Hamilton, Ohio was the winner). They DO count on the people's choice award for bottle design:

I was particularly drawn to the bottle for Bling H2O, which sells at $50 a pop. But then again, I am the kind of guy who wants people to know that I can pay $50 for water. The only thing missing from their stunning packaging is some kind of siren on the cap, to draw the attention of anyone in the room who did not realize I was paying $50 for water. And who won the bottle design contest? Bling H2O. The rich get richer. As a Republican, that's what I'm all about.

I have but two regrets for the day. First, that we could not stay to see the awards ceremony (no one had packed formalwear). I really, really want to know what a municipal water award acceptance speech is like. I hope someone thanked Jesus and their agent. Second, that while browsing a local antique shop, I did not pull the trigger on either the "Archie Bunker's grandson" doll with its anatomically correct peeing action, or this fine-looking book:

Tags: presidents, travel, water

Feet of Clay

Barack Obama, the most powerful man in the world, could not demand than an army of statues be built for his tomb. Even if he thought it was a fun way to spend his book royalties and went through private contractors, his career would be over. So if he wants to be remembered, he has to try to "help people" or "solve problems."

In that sense, the terra cotta warriors at the National Geographic Museum are really just another reminder that the world is no fun anymore. I'm sure living under the thumb of a homicidal maniac would have a few drawbacks, but if you were a Chinese peasant 2,200 years ago, at least you knew that your boss had panache. And panache is like the MSG of life: sure, it kills you, but it makes everything taste better.

If you're not familiar with the legend, China's first emperor from the very start of his reign planned out an entire necropolis (meaning a city for the dead, like in Egypt, or Michigan). The thinking was that he would continue to reign in the afterlife -- why let a supreme being have all the fun? -- but you can't just show up in the afterlife and start bossing people around. The dead are very set in their ways. So, to facilitate this glorious paradigm shift in post-mortal macropolitics, the emperor had 1,000 of his closest living friends whip up a few thousand running buddies made from baked earth. A lot of these were fully armed soldiers, but there were also some pencil-pushers in there, because when your spirt army isn't happy with a sudden spike in payroll taxes you need a fall guy.

(I'm not exactly clear on how lifeless clay statues make the jump to fully actualized spirit army, but it's probably something along the lines of "Pinnochio." Also, I did not see any terra cotta hookers, or females of any kind, so those clay soldiers would have been pissed. Just putting it out there.)

The display at Nat Geo is the first time any of the warriors have left China (had the British discovered them, it would be a different story, but the Chinese stumbled on them around 1976). The select statues on display are kind of neat! They have a variety of jobs (accountant, horseman, lovable sidekick) and a variety of facial hair (soul patches? oh yeah!). They're all roughly life-sized, and it appears that some of them do have a kung-fu grip of some kind. The downside: there's not enough of them. Though well made, they aren't exactly high art; the whole "wow" factor is that there are THOUSANDS of the statues. You get to see about 10, plus some fine samples of ancient Chinese roofing tile. The roofing tile isn't pulling its share of the "wow."

But I still welcome this display as an excellent reminder that, regardless of race or culture, crazy people are awesome. As soon as I find a dedicated revenue stream, I am commissioning a 300-seat necro-comedy club with a full audience and wait staff. If you're good with clay and you have a human-sized kiln, give me a call!

Movie Review: North Face

This is a pleasing addition to the "mountain climbing plus Nazis" genre, and while I do not think "North Face" will ever air regularly around Christmas, I'm putting it on equal footing with "The Sound of Music."

It's 1936, and mountaineers everywhere are all atwitter over the Eiger (in Switzerland). People had climbed the mountain before, but they had used up all the pansy sissy foo-foo routes. The important thing here was to scale the north face, which is largely vertical, has tons of avalanches and rock slides and gets slammed by horrific and unpredictable weather. In other words, the MAN ROUTE. So these German guys, Toni and Andi (apparently, you can still be a man even if your name ends with an "i"), decide to knuckle up and give it a try. They go camp at the foot of the mountain with all the other climbing teams, then when the weather breaks at 2:30 in the morning, they go for it. Meanwhile, the press and rich people in tuxedos watch through telescopes at this chalet at the base of the mountain.

The point isn't so much the acting, which is a little bland. It's more that they filmed a lot of this on location and it looks FREAKING AWESOME. Whatever portion of it was faked I have no clue, because when those guys are freezing to death on the side of the mountain, it looks pretty damn real.

Seeing all that suffering, and the skin turning black from the freezing to death and whatnot, you wonder what motivates people to do these things. In 1936 there were no REI stores for these dudes to stock up; ropes were heavier, pitons were weaker, and nobody had Underarmor. Gatorade was but a twinkle in a climber's eye. Anyone taking this trip has to know they might not return, so how do you even start out? In the movie, they do paint up the "national pride" angle -- Hitler apparently had high hopes that some Aryan supermen would be the first guys to the top. But why would you risk death to get somewhere (the summit) that can be reached safely? Especially knowing that there is no added benefit to humanity for you having made the trip, unless you count scoring with chalet skanks as an added benefit to humanity.

There's definitely something in the human spirit that compels us to try. Not MY spirit, specifically, but some humans' spirt. I'm more into eating sandwiches.

Tags: trivia, movies

Who Should I Have a Beer With?

A new McSweeney's column is up!

The famous poll question asks which candidate you'd rather have a beer with. So I'm taking it a step further, to caluculate which president would be the best drinking buddy. There are lots of ways to argue this one, as some people have different goals in mind for a drinking buddy -- sympathetic ear, wingman, someone to hold your hair as you vomit -- but I gotta say I like my choice. You can see who I singled out right here.

If you disagree, let me know! I always like the feedback.

Tags: presidents

And the Oscar goes to ...

Another year, another disappointing Oscar broadcast. A roomful of the most successful entertainers in the world, and yet they can't put on an entertaining show. We ask the show to live up to a memory -- not of one particular standard, but of the most exciting moments our minds have cherrypicked from the last 20 years.

Thank god I know how to fix this!

Fewer Best Picture montages. If you haven't seen a movie, a two-minute tribute isn't going to suddenly convince you of its greatness. Why not just let the nomination speak for itself?

A ban on thanking agents. People at home don't care about agents. Many of them would think "CAA" is the Colonial Athletic Association. Why waste your time running off a laundry list of names that mean nothing to the people watching at home? You can thank everyone in person after the show.

Actual acting. Lots of the acting nominess come from smaller art films that few people have seen, so we have no opinions about who to root for. All nominees should therefore have attend the ceremony in character, with appropriate costume. They they should perform a scene from something with at least five actors that is readily accessible -- maybe something from "The Jeffersons" where both the neighbors and the maid are in the room. Only, they should perform as though it were the character acting in "The Jeffersons," not them. "Good Times" would also work. Then the audience applause-o-meter at the Kodak theater could determine the winner. I also am open to the directing nominees each getting a 30-minute chunk of the Oscar broadcast to prove their worth to an eager nation.

Chimpanzees. Instead of playing a speaker off the stage with music, they should release angry chimpanzees once a speech hits the one-minute mark. If you didn't want angry chimpanzees, you could just release chimpanzees on Segways. If you can stay on the mic long enough to finish, you have earned it.

Pneumatic Oscar gun. Rather than have people wander all the way up to the stage to give their speeches, when awarded an Oscar, they should have it fired at them by one of those pneumatic hot-dog guns from stadiums, only rigged to shoot Oscars. Also, Oscars should be modified to bear the visage of L. Ron Hubbard.

No more movies that have already been released. Who gets pumped to go to the movie theater to see an old movie? The 2010 Academy Awards should be all about movies that will be released in 2010. Imagine how much MORE excited you'll be for "Iron Man 2" when it has already won 3 Oscars! Exciting, right? We should also reward concepts that sound intriguing, but do not yet exist. If best potential screenplay went to "Mammoth," a gritty crime drama about a beat cop who rides a wooly mammoth cloned from remains found in a glacier, then that might be just the thing that finally gets that project rolling. Incidentally, I have a script treatment if anyone wants it.

Better announcing. Let's lose the shrill woman who runs down the achievements of each winner as they walk to the stage. Instead, let's get Morgan Freeman to read a list of each winner's sexual conquests.

Death montage. Finally, the "in memoriam" montage should be modified. No longer should it honor the departed. Instead, it should list people whose careers have died. Either that, or people from all walks of life that the Academy of Motion Pictures would like to see dead.

Tags: movies

Sign of the Wha?

There's a bar in DC called "Sign of the Whale." For years it had kind of a tavern feel -- dim lighting, nothing too flashy. Some TVs for sports, but beyond that, just a solid, regular bar. It got sold, and the new owners decided to change the vibe and start catering to the young d-bag crowd. It's a good business decision! You go where the money is.

The grand reopening is 3/12, and they're distributing a little index card-sized flyer for the event. The STAR of the evening is Bridget from "The Girls Next Door." I guess the money from her post-Hef Travel Channel show finally dried up, so now she's doing bar openings in Washington DC on a Friday. You hate to see a first-ballot Hall of Famer forced to work memorabilia shows, but at the same time, who wouldn't want to be regaled with stories of ... uh ... that time she prostituted herself to an octegenarian for a few years. Cough. Cough.

But that's not important right now. Next to Bridget on the flyer are some photos for other fine events. Something called "A League of Our Own" is advertised for 7 p.m. on 3/11, and the picture is a classed-up extra from "Hookers at the Point" holding a bat, in a batting stance. Since the Nationals will be done their Spring Training game by 4, I'm not sure what this event involves, but if it has $5 Redbull Vodkas, and women in bathing suits with bats, I have to think you'll get a good story out of it. Make a point of stopping by.

But save some strength for Saturday! That blessed day is the "St. Practice Fest Party," in case you need to brush up on all the Irish skills you'll need for the 17th -- like puking, or calling your dad a coward, or punching your friend in the square in the throat when he tries to get you to talk about your altar boy experiences. It's more than a fest. It's more than a party. It's a FEST PARTY. Most parties have a 30/70 fest/sobbing-introspection ratio. This thing is 100 percent fest.

You're already there based on words alone, but look at the picture! There is one grade-A d-bag in the corner. He has two women in bar skank outfits draped off of him. They are pointing at a midget in a leprechaun costume who is sitting on the bar. And that leprechaun is enjoying a beer while looking STRAIGHT UP the very tiny plaid (Catholic school?) skirt of a girl dancing on the bar. And oh yeah, there's another girl dancing on the bar dead center wearing a green bikini.

The thing that struck me as I looked at this ad for the first time, obviously, was that Jesus might return to the earth, just so he could attend such a party. But after I made my peace with the end of days, I realized that there is no way Sign of the Whale commissioned this photograph. Grand re-openings are very important events, but photo shoots with midget leprechauns aren't cheap. How many hours does it take before the bimbo in the middle flounces here hair just right, AND the leprechaun gets a good upskirt look, and the d-bag remembers to point? Annie Liebovitz couldn't capture this much magic if you gave her 12 hours. It HAS to be a stock photo, and a quick Web search confirms that notion. There exists out there a database of stock photos for marketing to d-bags bars.

I want in. If you are available for any of the following holiday party-themed photo shoots, give me a shout:

Columbus Day. A white woman in a "Sexy Pocahontas" costume carries a naked beer-drinking midget in a papoose while dancing on a bar. A d-bag points while two large-chested girls behind him brandish sextants.

Yom Kippur. Two girls in blue bikinis with Star of David logos on each breast dance the horah on top of a bar. Meanwhile, a midget in a Charlton Heston "Moses" costume shows mini stone tablets to a d-bag, who is pointing.

Arbor Day. A midget in a Paul Bunyan outfit rides a potted tree like it was a horse, while standing on a bar. Two girls in thongs play in an indoor leaf pile in front of the bar. A d-bag points.

Tags: advertisement

It Ain't Gonna Bend Itself

Bend the cost curve!

• All government-subsidized medical care is provided at Civil War technology levels. Additional centuries of progress may be purchased out-of-pocket.
• To motivate general fitness, make health insurance eligibility contingent on reaching the second stage of "Ninja Warrior."
• President Obama should wear a "No Fat Chicks" t-shirt in public at all times.
• Establish local "slug lane" registries for expensive MRI scans, allowing providers to shave costs by cramming three to four patients in the machines for each scan.
• Take advantage of powerful placebo effects by announcing the addition of low-cost placebos to every municipal water supply. Only, don't actually add the placebos. Just announce it, see? Wink, wink.
• Establish a national phone bank of Little League coaches who can be reached at any time of day to tell someone to either suck it up or walk it off.
• Reduce expensive "end of life" care by establishing a 100 percent inheritance tax for anyone who dies past the age of 75.
• Cut down on emergency room costs by installing restrictor plates on ambulances.
• Empower Surgeon General Regina Benjamin to declare martial law.

Tags: politics

New Podcast: Harland Williams

Harland is back at the DC Improv (March 11-14) and I got to talk to him a second time. He is truly an interesting dude -- whatever personal mission statement he's living by, he keeps it up throughout the whole day. A lot of what he does is just silly or weird, and as a change of pace from your everyday life it's pretty damn refreshing. Go download the latest chat (or the first one) at the podcast page. And listen to the recent interview with Bert Kreischer too, because I think I forgot to plug that when I recorded it.

Tags: podcast

Pacquiao vs. Dinoshark

Manny Pacquiao is a Filipino boxer who was fighting a Ghanaian boxer on HBO pay-per-vie Saturday night. "Dinoshark" is a made-for-TV movie on the SyFy network about a shark that is apparently also part dinosaur. It aired Saturday night.

So two bold competitors were duking it out, with my personal happiness (and endorsement) as the prize. Let's look at the tale of the tape:

Manny Pacquiao is 5'7" and fights as a welterweight. He's something like 53-3. Despite no significant reach advantage, he is an offensive machine, relentlessly pummeling opponents and often absorbing massive amounts of punishment as he looks for openings in their guard. His opponent was a fill-in, but the guy seemed both taller and more defined than Manny. At full length, the fight would be about 45 minutes.

Dinoshark stars the guy who played Milo on the first season of "24," and even though it was in high definition, it appeared to be shot with a high-end consumer camcorder. It is an offensive machine, relentlessly pummeling viewers with a CGI shark that you could probably whip together yourself using iPhone apps. It runs 120 minutes with commercials.

Too close to call on paper. So what about known weaknesses?:

Manny Pacquiao was saddled with a truly horrible undercard. Going by appearances, everyone fighting appeared to be either a child molester or mentally impaired in some way. It's like someone went to a Mexican jail and said, "hey, we're totally willing to let that incident with the school bus blow over, IF you fight a slow Irish guy crippled by fetal alcohol syndrome on pay television." In fact, I'm pretty sure that most of the originally planned fighters must have eaten from the same hotel buffet and gotten some kind of parasite just hours before the event, and so the Mexican penal system was called on to save the day.

Now, ultimate fighting has some crappy undercards on its shows, but those matches are short. The apparent plan of everyone on the Pacquiao undercard was to bore their opponent to death in the 12th round. Also, no one ringside at 95 percent of boxing matches (i.e. the people you see on TV) seems to care about anything happening in the ring. That's a full three percent worse than the NBA. Boxing is a horrible, dead sport.

Dinoshark has commercial breaks, which makes it easy to flip away from Dinoshark. I won't lie: I missed large chunks of Dinoshark, including about 40 minutes where me and my brothers played Wii Sports Resort. So I can't tell you how Dinoshark got from Alaska all the way down to Southern California. I'm thinking he was frozen in a glacier and global warming somehow unleashed. Also, it bears repeating that Dinoshark has computer effects worse than those on 1980s Nickelodeon gameshows. Most shots of Dinoshark are a digitally added fin in the middle of a boat's wake, so that they can save money by not having to digitally ripple the water. Also, when Dinoshark eats a whole boat (he does this several times), there is no wreckage. It just sort of blinks off the water. This could just be a testament to the awesome power of Dinoshark, but I'm thinking it was tied to the $75,000 shooting budget. Of which $12,500 was probably tied up in Milo from "24." I guess the guy who played Chase in season 3 turned it down. Finally, Dinoshark relies on a lot of hand-held camera shots, so even on land the picture constantly sways. I guess a tripods turned it down.

Any great matchup has intagibles. This is no different:

Manny Pacquiao (or someone who knows him) arranged to have the national anthem of the Philippines sung by the Filipino Steve Perry sound-alike who currently tours with "Journey." This was pretty awesome. Also, because the fight was at Cowboys Stadium, both Jimmy Johnson, Jerry Jones and Barry Switzer were visible in the crowd shots. This was amusing at first, until we remembered that Jimmy Johnson is the new spokesman for Extenze, and then it just became a disturbing distraction. Does Jimmy Johnson have gambling debts? Or does Extenze have so much money they can get anyone? And if it's the latter, where is Extenze getting its money? Are people actually buying Extenze? You see the dilemma.

Dinoshark was preceded by "Spring Break Shark Attack," so we were in danger of shark attack fatigue. But Dinoshark also had a script which read (and was acted) sort of like a soft-core porno, except that at the spots were people would start doing sexual things, Dinoshark would attack. That's a very big positive.

And as for the fights themselves?

Manny Pacquiao wins by unanimous decision. He didn't lose a round. He threw something like 1,200 punches and his opponent threw, oh, eight. Seriously, his strategy was: "I will let a great boxer punch me 1,000 times, while not counterattacking at all." I admit that getting punched 1,000 times by Filipino is not easy, and I could not do it (at least with consciousness for the duration). But I am pretty sure that 45 seconds of Manny Pacquiao inverting my nose while I try to land one solid punch would be reasonably entertaining to a crowd. At the very least, if I had lost the first 11 rounds, I would come out in the 12th doing arm windmills, or emulating someone from "Mike Tyson's Punchout." But hey, I'm a showman.

Dinoshark kills an awful lot of people, but Milo gets revenge by ... wait for it ... riding directly at Dinoshark on a jetski, then jumping the jetski off a wave, then leaping from the jetski mid-air, as Dinoshark is leaping toward Milo, then throwing a grenade that blows up part of Dinoshark's gills. And you think Milo won, right? Not quite. As Milo lays in the water, Dinoshark resurfaces and stars slowly advancing on the surface toward Milo, flapping his teeth like a Hungry Hungry Hippo. At which point Milo's love interest shows up on a boat, says "Welcome to the endangered species list, you bastard," and shoots Dinoshark in the eye with a harpoon gun. I realize that killing a one-of-a-kind animal would actualy REMOVE it from the endangered species list, but you have to really see the movie to appreciate how great her delivery is.

Also, at one point in the final sequence, Dinoshark leaps straight out of the water like a SeaWorld dolphin show and picks a parasailer clean out of a harness. The complete harness stays in tact and keeps flying; the guy is removed without breaking the apparatus at all.

Dinoshark in a knockout. It's not even close.

Tags: movies

Can I Be President?

Time for a new profound question! For the super-special tenth column, I wanted to help you, the reader, figure out if you can ever be the president. Obviously, the Constitution has something to say about that, but who wants to read the Constitution? They amended it like, 27 or 30 times already, so if they're just gonna keep changing it, why bother?

I believe we are at the halfway point for profound questions -- I have ten more scheduled. Thanks to everyone who sent in suggestions so far; even if I haven't answered your question directly, it might have inspired me to think along a new path. I appreciate your help.

What I've Been Up To

Uh ... not a ton, actually. Just the usual wedding planning and living my life. Somehow the blog fell by the wayside for a week. Plus, it was like 70 degrees all last week, and as you might have read in this truly mediocre short story, sunny days are a cruel master.

As the weather does improve, I would like to say something. Everyone -- really, everyone -- has inner beauty. But very few people have the outer beauty to justify short shorts. If you're putting them on, think for a second about anyone who might have to ride behind you on an escalator. Should you feel even the slightest bit of discomfort, change. There's no shame in it.

Some people have a "wardrobe switch," where on the first sunny day, they just decide that the time for long sleeves and pants is completely over. This leads to the great transitional spring phase, when it drops down to 50 for a day, and some guy still feels the need to act like flip flops and a t-shirt with no jacket is OBVIOUSLY weather appropriate. Do you keep half your clothes in a public storage locker at all times? Is there only one day you can make the switch? Huh, you dirty hippie? Huh?

And finally, a word on flip-flops. They are made for the beach. They aren't for going out. If you are a guy, and you've used a urinal while wearing flip-flops, you have urine on your feet -- and probably not even your urine! Take a day and closely observe what people do to city sidewalks. Then ask yourself if you want a thin rubber line as the only thing between your skin and that mess.

SPATS AND WOOL OVERCOATS FOR ALL! Grumble grumble grumble.

Sharktopus

Finally for today, my brother Dave, who sat through "Dinoshark" with me, sends along this link to Sharktopus. It will be about a shark-octopus hybrid, it will be directed by the great Roger Corman, and of course, it will air on SyFy.

Clearly, SyFy has made a conscious decision to corner the market on direct-to-TV shark hybrid movies. I wholeheartedly endorse this choice, and I suggest the following titles:

Hipstershark

Dinosharktopus

Davecouliershark

Giraffeshark

Sharkira

Tetrashark

Cuisinshark

Sharkretary of Housing and Urban Development

Hannah Sharktana

Puppyshark

OBGYShark

Pigeonshark

Shark1N1

Tags: presidents

Trivia Recap 3/24

It was a fine, crowded time at HHT this Wednesday, with a lot of new faces there to enjoy ... uh, a game that I might have made a little too hard. Not impossible, by any means, but in a perfect world I think I'd have given a few more hints on some of the pop culture stuff.

We had the return of the music round, with "Before Part B" -- given clips of songs with "party" in the title, you had to name the performer. "Part B" tested teams on all things B, such as: which great American invented the geodesic dome? "Pub Crawl" was my humble attempt at throwing the crowd a bone. I gave them 14 fictional watering holes, and they had to identify the movie or TV show for each one. "Everyone loves TV shows, movies and bars," I thought. "This will be easy." Well, I was wrong. It was actually pretty hard.

And then we closed with "March Madness," nine questions on marching. Not basketball. Remember, I'm strange. The Golden Triangle Gun Club returned to the top of the mountain with a 27 out of 48. Monkey Pants came in second with a 26. And Joe F***ing Biden tied with We Ain't Dancing This Time at 25, but only the dancers stuck around for the photo. Here they are, in order of finish:

Tags: trivia

Dinoshark Revisited

I put out some feelers on Facebook for more shark hybrids, and I gotta say I like what you people came up with:

Rob Devereux (no relation to Blanche):
Shiger: Part shark, part tiger
Mansharkpig: Half man, half shark, half pig
Shark pei: Shark and shar pei
Shoodle: Shark and poodle
Sharquido: Shark and mosquito
Sharkanzee: Shark and chimp
Great white blood cell: Think "The Fantastic Voyage" with people chased by shark shaped blood cells.

Allyson Jaffe:
Vulshark: half vulture, half shark.
Sharkiepus: half shark, half cookiepus

Andrea Klee:
Shnarky: A snarky person/shark
Snookharki: What happens when Snooki breeds with a Jersey shark
High Jumping the Shark: An Olympic athlete shark who took things too far and lost its edge

I think if we add those to my suggestions, we have half a year of Saturdays blocked out for SyFy. Network executives, please send your checks c/o Chris White. You're welcome.

Baseball Trivia Stumper

At trivia on Wednesday, I had a 3-point bonus question that teams could work on all night. No one got it. But why don't you give it a try? E-mail your guesses to chris@dcstandup.com, and I'll let you know how you did:

START WITH Hank Aaron's career home run total

SUBTRACT number of inches from home plate to the pitching rubber

MULTIPLY BY minimum number of at bats a leadoff hitter can have playing an entire doubleheader

THEN ADD number of MLB teams currently named for animals (humans aren't animals, for our purposes)

What's the final number?

Tags: sharks, trivia

123 Lexington Ave.

Chester A. Arthur, werewolf and possible Canadian, became our fearless leader above Indian grocery in Mahattan.

Sort of. Kalustyan's is old -- around since 1944 -- but it's not like Chet was popping downstairs every few days to pick up curry powder. He lived in the building back in 1881, and it's where he was hanging out when the word came about James Garfield's death. Today Joe Biden probably clocks a significant number of hours at an undisclosed location (obviously not a barber shop), but back then the vice president really did almost nothing. If he wanted to hang out in Mahattan in his free time -- and it was mostly free time -- no one cared. If not for his bad kidneys, he probably could have hit the bars in Chelsea without anyone buying him shots.

So when Garfield kicked the bucket at the Jersey Shore, Chester was chilling at home in NYC. You can't get into his former apartment, since someone lives there. They probably throw awesome Chester Arthur-themed parties every month where the guests dress fancy and wear fake sideburns -- who wouldn't? But you'll have to make do with a tiny plaque behind a plexiglass shield near the door: "Here on Sept. 20, 1881, Chester A. Arthur took his oath of office as 21st president of the United States upon the death of President James A. Garfield, killed by a disgruntled office seeker." It's a notch a above "We don't swim in your toilet, so don't pee in our pool" on the grandeur scale, but it's something -- if nothing else, the whole setup is a reminder of how history just keeps plowing ahead. Only two presidents were inaugurated in New York City. Washington's ascent is still pretty well preseved down by Wall Street, because he's George F'n Washington. Chester's home, on the other hand, is an afterthought on a block dotted with Indian carryout places. There's only so much space in the national memory, so a plaque is as good as it's getting.

As it turns out, Chester also died at 123 Lexington Ave., about two years after leaving D.C. He kept his health problems secret from the public during his presidency, which was also a cool thing to do right up through 1963, but he never got to enjoy much of a retirement. He died way before Coyote Ugly even opened.

But stop by if you're in the neighborhood! There's no tour, or museum, or people who could pick Chester Arthur out of a police lineup. But sometimes it's nice just to wade into history, buy an imported jar of honey for $3.99, and then contemplate leadership until the Indian lady at the register starts to wonder what the hell your problem is and asks you to leave.

Tags: presidents

Movie Review: Alice in Wonderland

According to some interview I read, Tim Burton didn't feel a "connection" to the Alice books; they're just a series of bizarre events strung together, and there's not much in the way of character development. And he's exactly right. That's exactly the style Lewis Carroll was going for. Also, half the characters are parodies of 19th-century British politicians, so adults today don't get any of the in-jokes.

So for the movie, they ginned up a new story! Only, they built it out of the misshapen pieces of the original story. Since the whole thing is a daydream, it doesn't need to conform to the old books, but they decided to cram in all of the weirdos. I spent about half the movie trying to remember if Alice actually liked any of these characters the first time she saw them. Then once I stopped caring, I realized there was no reason for her to like them this time around. Everyone in Wonderland is insane, and not really in a way that inspires affection. That discomfort carried me through to the end.

So, the story is mediocre, and the characters stink. They pretty clearly pumped up the Mad Hatter because it was Johnny Depp, but he's just not that interesting or sympathetic. There wasn't a ton of humor or whimsy (it's Tim Burton). But it did look cool. It had that 3D hammock -- lots of effects up front, a bit of a dip in the middle, then a big finish -- but the visuals were very impressive.

If you want to drop $15 for something that looks cool, go for it. But as a straight-up movie, I'd say pass.

Tags: movies

Speedy Delivery

Since I run a multimillion-dollar operation from my palatial rental home, on occasion packages are delivered to the house. A little while back, a disturbing trend developed: if I wasn't home (i.e., in Hong Kong closing a deal with one of my distributors), the UPS guy (or sometimes the USPS guy) would leave a package on the side of the house, right next to the garbage cans but visible from the sidewalk.

Now, my palatial estate is not on a "bad" block, but you can't really leave out Jack O'Laterns at Halloween, or bikes without locks, or anything valuable that you care about. The school kids across the street are often in their "stealing is fun, and my life is obviously going nowhere" phase, and since 11th St. is a bit of an arterial road, it's a convenient north-south route for people who are drunk in the middle of the day. Or as I like to think of them, zany characters!

So you can see, there's some concern that a package might be stolen. Or that a neighbor might mistake it for garbage and throw it out. Or that it might get rained on.

On Monday, I was working in my oak-paneled office when I heard the front gate open -- someone was here. I waited for the bell, but instead, I heard the gate swing again -- someone was leaving. I looked out the window to see the UPS truck. So I threw on a business suit and ran to the front step. The guy, now sitting in his truck, left a package on the side of the house, next to the recycling can. I was a little bit irritated, so I asked him to stop leaving packages on the side of the house.

This was apparently a huge mistake on my part, as he got very agitated and told me that a "no signature required" pacakage can be left anywhere safe (which incidentally for my neighbors two doors down is directly in front of their door). I protested that the side of the house is not safe, and also I asked him why he didn't ring the doorbell. "Because you're never home!" he yelled, with such agitation that it made me feel like a deadbeat dad. I momentarily forgot that my being home was the one thing making this conversation possible. Then he said he was trying to help ME out, and he'd have to start sending packages back.

This made me sad, because my driver is not well versed in "leaving a note" technology, whereby they tell me a delivery was attempted, and I instruct where a package SHOULD be left. FedEx is pretty good with this stuff, but I guess UPS doesn't want to invest in the betterment of its employees. Shame on you, Brown. Anyhow, the whole thing somehow ended with me apologizing (along the lines of "I'm sorry your wife is so ugly") and going inside with my package.

But it gets better.

Around 4 p.m., there was a knock at the door. So I put down my 4 p.m. martini, hustled downstairs, and opened the door to discover ... our postman, putting a package INTO a recycling can. Yes, he was putting a package INTO THE GARBAGE. Because that's where I usually look for my mail. In the garbage cans that I share with two other units.

Now, if I was caught putting a package in the trash, I might be a little sheepish, but the postman, without flinching, told me "no signature required." So, if you're ever wondering why a certain piece of mail hasn't arrived yet, consider the possibility that you didn't root through your garbage every day. You really have only yourself to blame.

I'd tell you the story of how Comcast left me on hold for an hour before I could activate my new digital cable box (the UPS package), but I think that's enough excitement for one day.

Tags: movies

Slice

The other day I was jogging through Anacostia Park, because I have two sworn commitments in life:

1) Physical perfection.

2) Being the only white guy in as many situations as possible.

It's what makes me a beloved icon among people of all races and colors. But back to the story. I'm running through Anacostia Park as an ambassador for the caucasian persuasion, at around 2 p.m. on a weekday. As I'm coming up on the Pennsylvania Avenue bridge, I see two black guys hanging out in the picnic area, wearing jeans and T-shirts. That's not unusual. However, these guys were fighting with samurai swords. They were actual metal swords, too -- you could tell from the sun hitting the cruel steel. Since no one was bleeding from a massive face wound or trying to hold in their intestines, I'm pretty sure they were just choreographing something.

But how neat is that? How often do you go for a jog and see two black guys fight with samurai swords in the middle of the day? Assuming that you do not live next door to the RZA.

Tags: samurai