I Look Forward To These Every Year

Toilet brush wins wacky bowl

Michigan anti-lawsuit group gives out “awards” for wackiest warning labels on products.

A toilet brush with a tag that says “Do not use for personal hygiene” has taken top prize for the wackiest consumer warning label of the year, according to an anti-lawsuit group.

The Michigan Lawsuit Abuse Watch, M-LAW, whose main mission is to reveal how lawsuits and anxiety over lawsuits have created a need for overly obvious warnings on products, sponsors The Wacky Warning Label Contest each year.

Other top finishers this year include:

A scooter with the warning “This product moves when used.”

— A digital thermometer with the advice “Once used rectally, the thermometer should not be used orally.”

— An electric blender used for chopping and dicing that reminds users to “Never remove food or other items from the blades while the product is operating.”

— And a three-inch bag of air used for packaging that read “Do not use this product as a toy, pillow, or flotation device.”

“Warning labels are a sign of our lawsuit-plagued times,” said Robert B. Dorigo Jones, M-LAW president. “Plaintiff’s lawyers who file the lawsuits that prompt these warnings argue they are making us safer, but the warnings have become so long that few of us read them anymore– even the ones we should read.”

The group hopes the contest will remind us all to read the warnings on our products more carefully and motivate judges to stop what it says are frivolous lawsuits.

The winning labels were chosen by listeners of a popular morning radio show in Detroit, the group said.

If I can find the full list, I’ll post it. Generally there are a lot of good ones.

Why I’m Glad Christmas Is Over

It’s not the religion. It’s not those annoying songs. It’s not even that people become more fake than usual at this time of year because “it’s the holidays so we should all love one another.” No, my reason for being glad the holiday season is finally at it’s end is much worse than the horror that is any of those. Quite simply, now that Christmas is over, they’ll finally stop shoing that stupid Canadian Tire commercial on TV. Anybody who knows what I’m talking about is probably wondering which one I mean since they’re all stupid, but to me, this one takes the cake. I’m talking about the Christmas themed one that didn’t feature the regular plot of man advertising to the guy next door or marketing to his family gushing about the new Mastercraft toilet paper that he found only at Canadian Tire. No, I mean the other Christmas one, the one that started showing up sometime around November or so.

There’s a family getting ready for Christmas. They’re happy, they’re shopping, they’re finding great deals at Canadian Tire, things couldn’t be better. But wait, something is wrong. The cute little kid, or at least what they’d like us to believe is a cute little kid is not happy and doesn’t think that Christmas is coming. And why? Because as he puts it in that little voice of his that makes me want to kick him down 17 flights of stairs every time I hear it, “Santa isn’t coming because we don’t have a fireplace!” Sorry, let me try that again. “Thanta ithn’t coming becauthe we don’t have a fiow-plathe!” There, that’s more like it.

So time passes, the family is still happy, and the lisping little bastard is getting more and more upset because “Chrithtmath” can’t possibly come due to his family’s lack of a fireplace and Santa’s inability to find his way in without it. It’s around this time when I start wondering if he’s got any friends in apartment buildings who could set him straight, but that’s neither here nor there so we’ll move on.

Ok, it’s Christmas and the moment of truth has arrived for our little friend. Did “Thanta” make it to his “houthe?” Is there going to be a “Chrithmath?” Well of course there is, it’s a commercial, and commercials always have happy endings at Christmas when you’re supposed to part with your money. The kid gets his “fiow-plathe,” everybody else gets their stuff, all is merry and bright for all…accept me, because it’s at this point that the logical part of my brain kicks in and this commercial goes from being simply annoying to being complete nonsense.

Follow me here:
Kid doesn’t think that Santa is coming because his family doesn’t have a fireplace so he can’t get in.
Christmas comes and the family has a fireplace.
Kid freaks out because Santa brought the fireplace for them.

Are you seeing my point yet? If Santa can’t get into the house, how the hell did he get that fireplace in there without using a little technique that most of us might call a break and enter? And if the kid is smart enough to figure out that Santa Claus doesn’t have an entrance, how did he miss that? I mean for God sakes, who do they have writing this stuff, the people who write for Smackdown? It makes about as much sense and it’s just about as frustrating to watch.

Oh well, at least that horrible piece of advertising is gone for the year, and hopefully for good. If not, I guess I can just put it down as one more reason why we’re all supposed to drink so much at Christmas time.

Why Not Just Hit A Boxing Day Sale Or Something?

Steven Murray of Feasterville Pennsylvania was so outraged that he didn’t receive any presents from his family for Christmas that he burned down his parent’s home the next morning.

Police said Murray had committed himself to a hospital on Christmas Day, but decided to sign himself out later that day and walk the eight miles home.

He told police that he saw flames from a distance, but officers were suspicious because his jacket smelled like smoke and they found a lighter in his pocket when they searched him, as well as a gas can by the front door of the house. One officer says Murray “was irritated that his family gave him no presents for Christmas.”

He has been charged with arson and risking a catastrophe, and was jailed on $1 million bail. Nobody was hurt.

How Is It That You Get To Represent Your Country?!?

So I’ve been taking in mass amounts of hockey over the holidays with the World Junior Hockey Championships going on. I mean who knows when we’ll get some more good hockey. But there are three instances that have taken place at this year’s even that just make me shake my head and wonder how some of these assholes get the chance to represent their countries.

The first one was committed by our friends south of the border in the USA. They were one of the favourites to win the tournament coming in to it but had some trouble when they got to the last place Belarus team. Truth be told they were getting their asses handed to them by a shitty team and they weren’t enjoying it much. We can all understand that. Losing sucks, especially when you’re clearly better. But, as pissed off as the Americans were, the Belarussians were loving it. This was going to be the biggest win of their young careers, and for many of them, their lives. You can understand that the game might get a little chippy towards the end because of the frustration of the Americans but it should have been over at the end of the game when the buzzer went. it wasn’t. These young kids from Belarus began to celebrate this huge accomplish for them when apparently the Americans decided that wasn’t appropriate on their ice and started taking shots at them and shoving and the usual hockey bullshit. Now let’s forget for a second that the Americans were hosting the event and could have been good sports about this in front of their own fans but regardless of where it was held, the actions the Americans took was shit. It’s not getting much coverage but why, when most of these American kids were going to go on in the tournament anyway and have long NHL careers, did they feel they needed to ruin the moment for their opponents. The Belarussians had every right to be happy and celebrate. This was huge for them. They hadn’t won a game yet and this was huge. But, rather than celebrate the moment with their team mates, they had to fight off embarassed Americans who couldn’t stand back and just let someone else have the spotlight for a minute. There were some classy Americans like Suter and Fritchie that stood back, but there were alot more assholes than gentlemen, that’s for sure.

This next one kind of paid back the Americans for their actions but was still wrong. In the semi-final the Russians were leading 3-2 in the 3rd and scored to make it 4-2. The Russians began hot=dogging everywhere. They started cupping their ears to act like the American fans should be cheering for them, they slammed pucks back in to the net a second time after they had already scored, they skated by the American bench after scoring another goal pumping their fists. Before it was all said and done it was 7-2 Russia and they were sticking it to the americans and their fans. Dit it look good on the U.S. for the shit they ahd pulled the night before? Sure. Was it still disgraceful? Definitely. Tell me the importance of a 6-2 goal in to an empty net. There isn’t any but these clowns acted like they’d just won the tournament. Of course it all got out of hand and sticks started flying and there was shoving and pushing and again an international game was made to look more like a circus than an athletic competition.

One of the Russian players has a pre-game ritual where before the ref drops the puck to start the game, he skates down to the opposing teams net and pretends to fire a puck on their goaltender. Well, look out Russia because tonight you play Canada and the shit you pulled in the semi’s won’t fly. Canada has asked the governing body to make sure this doesn’t happen tonight by giving the appropriate Unsportsmanlike conduct penalty to the player if he does it tonight. I hope they try their hotdog bullshit against Canada tonight because we’ve got the horses to make them pay for it within the rules of the game. Can you imagine what happens to one of these guys if they start waving to the Canadian bench after scoring when he comes back out the next time? Phaneuf’s gonna nail this guy through the boards in to the 3rd row. I hope they try it. It’ll look better real good on them when they lose. Why are you celebrating after the semi’s anyway? You haven’t won anything yet.

The last one is a small thing but that has always been huge to me personally whenever I see it. during Canada’s game with Finland Canada was up 7-0 on the Finns in the third with no chance of the coming back. One of the Finns finally scores to make it 7-1 with like 5 minutes left in the game and he starts jumping around like he’s just scored the game winner. Umm. Escuse me. I might suggest that you TAKE A LOOK AT THE FUCKING SCOREBOARD!!! It’s 7-1 you dumb prick. You’re getting killed. Have some dignity. Put your hand in the air and skate back to center for the next face-off. That goal means nothing. There’s way too many guys like this out there. Guys that put themselves above the team. Their team can be getting killed 10-1 but they’re happy as long as they got the one goal. There’s a famous saying in sports that I’ve always loved. “the name on the front of the sweater is more important than the one on the back.” That’s magnified about 10 times if you’re playing for your country.

These guys should all be embarassed. You’re supposed to be representing their countries and this is the way they choose to do it. I’ve heard people say “oh that’s just how the Europeans are.” That’s bullshit. You didn’t see Igor Larionov doing stuff like this when he was one of the first Russians to come over to North America and pave the way for these young guys. Didn’t see much of this shit from Jari Kurri when he and Gretzky were setting records in Edmonton. And he ACTUALLY had something to brag about! these guys need to show some respect. If they ever get to the NHL they’re gonna get fucking killed the first time they do something like that.

Cuz guess what? You don’t get kicked out of the game for fighting in the NHL!

What an Odd Combination

Over the last few days I’ve been listening to the oddest thing and been pleasnatly surprised on how much I actually enjoy it. I downloaded the tracks from that Jay-Z/Linkin Park colaboration and I’ve actually thought it was pretty good.

Now I’m not usually much of a Jay-Z fan and definitely not a Linkin Park fan but for some reason when the two were crossed they came up with a sound that I actually enjoyed alot.

As most of you who have been reading here for a long time would know, I’m more of a Punk Rock fan but I do enjoy some other stuff as well. Rap is not right at the top of my list but there are a few Rappers that I don’t mind. If I’m going to listen to it though, it has to be more heavy and in your face. None of this cutesy lovey shit like Nelly and stuff like that that has all the 14 year old girls screaming these days. I need something that’s gonna still be heavy, even for rap so that I’m not venturing all that far from Punk. If you want to know what I mean download some Atmosphere tunes. (Trying to Find A Balance is their best song in my opinion). This is a Rap group that is a bit heavier and is rapping about something important like Social Issues. Y’know? Music with a message. it’s actually a nice change from “I got a million hoes and I shoot people who talk to them” kinda shitty music.

So, Linkin Park is by no means a largely “heavy” band but when you cross some of their music with rap lyrics like Jay-Z’s it comes off as a rap song with heavy music and I guess that’s probably why I enjoy it. I doubt I’ll be rushing out to buy the album but it’s not bad for a list of mp3’s. In my opinion the cross between Numb and Encore is the best of the group, but the rest aren’t bad.

Give it a listen if you get the chance. You might be surprised, too.

Logic

Two rednecks decided that they weren’t going anywhere in life and thought that they should go to college to get ahead.

The first goes in to see the local high school counselor, who tells him to take Math, History, and Logic.

“What’s Logic?” the redneck asks.

The counselor answers by saying, “Let me give you an example. Do you own a weed eater?”

“I sure do.”

“Then I can assume, using logic, that you have a yard,” replied the counselor.

“That’s real good!” says the redneck.

The counselor continues, “Logic will also tell me that since you have a yard, you also own a house.”

Impressed, the redneck says, “Amazin’!”

“And since you own a house, logic dictates that you have a wife.”

“That’s Betty Mae! This is incredible!” (The redneck is obviously catching on).

“Finally, since you have a wife, logically I can assume that you are heterosexual,” said the counselor.

“You’re absolutely right! Why that’s the most fascinatin’ thing I ever heard! I can’t wait to take that logic class!!”

The redneck, proud of the new world opening up to him, walks back into the hallway, where his friend is still waiting.

“So what classes are ya takin’?” asks the friend.

“Math, History, and Logic!” replies the first redneck.

“What in tarnation is logic?” asked his friend.

“Let me give you an example. Do ya own a weed eater?” asked the first redneck.

“No,” his friend replied.

“FAG!!”

Who Builds This Stuff?

I noticed something really stupid about my fridge yesterday while I was putting away groceries. The egg section in the top of the door only has 20 spots in it. I’m sure that at this moment a few of you are probably thinking who cares, but let’s face it, if you were looking for hard news coverage you wouldn’t be here so let me explain why I think this is so dumb.

Unless I’ve been really really sheltered throughout my whole life, eggs only come in cartons of 6 or 12, not 10 or 20. You’ve got your dozen and your half dozen, no more, no less. So why then if you’re a highly paid fridge designer would you decide that 20 is a good number to go with when you’re drawing up the plans for the little egg holding spot? It doesn’t make sense. Count up by 6’s. If you can’t, I’ll do it for you. 6, 12, 18, 24, 30…Ok, you get the point, no 20! You can’t evenly divide 20 by 6 and you can’t get eggs in cartons of 10 or 20 so you’d think that with all of these factors working against the pro 20 crowd, they might just see reason and give in. But no, at least not in the case of my fridge.

My egg section is divided up into 2 rows of 10. Why would they do that? Maybe they built the fridge slightly too small and adding those last 2 egg holes would have made that part too wide for the door. But that can’t be, because I know how factories work. They’ll throw stuff out or sell it to you for 50 cents if it has smaller problems with it than that, so the only conclusion I can logically come to is that those highly paid fridge designers that I talked about earlier are not in fact highly paid and messing with us by doing things like that is one of the few bits of satisfaction they get in life. Well, I for one have no sympathy for them, and if I could, I would condemn them all to a life of having to use their own creations and being forced to buy 2 dozen eggs every time they went out and got a fridge full of food so that they would have to stand there in frustration trying to find a place to put them all so they didn’t have to shove the whole stupid carton in the fridge just because they’re 4 spaces short. Sure it might sound harsh, but like that old saying almost goes, you lie in the fridge you make.

Bizarre reversals

Explain this to me. There are no ophthalmologists for humans in this city, but there’s one for dogs. What the hell? Why does a dog need an ophthalmologist anyway? It’s not like he’s gonna drive anywhere. I mean if the dog’s doing some kind of work, then ok, but most dogs sit around, gnaw on bones and go “arf arf.” Who in hell is going to pay to have Spot see an ophthalmologist? But humans who might need one, nope, they have to go to another city. I know there’s a major vet school here, so I guess that’s explained. It’s just a pain. There’s one for dogs right here, but I’m gonna have to go on a major excursion just so the guide dog school’s happy.

Anyway, that’s about it. I just couldn’t believe that. An ophthalmologistfor dogs? How do they even survive? Are there enough people taking rover and butch to see how blind they are in their old age? Guess the only way they could survive is if they charge an arm and a leg for an eye. Then the prosthetics-fitters for dogs would be kept in business too…so round and round we go.

I’m back.

Sorry for the unbelievably long silence from me except for drivel on the comment boards. That’s what happens when your plumbing breaks, your phone breaks, parts of your supposedly brand spanking new computer break, you have exams, and then you scurry home for Christmas, to your parents’ house who have dialup, and you just get back now. Oh yeah, and when you go home, you find out your grandma’s in the hospital and her family doctor is being a tool chest. A tool chest? Nope, a whole tool warehouse! But anyway, that’s my lame excuse for not posting since like, what? December 5th or something.

I don’t even know why I’m posting except to hope everyone had a good Christmas. Mine was good. I got stuff I didn’t even know I wanted until I got it. Love those. The only part that sucked about it was the Dr. Tool Warehouse part. My grandma had to spend part of Christmas day in the hospital for no god damn good reason, except that the doctor refuses to let her out until the results of some stupid ass assessment are back. Until then, she could have come home god damn it. She’s sharing a room with a woman who can’t remember her name from day to day and shuts off the lights at fucking 7:00 at night cause it’s time for beddy bies for crying out loud. that’s no place for her. Ok I don’t even know where that came from. Don’t let me near a keyboard and the internet when I’m really mad. Who knows what might happen.

And holy crap my parents get a lot of spam. Here’s a tip. don’t fill out surveys that pop up and don’t give them your real address. Jesus Murphy. They get emails with part of their real address in them. And downloading hundreds of crap-filled messages on dialup…did I mention how slow dialup is? isn’t fun.

My brother’s hilarious. Everywhere he goes with his laptop, he looks to see if there’s a wireless connection he can tap into and mooch off of. Silly brother I have.

On the positive side, my neighbour is hilariously cute. He knocked on my door and gave me a huge, and I mean huge, cookie jar filled with mints. So everyone who comes to see me can for sure have a mint. Hell have two! Man that’s a lot of mints.

How do I end a post like this? I dunno. Hope you’re all safe and happy and cosy and warm…and well, no where near Thailand.