GOD'S LITTLE JEST

According to today's Newark Advocate online, a man of God in Hebron, New Jersey, has been arrested for sexual involvement with a minor female. He is the associate pastor at the Licking Baptist Church, which is located on Beaver Run Road. Whether the subject is satire or extenuating circumstances, there are times when you just don't know where to begin, and thus decide it's simply better not to.

TRIVIA QUESTION

If you're into the acquisition, for potential display, of obscure but otherwise pointless information, you'll be delighted to know that the movie "Predator" featured three actors who would go on to run for governor of their respective states. The question would be, Who were they, What states were involved, and How did they do? Almost everybody will get Jesse Ventura, who won in Minnesota, and Arnold Schwarzenegger, who won in California, but hardly anyone will come up with Sonny Landham, who made a game and plucky attempt in Kentucky but came up short. Wire ten percent of your bar bet profits from this to:
Paladin
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WHEEEEEERE'S JOHNNY?

The tragic loss of the great Johnny Carson certainly brings back memories for all of us. In my case, of course, I am flooded with recollections of the many wonderful and unforgettable appearances I didn't make on his show.
The first time I wasn't on the Tonight Show was at age 16, when my searing fastball and dizzying breaking pitches as the star of my high school team got my picture on the cover of Sports Illustrated and agents hounding my family at all hours.
Just a few years later, I wasn't on the show for leading the California Golden Bears to an undefeated season and a thumping of Ohio State in the Rose Bowl with my uncanny passing and minklike evasiveness.
Only later would I not be invited on by Johnny to discuss my first New York Times best-selling novel, the first of several times that I found myself not on the program as the evening's "literary guest."
During the 1980s, I was not on the Tonight Show at least a dozen times as a stand-up comedian, and was later not a regular guest because my hit sitcom was also on NBC.
And finally, it was the ultimate honor to not find my name in consideration as Johnny's replacement when he retired.
As if anyone could truly replace Johnny Carson.
I can't imagine my life without him.

SPACE UNAVAILABLE

Prodded into action by the tall rubles the Russian space agency was pulling in with its "space tourist" trade, NASA, ever determined that unsavory civilian types not be allowed to foul the neighborhood 260 miles up, has issued an official set of criteria delineating those personality types that will NOT be permitted on board the International Space Station. Deemed astronauta non grata are: Anyone with a poor work or military record, anyone exhibiting criminal or dishonest tendencies, anyone guilty of lying or fraud, and anyone who drinks too much.
On the upside, this virtually guarantees that almost nobody in the current administration will ever wind up in orbit, where God only knows what damage they might be capable of, and that George W. Bush would personally not even be allowed to touch a space shuttle. On the downside, these standards just reek of the high-moral, Boy Scout pettiness that thickens the lower atmosphere these days.
Aside from the fact that most of the first generation of astronauts were renowned for their skill at pulling a cork and finding the bottom of a bottle, I can think of plenty of character types who would be far less desirable companions on a journey into space than would simple sloshes or truth-benders.
For example:
--Anyone who goes through more than two bottles of Gas-X per day.
--Anyone who insists on bringing their Michael Bolton, Jessica Simpson, C-Murder, or William Shatner CDs.
--Anyone who keeps muttering, "This will make the Hindenburg look like a kitchen fire..."
--Anyone who giggles during training whenever the words "coupling" or "Uranus" are spoken.
--Anyone named Osama, Suge, Ishmael, or Bugsy.
--Anyone who sweats gravy just lacing up his high-tops.
--Anyone who asks to bring along his "lucky butt plug."
--Anyone who wants to go into space in order "to shake hands with Jesus / Allah / Elvis."
--Anyone who voted for Nader, invested in Enron, and bought 49ers season tickets.
--Anyone who wears enough piercing jewelry to generate their own magnetic field.
--Anyone with a "Live Hard, Die Young!" tattoo.
--Anyone who lists under "Hobbies / Talents" an ability to "puke at will."
--Anyone who keeps asking what enemas are like when you're weightless.
--Anyone who even vaguely resembles Geraldo Rivera.

THE WOMACK PROTOCOL

"Don't cheerleaders all over America form pyramids six to eight times a year? Is that torture?"--Defense attorney Guy Womack, defending US soldier Charles Graner, accused of such Iraqi prisoner abuses as forcing them to form naked human pyramids, reported 1/11/05.


(AP--Washington--3/15/05)
Declaring that "I like the way this guy thinks," President George Bush today signed an order authorizing the use by the CIA and US military of the new Womack Interrogation Guidelines, as suggested by Bush's recently appointed Deputy Attorney General For Intelligence Acquisiton, former defense lawyer Guy Womack. Among the interrogation measures recommended, and the reasoning behind their justification, are:
1.) Bleeding prisoners once a month because cheerleaders, at least female cheerleaders, well, you know.
2.) Getting prisoners so drunk that they pass out cold and are then sexually violated by drunken young American males, another activity cheerleaders are frequently reported being involved in.
3.) Hitting prisoners alongside the head with long L-shaped sticks because that routinely goes on in hockey games.
4.) Throwing hard, fist-sized, cowhide-covered balls at prisoners' heads at upwards of 90 miles an hour because that happens all the time in major league baseball games, especially if Roger Clemens is playing.
5.) Hurling prisoners downhill into trees at 40-60 miles per hour, a common occurrence in skiing--or are you saying that these terrorist scum somehow deserve better than Sonny Bono?
6.) Having prisoners eat worms, goat intestines, squid eyes or live cockroaches, which countless Americans have enthusiastically volunteered to do if it would get them on some reality TV show.
7.) Forcing prisoners to wear dog collars and to be led around on all fours by a leash, a practice that more than a few State and Defense Department officials are known pay women generously to subject them to.
8.) Having prisoners punch one another in the face with all their might, which a number of Americans were more than willing to do for little more than a pack of cigarettes in "Bumfights," a greatly underrated video series.
9.) Stuffing prisoners into supermarket shopping carts and rolling them at high speed into concrete walls, which numerous American adolescents seemed thoroughly delighted to do on "Jackass," a popular cable series.
10.) Making prisoners stand in line outdoors, in terrible weather, with no restroom facilities or hot food, for hour after hour after hour, something that thousands of Star Wars geeks happily do to get opening day tickets every time Lucas cranks out another episode.

PAPA OOMAUMAU

If I wasn't so inherently lazy, I would send this to Jay Leno for use in his monologue, where it rightly belongs.

The results are in on the first installment of "Who's Your Daddy?" the new Fox network show, so emblematic of the taste level at Fox, in which a woman who was adopted as a child attempts to determine which of eight men, all claiming to be her father, actually is. It turns out that the viewing public evidently (and uncharacteristically) regards this concept with as much contempt as the critics. The show utterly tanked in the ratings. Fox is so panicked that the network is rushing in a replacement show directed at the urban and sports viewing markets, in which NBA star Allen Iverson attempts to determine which one of eight children is not actually his.