Why Survivor drives people to use cocaine and why do boxers throw hatchets?

- Reality television, besides being a misnomer because the shows in this genre do everything but depict reality, is apparently enough to drive people into a drug habit. The on-site doctor for Survivor (the show that basically kicked off the who genre), Adrian Cohen, recently admitted to an Australian medical tribunal that he used cocaine to combat stress on the job and he’s also accused of inappropriately obtaining prescription drugs and allegedly distributing them on Survivor and other shows. Execs for the show are keeping mum until this all sorts itself out, but the prospect of a junkie doctor with a coke habit and access to dangerous prescription drugs on location in a remote place with malnourished, mentally-frayed reality show contestants is a recipe for disaster. Don’t tell me that none of these competitors has never gotten any drugs illegally from the good doctor, either. You’re telling me none of these losers has ever tried to barter for some Vicodin or sleeping pills to help them keep going? I know being on or working on a reality show could drive someone to heavy drug usage, but I’m guessing that in the future, Survivor will be using a new doctor to apply bandages and give treatment to contestants who are burned, injured or become violently ill eating the disgusting bugs and other garbage and trying to insane stunts they are talked into doing.

- Memo to all future and potential future opponents of boxer O’Neill Bell: don’t mess with this dude, because he’s insane. Now boxers are known for being nutty and mentally unstable; Mike Tyson has bitten an opponent’s ear partially off, bitten another opponent’s leg, threatened to eat the non-existent children of opponents…you get the picture. Evander Holyfield continues fighting even though he’s lost 95 percent of his brain cells and his ability to form a coherent sentence before of boxing. But this is the first time I’ve ever heard of a boxer throwing a hatchet at his training partner. Bell, the world cruiserweight champion, was arrested yesterday after police say he threw a hatchet at his sparring partner during a training run. Assault with a deadly weapon is the charge facing Bell, who also reportedly threw large rocks at sparring partner, 37-year-old Larry Slaton, following an argument during a training run at the boxer’s camp outside of Big Bear, Ca. Cops responding to a phone tip found Slaton running for his life through the woods, with cuts all over him and a panicked look in his eyes. Yeah, having a hatchet heaved at you will scare most people. But O’Neill, buddy, you really can't be throwing hatchets at people. In this case, the hatchet was for protection against bears, and generally their acceptable uses begin and end with chopping wood and similar materials. Throwing them at human beings is not an acceptable use for a hatchet or ax, nor is it an acceptable method for settling a dispute. Here’s a crazy idea: you’re both boxers, so next time you disagree, put the gloves on, get into the ring and settle it there.

- I’m even more disturbed now that I know the awards show that Justin Timberlake will be performing at is the Grammys. For a show that esteems itself as the most prestigious and important in the music industry, putting an act like this on stage is an absolute joke. Learn this lesson, Grammys: just because it’s popular music (especially with teenage girls) doesn’t make it good music. I don’t care how many 14-year-old girls named Ashley (or some spelling variation thereof, God knows there are 50 ways to spell it) just scream their heads off for JT and force their parents to buy his album for them, his music is C-R-A-P. This isn't the Billboard awards, where you pass out honors because of the sheer number of a records and artist sells; this is the freakin’ Grammys, where you’re supposed to recognize quality music. But I’m sure JT is hard at work deciding which Michael Jackson gimmick to rip off for this performance, so there’s something to look forward to.

- Not only is Brett Favre returning to play for the Green Bay Packers in 2007, he wants the team to bring in a certain enigmatic, aloof, crass and malcontented wide receiver via trade. Randy Moss, the extremely talented but lackluster, often indifferent wide receiver who is currently under contract with the Oakland Raiders, is widely believed to be on the trading block this off-season. Moss has, in recent years, walked off the field while time still remained on the clock in a game where his team was trailing, admitted in a televised interview that he still regularly smokes weed and copped to taking plays off and only trying hard some of the time. He’s bitterly unhappy in Oakland, where he has not achieved anything close to the level of success he had early in his career with Minnesota. Moss verbally berated new coach Lane Kiffin when Kiffin called his star receiver up on the phone to try and establish a rapport. He dropped so many balls this season that you had to wonder if he was simply not trying, or if he was trying to perfect a new technique of catching balls with both eyes closed and his hands slathered up with pig grease. Bringing in Moss is a bad idea for the Packers, even if you argue that a legendary player and leader like Favre could help keep him in line. This guy is a professional team killer, a bitter-man extraordinaire who won't hesitate to throw even a legend like Favre under the bus when he becomes unhappy. The Packers aren't close enough to winning a Super Bowl for Moss to put them over the top, and they won't be for at least a couple more years. By that time, Favre will be gone (I think) and Moss will be an over-the-hill, surly, discontented a-hole that the Packers will still have to be paying crazy jack to. Don’t listen to Favre, Packer management, stay away from R. Moss and you’ll be better off.

- So rare is the occasion when an actually good song or album reaches the top of the Billboard charts, I feel compelled to mention it. The Shins’ Wincing the Night Away has managed to climb to the #2 spot on the album charts for this past week, and while I’m sure it’s no match musically for genius song stylings like those of Akon and Justin Timberlake, I’m going to go out on a limb and say it’s about the only album in the Top 10 with any substantial listening value. Next week, the latest offering from whichever of the talentless Black Eyed Peas has produced a solo album will probably usurp The Shins’ spot on the charts, but for a week it’s very, very good to enjoy quality music actually being popular.