- A big salute to health officials in the city of Dundee, Scotland for taking on one of the biggest plagues on the populace in any society: smoking. No one hates smoking more than me and no one does more to keep his distance from losers who smoke more than I do. We could jam all of these jerks onto a big freighter and ship them off to Siberia permanently for all I care. Choking down your cancer sticks around the rest of us and forcibly upping our chances of lung cancer because of secondhand smoke makes you a loser, no questions asked. So I tip my cap to officials in Dundee, who are undertaking a new program designed to help smokers in their city kick the habit. Participants will receive an electronic card each week worth $25 that they can redeem for fresh food and groceries. The cards cannot be used for drugs or alcohol, but you might be asking how this is going to help smokers stop smoking. After all, they could just use the cards for groceries and then with the extra cash that is freed up, buy their cigs. But that’s where the second part of the program kicks in. The pilot program will require participants to undergo weekly carbon monoxide breath tests to prove they haven’t started smoking again and they will also receive treatment for their addiction. If only American cities were making this kind of innovative, forward-thinking effort to stamp out smoking, maybe we’d be further ahead in stamping it out here in the United States.
- Suck it long and suck it hard, Chicago White Sox. While you all whine, b*tch and moan about how dirty and smelly the visitors’ clubhouse is at Wrigley Field and how ignorant the fans there are, you’re missing out on the real story. That story would be your cross-town rivals b*tch-slapping you in a three-game weekend sweep. Both the White Sox and Cubs may have entered and exited the series in first place in their respective divisions, it wad the Cubs winning all three games and outscoring their in-city rivals by a collective 22-11 margin. It was the Cubs pounding out nine home runs, including four from third baseman Aramis Ramirez, who might need to be pulled off White Sox pitching at this time. It was the Cubs getting strong starting and relief pitching from the likes of Ryan Dempster, Ted Lilly, Bob Howry and Kerry Wood. The first game of the series was the only close one, but even then it was decidedly in the favor of the Cubs as they rallied from a 3-1 deficit and ripped the game with a walk-off homer from Ramirez. From there, it was an 11-7 beatdown on Saturday and an even more thorough 7-1 butt-whipping Sunday night on ESPN Sunday Night Baseball. White Sox pitcher John Denks was among those with a lack of proper focus, complaining that the visitors’ clubhouse reeks of urine. Catcher A.J. Pierzynski basically called Cubs fans unemployed rejects, while manager Ozzie Guillen said his players hated getting dressed because the locker room is so small that you’re likely to find some teammate’s exposed rear end in your face at any given moment. Great perspective, guys. Keep that up and you’ll be on the receiving end of another sweep next weekend when the Windy City showdown resumes on Chicago’s south side at the White Sox’s home park, U.S. Cellular Field.
- Boy, I am just stunned. There are just some things in life you never see coming no matter how hard you try, no matter how closely you look. Life is rife with mysteries; things you cannot explain, predict or expect. Chief among those is how a good, clean-living, upstanding soul like Amy Winehouse is now allegedly battling emphysema and operating at 70 percent capacity in her lungs. Mitch Winehouse, the singer’s father and the man who has the unfortunate designation of being all but assured of ending up as a parent who outlives their child, told a British tabloid those facts over the weekend after his little girl was hospitalized (again) after a recent collapse. “With smoking the crack cocaine and the cigarettes, her lungs are all gunked up,” Mitch Winehouse explained. He also claimed that his daughter may end up having to use an oxygen mask full-time, which ironically might help her singing. It’s not like her singing could be any more indecipherable regardless of what she does, so it would have to help. Again, I find all of this totally flabbergasting. Who ever would have expected that someone like Amy Winehouse would end up with damaged lungs? Why didn’t someone tell her that snorting vodka and cocaine, jamming heroin into your veins, smoking weed and cigarettes and downing every kind of alcohol known to man is bad for your body? It’s not like people can be expected to know this stuff on their own. The bummer here is that at least with Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and Jim Morrison, we got a few years of amazing music before drugs and hard living wrecked and ultimately killed them. With Winehouse, we get a couple of crappy albums full of mumbling, moaning and growling that I’m not sure even qualify as music. Best of success in finishing off your steep and severe decline in health and prosperity, Amy.
- Looking for a way to get totally ripped off and throw away $400 for something that is overpriced by a solid 100 percent? Search no more, because you’re looking for the 30-disc boxed set featuring all seven seasons of The Sopranos. Yes, this massive rip-off gives you 30 discs plus two bonus DVDs and it’s been slapped with a $399.99 price tag. What extras do I get for throwing away $200 more than I should, you ask? Well, you’ll also get an interview with series creator David Chase, conducted by Alec Baldwin; three soundtrack CDs; and a pair of featurettes in which cast members sit down for dinner to reflect on their favorite scenes and what not. I’m guessing the ending is still a lame fade to black, so don’t expect this 10-lb. monstrosity, available Nov. 11, to rectify that problem. Yes, a lot of people loved this show and I’m not discounting that. I have a lot of shows I’ve loved too, but there is no f’ing way I would ever pay $400 for a DVD set of any of them Compounding my anger here is that fact I never watched this show when it was on the air and have no interest in it. Consequently, this freaking $400 price tag is pissing me off so much and it’s such a blatant ripoff that I may track down a copy of this DVD set and illegally burn a copy of it just out of spite….
- There may be a new reason to be amazed when you turn on your favorite NFL team’s game this fall. Aside from marveling at the feats of strength, speed and agility from your favorite players, you should probably take a minute to stop and appreciate the amazing fact that enough of the players stayed sober and out of the drunk tank long enough to play that game. Okay, so that might be a bit of an exaggeration, but it is alarming to see the rate at which NFLers are picking up DUI (along with the occasional boating under the influence charge) this offseason. In the past week alone, Tennessee Titans defensive end Jevon Kearse was booked on suspicion of DUI charges and Carolina Panthers wide receiver Dwayne Jarrett plead guilty to drunken driving charges. To follow that up, a man who has posted both a driving while intoxicated and boating while intoxicated incident this offseason (take a bow, Cedric Benson!) was ordered by a Texas judge to place a ignition lock breath analyzer on his car to prevent him from getting behind the wheel molared up. Benson is currently a man without a team because the Chicago Bears cut him after his second alcohol-related offense of the offseason, but he may be a man without a way home from his local bar if he can’t learn to stay sober. I get that these guys want to enjoy themselves in the offseason, but there should not be this many idiots in any one professional sports league. Point blank, if you drive while under the influence, that’s what you are - an idiot. It’s not open to debate; it’s just a fact. So if you see your favorite NFL player at your local watering hole, keep an eye on him and maybe offer him a ride him at the end of the night. It might be the best way to prevent these idiots from driving drunk since they can’t seem to take responsibility for themselves.
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