Ineffective prison chapel services in Texas, weekend movie news and rabid raccoons run amok in NYC

- Perhaps the chapel services at the prison in Livingston, Texas are not quite as effective as the officials there would like. After all, it’s hard to applaud the influence of a church service when five of the attendees sit through that service, then walk out of the room and attempt to make their escape from the facility in which they are imprisoned. Officials at the jail confirmed that three inmates were shot and wounded by guards Friday during an escape attempt at about 9 p.m. local time, when inmates were leaving a church service at a gymnasium in the prison. Jason Clark, a spokesman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, explained that while walking back from the church service, five inmates jumped an interior fence in an attempt to flee. Guards did what they do when idiot inmates make obvious, poorly planned escape attempts: open fire. Thrre of the inmates were injured and all five were immediately captured. The wounded inmates were taken to a hospital while the other two were simply taken back to Cell Block D. I don’t know what the sermon was about in that prison chapel service, but the chaplain may want to avoid that particular topic in future sermons. Of course, it’s not the chaplain’s fault that some of the prisoners he ministers to are absolute idiots who couldn’t concoct a good escape plan if you gave them access to a Home Depot, a stockpile of military-grade weaponry and a brain transplant. It’s instances like this that remind you definitively that we are far, far better off as a society without most of the morons who currently reside in our jails as a part of our everyday world…………

- It’s about freaking time and I could not be happier to see quirky, eclectic and awesome rockers My Morning Jacket back out on the road. Jim James and crew took nearly a year off from touring, but they will make their return starting in April for a nine-date outing through several Southeastern states. The tour commences April 20 in Birmingham, Ala., winds up in Columbus, Ohio on May 2. It includes a stop at the annual New Orleans Jazzfest and the opening act for all nine shows will be the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, a New Orleans favorite that lost many of its members for various reasons tied to Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath. The namesake venue that hosted so many of the band’s performances made it through the storm in near-unscathed shape, but the impact on the band’s musicians was more than enough damage. Many of the musicians have been displaced and cannot find work or paying gigs and Preservation Hall's Music Outreach Program, which provides private lessons for students who would otherwise be unable to afford them, was also severely disrupted. MMJ and the band from Preservation Hall first team up in the spring of 2009, when MMJ frontman Jim James performed with the band in its legendary French Quarter venue. Two songs recorded that night, "St. James Infirmary" and "Louisiana Fairytale," will be part of an upcoming benefit album for Preservation Hall. The album will also feature tracks by such artists as Tom Waits, Ani DiFranco, Jim James and Andrew Bird.

As for the tour dates for MMJ and PHJB, they are:

Apr. 20: Birmingham, AL (Alabama Theater)


Apr. 21: Nashville, TN (Municipal Auditorium)


Apr. 23: Atlanta, GA (Chastain Park)


Apr. 24: New Orleans, LA (Jazzfest)


Apr. 27: St. Augustine, FL (St. Augustine Amphitheater)


Apr. 28: Charleston, SC (Family Circle)


Apr. 30: Raleigh, NC (Koka Booth)


May 1: Columbia, MD (Merriweather Post Pavilion)


May 2: Columbus, OH (LC Outdoor Pavilion)

These should all be amazing shows, as any MMJ performance tends to be. It’s also a chance to generate some attention for a very worthy cause, so if there is a show on the tour in your area, you would do well to get out and see it………….

- As someone who loves Central Park and makes a point of spending time there on any visit to Manhattan, I bring you this next story so that you too can enjoy a pleasant visit to what I argue is the best place to go in NYC, bar none. Authorities and medical experts are concerned that a rabies outbreak in Central Park could spread from raccoons to humans. So far, health investigators have confirmed reports of 28 rabid raccoons in or near Central Park over the past two months. As of Friday, the situation had become serious enough that they felt the need to issue a public warning. The city’s health department has been monitoring the rabid raccoon situation since December and is working with the parks department and others to increase surveillance and vaccinate wild raccoons in Central Park, Morningside Park and Riverside Park. Officials believe that that ideal conditions in Central Park for animals, especially a low number of predators, could exacerbate an outbreak. "Urban ecosystems sometimes have the ideal measures," said Dr. Charles Rupprecht, chief of the rabies program at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "When you get an infectious agent like rabies, it tends to have these untoward effects, meaning an outbreak.” To minimize risks for park visitors, authorities are increasing surveillance and vaccinations and recommending that visitors to city parks keep pets on a leash and steer clear of raccoons they see during the day. For the nature-ignorant among you, raccoons are nocturnal animals who rarely venture out in the daylight. If they are out during the day, that "means they are probably carrying rabies," said Marlene Elizondo, a nurse with the International SOS, which offers medical care and consulting services to companies, nonprofits and other organizations. "In such a condensed area like New York, it's more likely that a human would come into contact with" a rabid raccoon, Elizondo said. Park visitors are also asked to notify authorities if they see any animal behaving strangely. To illustrate the rate at which the problem is growing, consider that health officials received 10 reports of rabid raccoons in Manhattan last year, but eight of them were in December. That was on the heels of only one such case from 2003 through 2008. The primary hot zone for rabid raccoons seemed to be the northern part of Central Park, between 79th and 110th streets. Keep that in mind if you are fortunate enough to visit Manhattan any time in the next few months and please steer clear of any demented-looking raccoons out during daylight hours……….

- Pittsburgh Pirates owner Bob Nutting is a piece of crap. A guy who trades basically his entire starting lineup, including two All-Stars, over the course of two seasons and then takes umbrage when two separate groups approach him with offers to buy his team is a douche bag, plain and simple. Gutting your team the way Nutting has shows definitively that a person cannot afford to field a competitive team and shouldn’t own one to begin with. Asking fans to continue to pay the same ticket prices to come see the crap the Pirates have put out on the field after their team-gutting trades the past two seasons is insulting and ridiculous and Nutting is either insane, delusional or dumb, possibly all three. Yet when he received two separate proposals to buy the team last year, he declined to listen to either. One was a surprise bid from Pittsburgh Penguins co-owner Mario Lemieux, who paired with Penguins co-owner Ron Burkle to make an unsolicited proposal for the Pirates four months ago. Nutting also turned down several sale overtures made by Pittsburgh lawyer Chuck Greenberg, who instead partnered with Nolan Ryan to purchase the Texas Rangers in a deal completed last week. A few years ago, Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban also was rebuffed in efforts to buy the team and he too was shot down. Nutting maintains that the Pirates aren't for sale even though the team would clearly be better off with someone other than him owning the team. This time, the Nutting and his crack staff felt the need to publicly shoot down the sale rumors said in a statement read Saturday at the team's annual fan festival. "No formal, substantive offer had been made," team president Frank Coonelly "We had a meeting four months ago with Bob, Mario and Ron Burkle. But what I can confirm for you at that time, today, tomorrow, next week, the Pirates are not for sale. Bob is committed to bringing a championship back to Pittsburgh." Oh no, he didn’t. That tool did not just say that the man who traded All-Stars Jason Bay and Freddie Sanchez and the rest of the lineup that took the field on Opening Day 2008 and has yet to bring a single marquee free agent to the Steel City is committed to bringing a championship to Pittsburgh. Exactly what part of getting rid of your best players mid-season every single year in a massive salary dump and ending up in last place spells “committed to a championship?” Or better yet, how is ensuring that you’re putting a team on the field that will continue your franchise’s string of 17 straight losing seasons showing commitment to a championship? The Pirates lost 99 games last to set a Major League Baseball record with that 17th straight losing season, yet their owner won't sell? Just look at the team’s payroll; the Pirates' projected $35 million payroll for the upcoming season is only about half of the totals for NL Central rivals Cincinnati and Milwaukee, despite being in a similar-sized market, and is expected to be the lowest in the majors by at least $5 million. There is no freaking way that Nutting gives a damn about winning a championship and he’s insulting his fans by trying to sell them on that lie. Worse still is Coonelly appearing at the team’s fan fest and perpetuating that lie. "Mario and Ron are very smart business people. They've been very successful with the Penguins and have done a great job with them," Coonelly said. "What they see in the Pirates, I would think, is that they're interested in purchasing a team much like the Penguins earlier this decade: A team on the rise. A team that has a plan. A team that has financial stability." A team on the rise? What kind of cheap stuff have you been smoking, Coon-Dog? Yes, owning two of the Pittsburgh's three major pro sports teams might have allowed Lemieux and Burkle to launch their own TV sports channel and that would have made them a lot of money. Having said that, any profit they may turn would pale in comparison to the fact that they would undoubtedly, by virtue of them not being Bob Nutting, would make in putting a team on the field that was at least mildly competitive and a threat for a winning season every now and then…………

- And so it continues. Avatar rolled on at the box office this weekend, raking in $30 million to push its domestic total to $594 million, perilously close to the record of another of James Cameron’s crap-tacular, overrated films, Titanic. That four-hour crap-fest made $600 million, but it is best known for wasting four hours of my life that I can never get back. What’s amazing about Avatar’s weekend is that it dropped off just 14 percent, which is a smaller drop-off than last weekend. Coming in second place was the R-rated drama Edge of Darkness with $17.1 million, a bit below expectations but still solid. That number could have been higher but for the angry Jewish contingent out there whose leaders called for a boycott of the film due to producer Mel Gibson’s comments a few years ago. Third place went to the Kristen Bell and Josh Duhamel-led romantic comedy When in Rome, which opened with a $12 million take. Next on the list was The Tooth Fairy, which rebounded from a disappointing opening weekend to give Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Co. a $10 million haul, good enough for fourth place and a cumulative total $25 million for 10 ten days in release. Rounding out the top five was the actual best movie among the group, Denzel Washington’s Book of Eli. The post-apocalyptic drama dropped 44 percent its third weekend in theaters, raking in $8.7 million to raise its cumulative tally to $74 million. The steepest drop on the weekend went to Legion, the Paul Bettany-Dennis Quaid drama that plummeted 61 percent and earned only $6.8 million in its second weekend for a total take of $28.6 million. In seventh place was The Lovely Bones with $4.7 million, followed by Sherlock Holmes (8th place with $4.5 million), Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakuel (9th place with $4 million) It’s Complicated (No 10 with $3.7 million). This week ahead will definitely be interesting, as Oscar nominations will be announced Tuesday, meaning that films no one has had any interest in before now will suddenly see a surge in earnings because people will mistakenly think that an Oscar nomination means it is definitely a good movie and go see it even though they already knew the basic premise and had no interest in it previously. Until then…………

A good Pro Bowl idea, a bummer of a story for my stoner friends and the state of polygamy in South Africa

- Count me among those who can’t generate much self-interest in watching the NFL Pro Bowl. When more than one-third of the stars elected to the game pull out with fake injuries or schedule conflicts, how can the NFL expect fans to be excited about the contest? Thankfully, one of the stars remaining in the game is Cincinnati Bengals receiver Chad Ochocinco. Ochocinco is almost always entertaining, he has plenty of personality and even if you deem his antics self-promoting and juvenile at times, he still makes you laugh and pay attention, which is more than I can say for the glorified exhibition game that is the Pro Bowl. So of course Ochocinco has an idea that might make Pro Bowl more interesting and of course it involves more of him on the field and in the action. Ochocinco is an avowed an international soccer fan and practices kicking during the season, so he wants to tee it up in some form during the Pro Bowl. "Yesterday was punting, today was kickoffs, tomorrow will be field goals," Ochocinco said. "I don't know. We'll see what happens. It shouldn't be a problem. If they're going to let me do it, I'm going to do it early in the game before they get serious and they start to play for real." He actually did kick this past preseason in an August game against the New England Patriots in Foxborough when Bengals kicker Shayne Graham was bothered by a sore groin in practice. Ochocinco kicked an extra point and had a deep kickoff as Graham's replacement in Cincinnati's 7-6 victory. After the game, he dubbed himself "Esteban Ochocinco, the most interesting footballer in the world." Hopefully he can live up to that moniker because we need the most interesting footballer in the world to salvage the Pro Bowl at this point. The game’s biggest names won't be on hand and if the game is going to feature a bunch of also-rans and second-tier players instead of names like Brees, Manning, Brady, Favre and Rivers, then the least the NFL can do is have Ochocinco out there kicking extra points and kickoffs, showing off his varied skills. Memo to the AFC coaching staff: Give Ochocinco the green light to kick as early and often as he wants. If he tries and succeeds, so much the better. If he tries and fails, at least it will be entertaining…………

- Dudes, this next story is a total bummer. Some intrepid businessmen/potheads were attempting to transport more than 700 pounds of marijuana stuffed in a septic tank truck full of human waste and a bunch of square cops had to ruin things by busting them for drug possession and confiscating the hippie lettuce. An officer pulled over the septic tank truck Wednesday after a check of the license showed it was invalid and from there, things just went downhill in a hurry. The traffic stop occurred on I-19 northbound stopped about 35 miles south of Tucson, Arizona. Apparently that particular stretch of highway is notorious for human and hippie lettuce trafficking, so the cops patrol it heavily. But what kills me is that had the fools driving this truck merely taken a few minor precautions, both they and their precious cargo could have gotten away undetected. Either have a valid license for your vehicle or stay off the roads, fools. Even with the invalid registration, there was still a chance to avoid the pot being discovered. See, the officer who made the stop discovered that the commercial vehicle markings on the truck were also invalid. From there, he began poking around and found the bales of marijuana in red and orange packages amid the waste. "It just shows how desperate these drug cartels are," Arizona Department of Public Safety spokesman Bart Graves said. "They'll go to any lengths to conceal their product. We've seen it concealed [among] watermelons, bell peppers. This is the first time we've seen it concealed in human waste.” Well no freaking kidding, a-hole. Of course 743 pounds of the chronic is valuable cargo. That’s a street value of about $409,000, give or take a few weed-smoke-drenched dollars. Do you have any idea how many stoners 409 pounds of tree could supply? That could be enough for an entire Willie Nelson or Snoop Dogg North American tour, for God’s sake. So if that ganja needs to be hidden in human waste in the back of a sewage truck, so be it. The driver of this truck Leonard Salcido, of Tucson, was arrested and charged with possession of marijuana, possession of marijuana for sale and transportation of marijuana. And lest police begin patting themselves on the back for this one, just keep things in perspective. This wasn’t even close to the largest drug bust for Arizona police; in 2008, police found more than 2,000 pounds of marijuana in a fake UPS truck. But the most vital, bottom-line fact here is that once again, my stoner buddies around the country, specifically in the Southwest, are going to suffer because of this bust and I don’t like that one bit. Stop persecuting stoners, police, and allow them to have their weed and get baked. They aren’t hurting anyone and you all just need to relax…………

- Hey, I didn’t know the Mormon religion was big in South Africa! After all, what other explanation could there be for South African President Jacob Zuma having three wives? Just kidding, Mormons, calm down. I know that a) your church has supposedly denounced polygamy and b) other religions do practice polygamy, not just the Mormon church of the past. But whatever religion he ascribes to, Zuma faced stiff questioning Thursday about his trio of wives during an interview at the World Economic Forum in Davos. It should be noted that polygamy is legal in South Africa, but there is an ongoing national debate about the practice. All told, Zuma has married five times (three remain current), but his critics say that polygamy is a thing of the past and that the president is behind the times and being unfair to women. Questioned by Newsweek editor Fareed Zakaria on the second day of the WEF, Zuma explained that it is part of his culture. "People interpret cultures differently," he said. "Some people think their culture is superior to others, that it is the only one accepted by God. That is a problem and one we need to deal with. We (South Africa) follow a policy that says we must respect the cultures of others." The topic came up because Zuma married third wife Tobeka Madiba earlier this month in a traditional Zulu ceremony at his rural homestead in the Zululand area of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. In what had to be a tad awkward of a scene, Zuma's first wife, Sizakele Khumalo, was among those in attendance to see her husband marry Madiba. In Zuma’s defense, he did sit patiently on the two-wife level for all of two years, having married his current second wife Nompumelelo Ntuli two years ago. Two of his previous marriages ended in two different fashions, with Zuma divorcing home affairs minister Nkosazana Dlamini and another wife, Kate Mantsho, committing suicide in 2000. Among the president’s critics is Reverend Theunis Botha, the leader of the opposition Christian Democratic Party, who labeled the latest ceremony a "giant step back into the dark ages." Zuma maintains that being a polygamist does not influence his political beliefs or his views on female equality. Asked if he treated his three wives equally, he replied: "absolutely," which drew chuckles from the audience. I suppose that to some out there, he is a hero for being able to have three wives and get away with it while others figure that as miserable as they are with just one wife, this guy must be insane to triple his misery. As for me, I realize and accept that it’s a different culture and one I don’t completely understand. I think it would be odd and awkward to have three wives, but maybe my man Zuma can handle it…………

- Oy. I wish I could say I expected better, but this is reality TV, this is MTV and this is the United States of America. We pander to the lowest common denominator, sink to the lowest level and prefer entertainment that is neither thoughtful nor worthwhile. In other words, we like Jersey Shore. Yes, a bunch of self-described “guidos and guidettes” with a combined IQ of 42, a combined annual tanning bill of approximately $158,500 and exactly zero ounces of class between them has so enraptured America that MTV announced late Friday that it has ordered a second season of the show. Sure, state lawmakers have denounced the show. And yes, activists have urged MTV to cancel the series because of the extremely negative and stereotypical way it depicts Italian-Americans. Oh, and the town where the first season of the show was filmed went out of its way to repeatedly remind everyone that it had nothing to do with the show other than being the setting for its depravity. Yet enough brain-dead fools watched JWoww, The Situation and Ronnie for MTV to continue to lower the bar for its programming and bring these fools back for a second season. The network has ordered 12 more episodes, with the plan being to follow the same cast of ass clowns Vinny as they “escape the cold northeast and find themselves in a new destination.” In other words, let’s soil another town’s reputation and give these surgically- and steroid-enhanced freaks even more chances to throw on their bathing suits or go shirtless in order to show off their oiled-up, ‘roided-up , over-tanned physiques. “Our audience has fallen in love with Jersey Shore and its amazing cast who have really grown together as a family,” said Tony DiSanto, MTV’s president of programming, in a statement. “That bond gives the show its heart, and we’re thrilled to reunite these friends.” Heart? This show has a lot of qualities – not good qualities, but qualities nonetheless – but heart is not one of them. The new episodes will begin airing this summer, seeking to capitalize on the momentum Jersey Shore built as the No. 1 original cable series in January among persons 12-34. The deciding moment may have been the season finale on Jan. 21, which attracted a 4.8 rating in the key demo — a 30 percent jump over the previous series high. For those who missed any of the first season (I missed all of it and am so much better for it) and are into self-abuse via crappy reality television, MTV will air the complete first season before the Super Bowl kickoff on Feb. 7, beginning at 9 a.m. Or you can throw away your money by pre-ordering the entire season — including some uncensored moments —online. As always, thanks for making our world a dumber, less classy, more ridiculous and generally worse place to be, MTV and Jersey Shore cast members………….

- I knew there was something I liked about the Obama administration. That something would of course be its willingness to look into the legality of the absolute abortion that is college football’s Bowl Championship Series. The Justice Department said this week that the administration the is considering a number of steps to delve deeper into the BCS mess. Assistant Attorney General Ronald “BCS Buster” Weich wrote in a letter to Sen. Orrin Hatch Friday informing him that the department will soon decide to launch an investigation into whether the BCS violates antitrust laws, as Hatch had requested. Hatch is on the case because the University of Utah Utes are regularly one of the non-BCS conference teams trying to crack the stranglehold that the six power conferences have on the extortion racket that is the BCS. Of course, Brigham Young University is also trending in that direction with its continued success on the field and with two teams in his home state in a position to be screwed over by the BCS on an annual basis, Hatch definitely has an impetus to act. According to Weich, the administration is looking at several other options, including asking the Federal Trade Commission to review the legality of the BCS under consumer protection laws. My thought on that is simply this: Whatever it takes. Consumer protection laws, anti-trust laws, criminal laws, civil laws, declaring nuclear war on the bozos who run the BCS, it doesn’t matter. Just get rid of that giant turd of a system, shift to a playoff like every other division of college football outside of D-1 and let’s get it on………….

Justice in the NBA, Smallville returns and stability returns to Honduras - kind of

- The other shoe finally dropped for Washington Wizards guards Gilbert Arenas and Javaris Crittenton when NBA commissioner David Stern suspended these two desperados remainder of the NBA season Wednesday. For Arenas, punishment will amount to a total of 50 games, counting the time he has already missed. It will be less for Crittenton because he hasn’t been suspended before this point, even though he hasn’t played yet this year due to an injury. The noteworthy aspect of the suspension for both men is that it comes without pay, meaning both will lose every cent they are owed for the 2009-10 season from here on out. Arenas has agreed not to appeal his sentence from Warden Stern, while Crittenton has yet to announce a decision one way or the other. Appeal or no appeal, these two idiots got exactly what they deserved for bringing guns into the locker room and pulling them out to settle a gambling dispute, even if both men insist their guns weren’t loaded at the time of the incident. "The NBA has conducted a thorough investigation of events relating to this matter," Stern said. "It is not disputed that, following an argument on the team's flight home from a game in Phoenix, both Mr. Arenas and Mr. Crittenton brought guns to the Verizon Center locker room and -- with other players and team personnel present or nearby -- displayed them to one another in a continuation of their dispute. The players engaged in this conduct despite a specific rule set forth in the collective bargaining agreement between the NBA and the Players Association prohibiting players from possessing a weapon at an NBA facility, and reminders of this prohibition given annually by the NBA to players both in writing and in person. The issue here is not about the legal ownership and possession of guns, either in one's home or elsewhere. It is about possession of guns in the NBA workplace, which will not be tolerated,” Stern said. Not surprisingly, the Wizards supported Stern's ruling. "Their poor judgment has also violated the trust of our fans and stands in contrast to everything Abe Pollin stood for throughout his life," the Wizards said in a statement. "It is widely known that Mr. Pollin took the extraordinary step of changing the team name from 'Bullets' to 'Wizards' in 1997 precisely to express his abhorrence of gun violence in our community. We hope that this negative situation can produce something positive by serving as a reminder that gun violence is a serious issue." Given the fact that Arenas made an absolute mockery of the situation by joking about it on Twitter and pretending to shoot his teammates in the pregame huddle the first game after the incident with his imaginary six-shooters, neither Stern nor the Wizards are out of line in what they are saying. In fact, the Wizards should definitely consider attempting to void the remaining four years and $80 million on Arenas’ contract, even if rules in the league’s collective bargaining agreement that prevent teams fro punishing players for the same offense the league has punished them for might make that a difficult fight to win. The one thing that would make such a move on the team’s part much easier is Arenas being sentenced to jail time during the season, which could happen at his criminal court sentencing on March 26. His sentence could range from probation and community service and a fine to a recommended prison term of up to six months and if he’s in the hole before the NBA season ends, the Wizards could have a much stronger case to tear up his deal and send him packing. Here’s hoping that’s just what happens so that the lesson finally sinks in for him that guns aren’t toys……………

- It is with a heavy hear that I wish a melancholy happy trails to the late J.D. Salinger, a truly legendary author who has been impacting the lives of young readers for nearly six decades with his 1951 novel, "The Catcher in the Rye." The notoriously reclusive author, so much so that he mandated no public memorial be held after his death in order to preserve his privacy, passed away Wednesday of natural causes at the age of 91. “Despite having broken his hip in May, his health had been excellent until a rather sudden decline after the new year," the statement by his literary agent, Phyllis Westberg, said. "He was not in any pain before or at the time of his death." Ironically, “Catcher” was Salinger’s only novel. But I suppose that if you’re only going to write one, having it be one of the most famous novels ever written is the way to go. Salinger also wrote more than 30 short stories and a handful of novellas, but it is the book Holden Caulfield, who is expelled from a private school, Pencey Prep, in Pennsylvania, and spends the next three days wandering around New York that Salinger will be remembered for. The portrayal of Caulfield as someone who is mistrustful of authority and decidedly anti-establishment has rung true with generation after generation. The novel has had dozens of printings over the years because demand remains high, a sign of how much Salinger’s message resonates. Yet some schools have banned it because of by Caulfield's language and attitude as well as his adventures with a prostitute. As for Salinger himself, he was born January 1, 1919, in New York City, attended Valley Forge Military Academy in Pennsylvania and spent time at three colleges. He served in the U.S. Army during World War II, right around the time he published his first stories. During his time in the army, he suffered a nervous breakdown and used the experience in his writing. Perhaps the best illustration of his reclusive nature is the fact that his last published story, "Hapworth 16, 1924," appeared in 1965. For the last four-and-a-half decades of his life, he didn’t publish a single work…..wow. The only times Salinger ventured out of hiding in his later years were to sue those who wrote unauthorized biographies or attempted to violate his privacy in some way. He gave sporadic interviews, the last one in 1981 to The (Baton Rouge, Louisiana) Advocate. Having said all that about a man who made a point of not being a part of the world for more than 40 years, it is sad to see Salinger pass…………

- Not that there is anything good about a tractor trailer driver plowing into a disabled car and killing a young mother, but if there is any way to make such a tragedy worse, this is it. Meet Thomas Wallace of Ohio, a Grade-A douche bag who not only violated transportation laws restricting the number of hours a truck driver can be on the road based on how much sleep he or she has had on a given day, but this piece of crap was D.W.W.P. Yes, driving while watching porn, that’s correct. Apparently when Wallace rear ended Julie Stratton in upstate New York in December, dude was streaming pornos on his laptop while driving on insufficient sleep. Stratton’s car was disabled in the left lane on the highway after she struck a deer. She immediately called police and was only in the left lane for a few minutes before Wallace came rumbling down the road in his porn-streaming, sleep-deprived state. , "Mr. Wallace was in violation of the transportation law that determines how long you can drive a tractor trailer. It's for safety purposes. It was clear from the evidence that he had gone over the time period. In fact, in a 27-hour period it appeared that he had only been asleep for four hours,” Capt. Michael Nigrelli of the New York State Police explained. Wallace has been arrested and charged with second-degree manslaughter, which I would contend is getting off easy. I know there is no douche-bag provision in the law that allows for charges against a person to be escalated if they are doing something truly despicable and indefensible – say, watching porn on their lapper while driving a big rig – but there should be. Wallace was arraigned in Pembroke town court and remains in the Genesee County jail on $50,000 cash bail, which hopefully will not be paid. Dude needs to sit and rot in jail for as long as possible……….

- Smallville finally made its return from the holiday break tonight and it was a decidedly Oliver Queen-centric episode. Apparently Ollie has taken up residence in some sort of old brick warehouse building on the outskirts of Metropolis and is still serving as a mentor to Mia, the girl he met during his stint in some sort of Fight Club­-like group. But Oliver is clearly on edge and believes that someone has been following him. Around the same time, Clark and Lois are on a date at a Daily Planet fundraiser. They say their goodbyes on the street and as Clark super-speeds off because he hears a citizen in trouble, Lois tries to start her car and finds it won't fire up. She gets out to check under the hood and as she does, an arrow fired from above pierces the engine and sends her running for cover. She spots the mystery archer, a man dressed just like the Green Arrow, on a rooftop nearby. The archer fires again, piercing Lois’ left shoulder just below the collarbone. She spends the night in the hospital and the next morning, Zod visits Clark at the Kent Farm, asking him to help the Kandorians get their superpowers after they showed him respect by kneeling before him in the last episode before the holiday break. Clark has his doubts about their intentions if they gain their powers and also doesn’t know what he could do to help them regain them because he’s simply always had them for as long as he’s been on Earth. Back at the hospital, Chloe is standing watch and when Oliver hears about Lois being shot and comes to see her, Chloe tells Oliver about the shot and arrow that put her there. Looking at the X-rays of where Lois was shot, Oliver realizes that the person who attacked her was an expert marksman and when he finds out about the arrow used, he turns an ugly shade of white and immediately excuses himself. Chloe eventually departs the hospital and returns to Watchtower, where she gets back to work and suddenly finds herself in a very dangerous position. The lights flicker, her computer screens bug out and the image of a medieval archer flashes across the largest screen in the room. When the lights come back on, the same mysterious archer who attacked Lois is standing on a ledge at the end of the room, aiming right at Chloe. He fires an arrow and she dives for the floor, with the arrow grazing her right arm. Before the archer can fire another shot, the sound of someone approaching from the stairs scares him off. Clark walks into the room just in time to save his friend and she escapes with a surface wound. In the meantime, Oliver has guessed that someone with a connection to his past is the mystery archer and looking to keep Mia out of harm’s way, he tells her their training is over and kicks her out. On her way out of the building, she is accosted and kidnapped by the so-called Dark Archer, who tells her that she will help him get his message through to Oliver. Before he realizes that Mia has gone missing, Oliver is visited by Lois, who is trying to figure out who is hunting she and her cousin. As the pieces come together, Oliver realizes that it is likely Bordigan, his mentor in some sort of secret society for archers that he belongs to. The society’s motto is “No lovers, no allies, no apprentices,” which would explain why Lois (lover) and Chloe (ally) were attacked. Oliver surmises that Mia is next to be attacked but by this time, Bordigan has already taken her. Clark and Chloe come to the same realization at the same time and after some cyber-sleuthing, Chloe unearths the details on the secret society of 13th century archers. They theorize that during his year of being AWOL, Oliver may have joined and now his mentor is coming back to haunt him. When Chloe finds an altar from the society has been shipped to a wealthy businessman living in Coast City, she pulls up the satellite images and zooms in on a ginormous maze in the same shape as the society’s crest. Zooming in on the maze, she spots Mia in the midst. Bordgian has stashed her there to lure Oliver in and Ollie obliges, coming to save his protégé. Bordigan meets him with a simple directive: because he, Bordigan, is beginning to show signs of slowing down due to age and can no longer move and react quickly enough to do his job, Oliver must now take his final test to prove himself – killing his mentor, who is no longer fast or quick enough to survive. This cannibalistic approach seems a bit severe and when Oliver refuses to kill Bordigan, the mentor threatens to kill Mia in order to provoke Oliver and make him unleash his inner killer. Mia runs for her life inside the maze, but Bordigan tracks her down and unleashes three arrows just as Oliver catches up to them. Ollie steps in front of the arrows to save Mia, but Clark then super-speeds onto the scene and takes the arrows instead, deflecting them and saving Oliver and Mia both. Before anyone can see him, Clark then speeds off and Oliver returns fire, taking down Bordigan. Clark returns once Bordigan is down and Oliver explains that he didn’t shoot to kill, only to wound his mentor. Bordigan is arrested and thrown in jail, but his final words about how the demons inside Oliver will eventually catch up with him stay with Oliver. Clark has other troubles as well, namely Zod. Zod pays Lois a visit in the hospital while she’s there, claiming to be an old friend of Clark and offering to have dinner with Lois and tell her about Clark’s past. When Clark finds out about the visit, he finds Zod and demands that he stay away, returning a Kryptonian symbol necklace Zod gave to Lois as well. After threatening Zod to stay away from Lois, Clark leaves. Zod also departs but meets up with one of his minions in the alley below, telling her that they need to find the book of Ra somewhere on Earth to help them build the towers they need (the ones we saw in Lois’ dreams of the future earlier this season) to set up their system to turn the yellow sun red and give them their powers. Zod realizes that Clark doesn’t know where the book is, but promises that once it’s found, CK will be forced to either capitulate to his demands and follow Zod or be thrown into prison. That’s where things end, setting up next week’s two-hour Justice League mini-movie, starting at 8 p.m., one hour early. Be sure to tune in for that…………

- And so the nightmare finally ends. Ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya finally came out of hiding after months holed up in a Brazilian embassy compound and exited stage left Wednesday. The saga, which went from Zelaya being ousted in a military coup, exiled, denied in attempts to return to Venezuela, allowed back in but only as long as he stayed on the grounds of the Brazilian Embassy in Tegucigalpa and denied exit when the rogue government didn’t like his relocation plans and has finally ended, became quite the black eye for Honduras. It came to a close as Zelaya flew into exile on Wednesday, ending a months-long political crisis as the country’s newly-elected president took office. The saga spanned seven months and as opposition leader Porfirio Lobo, elected in November, took office, the last man legitimately elected president by the people prior to Lobo’s selection last month left the country. Zelaya boarded a plane for the Dominican Republic, with thousands of supporters at the airport cheering as the plane took off. The wheels went up just hours after Lobo received the presidential sash in a ceremony in the national stadium and attempted to put the turmoil of the past few months behind he and his people. "Today we want to heal the wounds of the past," he said. A big step in that direction could come if the government decides to waive the pending criminal charges hanging over Zelaya, which there is no indication of at this point. The Honduran Congress granted Zelaya political amnesty on Tuesday but the move does not affect those charges. Even so, Zelaya flew to the Dominican Republic on a plane sent by the Caribbean island nation's president. "I have an invitation ... to go to the Dominican Republic and I will accept the invitation, obviously with the approval of the new government," Zelaya said on local radio Tuesday. The brightest spot in all of this may well be the fact that the despotic Roberto Micheletti, who installed himself as the de facto president after heading up the coup to oust Zelaya, is no longer in power. He presides over serious human right abuses, including deaths, as security forces cracked down on pro-Zelaya protesters and media outlets in the weeks following the coup. In light of the international support Honduras lost during the time Micheletti’s illegitimate government was in power, Lobo has a lot of work to do and he knows it. "Due to the political crisis, Honduras has lost $2 billion dollars in foreign aid and international investment," he said. But being the optimist I am, here’s hoping that better things are ahead for Honduras as the country looks to get back on track under new (legitimately elected, for a change) leadership………..

An ill-advised perspective on Haiti, Riot Watch! in Venezuela and the demise of Ugly Betty

- There are a lot of different perspectives on the ongoing crisis in Haiti. Depending on which news network you prefer, the slant you’re getting on the situation will be varied and skewed in a certain direction. But you could watch every cable and broadcast news network out there and I doubt you would find anyone thinking or at least willing to admit they are thinking the same thing that former NBA player (stints with the Atlanta Hawks and Phoenix Suns as well as several years playing abroad) and now ex-ESPN blogger Paul Shirley is thinking about the crisis. Shirley, who wrote mainly about music and pop culture for ESPN.com (and whose work I was a fan of, sharing a lot of similar music/indie rock tastes), has been fired from his job at ESPN following a controversial blog entry about Haiti that appeared on another Web site Shirley writes for called the Flip Collective. He began his blog entry by stating, “I do not know if what I’m about to write makes me a monster. I haven’t donated a cent to the Haitian relief effort … And I probably will not.”” After that, Shirley went on to state that he hasn’t donated to the Haitian relief effort for the same reasons he does not give money to panhandlers and homeless people he passes on the street. “I don’t think the guy with the sign that reads ‘Need Your Help’ is going to do anything constructive with the dollar I might give him,” Shirley wrote. “If I use history as my guide, I don’t think the people of Haiti will do much with my money either. In this belief I am, evidently, alone.” Those are some harsh words, but had he stopped there, it’s unlikely Shirley would have gotten into much, if any, trouble with anyone. Unfortunately for Shirley, he was just getting started. His most offensive comments came in a portion of his post written as a direct, extremely sarcastic letter to the people of Haiti. “First of all, kudos on developing the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. Your commitment to human rights, infrastructure, and birth control should be applauded,” he wrote. “As we prepare to assist you in this difficult time, a polite request: If it’s possible, could you not re-build your island home in the image of its predecessor? Could you not resort to the creation of flimsy shanty- and shack-towns … and could some of you maybe use a condom once in a while.” Wowsers. The condom blast was way over the top and there is actually a much better way to say everything he just said and get your outrage and unhappiness across without being a total a-hole. Heck, you could even keep some of the sarcasm in there if you feel like you don’t want to totally neuter your writing or soften your tone too much. The truth is that some of Shirley’s fundamental sentiments may actually ring true with certain people, but the way in which he presented them was so douche-baggish and crass that even those who might be inclined to agree with him will want nothing to do with the guy. ESPN couldn’t distance itself from his fast enough, posting a statement on ESPN.com that read: "He was a part-time freelance contributor. The views he expressed on another site of course do not at all reflect our company's views on the Haiti relief efforts. He will no longer contribute to ESPN." No word on Shirley’s next move, but he is actually a smart and well-read guy who could be a great contributor to a group or media outlet willing to look past this incident. Feel free to use this as an opportunity to grow and understand the social climate in which you like, P. Shirley…………

- If you are a fan of ABC’s fashion-themed drama/comedy "Ugly Betty," my advice to you is to enjoy the remainder of this season – the show’s fourth – as much as possible. That’s because the show’s fourth season will also be its last one, as the network has announced that the ratings-challenged series will end at the close of this season. “We’ve mutually come to the difficult decision to make this 'Ugly Betty’s' final season, and are announcing now as we want to allow the show ample time to write a satisfying conclusion,” a spokesperson for ABC said in a statement. “We are extremely proud of this groundbreaking series and felt it was important to give the fans a proper farewell.” It is ironic to hear ABC talk about treating the show’s fans well at this point, given the way it has absolutely jerked “Ugly Betty” around during the past few years. The show went from Thursday nights last season to Fridays at the beginning of this season, which may have sealed its fate because Friday night is notoriously bad for television shows, what with people typically having much better things to do than sit around and watch TV as the weekend gets underway. Not content with messing with the show’s air time once in a season, ABC then proceeded to move “UB” again when it returned from a hiatus in January, this time shifting it to Wednesdays. It has also changed nights in its first three seasons and some fans undoubtedly tired of trying to figure out what night the show would be airing on. At least now they know that America Ferrera and friends will be saying goodbye and should remain on Wednesday nights for the remainder of its run. Either that or ABC will change it to Thursday nights in a couple of weeks and then shift it to Monday nights for its final few episodes…………

- In the financial crisis that engulfed the American automobile industry last year, culminating in a massive government bailout, I don’t seem to remember Toyota being affected all that much. Perhaps the company felt left out with many of its competitors screwing up and getting so much attention, because Toyota appears to be trying to make up for its absence in last year’s clusterf*ck by engaging in a ginormous recall of its vehicles that appears destined to include every vehicle it has made in the past five years by the time all is said and done. Back in November, the automaker issued a modest recall for some of its vehicles to ix a problem in which the gas pedal can become caught on the edge of the removable floormat, causing the vehicle to accelerate uncontrollably. Now, Toyota says it is adding another 1.1 million vehicles to that earlier recall, bringing the total number of affected vehicles to roughly 5.3 million. The vehicles being added to that recall are the 2008-2010 Highlander, 2009-2010 Corolla, 2009-2010 Venza 2009-2010 Matrix, 2009-2010 Pontiac Vibe. And just to make sure this recall isn’t exclusionary in any way, General Motors' Pontiac car is a part of the recall because the Vibe and Toyota's Matrix are similar vehicles that were produced under a partnership between the two companies. Good to know that just because GM is ditching the Pontiac brand doesn’t mean it’s dead and gone just yet. In case you were napping during the original recall or just numb to news about the auto industry f*cking up because it happens so often, the vehicles originally included in this recall were the 2007-2010 Toyota Camry, 2005-2010 Avalon, 2004-2009 Prius, 2010 Tacoma, 2007-2010 Tundra and the 2007-2010 Lexus ES350, 2006-2010 and the 2006-2010 IS250 and IS350. Oh, and this recall is separate from one announced last week regarding accelerator pedals that could stick on their own. When you add the 2.3 million vehicles involved in that recall, you’re up at 7.6 million (and counting). That total drops when you factor in that some of the vehicles involved in the more recent recall are also involved in the older recall: the 2009-2010 Toyota RAV4, Corolla and Matrix and the Pontiac Vibe; the 2005-2010 Avalon; 2010 Highlander; 2007-2010 Tundra and the 2008-2010 Sequoia; and some 2007-2010 Camrys. This most recent recall is interesting because in site of recalling so many vehicles, Toyota has not yet announced a suitable fix for the problem. In other words, your possibly dysfunctional car needs to be recalled because of a potentially fatal problem, but we don’t know how to fix it yet. Anyone who experiences sticking or slowness in the movement of their car's gas pedal should stop driving the car and call a Toyota dealer immediately……..assuming they are in fact still alive and haven’t been killed by their fatally flawed car…………

- In a jailhouse fight, you have to be resourceful. The tradition of making shivs and using them to stab your opponent in the shower is long and honored, but there are quite frankly too many times when a piece of metal – ripped from a bed, door handle, the weight room, etc. – cannot be found and shaped into a crude knife in time to save you from peril. In those cases, you must be MacGyver-like in your ability to adapt, adjust and make use of whatever tools you have on hand – or on arm, as the case may by. Inmate David Hanna of the Monroe County(N.Y.) Jail understands this principle and he understands it well. In fact, he understands it so well that he is facing felony assault charges for beating another inmate with his prosthetic arm. Hanna is accused of using his prosthetic arm to punch fellow inmate Elijah Armstrong in the face nine times when they got into a fight. Armstrong was taken to Strong Memorial Hospital with several broken bones in his face, so clearly Hanna’s tactics worked and they were brutally effective. Of course, that effectiveness has temporarily cost Hanna custody of his prosthetic arm because it has been confiscated and put into evidence. Armstrong has since been released from the hospital and returned to the jail, where I’m guessing he’ll want to have a few words with his good friend David Hanna. I’m also assuming that Hanna will have some additional time tacked onto his sentence once this case plays out, but that time will pale in comparison to the value of the adaptive and improvisational skills he showed here. Those skills will serve him will in his (soon-to-be) extended stay in the hole and make fellow inmates less likely to pick fights with him in the future…………

- Riot Watch! Riot Watch! Media freedom in Venezuela may be declining by the hour, but the willingness to take to the streets in protest is increasing in corresponding fashion and it is pumping me up. Protests across the country continued Tuesday, a day after two student protesters were killed in separate clashes. That didn’t deter student leaders from organizing more protests to oppose cable operators' decision to drop five television channels, including an opposition station, for failure to follow broadcast laws in broadcasting the propaganda garbage that passes as Hugo Chavez’s speeches these days. The nation’s Interior Ministry designated four investigators to look into the shooting deaths of the two students in the western state of Merida, but I wouldn’t expect that investigation to go too far. Besides, all of this could be resolved if Chavez were to stop channeling his inner totalitarian despot and ripping stations from the air merely for having the kahones to oppose him. That’s precisely what he did in suspending cable station Radio Caracas Television (RCTV) and five other stations over the weekend. All six stations were pulled from the air because they did not broadcast a speech by Chavez, as required by national broadcast “laws.” This isn’t the first time RCTV has faced off against Chavez, having had a beef with the dictator in 2007 for similar violations. The protestors who clashed who police and military this week were pissed because they (rightly) believe the suspension of RCTV was provoked by the government. As I always say, whatever a citizenry needs to believe in order to inspire it to take it to the streets and clash with The Man, I am down with. These protests have become widespread and varied in their scope and execution, with the street protests nicely complemented nicely by a demonstration this past weekend in which fans in the crowd at a national baseball series wore red bandanas over their mouths in protest. One of the two protestors killed this week, Marcos Rosales Suarez, was shot when a group of unidentified gunmen fired into a crowd of protesters. "We applied the law," Chavez said of his indefensible decision to rip the free speech of the television stations. "If they don't follow it, they won't be allowed back on the air.” In other words, agree to be a glorified government mouthpiece that backs everything your dictator says or you have no voice whatsoever. Very fair and balanced of you, Hugo. As for the many press freedom organizations, including the Committee to Protect Journalists, urging Chavez to allow the stations back on the air, save your breath. You are 109 percent correct, but that doesn’t matter here, not in Chavez Land. There, the government will continue to paint the cable stations as the villains because they “were aware of the laws and chose not to follow them.” Just because they didn’t follow your insane, biased and unfair laws doesn’t make them the villains, idiots. Stop trying to stifle opposing viewpoints, mostly because it’s blatantly unjust but mostly because there are just too damn many of them……………

Noted drunk Bode Miller loves tennis, the Eggo shortage continues to infuriate and the Pro Bowl turning in amateur hour

- Good news for authors willing to embrace and support Amazon’s quest to subvert and beat down its competitors the field of electronic reading devices and push Jeff Bezos’ crew towards a monopoly on the devices: You can earn a tidy profit for being anti-competition. Amazon announced a new royalty program Wednesday morning that will allow authors to earn 70 percent royalties from each e-book sold, but with a catch. Authors will receive more per book than they typically earn from physical book sales so long as they agree to certain conditions – conditions that give Amazon a decided advantage in keeping control of the e-reader market. Those conditions include: listing books for between $2.99 and $9.99 on the Kindle (most books already fall within this range, but authors are able to set prices higher if they want), the price must also be at least 20 percent below the lowest list price for the physical book, the book must be available in all geographical areas where the authors has rights, it must include all features of the Kindle store (including text-to-speech capabilities), and the Kindle price must be the same or below the price offered at other e-book stores. Assuming you can live with those guidelines, you can make yourself some extra cash. Those who reject selling out to Amazon can stick with the old system, but any author willing to whore himself or herself out to Amazon would make nearly twice as much on the sale of, for example, a typical $8.99 book. The author’s profit would jump from $3.15 under the "standard" system to $6.25 under the new 70 percent scheme. Amazon would argue that everyone wins here because the author gets more money, the company gets multiple benefits from the deal and customers would not be harmed in the process. And assuming that you’re not in favor of open competition and allowing everyone a fair shot in a given product market, then I suppose you wouldn’t have a problem with it either. As you can probably tell, I wouldn’t include myself in that category……….

- As with most things in life, as long as Bode Miller can show up for this thing drunk, he’ll just be fine. The guy has admitted to skiing drunk in the past, a dangerous endeavor when downhill skiing on some of the most treacherous courses and terrains in the world is your profession. Getting hammered seems to take precedence over representing his team and his country more often than not, so making that joke is hardly out of line. Keeping his predilection for booze in mind, the possibility of Miller pursuing a spot in the U.S. Open tennis tournament’s main draw is a relatively good idea. After all, drunken tennis is a lot less dangerous than drunken downhill skiing. The potential for death or serious injury is substantially lower on a tennis court and apparently Miller has a decent background in tennis. He is a former Maine high school singles champion and has long been an instructor at the Tamarack Tennis Camp in Easton, N.H., founded by his mother's family. Miller will take part in a national playoff created by the U.S. Tennis Association in an attempt to drum up interest in the event from casual fans. Miller has announced his intentions to compete and although he won't have any advantage over any of the other competitors because of his quasi-celebrity status, you can bet he’ll receive more than his fair share of attention. “Tennis has always been a part of my life," Miller said. "The U.S. Open National Playoffs is a great concept and I look forward to playing in one of the sectional qualifying tournaments this spring. It will give me an outlet to focus my competitiveness after the Olympics and World Cup season.” The playoff will allow USTA members 14 years of age and over to register for a $125 fee. The qualifying tournament will begin with competitions in 16 of the 17 USTA sections -- all but the Caribbean -- from April through June. There will be a cap of 256 players on both the men’s and women’s side of the draw and there will be no seeding for the event, making it a bit of a clusterf*ck, if you will. "While professsionals are eligible to play, we expect the draws to be filled with top junior players, collegians, teaching professionals and even recreational players who will now have a chance to play themselves into the U.S. Open for the first time," said Jim Curley, chief professional tournaments officer and U.S. Open tournament director. The winners of each of the 16 sections will then play in a 16-draw national playoff to coincide with the summer hardcourt U.S. Open Series of ATP and WTA events. From there, the winners will receive slots in the regular U.S. Open qualifying event. By the time all is said and done, a player could have to win up to 15 matches to qualify for the U.S. Open main draw. For more information and a possible chance to serve it up against a borderline-alcoholic professional skier on the court, visit www.usopen.org. Registration begins Feb. 1, so plan accordingly………..

- I don’t know about you, but I have had just about enough of this damn Eggo shortage that is plaguing the United States. Back in November, Kellogg Co. announced there would be a nationwide shortage of its popular frozen waffles until the summer because of interruptions in production at two of the four plants that make them. Basically, things went south when the company's Atlanta plant was shut down by a September storm that dumped historic amounts of rain in the area. Without the necessary capabilities to deal with massive amounts of water, the plant suffered enough damage to render it inactive for a prolonged period of time. That I can understand, if not be okay with. What I don’t like or accept is that at the same time the Atlanta plant was closed by water damage, several production lines at the company’s largest bakery in Rossville, Tenn. was closed indefinitely for repairs. The remaining two plants, in San Jose, Calif., and Blue Anchor, N.J., have been unable to cope with the added burden and as a result, it will take several more months before shelves around the country are stocked at pre-shutdown levels, a company spokesman said. At first, going to the local grocery store and finding it devoid of Eggo boxes was disappointing, but you could always snare a box of the store brand and make do for the time being. After months of having to do that, I am at wit’s end. The dropoff in quality is marked and steep and I am not the only one who is noticing. Even though the Atlanta plant is back at full production now, the waffles just aren’t being churned out fast enough. Fans of the waffles are lamenting their scarcity on the waffle's Facebook page and others are joking about putting any Eggo’s they find up on eBay because demand is so high at this point. Bottom line here: Eggo is just a tasty waffle that occupies a prominent place in the dietary regimen of myself and many other across this land of ours. As such, the company faces an added burden to keep its supply of waffles consistent and uninterrupted. This sort of disruption is something we just can't have at a time when life is so difficult for so many Americans……………

- Hey, this idea of moving the NFL’s Pro Bowl from Hawaii to the city hosting the Super Bowl and to have it played on the Sunday prior to the Super Bowl is working out great. What’s not awesome about a record 32 Pro Bowl players pulling out of the game, either due to (bogus) injuries or because they are on one of the two teams playing in the Super Bowl? No position illustrates this point more perfectly than the quarterback position in the AFC, where Tom Brady (claiming an injury), Peyton Manning (playing in the Super Bowl) and Phillip Rivers (also claiming an injury) have all pulled out of the game. Nothing like the conference’s three best quarterbacks and three of the best four signal-callers in the game ejecting from an event. Worse still, Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger was named to replace Brady and he too pulled out of the game because of an (alleged) injury. That leaves luminaries such as Matt Schaub, Vince Young and David Garrard at quarterback for the AFC, ironic because those three are the quarterbacks for the three teams Manning’s Colts boat-raced to win the AFC South this season. Over in the NFC, the top two quarterbacks, Drew Brees and Brett Favre are also out of the Pro Bowl, as are top receiving targets like Dallas Clark of the Colts and Randy Moss and Wes Welker (actually injured) of the Patriots. If the NFL thought players and fans had no interest in the Pro Bowl when it was in Hawaii and held a couple weeks after the Super Bowl, they must be loving the way this year’s event is unfolding. As one of the few people who watched any of the Pro Bowl in years past, I can honestly say that this game is a dying relic and although the NFL clearly needed to do something to revive it, the moves they have made were not the right ones. I can’t say for sure what those right moves are, I just know that the alterations made this year have failed and failed miserably. Seeing some of the league’s most middling, less-than-great players line it up and play a meaningless exhibition game just doesn’t do it for me and from the looks of it, I am not alone…………

- So Apple’s big announcement finally came today as CEO Steve Jobs unveiled the iPad, the much-hyped tablet computer that he called "a truly magical and revolutionary product." A lot of people, myself included, don’t share that assessment, but let’s allow Jobs to have his say. "What this device does is extraordinary," Jobs said. "It is the best browsing experience you've ever had. ... It's unbelievably great ... way better than a laptop. Way better than a smartphone." That last phrase, better than a smartphone, is ironic because a great way to describe the iPad is as a giant, oversized smartphone. It’s basically an iPhone or iPod touch on steroids, to be blunt. The iPad has a nearly 10-inch screen, runs existing apps from the Apple apps store and is available in 16-gigabyte, 32-gigabyte and 64-gigabyte versions. . Pricing will start at $499 for the 16-gigabyte version, $599 for the 32-gig version and $699 for the 64. The price points are actually the most attractive point of the iPad, because as details of this device come out and people become increasingly disenchanted with it, Apple would have been absolutely annihilated if it had slapped a high price tag on the iPad. As is, the tablet computer is merely a disappointing device that does not allow users to multi-task (one app at a time, folks), requires all sorts of adapters and plugs for things like power and USB and will cost you an extra $130 for 3G mobile access. The iPad will have a 1 GHz processor, meaning it should be fairly fast – for a device that can only run one app at a time, that isn’t too hard to do. They are scheduled to begin shipping in 60 days, although you can obviously order one now if you’re hip to throwing away a few hundred bucks on a purchase you’re bound to regret – and that’s from someone who is an Apple guy. Jobs also announced several new apps designed specifically for the iPad -- including the New York Times and Major League Baseball. Having said that, I expected much more from Apple after it waited so long to enter the battle in the tablet computer world. Its laptops and desktops are superior, but the iPad doesn’t appear to continue that tradition. Sure, it’s razor-thin (actually, half an inch), but complaints are already flying in about the über-wide bezel (the border around the screen) and other structural and design issues with the iPad. It is worth noting that the device also has an electronic reader function, which could take a bit of market share from the Amazon Kindle and other similar devices, although I wouldn’t bet on that. In short, an announcement that was awaited so eagerly by so many proved to be a major letdown and for once, Apple doesn’t look like the computing powerhouse it normally is………….

Greek returns for a new season, legalizing the hippie lettuce in D.C. and Riot Watch! in Venezuela

- Greek returned for another season last night and things picked up right where they left off at the end of last season. The Zeta Betas continued to worry over being caught responsible for burning down Gamma Psi house, for starters. Tensions in the house were high and as one sister after another remarked about the problem and how it could affect them, Casey decided that she would go visit GP officer and Pan-Hellenic chairperson Katherine to dig for information on how the investigation into the fire was going and if the ZBZ’s really were responsible for starting it. Crammed into a crummy dorm room with an annoying roommate by the university for now, Katherine informed Casey that the investigation was ongoing but that she hoped ZBZ would support GP at the fairy tale-themed party they were hosting to raise money to rebuild after the fire. The next day, a ZBZ chapter meeting is interrupted by a local fireman who is passing out literature warning all sororities on campus about the dangers of burning too many candles in their houses. The fireman informs them that the investigation into the GP fire is complete and it was determined that the fire was caused by a candle left burning in the common room – the room where ZBZ member Rebecca Logan left a candle burning when the ZBZ sisters snuck into the house to find proof of GP cheating in the campus Song Fest competition. Casey’s worries over the fire investigation also spill over into her relationship with Cappie, although the two apparently talked, texted and kept in touch all during break and are doing great. Cappie has problems of his own, most notably dealing with the fallout from having three Kappa Tau brothers expelled after they were left holding the bag during what was supposed to be a joint prank on the campus security officer last semester. After debating whether to appoint a new KT pledge educator to replace the expelled Wade, Cappie takes Rusty’s offer to be the new pledge educator. However, Rusty struggles right from the start. First, Cappie sends in Beaver as an enforcer to assist Rusty, undermining Rusty’s authority with the pledges, then Cappie bans Rusty and pledges from meeting in Wade’s room where Rusty takes them in an attempt to help them bond. For help, Rusty tries reading leadership books but finally turns to his roommate Dale, who has somehow managed to find himself two new “interns” to assist him with whatever he needs in anticipation of winning the prestigious engineering grant that he and Rusty are both competing for. Dale attends the next pledge meeting and uses his newfound confidence to whip the pledges into shape. It works like a charm – right up to the point when Rusty decides to use Wade’s meat cleaver, used to intimidate pledges, to do some intimidating of his own. Instead, he drops it on a pledge’s foot and sends him to the hospital. As bad as that was, Rusty’s plight was overshadowed by that of his best friend Calvin, who returns from breaking expecting to hear his boyfriend Grant share how he did in coming out to his family over break. Instead, Grant admits he couldn’t go through with it and because of that, he isn’t ready to come out to the rest of the Omega Chi brothers either. A frustrated Calvin declares their relationship over and packs his bags to stay with Rusty until he can be assigned a new roommate at the Omega Chi house. Spurred on by losing the guy he loves, Grant decides to step up and come out at the fairy tale party by asking Calvin to dance in front of everyone. When Omega Chi president Evan Chambers sees it, he urges the other OC brothers to find a girl to dance with and get out on the dance floor to support Calvin and Grant. The party is also a site of tension between Casey and Cappie. When Cappie is late to help Casey in decorating, she snaps at him and when they both admit that there is something wrong between them, she doesn’t want to deal with it and tells him that he can come to the party or not, she doesn’t care. Casey drives off and Cappie heads back to the KT house, where he hangs out with the pledges and tells them they don’t have to go to the fairly tale party if they don’t want to. This infuriates Rusty, who is dressed as the Pied Piper and needs the pledges to be the piper’s rats. He berates Cappie for continually undermining him as pledge educator and urges him to get over whatever is bothering him. Rusty also dispensed some advice on the same thing to Casey when she stopped by his apartment asking about how to deal with a problem she was facing without saying what it was. Rusty’s advice gets through to Cappie, who decides to costume up and attend the party. He actually arrives there before Casey because she and her fellow Zeta Beta’s find out while getting ready that they must bury Katherine’s clipboard with the Song Fest results that they took from the GP house when they broke in and accidentally burned it down. Stupidly, Ashleigh still has the clipboard and the ZBZ’s know they can’t just throw it in the trash because someone might find it. They hike out into the middle of the woods to bury it, then nearly get lost on the way back to the party. Along the way, Ashleigh admits that she has been so negative lately about Casey’s relationship with Cappie because her own relationship with boyfriend Fisher ended over break because he cheated on her. At the party, Casey and Cappie finally talk and work things out when both come clean about the secrets they’ve been hiding. Cappie taunts her about being an arsonist, but it’s all in fun. Evan and Rebecca also share a dance and a kiss during the party and clearly they aren’t over each other or art least still enjoy hooking up at a minimum. The episode ends the next day when Rusty and Dale get a call telling them the results of the competition for the engineering grant they are both vying for. Rusty is declared the winner, stunning both of them and leaving Dale devastated. Now, their friendship is back on the rocks, it would seem. How will Dale react? Tune in next Monday at 10 p.m. to find out as the new season keeps rolling…………

- Every state in the U.S. is dealing with the same budget crunch and dire financial straits. The degree to which your state is suffering may vary, but the bottom line is that no state is soaring financially and all must find ways to make their budget work. Having said that, you cannot be serious, state of New Hampshire. Your fiscal hopes are now pinned on a t-shirt featuring three wolves howling at the moon? Sadly, it’s true. State economic officials are looking to gravy-train off a Keene, N.H., company's T-shirt that has gained some attention on the Web. The Three Wolf Moon T-shirt has been on Amazon.com's Top 100 list for more than six months and it features a rather ordinary scene of three wolves howling at a moon. The shirt became something of a cult favorite after one online review alleged that it had the ability to attract beautiful women, among other powers. Others took up the thread, somehow managed to hook a whole lot of suckers and suddenly demand for the shirts was so high that printing company The Mountain had to work extensive overtime to handle the sales. That has led to one of the ultimate cheeseball political plays of all time the state Division of Economic Development designating the shirt the official T-shirt of New Hampshire economic development. "The Mountain's Three Wolf Moon is a true New Hampshire success story," said Steve Boucher of the Division of Economic Development. "What started off as a tongue-in-cheek take on a cool T-shirt has resulted in worldwide acclaim for a very creative and growing Granite State business." Good thing there are a lot of idiots out there to buy ugly t-shirts and allow you to seize upon that popularity in a lame attempt to boost your state’s flagging economy, S. Sure, actors Rainn Wilson of "The Office" and Allan Hyde of "True Blood" have worn them, as have members of the U.S. Marine's Bravo Company 1st Combat Engineer Battalion. That being said…….it is a butt-ugly shirt that I wouldn’t be caught dead in. But don’t let that dampen your enthusiasm, New Hampshire Division of Economic Development! Go ahead with your online campaign featuring local business officials and celebrities wearing the shirt. And someday, when your state is still slumming it in the ditches of economic ruin and depression, you can proudly say that you are there in large part because your state had nothing better to revive its rotting financial carcass that an ugly t-shirt with a picture on it of wolves howling at the moon…………

- That bitchin’ dorm fight that took place Nov. 22 at a campus residence hall on the Michigan State University campus is the gift that keeps on giving. The brawl resulted in eight MSU football players being suspended from the Valero Alamo Bowl on Jan. 2, a game the Spartans lost. Some of the players were hit with criminal charges for their role in the brawl and it seemed like things were slowly simmering down and dying out. But like the villain in a bad horror movie, this story just keeps coming back to life. The latest development occurred Tuesday when two more players were indefinitely suspended after being charged in connection with the brawl. Junior defensive tackle Oren Wilson and redshirt freshman receiver Myles White both face misdemeanor charges of assault and conspiracy to commit assault. Michigan State coach Mark Dantonio on Tuesday indefinitely suspended both players from "all football-related activities" and Wilson and White must turn themselves in for arraignment. "As with the previously suspended players, their status with the team will be re-evaluated on a case-by-case basis as their legal issues are resolved," Dantonio's statement reads. All told, police have charged 11 football players with assault and conspiracy, more than 10 percent of the team. On top of that, four players who were present at the fight but did not participate (or at least their participation can’t be proven) have also been suspended by the university. How ironic it is that this incident started following a fraternity potluck event, because this is truly a stroke of amazing luck for each and every one of us. Glenn Winston and Roderick Jenrette were thrown off the team, two other players who face charges, Ashton Leggett and Jamiihr Williams, will transfer to other schools. This thing is snowballing into a ginormous debacle and I could not be happier about it. What’s better than knuckleheaded football players not being bright enough to walk away from a brawl and having their football careers end because of it? Way to show that you appreciate the opportunity given to you, fellas. I know you want to have your guys’ backs when something goes down, but do what you have to do to extricate them from the fray and get the heck out of there. Your inability to keep your head in a skirmish at a campus function with some frat boys taunting you doesn’t bode well for your life from here forward………….

- Riot Watch! Riot Watch! Everyone’s favorite overview of social dissidence and unrest ‘round the world is back and today we have the sheer and total joy of a freaking prison riot to revel in. This particular prison riot comes to us from La Planta prison near Caracas, Venezuela. The riot happened during visitation hours at the capital and left eight dead and 16 injured. Consuelo Cerrada, the country's penitentiary director, confirmed news of the riot, but said that at this point, authorities are still investigating the motive behind the deadly riot. What we do know is that shots were fired in the incident, Cerrada said. All in all, this has me pumped up. Hopefully none of those killed were guards because if only inmates died or were injured in this melee, it becomes even better. A bunch of angry, homicidal inmates brawling over something probably as trivial as being members of rival gangs or someone talking junk in the lunch line end up sparking a massive prison riot that leads to gunfire? The only way this gets better is if the facility was set on fire and major property destruction took place. Prison riots tend to be great because they are self-contained pockets of mayhem that don’t endanger the rest of society. We can sit back, watch these hooligans riot and enjoy the show…………

- Do it, D.C. Legalize the hippie lettuce and do it NOW. For years and years you’ve danced around the issue, but legalizing medical marijuana is as tantalizingly close as it has ever been and it needs to happen, period. Back in 1998, voters in the District voted nearly 7 to 3 for doctor-prescribed tree, which is actually a greater majority than those in any of the other eight statewide ballot initiatives that have passed around the country. Yet the vote wasn’t enough to make the chronic legal for medicinal purposes because poll workers spent that election night fudging the results of the vote, kowtowing to a last-minute congressional amendment pulling funds from D.C. for the processing of any drug-legalization initiative. Ballots were printed prior to the ban, but the D.C. Board of Elections and Ethics stupidly decided that to follow the intent of the law it had to withhold the results after the votes had been cast. How a federal entity can tell a local government that it cannot even announce the results of a legitimate election is bogus bullsh*t, to be sure. We’re 12 years past that indefensible decision and it is still infuriating to no end. Ironically, the sponsor of the 1998 congressional ban, Bob Barr, has gone from being staunchly anti-pot to a libertarian who openly supports the legalization of tree. He is even lobbying against the law he once wrote and now that fifteen states have done so, it seems like common sense for D.C. to follow suit. In December 2009, Congress quietly lifted the Barr Amendment, giving the city an opportunity to enact its old law. City council member David Catania proved to be just the hero his city needed, introducing a bill that would implement Initiative 59, with the co-sponsorship of nine of the 13 council members. "As far as I'm concerned, this is an important issue. The evidence I've seen certainly suggests a powerful medicinal use for marijuana that can stimulate appetite and can reduce pain and suffering. So frankly that's my decision, and I'm capable of doing more than one thing at a time, as are my colleagues and as is this government,” Catania said. He readily admits that the details and fine print must still be worked out - how many dispensaries to allow (as many as possible!), whether they'll be nonprofit or private, for which diseases prescription hippie lettuce will be available, where the weed will be grown. The one issue I do have with Catania is that he is thinking far too small and conservative on this issue. He is shooting for more restrictive implementation because he fears future governments would strike down anything too liberal. "The voters approved the medical use of marijuana, not the recreational use of marijuana," he said. "The more professional and controlled and evidence-based our system is, the greater likelihood it will be sustained going forward." Having said that, a plan that would create five to 10 nonprofit dispensaries around the city is better than nothing. A spokesman for the D.C. city council says the bill is likely to get through the council by the end of the spring and may be approved in Congress by the end of summer. Now, you may be wondering if I am rooting for this bill to pass because I assume that the legalized hippie lettuce for medicinal purposes will ultimately lead to some of that pot finding its way into the hands (and bongs of all shapes and sizes) of stoners using the drug for recreational purposes. The answer to that, of course, is that…………

A massive sausage recall, a Heroes recap and one of life's infallible truths holds true

- When I see the headline “Huge sausage recall,” you know I have to talk about the situation. Sadly, when I delved deeper into this situation, I found out that these were actual, edible, food sausages being recalled. The recall was announced by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which has reported 184 potentially outbreak-associated cases that have been identified in 38 states, including eight from Oregon and 14 from Washington. The offending sausages are Rhode Island-based Daniele brand salami and the recall includes: Daniele Deli Selection (20 oz), Daniele Italian Brand Gourmet Pack (16 oz), Daniele Italian Brand Gourmet Pack (8 oz), Daniele Surtido Fino Italiano (454 g), Dietz and Watson Artisan Collection Party Platter Pack (8 oz), Daniele Gourmet Combo Pack (16 oz), Daniele Surtido Fino Italiano (340 g), Daniele Brand Gourmet Pack (Emballage Assorti Gourmet Italian) (500 g), Boar's Head All Natural Salame Coated with Coarse Black Pepper (8 oz), Daniele All Natural Salame Coated with Coarse Black Pepper" (10oz), Daniele Pepper Salame, Black Bear Baby Genoa Pepper Salame (9 oz), Dietz & Watson Artisan Collection Baby Genoa Pepper Salame, Daniele Gourmet Italian Deli Selection (600 g), Daniele Salame Bites Pepper Salame (7 oz), Daniele Natural Salame Coated with Coarse Black Pepper, Daniele Gourmet Deli Selection (Assortment De Fines Charcuterie Italienne) (400g), Daniele deli Selection (32oz). If you currently own any of these sausages, do not – DO NOT – eat them. They are among the of 1.2 million pounds of salami and other “ready-to-eat sausages” being recalled and you do not want to follow in the footsteps of the more than 35 people already hospitalized for eating bad sausages. The incidents date back to July of last year and the Oregon state Department of Public Health has been at the forefront of the investigation because Oregon and neighboring appear to be the epicenter of this crisis. The offending sausages are widely sold at groceries, warehouse stores and online by vendors including Costco, Walmart, Sam's Club and Amazon other locations. Once again, please do not choke down any of these tainted sausages, no matter how delicious they may appear. They are, in fact, dangerous and should be returned to the point of purchase as soon as possible…………

- Anyone who has grown up with the complete and total hassle of having braces put on their teeth will appreciate this next story. Thousands and thousands of kids are saddled with this menace each year in the name of cosmetic beauty (and alleged dental benefits) and curse every second of having those ridiculous contraptions on their teeth. Even with 20 percent of those getting braces now over the age of 18 (vanity at its finest), news that researchers are testing a new device that shakes teeth back into shape to get braces off patients’ teeth faster than ever is sure to go over well. A clinical trial is ongoing and it centers on a device that researchers believe stimulates bone remodeling and speeds up the straightening process. In the trial, patients clamp their teeth down on the device for 20 minutes a day and it delivers low-frequency vibration to her teeth, which "Vibrations, when they are applied to the bone, there is a solid body of evidence in clinical trials and from experiments in humans and animals that the bone metabolism accelerates," said Dubravko Pavlin, D.M.D., Ph.D., Associate Professor of Orthodontics at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio. " The bone remodels at a faster rate." That, of course, leads to the obvious question of how much this treatment would shorten the time patients would need to wear braces. "If we are talking about the average orthodontic treatment being maybe 24 months, 24 to 26 months, that would mean that we can shorten that treatment to maybe between 12 and 16 months," Pavlin said. Patients in the trial are showing encouraging results, enough that the doctors running the trial are extremely encouraged by what they see. Of course, they all stand to make a crap load of money if this pans out, so of course they are excited. The device itself is called Acceledent and the battery-operated device is still pending FDA approval. As someone who suffered through several years of having braces and knows firsthand the hassle they bring about, I sincerely hope that this device tests out well and is able to shorten the misery and suffering of so many who are forced to live with braces as a part of their life for a prolonged period of time…………

- Once again, another of life’s infallible truths has held true. You can get away with a lot of crimes in this country – murder (O.J.), assault (the police officers in the Rodney King beating) and more – but if you try to jerk with the IRS on your income taxes, your ass is going down. Professional golfer Jim Thorpe has learned that lesson the hard way. He has been sentenced to a year in prison for failing to pay more than $2 million in income taxes, which is actually a pretty freaking good reason to send someone to prison. It’s one thing if the average, non-athlete gets behind a few thousand dollars on taxes, because that I can look at and say it doesn’t harm the government all that much. But being behind $2 million…….that’s going to raise a few red flags. How do you think you’re getting away with that, J. Thorpe? In actuality, you don’t get away with it and you end up with a year behind bars, two years of supervised release and 200 hours of community service. Under the terms of his plea agreement, Thorpe's attorney, Mark Horwitz, said that his client must turn himself in to authorities by April 1. In between now and April 1, he must also use his last few months of freedom for the foreseeable future to try to repay the taxes he owes. Thorpe pleaded guilty to two counts of failing to pay income taxes and to be honest, he got off easy on this occasion. He faced up to two years in prison and probably should have received the maximum sentence because his actions were an egregious “Screw you” to the rest of us who actually pay our taxes. Horwitz said Thorpe "has accepted his punishment and will be getting on with his life." On the upside, no one pays attention to Geezer Golf, a.k.a. the Champions Tour, so it would seem highly unlikely that Thorpe will become a target in whatever cushy federal prison he ends up doing his time in…………

- The end of the season is nearer than you might realize for Heroes and based on the lackluster season it has been, it’s not as disappointing as you may think. In tonight’s episode, Sullivan Bros. carnival began the evening with operations shut down because the rest of the super-powered carneys (people with powers – PWP – as I call them) hates Samuel for the massive earthquake/sinkhole he caused last episode when he couldn’t control his rage, unleashed his power and basically destroyed the small town near the carnival by using his ability to control the earth and its elements. Samuel confronts Lydia, a.k.a. the Tattooed Woman, because he believes she has positioned herself as the voice of those who are dissatisfied with his leadership. He vows to show everyone how much he cares for and needs them and to regain his position of authority. Meanwhile, back in New York City, Peter Petrelli is still having his prophetic dreams courtesy of the power of absorbed from his mother Angela and he is dreaming about his friend Emma, who has the power to see sounds as colors and a siren-like ability to draw others to her by playing the cello. Peter tries fruitlessly to trying to find her, but in the midst of his search, he gets a call from Angela. She asks him to come over, ostensibly to help choose the wording for the quote on the late Nathan Petrelli’s tombstone, but really Angela wants to see how her lone living son is. Peter assures her that he’s fine and wants to follow up on what he saw in his dream, namely Sylar coming to Emma’s aid, attempting to prevent the disaster that occurs in the dream in which Emma is responsible for the deaths of thousands of people. Angela reluctantly steers Peter in the right direction to find Sylar and he’s off. Parent-child relations are also front and center for Claire Bennet, who goes to see her father H.R.G. following her unexpected and bizarre visit from a discombobulated Sylar last week and also to talk about their recent tension over her visit to the carnival and his role in attempting to cover up Nathan’s death. Claire’s roommate/BFF/quasi-lesbian girlfriend (keep dropping those heavy-handed hints, show producers) drives her to H.R.G.’s apartment in D.C., but Claire decides that she has to go inside by herself and face the uncomfortable talk on her own. That ends up being a moot point when H.R.G. isn’t home and Claire is greeted by his lady friend Lauren, who tells Claire that her father will be back shortly. Things go from tense to confrontational when Claire spots files and documents laid out on the counter relating to Lauren and H.R.G.’s plan to attack the carnival and capture Samuel. Believing such an attack would lead to disaster, an angry Claire storms out and back at the dorm, she tries to talk Gretchen into loaning her car for a few hours so Claire can go warn her pals at the carnival. Gretchen suggests that Claire go to class, forget the whole thing and allow H.R.G. to do his thing, but an angry Claire snatches the keys and drives away. At the carnival, she warns Lydia of the coming attack and they in turn attempt to convince Samuel to turn himself in to H.R.G., thereby protecting the other members of his carnival “family.” He tells them he’ll go along with their plan, but then we see his right-hand man Eli lurking outside, not seeming too pleased with what he’s hearing. There is a lot of that going around, because Matt Parkman isn’t at all happy with what he’s hearing with archnemesis Sylar sitting in his kitchen, pretending to be an old friend from the police force. Parkman sits through an uneasy lunch with his enemy, but soon invites him down to the basement, away from Parkman’s wife Janis, to find out what’s going on. Sylar drops the bombshell that he wants Parkman to wipe his memory and take away his abilities so he can be “normal.” After protesting and saying he’s 50 murders too late for that, Parkman agrees to try after Sylar threatens his family. However, the first two attempts to erase Sylar’s memories and strip his abilities fail and both men become increasingly frustrated. When Sylar snaps, uses his telepathic power to pin Janis to the wall and threatens to use all of his powers to torture and kill her, a frantic Parkman talks him out of it and agrees to try one last time. He helps Janis flee the house and on the way out, she tells him that he needs to “bury” Sylar where he can never hurt them again. Parkamn concurs, goes back inside and places his hands on Sylar’s head. Instead of taking away his powers, Parkman traps Sylar inside his own tortured mind in a way that his abilities are suppressed but in which Sylar is also trapped alone inside his haunted mind – forever. Inside his head, Sylar is alone in a giant world, but in real life he is in a sort of coma. Parkman takes his limp body down to the basement and begins to wall him in brick by brick, Telltale Heart style. His plan looks to be succeeding (although having a comatose serial killer with superpowers inside a secret room in your basement would be unnerving to live with, no?) until Peter Petrelli shows up, following his mother’s guidance to find Sylar. He shakes Parkman’s hand, absorbs his ability to read and control minds and immediately knows that Sylar is in the house. Peter rushes to the basement, finds Sylar unconscious because a nearly-done wall of bricks and over Parkman’s strenuous objections, places his hands on Sylar’s head in an attempt to awaken him so he can help Emma like Peter saw in his dream. His attempt places him inside Sylar’s mind, where a frantic Peter runs along empty city streets in what appears to be downtown Los Angeles, with no signs of life to be found. Will he find Sylar or be trapped inside this lost mental prison forever? Not sure, but I’m confident we’ll find out soon. Meanwhile, all hell is breaking loose at the carnival. H.R.G. and Lauren have made their way there, looking to execute their plan and capture Samuel. As they watch from a nearby hill with rifle poised, Samuel strolls out onto the midway and stands up on a stage to address his family. He apologizes for his recent actions and reveals his plan to turn himself in. They gasp in horror and protest, but just as he finishes speaking, shots ring out. Bullets fly everywhere and multiple PWP are hit, including Claire, Samuel and Lydia. But the shots aren’t coming from H.R.G.; they are coming from Eli, who has replicated himself and taken up multiple positions on the hill. He is the one doing the shooting, but when H.R.G. realizes this and shoots at the Eli he sees, the body vaporizes and he realizes immediately that it’s one of Eli’s copies and not the real thing. The real Eli appears behind him, knocks him out with the butt of his own rifle and drags H.R.G. into the carnival. Lauren, who took a bullet to the shoulder during Eli’s assault, tries to intervene but her wound prevents her from firing her gun. Eli drags H.R.G. into the midst of the carnival and Samuel immediately paints his nemesis as the one responsible for the shooting. H.R.G. is carried off to the hall of mirrors and tied up while Claire is carried off by multiple Eli’s to Samuel’s trailer to be kept prisoner. Eric Doyle (the Puppet Man) then summons Samuel to Lydia’s side. She is bleeding to death on the ground, having been struck in the chest by a bullet. As she lays dying, Samuel bizarrely plants a kiss on her, knowing that she can perceive a person’s innermost thoughts and desires from a single touch. She gasps, looks at him in awe and says, “You did this.” In other words, she knows he was the one responsible for the shooting. He watcher her die, says he did it to give the people of the carnival a villain to hate worse than they hate him and that she was a necessary sacrifice. Claire and Doyle rush to draw some of her blood to inject in Lydia to save her, but they are too late. She dies and her many tattoos vanish from her skin as the life ebbs out of her. In the aftermath of the shooting, Emma strolls into the carnival and is greeted by Doyle, who points her in Samuel’s direction. He asks her to treat his bullet wound and she does as he rants on about how she is not only saving him, but helping the PWP of the carnival to a new beginning, one in which they will show the world who they truly are and what they are capable of. The episode ends there, with a lot of key characters once again getting no screen time. That is the show’s ever-present problem and it’s made this season a train wreck for the most part. Can the last two episodes of the season provide redemption? Not likely, but stay tuned to find out…………

- Believe it or not, but counterfeit capsules of the diet drug Alli that are sold online can pose a serious health risk to users. How a drug that you bought from an online pharmacy could be dangerous in any way, I don’t know. After all, those places are so strict with who they will sell to and so adamant about demanding patients go through the proper channels and receive legitimate prescriptions that there should be absolutely no danger at all for any involved party. Yet there is the Food and Drug Administration said Saturday, warning consumers that fake versions of Alli are being sold, mainly on online auction sites, and those drugs could pose serious health risks. The biggest danger seems to be excessive amounts of sibutramine, a prescription drug and controlled substance that can place people with cardiovascular disease at risk for higher blood pressure, heart attack or stroke. Janet Woodcock, director of the FDA Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, spoke about the ills of these phony weight-loss pills late last week and hopefully her warnings will reach those who need them – i.e. morons who think that buying knockoff weight-loss pills online is a good idea. The fake pills contain at least twice as much sibutramine as would normally be recommended, Woodcock claimed. "Unfortunately, many people with high blood pressure or heart disease are trying to improve their health by losing weight, and we are concerned that such individuals might be exposed to the counterfeit drug," Woodcock said. Those who consume the bogus pills and thus ingest excess sibutramine could suffer heart palpitations, sleeplessness, anxiety, dry mouth, nausea and shakiness. Sibutramine is the active ingredient in the prescription diet drug Meridia, but is found in much lower doses there. "Sibutramine could potentially interact with other medications the consumer may be taking, and there are dosing differences between Alli (three times a day) and Meridia (once a day)," Alli's Web says. If all of these dangerous weren’t enough, research also shows that the counterfeit pills lack the active ingredient orlistat found in the authentic Alli product, which prevents a portion of the fat eaten from being absorbed. So……these pills could not only give you heart palpitations, sleeplessness, anxiety, dry mouth, nausea and shakiness, but they also may do little or nothing to help you lose weight? Shocking. According to GlaxoSmithKline, which manufactures Alli, consumers should look for the following in order to determine if their weight-loss pills are fake: LOT code information missing from the top of the box, an expiration date that includes month, day and year (example: 04222010), instead of only the month and year (example: 08/13), the absence of the words "SEALED FOR YOUR PROTECTION" printed in white ink on the seal of the bottle and a larger, more-powder-like pill. If you’re dumb enough to have wasted money on a pill that fits any of these descriptions, throw it in the trash without taking any and see if you can’t find a way to be a lot less dumb in the future…………