- Everyone knows there’s only one way to impress a classy lady: Buy her two tickets to the gun show. Iconic (and fictional) TV news legend Ron Burgundy taught the world that lesson and Carolina Panthers linebacker Kion Wilson lives it - or at least he will once he gets his guns back. In Wilson’s case, the guns aren’t the twisted steel located between his elbow and shoulder that is toned and built by hours in the weight room, but actual guns and plenty of them. Apparently Wilson is something of a gun enthusiast and a few days ago he was tooling around Charlotte with four pretty heavy pieces of weaponry in his truck. He headed out to the shooting range with his FN 57 handgun, Mossberg 12-gauge shotgun, Glock 23 and Smith and Wesson Body Guard 380 in tow. With the proper permits in hand, there was no issue with Wilson’s small weapons cache - until he stopped at a local best buy on the way to the range. He found a parking spot, departed his Ford F250 truck and headed inside to check out the iPhones, laptops, iPads and noise-canceling headphones. When he returned, his truck had been broken into and the guns were gone. Panthers general manager Marty Hurney said the team had confirmed the guns were registered to Wilson and that the player had done nothing wrong, but had no further comment. Considering the issues NFL players have had with guns and shooting either themselves or others in the past decade, one player having four guns stolen from his truck probably registers as a relief on commissioner Roger Goodell’s radar. As for the scumbag who stole Wilson’s guns, here’s hoping karma comes back to smack that fool…………
- French President Nicolas Sarkozy is digging deep and reaching for every weapon he can find in his battle to stay in power. Well, he may not be willing to use gang members as mercenaries to crush revolutions the way Bashir al-Assad’s regime is in Syria, but Sarkozy is looking for every legal method possible to curry favor with voters ahead of April’s presidential election. Polls suggest Sarkozy is losing ground to Marine Le Pen, leader of the far-Right National Front, and could fall well short in the first round of elections in April. Socialist contender François Hollande is currently leading in most polls and Sarkozy is showing signs of desperation. He is digging deep and trying to pander to France’s general love of Joan of Arc to bolster his fading campaign. Sarkozy made pilgrimage to Joan of Arc's birthplace in eastern France for the 600th anniversary of her birth this week and seized upon the occasion to remind the French that no single party could stake a claim on the Maid of Orleans, especially not his rivals. "Joan is the incarnation of patriotism, which is the love of one's country without the hatred of others," Sarkozy said in a speech at Vaucouleurs, eastern France, where Joan began her campaign to push the English out of France and place Charles VII on the throne. Latching on to the legend of a 15th century peasant who led the French army against the English after hearing religious voices and was later burned at the stake does seem like a reach, but politics are often a desperate endeavor. Just to be safe, Sarkozy later e visited Domremy-la-Pucelle, the village said to have been Joan of Arc’s birthplace. He reminded his citizens that Joan of Arc’s legacy is not the property of any single party even as he tried to gravy train on her beloved status to help his own campaign. "Joan doesn't belong to any party, any faction, any clan," he said. "May we continue to think of her (Joan) as the symbol of our unity and not leave her in the hands of those who would use her to divide. To divide in the name of Joan of Arc is to betray Joan of Arc's memory." Le Pen actually threw the first punch in the fight earlier this week when she claimed that she had more in common with the late saint than Sarkozy, both ideologically and physically. "He must know that I have stronger convictions, a purer heart and longer legs and thus he will have great difficulty, I think, in catching me," Le Pen said. She also held a rally Friday in central Paris at the base of an armor-clad statue of the saint. And you thought the Republican presidential race was full of desperate, pathetic candidates…………
- Van Halen is back…..for another cash grab. The ‘80s rockers are back together with David Lee Roth as lead singer and will begin a nationwide arena tour next month, but they kicked off their on-stage reunion Thursday night at a small club in New York's West Village. The show took place at the famed Cafe Wha?, owned by Roth’s uncle Manny, and featured plenty of VIPs to see the band play some of their greatest hits including "Jump" and "Panama." Former tennis great John McEnroe was among those in attendance as Van Halen played an hour-long set. "Welcome to Occupy Van Halen, ladies and gentleman!" Roth yelled just before the band launched into "You Really Got Me," the first song of the night. He also took time to single out some of the other greats who had played at the club, including Bob Dylan, and claimed he was more nervous on the Café Wha? stage than he would be next month at much larger venues. "I'm more nervous about this gig than I would ever be in the Garden," he said, referring to Madison Square Garden. The World’s Most Famous Arena is one of the venues Van Halen will play in the coming months as they kick off their reunion tour. The tour begins in Louisville, Ky., on Feb. 16, and will tour through June, hitting cities like Boston, Atlanta and Chicago. Of course, there is a new album to promote as well and the band announced Wednesday that they'll release "A Different Kind of Truth" on Feb. 7. It will be their first album with Roth since their celebrated album "1984," released that same year. Since then, the band has veered all over the place, swapping out lead singers, fighting amongst themselves and putting out some extremely unlistenable music. Roth left for a solo career and Sammy Hagar took his place, bassist Michael Anthony left and was replaced by Wolfgang Van Halen, the son of guitar great Eddie Van Halen and plenty of discontent permeated every album and tour. However, nothing brings people together quite like money and the promise of renewed fame, so everyone was smiling Wednesday night during the show. "This has been a really long time coming," Roth told the audience. "It took us 50 years to get this gig. It was easier to get in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame than to get this gig." Glad someone enjoyed the occasion even if the whole thing is a blatant cash grab…….
- The Guinness Book of World Records continues to inspire losers around the globe to attempt truly asinine feats. Whether it’s kooks growing their fingernails for seven years, thousands of tools uniting to play the opening lick of “Smoke on the Water” in unison or a fool collecting the world’s largest ball of yarn, there will never be a shortage of ass hats willing to do worthless things just to get their name in that book. Maitland, Fla. resident Penny Gold is one of those ass hats and her feat is no less ridiculous than any of the others. She is seeking a new world record for……wait for it…..wait a little longer…….owning the most pairs of Converse tennis shoes. Her collection currently contains 733 pairs and even if a person is buying their Chuck Taylor All-Stars from the discount store, that would still put her in the neighborhood of $15,000-$20,000 spent on shoes that, while awesome, are not a product that one needs to own in bulk for any reason. When did the madness start for Gold? "The collection began about 20 years ago,” she said. "I’ve been wearing Converse since I was a very little girl in Brooklyn. When all the Converse outlets opened here in Orlando it was at least reasonable to buy." Umm, not really. Nothing about owning 733 pairs of the same kind of shoes is reasonable. Gold has even beaten any resistance to her shoe collection out of her husband Barry, who admits he’s given up the fight. “We're married 40 years, I have no choice,” he said. Instead, he dutifully builds shelves to house his wife’s kicks and keep them neat, color coordinated and organized. Some of the shoes are brightly colored, some are sparkly and some have comic book characters or band names on them. Like any loser with a large collection of junk, Gold wants her name in the Guinness Book of World Records. She followed the book’s requirement to document her collection by holding a public display and having her friends count every pair, including the ones on her feet. If her count is accurate, Gold will best the loser who currently holds the record by a margin of 173 pairs. Her official count will be reported to Guinness at its headquarters in England and her record would then appear in the book’s 2013 issue, cementing her status as a world-class loser…………
- This is only going to fuel the arguments of those sad souls who truly believe their dogs are really their children and equivalent to a human member of their family. A new study led by researcher Jozsef Topal found that dogs possess non-verbal communication skills comparable to what is seen in 6-month-old human infants. "These results support the notion that dogs are sensitive to the cues signaling humans' communicative intent in a way that is analogous to preverbal human infants," said Topal, the study’s lead author. He and his team found that dogs who were spoken to or who had direct eye contact with a person were more likely to follow that human's gaze as it moved across the room than if the person didn't make direct eye contact with them. They also discovered that dogs pay attention to the right side of a person’s face to read non-verbal clues in much the same way humans do. For the study, Topal’s team had 16 domesticated dogs watch videos of female actors turning towards a plastic pot. In the first video, the actor looked directly at the dog and said in a high-pitched voice, "Hi dog!" In the second video, the same actor said "Hi dog" in a low-pitched voice but didn't make eye contact. Researchers used eye-tracking techniques, which are already commonly used to study infant behavior, to determine that the dogs were more likely to follow the human turning toward the pot when they had both been spoken to and received direct eye contact. When the actor said "Hi dog" in a low-pitched voice without the direct gaze, the dogs seemed unable to read the person’s intent. "The [dog's] gaze was only triggered when preceded by communicating intent. It does seem to be that dogs do look at humans and follow gestures," said Dr. Nicholas Dodman, director of the Animal Behavior Clinic at Tufts Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine in North Grafton, Mass. "This is intuitive to anyone who owns a dog, that dogs seem to be more in tune with us than some scientists believe." Eye-tracking techniques also play a role in other aspects of dogs' cognitive processing, such as memory skills and reasoning abilities, said Topal, who is an associate professor in the Comparative Behavior Research Group at the Institute for Psychological Researches, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, in Budapest. That’s where you should send your angry messages once the pathetic person in your life hits you with, “Not only does little Fluffy love her Mommy so much and love the sweater I knit for her, but she understands me and how I feel. She really is my child.” Thanks for that, Joe…………
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