The "Bad Santa" sequel, a politican actually helps someone and Eddie Lacy's FAT problems

- It’s another movie sequel no one was demanding, but there is money to be made without needing originality or creativity and so Billy Bob Thornton will start shooting “Bad Santa 2” in January. Yes, his co-stars in the original Bad Santa included Bernie Mac and John Ritter, both of whom have passed away since its release, but having two key cast members die far too young isn't going to stop Miramax and Broad Green Pictures from confirming that the second film will start production at the start of next year and hit theaters during the holiday season next year.  "We've been waiting far too long to see Billy Bob's Willie Soke mess with the holiday season in his own unique way," Miramax's Zanne Devine said in a release. "We couldn't be more excited to partner with Billy Bob, the entire creative and producing team, and Broad Green and Sierra/Affinity to bring back the outrageous humor and characters that made this movie brand iconic in the first place." It’s been 12 years since the original “Bad Santa” starred Billy Bob Thornton as an alcoholic conman who poses as a shopping mall Santa Claus in order to rob department stores on Christmas Eve. It starred the underratedly attractive Lauren Graham in a supporting role and was chock full of sex, swearing, debauchery and all-around misery and for haters of traditional Christmas movie fare, the black comedy has become something of an anti-Christmas favorite. Depending on who you asked, this sequel has possibly been in the works since 2009 and “Entourage” creator Doug Ellin was hired to rewrite the script in 2013. Miramax didn’t reference any specific writer or director for the sequel, but it’s safe to say they have a few options in mind……….

- At least people aren’t talking about the growing scandal surrounding University of Louisville men’s basketball allegedly having a former assistant coach who plied high school recruits and their parents with parties, strippers and sex. No, at least for a few days, the world can shift its focus to university president James Ramsey, who got Halloween started a little early with a photo in which he and members of his staff channeled their inner racists by dressing in matching stereotypical Mexican costumes. The university quickly went into damage-control mode, apologizing to its entire Hispanic community after the photo of Ramsey among a group of staffers at a Halloween party dressed in sombreros, fake mustaches and other offensive garb while shaking maracas surfaced. Ramsey's chief of staff, Kathleen Smith, issued a statement expressing "deep regret" over the incident. "We made a mistake and are very sorry," Smith wrote. "This event shows we have much more to learn about our community." But don’t worry, because the administration vows to train staff and engage with the campus over diversity and racial equality issues, which doesn’t at all underscore the fact that sh*t like this shows that these people are out of touch, ignorant and wholly unaware of basic life truths that literally everyone should already know. Worse still, this photo wasn’t take at some after-hours party at someone’s home where everyone was two drinks deep into the fun, but rather at an annual Halloween luncheon for Ramsey and members of his staff at a mansion owned by the university. But hell, who could have imagined that a smiling Ramsey leaning on a porch railing, wearing a sombrero and a rainbow-striped poncho trimmed in fringe while surrounded by idiots clad mostly in black clothing with fake mustaches and beards stuck to their faces and sombreros atop their heads would offend anyone……….

- Fans and Twitter trolls are having a field day and clowning him with nicknames like Bready Tasty, but Green Bay Packers running back Eddie Lacy doesn't care how the pictures look. Lacy, who has become a very productive player in the NFL despite not being the most svelte guy, has heard the talk after a few unflattering photos from recent practices surfaced online. After Packers coach Mike McCarthy said this week that Lacy is "bigger than he was as a rookie," it added fuel to the fire and Lacy felt compelled to respond. "I'm not the smallest person," Lacy said . "Brandon Jacobs wasn't the smallest person. (NFL Hall of Famer) Jerome Bettis wasn't the smallest person. Some people can just play like that, not that I'm Jerome Bettis' weight or nothing like that. I'm just saying, not everybody's meant to look like Adrian Peterson or somebody like that." The Packers list 5-foot-11 Lacy at 234 pounds, which is three pounds heavier than he was at the NFL scouting combine in 2013, but his weight has been a popular target for haters since his rookie season. When he was a 1,000-yard rusher last season, he was able to silence much of that hate, but it amped up after he was limited to four carries for 3 yards in the Packers' most recent game, a 27-20 win over the San Diego Chargers on Oct. 18. Despite the criticism, Lacy insisted his weight isn’t affecting him. "When I get on [the scale], it's like, 'He cool,'" Lacy said. "If I'm not, I'm pretty sure I'll hear from the guy upstairs," alluding to general manager Ted Thompson, who can fine players for being overweight at the weekly weigh-ins. It’s ironic that in the NFL, where size and bulk are a priority, that a guy is being targeted for being too big, but such is life under the spotlight for talented players……….

- It’s time to stop saying that politicians don’t help people. Uruguayan President Tabare Vasquez may not preside over a world power, but he’s proving that elected officials can in fact make a direct, positive impact on the world. According to presidential spokesman Jose Luis Veiga, Vasquez was traveling to France for a state visit when his flight to Paris took a very dramatic, even movielike feel. As the plane cruised at 30,000 feet over the Atlantic, the pilot asked over loudspeakers if a doctor was on board. Veiga said the emergency was a 17-year-old French girl who appeared to be choking. Vasquez and his medical team got up and assisted the girl, hailing back to  his old profession as physician. Vasquez and his medical team gave her an injection that revived the girl, who had competed in a hockey tournament in Argentina and apparently ate a food that contained nuts, which she is allergic to. Dealing with nut allergies six miles up in the air has to be a lot easier than dealing with the Uruguayan national legislature, so this incident may have been a nice break from the normal grind for the president. Veiga said the incident "could have been very serious,” but thanks to Vasquez and his crew, the flight was able to continue on to Paris and one girl can thank an unlikely hero for making sure that a bag of airline peanuts containing approximately three actual nuts inside its tiny, air-filled interior was not her undoing……….

Adrian Peterson v. shrimp/Skoal, an elderly man and his pennies and Harry Potter dorks go ape-sh*t

- Man, Amnesty International is quite the cadre of conspiracy theorists. The London-based human rights group is known for fighting alleged injustices against humanity around the globe and using non-violent guerrilla warfare tactics to make its points, but its latest act of non-violent war is particularly interesting. AI is using full-page ads to accuse Australian border protection officials of illegally paying people smugglers and endangering lives in their efforts to prevent asylum seeker boats from reaching Aussie shores. The unusual advertising campaign in Australia's largest cities of Sydney and Melbourne came on the heels of a report condemning the government's highly secretive Operation Sovereign Borders, a flotilla that has all but stopped asylum seeker boats from reaching Australia. Aussies are known for many things, most including beer and fighting, but secret government conspiracies involving flotillas is not typically one of them. For its part, the Australian government has rejected the report and denied any wrongdoing and we all know that governments accused of any sort of wrongdoing never, ever deny their actions when they’ve done something heinously inappropriate. Yet here is AI, claiming that Australian officials were "complicit in a transnational crime" in May when they paid people smugglers $32,000 to take a boat carrying 65 asylum seekers bound for New Zealand to an Indonesian port. Greasy, duplicitous government representatives paying off people in the dark of night to send needy, desperate foreigners away to a distant land? That would never happen in this 21st century we all call our chronological home………

- Wiz-nerds of London are geeked. How geeked? So much so that advance tickets for a two-part Harry Potter stage play -- which won't begin previews until June 7, 2016  - went on sale Wednesday and wrecked the online ordering system for London's Palace Theatre.  "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child" is a sequel to J.K. Rowling's phenomenally popular "Harry Potter" novels and their film versions, meaning it will give Potter dorks, er, enthusiasts a chance to get another fix of their favorite young wizard even though Rowling is done penning books on the topic. It’s based on a story by Rowling, Jack Thorne and John Tiffany, with Tiffany directing a show set 19 years after the novels and films left off. Proving that sometimes you just want a character to ride off into the mythical dream future you’ve imagined for them, this sad tale will feature Harry Potter as "an overworked employee of the Ministry of Magic, a husband and father of three school-age children." Yes, Harry Potter grew up to be a bitter adult who hates his job and must deal with the daily drudgeries of being a dad to a bunch of kids doing papier-mâché volcanoes for science class. Yet demand for tickets for the shoe was so high that they sold out within an hour. But wait, there’s more. Some wiz-nerds who thought they’d locked up ducats learned that the system had lost their purchases and they couldn’t go back in to buy more. These were folks who'd signed up on the show's website for a chance to buy "priority" tickets, as the general ticketing free-for-all starts Saturday. The two-part play, as recommended by producers, should be seen on the same day or consecutive days as Harry's youngest son, Albus, "struggles with the weight of a family legacy he never wanted." Sounds riveting………. 

- Everyone has that one old relative who grew up in poorer times and appreciates the value of every last cent perhaps a bit too much. Rustin, Louisiana resident Otha Anders is that relative and he collected pennies for almost half a century before finally cashing them in for an unusual reason. This super saver wheeled in 15 water jugs full of pennies to the bank in Ruston, ultimately toting in 513,614 pennies with the help of friends and family. The final count was $5,136.14, a total that began to accumulate when Anders started collecting the coins in the late-1960s. It eventually morphed into a massive hobby so intense that he would deliberately avoid ever spending pennies. "I would break a dollar before I would spend a penny," Anders said. Whenever I would see a penny, I would always say a prayer of thanks. It was a reminder to me to always be thankful.” His tale is uplifting because Anders supervises in-school suspended children for the Jackson School Board, so he clearly cares about others in trouble. Why cash in now? Oddly enough, it’s because his insurance policy won't cover the collection. Bank employees had to be fired up to see Anders and his family coming trekking in with load after load of pennies, as did other bank patrons, because it y took five hours for machines to count all the change. Now that his copper bounty has been counted and the sum total paid out, Anders says he plans to use the cash to help pay a dental bill. Given the scam job that medical bills tend to be, the better move would have been to haul about 100 socks full of pennies into the dentist’s office and force the staff there to count them all out in order to receive payment……….

- No matter which tale of how the NFL’s best running back nearly missed the Minnesota Vikings' road game in Detroit makes Adrian Peterson look good. On the one hand, there is the story that the man know as AD suffered an upset stomach and was downgraded to questionable on Saturday because he swallowed dip on the team charter during a rough landing at Detroit Metropolitan Airport. Detroit is a rough place, but nothing is more revolting than dip and the many, many unsavory and unsanitary qualities associated with the use of chewing tobacco. Had that been the final, official story, it would have been disgusting. Instead, we have an alternate version of the story in which Peterson’s seafood allergy could have played a role. "That situation was just so simple, and I really just wasn't feeling well, but they had to report it, and coach Norv Turner made a joke, and it just took off, about the dip," Peterson said. "Yeah, I had shrimp. You know, people would be like, 'Why do you eat shrimp when you're allergic to it?' Well, here's the thing: I've eaten shrimp my entire life. Shrimp is not my -- you know, when you get the tests done, you have, for instance, scallops, lobster, shrimp and, let's say, peanuts that they're testing you for. You might swell up more when there's lobster. You might have a bigger allergic reaction to lobster than you do shrimp. Shrimp might just swell you up a little bit.” My man, if you have even a slight allergy to a certain kind of food, why are you eating in on the eve of an NFL game? Peterson's seafood allergy was first discovered in 2012 at training camp when he experienced a bad reaction to gumbo and dude carries an EpiPen with him in case of emergency. Those things aren't actually designed to be handy in the event you have a hankering for some jumbo shrimp, AD……….

Tool v. its fans, the magical world of Holland and calling "scare actors" what they really are

- NBA commissioner Adam Silver has gotten much right during his tenure leading the Association. This is not one of them. The commish continues to swing and miss on the dreaded "hack-a-player" strategy employed by some NBA coaches to stall opposing offenses and send bad free throw shooters to the line rather than let their rivals get shots in the run of play. Silver has made remarks about addressing the problem and eliminating the practice from the game, but every time he has come back to inaction as his chosen course of action. He did so again this week on the eve of a new NBA season, saying that as ugly as the hacking tactic makes games, it’s unlikely to go away any time soon.  "I'm not going to say we're never going to change it, but we'll look at it closely," Silver said. "We had a long discussion about with the competition committee this summer and the decision was to leave it and let's continue to track it. "My inclination is not to change it, but we'll continue to watch it." In other words, people still love our sport, they’re still paying premium money for tickets and cable packages and swag, so we’re not inclined to change it until we absolutely have to. "It's bad, I get it, from an aesthetic standpoint, from an entertainment standpoint, for fans," Silver said. "On the other hand, I hear from literally thousands of coaches -- not just from the United States but from around the world -- saying, 'You cannot change this rule. What lesson does that send? The kids who are learning the game, this is a fundamental part of the game: A guy's got to be able to make free throws.'” The message it sends is not turning a basketball game into a stilted, farcical version of itself because a coach is too lazy or not confident in his team’s ability to get defensive stops. Wrong again, commish………

- First and foremost, assaulting another human being is wrong. Now that we’ve established that, let’s tackle the real problem here. The real issue is William Gailit, an underemployed, fully grown loser of a man who is trying to pass himself off not as some guy making $10 an hour to put on makeup and raggedy clothes soaked in fake blood in order to temporarily terrify visitors to Universal Studios' Halloween Horror Nights in Orlando. No, Gailit is trying to pass himself off as something else entirely, something that obscures his actual gig and makes him sound quasi-legitimate. Gailit is billing himself as a “scare actor,” a role in which he claims to have been assaulted by a guest at the haunted house over the weekend. The Orlando Police Department plans to ask the state attorney's office to file a battery charge against the guest, Brandon Brown, who allegedly booted Gailit in the face while going through the maze of papier-mâché tombstones, rubber spiders and witches in prosthetic noses. Gailit told police he escorted Brown out of a haunted house Saturday night after the reported incident and Universal spokesman Tom Schroder says the theme part has a zero-tolerance policy that can include prosecution of anyone suspected of compromising the safety of employees. The truly sad part of all of this is that this ugly incident may have brought Gailit’s scare acting career to an abrupt halt, as he said this will be his last year as a part of Halloween Horror Nights. Then again, getting size-11 Nike to the face is probably not worth it when you’re taking home $8 and hour after taxes………

- It’s a bad week for the paying, adoring masses. First, Buffalo Bills receiver Sammy Watkins tossed up a truly regrettable Instagram post in which he attacked Bills fans hating on him for always being injured and mocked them as losers with “little jobs” at which they must toil every day. Then, Tool frontman Maynard James Keenan took a run at his band's own fans, which could make for an interesting scene when the band makes its 2015 live debut headlining at the Monster Mash Music Festival in Tempe, Arizona. The band recently wrapped up a seemingly interminable eight-year lawsuit and Keenan said that the rest of the band "had to con me into" playing the festival. Why? Why turn down a gig that will make even more money for someone who has already made a sh*t ton of it over the years? "Insufferable people... It’s just ridiculous, retards. I’m sorry. Can’t help them. Way too serious. Too much. Lighten up,” Keenan said. He added that those too-serious people miss the inherent humor in his band’s lyrics, suggesting that they are “so focused on the other bullsh*t.” Maynard, those insufferable people are the reason you have the career you have and their dollars are the ones funneled into your bank account so you can fly on private jets, own expensive homes and sweet rides and dine at expensive restaurants with overpriced bottles of booze. Whether previous comments made by guitarist Adam Jones that work has began on a new album are true or not, why would fans spend any money supporting an ass hat who doesn’t appreciate them and thinks he’s so far above them? Feel free to develop a bit of self-awareness any time now, M.J. Keenan………

- What a bizarre world exists at the northern end of Europe, nestled ‘twixt Germany and Belgium. In a magical, mystical place known as the Netherlands, a.k.a. Holland, curious things are happening, events that would be unheard of in bigger, richer and more powerful nations where bureaucracy reigns and governmental incompetence and ineptitude are not only unpunished, but often rewarded with job security and copious amounts of vacation time. This all centers on a failed high-speed rail service linking Amsterdam and Brussels that - brace yourself for this, followers of American politics - is actually costing people responsible for the troubled project their jobs. A scathing report, published Wednesday following a parliamentary inquiry, cites the mismanagement with the net result being that "passengers didn't get what was promised: fast, direct transport to Brussels for a reasonable price." Anyone who has ever visited Europe and especially this particular section of the continent knows that train travel is a vital cog in the transportation machine, so dangling a high-speed carrot in front of the public and then yanking it away is extremely offensive. In the report, government ministers and the national rail company are accused of putting their own interests ahead of passengers throughout the ill-fated project. One of those officials, junior infrastructure minister Wilma Mansveld, announced her resignation at a hastily arranged press conference, saying she accepted political responsibility for the failure. Mansveld may be falling one the grenade for those above her, but at least someone on a high pay grade is losing her job after the Belgian and Dutch governments pulled the plug on the high-speed link in 2013. The new Italian-built trains were plagued with technical problems in their first few months of service and getting any sort of verdict in the matter within two years has to be some sort of record for a government in a civilized, developed nations……….

Rooting for World Series hair, bad El Salvador cliches and man-banders v. Drake

- It’s such a terrible cliché that it almost makes you sad. How many movies and television shows have featured a man of the cloth in some foreign land, masquerading as a holy guy only to be corrupt to the core and serving as a front for a gang, cartel or other corrupt organization? In fact, it’s such a cliché that it almost can’t be true in real life…except it is. This trite tale is true in El Salvador, where the national prosecutor's office has arrested an evangelical pastor for allegedly having ties to a criminal gang, charging him with belonging to a terrorist organization. Despite its name making it sound like it’s part of some whacko religious cult itself, the Life Unit of the prosecutor's office says it ordered the arrest Tuesday of the Rev. Pedro Antonio Jimenez de Leon and 28 alleged members of Mara Salvatrucha, one of El Salvador's two major gangs that operate in the historic central district of the capital. This padre allegedly worked the street corners of the city along with his minions, carrying Bibles and collecting extortion money as church offerings. Best of all, it still isn't clear if Jimenez is actually an ordained pastor. What is clear is that El Salvador recently designated Mara Salvatrucha and the 18th Street Gang as terrorist organizations in the hopes of stemming a massive tide of violence as warfare between gangs and with the government has pushed homicide rates to civil war levels. Not that El Salvador has ever been a top tourist destination, but gang wars tend to turn away the would-be vacationers……….

- Are you a casual baseball fan without a rooting interest in this year’s World Series? Now you have someone, or more specifically, something for which to root during the fall classic. Throughout the New York Mets’ unlikely run to the National League pennant, one un-missable element of their appeal has been the waves upon waves of glorious, flowing hair streaming out from underneath the hats of starting pitchers Jacob deGrom and Noah Syndergaard. The young, talented duo clearly form the best 1-2 punch of quality lettuce by starting pitchers in all of baseball to the point that the Mets often use the hashtag "HAIRWEGO" on Twitter to promote deGrom's starts. Players often grow weird facial hair or let their mane go wild during playoff runs due to superstitition, but deGrom’s awesome hair has been a thing for quite a while now and yet, as the World Series kicked off, he dropped a piece of disturbing news on the world. When he was asked who had better hair between him and fellow Game 2 starter Johnny Cueto of the Kansas City Royals, deGrom hit humanity with a jaw-dropper. "I think mine is gone at the end of the year, so I'll give that award to him. It's driving me nuts. I've got to get rid of it,” deGrom said. Yeah, but this dude is 3-0 with a 1.80 ERA this postseason, so why mess with what works? Sure, DeGrom had closely cropped hair at Stetson University and during his early years in the minors, but was he winning playoff games and making himself a lot of money on his next contract with that short ‘do? No and no. So root for some of the best hair in MLB, root for deGrom to change his mind and root for all who let it flow……….

- At some point, career criminals just become depressing. Being a renegade who spits on the law and risks going to prison in order to make a dishonest living has a certain appeal for a time, but when that criminal reaches retirement age and keeps on going the outlaw way, he or she goes from badass to sad sack. They become 85-year-old Doris Payne, who swore 10 years ago that she was done with a lifetime of thieving jewels across two continents. She said the same thing several arrests later, in 2013, but amazingly for a woman who has committed countless thefts over six decades in the U.S. and Europe and has discussed her exploits publicly, she appears to have been lying every time. That much was clear earlier this month when she was arrested and charged with pocketing a $690 pair of earrings from a Saks Fifth Avenue department store at a mall in Atlanta's upscale Buckhead neighborhood. She’s clearly slipping in her old age, as a lowly store security guard watching surveillance video took her down when he saw Payne enter a Christian Dior boutique inside the department store and take the earrings from a standing shelf before quickly leaving. She was arrested before she could even leave the mall and now faces a charge of theft by shoplifting. Weirdly enough, she is also wanted on a warrant for a similar offense by the sheriff's office in Mecklenberg County, North Carolina, and will face extradition, so it appears Payne will be spending her golden years eating off cheap metal trays in the prison cafeteria. Maybe this was how it was always supposed to end for the daughter of an illiterate coal miner from tiny Slab Fork, West Virginia. Maybe a woman who walked out of a Pittsburgh jewelry store with a diamond valued at $22,000 at the age of 23 can’t end up any other way, but it doesn’t make this tale any less of a bummer…………

- Het Backstreet Men, stop grasping for relevance like a hormone-fueled 14-year-old girl shrieking and clawing the skin off a bunch of her peers in an effort to get even a touch of your bedazzled clothing. You may remember the BSM as a bunch of pop-and-locking grown men masquerading as a teen pop group, singing sugary sweet pop crap written for them by someone else while being carefully managed and promote so as to squeeze every dollar out of their appeal before their lack of actual musical talent was discovered. That was nearly two decades ago and yet these fools persist, with their latest stunt a cheeky tweet in which they draw supposed similarities between their song 'The Call' and Drake's 'Hotline Bling.’  'Hotline Bling' was originally released in July, but its music video dropped last week and Drake’s goofy dance moves in it have spanwed wave after wave of meme. It also sparked the BSM to tweet - still unclear why a defunct man band needs a Twitter account - that their 2000 phone-themed track was the original and Drake is just an imitator. “The Call,” which no one cares about and has ever actually listened to, has a man telling his lady friend not to wait up for him to call because his phone’s battery is about to die. Drake’s song sports a chorus in which he sings, “You used to call me on my cell phone late night when you need my love/And I know when that hotline bling that can only mean one thing.” What say you, man banders? "Not to cause any beef @Drake... but before there was Hotline Bling... there was The Call,” BSM tweeted. Nice try, tools. Now put down the phone you used to post that missive and go the hell away….again………

Greg Hardy's obvious pattern, Dick Cheney's ideal hunting dog and besmirching Joseph Kony

- No one could have seen this coming. Joseph Kony, all-around good guy and leader of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), a guerrilla group which used to operate in Uganda, has done so much good over the years that it’s hard to believe that this guy’s forces are accused of continuing to kill elephants for their ivory, which they trade for supplies in Sudanese-controlled territory. Kony is best known for giving young children the chance of a lifetime by kidnapping them and forcing them to serve as child soldiers in his army, so you have to questions the claim of defectors who say the ivory is trafficked from Congo's Garamba National Park to a Sudanese-controlled enclave known as Kafia Kingi, where rebels trade the ivory with Sudanese merchants for food, uniforms and ammunition. These defectors are telling their sad tales to the watchdog group Enough Project, which is in turn tarnishing Kony’s sterling international reputation. "The tusks are likely trafficked to Nyala, South Darfur, and on to Khartoum for export abroad, primarily to Asia," the grou’s new report claims. Kony is a very popular guy these days, the target of a large, ongoing manhunt involving U.S. advisers deployed to the jungles of central Africa. He’s accused of giving direct orders for the ivory sales, which just seem out of character for such a stand-up guy. Next thing we’re going to hear is that Kony treats women poorly, is willing to traffic in drugs and disregards traffic laws while littering on his way through the jungle……….

- Maybe vastly overrated pop star Janet Jackson should title her next album “Irony.”  Jackson, who is supposed to be touring the United States right now to promote her hew album “Unbreakable,” is doing less touring and more napping it out these days in order to get the vocal rest her doctor prescribed to keep her pipes from being permanently harmed. It’s not quite the miraculous intervention provided by Nickelhack frontman Chad Kroeger’s doctor when the good doc told Kroeger not to go on tour at all and thereby spared thousands of innocent eardrums hours of torture, but it’s still a nice gesture. Having already postponed shows in Salt Lake and Denver last week, Jackson was forced to pull the plug on gigs in Kansas City and St. Louis this week, bringing her total of axed performances to four. After axing the shows, Jackson tweeted, "Must postpone Kansas City & St Louis... Doctors orders. Hold onto your tickets! I'll be back in Omaha. #Unbreakable.” Did you hear that threat, Nebraska? She’s vowing to be back on stage in your fine state and unless her doctor intervenes, that’s going to happen. Jackson really hasn’t been relevant since Justin Timberlake ripped off a piece of her skin-tight outfit at the Super Bowl in 2004 and briefly exposed the world to something that led to the NFL steering away from anything remotely controversial at the Super Bowl halftime show for a decade, so her canceling two shows is barely worth mentioning. Any time she wants to retire, it will be a few years too late………

- Speaking of irony….North Webster, Indian resident Allie Carter. This northern Indiana outdoors woman is recovering from a gunshot wound to the foot after someone very close to her Dick Cheney-ed her on a recent hunting trip. Carter was out on a waterfowl hunt at Tri-County Fish and Wildlife Area when she needed to take a break. As any hunter knows, taking a break is fine. The key is being safe when you take a break, which means making sure the safety on your gun is engaged, putting that gun in a place where it won't fall into the wrong hands and wearing the proper safety gear to ensure that no fellow hunters mistake you for a 10-point buck while you’re resting. Carter either forgot her hunter’s safety course or thought it didn’t apply when your only hunting companion has four legs and an affinity for eating its own vomit. She and her chocolate Labrador retriever, Trigger, comprised Carter’s hunting party and when Carter laid her 12-gauge shotgun on the ground without the safety on, Trigger lived up to his name by accidentally stepping on top of the gun and putting one of his mangy paws on the trigger. The resulting shot from point-blank range sent Carter tumbling to the ground with injuries to her foot and toes. She was treated at two hospitals and released with a valuable life lesson about not being a moron. At least when Dick Cheney’s hunting buddies get shot in the face, the ass hat shooting them was actually trying to hit something………..

- Step back and see the pattern, Dallas Cowboys. The Greg Hardy puzzle isn't like one of those densely packed mazes of dots in kids’ magazines that you have to stare really hard at for an hour before you actually see the picture emerge. No, one cursory glance at this ass hat’s behavioral trend over the past few years - and especially since he arrived in Dallas this offseason - reveals that he’s tone deaf to his Neanderthal behavior, he has misogynistic tendencies, he’s prone to violence and he can't take a hint when it’s time to change. Hardy, who was released by the Carolina Panthers amidst legal troubles involving an alleged domestic violence incident in which he was accused of hurling his girlfriend onto a futon covered in automatic weapons before (allegedly) buying off his accuser to avoid her pressing charges, arrived in Dallas facing a 12-game suspension from the NFL. He had his suspension reduced to four games and when he came back, one of his first public comments was about coming out with “guns blazing” in his return to action. He also made crude comments about New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady's wife Gisele Bundchen, but Hardy was just firing up. His tour de force performance came in Sunday’s 27-20 loss to the New York Giants, when the defensive end was involved in sideline altercations with an assistant coach and two teammates. First, Thug Life Hardy swiped at a clipboard special teams coach Rich Bisaccia was holding, which led to the coach shoving him out of the huddle. From there, he went at it with inactive teammate Dez Bryant, a noted hothead who was actually trying to calm everyone down. Oh, and mix in a verbal showdown with receiver Devin Street, making for a hat trick of idiocy. After a defiant Hardy acted like a petulant child in postgame interviews by tersely snapping, “No comment,” to every question he was asked, Cowboys owner and Chief Enabling Officer Jerry Jones  said he did not have any issues with the incidents. "As a matter of fact, I would encourage it," Jones said. Jones called Hardy "one of the real leaders on this team." Head coach Jason Garrett backed Jones, saying Hardy won't be disciplined. Keep on enabling, Dallas, and see how this mess ends (hint: poorly)………..

Riot Watch! Kosovo, NFL QB's flying coach and Keith Richards misses the point

- Almost, gun-happy Florida kooks. You had a chance to open fire on humanity’s furry tormentors with the blessing of your state government and yet, you couldn’t hit the mark. The Sunshine State held a statewide bear hunt to end last week and the hunt ended Saturday with 207 bears killed across the state. That was just under the limit set by the state as 99 bears were killed in Central Florida, 12 in North Florida, 15 in South Florida and 81 in the panhandle. While hunting is expected to continue statewide in some parts that haven’t reached a quota set by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, failing to off as many of these toothy killers as possible is disappointing.  "The harvest objective was set as the number we want to achieve to stabilize the growing populations," commission spokeswoman Susan Smith said. "When we set them, we did so with allowable range, recognizing that the harvest may exceed the objective." The plan is for the weeklong hunt to continue until 320 bears are killed and registered at the 33 “check-in” stations the commission set up around the state. Hunters who blast a hole in ol’ Smokey have  12 hours to present the carcass to wildlife agents, who will update the statewide tally each night. Depending on whom you ask, the purpose of the hunt is to either cut down on the surging population of the black bears or senselessly slaughter some of God’s most misunderstood, warm and cuddly critters. The state estimates there are about 3,000 bears roaming parts of Florida, with hundreds of neighborhood bear incidents in recent years. This is Florida’s first bear hunt in 21 years and predictably, it was met by a lawsuit from animal rights kooks who argued that the purpose was giving hunters something new to hang on their wall. That lawsuit was rejected and the hunt continues………

- The best smartphones may offer a variety of options when it comes to alarms, tones and means to ensure a person wakes up on time, but one thing no iPhone or Droid comes equipped with is the capability to overcome laziness and stupidity. That’s a problem for Houston Texans backup quarterback Ryan Mallett, whose issues with sleep and time management have become a real problem for both he and the team. The Texans, who traded a draft pick to the New England Patriots on Aug. 31, 2014 for what they thought was a promising young quarterback who just needed a chance and signed Mallett to a two-year, $7.005 million contract this offseason, left their second-string signal caller behind when the team charter took off for Sunday's game against the Miami Dolphins. Mallett missed Saturday's team charter to Miami and the 6-foot-7 veteran quarterback later took a commercial flight to south Florida. He also missed a practice during training camp, two days after the Texans named Brian Hoyer their Week 1 starting quarterback, telling the team at that time he bought an alarm clock and promising general manager Rick Smith that that kind of thing would not happen again. Despite not being able to use the clock/alarm app on his phone, Mallett got a chance to play when Hoyer struggled in the first game and even started in Week 2. Over the next three games,  Mallett went 1-3, completing 52.2 percent of his passes for 672 yards with two touchdowns and four interceptions. He lost the starting job again and has shown his discontent with a prickly sideline demeanor in the weeks since. Teams are generally reluctant to hand a starting job to a guy not smart or responsible enough to wake up and get to work on time, so flying in coach with a bunch of tourists heading to Miami for the weekend might be the first of many indignities Mallett will suffer over the last two months of the season before he’s released this winter………

- Riot Watch! Riot Watch! Sh*t got real this weekend in Kosovo, where police say one officer and two protesters have been injured in clashes in the capital city of Pristina just one day after the opposition disrupted parliament with tear gas to protest against agreements with Serbia and Montenegro. The rage was real in the early morning hours as several hundred opposition supporters threw petrol bombs and other objects outside the parliament building in Pristina. The sight of enraged rioters hurling fuel bombs, Molotov cocktails and whatever the hell else they can get their hands off is always an uplifting one, even if 10 of these maniacs were arrested for their efforts. Those 10 detainees can take pride in the fact that their efforts were part of a weekend that saw the opposition twice disrupt lawmakers’ efforts to hold the parliament session in their chamber. Parliament members of the two governing political parties were eventually forced to a different space in the building to meet — without their opponents - which was a bit offensive given that those opponents had people outside trying to burn their city to the ground all in the name of making their voices heard. Opposition members demanded cancellation of Friday's session unless the government renounced deals with Serbia to give more powers to Serb-dominated areas in Kosovo, and with Montenegro on border demarcation. Fear of losing chunks of your country and control over it is enough to strike fear into the heart of most any über-nationalistic soul, so this is a battle that won't end quickly or quietly. Burning down parliament hasn’t worked so far, however, and as a new week begins it might be time to find a new tactic to create change in one of the world’s most combustible regions……….

- Not the point, Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards, not the point. Richards seems to believe that the purpose of rock stars ingesting immense amounts of various illegal substances is to somehow enhance their creativity by expanding their minds and removing barriers to free thinking courtesy of chemicals. Richards, who famously admitted to snorting his late father’s ashes as if they were a vial of premium cocaine, was asked about the possible connection between drug use and creativity. "I have never felt it did anything for my creativity. It kept me up a lot at nights looking for the stuff,” Richards said. "It was something that I had to stop because I realized there are experiments that go on too long. Some people can handle things and other people can't. If the drugs become more important than the music then you've lost the battle." Fine, but the point of taking drugs isn't to make you a better musician. No, free blow, pot, X, heroin and the like are merely one of the perks of being a rock star, a way to certify that you’re one of the cool musicians who’s made it to a place where narcotics, booze and groupies flow freely and the rules of civilized society don’t apply. No one does a row of the Bolivian marching powder off a groupie’s stomach before having sex with her in the dressing room because it’s going to help them write the next “Let It Be.” They do those things because they’re an effing rock star and that’s what rock stars do. Maybe weaning themselves off drugs is part of what’s gone wrong with the Stones as they’re morphed from awesome, blues-rooted rock band to a bunch of commercialized sellouts cranking out a steady stream of arena rock and car commercial jingles as they refuse to admit that their time of relevance is over……….

Bacon + Pop Tarts, Bob Ross meets YouTube and WWE is just like MLB

- Who says professional wrestling isn't a real sport? Any time one of your competitors can suffer an injury in exactly the same fashion as a quality former Major League Baseball reliever, then you have a bonafide argument that you are indeed a sport. Enter World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) superstar Randy Orton, who was supposed to be a part of a tag team match with partner Dean Ambrose at Sunday night’s Hell in a Cell pay-per-view. Instead of wrasslin’ inside the squared circle, though, Orton will be recuperating at home from a dislocated shoulder he sustained while taking out the trash. It’s the exact same way then-San Diego Padres pitcher Jay Witasick wrecked his elbow during spring training in 2003, damaging ligaments in his elbow while tossing trash bags filled with watermelon remains into a dumpster and nearly causing enough carnage to require Tommy John surgery. Say what you will about professional wrestling, but its performers are mostly in amazing, world-class shape and the fact that a physical specimen like Orton - and a world-class thrower of the baseball such as Witasick - can injure themselves doing mundane, everyday tasks that fat slobs with 30-percent body fat do on a daily basis with no problems is hilariously ironic. Orton's injury forced WWE to cancel his and Ambrose’s match against Luke Harper and Braun Strowman and convert the contest into a six-man tag team match featuring the three other originally scheduled participants. The full extent of Orton’s injury isn't known, but he has dealt with recurring shoulder injuries throughout the course of his career……….

- Sometimes, history needs a makeover. That’s very much true in Ukraine, where new legislation - so-called “decommunization” laws - came into force and mandated that all remnants and symbols of the country’s communist past be taken down. Getting rid of so many monuments and displays can be a daunting task, but artist Alexander Milov is ahead of the curve on this one. Right around the time dorks around the world were diving into the minutiae of the “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” trailer and analyzing every single frame, Milov was showing off his own innovative take on the iconic sci-fi franchise by revealing a statue of Vladimir Lenin being converted into the likeness of the dark lord himself, Darth Vader. Some might argue that it’s less of a conversion and more representing who Lenin truly was, but either way Milov is delivering what he claims is the world’s first-ever monument to Vader, the Sith lord formerly known as Anakin Skywalker. The statue is a technological piece whose head contains a Wi-Fi hotspot hopes it will attract Star Wars dorks from around the world. Overhauling the statue was a good idea because the original was made of gypsum, which had weakened over time. The artist strengthened the structure and added the necessary helmet and cape, both made of titanium alloy. Darth Lenin resides in Odessa, a Black Sea port city that has been the site of clashes between separatist and pro-Ukraine forces. Pro-western former Georgian leader Mikheil Saakashvili, who was recently installed as governor of the region, has to be fired up about this, as does the Internet Party of Ukraine, which presented Darth Vader as candidate for prime minister last year. Stay dork-tastic, Ukraine………

- Happy trees for one and all. An all-time great television show from a bygone era has come into the modern age, as the very first episode of the very first season of Bob Ross’ “The Joy of Painting” is now online. Ross, whose ahead-of-its-time Jew fro, epic facial hair and calming, congenial style made his instructional painting show a cult classic both when it first aired on January 11, 1983 and in the 21st century, passed away in 1995, but his cult following lives on and the first episode shows why. “I think each of us sometime during our life has wanted to paint a picture,” Ross ruminates at the beginning of the episode. His man perm, unbuttoned top buttons of his button-down shirt and the paintings he made look so easy and sound so easy to do at home - even though they clearly weren't - made for an amazing, soothing show. “I think there’s an artist hid in the bottom of every single one of us,” Ross says later in the episode. “You know, we have avoided painting for so long because I think all of our lives we’ve been told that you have to go to school half your life, maybe even have to be blessed by Michelangelo at birth to ever be able to paint a picture. And here we want to show that that’s not true — that you can paint a picture right along with us.” Another reason the show was so much fun to watch is the manner in which Ross offered tips and encouraged viewers to paint along with him rather than positioning himself as a high-minded expert talking down to the masses who weren't nearly as talented as he was. Phrases like “happy trees” were epic as well, so bringing the show to YouTube is a a brilliant idea. “Anybody can paint,” Ross says near the end of the episode. “All you need is a dream in your heart [and] a little practice.” Damn straight, B. Ross………

- Because bacon. If there is any food resource that the majority of Americans can agree is vital to our national happiness, this salted pork product is it. That makes Kellogg’s decision to trot out its new Frosted Maple Bacon Pop Tarts a brilliant one on multiple levels. It is the first-ever sweet-and-salty Pop-Tart and much to the delight of stoners everywhere, it will have a maple and bacon flavored filling. On the exterior, this nutrition-poor breakfast pastry will have sweet white frosting sprinkled with salty and smoky flavored "crunchlets." Slackers with no culinary skills won't have to wait long for this one, as it will hit store shelves in December. Frosted Maple Bacon Pop Tarts are one of five new flavors due out in the coming months for the popular pastry line, which debuted with four simple flavors in 1964: strawberry, blueberry, brown sugar cinnamon and apple currant. In the past 50 years, Kellogg's has added more than two dozen flavors, including s'mores, cookies and cream, cinnamon roll and PB&J. The five new flavors are among the most diverse to date as alongside Frosted Maple Bacon, Kellogg’s will add Frosted Chocolatey Caramel, Pink Lemonade, Limited Edition Frosted Watermelon and Limited Edition Frosted Spring Strawberry. That three of the five are fruit-based makes sense because fruit and pastries are a natural fit and have worked well together for Pop Tarts over the years, but the Frosted Maple Bacon version is clearly the standout here and for Americans who feel like bacon-topped donuts with maple frosting isn't quite enough to propel them into both obesity and a diabetic coma, this could be the piece de resistance in their mealtime arsenal. Big ups to Kellogg’s for making yet another bacon-fueled dream come true………

Community college foot-brawls, honoring despot Bob Mugabe and being The Weeknd is exciting

- It’s one of those conversations every parent has to have with their children at some point. Mom and dad must sit down with little Ashley or Tyler and tell them, “There are bad people in the world who want to hurt you. Be careful around strangers … and around that creepy, sociopathic next-door neighbor who may or may not be a cannibal preying on the young and naïve.” It’s a chat that the unfortunate family living next to Champlin, Minnesota resident whack job Carrie Pernula was forced to have after their mentally unstable neighbor sent them a series of anonymous notes, beginning with a missive that arrived Sept. 27 by mail and said: “The children look delicious. May I have a taste?” It was a creepy letter from a woman who told police she was upset because the children made noise and left things in her yard and on her porch. Rather than doing something petty and vindictive - yet not criminal - such as throwing those left-behind toys in the trash or burning them, Pernula elected to send threatening notes and - this is true - signing her neighbors up for magazines addressed to “tasty children.” Had this crackpot stopped with threatening notes, she would have been much tougher to identify, but police were able to trace the magazines and arrested her. She spent three days in jail and you know she’s in trouble because her attorney, Debbie Lang, didn’t even try to pretend her client was innocent and instead simply called it "an unfortunate and complicated situation for everyone involved." Yes, complicated is a good way to describe the many, many psychological issues your client has, but the case itself, not so complicated………..

- Life as R&B star The Weeknd is many things, but dull is clearly not one of them. No, the artist (real name Abel Tesfaye) isn't the most talented or biggest thing in music, but he might be the best show away from the stage. Tesfaye kicked off the week by recalling a time in the recent past when he was hanging out at a party with Taylor Swift and everyone’s it girl was a little bit drunk, leading her to allegedly fawn over him and be unable to stop stroking his luscious hair. For a man who recently released his new album 'Beauty Behind The Madness,’ it was a claim that may have been made up, but one that faded quickly into the background when Tesfaye  pleaded no contest to charges of allegedly punching a police officer. The incident for which he was charged occurred  in January at the Cromwell Hotel in Las Vegas and according to police reports, officers arrived at the scene to find Tesfaye in the middle of a fight. It was his first fight of the night, but not his last. When an officer attempted to pull him from the melee, Tesfaye either was too locked in the moment to notice who it was or simply didn’t care because he (allegedly) punched the officer in the head. After pleading no contest, he gets to avoid jail time, but must pay $1,000 in damages to the injured officer and will complete anger management, alcohol evaluation and 50 hours of community service. Brawling in Vegas, assaulting cops, getting your hair stroked by the biggest recording artist in pop music and releasing a new album in the space of a calendar year is enough to fill a bucket list for most people, but there are still two-plus months for Tesfaye to add to what has already been a damn fine year……..

- It’s great to know that someone has finally recognized all that 91-year-old Zimbabwean despot Bob Mugabe has done in the name of peace. The embattled dictator, who has bulldozed national laws, election laws and the laws of common sense by remaining in power for 35 years with no chosen successor, was awarded China's alternative to the Nobel Peace Prize Thursday for what the prize committee called his inspired national leadership and service to pan-Africanism. China’s ability to overlook Mugabe trampling the basic human rights and freedoms of his people, crush dissent with an iron fist and refuse to accept that his time to govern is over, is the latest in a series of critics of the West who have received the Confucius Peace Prize. The award committee boldly chose to zero in on the one instance when Mugabe wasn’t a totally power-hungry dick, tabbing him for his government’s support of a plan to acquire large parcels of land, many from white owners, to give to black farmers. Of course, that was way back in 2002 and when land  owners challenged the move, Mugabe reportedly called them "greedy, greedy colonials." His reign of terror began after fighting in a guerrilla war in the 1970s and come 1980, Mugabe was elected president by people who clearly had no idea what they were in for. What they were in for is a tyrannical fascist who has violently cracked down on opposition groups, sending many of their leaders to jail. The Confucius committee tried to defend its decision by saying Mugabe has "overcome difficulties of all kinds and has strongly committed himself to constructing his nation's political and economic order, while strongly supporting pan-Africanism and African independence." That statement was presumably issued by the mere 36 of 76 voters who cast ballots for the award. Yes, 36 votes was enough to win against a field that included  Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev, Microsoft founder Bill Gates and South Korean President Park Geun-hye. Well played, Confucius Prize Committee, well played……….

- Big ups to the players in a junior college game between East Mississippi and Mississippi Delta for doing what most of the dozens in attendance probably wanted to do themselves if only they had the power. Thanks to a hard-to-count number of hot-tempered student-athletes, the game between these two heated rivals was terminated in the final minute of the first half with East Mississippi ahead 48-0. The Lions had that massive lead when running back D.J. Law was tackled out of bounds late in the second quarter and when attempting to get up, he was shoved back to the ground while still out of bounds. Because #dudesbeingdues, Law responded to the unnecessary shove by attacking his assailant and because #dudesbeingdudes, several Mississippi Delta players joined the altercation. From there, the obvious happened as EMCC's bench emptied and a full-scale football riot broke out. You know a sporting event has gone off the rails when the police have to step in to regain control on the field and with the assistance of coaches and administrators, officers were eventually able to retake the field and restore order. The officiating crew then held a hurried meeting about how to handle the situation and the zebras eventually decided to call the game. Credit to Law for his very smart reaction that instigated a fight so massive that the Lions, ranked third in the country after winning a national championship last season, have been banned from the Mississippi Association of Community and Junior Colleges playoffs, meaning they won't be defending any titles this season. But when Law’s kids ask him some day about why everyone knows who he is and none of them seem to think too highly of him, he can tell them that he’s infamous for selfishly ruining a sure win and his team’s season all because he had to be governed by testosterone instead of intelligence in the heat of competition. Well done, idiot………

Nigerian email scam helpers, Maroon 5 a possible Super Bowl ruiner and an NHL hero returns

- The NHL is a better place today than it was at the start of the week. One man is the reason for it and his name is John Robert Tortorella. Torts, who hoisted a Stanley Cup for the Tampa Bay Lightning and ranted, raved and berated led the New York Rangers to the verge of a Stanley Cup finals berth, is finally back in professional Hockey. He has been out of hockey since the Vancouver Canucks fired him in May 2014 after one season on the bench, but not because he wasn’t a hell of a good show on the bench and in interviews. In fact, Tortorella’s animated ranting and raving in press conferences is just about the best show in hockey and that’s why it’s a beautiful thing that the struggling Columbus Blue Jackets have hired him to get them back on track after to an 0-7 start. Tortorella takes over for Todd Richards, who was fired on Wednesday with the team off despite having led Columbus to its their second NHL playoff appearance in 2013-14, when they lost to the Pittsburgh Penguins in the opening round. "One of the problems right now is expectations," Tortorella said. "Expectations that weren't there last year with this club." The amazing Torts is referring to the high hopes for the Blue Jackets after finishing last season on 16-2-1 run. After losing to the New York Islanders 4-0 on Tuesday, those lofty expectations have taken a hit and that big finish looks like fool’s gold. "We're not responding the right way," general manager Jarmo Kekalainen said. "By no means does this let anyone off the hook." Firing coaches on a whim is kind of the NHL’s thing, so the change is hardly a stunner, but what would be is Tortorella completing the a three-year contract he signed. Dazzle us while you can, Torts……..

- When you have a chance to make a life-changing real estate purchase, this is why you cannot sleep on it. On the rare chance that two New Hampshire properties at the center of an armed standoff with federal agents, including a compound that featured escape routes and once was believed to be booby-trapped, goes on the market and you don’t buy it, someone like New Hampshire businessman James Hollander will. Hollander snapped up the two properties once belonging to convicted tax evaders Ed and Elaine Brown during a federal auction that attracted seven bidders and lasted only about 15 minutes, dishing out a mere $205,000 for the 100-acre compound and $415,000 for Elaine Brown's dental office. How much did it cost to get in on the action? Minimum bids were $125,000 and $250,000, respectively for these pieces of American lore made famous when the Browns became anti-government celebrities in 2007 by holding federal agents at bay for nine months after they were convicted of tax evasion. Any property upon which two people are able to hold off the feds after agents come to take them into custody is one worth respecting at a minimum and owning if at all possible. The Browns are now in their 70s and serving prison sentences of more than 30 years and to this day, it’s still awesome that during their standoff with The Man, the Browns welcomed anti-tax and anti-government supporters to the compound. The feds tried to hold an auction last year, but federal agencies couldn't ensure the entire parcel was free of booby traps. This time around, the hilltop house and the grounds up to the tree line were searched extensively and deemed free of improvised explosive devices. That’s actually a bit sad because the Browns went to a lot of trouble earning their 2009 convictions for of amassing weapons, explosives and booby traps and plotting to kill federal agents who came to arrest them. Here’s hoping Hollander enjoys his, um, interesting new home………..

- Noooooooooooooooo. The NFL has chosen some regrettably bad musical acts – hello, overproduced pop hack Katy Perry, an aged-out Aerosmith and Madonna – but as the league bears down on the historically-significant-due-to-its-number-being-round Super Bowl 50, the league can't whiff on the act it picks to lip-sync a bunch of garbage mainstream pop songs on a stage the size of Rhode Island and with more LED lighting than five Las Vegas Strips…..right? Literally every artist in music would want that platform to promote their career, so picking a great artist is easier than knowing that noodle-armed Peyton Manning and his Denver Broncos won't get within one game of the Super Bowl. Having said that, let’s take a look at the reported new frontrunner for the halftime show and…..seriously? You ass clowns in the league office are picking arguably the biggest tool in music right now – all apologies to Nickelhack and especially frontman Chad Kroeger and his mercifully damaged vocal chords – and negotiating with Maroon 5 and its ultimate poseur of a frontman/reality karaoke show judge/coach Adam Levine? While several acts have been rumored to be taking the stage in Santa Clara next February, Levine and his band of music murderers have reportedly been in extensive talks with the league, which was previously thought to be considering two much smarter choices in Coldplay and Bruno Mars. Mars may have just performed at the Super Bowl in 2014, but he did a great job and would be a huge upgrade over an ass hat like Levine, who is the personification of the term d-bag with his poseur tattoos, ridiculously stylized attempts to look rugged and tough and whose falsetto tones hurt both ear and soul while belting out mindlessly inane lyrics. Depending on who you believe, One Direction, Taylor Swift and Britney Spears have also been considered for the gig and only Swift is definitively better than Maroon 5, so the NFL is clearly going down the wrong path here. At least we’ll all have fair warning if the glorified boy band known as Maroon 5 is ultimately chosen and can make plans to better spend our 30 minutes of Super Bowl intermission time, perhaps making another bowl of guacamole, emptying our bladder after two-hour first half fueled by four beers or organizing our sock drawer………

- Did anyone consider that Ojukwu Nnamdi Rowland and Ngene Linus Chibuike were just bringing that much-needed seed money to the deposed Nigerian prince who has been sending out those heart-wrenching emails soliciting thousands of dollars from total strangers so he can access his massive inheritance and pay them back their investment with interest? Sadly, Nigeria's Economic and Financial Crimes Commission doesn’t seem to think so of the two men charged with money laundering after they were arrested at the international airport in Lagos, Nigeria's commercial hub, while carrying $5.4 million in cash and both trying to fly to China. The commission said in a statement that Rowland was carrying an undeclared $2.9 million in U.S. dollars when he was searched, while his pal Chibuike was arrested carrying $2.5 million. Both were trying to make their connection for the first leg of a journey to China via Ethiopia's capital, Addis Ababa. According to the commission, the pair were charged at the Federal High Court in Lagos. Both pleaded innocent and were granted bail, which seems a bit surprising for two dudes rolling deep in benjamins and with obvious means to find a way out of the country. They become the two most visible examples to date of President Muhammadu Buhari’s quest to halt endemic corruption in a country cited in more financial scam emails that any in the history of the Internet. Buhari has also asked other countries to help return billions of looted dollars, a request that hasn’t exactly been met with a massive rush of cooperation so far……….

Drunk wheelchair riders at the story, walk-on college kickers and a "Die Hard" prequel

- Very smart, Bruce Willis. Your last attempt to add on to the legacy of one of the most iconic action franchises in movie history went poorly, so this time you just give the idea of another “Die Hard” movie a thumbs up and keep your distance. Willis brought back action hero John McClane in 2013's “A Good Day To Die Hard,” which was slammed by fans and critics and yet still made $304 million worldwide. The movie was an unequivocated disaster and tarnished the three great films that came before it, so Willis wanting no part of another one makes sense. It helps that the next “Die Hard” movie will be a prequel set in 1979 and  focused on McClane's early career as a New York City police officer. The prequel, which currently has the working title “Die Hard Year One,” would feature a younger actor playing McClane in the late '70s, setting up the first movie in which Willis appeared and flew to California to meet his estranged wife and their two children for the holidays. Len Wiseman, who directed “ Live Free Or Die Hard” in 2007, came up with the concept for the new movie and is set to direct it. He and the film's producer, Lorenzo di Bonaventura, are in search of a screenwriter. "It's a very good idea, a really tricky idea, and I'm very happy about it. It's a really cool idea, because it's the origin story,” Willis said of the project. “It's gonna happen at the beginning of this. We're going to bounce back and forth." Wiseman and di Bonaventura are reportedly keeping Willis looped in on their new endeavor and a safe distance away is a nice place for him to be……….

- Quick…what do a well-known fortune teller, a veteran police officer and a civilian in Thailand have in common? As it turns out, all three are involved with an alleged plot to cash in on the name of the country’s royal family and in Thailand, that’s a much bigger deal that it would seem reading those words on a computer screen. The fortune teller, cop and random third dude have been arrested under a law that protects the royal family and the three men were heavily guarded as they were forcefully hauled into a military court in Bangkok. In Thailand, a lese majeste law makes criticism of the royal family punishable by up to 15 years in prison and over the past year, the royal family has grown increasingly oversensitive, which has resulted in a massive uptick in lese majeste convictions. From the outside looking in, rights groups have wisely decried what they call a wider crackdown on dissent since the military seized power from a civilian government in May 2014, but there is no actual way to slow down this runaway train of injustice. The hearing for the three most recent suspects in this campaign of terror had their hearing closed to the public and officials refused to give any details of the case. Word on the street is that the men are accused of using the royal family's name for personal benefit, which could mean they lied about being related to the royal family to get a dinner reservation at a good restaurant. Hope that was worth 15 years of hard labor in a Thai prison……….

- How do you know your college football season isn't going the way you wanted? When your head coach is using the bye week to send out an "all call" for kickers on social media after your starting kicker got trampled during a kickoff and may not be able to play when you host your most bitter rival on Halloween. Enter the Florida Gators, who suffered their first loss of the season last week and in the process, saw kicker Jorge Powell suffer an injury made possible when he made the cardinal mistake of being a kicker who got anywhere near the action on a kickoff. Austin Hardin, the Gators' top kicker, is also dealing with a leg injury but is tentatively slated to kick against Georgia on Oct. 31. Just in case, head coach Jim McElwain wants to scour the student body to find a backup kicker in the event Hardin can’t go. "As long as they can flip it up there through the uprights, I'm good with it," McElwain said after 216 students answered the school's call to be the walk-on kicker. Having a bye week means a chance to give a possible walk-on kicker as much preparation time as possible, but yanking some frat bro from a great season of intramural soccer or flag football is going to be a disaster regardless of how much practice time he gets. College football kickers are under immense pressure to make extremely difficult kicks and even the ones recruited to their school to do the job know they’ll probably get death threats from Internet trolls if they miss a game-winning field goal. How the hell is some walk-on who last kicked for his high school JV team in Sarasota going to cope with that kind of heat? Not well………

- Humanity, we’re in trouble. Every day, we’re locked in a battle and most days, we get our asses kicked by a foe that surrounds us on every side and outnumbers us by an alarming ratio. The enemy, simply put, is oblivious ass hats in grocery stores. You know these fools. You deal with them every day when they haphazardly push their cart in an erratic pattern through the aisles, unaware that they are cutting off and impairing the progress of other shoppers. They park their carts stupidly in the middle of the frozen foods aisle so no one can pass and when they come to the end of that aisle after blocking it for 10 minutes, they careen around the corner without giving a damn who they might run into. You can also spot them in the checkout line with 175 items that will take approximately 55 minutes to check out with because apparently, they only shop once every three months and don’t give a sh*t how much they hold up the line with their morass of items. It’s bad enough dealing with these fools when they’re at their limited best and sober, so what the hell chance do the rest of us stand if alcohol is thrown into the mix? Credit Georgia resident Danny W. Mitchell for illustrating this very real danger courtesy of his arrest on suspicion of  DUI and public drunkenness while operating a motorized wheelchair inside a Kroger supermarket in Conyers. A police report lays out a bizarre scene in which officers were called to the scene found a disheveled Mitchell backing into the building and driving over plants. He submitted to a breath test after drunkenly informing the arresting officers that he had taken Valium, trazadone and a pint of booze and mixed them together. He also claimed that he can barely walk and was at the grocery store to get a prescription filled, although one has to wonder if they’re giving out prescriptions for Kettel One these days……..

India v. tattoos, the "Trainspotting" sequel and Immigration and Customs Enforcement orgies

- See what University of Utah men’s basketball coach Larry Krystkowiak has inspired? Krystkowiak famously went amateur crime stopper a couple years ago when he spotted and detained an on-campus bicycle thief and it appears at least one fellow coach was inspired to follow his example. Unfortunately for New Orleans Saints linebackers coach Joe Vitt, his efforts to bring citizen-fueled justice to the world didn’t end as well as they did for Krystkowiak, who walked away from his heroic act in good health. Vitt’s fate was decidedly more painful after he chased away a man and woman who were attempting to steal his car and a neighbor's car at his Metairie home early in the morning. The 61-year-old Vitt was walking through his kitchen when he noticed a shadow running across his front lawn. For most people, the only reason to be up at 4 a.m. on a Saturday is that they’re just getting home from an epic night out or they woke up to tend to a crying baby, but NFL coaches are notorious for not sleeping much and working too many hours, so it makes sense that Vitt was up and went outside to investigate, at which point he noticed a white female with blonde hair wearing khaki shorts and gloves attempting to enter a neighbor's vehicle. According to Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office spokesman Col. John Fortunato, Vitt then looked toward his own car and saw a white male inside the vehicle. When this amateur crime duo saw Vitt, they took off running, according to Fortunato. When the veteran coach gave chase, he tripped shortly into his run and suffered a torn Achilles tendon and a broken wrist after falling. Vitt, who was the Saints' interim head coach during Sean Payton's bounty suspension in 2012 and as the St. Louis Rams' interim head coach in 2005, will probably keep on working through the pain and get himself a scooter to get around the office, but maybe he also needs a golf cart at his home in case he needs to chase any future car thieves………..

- Way to encourage tourism and spread love to the world, India. Someone shows up from a foreign country, spending their money to boost your economy and looking to experience a great, unique culture they once visited and enjoyed, and you harass them using the police because of a small bit of ink on their leg? Such is life in Bangalore, where an Australian couple said they were harassed by people who objected to a tattoo on Matt Keith’s leg. Keith and his girlfriend were having lunch at a restaurant in the city in southern India when fellow patrons spotted Keith’s tattoo of a Hindu goddess. A small crowd grew around the couple and these intolerant fools angrily claimed that the design g offended their religion. Had this story ended with the angry mob running the couple out of the restaurant, it would have been an ugly tale of intolerance, but wait, there’s more. Somehow, the crowd pulled the local police into their hate fest and Keith and his girlfriend were taken to the police station, where Keith was forced to write a letter of apology before they were allowed to leave. He later detailed the situation in a Facebook post. "I love India which is why we came back to visit," he wrote. “We have heard about the growing Hindu nationalism, but nothing justifies the way we were treated.” Indeed, India has seen a rise in incidents of religious intolerance over the past year thanks largely to a bunch of ass-hatted Hindu nationalists trying to create a more Hindu-centric country. Thank God Keith’s second tattoo of the elephant-headed Hindu god Ganesha on his back wasn’t in a visible spot or he may have been tarred and feathered for his evil deeds……….

- Such are the perils of making sequels to classic movies that should be left alone, director Danny Boyle. Boyle, who helmed the classic cult favorite movie “Trainspotting,” is hoping to shoot the long-planned sequel to the movie next year and admitted that the prospect of making “Trainspotting 2” is "worrying" because, as director, he will get "absolutely crucified" if it sucks. Boyle confirmed that the key original cast members from his 1996 black comedy, which came about as an adaptation of the novel of the same name by Irvine Welsh. "We're going up to Scotland very early and we're going to do a week's workshop up in Edinburgh working on the script and we're filming in May and June of next year,” Boyle said. “Obviously it's worrying because people will kill us if we made a bad job of it. I will get absolutely crucified. But you have to thrive on that potential danger within it and if it feeds into it, you might get a decent film out of it, you know." Yes, but that’s why you make a lot of money and get a lot of autonomy to make these movies, Danny. The director upped the ante by saying that he is trying to have the sequel ready in time for Trainspotting's 20th anniversary next year. "Hopefully we can get it finished in time to release it in 2016 which is the 20th anniversary year. So yes, we're on it, and it's looking good,” he added. Apparently, the sequel is "very loosely based" on “Porno,” Welsh's own sequel to “Trainspotting.” Screenwriter John Hodge, who penned to script for the original film, is also on board with the project………..

- This could be a big reason the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency is having a hard time finding and retaining good employees. When a supervisor is using his authority and resources to recruit employees during work hours to join sex parties with him and his wife at their home, people aren't going to have much of an interest in that gig. That scenario is exactly what ICE investigators are looking into at the agency's San Diego office following a complaint alleging that the issue has been going on for about a year. Because some of these employees are subordinates, the allegations would represent an abuse of authority if proven true. In the complaint, some of the taken-advantage-of workers were identified as "rookie employees" who may have gone along because they were "intimidated, afraid or foolishly 'wow'd' -- thinking participation will land them a promotion." If engaging in some swingers action with your middle-aged boss and his old lady is the price for a promotion.....maybe it’s time to a) find a new job or b) get a lawyer and try to expose this sick freak. According to the complaint, the pervy supervisor and his wife went to great lengths to assure privacy at these parties, going so far as to ban their “guests” from bringing cellphones into the house. "The parties take place while their kids are watching a movie in their rooms," the complaint says. "Kids are told that mom and dad are working on a project with the other couples and not to disturb them nor knock on the bedroom door for at least an hour." Wow. If you’re having an orgy in your bedroom with your kids in the house and telling them that the sounds they hear are just mom and dad “working on a project” with some strangers, you are a sick freak without a soul………..