Cute Puppies: Female Aphrodisiac, Male Contraceptive

A girl came into my store last week. This is not atypical, truthfully. She was also rather attractive, and clearly well over the age of consent in all 48 contiguous states, Alaska, Hawaii, and even Puerto Rico and other colonial landholdings of the United States. And I must admit, I stared quite a bit.

Everyone was pretty alright with this, as this girl happened to be holding one of the laziest, most adorable puppies I've ever seen. It never left her arm. The one arm. A second was not necessary. To be fair, I'm not sure this dog was even awake more than 30% of the time his owner was in the store. The only thing I saw him do was yawn.

Oh yes, him. I know it was male, because we kept cruising this girl so hard eventually we had to admit it was just a cute dog and we didn't suspect her of shoplifting with an incredibly realistic hand puppet. She then informed us the little guy was named Jeffrey. Adorable.

Amazingly, it stands to reason this was the only time such a pretty young lady could be certain that people were checking out her dog and not, say, her ass. While I'm sure Jeff attracts that certain breed of douchebag who see him as an "in" with his master, more often then not I'd suspect she does not bring her dog with her to casual pick-up spots for the swarthy Lothario club hopping crowd.

All the attention we lavish upon her is directed entirely at her dog. It's the same method douchebag men use to attract gorgeous women and then sway the conversation to drinks and superficial bonding activities.

Basically, this girl is either the world's greatest (worst?) female pick-up artist, or she's discovered the most effective manner of unwanted male attention deterrent since the all-girls gym membership.

Bravo, Miss.

Bwavo.

On Quality Photography

I have a 3.5 megapixel camera sitting in a donation pile because my phone has a pinhole that makes its predecessor look like a disposable click-wheel. An iPhone has an 8MP built in, with autofocus, austoexposure,autoflash, face detection, and self-stabilization.

So how the fuck are you still taking blurry-ass, low-light mirror shots for your profile picture?

Did you just select Instagram's "whore" filter? Or maybe it was the "aging barfly sepia tone" that caught your fancy, polishing over your dimpled adult acne and pale, sweaty club rat complexion.

Listen, it's 2012. Hoverboards are only three years away, Optimus Prime first died eight years ago, and has come back like four times, and we've passed John Connor's Judgement Day trice already. We live in the future, and you no longer have an excuse for not having quality headshots on your LinkedIn profile.

The least you could do is Windex your bedroom mirror, god damn.

So you turned off the flash, stood in a shadow, deadjusted the RGB levels,
and–I'm guessing–stood about 15 feet away from the mirror and used digital zoom.
Before cropping the photo to hide your filthy living room and the dog's second bowl?

On A Serving Size

Truthfully, one "serving size" of any packaged food is not satisfying. If you really want to feel full and contented after indulging in processed snack foods of any variety, here's a handy conversion for you.

1. Take the "recommended" serving size

2. Multiply it by 1.5

3. You're done.

I know, that one seems difficult, but it works. Every time. Two Fig Newtons, Bryan Regan? As much as I too enjoy eating them by the sleeve, I can stop after three and not be miserable for the rest of the day. If I go to four, well, I'm probably going to be miserable for a completely different reason. Wash id down with an 8oz glass of milk? Try 12oz, you'll feel better. Ever notice you always have a little soda left in that 20oz bottle you really need to belch before chugging down? That's because it's 2oz more than the 18 your wanted when a 12 was too little.

Look, I'm not saying it was right of me to eat that entire box of Spongebob-shaped Kraft Macaroni and Cheese for breakfast at three o'clock, I'm just saying it seemed a shame to waste that last recommended serving when it wouldn't satisfy even once after this.

New Celebrity Diet Endorsement You'd Actually Try

At work the other day, I was reminded a friend is what's sometimes called a "pescatarian." Short version: it's like a vegetarian, but fish and seafood is okay. Basically, no beef, poultry, etc; the only "meat" is fish.

Now, I love dead animals in my food, in fact pretty much any kind so long as it's not fish. Can't stand those salty bastards. But cows? Delicious. Chickens? Those things are mean, stupid, and tasty. Tell me they weren't designed expressly for my consumption. I don't believe in creationism, but I believe certain animals have been domesticated to the point where, like terriers with underdeveloped legs, they are utterly useless for anything but that which we impress upon their genetic code. When I eat a salad, I want at least two animals to have died for it, and a cow or goat to have been molested into making some cheese too.

But I might be down for this new diet another coworker of ours accidentally created in pronouncing it, "pesh-eh-tarian."

Realistically, I'd make it about 3 days.

I'll only eat foods endorsed by Joe Pesci.

So far, that list includes Snickers bars, the mac & cheese from Home Alone, and if we're stretching it pesto, for the pigeon modeled after his Goodfellas character on the WB's classic cartoon "Animaniacs."

On Celebrity Look-Alikes

It struck to me today, whilst terrifying myself with the plastic-surgery-obscuring removable half-jacket on Michael Jackson's autobiography, just how much his likeness was the basis for the character design of Harry Potter's Lord Voldemort.

It's uncanny, really.

• Removed his real hair

• Thin, almost non-existent lips

• Removal of the chin

• Bleaching of the skin

• Obsession with male children

And, of course, there's that whole ashamed-of-and-ignore-his-extended-family thing. But mostly, it's the pedophile albino boa constrictor angle.

An Open Letter to Nikki Minaj, From Her Cardiologist

I'm pretty sure they made Nikki Minaj out of whatever was left
from building Katy Perry's California Gurls set.

Ms. Minaj,


This is to confirm the results of the blood work and chem panels ordered at your last visit on 23 March. We agree to disclose these test results herein at your request in light of your hectic travel schedule.

All lab results came back nominal, with no significant aberrations or abnormalities to be concerned with. Cholesterol is slightly elevated, but well within normal ranges for age, sex, and race. Glucose levels are good, blood pressure normal.

We would like to schedule an appointment at your earliest convenience for follow-up testing to determine that cause of your recently reported episodes. Though it does not seem likely and your blood work is not troubling in any way, based solely on your oral description we would like to rule out the possibility of a mild tachycardic arrhythmia.

Such a condition would require only mild medication and could most likely be managed with simple diet and steady exercise. Again, we stress that your previous check-ups and history are not strongly indicative of this possibility.

In the meantime we suggest a mild diet, balanced sugar intake, and a slight reduction in salt consumption. Perhaps, switch to dating scrawny white men for the time being and report if episodes decrease in frequency.


Regards,

Dr. Jigga Mogol

On High Finance

I totally kept a few 1st Editions.
Gotta plan for my retirement, right?

It makes me sad that it's fiscally less responsible of me to go to work for the day than to drive to the mall and sell someone a binder full of early Pokémon cards.

I'd describe this feeling as being akin to flipping a house you've put a decade of work into. Yeah, you're taking a huge financial loss, but it's been so long that you'd thought all that money wasted in the first place.

Or selling any type of collectible, I guess. Anyway, the moral of the week is "thank god for nostalgic nerds."

On Gender Equality

I'm in log Island, tonight, having visited a dear friend and treated her to a showing of the soon-to-be released Star Trek: The Next Generation blu-ray edition theater screening.

Her mother and I have a bit of a tense relationship, chiefly due to my inability to communicate well with normal human beings, my low aptitude for planning well, and a certain issue with the bathrooms being left in disarray and in flushed after my visits.

The awkward bit is I'll cop to the first two without hesitation, but the toilet flushing is entirely her daughter.

Seat up and yellow, I don't understand. I left it down and clean. It's so very odd in a household of three fourths women. I'm not sure we could ever live together. I'd certainly never e able to bring dates home, not without spot-checking all the common areas of the apartment first.

And to top it off, I saw a 24th century man wearing a military skant tonight.

Oh, the future we live in.

On Catholicism

I miss this pope. He looked like Dude Mother Teressa.
New Pope looks like Emperor Palpatine.
Enjoy Pope Classic responsibly.

English is a dangerous language. We steal words from just about everyone, ever since that whole Norman Invasion thing and the bit where English was a dead language for a long time. Yet that's a digression. The point is, we steal words constantly, and sometimes we steal two words that sound close to each other and don't mean anything remotely similar. Case in point:

"Catholic" comes from the Greek καθολικός meaning "universal," from contraction of the phrase κατά όλος, "regarding the whole." 

καθίεμαι, meanwhile meant "to sit." καθίεμαι became καθετήρ, explaining from whence we get "catheter."

You will notice both words contain the root "kath-." Or perhaps the difference is "kat(h)a" versus "katie," I'm not actually an etymologist. The point is, I'm starting to understand.

Worshiping the pope is as painful an experience as shoving a rubber tube up your dick.

Fun with Fetuses

Someone posted a sonogram to facebook the other day. I hope she's really happy. I'm a little sad, though. She's trading possibility and a killer beach bod for a tiny, incapable monster that won't appreciate her for 30 years.

Mostly, I'm just skeeved out by pregnancy. I mean look at this thing:

I know you're supposed to look at that T.V. static peanut and see a baby like so:

But all I see is this:

I'm pretty sure I've seen that Pokémon before. I'm also pretty sure it burst out of Kane's chest in Ridley Scott's Alien.

Pregnancy is terrifying.

The MySpaceification of Facebook

Things are getting out of hand.

"LIKE if you Like it <3"

Let's ignore the lack of punctuation and inconsistent capitalization, although that's so, so special in this phrase. It really is.

"Like if you like" it? Really?

That is literally what liking something means. Not just in reality, but on facebook too. If I didn't like the thing I'm clicking, I wouldn't click the button that says "Like." You want to see how easy that is?

Boom.

That was me, just now, not hitting like on a picture of someone's sonogram. Because I don't give a crap about a sonogram. I don't like it, so I didn't Like it.

What's more upsetting here is the trend I'm starting to see with more 'Victorian woodcut/lithograph figures with amusingly juxtaposed text' e-cards and 'I appreciate my [close relative or sig-oth]'image posts.

I'm waiting for the day facebook releases a security update that secretly converts all of our profile photos into .GIF format and enables "sparkly" as a comment font option.

The Dark Knight Rises | SPOILER FREE Easter Eggs!

Who the hell nails a cup to the side of a building??

*The following contain no spoilers whatsoever.*

• First and foremost: NO POST-CREDITS SCENE. Nolan don't play that game. You get a Bat insignia made out of something at the start, and a simple title card at the end. So, relax. Head out and hit the bathroom with confidence.

• Listen for a police officer's joke about a "giant alligator" in the sewers.

• Holly Robinson gets a couple scenes. And yes, she does appear to be rather young and of questionable character. And yes, she appears to also have some sort of off-putingly close, Saphic relationship in one of those scenes.

That's really about it. I can recall laughing a single "Ha!" a couple times at certain bits, but–frankly–they're all kind of centered around plot elements. Overall review: excellent. A three act play, as with the others, with multiple perspectives meeting at the head, same as the others. Unlike other failed trilogies, this one has a sense of being "closed." I won't say 'ending,' but the story we've had these past few years feels wrapped up without ending the whole universe–I'm looking at you Matrix Revolutions.


Oh, and actually, Alfred died in the jungle hunting that bandit he mentioned in Batman Begins and this has all been his last fevered dream. At the end Leonardo DiCaprio walks out and says, "That was fucked."

THE END

The Dark Knight Rises … In My Pants

So today I will be viewing Christopher Nolan's entire Dark Knight series starting at 6:30 p.m.

The funny thing is my ticket came with a free "Dark Knight Corn," a small popcorn exclusive to this marathon. Why didn't they just go ahead and call it "Bat-Corn?" Is Nolan's trilogy too dark to engage in self-referential metahumor? Even out of continuity?

You could top in with Bat-Butter (milked from the winged mammals?) and Bat-Salts (Joker may be faceless now, but the rest of us need not be). Store it in the Bat Cave's Bat-Fridge, next to the Bat Shark Repellent.

I'll have my traditional no-spoiler Easter Egg post some time around 3 a.m., but I'm confident it'll read something to the effect of "It was awesome, go see it now. Twice."

You know, so long as they don't end up revealing Bruce actually died as a kid and this has all been the delusions of his vengeance-racked father of grief-stricken, homicidal mother.

I May Need to Rent My Body to Find a Roommate - 1300th Blog!

The first apartment I looked at, I kind of just drove through the place looking around. Determining it was sufficiently slummy enough to meet my financial straights, I uncovered the facility office and, thinking it odder to call ahead and then possibly say, "Oh, actually I'm right outside your window if you can do an meeting now, thanks," popped my head in the door.

I mentioned I'd be looking with at least one other guy, and the super proceeded to describe a lovely sounding apartment that had just that day become available–one of the two not belonging to the owner possessing its own washer/dryer–with a fairly cheap price for the area.

I told him it sounded great.

He asked what I did and how much I make, not unreasonable to decipher if rent were to be expected of me. So I told him.

He did not like this. "Can you afford this lace?" he asked.

I was a little put off. Purple prose aside, this was kind of an adulterated shithole. A tad more violet, I say here that I am sure to the fullest of my faculties that adultery took place there in a continuous, unabating, forceful stream of ubiquitous sin.

It dawned on me that perhaps this man, a paragon of exactly how little you would think of a low-grade apartment super, might not understand what I was looking for, not having much experience with the upwardly mobile.

"Well, I'd have a roommate. It's a two bedroom."

"Oh!" he said. "No, this is a loft." And with that we shook hands and said our goodbyes.

It did not occur to me until later that perhaps he heard me mention the second person at the outset, and simply assumed that we were a homosexual coupling, rather than a live-action retelling of Bosom Buddies.

Which is cool, I guess. It means I'm stylish and clean-cut, respectful. I've been confused for an astronomer, a Canadian, and someone who gives a damn, so why not a gay man? After all, I've always wanted to adopt that cute Asian girl Kylie from the old Windows 7 ads.

Adorable.

That's the process for adopting Asian babies, right? You come out and then you can get one?

Nobody Puts Romney In A Corner

"…so I told George Hammilton, 'I'm all for a healthy tan …
Just call me inside before someone mistakes me for my gardener!'"

I finally realized who Mitt Romney reminds me of, with his open-colored starched shirt and his blue yacht blazer, the distinguished gray at his temples: he looks like the rich, out-of-touch dad from every '80s teen movie.

In fact, you can summarize Romney's stance on pretty much anything using '80s douche movie dialogue. Insert hashtag #NobodyPutsRomneyInACorner


On Abortion:

"I see someone in front of me who got his partner in trouble and sent her off to some butcher, while he moved on to an innocent young girl like my daughter!"
                             - Jake Houseman, Dirty Dancing, 1987

On Investing:

"It's easy to grin
When your ship comes in
And you've got the stock market beat
But the man worthwhile
Is the man who can smile
When his shorts are too tight in the seat."
                             - Judge Smails, Caddyshack, 1980

On Environmentalism:

"I'm warning you. Turning off these machines will be extremely hazardous."
"No, I'm telling you what's hazardous."
                             - Dr. Egon Spengler, Walter Peck, Ghostbusters, 1984

On A Knowledgeable Support Staff:


"I'm not interested in your opinion."
                              - Also Walter Peck

On the Children Being Our Future:

"No McFly ever amounted to anything in the history of Hill Valley."
                              - Principal Strickland, Back to the Future, 1985 (actual 1985)

On Cutting Loose:

"Sometimes you just gotta say, 'What the heck.'"
                              - Joel's Father, Risky Business, 1983

On Corporal Punishment:

"I just picked up Jeannie at the police station! She got a speeding ticket, another speeding ticket, and I lost the Vermont deal because of her!"
"I think we should shoot her."
                              - Katie and Tom Bueller, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, 1986

On Foreign Policy:

"If you don't like my policies you can come on down here and smooch my big ole' white butt."
                               - Ed Rooney, again Ferris Bueller


I was actually going to throw in Sixteen Candles here, but that dad was kind of the man.

I tried to come up with a quality blog last night

but this was the universe's reaction:

Bambi's Dad is Kind of a Racist

I came across a picture book version of Bambi the other day, about 60 pages in all. The first thing I said upon recognizing it was:

… I wonder what page his mom gets shot on."

Those around me thought this something horrific and hilarious, though I legitimately wonder with those books; they tend to down-play the more mature themes in Disney movies, especially the old ones with hints of subtle, off-color plot.

For the record, the answer was page 39.

The weird thing is, this particular version of the story has Bambi happy for a long while, then his mom gets shot in two pages, then he's sad for two pages. Then there's four pages where his dad teaches him how to be a good buck.

Um, no.

Bambi's dad went through all that trouble to save him from a forest fire, because he's King of the flippin' Forest, and Bambi's the Prince. Then after all that, when his baby-mama gets knocked off, man can't be bothered to raise his own kid suddenly.

"Nah, fug that little bitch. He almost two now; gawn be growin' in his antlers by Springtime, y'here? Kid's gawn be fine."

Where's the logic in that? Your kid's hanging out with the wrong crowd, Mr. King of the Forest. He's getting fed by a goddam rabbit. He's practically dating a skunk. A skunk, for Chrissake. You don't want her kind sniffin' around your neighborhood. Keep her people down by the yellow petunia patches where they belong, and hope to the wood nymphs your boy starts looking at that slutty one year-old doe.

The last thing the forest needs are any more jokes about gay deer after that whole Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, and Vixen debacle.

BBC: "Romney hits back on Bain attacks"

First he'll break the Bat, then he'll break the GOP.

Bane Dorrance 2012.

An Open Letter To Sodas That Want to Make Me Dance

Dear Sodas That Want to Make Me Dance:


You Sodas That Want to Make Me Dance are all the same. Pepsi, Coke, Dr. Pepper, Fanta, Sun Drop, you all tell me I should be dancing when I drink you. In fact, you seem to be indicating that drinking you should make me want to dance, even feel the urge uncontrollably. You know who else made you dance against your will?

Beetlejuice.

And that was pretty awesome, but those guys were assholes. I love Michael Keaton, but I don't want my soda to be like Michael Keaton. I want my soda to be like soda.

You and all your proprietary dance moves. If I wanted to Fanta, don't you thinking I would Fanta? Of my own volition? Listen, I don't Macarena, and I don't Fanta. I don't want to Drop It Like It's Hot. Who likes hot soda? It's terrible. Just awful.

I also don't want a soda that gives me duckface after drinking it.

Listen, I'm not trying to tell you how to do your job, I'm just telling you if that your job is to get me to drink you, you're not doing that job well. Maybe the distinction is lost on you, I don't know.

Just remember, if I wanted a stomach ache, I'd gorge myself on Thai food, not drink you and then bounce around a lot. I don't even like that vending machines drop my drink three feet before I open it. Are you in league with the antacid crowd?

I've seen what you and Mentos do. I wouldn't be surprised.

The Goatee - Secrets

• The goatee is the universal sign for evil. The trickster god Pan was typically depicted as sporting a goatee, so when Pan's likeness was ported to Christianity as a representation of Satan, the whiskers acquired a more sinister air. Later, Leonard Nemoy cemented this transition with Mirror Spock (though in novels Mirror Spock later turned things around, kind of). To this day, children without prior conception fear goatees out of sheer cultural memory.

• When combined with a mustache, it becomes a Vandyke, so long as the two remain unconnected. Luckily for all Jewish boys, this connective tissue doesn't actually grow in until about the age of 21.

• It is surprisingly difficult to rock the goatee before 30. Remember the early '90s? Didn't most handsome leading men in Hollywood look like utter scumbags? Yeah, it's rough. Even Ethan Hawke looked pretty crumby. Even Robert Downey Jr. in the late '80s. Now, though? Depp, Downey, even the dad from "Malcolm in the Middle" in "Breaking Bad." Old guys can nail it. It's a beard of experience.

• The internet will always tell you you look like Robert Downey Jr. Yeah, speaking of, "Look-Alike" apps will be broken forever. Put a Mirror-Spock on a picture of a moose and it'll come back 40% to your face.

• No one else will think it's cool but you. (And every other guy who wears one.)

Things I'm Looking Forward to About Moving

Actually, "My Friends Haul For Beer and Burgers" might be more accurate.

• All the cardboard boxes I'll get to play with.

• A furniture configuration that may actually look like a bedroom.

• A functional bedroom door once again.

• A bedroom that doesn't look like it belongs to a basement-dwelling neckbeard. (I shaved my neckbeard years ago. It's time for the katana to come down off the wall.)

• Having a furnished basement in which to computer chair joust.

•  Living above my means, thereby forcing myself to seek higher means and meaning it.

• Not living in Connecticut. 

• Possibly having enough closet space for my multitude of costumes, uniforms, fancy hats,and assorted mannequin parts.

• Having enough dresser real estate for all my little movie boxes and speakers and such.

• Having a place I would not feel embarrassed about bringing dates, assuming that I had dates and that I will end up in a place in which I am not also embarrassed to reside.

• Mostly, it's the cardboard boxes, though.

On Feminism

If I were Elaine Showalter, I'd have secretly written a bodice-ripping romance novel full of poor character development and trite symbolism by now, to be released only upon my death.

You know, just to mess with people.

Part of me says it would be to deconstruct my own deconstructions, to prove that no one viewpoint is ever the entire objective picture, but my gut says it's just to make people think.

Because people hate thinking. Especially people who plan on doing your for you.

How to Pick Up A Date at Comic Con

It's that time of year, again, when nerds of ever creed and manna color pack up their buddies' vans and head out to San Diego.

It is important in these days to remember that awareness of certain decorums are going to drop significantly as excitement builds approaching the convention. Body odor is the classic example, staying hydrated a distant second, but there are certain other behaviors which tend to fly out the window when geeks congregate and become aware that there are no "normal" people around them to stifle their subcultural impulses.

Thus, here are some tips for acceptable ways to approach a sexified person at SDCC.

She is wearing a headband and yoga socks.

"You wanna get drunk in my hotel room and fuck to subtitled episodes of Naruto?"

He is Asian with spiked hair and is showing his bare torso.

"I really like your jacket. Do you have a Facebook? Maybe we can be friends." Ladies, give him your contact info, but make sure to have him friend himself on your phone (if you miraculously have service, otherwise get his info too and contact him early). He will be somewhat shy, actually. Be overtly feminine so he feels manly and in control.

He is Asian with spiked hair and is showing his bare, shiny torso.

He's gay. Ladies, ogle from afar, get a picture in necessary. Dudes into other dudes, follow a less bubbly version of the above advice.

She is showing some cleave and is really into posing for pictures.

She's a cosplay model and you stand no shot with her. She may even be dating the stylish photographer nearby not in costume. Your only real shot is to be Buddy Scalera. Man, that guy's nice.

She is showing a lot of cleave and is happily posing for pictures.

She's wearing very short pants isn't she? And is their a website printed on either them or her small t-shirt? Yeah, see, that's a booth babe. She's paid to be there, but she's also getting exposure for herself if she already works for the company. Honestly? Go ahead and try to chat her up. Engage her innocently and about not what she does, but what she enjoys about Comic Con and possibly what you imagine her positive career progression would be.

WARNING: If Booth Babe (male or female) looks disgruntled in any way, ABORT. Most likely this person is a model hired for the day to wear a costume/uniform. While they are sometimes nerds happy to take a dream job, more often they are looking for a paycheck a bit bigger than Timmy's eighth birthday party. If you are going for gusto, approach at your caution early on day two, when the shock-and-awe has worn off, but the hatred for humanity hasn't set in yet.

Example 1: You are talking to a girl at the GodsGirls.com booth. Good.
Example 2: You are talking to a dude from Real World Season 8, dressed as Captain America outside a booth selling comic books and vinyl maquettes. Bad.

You come across someone wearing a costume complimentary to your own.

Get buddy-buddy for people taking photos. See if you're headed towards the same panel. If not, no, you're going to their next panel. What a coincidence. Make friends, try to invite them out to an after-party. Functionally, follow the Naruto advice without explicitly saying anything boneheaded.

They are an exhibitor/panelist/other guest.

Please, just don't try. We all want them to come back next year.

Exception: They are Nathan Fillion.

Do whatever you have to.

Amy Winehouse: Hopefully Not Too Soon Now

With some distance between us and the tragedy itself, in retrospect does Amy Winehouse's "Rehab" come off more like a desperate cry for help, or a preemptive suicide note along?

You know, like anything by Nirvana ever.

Truck Nutz are a Gendered Commodity

I've combed the internet, and aside from a few other bloggers making the same point I'm about to make, there is an astounding lack of Truck Nutz™ products geared towards women. Not little pink Nutz, I'm pretty sure those exist with very little effort.

No, I'm talking about Truck Labia™^© for hard-hitting Hemi Heads who just also happen to possess mammary glands.

It wouldn't be very hard. Instead of balls on an O-ring hanging off the trailer hitch knob, just remove the top and pin, then shove a Fleshlite up the square piping. Done deal.

Of course, this could potentially ruin a few relationships by bringing new meaning to the phrase, "Sometimes I think you love that truck more than you love me."

Gay marriage? Yeah, still totally a sin. But fucking your Dodge Ram Turbo? Everything's cool so long as you don't try to stick it up her tailpipe.

Higgs Boson Jokes for the Discerning Physicist with a PowerPoint to Liven Up

• Forty-eight years and a couple billion dollars to dredge up the mass equivalent of a chocolate chip in a fondue field.

•  It's only a matter of time before Star Trek starts mentioning "Higgs Field Disruptor Drives" as a means of Faster-Than-Light travel, removing mass to propel a ship faster. That's … not so much a joke as a plea to Jonathan Frakes to avoid the issue.

• Apparently your mother's so fat because she's been eating raw Higgs in a blanket all these years.

•  The Higgs boson is a miniscule yet highly massive particle that is not a pregnant Snooki.

• Someone at CERN's going to win the Nobel for this, but if you ask anyone at Tevatron, they couldn't give two gigaelectronvolts.

Uncle Sam, Like Nana, Can Never Remember Your Birthday

Independence Day commemorates Will Smith's slaying of invading aliens the vote by the Continental Congress to approve the wording of documentation explaining their previous vote on July 2 to legally separate from the British empire. Signing of this Declaration of Independence occurred between July 4 and August 2, 1776.

Basically, the Declaration was a giant post-dated check like your grandma sends you for your birthday a month early. She doesn't know when exactly you'll receive it, but you couldn't actually check it until an arbitrary later date.

Worse, the 4th of July is like setting your anniversary after you and your sig-oth have already been banging for a few weeks pretty regularly and you've just decided to make it official. Yeah, the date's important and you'll celebrate it every year from now on, but we all know that one of you secretly counts from the first time you tickled the pink dolphin.

7 Spoiler-Free Spider-Man Easter Eggs for Nerds

Normally a *SPOILER* warning would go here. If anything here is a spoiler to you, you're a terrible nerd, and likely haven't seen any trailers of previous Spider-Man films/comics/T.V. series.

"Maaan…I hate missing the F-Train."

1. Yes Stan Lee gets a cameo. No to Bruce Campbell, though. Sadface.

2. Lizard in a coat. As promised, there is a slight nod to the comics, in which The Lizard frequently wore some tight little Hulk pants and his lab coat. It's short, as expected, but it's there.

3. Spider-Man's shoes. While they don't attempt to scientifically explain the spider-power that is sticking to pretty much any surface this time around, fans have been miffed for years about not getting even a casual explanation for Peter Parker's ability to stick to walls through his shoes. However, if you look closely in Amazing Spider-Man, he wears modified steel-reinforced boots, and I'm pretty sure I saw some little grippies on them. I'm not saying they could keep a normal man upright, but maybe it's enough to compensate for socks and shoes on a spider-being.

4. The ridiculous action pose. Also as promised, there is one shot of Spider-Man that is spot-on to the comics and some of the character's more … limber maneuvers. It's unobtrusive, yet noticeable.

5. Andrew Garfield is an awkward spider. Garfield actually studied spiders' movements to accentuate his own for the roll of Peter Parker. And not just for superheroics. Peter starts so awkward as to boarder on "I'm not going to pick on that kid because he might bring a gun to school," but after his transformation he acts nearly autistic; avoiding eye contact, greater trouble expressing his thoughts verbally, odd ticks and repetitive motions. At parts, it feels almost as if Spidey is the channel through which Peter circumvents the social aspects of Asperger's in order to engage society and individuals around him, which–incidentally–is a phenomenal take on the character. Peter is supposed to be a smart mouth, but never in his personal life, only in costume. That was one thing Tobey McGuire got right.

Oh, and this isn't really an Easter egg, but there's one scene, you'll recognize it immediately, where Emma Stone goes toe-to-toe with Awkward Peter and they awkward it up together awkwardly. Seriously, the scene was chewy with awkward. When it was over I felt full. Like I could wrap up the leftover awkwardness and bring it home in a doggy bag to save for lunch tomorrow.

6. Yes, there is a mid-credits scene. Stay for it.

7. No, there is no second post-credits scene. Joss Whedon really burned you forever with that one, didn't he?


And one more fun little tidbit?

I heard through a reliable source (read: "a nerd I know") that a Sony Pictures executive has openly stated to being open to the possibility to leasing the rights to Spider-Man to Marvel Pictures for use in an Avengers sequel. Since this movie is going to make several bajillion dollars, I see no reason this could not potentially work out if all parties are open to it. Andrew is the right age to still be the young guy on the team and, this is just my speculation, if they'd lease out Web Head, there's no reason Sony wouldn't also lease out X-Men property characters, the only one they give any care for being Wolverine. I'm sure Hugh Jackman would be more than enthused at slicing up Manhattan.

Anderson Cooper Says He's Gay, Is Last to Do So

Today at work we compared Anderson Cooper being attracted to other men to a chair's insatiable need to be acknowledged via repeatedly falling down: it was about as pivotal, and the chair was a more immediately pressing concern.

Good to stand up to count yourself when it matters, but glorious that it didn't seem to matter to a single person I met today. I imagine that's a bit Major City Bias, but it's still comforting to know most of the people I work with put who you want to make kissy faces with on the same level as what socks you wore to dinner last night.

For Anderson, I image both are really, really classy.

Scientists May Announce Higgs Boson Discovery Today

What you'll need to know at the water cooler:


What is it?
A fundamental particle, in the same group as gluons (they hold together the quarks that make up protons and neutrons), gauge Bosons (they stick the protons and neutrons together), and the hypothetical graviton (which would be the reason gravity affects matter).

Why does it matter? The Higgs is modeled to be the thing which lends matter its mass, thus kind of getting everything else to gel together. Really, everything. And since the Standard Model works for pretty much everything else, not having the Higgs kind of ruins science. And the universe. We- we really kind of need this thing to work.

How does it do that thing it does? Apparently, and this is science, there is an energy field created by all living things. It surrounds us, penetrates us, binds the galaxy together. Yes, I just quoted Star Wars. That's how awesome this is. Within the fabric of space is an all-permeating energy field, and the Higgs boson interacts with it in such a way that any particle acquires a modicum of mass. Because of gluons and the other bosons these masses are bound together, and because of the graviton they fall towards each other even over vast distances.

So science is complete now, right? No such luck. In fact, this announcement will probably only confirm the existence of a suspected Higgs particle around an expected mass range to within 99.99% certainty. So about a thousand times less certain than anything accepted as sure enough to go in a textbook. Then of course we have to figure out why gravity is so weak, what powers dark energy, and why every quantum is so full of solace for Daniel Craig.

On the Measure of Nostalgia

One of the best ways to determine how much some old piece of your childhood means to you is to consider whether you would be willing to box it up, carry it down two flights of stares, squeeze it into your car, carry it up three more flights of stares, and shove it into the back of a new closet.

If the answer is "No," trash the doohickey or see if you can donate it to charity for a tax write-off.

Tax Write-Offs: the presents you give to yourself ever April after forgetting about them all year.