Albert Pujols is More American Than You

Chances are that the St. Louis Cardinals' Albert Pujols is already a slightly better baseball player than you. If you call yourself an American citizen, now he's got you beat there, too.

The former National League MVP, Gold Glove winner and World Series winner scored 100 percent on the U.S. citizenship test on Wednesday, thus not only securing himself a position as an official American, but one that is as or more American than Captain America.

Think you could score 100 percent on the U.S. citizenship test? Try it. If you fail, don't feel too bad. I hear that the Dominican Republic recently had a roster spot open up.

Anna Nicole Smith has Died

After MSNBC.com (and a bunch of other places--your guess is as good as mine as to which news outlet broke the story) initially reported that Anna Nicole Smith collapsed at the Hard Rock Casino in Hollywood, Florida and was rushed to the hospital earlier today, one of Smith's lawyers has announced that the former model and Playboy playmate has died at the age of 39.

Out of respect for the recently deceased, I've gone ahead and removed all previous incidents of glibness from this post...

UPDATE: ...other than perhaps to point out the curious fact that, as of this writing, no media outlets have yet used the word "overdose", when that is the strong-money bet to be the cause of Anna Nicole's death.

UPDATE 2: Defamer.com tells us that on CNN, Dr. Sanjay Gupta used the phrase "too much medication" in passing...so we're getting warmer.

'Law & Order' Star (hearts) Crime

Former Tennessee Republican Senator and current star of NBC's "Law & Order" Fred Dalton Thompson (he plays the District Attorney, who gets maybe two scenes an episode, thereby rendering calling him a "star" of the show suspect) showed up at the Scooter Libby trial today, explaining to reporters that he was there because he is "a friend of Scooter Libby and his family".

You see that, extreme right-wing conservative Republicans who hold blind alliegance to George W. Bush? Hollywood's not all bad. Just because an actor might play a person who stands for truth and justice on TV, that doesn't necessarily mean that in real life he doesn't publicly support perjury, obstruction of justice and the endangering of national security in the name of getting back at somebody who criticized the president. Perhaps there's hope for the godless entertainment industry yet!

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 02/08/07

QUESTION: "Place the same three-letter word in each blank below to make five different words.

"___E
___TROT
___WOOD
___MA
___LEG"




MY ANSWER: "DOG"

ACTUAL ANSWER: "DOG"


CONSENSUS: Even if you're only certain of two ("DOGWOOD" and "DOGMA") out of a potential five words, a lazy guess can defeat the Mensa calendar. Hooray for lazy guesses!

White Trash from Outer Space!

There once was a time when space travel was such a significant achievement that for a person to accomplish it more than likely indicated a level of character rendering him or her exempt from ever being qualified to appear on "The Jerry Springer Show".

Apparently, those days are over, as evinced by the kidnap-and-murder-attempting, diaper-wearing, git-yo-hands-off-my-man shenanigans of NASA astronaut Lisa Marie Nowak.

According to authorities, Nowak, a 43-year-old married mother of three, believed a woman named Colleen Shipman was a competitor for the affections of Navy Commander William Oefelein, an unmarried fellow astronaut. This Oefelein guy must be quite the catch, because Nowak drove 900 miles from Houston to Orlando to intercept Shipman at the airport (where Shipman was flying in from Houston) and--disguised in a wig and trench coat--try to carjack her with alternating tactics of crying and pepper spray. She never got a chance to use the BB gun, knife, steel mallet, rubber tubing and garbage bags she had also brought along before Shipman drove away and contacted the police.

In all of this, what truly makes Lisa Marie Nowak an American hero--someone little girls all over the country can really look up to--is that she wore a diaper for the entirety of her 900-mile drive so she wouldn't have to stop to go to the bathroom. I have many questions regarding Nowak's actions--why not fly to Orlando? what were the garbage bags for, Shipman's body or her own pride? instead of going after Shipman personally, why didn't she use her expertise as a robotics specialist to build a giant robot to attack the woman for her?--but the one tactic of hers that I understand completely was the use of the diapers.

That's just common sense.

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 02/06/07

QUESTION: "An eight-letter word is spelled out in the box below. Find it by beginning with the correct letter and moving clockwise or counterclockwise around the box, using each letter only once.

"[As the letters appeared clockwise inside the box, beginning in the upper right hand corner:] I N G B O T T L"




MY ANSWER: "BOTTLING"

ACTUAL ANSWER: "BOTTLING"


CONSENSUS: Even a Mensa calendar can't bring its 'A' game 365 days a year.

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 02/02/07

QUESTION: "The names of three capital cities are interlettered below. Can you find them? (The letters are in consecutive order.)

"L W O O A T N S T D H A O I W N N A P G M O T C I O L T N"




MY ANSWER: "I don't think I understand the question."

ACTUAL ANSWER: "London, Washington, Ottawa"


CONSENSUS: Bullshit. "The letters are in consecutive order"? I spent my time trying to unscramble three consecutive capital city names from that row of letters. The directions were unclear. (Also, it didn't help that I was searching exclusively for American state capitals, because I'm a patriot.) Screw you, Mensa calendar.

Like Most Sequels, 'Exxon Valdez 2' a Relative Disappointment

Disaster fans have been waiting 18 years since the Exxon Valdez spill for a nautical mishap that could harm the environment with like or perhaps even greater severity...and when the MS Nordkapp cruise ship ran aground in Antarctica on Tuesday [Ed. note: Did you notice that that link is from the future? Yeah, I can see into the future], some no doubt entertained the thought that their dream had become a reality. But alas, it was not to be.

While scientists at Spain's Antarctic base have detected the presence of trace amounts of hydrocarbons on the coastline where the accident occurred--thus confirming that fuel did spill from the ship and that the ecological system has been damaged--non-scientist spokespeople for the Hurtigruten Group, the company who owns the MS Nordkapp, are essentially saying they haven't seen any spilled oil and therefore there isn't any. Both solid arguments, but no matter who turns out to be right, it's clear by this point that the Nordkapp accident pales in every element--scope, drama, and oil-covered seals--to that of the Exxon Valdez.

Much like the world learned from Blues Brothers 2000 in 1998 (?), this incident further proves that the more time that passes in anticipation of a sequel, the harder it is for that sequel to reproduce the magic of its predecessor.

Future of Horse Racing Lies with Frank Stallone of Animals

I'm no psychologist, so it's difficult to determine whether the horse racing world is in the "denial" or "bargaining" stage of grief over the recent death of Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro, but everyone is almost definitely setting themselves up for disappointment by counting on his brother to carry on his legacy. Though it is no doubt heartbreaking for those close to the sport to know that Barbaro's potential to develop into the next Seattle Slew or Secretariat will never be fulfilled, you might want to rethink transferring all of those eggs into the basket of a horse with (literally) no name.

Just because the yearling in question shares the same mother and sire as Barbaro (or that the sire's name, Dynaformer, may be doubly encouraging in that it makes one suspect he's an Autobot), that doesn't necessarily mean that he's cut out for racing. Maybe, like Jimmy Carter's brother Billy, he'll make a career of endorsing a namesake beer, or, like Patrick Swayze's brother Don, he'll, uh...occasionally hang around with Patrick Swayze. The point is, if things don't pan out for Barbaro's younger brother in the realm of horse racing, it won't be the end of the world.

After all, Barbaro's mother is currently in foal again to Dynaformer...and that horse could easily turn out to be the next Jim Hanks.

France has been Cancelled

Today marks the beginning of a ban on smoking in public spaces in France, which essentially means the end of France. It might stick around for another year or so, but on January 1, 2008, when the ban extends to cafes and restaurants, the rest of the world can pretty much say au revoir to the whole (slightly less, by that point) stinking country.

How can the French government do this to its citizens? Along with cowardice, smoking--particularly smoking in cafes--constitutes France's entire identity. To imagine France without smoking is to imagine America without shooting deaths or morbid obesity--it just isn't the same!

In commemoration of this sad day, I encourage all French people to smoke 'em if you got 'em. Of course, you'll have to go outside to do so.

'Diddy' Not a Stupid Enough Name to Prevent Other People from Wanting It

You would think that an adult could voluntarily refer to himself as "Diddy" and be left alone, if not derisively laughed at by others. But the artist (?) formerly known as Sean "Puffy" Combs, aka Puff Daddy, aka P. Diddy, aka Diddy, aka Diddy Kong (he hasn't actually started using that last one yet, but I assume he will) currently finds himself facing legal action from a London-based record producer named Richard Dearlove--who, for reasons unfathomable to man, also wants people to call him "Diddy" with a straight face.

Specifically, Dearlove wants people to know him as Diddy on MySpace and YouTube in Britain, and he claims that the American Diddy (the "real Diddy", if there could be such a thing?) has broken an earlier agreement not to let his MySpace and YouTube pages show their faces in Dearlove's territory and risk confusing residents of England as to who is the One True Diddy.

I don't know how you prevent web pages from being viewed by an entire country, but if Dearlove wins his court case, American Diddy is going to have to figure it out (and I'm sure he could--he seems quite computer-savvy) or change his name on the internets. Dearlove's lawyer is suggesting that American Diddy revert to a "neutral" name like P. Diddy (since when is "P. Diddy" neutral?), but I think that American Diddy should turn this lemon of a legal situation into lemonade and use the opportunity to once again completely overhaul his moniker. In addition to the previously suggested "Diddy Kong", he might also want to consider "Ziggy", "Twinkletoes", "Secretary Assface Fairypants", or perhaps "Guy Who Might Have Secretly Been Involved in Killing the Notorious B.I.G."

Hmmm. Maybe not that last one.

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 02/01/07

QUESTION: "Five words starting with FE or FEB are defined in the list below. Can you fill in all five?

"1) Feverish _______
2) Part of a car ______
3) Catlike ______
4) A particular artery ______
5) Irresponsible ______"




MY ANSWERS:
1) "______"
2) "fender"
3) "feline"
4) "femoral"
5) "______"

ACTUAL ANSWERS:
1) "febrile"
2) "fender"
3) "feline"
4) "femoral"
5) "feckless"


CONSENSUS: I got "femoral" but I couldn't think of "feckless"? This can only mean one thing: my Mensa calendar is making my brain so powerful that it is beginning to reserve itself for the processing of difficult questions while it disregards easy ones. I can live with that. (As for "febrile", nobody knows what the hell that means. "Feverish", apparently.)