Don't Call Me Shirley

Well, Leslie Nielsen died yesterday. I'm guessing that right at this very moment, you're thinking that surely, I can't be serious. But I am serious. And don't call me Shirley.

But while an unknown portion of the United States mourns this ridiculous actor, their sorrow is nothing compared to that of the Chileans in Chile today. You remember Chile, right? They had a bunch of miners trapped underground for some God-awful length of time before they were miraculously rescued alive. (And I'd like to take this opportunity to mention that while it was all very nice that they were thanking God and all of that, I really would have liked a shout-out to the US, as it was the majority of our technology and expertise that got them out of there in one piece and without having had their bones gnawed upon by their compadres. I'm just sayin'. Now where was I?) They are also, apparently, huge fans of Leslie Nielsen. Behold!

Yep. What you're looking at is the front page of a daily Chilean periodical called Las Ultimas Noticias. That translates into The Latest News (according to Google Translate, which I freaking love). The page which reads "Leslie Nielsen fallecio de una neumonia" and "Repentina muerte de la estrella de "Donde esta el policia?" translates into "Leslie Nielsen died of pneumonia" and "Sudden death of the star of "Where is the police?" I guess that, since that picture is from The Naked Gun, they call it Where Is The Police? That's odd because it's not like you can't translate The Naked Gun into Spanish. Why don't they call it "Agárralo como puedas"? I don't know either, but they don't and he's still dead.

I felt the need to check out other stories on their website to get some sort of a grip on what kind of news they report on, especially if the death of Leslie Nielsen warrants taking up the entire front page over there. I'm still not really sure what they're all about. They had this picture:

And the title or headline that accompanied it read "La esposa del campeon dejo ver sus encantos", which Google Translate says is "The wife of champion left to see its charms". I'm looking at the picture and I'm reading that accompaniment and I'm still not getting it. Nice rack, though. And hey! Before you start judging me for saying that, I'm just going to add that underneath that cryptic description, it also said "Peligroso escote", which apparently means "dangerous cleavage"! Hmm. I'm really wanting to know more about these folks AND about her cleavage. Just HOW dangerous is it?

Then there was this picture:

That was accompanied by "Pas Buscunan se la juega por la vida sana" and "La actriz lanza su página web con audaz foto" which apparently means "Pas Buscunan it plays for healthy living" and "The actress launches its website with bold picture." Well, that's definitely a bold picture. So far, we have dangerous cleavage and a bold picture. Is there anything in this newspaper that doesn't have to do with female physique and (of all things) an unabated love for the newly deceased Leslie Nielsen?

Well, there's this: It's accompanying caption reads "Zafrada cuenta su vida en Internet" and "Tiene su propia página web". Uh-huh. As confusing as that is for me, the English translation didn't do much to clear things up for me when I read it means "Zafra has your Internet life" and "It has its own website". What is Zafra? Or maybe the question should be WHO is Zafra? Is that little boy Zafra? Does Zafra mean leather loafers and courdoroy pants in Spanish? I'm very confused by this entire newspaper and the events upon which they report. I think I'm just going to go back to mourning Leslie Nielsen by watching "Where is the police?" in English.

Idiotic Things I Read Today

You'd think that I'd be happier, what with the election finally over. Finally, I can have the TV on for more than 5 minutes without being bombarded with an ad by Meg Whitman or Jerry Brown telling me why their version of hell is better than their opponent's. But I'm irritated. I started perusing the Innerwebs this morning and just found idiocy after idiocy. Let's review.

My semi-beloved San Jose Mercury News ran a piece detailing the most awesome victory parade in San Francisco for the World Champion San Francisco Giants after they won the World Series in most excellent fashion on Monday. When describing the size of the massive crowd, the article read: "Those arriving in downtown San Francisco -- where police officers gave crowd estimates ranging from 200,000 to 1 million -- were greeted by gigantic orange and black balloons that bobbed on the traffic signals."

That's the BEST you can do?! Somewhere between 200,000 and a freaking million? OK, that's not really an estimate. That's just pulling numbers out of your arse. Anyone could come up with an estimate like that! What good does that do anyone? That's just a ridiculous way of saying "The crowd was very, very large". You morons.

Then there was an article over at Politics Daily. I'm not going to bag on the writer of the article so much, as I do kind of like what she tends to write. She was probably just having an off day. The point here is that the article focuses on the folks that Sarah Palin endorsed. The title of the article reads "Sarah Palin's Midterm Scorecard: A Winning Record, but Some Key Losses". In essence, it goes on to detail how Sarah Palin supported "...more than 100 conservative candidates during the primary and general elections." Um, OK. I guess she can do that being how she's being whatever it is that she's being these days. (I still haven't quite figured that out yet.) It then goes on to say, "A Politics Daily tally puts Palin's Tuesday successes at 62 wins, 23 losses and seven contests that are still too close to call, with Palin's candidates trailing in five of those races."

Let's do the math. She supported more than 100 candidates. She currently has 62 wins, 23 losses and 7 undecided. That's 92! That's not more than 100. What gives? On top of that, what makes these "wins" or these "losses" Sarah Palin's to absorb? Aren't there a lot of people out there who would support just about any conservative candidate, no matter how wacky they appeared (Christine O'Donnell, I'm talking about you)? I think there are. Since when did the wins and the losses of the conservative candidates fall squarely on the shoulders of Sarah Palin? She's a former half-term governor who once spent a couple of months running for Vice President! (And don't get me wrong. For the most part, I like Sarah Palin. But her endorsement of someone certainly isn't gold by any means and it shouldn't be construed as such.)

And finally, I'm really getting tired of how any time an animal attacks a human, it is made into some sort of sensationalistic news, as if something like that is so shocking and so unheard of that we should all just be in a state of disbelief that it ever occurred. Take this headline from The Huffington Post: "Peter Evershed KILLED by 5 Lions in Zimbabwe." Um, yes. I would imagine that five lions WOULD kill a man.

To begin, I get thoroughly annoyed when the media runs the name of some person afflicted by tragedy in a way that makes the reader feel as if something horrendous has happened to someone that they knew. Does anyone know who Peter Evershed was, other than people who actually knew him? No. He was a 59-year-old businessman from Zimbabwe. But the headline makes the reader initially feel as if they've just read "Brad Pitt KILLED by 5 Lions in Zimbabwe". (And, in this example, it wouldn't be much of a stretch for Brad to have actually been in Zimbabwe. He could have been over there buying another child to complete his collection. They don't have one from Zimbabwe yet, do they?)

See, animals eat meat. Humans are made of meat! Of course they're going to eat a human if they're given the chance. It's a big piece of meat! Why is that so shocking to people? Or maybe it's only shocking to the media. I'm not sure. But in another example of the inexplicable shock that this article tries to convey is when they quote some Zimbabwe guy as saying, "We appeal to everyone to exercise extreme caution. Animals have become extremely unpredictable." Wait. What now?

Have become? Animals have become unpredictable?! They're animals! Aside from that, since when is a wild animal eating human considered "unpredictable"? Seems pretty predictable to me. If you showed anyone a picture of a human standing in the wild with a bunch of lions walking around and you asked that person to guess what might be about to happen, I'd guess that nine times out of ten (with the tenth being the moron who wrote the article) the person you are asking would correctly infer that the chap in the picture is about to become lion lunch! HOW is that unpredictable?!

I've had enough. I'm going to go watch a little TV without a political ad in sight to try to make myself feel better.