From The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy:

In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.

File this one under “Eeeeeww!!”

According to this Reuters article, a customer at a Wendy’s burger joint in San Jose had a rather… *urp* …unpleasant dining experience envolving a bowl of Wendy’s chili (which, incidentally, I would not eat if I was starving to death).

Here’s the direct quote from Ben Gale, director of the Dept. of Environmental Health.

“This individual apparently did take a spoonful [of chili], did have a finger in their mouth and then, you know, spit it out and recognized it. Then they had some kind of emotional reaction and [edit: unate the chili].”

Emotional reaction?! Gyyyeaaaahck! Talk about an understatement.

What is really funny is the ads that came up with the article on Yahoo News. (I swear I am NOT making this up.)

*Croons* Isn’t it ironic… don’t ya think?

Drudge linked an article today that reports that, at least with respect to Hollywood movies, sex does not sell.

At a recent convention of movie theater owners, the National Association of Theatre Owners came to blows over whether or not to spell theater with the r before the e. But before that, they actually got some good discussion in. Such as when their president, John Fithian, urged Hollywood film studios to stop making so many R rated movies and start putting out more PG and PG-13 flicks.

It seems that theater owners are tired of screening R rated movies and then losing money on them.

As any theater owner will eagerly tell you, American audiences like their movies PG and PG-13, not R, and certainly not NC-17.

Last year, five of the top-10-grossing movies were PG. Of the top 25, only four were rated R.

The article lists many overtly sexual films that have tanked financially in the last few years despite heavy marketing from studios and even some Oscar nods.

“Lolita”, “Striptease”, “Showgirls”, “Henry and June”, “Crash”, “The Brown Bunny”, “The People vs. Larry Flynt”, “Crimes of Passion”, “Wonderland”, “Original Sin”, “Eyes Wide Shut”, “Inside Deep Throat”, “The Dreamers”, “Closer”, and “Kinsey” just to name… well… a bunch.

Now, sex is still selling some movies. Goofy, slap-stick, “teen” comedies (ala “American Pie”) can be as sexual as you please and still make a profit. That’s really sad, but to some degree it makes sense. Kids love to watch shows that parody sex because they don’t yet understand how serious sex is, and their MTV society doesn’t teach them otherwise. (BLARING BULL-HORN NOTE TO PARENTS: It’s YOUR job to teach your kids otherwise. Please don’t be prude about talking about sex. If you are, I guarantee your kids won’t be prude about having it.)

Still, it’s good to see some concrete evidence that Americans do not all have their minds’ in the gutters. Funny… if you look at a map of America, and you think of the gutters as being along both sides… sure enough, entertainment capitals New York and L.A. are as deep in the gutters as you can get. Hmmm.

You can read the complete article here.

Alas, two weeks late, I have come to satisfy your white board quip desires.

“She was extremely short for her weight. I figure, ’bout seven feet.”

WBQotW #18 comes from a song called “Count ‘Em Up Queek”. It’s the story of a weary soul who goes on an inexpensive vacation and runs into “Mona, the mmmonkey woman” who is described in our quip of the week.

The band, if you can call them that, is called 2NU (pronounced “too new”) and specializes in off beat, eclectic ballads rich with sound effects and back masking. 2NU’s claim to fame was a song called “Ponderous” that enjoyed a short stint on the pop charts back in the early nineties and lead me to buy the cassette. This was the impetus that eventually lead me to be a fan of Doctor Demento.

I received the Ponderous CD as a gift. It was my first ever CD, and since I did not have a CD player, I never opened the box. Now that I think about it, it was a rare and no longer available long box. Oooh. Where did I put that thing?!

Good grief. I can’t leave me alone for a minute. I turn my back on me for just a little while and a whole week goes by without a post. I should be ashamed of myself. I will now send myself to my room without dessert and tell myself to think about what I have done. Then, I will pout and sob quietly as I submit to my punishment.