Paper says soldiers’ singing will create ‘mortal terror’

Apparently, the author has never seen American Idol. If we can take Keith (not for the faint of heart), we can take North Korea’s army.

NASA Flip-Flops in Columbia Investigation
Does this headline make anybody else wonder what effect a stray sandal would have on the heat shielding?

Along the same lines, this headline from last week’s Onion made me chuckle:
Texan Unable To Trick NASA Into Hauling Old Washing Machine Off Lawn.

Japander:n.,& v.t. 1. a western star who uses his or her fame to make large sums of money in a short time by advertising products in Japan that they would probably never use. ~er (see synecure, prostitute) 2. to make an ass of oneself in Japanese media.

Check out many of these asses on Japander.com. Some of the biggest and best asses were Nicolas Cage and Arnold Schwarzenegger (especially the latter’s Arinamin V ads).

Funny quote from Sylvester Stallone’s page: Sylvester Stallone – synonymous with ham in Japan.
Amusingly, he’s synonymous with ham in the States as well.

Weird. Weird. Weird. Weird.

From Powell may take U.S. intelligence to U.N. at CNN.com…
“Stevenson had a much easier task, I think,” Powell said. “All he had to prove was that there were Russian missiles in Cuba, and viola, there were Russian missiles in Cuba”
As “voila” seems more likely to be misspelled than mispronounced, I’m assuming the error occurred in CNN’s domain. Maybe somebody should ask the Secretary of State to please refrain from using words that are “all complicated and French”.

As usual, I Tivoed the Superbowl this year so that I could fast forward through the game and watch the commercials. I have my priorities in order. If you weren’t quite so clever, you can see most of the ads on AOL. If you’ve ever wondered why the 5th dentist didn’t recommend Trident, check out this ad. The big winner this year, though, was the Terry Tate: Office Linebacker spot. If you enjoy that, you should check out the extended and alternate versions at Reebok.

The Peabody Hotel in Memphis is looking for a new Duckmaster. This might just be the new career you’re looking for. (Unless, by some outrageous coincidence, you already are a duckmaster.)

Actually, I can’t hear “duckmaster” without thinking of that awful Marc Singer movie. Except that instead of
The courage of an eagle, the strength of a panther and the power of a God!
it would be
The courage of a duck, the strength of a duck, and the power of… say it with me… a Duck!
The big DM could command vast armies of waterfowl, or just go into that goofy trance and scan the landscape in DuckCam mode.

Now that’s Hollywood gold. Virtually guaranteed to make millions at the box office.

Expert: Bananas could disappear in 10 years
From this article we can glean several important facts, each more alarming than the last.
1. The banana hasn’t had sex in years.
2. The banana lacks genetic diversity and could go extinct.
3. There is an International Network for the Improvement of Banana and Plantain.
4. It’s in France.
5. It’s headed by a man named Frison, which (according to Babelfish) means “clippings” in French.