I turned 25 Sunday, and I’m not happy about it. Yes, I received some lovely gifts, and yes, I spent the weekend surrounded by family and friends, but every time someone asked me to smile for a picture, I felt like they were sizing me up for dentures.
I don’t like being 25 on a college campus, where everyone is younger than me, including most tenured professors. When I bought textbooks this year, a number of people in line, waiting to purchase titles such as “Quantified Nanobiology Theory and Practice in Latin,” looked like they had come straight to college immediately after an excellent showing in the third grade. (more…)
As the old William Shakespeare quote goes, “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” This is a lie. There are way more than three kinds of lies. White lies, for instance and my mother’s hair color.
Also Shakespeare never said it. It was Benjamin Disraeli, who, according to Wikipedia, is “some kind of fish.”
That’s a lie, too. Wikipedia never identified Disraeli, a former British Prime Minster, as “some kind of fish.” (It specified that he was a mackerel.) But for the internet generation, it’s easier to trust Wikipedia than go to a more reliable source, such as guessing. (more…)
You may be worried about the economy, what with the bankruptcy last week of Lehman Brothers, the buyout of Merrill Lynch, the bailout of AIG by the federal government and the termination of McDonald’s $1 soft drink promotion. But there is absolutely nothing for the average American to worry about, provided he has diversified his assets and is a Canadian citizen.
“I know Americans are concerned about the adjustments that are taking place in our financial markets,” President Bush said last Monday, attempting to pacify the nation. Here is how you can tell he is lying through his teeth: There are 27 syllables in that sentence, and he did not botch a single one. (more…)
Microsoft paid Jerry Seinfeld $10 million to fit Bill Gates for shoes in a TV commercial. I don’t see the logic behind this. I mean, if you were Microsoft, would you have Seinfeld fit your chairman for shoes? Or would you go the more reasonable route and use his voice for that animated paper clip? (”It looks like you’re writing a letter. What’s the deal with letters?”)
Microsoft’s ads, which the company has announced it will cancel, are the latest in a surge in pointless commercials. They’ll give you some mumbo-jumbo about trying to improve their image with the public, but come on. Bill Gates just wanted to hang out with Jerry Seinfeld. It may seem unfair that Bill Gates gets to spend company money to purchase Jerry Seinfeld whereas you would get questioned for a $15 business lunch, but in all fairness, Gates has to go through life with that haircut. (more…)
Your average politician has the sex appeal of a jack-o-lantern, and yet these guys have romantic encounters all the time. Take Eliot Spitzer, for example. The guy looks like Kermit the Frog, but still was able to have sex for less than $5,000.
Think about the recent headlines. John Edwards admitted to an affair with a former staffer. Sarah Palin’s 17-year-old daughter is pregnant. Political sex is in the news again, so you need me, your faithful Sex Column Answer Man, more than ever. Because of the sensitive nature of these topics, I will use my maturity and wisdom to handle these topics with all the delicacy of an NFL linebacker. I’m a sex columnist, not a nun.
Question: Why is it surprising that former North Carolina senator and two-time Presidential candidate John Edwards recently admitted to an extramarital affair? (more…)
Whether to join a fraternity or not is one of the biggest, life-defining decisions a new student can make. That’s why it’s very important you do not commit to a house until you have given it careful thought, by which I mean “consumed twelve Jell-O shots.”
Ha ha, that was a joke. Anyone in the Greek system will reassure you that alcohol is not served at fraternity recruitment events, although it will be hard to understand him, what with all the slurring. (more…)
Welcome to college! You and your new roommate will get along splendidly and soon be the closest of friends, unless he snores, in which case you’ll have to kill him.
Just kidding. You’ll want to kill him even if he doesn’t snore. This is because it takes a lot of maturity to live with another human being, and the reason for freshman roommates is that you lack the low level of maturity needed to live on your own. (more…)
It’s Barack Obama’s big night! Democratic National Convention organizers have moved the final evening of the week-long event from the Pepsi Center in downtown Denver to Invesco Field at Mile High, home of the Denver Broncos. It will be there where Obama will be named the party’s candidate, provided he can make a 50-yard field goal to defeat the Bengals. Otherwise the nomination goes to Adam Vinatieri. Rules are rules.
Actually Obama will just come out and give a speech about the future of America and how we all have to blah blah together for blah blah unity or whatever. Unfortunately this is what’s happened to political conventions, which, over 100 years ago, were really exciting. In 1880, for example, the Republicans took 30 ballots to nominate James A. Garfield, and that was only after a compromise wherein, to appease his detractors, he agreed to be assassinated the following September. (more…)
If you want to succeed in journalism, you need to select topics carefully, research thoroughly, interview intelligently, and use adverbs sparingly. Or you can write about sex.
It doesn’t matter what you say about it. “The sex was a vapid, purple, pistachioed umbrella,” you can write, and yours will be the most-read story on your publication’s Web site. You might even win a Pulitzer. If the Wall Street Journal followed Cosmopolitan Magazine’s lead and ran more stories like “50 tips to please Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke in bed,” they could finally afford real photographs instead of those silly doodles. (more…)
When it comes to the Internet, old people have the know-how of squid. I’m not sure if it’s because they’re stuck in their ways or because there aren’t a lot of web sites dedicated to false teeth, but something about going online leaves them quaking in their Depends.
[Note to editor: Please remove that paragraph from the print edition. Old men are tough and can kick my ass. Probably old women, too.] (more…)