I got my Mojo workin’ but it just ain’t workin’ on you, Torn Slatterns and Nugget Ranchers

And here we thought he didn’t care
Saudi Arabia's top cleric, Sheik Abdul Aziz al-Sheik, called on Muslims to forsake terrorism. Wow, that’s really going out on a limb, isn’t it? A religious leader that’s actually against people blowing up people? That’s bold. Next he’ll say we should be kind to puppies and kittens.

Should Christians follow the Muslim cleric’s lead and make an adjustment to the Lord’s Prayer? “Give us this day our daily bread, and lead us not into temptation and please, please don’t blow people up. Amen.”

Slick Willy slides past a deadline
Bill Clinton is reportedly way past his deadline on his autobiography. Apparently, Clinton’s writing style is slow. Clinton doesn’t use a computer, he writes longhand on a legal pad, he likes to discuss topics in detail before he writes them down and he spends a lot of time chasing tail.

Clinton is writing slowly. Every time he has to use the word is, he has to ask what it means.

This shouldn’t be surprising that a man who once asked for the definitions of alone, is and sex, is having trouble writing a book.

It should be no surprise that a guy who, conservatively, takes over 130 shots in a single round of golf and then gives himself a score of eighty is having trouble calculating a deadline.

You have to feel sorry for Clinton’s publishers. What are they going to say to the former president of United States about missing a deadline? “Hey, Slick Willy, you mind getting off that intern and getting the lead out? We got a company to run here, Cigar-boy.”

Can’t you just hear the conversation Bill Clinton had with his publisher when he missed his autobiography deadline? “Heck, sorry about missing the deadline, but, like I told my buddy at the IRS who I can still have audit people on command, I should be done pretty soon.”


Bennifer, we hardly knew ye
Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck continue to blame their break up on the media. That’s like James Brown blaming his scary mug shot on the police photographer.

My enduring memory of J. Lo and Ben will be their front row appearance at a nationally televised Boston Red Sox playoff game. When the camera predictably shot them, they appeared annoyed and waved it away. That’s like going to passport photo shop and getting angry when they take your picture.

On no, Senior
Officials in Tijuana, Mexico have announced they are going to crack down on bars that offer “All you can drink” specials. Gosh, I hope this doesn’t contribute to Tijuana’s horrible shortage of drunk tourists.

And now, a little journey to a place I like to call, the Catskill Mountain lounge in your mind
“Touching the Void” is a new movie about the remarkable and true story of two mountain climbers. Please, do not confuse the amazing “Touching the Void” with these other films.
(Get the drum kit out for the rimshots)

The psychology documentary: “Touching the Freud.” Badaboom.

The bodybuilding instructional video : “Touching the Deltoid.” Rinkadink.

The Brooklyn-based ornithological film: “Touching the Boid.” Bangabash.

The anger-management therapist massage technique tape: “Touching the Annoyed.” Dingaling.

The porno the father of Jeff and Beau Bridge made when he was broke: “Touching the Lloyd.” Kaboomaroom.

The very special episode of “The Andy Griffith Show” where the barber gets lucky; “Touching the Floyd.” Wheeze.

And especially do not mistake the mountain climbing story “Touching the Void” with that med-school proctology video: “Touching the ‘Roid.”
Taaaaaah Daaaaahhhhhh!

Thank you, I'll be here all weak, try the veal and tip your waitresses.


Since you asked:
With the endless amount of talented and amazing people in this country, it has always been surprising to me that our choices of candidates can be so lacking. Why is that?

Think back to high school. Who ran for school offices? The brains? No, they were too busy studying. The jocks? Please. The cool kids? They didn’t want to be bothered. The stoners? You know what they were doing.

No, in high school, as in real life, the slightly odd kids desperate for approval, the ones who looked great on paper but made you somehow feel creepy, they ran for office and we voted them in, partly because we knew how hard they would work for our acceptance.

It’s the same thing with the presidency. You have to have more than one screw loose to want to put up with the aggravation and expense of running for president.

You had a Bill Clinton in your high school, you just didn’t know him. That was the guy who quietly fumed while the cool kids had all the parties and the jocks got all the cheerleaders, poor Bill Clinton sat at home studying his brains out, the whole time plotting:

“Man, I’m gonna show them. I’m gonna go to Harvard, become a governor, maybe even president, and then I am going hang with movie stars and get all the girls.”

And Bill was right, he had to become governor and president just to get laid.

You knew Hillary Clinton in high school. She was the head of girls club, she organized the pep rally, she painted the banners for the football game, she did all the work for the ice cream social. The only thing Hillary didn’t do was get invited to parties and the prom, and she has devoted her entire public life to get back at the people who snubbed her -- only now they are called republicans -- the whole while laboring under the guise of helping the less-fortunate.

I was genuinely not surprised by the seemingly cool Dr. Howard Dean’s red-faced rant. Amused, but not surprised.

Why can’t our presidents be funny, smart, cool, witty, as well as moral, like President Bartlett on “The West Wing?” Because Bartlett isn’t real, “The West Wing” is pretend. (Somebody forgot to tell Martin Sheen that when he made his anti-Iraq commercial) Our presidents, and our presidential candidates, are, sadly, real.

Remember this expression? “If you can’t find the sucker at the poker game, it’s you.”

You don’t have to find the whacko running for president, if they are running for president, they are, by definition, a whacko.

Just a thought to ponder to kick off your Super Duper Super Bowl weekend, Torn Slatterns and Nugget Ranchers

You know how they abbreviate team names like calling the Packers the Pack, and the Patriots the Pats? How come they don’t call the Panthers, the Pants? Either way, it’s good they don’t abbreviate the Titans.

We gonna kick it ol’ school up in here, Torn Slatterns and Nugget Ranchers

But he bats both ways
*Thursday, Indians minor league pitcher Kazuhito Tadano asked for forgiveness for his appearance in a gay porn video in which he engaged in a homosexual act. Today, New York Mets catcher Mike Piazza held a press conference to announce he has never viewed the video.

Hate to see that
*There was an embarrassing moment at the Super Bowl XXXVIII media day. Bill Clinton barged in uninvited and all breathless. Turns out Clinton saw the three X’s of XXXVIII and mistook it for the rating of an adult movie.

No Bull
The once great dynasty Chicago Bulls are in shambles. They have an NBA last place 283. winning percentage. When it’s that far below 500., shouldn’t it be called a losing percentage?

How bad are the Bulls? Even Pete Rose wouldn’t bet on them.

Today at practice in Los Angeles, the Clippers were telling Bulls jokes.

He? Yes. Hate? Who’s He Hate? Me. You? No, Me. He? Who’s On First? Right.
*The Carolina Panthers' Rod Smart was known as He Hate Me in his XFL days. He Hate Me. As opposed to Bill Clinton who was, at that time, known as “She Ate Me.”

What an inspiration
*NASA said they will just let the Hubble telescope degrade until it’s useless. They got this idea from watching the Joe Lieberman campaign.

Attendance imitates life
*Did you know that about half of the Super Bowl tickets go to corporations and their clients? A big percentage goes to the host city. So a vast majority of the fans at the Super Bowl don’t really care about either of the teams in this game. Sort of just like the rest of the country.

In Paris in springtime. . . or anytime, for that matter
*According to the "New York Post”, Paris Hilton has several movie offers on the table. It’s no wonder, from watching Paris’ little video, we all know she knows how to audition.

With the sex tape, the wild parties and the rumors of many, many boy friends, Paris Hilton has a reputation for being easy. But it’s not her fault, if her parents wanted her to put up more of a fight, they wouldn’t have named her Paris.

Hall of Lame
The first Super Bowl had ten players who went into the football Hall of Fame. This Super Bowl will probably be the first one to be just like Pete Rose and the entire roster of the Detroit Tigers: Not one person in the Hall of Fame.

Since you asked again:
My five-year-old daughter is a tad on the dramatic side. Just now I told her to turn off the TV. As a result, Ann Caroline basically recreated the death scene in "Carmen."

Did you know that Tour De France Champ Lance Armstrong and babe singer Sheryll Crowe are a hot item? Not sure how that is going to work out. Wait until the singer of "All I Want To Do" (Is have some fun) finds out that all Lance wants to do to have some fun is ride a bike up a mountain for four hours.

It truly ain’t nothin’ but a thang thing, Torn Slatterns and Nugget Ranchers

Take one:
CIA Agent one: “Are you sure there are weapons of mass destruction in Iraq?”

Agent Two: “Well all the evidence points to it.”

Agent One: “I have to get this to the White House. You better be sure, because this could lead to a war.”

Agent Two: “OK, yes, I’m sure, there are weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.”

Narrator: Want to get away? Southwest Airlines has flights available right now.

Put a cape on him and take him away
*James Brown was arrested on a domestic violence charge. Did you see his mug shot? Even Nick Nolte is making fun of that picture.

James Brown and Glen Campbell are starting a new singing duo: The Scary Clowns.

James Brown has a new single, it goes; “I feeeeel good, hah, but I loooook bad.”

For James Brown’s mug shot, Papa should have worn a brand new bag over his head.

James Brown and Glen Campbell are starting a new singing duo: The Mug Uglies.

In defense of his domestic violence charge, James Brown said it was a mistake. When Brown went to jump back and kiss himself, he accidentally knocked her down.

Did you see the James Brown mug shot? Apparently Brown has his hair done by the same guy who does Nick Nolte.

Misunderstanding
*Former chief US weapons inspector, David Kay, said the US government was wrong that Iraq was maintaining weapons of mass destruction. Today, a White House spokesperson said; “Did we say weapons of mass destruction? No, we meant weapons of VAST DECEPTION, yeah, that’s it, it was a huge fake.”

After Kay’s announcement, Hillary Clinton had to seek treatment for a strained abdomen for trying to retain a “Neener Neener Neener.”

I hope this doesn’t mean we have to plug Saddam Hussein back in his spider hole.

How gauche
*The Martha Stewart trial is a little different. Today, Stewart’s attorney objected that the prosecutor didn’t send the jury personally hand-written calligraphy Thank You notes for serving.

*Good news for the Super Bowl. Today ten more people actually decided to actually give a crap about it.

Yikes
*There’s a sex tape circulating the Internet of former NBA great Julius Irving and a woman. This video is a different from Indian reliever Kazuhito Tadano gay porn video, Tadano apologized for his video, after watching the Dr. J. tape, guys have to apologize to their girlfriends or wives.

Arrr me matey
*Pirate attacks on the high seas are up 20%. The pirates are using more weapons, they are more aggressive and, for some odd reason, they are dressing and sounding exactly like Keith Richards.


Since you asked:
Slats and Nugs, do you remember watching your first Super Bowl? Boy, I sure do. It was January of 1969, our country was on the cusp of changes unimagined, I was ten and I was into football and that game like only a ten-year-old boy can be into something.

With coaching from my Johnny Unitas-loving Dad, I started to follow the success of the Baltimore Colts and adopt them as my post-season team. We lived outside Chicago so the Bears, of course, were our team. But man did they suck in 1969. My idol, Gayle Sayers, was not the same since his knee injury, and George Halas –as we now know – was too cheap and too stupid to field a decent team.

So, during the post-season, I had no choice but to adopt a playoff team to cheer for. And in 1969, it was always the NFL winner. As far as we were concerned, the AFL was only a little bit better than communist Russia. The AFL had funky facemasks, they huddled up in two funky lines, they had a narrow goofy-looking football, they were, in short, pure evil. But the most evil of all was the New York Jets' quarterback, Joe Namath.

Joe Namath had long hair. At the time, my Dad and I hated hippies. (Later, of course I grew my hair because you had to legally) Joe Namath had white shoes, low-cut Riddell cleats. Football players don’t wear low-cuts, they wore high tops and a crew-cut like the God of football, Johnny Unitas. But worst of all, Joe Namath was . . . A LADIES MAN.

At ten, you still try to convince yourself - and everyone else - that you hate girls. Of course you don’t. I didn’t. I was hopelessly in love with Karen Dean, but I expressed my affection to her in the way ten-year-old boys do: I pushed her into the mud. I threw dodge balls at her. I stole her hat during recess, which, in Chicago in January, can lead to immediate hypothermia. I tortured poor, beautiful, flaxen-haired, green-eyed Karen Dean every chance I got. My affection for Karen Dean got me sent to the principal’s office – death row for a ten-year-old – about ten times.

So, the fact that Joe Namath was “a ladies man” made me hate him even more. The Colts versus the Jets was the clearest example of good versus evil that a ten-year-old boy could witness.

This is how big this game was: it forced my Dad to break his "We don't need color TV, dammit" law and buy a Zenith the size of a Buick, just for the third Super Bowl game.

The game was played in Miami and started at dusk. In Chicago we were one hour behind, so it started in the late afternoon. As the game wore on, and the Colts faltered, the darkness outside descended and mirrored the darkness that covered our hearts and souls. The freakin' dog-assed Jets won.

How could this happen? How could the Jets win? Why did bad things happen to good people? This was not just the worst sports-related thing that had ever happened to me, but the worst thing - besides taking trumpet lessons from Mr. Bakehouse - that had ever happened to me period.

Until that Fall when the Chicago Cubs lost to the New York Mets and Karen Dean moved away.

We crazy like that, Torn Slatterns and Nugget Ranchers

Beating around the Bush
*It turns out that President Bush’s brother Neil Bush, who is getting divorced, had many affairs including women in Asia that Neil claims simply showed up at his hotel room for no charge. We call that the Kobe Bryant defense.

Upon hearing about all the dirt on Neil Bush, Roger Clinton said; “Hey, get your own gig, Pal.”

A good start
*The Howard Dean campaign is accused of dodging a $900 sandwich bill by a New Hampshire deli. In Dean’s defense, he could be trying to demonstrate his Presidential ability by creating a deficit.

Nahhh
*Indians minor league pitcher Kazuhito Tadano is asking for forgiveness for his appearance in a gay porn video in which he engaged in a homosexual act. The good news is baseball players are so sensitive and caring, so his teammates probably won’t give him a hard time about this.

Why the long face?*John Kerry won the New Hampshire primary. Kerry has a long, but presidential face, you could see that face on Mount Rushmore, if Mount Rushmore was a little higher.

Not good
*I don’t want to say Dennis Kucinich is a lost cause, but, in the New Hampshire primary, Charlize Theron received more votes.

Improvement
*Howard Dean did better in New Hampshire than he did Iowa, finishing in a close second place. So, instead of a red-faced rant, Dean only gave a light-pink faced diatribe.

Somebody up in here gonna catch a righteous beat-down, Torn Slatterns and Nugget Ranchers

They Keyshawn’d Johnson
Two days after Bucs-dumpee Keyshawn Johnson got held up at gunpoint in Berkeley, he was slapped with a restraining order in Oakland for threatening his ex-wife's ex-boyfriend. What a trip. There were convicts at Alcratraz who had better visits to the Bay Area than Keyshawn.

There are crabs at Fisherman's Wharf who had a better time in the Bay Area than our buddy Keyshawn. And let me please add that it could not have happened to a nicer guy.

Keyshawn’s Oakland visit has sparked rumors that the ever-classy Raiders are going to force Jerry Rice to retire and sign Keyshawn. Good move, whenever possible you should always replace a certain Hall-of-Famer with a certain Hall-of-Shamer.

The World Champion Florida Marlins have sold fewer than 5,000 season tickets for 2004, fewer than the last place Tigers or Brewers. There are actual Marlin fish that have better short-term memory than the Marlins fans.

The Chicago Cubs could sell more than 5,000 tickets to watch foul-ball-flubber Steve Bartman take a righteous beat-down.

Since you asked:
There is only one thing more excruciating than working out on a treadmill, and that’s working out on a treadmill next to somebody who is yammering on a cell phone. I am pretty sure that, when that happened, time actually started to go backwards. When I finally got off, I was thirty minutes younger.

Forget that this woman was spewing into a cell phone directly beneath the sign that said “Go Outside to Use Your Cell Phone” – in fact, if the sign fell down, it would have hit this woman on the head – her conversation was crushingly useless. You never hear anyone on a cell phone say anything of value, like; “Tie off the artery, I’ll be right there.” No, it’s always; “I don’t want Chinese food. Why do you always get to decide what we have?”

Folks, please, never subject captive audiences to your phone conversation, but if you have to, for the love of God, at least make it interesting: “What do you think we should do with her body? No. What you nuts? We can’t dump it there. Well look what happened to Scot Petterson. The Moron was too lazy to dig a hole.”

I bet, after that conversation, the grocery bagger will listen to me when I say I want plastic.

Yo, you straight flipped me now, Torn Slatterns and Nugget Ranchers


Umm, how cold, um was it?
*It is cold back east. In New Hampshire people are shaking like Howard Dean without caffeine.

Good news, Howard Dean supporters, today Dean found, and went to, his happy place.

I finally figured out who Howard Dean reminds me of: An over-caffinated Barney Rubble.

Impressed
President Bush has been eerily silent on the Howard Dean Iowa rant. That’s because Bush is somewhat in silent awe of all the states Dean knows.

Nobody likes this joke but me
*In the midst of a nasty divorce, NBA great Julius Irving’s ex-wife released a video of Irving having sex with another woman to the New York Post. Proving, once again, that hell hath no fury like a woman porned.

Guys, for the last time, if you make a video of yourself having sex with a woman besides your wife, please mark the tape “The Three Stooges.” She’ll never watch it.

The name game
*The awards for the worst film performances, the Razzies, have been announced. Or should we call them the “Gigli’s”?

I got twenty on Ben Affleck
*Betting on this Super Bowl is slow due to a lack of excitement. In fact, there’s more betting action in Vegas on who Britney Spears is going to marry next.

You know how we do all up in here, Torn Slatterns and Nugget Ranchers


Ed: How cold was it, Johnny?
It was cold in New Hampshire. Today voters huddled around Howard Dean just for the warmth he generates during a rant.

Where did this come from?
At the Bob Hope Classic, John Daly scored a rare double eagle: a two on a 514-yard par five. A double eagle. Wow, that’s more fun than beating up a Mime.

The runner-up at the Bob Hope Classic was Skip Kendall, who at one time was off the tour and working at an Olive Garden restaurant. Or as Tony Soprano calls the Olive Garden: The seventh circle of Hell.

Monkey shines
Happy Chinese New Year. It is the year of the monkey. To celebrate the year of the monkey, my local Chinese restaurant has a special on Kung Pao Chimp.

And when you sneeze you chirp
In health news, have you heard about this Bird Flu Virus? It’s bad, the first symptom of the Bird Flu Virus is an uncontrollable urge to crap on a statue.

Honor student? Well, she should get off of him before she gets in trouble
Nashville has banned all honor roles saying it’s an embarrassment for underachieving students. I am shocked. That is amazing. I had no idea there were any honor students in Nashville.

I was an honor student. No lie. One teacher said, with me as a student, she would really have to stay on her student.

My folks always asked me if I was on the honor role. I sure was, I told them, after the first joke, I was on a role.

(You can almost see the Catskills cocktail waitress rolling her eyes)

Blaspheme? Why yes it was, thanks. And I hope it was a blast for you as well
The first Christian themed nudist camp is going to open in Florida. For the guys this could bring new meaning to the minister’s command “All rise”

A Rose by any other name
Pete Rose is scheduled to do a book signing at a Casino. Good to see Rose is really sorry about his gambling problem.

Are you listening, Sean Penn?
The Golden Globe Awards were last night. All awards shows with actors are great. It gives us a chance to listen to actors talk on their own so that we can truly appreciate the value of a good scriptwriter.