Year-Not-In-Review

After taking a break for a couple of weeks, I'm back to give you a little twist on the typical year-in-review. Instead of reviewing all the great adventures I've been on and stories I've told you, I'm going to give you bite-sized chunks of all the stuff I wanted to write but never did, either because I was too lazy or I found something more interesting to occupy my time. So, here we go:

Vanessa Hudgens is Vain

The co-star of the wildly popular Disney franchise made headlines when somebody found naked pictures of her online, allegedly meant for teen superhunk Drake Bell of Nickelodeon's "Drake and Josh". Fans were shocked, but seriously, we should have seen it coming. Any Google search for a celebrity's name followed by the word, "naked" is going to yield several thousand results.

This event has caused me to doubt Hudgens' ability to be a role model for children, not because she was taking naked pictures of herself, but because the photos reveal the shallower aspects of her personality. First, if you're attracted to a young man and your first thought is, "I'm so hot, I'm gonna send naked pictures of myself to this guy," someone needs to slap you in the face. Second, I think Vanessa's attraction to Drake shows that she's the kind of girl solely interested in looks. Don't believe me? Check out a side-by-side comparison of Drake Bell and Hudgen's current boyfriend, Zac Efron. They're practically clones:


Bill Hicks is Overrated

Okay, so I could get into serious trouble for this, as his fan base is extremely loyal and would kill for him on command, were he still alive. A few of his fans have even compared him to Jesus Christ. For those of you who don't know, Bill Hicks was a stand-up comedian known for his searing jabs at American culture and his Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories. I respect the heck out of him for his refusal to be silenced even in the face of the harshest criticism, and I love that he was brave enough to voice an opinion that most of the country didn't agree with. But my three problems with him are that he had a "me against the world" attitude that drives me up the wall, he was a textbook case of the pseudo-intellectual (the guy was well-read, but he tended to jump to conclusions), and finally, he just wasn't funny.

Martha Stewart's Apple Pie Stinks

I baked a pie, following Martha's recipe to the letter. It tasted awful. From now on, I'm using the recipe in the book Carol got me at the church charity sale, which is delicious (the pie recipe, not the book).

The Most Ridiculous Holiday Products of 2007

Every year, the Christmas products get weirder. Among the craziest were a snowman keg, angel ornaments engraved with sarcastic messages, and a Spider-Man 3 Santa hat (located next to the Spider-Man 3 stocking at Target). I couldn't really find anything other than those.

The Top Three Other Things We'd Like to Say to Our Customers

Yes, I'm working at Regal again over winter break. I wanted to go on a big rant, but between teenage customers trying to get high off popcorn salt and being mentally undressed by women twice my age, it wouldn't be anything you haven't heard before. So I've decided to sum up all my frustrations with the three things every Regal employee would like to say to their customers:

1. You are not special.
2. You have never been special.
3. Continuing to complain will not make you special.

That's it for the Year-Not-In-Review. I look forward to having more of these little chats with you in 2008. Peace out, everybody.

Stuff this week and Proof, Part I

It's weird to think that it's already the middle of December. I can't decide whether it's because the school year went by so fast or because it's currently seventy-six degrees outside. I've been watching the weather forecasts lately, and I'm pretty sure the National Weather Service has completely given up on predicting the weather for Georgia, since the high and low predicted temperatures on an average day are about thirty degrees apart.

So this is Mercer University's final exam week. I've completed one test and one project so far, so that just leaves two essays and one more test. I'm exhausted, and it's only Monday. Anyway, since it's winter everywhere else in the country, I thought I'd share my home made snowman screen saver with you. It's the same one I made last year, only this one doesn't have an obnoxious label on it and it won't expire.

I want to make you all laugh this week, but since I don't have a lot of spare time, I'll just share this photo with you instead. This was taken at a shopping center parking lot near my house, and I could barely breathe from laughing so hard when I saw it. I've made it a part of a new series I plan to publish here now and again, entitled Proof that We Don't Know what We're Doing.

A Tribute to Fruitcake

Despite the 200-year commercialization of my favorite holiday, there's no denying that everyone enjoys receiving gifts, and some people enjoy giving them (so every once in a while, it's a win-win situation!). Nobody knows this more than me. I used to go through Sharper Image catalogs when I was young, circling what I wanted Santa to give me that year. Of course, I never got those things because everything Sharper Image sells is overpriced and serves no real purpose. And I like to think I'm a better person for not getting any of that stuff.

New gifts come out every year, and there's usually one that everyone wants to get their hands on. In the 90s we had Tickle-Me Elmo and Furby, last year we had the Nintendo Wii, and this year...actually, it's probably still the Wii. But there is one item that continues to show up on store shelves every holiday season without fail: the fruitcake. Whether you're at a grocery store, a big box retailer, or the local mall, you're bound to find at least five metric tons of fruitcake somewhere inside.

Nobody likes fruitcake. I have never had the word "fruitcake" come up in a conversation without seeing a look of revulsion on all listening. So why do the food companies continue to sell it to us? Is there some meeting that all the market researchers in the United States forgot to attend? I decided to do a little research on the subject, and found some startling facts.

I first looked to my education in Mercer's Christianity department. As it turns out, the origin of fruitcake can be found in a long-lost piece of biblical scripture that was never canonized, called The Book of Festivities. The book explains how fruitcake was created by God as a punishment for unfaithful early Christians.

"Jesus said to the Lord, 'Father, the men of the world have used my birthday as an excuse to make money and engage in mindless eggnog-induced merrymaking. Also, they buy presents for everyone except me!' And thus the Lord said, 'Let there be a plague upon the earth. I will create a pastry most foul, and feed it to the masses as punishment for forgetting the Son on His birthday. They will quickly forget how much they hate it, and thus consume it again every following year!'"
-The Book of Festivities, 3:12-17

The original fruitcakes were lost over several hundred years, the last recorded sighting being in the early crusades where it was used as an effective but unwieldy blunt weapon. In the early nineteenth century, a young entrepreneur named Matthew Shrinkalheimer discovered the ancient scriptures and medieval documents which had been long-forgotten in the Library of Congress archives. He set to work recreating the pastry, and in 1818, every fruitcake in existence was baked. To this day, not a single fruitcake factory has been in operation, since most of the cakes made then have yet to be sold.

Well, I hope this has been enlightening for you. I know that my life has been enriched through this knowledge, and I hope you feel enriched as well. To my fellow students, I wish you the best of luck on your final exams, and to everyone I wish a happy holiday season.