Color me embarrassed. We had a PRETTY BAD error on our file, and is our policy, we had to publicly correct it. It seems we reported that Bulgarian prosecutors are investigating a new gambling game in which drivers defy death by speeding through red lights for bets of up to $2,200.

In a game known as ‘Russian road roulette,’ the driver must jump red lights at busy intersections at high speed and not crash into any other cars or pedestrians.

Imagine doing something that stupid for $2,200!

Well, it soon became clear we had it all wrong. It turned out, drivers are playing this game for bets of up to $7,400, which is a lot different from doing it just for chump change like $2,200.

But as insane as this game still sounds, the most amazing part to me is that according to our story, ONLOOKERS bet on the outcome, too!

“Hey Lamar, look! They’re havin’ one of those Russian road roulette games right here! Think we should get the hell out of the way to save ourselves?”

“Not so fast, Clancy! I’ll bet you $200 that red Mustang misses that pedestrian in the Hawaiian shirt… Oops! Well, we didn’t shake on it, Clancy…”

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These are just random photos of Bulgarian traffic carnage, not connected to Russian Road Roulette.

Above: Drivers and members of the Bulgarian security service confer after the leading car of the motorcade of the visiting Maltese President Guido de Marco collided with a truck near the village of Mursalevo in a 2001 file photo. REUTERS

Below: A Bulgarian firefighter tries to extinguish a burning taxi whose propane gas tank had caught fire on a motorway in central Sofia in a 2005 file photo. REUTERS

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The holidays are rushing at us, and if you’re like me, nothing says “Peace on Earth” like the topic of serial killers. So you’ll be happy to know that the 2010 Serial Killer Calendar is now available if you’re looking for a gift for Uncle Lamar, who broke out of maximum security and is knocking on your door with an ax.

I am not making this up. You really can get the calendar online, and at some pretty respectable bookshops.

But there’s other merchandise as well: Serial Killer Trading Cards, wall clocks bearing the faces of Jeffrey Dahmer, Ted Bundy and others, kitchen aprons with the faces of real cannibals… Again, not making this up.

James Gilks, owner of SerialKillerCalendar.com and the editor of Serial Killer Magazine, tells me there’s other stuff in the pipeline.

“In fact, we are in the process of printing a new line of Manson Family Energy Drinks called “Cult-a-Cola.” We are also working on a “Jim Jones Ghoul Aid.” Keep your eye out for that early next year,” Gilks says.

Personally, I think this dude is thinking WAY too small.

Where’s the “Jack the Ripper Bloody Mary Mix?” ” What about the Son of Sam Talking Dog Toy?”

The “Zodiac Killer Charm Bracelet?” Crap, where’s my “Vlad the Impaler Giant Ice Pick?”

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Blog Guy, did you read about those guys who made the highest parachute landing ever at a drop zone near Mount Everest last week?

So they had the danger of diving from four miles up, AND they had to avoid hitting Mount Everest! They must be REALLY macho!

Total weenies, those guys. If they had only checked around, they would have found much more dangerous new combo sports. Just to name a few:

• Jumping over Everest from four miles up while playing Russian roulette
• Jumping over Everest from four miles up in a jumpsuit full of cobras
• Jumping over Everest from four miles up with a three-mile bungee cord attached to the airplane
• Jumping over Everest from four miles up while listening to Barry Manilow on your iPod

Wow! Do you need a special parachute for those combo sports?

Who said anything about a parachute?

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Ramesh Chandra Tripathi, one of three team members, prepares to land at Gorakshep near the Mount Everest area, September 22, 2009. REUTERS/ Handout

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Welcome back to a feature called What Year is this Again? where we offer items that lack humor, but do make us wonder if we have somehow gone back in time…

Children, welcome to third grade! I’m Miss Johnson. Let’s start with all of you writing a paragraph called “How I Spent My Summer Vacation!”

Dear Miss Johnson, my family went to Disney World. We rode on every ride. I threw up.

Lisa

Dear Miss Johnson, we went to Martha’s Vineyard. I saw President Obama. He waved.

Sean

Dear Ms. Johnson. Last Sunday, Mommy and I were on a bus. There was a truck full of roosters. Some guys called “hit men” drove by and killed two men in the rooster truck. Four days earlier in the same city, “hit men” went to a clinic, lined up patients and killed 17 of them. Next summer, I want to visit Hollywood.

Rosie

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A woman and her daughter look at a crime scene where hitmen killed two men in the border city of Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, September 6, 2009. Four men were traveling in a truck loaded with roosters when they were attacked on Sunday afternoon in a drive-by shooting, according to local media. REUTERS/Tomas Bravo

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Blog Guy, you’ve set up amazing fantasy photos for readers, and now it’s my turn. It won’t be easy. I want Miss Universe and Miss USA together, on top of a skyscraper.

I think I can manage that.

There’s more. They must be holding a box of fancy cupcakes.

Cripes, that’s tough. Beauty queens won’t go CLOSE to tempting desserts!

That’s your problem, Blog Guy. That’s why you make the medium-size bucks. One more little thing. I want them using a futuristic death ray, incinerating people for fun.

You want them smiling and shooting folks with a death ray?

I’m talking mindless bliss, as they obliterate unsuspecting tourists. I don’t want to see a single thought in their heads.

Here you go. Two gorgeous, grinning empty skulls, amid an orgy of sticky cupcakes and incinerated pedestrians. Zzzzzzst! Sizzle! Zzzzzzst!

This is FAR better than I ever dreamed! I’ll never doubt you again, Blog Guy!

Good. Hey, don’t point that thing at ME, ladies!

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Miss Universe, Stefania Fernandez, of Venezuela and Miss USA, Kristen Dalton (R), pose on the observation deck at Rockefeller Center in New York, September 2, 2009. REUTERS photos by Lucas Jackson

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Quick quiz: In this photo on the right, President Obama is saying to the Kroger manager…

• “Five bucks for clementines? I pay $3.99 at the Safeway near the White House!
• “What the frick is a clementine?”
• “Do you sell these things in heavy syrup in a can?
• “I’m thinkin’ of gettin’ these for my death panels. You know how many pounds it takes to kill a really old person?”

Actually, the most interesting thing that happened at that Kroger visit was when Obama took a piece of fruit and ate it in front of everybody. The White House said he paid for it “seconds later.”

Well, maybe so, but I’ve tried the old, “Oh, I was GONNA pay you for that six-pound Cadbury bar I ate in aisle four,” and guess how well it worked for ME?

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Above: President Barack Obama holds a town hall meeting about health care at the Kroger Supermarket in Bristol, Virginia, July 29, 2009.

Right: Obama holds up a piece of fruit after biting into it.

REUTERS photos by Larry Downing

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Hey Blog Guy, sometimes I see funny stuff in the news and I’m sure you’ll use it in your blog, but then you don’t. Do you take bribes to ignore certain things?

Well sure, but folks don’t try to bribe me nearly often enough, even though it’s not hard to do. The truth is, I ignore some stuff because it’s just too obvious, and I do have some pride.

For instance, see this shot below of President Obama? It’s a very funny photo, so I didn’t use it. I’ll leave it to the hacks.

And then there was a story about a widow selling her husband’s burial spot directly above Marilyn Monroe’s crypt. Give me a break.

Sure, some guys went with headlines like Want to Lie with Marilyn Monroe Forever? or The Long Sleep, with Marilyn Monroe… Let ‘em do that if they want.

But you won’t see some cheesy Monroe movie reference like “Gentlemen Prefer Bones” under some smirking double entendre headline here, not as long as Bob Basler is doing this blog!

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Above: The crypts of Marilyn Monroe and Richard Poncher are pictured in Westwood, California August 17, 2009. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni

Below: President Barack Obama presents the Medal of Freedom to Joe Medicine Crow - High Bird during a ceremony in the East Room at the White House, August 12, 2009. REUTERS/Jim Young

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Blog Guy, you know stuff going on around the world. I’m a zombie - where can a guy like me kick back and have some fun with other zombies?

Oooooh, sorry, bad timing. You just missed the zombie parade in Frankfurt. You could have met hundreds of German zombies, if that sounds like fun to you.

I missed that? Damn! That’s the story of my life. Or the story of my undeath, I should say.

Well, don’t feel too bad about it. I just reread our actual captions on these photos, and we went out of our way to say these were people “made up to look like zombies.”

If we didn’t make that clear, many readers would think these were REAL brain-sucking zombies lurching through the downtown area of a major European city, a news event which of course we would blow off with just a few photos and no story.

Zombie slideshow

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A woman made up to look like zombie takes part in zombie parade in Frankfurt July 18, 2009.

People made up to look like zombies take part in zombie parade.

REUTERS photos by Johannes Eisele

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I’ve blogged before about Saint Death, this grinning skeletal figure who isn’t recognized by the Catholic Church, but is revered by drug traffickers and other criminal scumbags.

I get a kick out of this guy, because I don’t begin to see how he fits in with regular theology. I noticed this photo when soldiers in Mexico seized a house used for storing marijuana and a lab producing cocaine. According to the caption this is an “altar to venerate Saint Death.”

Looking at the AR-15 rifle leaning against the thing, I’m thinking they meant “ventilate” instead of venerate.

Anyway, note the statues of the saint and the large work of art. The caption doesn’t say, but I’m hoping and praying the artwork is made of velvet. It just seems right.

To get scholarly for a moment, the blown up section shows Death is smoking a joint, something you rarely see in religious art apart from Saint Jerry Garcia. He is also waving a scythe, similar to the one Saint Happy New Year! carries.

Finally, in big gold lettering on the frame we see SANTA MUERTE, which I believe translates to “Maybe we should have chosen another frickin’ career.”

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An AR-15 rifle is seen at the base of an altar to venerate Saint Death, inside a house seized by the army during an operation in Monterrey, northern Mexico June 23, 2009. The army seized a house used for storing marijuana and a lab producing cocaine during an operation early Tuesday. One man was detained and three more escaped, according to local media. REUTERS/Tomas Bravo

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Occasionally I do an item here having nothing remotely to do with humor, if it fits into a theme I call “Remind me what year this is, please?”

Right now, several people are on trial in the African country of Burundi, charged with murdering albinos to sell their body parts for use in witchcraft.

I’m going to mention what they are accused of again, in case you missed that. They are charged with killing albino human beings to sell their body parts.

It turns out more than 50 albinos have been murdered in Burundi and neighboring Tanzania in recent months. Witch doctors tell clients that albino body parts bring luck in love, life and business.

I don’t know too much about selling body parts, but if that many albinos have been killed, it’s pretty certain there is a viable market there.

Which leads me to wonder how much luck in love, life and business does a person have to want before shelling out money for the body parts of a fellow human being?

And by the way, I checked out the answer to my question: It seems this is 2009. Seriously.

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Above: A woman walks with her albino son to a courtroom in Ruyigi, Burundi, May 28, 2009. Prosecutors asked for life sentences for three people on trial for allegedly murdering albinos to sell their body parts for use in witchcraft.

Left: Kazungu Kassim (R), head of a Burundi albino association, listens to proceedings in the courtroom, May 28, 2009.

REUTERS photos by Jean Pierre Aime Harerimana

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