Blog Guy, a couple of months ago you said there were pockets of China that have little gravity. Do you have any more info on that?

Sure. Here are military training photos from Sichuan Province. These guys have bricks hanging on them at all times, even when they sleep, just to keep grounded.

I think you’re full of it. I’ve seen people walking around brickless in Sichuan without any problem.

I’m going to change my answer slightly. These guys are in a yo-yo club. Chinese yo-yos are…

No, they’re not yo-yos, Blog Guy…

This man suffers from sleep-walking, and the brick stops him from… Wait! These are prisoners in a Chinese chain gang?

That’s it! You’re a moron. I’m out of here.

Don’t go! These are Chinese lunchboxes. Hey Chen, I’ll trade you my Braunschweiger sandwich for your Hostess Cupcake….”

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Paramilitary policemen attend a training session at a military base in Suining, Sichuan province June 23, 2009. REUTERS/ Stringer

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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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If you weren’t convinced the world is going to hell from reading my post on the Heart Attack Grill, here’s an item that should put you over the top.

You know how, after a hard day of work, you really want to find somebody to belittle and demean and taunt?

Yeah, me neither. But now there’s this bar that actually encourages its customers to insult the staff, and even gives free drinks for really creative abuse. Seriously.

“When you come in after work, you can swear at them and call them bastard or imbecile,” said one happy customer.

Here’s what I think would be REALLY neat. I like to imagine that as this bar gets more publicity, people will come from farther away to try their abuse, and some of them will accidentally go to the bar across the street. The one owned and staffed by twisted psychopaths and recently released homicidal maniacs.

I’ll just sip my drink and watch the fun.

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Above: A boat sails past buildings at the coast line of Cullera, Spain, where the bar is located, March 27, 2009. REUTERS/Heino Kalis

Below: Co-owner Michal Lotocki (L) and a customer argue and insult each other in a friendly way at the ‘Casa Pocho’ bar in Cullera, June 18, 2009. REUTERS/ Heino Kalis

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Blog Guy, I just heard that a pilot on a Continental Airlines flight from Brussels to Newark died in mid-flight today!

That’s true. But the plane was landed safely by two co-pilots.

Yikes! That raises so many questions!

Like what?

Like, when the plane landed, what did the arrival sign look like?

I’m very glad you asked that, complete stranger. It gives me the opportunity to use our actual photograph of the sign, which otherwise nobody might ever see. It looked a lot like this.

Amazing! were you alone with that shot?

Um, something tells me others managed to get it, too.

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Above: A message board shows the arrival of flights at Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey, June 18, 2009. The pilot of Continental Airlines flight 61 died in mid-flight and the plane landed safely under the control of two co-pilots.

Right: cameramen shoot the arrival boards.

REUTERS photos by Eric Thayer

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Sometimes a news story is so jam-packed with stupidity that it just overflows with creamy stupid goodness.

A teenager goes into a tattoo parlor. She says she wants three stars tattooed on her face, but ends up getting 56, which would be a whole lot more than three.

You’re saying, “Bob, how does something this stupid happen?”

For starters, she FALLS ASLEEP during the procedure, and wakes up as her nose is being tattooed, or so she says. I personally can’t see dozing off while some guy is puncturing my face like a pin-cushion, but maybe that’s just me.

Here’s another thing. The tattoo “artist” says he thought the girl wanted 56 stars.

Kids, a tattoo parlor is a place where you don’t want ANY ambiguity whatsoever.

You know how you always double-check that your surgeon knows how many legs you want amputated, and you always ask which cord to pull to deploy your parachute? Well, it’s just like that.

So now this poor girl has to live with those 56 facial stars the whole time she’s at Harvard, if she goes there. And later in life, say she’s a Supreme Court Justice, she’ll always be “Justice Johnson, the first Supreme Court Justice with 56 stars on her face…”

Video report

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Above: Video grab of star tattoo girl

Left: Isobel Varley poses during a tattoo fair in Gijon, Spain, May 15, 2009. Varley, born in 1937, is the most senior tattooed woman in the world according to the Guinness World Records. REUTERS/ Eloy Alonso

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Blog Guy, I know you closely follow the film industry. What’s Steven Spielberg’s next blockbuster?

Well, of course he put his movie projects on hold in recent months while he campaigned to become President of Iran. But now it looks like…

WHAT? President of Iran?

Yeah, you probably followed the campaign as I did, through photos, but he must have lost, because he suddenly dropped off of the photo file.

You’re trying to tell me the director of “Schindler’s List” ran for President of Iran? Are  you an idiot? You’re mixing up Spielberg with presidential candidate Mirhossein Mousavi!

Oh yeah? Have you ever seen those two dudes together at the same time?

Of course not!

Bingo. Makes you think, doesn’t it?

Above left: Iran presidential candidate Mirhossein Mousavi, REUTERS/Raheb Homavandi

Above right: Director Steven Spielberg REUTERS/Mike Theiler

Left upper: Iran presidential candidate Mirhossein Mousavi REUTERS/Morteza Nikoubazi

Left lower: Director Steven Spielberg REUTERS/Jean-Paul Pelissier

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Okay marketing team, we need an image for our new candy product.

We want to use a man’s name. It turns out Russell Stover is already taken, so we’re gonna have to go with our second choice, Osama bin Laden.

Heck, let’s call him SUPER! Nothing says “yummy, tasty, milk coconut kulfa balls” like Super Osama bin Laden.

I want a photo of him with his mouth open, holding up a finger like he’s saying, “Kids, they’re kulfa-licious!”

Lonnie, we’ll need a marketing plan similar to the ones for our Gummy Hitlers and Satan Brittle.

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A man holds a box of Pakistan-made “Super Osama Bin Laden, Kulfa Balls” milk and coconut flavor hard candies bought at a bazaar in Kandahar city June 10, 2009.  REUTERS/ Jorge Silva

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Two places that belong in the Disgusting Infestation Hall of Fame have reason to celebrate today.

This week we heard about a police station in Sierra Leone that was overrun by venomous snakes. I’m pleased to report soldiers with AK-47s and firemen with power hoses have attacked the slither-fest, and killed about 250 of the 400 snakes.

Imagine how much safer folks will feel now, with a mere 150 snakes left!

Meanwhile, I’ve blogged about Alaska’s Rat Island, which has been run by rats for 229 years ever since a shipwreck spilled rampaging rodents onto the remote island. Suffice it to say as an island tourist destination, Rat Island hasn’t been giving Maui any sleepless nights.

But now the place appears to be rat-free, thanks to a government program of dropping poison from helicopter-hoisted buckets. The only remaining question is what to call the place.

Some helpful suggestions from me:

• The Fetid Stench-Pit Formerly Known as Rat Island
• Your Tax Dollars at Work Island
• Little Skeletons Island

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Above: Rat Island in a 2006 file photo. REUTERS/Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge/Handout.

Right: A St. Domenico statue is covered with snakes at the beginning of the St. Domenico’s procession in Cocullo, central Italy in a 2007 file photo. REUTERS/ Alessandro Bianchi/Files

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Ring ring ring…

“Hello? Is this the police? I want to come down to the station to report a stolen car…”

“Your call is important to us. Currently our office is being overrun by hundreds of venomous snakes, so please expect to be bitten a few times and maybe die.”

“Ah, then I think I’ll just wait. Maybe I’ll start taking the bus instead of driving. Good-bye.”

The above was a simulated conversation about a real situation over in Sierra Leone, where an actual police station is overflowing with slithering cobras and vipers.

According to our story they’ve tried getting rid of them by using snake charmers and have also tried smoking them out, with no luck. The next plan is to use firemen and soldiers to flood them out, which I’m guessing they haven’t properly discussed with experts or with their insurance agents.

I’m also guessing that the only bright spot is that reported crimes in that precinct are way, way down.

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Above: Snake Handler Jack Bibby dangles rattlesnakes from his mouth during a performance at the Taylor Rattlesnake Sacking Championships in Taylor, Texas, in a 2007 file photo. REUTERS/Jessica Rinaldi

Left: A traditional dancing devil parades down the streets of central Freetown, Sierra Leone, in a 2008 file photo. REUTERS/Katrina Manson

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A guy has been sentenced to five months in jail for snatching the toupee off the head of a politician. Five months, and I’m not making that up.

The court’s reasoning was that the wig-grabber deprived the lawmaker of his “freedom to look good.”

Honestly, I wasn’t even aware that there WAS a freedom to look good, or I would have exercised it long ago.

It seems like this landmark decision could be the basis for legal action against the makers of nose rings, pork pie hats and even worse stuff, if there IS worse stuff.

And surely barbers who give mullet haircuts could go to prison for life.

I’d give a lot to see this guy on his first day in the slammer, when he has to tell the other hardened cons that he’s doing time for wig-snatching. They may deprive  him of his freedom to look good pretty quickly.

Video of the wig incident

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Above: Not the guy in the story. Former Philippine presidential contender Eddie Gil touches his wig in 2004 file photo. REUTERS/ Erik de Castro

Left: Wigged women at the E3 Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles, June 2, 2009. REUTERS/Phil McCarten

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