F Osama, We've Got Eggs To Hunt

Hello, Phans, welcome to the Peverett Phile. If you're wondering why there's an Easter themed title this week, it's because next week I am planning something for the Phile's 69th entry next week. So, it was so nice out today, comedian Eddie Griffin walked into a concrete barrier. What a story! A woman is having a snack, choking to death, and she receives the Heimlich treatment from her dog. This is a very talented dog — he also did Regis’ bypass surgery. Happy birthday to Hugh Heffner — 81 years old yesterday. Quite a guy. You know, Hugh Heffner takes so much Viagra, that when he dies it’s going to be an open coffin. It seems like every couple of weeks, we hear that McDonald’s is making their menu more diet friendly. Fewer calories, no trans fats . . . They’re now offering a third of a pound hamburger. The damn hamburger weighs a third of a pound. Don’t worry though . . . You get a pretty good workout at the ketchup pump. There’s a couple of paparazzi who are suing Denise Richards and Pamela Anderson for physically and verbally abusing them. Suing them! I would pay for that! Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is the No. 1 movie in America. They beat the 300. Which is embarrassing for the Spartans. They hold off thousands and thousands of heavily armed Persians, but four turtles and you’re done. I saw the Turtles film last week, but haven't seen 300 yet. I want to see 1 through 299 first. I’m bummed. I have a little tradition. On Thursday nights, I go the kitchen after writing the blog and I treat myself . . . I eat a can of dog food, and now I find out it might be poisonous. Al Gore testified yesterday about global warming. Al Gore told members of Congress that, "The planet has a fever, and it needs a doctor.” When they heard this, members of Congress said, "Yeah. You won an Oscar for this?” Sources at the Pentagon say several factories in Iraq will soon begin making clothes to be sold in the United States. That’s right. Because Americans only want two things from Iraq: a central stable government and affordable quality men’s wear. Britney Spears has agreed to give estranged husband Kevin Federline $20 million in a divorce settlement. Apparently Federline will get $2 million in cash and the rest in beef jerky. Baseball spring training underway. Players on the San Francisco Giants don’t mind playing with Barry Bonds, because they’re hoping some of his greatness will rub off on them. Either that or they’re hoping Bonds will inject some of his greatness into their biceps. By the way, this entry of the Phile is sponsored by Ray-Ban: We'd love to be sitting on your face.

BROKEN

UNFORTUNATE STAR WARS COSTUMES

Judging by the expressions of the guy dressed as the Hoth soldier, either he's never seen a girl in just her bra before or her breasts are set to stun.

and now for another new feature called...

DIG FOR NOSEBERRIES

Sting polices his proboscis while perambulating in London, 2006.

WHEN YOU'RE A CELEBRITY, ADIOS REALITY

Picture it, Maputo, 2007: Teams of two Americans spend time in airports trying to get airplane tickets. One team, a little person and her annoying cousin fly away first, leaving all the other teams behind to fight for standby seats on overbooked flights to Tanzania. That pretty much sums up most of last night’s "Amazing Race 11" episode, which largely took place in airports. Despite this, because the editors are among the best around, the results were still engaging, if not exactly suspenseful. The episode would have been a lot better if it’d included more of Oswald’s impression of Santino impersonating Tim Gunn on "Project Runway". “We have the same driver, Andre,” he said. Slipping into a Santino-as-Gunn voice, he said, “Andrae, where’s Andrae?” At Red Lobster, of course. Eric said, with a completely serious tone and expression, that Tanzania is “where the Tanzanian devil lives.” After Danielle corrected him (“Tasmania”), he tried to regather his testicles and insert them back into his scrotum by mocking his alleged girlfriend: “I was just kidding. You knucklehead.” “That was a little awkward, holding hands and all that religious stuff,” Charla said after Mirna asked an airport employee who was helping them to hold hands and pray with her. “He enjoyed it,” Mirna said. Walking down the jetway, Eric committed one of the biggest race sins: foreshadowing one’s own calamity. “Still waiting for somebody to run after us and tell us to stop,” he said. Moments later, on board the plane, an airline rep told them, “You were accidentally given somebody else’s seats. Sorry, I must ask you to leave the plane right now.” Eric offered the passengers “50 bucks” “to get off the plane,” but no one agreed, perhaps because they knew he was racing for $1 million, the cheap bastard. Being pulled off the plane led Danielle to throw her backpack to the ground, start crying, and demand more juice and peanut butter crackers. “I don’t wanna do this anymore,” she cried. “Due to the weather,” Charla and Mirna were told, their boat to Zanzibar would leave at 5:30 a.m. the next day. That was pretty suspicious, considering that delay would allow the rest of the group to catch up to their commanding lead, especially since the clouds overhead were just wispy little ones. At least edit in some thunderheads. “This is our corner. We work this bench,” Oswald told Charla and Mirna, pretending to be a prostitute. While Mirna laid on the deck of a boat, waving a TAR flag, Charla leaned overboard and hurled. This was funny because of the editing, which showed everyone lounging on the boat, and as the camera panned to puking Charla, the soundtrack stopped with a violent record scratch. It was also funny because puke is inherently humorous, unless it’s coming out of one’s own mouth. “Two ones in a row. You are too hot to handle,” Phil told Charla and Mirna checked in first again, and they screamed excitedly. “I have some good news for you,” Phil continued. “As the winners of this leg of the race, you have each won a 12-and-a-half foot catamaran.” Cue the crickets. “Huh?” Mirna asked. “What is that?” Charla said. “It’s adual-hulled sailing boat,” Phil said, as if that was in any way more descriptive, and the two pretended to be excited. Uchenna and Joyce checked in third but had a 30-minute penalty because they were marked for elimination. But they were at least 30 minutes ahead of the next team, so their penalty turned out to be irrelevant. Oh, new nonelimination leg penalty. You are better than the begging for money penalty, but you fail to deliver drama so often, I fear you will be replaced soon. “There’s always a chance,” Teri said, but there wasn’t. The Guidos easily beat them to the pit stop, and no one really cares that they’re gone. Five seconds from next week’s two-hour episode seemed to make up for the slower parts of this week’s episode: Charla in knight’s armor falling on her face. I’m making the popcorn now.

TODAY IN HISTORY

1951: Julius and Ethel Rosenberg are both convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage. 1977: Lee Harvey Oswald's best friend, and coincidentally a friend of both Jackie Kennedy and George HW Bush, Dallas socialite George de Mohrenschildt dies from a self-inflicted shotgun wound to the mouth, at 3:45 pm. It is likely he was going to be called to testify before the House Select Committee on Assassinations. 1979: A U.S. House of Representatives committee report finds that John F. Kennedy's assassination was the result of a conspiracy. 1992: Arkansas Governor and Presidential candidate Bill Clinton tells the New York Times: "When I was in England, I experimented with marijuana a time or two, and I didn't like it. I didn't inhale, and never tried it again." 1997: Kazuo Konya, a formermember of the Aum cult, tells Tokyo Municipal Court that he paid $8,100 for the privilege of drinking the guru's blood in a 1988 initiation ritual. Other former cult members also testify they paid for blood, strands of Shoko Asahara's hair, and his bath water. Some say they paid $2,400 for an intravenous injection of an unknown substance. Ironically, all throughout, Asahara preached to his followers that they should renounce materialism.

LESSONS LEARNED FROM CARTOONS

CARTOON: Scooby Doo LESSON: Trust no one. Those phantoms in the fog are actually malevolent hicks, dressed up as ghosts to scare you off their spooky farm. That monster hiding in the attic is actually old man McGee, trying to find the treasure buried in the floorboards. And that happy-go-lucky frat boy, Fred, is actually a bloodthirsty killer. Don’t turn your back on him. Or the girls. Or your dog… Or maybe we’ve just been spending too much time in the Mystery Machine, and got a little contact high paranoia. Hey, it happens. You want a Scooby Snack? Yeah, it is dog food. So what? You’re really harshing my mellow man. What are you, a narc? How it affected us as adults: We can’t be certain, but it would appear that our habit of, upon being dumped, grabbing hold of our ex-girlfriends’ chin and yanking upward, started with this show.

UNITENTIONALLY FUNNY COMIC BOOK PANELS

DAD

MOVIE BUZZ

Sweeny Todd: Here's your first look at Johnny Depp in character in his new musical. And since that character is a serial-killing barber, this is the first musical guys will drag their girlfriends to instead of viceversa.

Transformers: Optimus Prime and Megatron go head-to-head in a pair of new movie posters. I think I would have gone with a couple of cardboard theater standees that actually changed from car to robot and back.

John Rambo: Australian authorities may have taken away Sly's stash of human growth hormone, but it looks like the substance did the trick in these set-visit pics. Come on, guys. Give it back. He looks good!

The Dark Knight: Oh no! The Joker's henchmen are trying to steal the Batmobile! All right, they're probably just stunt guys giving the badass vehicle a once-over between takes, but I had to try to make this set-visit pic seem a little more exciting. Spider-Man 3: You can watch the "final" trailer here. Did we really need another one? Aren't I excited enough? Ah, who am I kidding, I could watch a hundred of these. TMNT: Featuring the voices of Chris Evans, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Mako, Kevin Smith, Patrick Stewart, Laurence Fishburne, Ziyi Zhang. Now that the kids who grew up with the Turtles the first time around are having babies of their own, they decided to make the pizza-eating crime fighters detached, depressed and needing space to work out their "issues." I'm not making any of that up, either, by the way. Even April's boyfriend has newfound commitment problems. I spent the first part of this movie wondering who they'd made it for. But then the shelled ones start battling the Foot Clan, and it more or less rights itself. I knew the toys and the TV show were hot again, so it was a matter of time before they dusted this off and made a new film version. And really, since it was inevitable — and even more inevitable that it'd be animated instead of dorky-but-amiable live-action — and further, easily assumed that it'd be by-the-numbers in the plot department, at least they went and made it look nice. It's almost a kid noir since it all happens at night and in sewers. And the CG is so depth-y, it's like watching a 3-D movie. It makes the first Shrek look primitive by comparison. You know what kids love? Irony! Well, you'd think they did from watching this, anyway. When "cowabunga" is reduced to a kind of in-joke instead of assuming its rightful place as a ridiculous dialogue staple, you know you're in for a movie that, as I mentioned earlier, is twisting itself into a pretzel to appeal to parents, too. And I always thought movies like this were made so that parents could have a little nap while the kids enjoyed themselves. I kind of liked the 13 monsters unleashed on the city that the turtles have to battle. They're forbidding, well-designed and memorable. And the fighting scenes are definite kid-pleasers. Also, it's also the perfect vehicle for an actor like Zhang to continue practicing English. It sure beats throwing her into something like Memoirs of a Geisha. In this Warner Bros. movie, the rat guru Splinter's hobby is "watching [his] stories." To demonstrate this, he turns on the TV and the CW show Gilmore Girls is on. Well, that's it for another entry of the Phile. Check out the Phile's Webshots page for pictures of my life and my Myspace page. We are close to reaching 1500 views of the Phile here, but my goal is 2000 by June or July. So, spread the word, not the turd.