THis week, just to salt the wound a little bit, the theme for questions is gonna be ” Dallas”. One guess per person.

Michael Nutter called out the people of Philadelphia today in a stirring speech at LOVE Park. “This is supposed to be the city of brotherly love and sisterly affection. We need to start acting like it. We need to start acting like it,” he said. WE NEED…TO START…ACTING LIKE IT.”** What are you doing to show Brotherly Love? There is still a severe shortage of men in the Big Brothers Big Sisters program, which is a great way to make a huge impact on the future of the city. If that’s not your bag, why not go to philacares.com and find something that does interest you. The future of Philadelphia is in your hands. GET INVOLVED!

And speaking of Brotherly Love, I highly encourage you to watch this great 3 minute film about our beloved city.

A couple of years ago my girfriend at the time (the one who hates Houdini) and I took a romantic holiday weekend to Delaware for the Punkin’ Chunkin’. It almost turned out tragic. If you have not already read the story of the pumpkin accident that nearly ended my life, I highly recommend you read it. Last year, I went down, but got their too late for the actual chunkin and just hung out in Ocean City for a night.

Well, my old freshman roommate in college goes to Punkin Chunkin every year and this year he rented a freaking RV so that he and his friends would not have to leave the punkin field the whole weekend. You can see why we hit it off so well in college. So I’m heading down first thing tomorrow morning and will be taking plenty of pictures and some video. And hopefully this year I can avoid pumpkin tragedy.

–The Enola Gay pilot Paul Tibbets died and with him went his dream of dropping another atomic bomb.

-I don’t watch many movies, obviously, but I gotta admit, I’m kind of excited about American Gangster and might try to actually go to the theatre to see it. Denzel was so good as a bad guy in Training Day (though it wasn’t that great of a film), and I look forward to see him as the bad guy again.

-Speaking of gangsters, the City Paper has an interesting article about a restaurant in South Philly that is apparently run by the mob, but because the writers didn’t want to go swimming in the Schuylkill, they didn’t say what restaurant it is. Anybody got the inside scoop? (CP via Foobooz)

-Went to the dentist yesterday and got some great news: I’m getting a root canal! That’s right, only $3000 for one of the most awesome experiences of my life! Seriously, I can’t wait. I love not having dental insurance! This is gonna be awesome.

Alright, we’ve got until 5 p.m. today to determine which movie I’ll be watching. Just click here and vote for which classic movie I should watch for the first time. There’s some good ones, and we’ve got a pretty close match between three of them.

Due to renovations, we will not be having quizzo at the Good Dog tonight. If you have not had a chance to play the Spooktacular this week, be sure to make it to the Bards at 10 p.m. I might even start close to on time tonight. Doubtful, but possible. And who knows, you might get to see me go all Irish Jon on someone again like I did Tuesday night, when a girl who had sat there all night shouted out an answer on the 39th question. And finally, you could win tonight: Sofa Kingdom won’t be playing.
(photo courtesy of Messy and Picky)

-Thanks for voting for me, gang! Just got named Philly’s Best Quizzo in the City Paper for the 4th straight year. However, after that cover story yesterday, I have to wonder if Steve O. has taken my title as Philly’s favorite “C” celebrity. This kind of reminds me of when Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat took the Intercontinental Title from the “Macho Man” Randy Savage.

-Sarah of the Narotyzing Dysfunktion (above) definitely wins for best costume at quizzo this week, made even more impressive that she threw it together in an hour and a half with stuff she had lying around her apartment. And the best part about her outfit, as the Sofa Kingdom quickly pointed out: she was wearing loafers with her spats.

-Just when you’re ready to believe the stereotype that the Japanese are very efficient in the workplace, you find out they are really spending all their time at the office doing this with their pens.

-Don’t look now, but Dennis Kucinich is making a run.

-Here’s Trivia Art’s latest in the Metro (from yesterday).

Steve O. hooked me up with a ticket to the Zee Bar’s annual Halloween party, and I headed over there on Saturday night. It was filled with beautiful women and a lot of toolbag type guys wearing outfits that revealed how awesomely ripped they were. That included a group of guys who went as SWAT team that was sitting at a booth. At one point in the evening, a young lady said, “Come with me to my friends’ booth.”

Now, if there is anything more toolish than getting bottle service at a party where the alcohol is free I’d love to know what it is. But this team of totally ripped SWAT team guys had done just that, spending over $100 on a bottle of booze at a free booze party. Amazing.

By the time I got to their booth, all of the booze was gone, but a few of them were looking at me disgustedly. Finally, one of the guys goes, “You’re not with our group. Get the f*** out of here. You’re not f****** with us!” He glared at me angrily. Now, keep in mind that as this guy is getting all fired up at me for daring to sit at his booth, I am dressed as Pee Wee Herman. I thought about it for a second, and realized that if I started to fight this guy and Andy Reid (aka Steve O.) joined in, it would be one of the greatest C-celebrity Halloween stories ever. But Steve was nowhere to be seen, and there were four of them, so I figured that discretion would be the better part of valor.

I headed out, but not before chiming in, “Well, I guess I’ll just be going then” a la Pee Wee at the Private Club of the Satan’s Helpers. I looked over a few minutes later, and the head toolbag had his head in his hands. Apparently that bottle service booze had gotten the best of him. Or maybe he just felt bad for kicking out Pee Wee. 

Continue reading “JGT Almost catches a beatdown at Halloween Party” →

JD Outten (above, with son), whom I spoke about earlier this week because he took honorable mention in a middle school oratory contest that I deserved to win, answered back in the comments section with a poem of his own:
The Broadwater Gym Lights, have seen great sights,
But the greatest they ever did see:
was long before SARS
and a poem about Mars
And I defeated Johnny G. T.

In true East Coast/West COast fashion, I have answered with a poem of my own:

I’d memorized every line of that confounded rhyme
About a raven as black as dark fudge is
So when they announced that JD
Had defeated JGT
I knew he must have paid off the judges.

-Danny Lloyd, who played the young boy in The Shining, is currently a biology teacher in Louisville. He didn’t know he was acting in a horror movie until years later.

-Do yourself a favor and a story by the greatest horror writer ever today, Edgar Allen Poe.

-Harry Houdini died on Halloween, 1926, after some dude at McGill University punched him in the stomach. Perhaps not coincidentally, my ex-girlfriend (named, appropriately enough, Elvira) went to McGill University. The lesson: If you are a quizmaster, magician, or some other novelty profession, steer clear of McGill students and alumni.

-The jack o’lantern originated in Ireland. But they carved their jack’s outta turnips. Here’s some more Halloween fun facts.

-Ladies are dressing quite revealingly at Halloween these days. Are these outfits perpetuating stereotypes about certain professions (naughty nurse, tough cop, etc.)? And here’s an article in last years NY Times about the current trend of, ahem, revealing outfits. What do you guys think? Slutty outfits: harmless fun or a sign of the decay of the Western World?