Scoreboard, Brought to You By The Emperors Club

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O’NEALS

  1. He Who Speaks to Spear Tooth 96
  2. We Got Nothing 87
  3. Young, Old and Restless 67
  4. Buzztime Tattoo 59
  5. Johnny Bettertimes 57

BARDS

  1. Sofa Kingdom 110
  2. Narcotyzing Dysfunktion 108
  3. Clients #10 and #11 80
  4. Cutz Dat Flo 69
  5. Um, I Think You Did Hook Up W/ Him 53

LOCUST RENDEZVOUS

  1. Ganjer or Mary Anne (aka Jams) 114**
  2. Trust Us We Know 101
  3. 1022 85
  4. Someone Went Corporate 74
  5. Grady Bunch 69

BLACK SHEEP

  1. Duane’s World 108
  2. Spitzer Swallows: Prince of Thieves 99
  3. The Original Spitzer Swallows 88
  4. Emperors Club VIP 86
  5. Trashtastic 82

GOOD DOG

  1. MAGMA 111
  2. Shomer Shabbas 83
  3. The Underachievers 81
  4. Lucille II 63
  5. The Misfitz 50

BARDS

  1. Western Omelette 104
  2. Hurtin Bombs 100
  3. Rather have a bottle in front of me…100
  4. Sofa Kingdom 95
  5. Yes You Can’t 83

**Had a perfect score going into final question. Missed “Who sings Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots?” Answer was Flaming Lips.

JGT Gets Blasted In Letter to the Editor

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The Metro received quite possibly the greatest letter ever after my column on Thursday. While I will admit that Thursday’s piece wasn’t my strongest work, I am frankly flattered that it inspired this young writing genius, Michael Pomranz, to respond with a diatribe that was longer than the piece itself. For your reading enjoyment, I have provided footnotes. You’re gonna like this:

Dear Involved Parties:

On Thursday, March 13, 2008, the Philadelphia Metro printed a column by author Johnny Goodtimes under the heading Goodtimes File entitled “Johnny Oldtimes”.

Rarely in my life am I privy to reading such uninspired hack (1). How being a “local quizmaster and blogger” qualifies someone to be a comedian, or even a commentator, is beyond me, and this article further confounded the decency of my senses (2).

Not only has this bit been played out by every comedian on the face of the planet (3) — let’s be honest, if this is the first time you’ve seen or heard the “things I know ’cause I am old that young people don’t know about and boy is that funny” bit, you may want to resign as an editor, or figure out why VH1 is blocked by your cable provider (4) — but given the opportunity to mine humor from it, Mr. Goodtimes (5) instead foregoes any inspiring commentary and simply settled for compiling a boring list.

For example: “They don’t remember when the Berlin Wall fell.” Wow? They don’t? That’s probably because they weren’t alive then (6). How about turning it on itself to say something like: “When they hear about the falling of the Berlin Wall, they think it sounds easy. That thing didn’t fall on its own. It took a lot of Germans with pickaxes to bring that sucker down.(7)”

See, Johnny. That is called adding humor and perspective (8). The topic is still a bit hacky, but at least I added some personal spin on it (9). We (10) could continue to dissect the inadequacies of every item of pedestrian babble on this list provided for Philadelphia’s reading pleasure, but since the Metro is (I can only assume) paying you (11) for your writing services, maybe you should put some more time into them yourselves in the future.

cheers!
Mike Pomranz

1) Occasionally Michael is privy to such hacks. But this is very rare.
2) You’d be amazed at how decent Michael’s senses are. They remind me of Tipper Gore’s senses.
3) Not true. Carrot Top refuses to use this bit in his act “on principle”.
4) Dorothy resigned earlier today, stating that letter to the editor writer Michael Pomranz made her realize that she just wasn’t cut out for this job.
5) Thank you for addressing me formally, Senor Pomranz.
6) Actually, they were alive then. The Berlin Wall fell in 1990. But math isn’t Michael’s strong suit. Comedy is, as we can see by…
7) HA! Oh my-HA! Germans with-HAHAHAHAHA! Did he just say that the Germans had pickaxes! No he didn’t! I didn’t even think about that! (Loud guffawing, reader falls to the floor, holding sides.) Stop it! Stop it, Michael, no more about the Germans! I bet Hitler had a pickaxe! HAHAHAHAHA!
8) If there is one thing your 300 word diatribe to the editor about a 300 word column has taught us, Michael, it is perspective.
9) I’ll say you did! Pickaxes! HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
10) Did he just invoke the royal “We” in a non-ironic fashion while complaining about a hack writer?
11) They are Mike, but after this tour de force of a letter to the editor, I think they might just be paying someone else to do some writing in the near future 😉 LOL!

Around the Horn

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  • This is kind of sweet. Ben Franklin impersonator Ralph Archbold (above, with duck) is going to marry a Betsy Ross impersonator. I’m still hoping to marry an Ashley Dupre impersonator.
  • Quizzo continues to get no respect. The City Paper has a bracket of 76 things that are quintessentially Philly, and quizzo apparently got knocked of early in its conference tournament by the Spiral Q Puppet Theatre and didn’t make the dance. Anyhow, the brackets are a lot of fun, and you can vote for Trivia Art over at Foobooz when you fill ’em out.
  • Here are Philly natives Tim and Eric in a vodka ad with Zach Galifinakis that is hilarious.
  • My kind of movie critic: What distinguishes “Horton Hears a Who!” from the other recent Dr. Seuss film adaptations is that it is not one of the worst movies ever made.

Political Sex Scandals Quiz

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  1. What was the name of the woman who accused Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment in 1991?
  2. For many years, there were rumors of a homosexual affair between between senator Rufus King and this president.
  3. Gary Condit had an affair with chandra levy while was a Representative from what state?
  4. In what year did Jim McGreevey state that he was a gay American?
  5. This Republican, highly critical of Clinton during the Monica Lewinsky scandal, was at the time carrying on an affair himself with a woman named Calista Bisek.
  6. This founding father was involved in a torrid affair with a woman named Maria Reynolds. A muckraker named James Callendar published letters between the lovers, and it caused the man not to run in the 1800 election.
  7. Speaking of the 1800 election, another controversy brewed when it was discovered that Thomas Jefferson had a black lover. What was her name?
  8. Larry Craig tried to have this gay congressman expelled in 1990 after it was discovered that he had allowed a male prostitute to run an escort service out of the congressman’s home.
  9. Gary Hart’s run at the presidency was derailed in 1988 because of photos of he and Donna Rice on board this aptly named yacht.
  10. In 2007, Deborah Pelfrey was charged with running a house of prostitution, a ring had Republican Senator David Vitter as a client. What was her nickname?

Answers after the jump.

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The Donspiracist Returns With: The United States of North America?

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Most of you have probably noticed the precipitous plummet of the US dollar on world markets. As of this writing, it is now trading at a low of $1.54 versus the euro. Big deal you might say: the euro is a fairly new currency; historic lows against it don’t mean much. But when I last visited Europe in the summer of 2004 it was only trading in the low $1.20’s. Even then, experts had begun to speculate that perhaps the euro was destined to become the new world currency.

If you’re not convinced something odd is up, then note how the Canadian dollar is on par with the US dollar. In fact, it’s worth slightly more. That’s the first time that’s happened in ages. It indicates that something dire is happening to our economy.

But it goes deeper…

Cut to a mere week and a half ago, when Canada and the US made a historic but little covered agreement, pledging military support to one another in cases of domestic civil disturbance. Jerome Corsi, on WorldNetDaily, correctly notes that the import of the agreement is that it “was not submitted to Congress for approval, nor did Congress pass any law or treaty specifically authorizing this military agreement to combine the operations of the armed forces of the United States and Canada in the event of a wide range of domestic civil disturbances ranging from violent storms, to health epidemics, to civil riots or terrorist attacks.”

In other words, the governments of the US and Canada made a decision, without consulting you and your representatives that could have significant military implications over the lives of American citizens…

Welcome to the New World Order. Welcome to the North American Union.

Continue reading “The Donspiracist Returns With: The United States of North America?” →

Beauty Shop Cafe enters the fray

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The Beauty Shop Cafe, aka the place where I get my coffee (corner of 20th and Fitzwater) has signed on as a Quizzo Bowl sponsor. I am a big fan of this place due to it’s excellent coffee and baked goods, as well as a few tasty sandwiches. In 2007, their iced coffee was named Best in the City by City Paper. And more importantly, the owner John helps me come up with ideas for my Metro column. So all in all I am a big fan of this place and I am sure that you will be too. Check ’em out on Myspace. I’d like to reiterate that there is no way I coulda made tickets this cheap without our fine sponsors, so I do ask that you give ’em a try. Zipcar, the world’s largest car sharing service, is providing financial assistance. Sly Fox Brewery, gold medal winners at the Great American Beer Festival in 2007, will be providing beer. Foobooz, Philly’s premier food and drink website, is providing promotional assistance.