Build Date: Thu Nov 21 08:50:13 2024 UTC
Why should ANYONE around here feel in awe of "Fight Club?" Fuck "Fight Club."
-- Mr. Bad
El Destino versus the Nielsens
2002-01-21 22:44:20
"This is Deborah with the Nielsen TV ratings service," the cheery voice on the phone said. Viewers across America were about to be represented by a degenerate freak like me...
You're a paranoid geek, sitting home alone, and your phone rings. What the -- I should've asked her how she got my phone number; it's unlisted! But okay, Deborah -- assuming that is your REAL name... Bring it on. What is it the Nielsen ratings want to know today?
"Well, first of all, sir: what kind of TV shows do you watch." There was a pause. Er, I'd always assumed the questions would be more specific.
"Um...cartoons?" I said.
"And news. Sometimes I like to watch the news."
"And comedies. I like comedies. And dramas." Ooo, yeah. That oughta mess with their heads. I'm stickin' it to the Man!
Sadly, that was pretty much the only question Deborah had. (Besides whether or not I was the head of the household.) Oh, and there was one more question. "Please bear with me, sir. Are you of Spanish or Hispanic origin?
"That is, are any of your ancestors, parents, grandparents, great grandparents, and so on, from a Spanish-speaking country. Like Mexico, Puerto Rico, Cuba, or Spain."
Am I really sure this isn't some white supremacist group? I mean, she didn't ask if I spoke Spanish -- but rather, if I my great-grandfather may or may not have been Spanish. How will this help NBC know whether or not to bring back Blossom? I asked her to repeat the question, and sure enough, the Nielsen people had apparently written it out for Deborah on a little card.
"Are you of Spanish or Hispanic origin? That is, are any of your ancestors, parents, grandparents, great grandparents, and so on, from a Spanish-speaking country. Like Mexico, Puerto Rico, Cuba, or Spain."
That offended me for some reason. Some stranger calls out of the blue and starts asking questions about my gene pool. "We want to know better how to exploit Hispanics such as yourself by popularizing worthless consumer products," they're really saying. "The Nielsen organization thanks you for your time."
I feel dirty.
So here's a tip from El Destino, all you TV-viewing ladies and gentlemen aross this fine, proud and diverse nation of ours. From now until doomsday, whenever a pollster calls you up...
Lie.
T O P S T O R I E S
Another Nobel Prize-Winning Author Describes Drunkenness
This book won a Pulitzer Prize. Here's its famous paragraph on getting drunk... (More...)
'Why I'm pretty sure JD Vance had sex with a couch'
True or false? The answers await us in that magical land where all truths are revealed -- the internet. (More...)
In 2010 Dr. Cheng-Huai Ruan discovered a way to cause a patient with an abnormal heartbeat to get back into a normal rhythm by sticking a finger up the patient's ass. (More...)
WKRP in Cincinnati aired from 1978 through 1982. Howard Hesseman played Dr. Johnny Fever, a DJ from Los Angeles who was fired from his previous job for saying the word "booger" on the air. In the show Hesseman would do some dialogue, introduce a song, and start the song. You'd hear a few notes, but never the whole song. (More...)
SF Hippies Can't Get Their Act Together
The annual 420 Hippie Hill event in Golden Gate Park, where large crowds of hippies, wannabe hippies, and hippie poseurs drape themselves in tie dye t-shirts and gather on a hill on 4/20 to smoke weed, was cancelled this year because the organizers couldn't get their act together. (More...)
Mozart to be inducted into the Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame
Joining such hard-rocking inductees as Abba, Chet Atkins, Nat King Cole, and Neil Diamond, the Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame is proud to induct Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. (More...)
C L A S S I C P I G D O G
During a magnificent sunny day in a fast receding autumn, the Spock Science Monitor reporters once again blew the playa dust off of their computers and covered the 2002 Burning Man Decompression – held every year just east of Portola Hill in beautiful San Francisco. Both an afternoon and evening issues were released to the unsuspecting crowd of freaks attempting to in some small way experience the euphoria of the playa – if but for a brief afternoon far from the desolation of Northern Nevada. (More...)
It's not like I have a heroin problem, see. I'm just a self-indulgent brat who likes to live beyond her means. When I zip down to my corner Money Mart for a little cash-till-payday loan, I'm really not planning to spend it on drugs. I'll spend it on sushi. Seventy bucks of interest for a two-week $400 loan is perfectly reasonable, if you really need that hamachi. (More...)
A Treatise Prepared for the Gallup Organization on the Symbolism of the Scarab
Well dahlings, the response to my new tarot column has been quite overwhelming. I got three whole pieces of mail requesting my arcane insight. One asked why blogs suck so much, and one was a completely incomprehensible tale of bears shitting random numbers in the woods — I am fairly certain it was a cryptographic allegory. Howsomever, only ONE of the inquiries was accompanied by a crisp ten-dollar bill, and so it's the Gallup Organization that will this week reap the benefit of my wicked pack of cards. (More...)
Poor Metallica. All they want is to continue to put out the same weak "Heavy Metal" they've been churning out since the "And Justice For All" days? and make gooey wads of cash in the process. The problem is, people aren't buying their bound for the heavy metal scrap heap, over-produced, uninspired, tired crap. And let's face it, their various commercial endorsements won't pay for the lifestyle they've become comfortably accustomed to. Resorting to lawsuits makes perfect sense, when you need spending money. But just one lawsuit isn't going to pay their bills. So, to aid Metallica, I've composed an open letter to the boys in the band, with suggestions as to whom else they might sic their lapdog lawyers on... (More...)
Juggler Vain attempts to wrestle with the issues around the KPFA shutdown; Big-time wrestling ensues. (More...)
Skunk School -- Learn Why Not To Keep Skunks As Pets
There is an alarming trend in pet purchasing habits this fall. People inspired by the WWII film, "Life is Beautiful" -- the one with that annoying Italian guy -- are buying descented skunks by the millions. (More...)
