The best thing about Halloween to me is that it illustrates just how stupid prejudice of any kind truly is. You go into the bank and you’ve got Count Dracula chatting it up with a teller dressed as Sponge Bob Square Pants – they’re getting along just fine. You’ve got a woman dressed as Sara Palin waving hello to a couple of drag queens, who may or may not even be dressed up. You see nuns and hookers going to Halloween parties together, Osama Bin Laden and George W Bush standing side by side handing out Halloween candy. Somehow we manage to set aside our differences for this one day a year to exist in perfect harmony. Why can’t we do that for the other 364 days of the year?

I was absolutely shocked when I first read that Jim Martin from the band Faith No More became a champion pumpkin farmer, I was surprised – he grew one of the world’s largest pumpkins ever (1064lb). This surprised me almost as much.

Tool front man Maynard James Keenan has opened up a store in his home town of Jerome, Arizona, population 300, to sell merchandise from his side project Pusicfer, local art, coffee and limited edition items. Like what? Cattle bones carved into eagles?

I heard the Puscifer side project, it was alright, but I wouldn’t think they would move enough merch that it would merit opening a full-blown retail location. Local art and coffee, okay… I guess. It just seems strange to go from a Grammy-award winning rock band to selling hillbilly art.

I was reading a new book called When You’re Engulfed in Flames. It’s a compilation of humorous short stories about author David Sedaris’ life, one of which involves him buying and using a catheter for convenience while traveling and on book tours. Essentially, the device consists of a latex sock, some tubing and a collection bag, which is strapped around one’s ankle. I wondered how one might choose the appropriate sock size to ensure a snug fit. I shared my curiosity with my wife, who works for a medical supply company. She said there is a disposable measuring device used specifically for this purpose. I couldn’t resist seeing what this “measure device” looked like.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBdymtyXt8Y 

The world’s fattest man got married; a 43-year-old Mexican man name Uribe, who, just two years ago tipped the scales at over 12-hundred pounds. He’s since lost 550 pounds and Sunday walked down the isle, marrying his girlfriend of 4 years.

I feel like I could make so many jokes right now. But the real kicker is, his girlfriend is pretty hot. This guy is almost 700 pounds and he found himself a hot woman to marry him. He doesn’t have the physical endurance to play a game of boggle, but he’s clearly got more game than you and me. I think Uribe’s got a lot more to laugh about than we do.

I used to be a big dude — 270 pounds. I ate healthy, exercised, and lost a pile of weight. I’m around 200 pounds right now. As proud as I am of that accomplishment, it’s pretty easy to take your mind off food when you can go for a walk, a jog, or go outside. Imagine trying to lose that weight, when you aren’t even healthy enough to get up and walk away from your bed.

Not bad, eh?

Tomorrow, we’ll be broadcasting the entire show from the The Hat on Jasper Ave. 10251 – Jasper Ave. It’s the old “Silk Hat”, which has been around since 1912. They closed down last year, freshened the place up, did some renos, added a new menu and tomorrow at 4pm they throw open the doors.

I was in Custom Costumes the other day and I saw Halloween costumes for DOGS. Now I love animals, but I love people too, which is why I’m going to let you in on a little secret. When you dress up your pets at Halloween, the rest of the world doesn’t think it’s cute. Sure they smile, but it’s because they’re thinking about strangling you to death with that leash!

I see people walking down my street with little dogs and they’ll be pushing the dog in a baby stroller. If your dog can’t walk on its own, it’s not even a pet. It’s just a lump of flesh. In which case, you might as well take a pound of ground beef out of your deep freeze and take THAT for a walk. It’s a dog. Maybe it’s a cute dog. Maybe it isn’t. The point is, it ISN’T a baby and no matter how dry your ovaries are, so how hard you took a slapshot to the junk, it will never BE a baby. Walk it on a leash.

Just so you know, when people call out “Hey look, it’s Goofy!”… they aren’t talking about the dog.

Congratulations to Elicia Weaver, who won herself $7,000 on Friday by solving the final Mega Money Music Montage. That makes a grand total of $14,000 handed out on this show alone. For those of you who spent countless hours listening to the montage in an fruitless attempt to grab a fistful our money, my apologies. Don’t think for a second that I’ve taken your effort for granted. In fact, I got this invoice from Team Magna for all the hard work they put in to trying to figure out the montage. I’ll personally see to it that it’s paid… as soon as my NHL career takes off.

I went to the Feist concert last night at Rexall. What a super-talented woman! I enjoyed myself so much, I’m a little bit embarrassed. There’s nothing WRONG with liking Feist, but that isn’t exactly a concert you go bragging to your buddies about, is it? Kinda like that scene in 40-Year-Old-Virgin. “You know how I know YOU’RE gay? Cause you like Coldplay.”

A pretty different crowd than you see at a lot of SONiC concerts. Very few exposed tattoos, no Mohawks, no distressed denim jeans. The crowd looked more like a bankers convention on a casual Friday than it did a concert. Still, at the front door was a security waiting to pad you down or search your bag. But even he was just going through the motions. “Slow night?” I asked. He just looked up at me and rolled his eyes in agreement — not a whole lot of people feeling stabby at the Feist show I guess.

It’s picture day here at the old radio factory. It’s just like picture day when you’re a kid. Only instead of my mom dressing me, it’s my wife. And just like picture day when you’re a kid, it’s a constant struggle to keep your shirt clean; at least up until you say cheese.

I figured snacking on a nectarine was pretty safe, but no. I happened to pick up the world’s juiciest nectarine, which ordinarily is a good thing; a gift from the gods, but not on picture day. By the time I stepped in front of the lens, my shirt was so full of pulp it looked like it I was in an explosion at Minute Maid.

With any luck, maybe the globs of nectarine pulp on my shirt will help draw the eye away from my twisted, contorted face. For some reason, trying to look natural in front of a camera is next to impossible for me. It’s like when you listen back to your voice on the answering machine. The immediate reaction is “I don’t sound like that”. I feel the same way about pictures.

When I don’t smile, I look like a serial killer. When I do, I somehow end up looking like my mother and father might have been brother and sister. First cousins; yes, but not brother and sister. Why is it so hard to look natural in pictures?

I was flipping through the paper the other day and I saw an ad for laser vision correction. Seemed like a good deal. I have great vision so I don’t need it, but when I saw the ad, I silently committed myself to getting it once by sight does begin to deteriorate. I even went so far as to read the fine print; nothing misleading. It said something trivial like “prices subject to change without notice”; no doubt in there to satisfy some lawyer somewhere.

Then, I started thinking more about who the ad might have been targeting — people with poor vision. Fine print, in an ad for people with poor vision. Isn’t that like advertising hearing aids on the radio and then whispering “additional may apply”. I like to think that as a society we’ve evolved to a point where we can assume because of inflation, prices will inevitably go up. It’s sad we have to include that in ads to begin with. But isn’t putting small print in an ad for people with poor vision, the same as not putting it in at all?