I think I’m starting to buy into your whole idea that all sports are rigged with the shitacular reffing in the first half of the Super Bowl. – Tom Pandich
Tom sent that to me after the first half. Said phenomenon, of course, continued in the second half.
I don’t think it was only the reffing that bothered me. It was the whole package. The zebras aren’t the only ones whom blame can be put on this mess.
Let’s start with the National Anthem. Did we really need another Tribute To Nawlins to try to disguise the botched job the Junta did during Katrina? Didn’t the NFL do one during the first week of the season, and hold a fund-raising effort to boot? Isn’t the league forking over twenty mil to help rebuild the Superdome? Isn’t that enough? My God, it’s Aretha. Aretha Fuckin’ Franklin, a national treasure. As much as it was nice seeing Dr. John, she should have had the stage to herself. Goddamn shame, since her part of the anthem was terrific.
And what about that creepy Dr. Seuss thing? The choice of authors was appropriate, since that’s about the maximum level of reading ability most NFL players have. But combine that with a wizened Harrison Ford, and you’ve got something to scare people who are aware.
Then there’s the coin flip. Everyone knows how much I loathe Tom Brady and the whole New England Patriots/East Coast Bias mentality, so obviously I had nothing good to think about this. And that outfit he wore…okay, Brady Boosters, defend his alleged heterosexuality, I dare you. They should have done a last-minute change. You know who should have flipped the coin? John Conyers. It would have been a tribute to Detroit and a tribute to the memory of two women who helped change this country for the better, Coretta Scott King and Rosa Parks. Combined with Warren Moon making the Hall of Fame, it would have made a very powerful statement, especially with the architect of the Rooney Rule in the house.
It even continued after the game with Bettis’ retirement speech. Oh, how sweetly reminiscent of Elway, and what a wonderful way to end off the two weeks of blanket coverage of him. Excuse me while I vomit.
You know, I’m actually happy that Joe Cool and Bradshaw stayed away because of the money. It put the right touch of cynicism into the proceedings. If I was them, I’d stay away too if the goody bag only contained free airfare, hotel, use of a rental Caddy, two tickets to the game, and a thousand bucks of spending money. I’ve received offers as good when going on job interviews.
Combine all of this with the insult to football that was the game, and you have hours of nauseating memories. Those that weren’t blotted out by continual consumption of alcoholic beverages, that is.
Ah, but there were the commercials. Someone actually downloaded all of the commercials and put them into a torrent, which I proceeded to download to re-watch for purposes of this column. I’ll give you my views on the best and worst, in no particular order other than alphabetical by product…
THE SUPER PIMPS
The only “Magic Fridge” that should be linked to the Super Bowl was there twenty years ago
Please note: network pimps are not judged, but I have to admit that getting Hugh Hefner to push “Desperate Housewives” was a great touch. Ditto pimps for the NFL.
Best:
Aleve, “Live Long and Prosper”: Talk about twisting reality. Len is notorious for shying away from conventions, yet here the commercial would have us believe that his reluctance is due to the fact that he can’t give a Vulcan salute due to arthritis pain. But I’ll ignore it because it’s great to see him do anything. You also know that the reason he agreed to do this is because he’s seen what’s happened to Shatner after he became Priceline spokesman. Regular role in a dramatic series, Golden Globes, an Emmy…yeah, Len’s supposedly semi-retired, but you know he wants it. If he thinks this is Step One, more power to him. And it was a very effective commercial to boot.
Ameriquest: “That Killed Him”: Just the defibrillator being used as a bug zapper put this one over the top. Effective punchline as well. The other Ameriquest commercial, “Turbulence”, was just about as good.
Bud Light, “Magic Fridge”: Everyone’s praising this one, and rightly so. If I did rank the commercials, it would almost certainly be on top. Suitably goofy premise with an incredible payoff. “The Magic Fridge is back!” Wonderful.
Budweiser, “Streaker”: Every few years, they do something brilliant with the Clydesdales Playing Football concept. Remember the zebra reviewing the play from a few years ago? The image of that sheared, streaking sheep is going to stay with us for a long time. Can I request Bud’s ad agency to do a Clydesdales Playing Soccer ad for the World Cup? Maybe with hooligan rams in the audience?
Burger King, “Whopperettes”: This one’s produced a lot of polarization. People either love it or hate it. Put me in the former category. It’s brilliantly self-aware about its nature as an ad (and that the Burger King is, at heart, really creepy). Great production values, terrific costuming…BK’s been on a roll with its ads recently, and this continues the streak. All of a sudden, I feel hungry for a Whopper.
CareerBuilder, “Monkey Party” and “Jackasses”: I use CareerBuilder for my frequent job searches, so I’m happy to see they came through with a great pair of ads. It definitely makes the point, and the first ad used Quiet Riot. What’s not to praise?
FedEx, “Caveman”: If people aren’t anointing “Magic Fridge” as Best In Show, they’re giving the honor to this one. Again, it’s deserving. Great concept, great execution, message right on target. There’s only one problem with this: it’s a forty-five second commercial that’s jam-packed enough that they can’t cut it down to thirty for regular use. Of course, one wonders if this would have been made had Geico not done its own well-regarded caveman commercial recently.
Gillette, “Fusion Experiment”: The full one-minute version, not the thirty-second one. I recently bought the four-blade from Gillette, and now they come out with this, which pisses me off a bit. However, I don’t want the razor per se. I want the secret base and the experiment chamber. They’re the only things I need to achieve my destiny as Emperor of the World.
Honda, “Silver Goddess”: If you saw it, you know why I liked it. At last, Yosemite Sam got the girl.
MasterCard, “MacGyver”: My only fear is that the success of this ad will spawn other attempts by MasterCard’s ad agency to do other commercials with well-known TV characters. The conjunction between character and concept here is perfect, and really can’t be replicated. But they did pull off a difficult trick: revive a stale ad campaign while it’s still running. Kudos.
Michelob, “Yard Football”: Some retards have actually come out and said that this commercial encourages violence against women. That’s the only reason that I’m putting it in the Best list. Did they notice that the woman in the commercial got hers back at the end? I personally think that the commercial encourages gender equity. If you play football, get ready to experience bone-crunching hits, no matter what gender you are. The late Betty Friedan would have approved.
Nationwide, “Fabio Shampoo”: What a payoff. And they chose the perfect endorser. It’s well-known that Fabio likes to make fun of his image, and this did that effectively. Their “Swing” commercial almost made this list because, let’s face it, fat kids are funny.
Pizza Hut, “Miss Piggy”: How can you not love Miss Piggy, a true icon, clowning Jessica Simpleton? Especially after Simpson’s performance in her commercial? And to think that La Piggy’s erstwhile love is stuck in a shitty SUV commercial…
Sierra Mist, “Metal Detector”: PepsiCo misfired on most of their other commercials this year, but not on this one. Kathy Griffin’s magnificent deadpan performance and one of the few allusions in a Super Bowl commercial ever to an anal cavity search? Winner by my standards.
Sprint, “A Song For Every Occasion”: The cell phone commercials this year were just about as abysmal as the car commercials. This was one of the exception. Again, terrific concept, and taken in a totally unexpected direction. The moment that “Yakety Sax” kicked in…oh, yes, Benny would have approved.
Sprint, “Theft Deterrent”: Now, this is why I don’t own a cell phone. I WILL end up throwing it at people and, hopefully, doing damage. Probably the one commercial I fully empathized with.
United Airlines, “Slaying Dragons”: Sometimes I love weirdly symbolic commercials. I just want to know one thing: is it easier to kill a dragon or get through the United terminal at O’Hare?
Worst:
Aleve, “Dancing In The Street”: The same product having one of the best and one of the worst ads, and it’s not a beer or soft drink. This one was just too goofy. It actually made me want to suffer with pain more than take naproxen sodium.
Bud Light, “Skydiving”: Apparently, Anheuser-Busch shot their wad on their puppy piss with “Magic Fridge”. The rest of the commercials ranged from mediocre to awful (although “Save Yourself” had potential). This was the worst of the bunch. I mean, how would the pilot know that the Bud Light was thrown out of the plane? Logic, people, logic.
Budweiser, “Clydesdale Dream”: I just loathe cutesy inspirational ads like this. Guess that’s just me, though. But did it really need to be a one-minute ad? You can actually see where the cuts are going to take place to bring this down to thirty seconds for post-SB use.
Degree, “Stunt City”: A case study on how to undercut your entire premise. Fill up thirty seconds with stuntmen pulling off dangerous moves, and throw in the “Do Not Attempt This At Home” disclaimer throughout the ad. Shouldn’t this be obvious? Yes, I know, we’re a litigous society, and they have to throw that in so that some moron out there doesn’t sue the ad agency or the deodorant maker. If they needed the disclaimer, throw it on the final second of the commercial and that’s it. Good concept pissed away by legal necessities.
Diet Pepsi, “P Diddy”: Please note, putting P. Diddy and Jay Mohr in the same room is an invite to the Black Hole of Suck. Combine that with the “Brown and Bubbly” tagline (which sounds like something a WB sitcom would use), and you have a horrid situation happening. The Jackie Chan commercial somewhat redeemed it, but not enough.
Dove, “Campaign For Real Beauty”: Yes, intentions are good. But, the concept of a beauty care company using the media to combat media stereotypes of what’s beautiful in a woman, especially after decades of using those stereotypes to sell products…that just smacks so much of Altria’s anti-smoking efforts that you just have to pull the hypocrite card.
Emerald Nuts: “Druid”: Mnemonics are a dangerous tool in the wrong hands.
GoDaddy, “We Finally Got One Approved, Yay”: Maybe it’s the wrestling fan in me, but the only dirty old man that Candice should be involved with is Vince. It’ll be enough to maintain Candice’s momentum, but not the company’s.
Hummer, “Monster and Robot”: So f*cked up on so many levels that it’s impossible to describe.
Motorola, “Rock Of Ages”: So…Motorola makes all their phones out of meteors? I don’t get it. And financial analysts are saying that Moto’s making a big comeback. Not after this.
Nissan, “Manta Ray”: Again, what’s the point here? Why compare a car to a marine animal? Does the Murano drive underwater? If so, I want one.
Toyota, “Bilingual”: You want to impress me with bilingual capabilities, Toyota? Design a car that, when it hears an inordinate amount of Spanish being spoken inside, locks the doors, speeds up, and doesn’t stop until it’s over the Mexican border.
That’s enough of the meta-media stuff. On to the real Pimps…
THE PIMP SECTION FOR WRITERS ON THIS SITE
Oh my God, it’s Haley. By the way, John, do I get a free pass on Cena negativity considering my particular history?
Memo to Lucard: Is Half-Life more horror or science-fiction (no arguments about HL2; that’s SF all the way)? Because if you put Doom on the list and not HL, I’m going to have some rather vociferous objections.
And another Memo to Gubitosi: Considering the mindset of the troglodytes in this country, the particular biases said in public by football players, and what happened over the weekend in Massachusetts (and its continuation in Arkansas), would the Village People really be considered “safe”? By the way, if it isn’t the Village People doing the theme for The Emperor’s New School, it should be. It’s a perfect VP knock-off.
And yet another Memo to Morrison: Isn’t it “Dan DiDio”, not “Dan Dido”? And if you did the misspelling on purpose, what happened to the “l”?
Memo Number Four goes to Basilo: Not only is the contractual obligation to Spumco for a specific number of broadcasts the correct reason, but CN actually alluded to it in an Adult Swim bumper. They know it’s shit, they want to get its number of airings out of the way, then they want to bury it. The problem is that no hole’s deep enough for that turd. Of course, they’re now advertising a new episode this weekend, so we’ll see that one get a half-dozen plays and disappear too.
Hevia is only this low on the Pimp List because I wanted to put all of those Memos together. Just because I throw in screen caps into my stuff, he has to do Flash animations. But I have to admit it was great to see Mighty Molly again.
Pandich did a Super Bowl commercials things too, but mine’s better. However, he’s got the lead quote and reviews the Rescue Rangers and Duck Tales DVDs, so he’s still cool.
Boy, did Pusey get worked over by Pat and Steve on IPSR last week. And he’s striking back at Pat for it. This should be fun, considering that Pusey’s a boxing columnist, Pat has big balls, and Pusey has no qualms about low blows and easy targets.
Stevens is bald. Meanwhile, I’m older than he is and has a full head of hair. Be jealous, comic boy.
Hatton has his usual double shot of his comics and his friends. By the way, Hatton, did you include leap days in that countdown?
TNA FINALLY GETS THEIRS
So, it’s now official. Impact at 9PM Eastern, 8PM Civilization Time on Thursdays starting April 13th. Good for TNA. They’ve been pulling in steady ratings for Spike on Saturdays, so this was long expected and, in a sense, deserved.
Now come the questions, just so I can piss on their parade as I am wont to do. Question Number One: did TNA really want Mondays at 7 Civilization Time? They would have loved to have had the slot before Raw so that Spike could use them as a lead-in to UFC and not have wrestling fans change the station. Well, that was their mindset, and probably Spike’s as well, but apparently Jarrett forgot about the fact that we used to do that all the time with Nitro, watch the first hour, then switch over to Raw. Fortunately, someone at Spike realized this and said no. In fact, it may have decreased UFC’s ratings since the audience’s appetite would be whetted for wrestling and they’d want more.
Jarrett didn’t have enough stroke, so to speak, to get that extra half-hour that he wanted. Wonder what he traded that off for? Hopefully, it was for more network promotion for Impact, since, with this new slot, he really needs it. Who knows what ratings promises were made? Remember the abject lesson of one Extreme Championship Wrestling in their dealings with a previous incarnation of this very network. They were promising 2.0s by six months into the run.
Is Thursday the best day for them? I dunno. I don’t really watch network TV anymore (or much of any TV, really). So let me check zap2it and find the schedules…oh, hey, Lucy Lawless is going to be a regular on Galactica next season, as well as doing another preparatory guest shot later this month. Three hot Cylon chicks as regulars…oh, they’re really trying to make me forget my true love for Seven of Nine, aren’t they? Forget it. There’s only room for one beautiful cyborg in my life. Now, where was I…oh, yeah, TV schedules. So, Thursday nights. Hmmmm, Dancing With The Stars will be over by that time. My Name Is Earl and The Office are attempting to revive Must-See TV and doing a decent job at it. Ah, but then there’s CBS and a little show called CSI. Ay, there’s the rub. It’s only the number one rated show on the number one rated network, with all the effort that Viacom can bring to bear to promote it. Only American Idol tops it in the ratings on a consistent basis. Will Viacom be happy if CSI‘s ratings drop in favor of a rise for Impact? What they’re probably hoping for is that Impact can take away viewers from the show that more matches Impact‘s demographics, namely The O.C.. If that happens, we have a winner.
Now comes the big question. Will they be able to get above their normal .9 in a Thursday slot? You know what? The answer to that is no, at least not as much as they’re hoping (and what they hope for is approximately triple that number, or at least double it). “Oh, but, Eric,” you say in your pitiful, know-nothing fashion, “more people are at home on Thursday night than Saturday, when their target audience is out on dates and doing stuff like social interaction that you renounced years ago as unnecessary to your life. They’ll watch Impact.” Excuse me, but those people don’t exist. Who does Impact appeal to? The hardcore wrestling fan. Name me one hardcore wrestling fan who actually knows a woman well enough to go out with her. But let’s say there are people like that, and they happen to have a regular source of sexual relief in their lives (and that regular source happens to be female instead of, oh, one’s hand). Now, they’ve finished dinner and are sitting down to watch TV. He says, “Let’s watch Impact.” She says, “CSI.” He says, “Impact.” She says, “CSI, or you aren’t getting any tonight.” So CBS comes on and he’s rattled enough by the prospect not to DVR Impact (this is the first Sweeps Month that DVRs are being counted by Nielsen, by the way), and he ends up watching the replay on Saturday night, disappointed by the delay but at least not suffering from blue balls. This is the type of argument that doesn’t occur at 10PM on Saturdays, when there’s f*ck all else on. You know where they’ll gain audience share? The gay couple demographic. And they might be watching CSI too.
As to what this means to me, well, I did the Short Form with a show on Thursday and a show on Friday before, except now the shows are swapped. It means that the Short Form will be done on Saturday instead of Sunday, except when there’s a Saturday Night’s Main Event, in which case, the Triple Threat Short Form returns and it gets finished on Sunday, by which time you’ll already have forgotten what happened on Impact. That’s a benefit.
So, in other words, congrats, TNA, on your hard work to get to this point, but good luck, because you’re definitely going to need it.
HAS WWE DONE A MUHAMMAD CARTOON?
According to 1bullshit Junior, WWE’s applied for a trademark for “King of Kings”, obviously for Trip. Now, is this going to give a reason for the Christian fundies to bitch and moan? Of course it will. We’ve seen over the past week what happens when fundamentalists get their knickers in a twist over something like this. I can imagine Pat Robertson screaming about this with threats to assassinate Vince, or Fred Phelps leading a delegation over to Titan Tower to march in front of it with a bunch of weirdos singing hymns. By the way, if he should do so, please, someone, take a shot at him. It saves me the trouble of going up to Topeka to do so, especially since I don’t need to do any shopping right now.
They also put a trademark request in for something called “Cyber Sunday”. A replacement PPV along the same lines as Taboo Tuesday? What I think is that this is probably a preemptive strike to take away TNA’s chance of doing a Taboo Tuesday-style “interactive” PPV moreso than plans for one of their own. But that’s just me talking.
ARE THERE ANY TANNING SALONS IN ANCHORAGE?
You know that Vince had to be paying attention to the achievements of Michaela Hutchison, who on Sunday became the first female to ever win a state high school wrestling championship while competing against male competition. Despite the fact that she’s only a sophomore, Vince has to be looking into the possibilities for her long-term future; knowing Vince, those possibilities might include an arranged marriage to Reid Flair. On camera, of course.
The thing is, it isn’t only the freak-show attributes that have to be attractive to Vince. Hutchison comes from a wrestling family. She’s actually the third member of her family to win a state title. Her older sister was a bronze medalist at the state level. And they’re part of a brood of ten children. The comparisons to the Harts have to be overwhelming Vince right now, and they have the advantage of not being Canadian. An entire family of potential Kurt Angles, both male and female, just sitting there…the mind spins with possibilities.
Just look at those two older brothers who won state titles. Their names are Zeb and Eli. No shit. They’re named Zeb and Eli…they’re brothers…they’re from Alaska. “Creative” doesn’t have to invent a gimmick. It’s right there for the taking. It dovetails right into Vince’s inexplicable love for hillbillies. Honestly, if Northern Exposure was still on the air, the kids would be holding the tag titles right now.
You know what? Lay the groundwork right now, I say. It’s easy, and it could help some of the other performers. Invite Michaela to a Smackdown taping; get all twelve of the family to come, in fact, under the guise of an all-expenses-paid family vacation. At the taping, bring her out to the ring and have Angle present her with a replica Olympic gold medal and have him tell her that she’s well on her way to winning one of her own, that she’s a credit to amateur wrestling, etc. Then have Daivari interrupt the ceremony, whereupon Michaela takes him down. That’s worked pretty well in the past for other people, and you could do a lot with Daivari trying to erase the “stain” of being taken out by a 105-pound adolescent girl.
Oh, come on, Vince, you know you want to do it. So what’s stopping you?
And what’s stopping me now is the need to do the Short Form. So let’s move it…
THE SHORT FORM
Match Results:
Chris Masters over Kane, Road To Wrestlemania Tournament Quarter-Finals Match (Pinfall, rope-assisted rollup): A truly sad match ended by one of the lamest pinfalls I’ve ever seen. Although I do have to ask this: so, Kane’s made seven WM appearances. Does that include the ones as Isaac Yankem and the Fake Diesel? I don’t believe so. Kayfabe lives in some dark corners of WWE.
Ashley Massaro over MickieLexis LaJames (Pinfall, rollup): Now this was the result I expected at Royal Rumble. Why couldn’t they do it then and at least make one of my predictions correct? Why wait eight days? I don’t mind slow burns for angles, but I do mind when nothing happens during that slow burn. Yikes. And can’t Trish do better than that guy? I mean, really. He must be hung like a Clydesdale. That’s the only reason I can think of.
Trip over Ric Flair, Road To Wrestlemania Tournament Quarter-Finals Match (Pinfall, Pedigree): Well, the path starts. First Flair, then Michaels (okay, it was Michaels at the time), then Van Dam, and it’s on to face Cena at WM for reign number eleven (Steve Murray wrote me right after Raw and went on the same path as I did with this tournament). It’s inevitable, so all we can do is lie back and enjoy it. About this match, well, it’s simple, really. Flair’s pride won’t allow him to have a bad match. More importantly, Trip won’t allow Flair to have a bad match. He cares too much about him. So the match was actually decent. Its problem was that it happened after the bloodbaths they had late last year. After those, this one was just anti-climactic, and it suffered for being that way.
And before you say anything else, Steve Murray has a few words for you:
Okay, maybe I need to emphasize this for people that just don’t “get it”. I am 36 years old. My father is 55. Ric Flair, who is almost exactly my father’s age, is having matches against HHH, the biggest heel in the business. Meanwhile, my father just had quadruple-bypass surgery the day before Christmas, because he ate too much bacon & eggs & scrapple for breakfast. Wrestling fans tend to skew younger: believe me, you really will want to die before you get old.
I’m 41. I’ve had bad knees ever since I got out of the Army when I was 27. At that point, I was in the best shape of my life, and I still couldn’t do what Ric Flair does in the ring. Appreciate him, folks. He’s going to be gone soon, and we’re definitely going to have a void in our lives as wrestling fans when he hangs them up.
The Big Show over Shelton Benjamin, Road To Wrestlemania Tournament Quarter-Finals Match (Pinfall, chokeslam): So, we now have the crux of a Benjy/TBS feud in that little heart attack that Mamma suffered due to being yelled at by TBS. Well, at least they have something to do.
Rob Van Dam over Carly Colon, Road To Wrestlemania Tournament Quarter-Finals Match (Pinfall, Five-Star Frog Splash): A double-springboard twisting somersault senton? From Carly?! Or as Steve Murray put it, when did workrate matter with him all of a sudden? Here’s my theory: at one point during the Elimination Chamber match, Carly suffered a slight bit of brain damage. Specifically, the damage was to the section of the brain that was blocking him from exhibiting his wrestling skills. The damage was slight, so there’s still that inhibition, but occasionally, something will happen, something like the equivalent to an epileptic seizure, and he’ll pull out an actual move that will make us wonder why he hasn’t done that before. Well, I just told you why.
Now, let’s move to the other competitor. Remember I said last week that I didn’t miss Van Dam, but I missed Joey Styles calling a Van Dam match? This match exhibited a great example of why. It’s obvious that Van Dam blew the first Rolling Thunder. Styles, though, covered that up by calling it a “modified Rolling Thunder”. Of course, Van Dam committed the cardinal sin by repeating the spot, which made it obvious what happened. But that’s what Styles brings to the table if he’s familiar with the movesets of the guys he’s calling, as he certainly is with Van Dam. For those of you who are still inexplicably missing Ross, here’s an example of why you’re ‘tards.
John Cena and Maria Kanelis over Edge and Lita, Winner Gets To Choose The Special Guest Ref For Next Week’s Title Match Match (Pinfall, Maria pins Lita, misdirected Edge spear): Well, the rumor was floating around about an Edge/Foley feud culminating with a match at WM, and this was the official kick-off for that.
Angle Developments:
I’ll Pay You To Abuse Maria: Well, just as I suspected, they couldn’t think of a reason for Lita to hit Edge with the belt last week, other than the obvious one that I mentioned: Edge has a win over Cena in the books, therefore he’s a legit contender. Well, duh, just say it. And, uh, Memo to Jim Duggan: if you are the guest ref next week, please, do us all a favor and wear underwear. Now, this is hypocritical of me, since I don’t wear underwear, but I also don’t walk out in front of four million viewers and have my tackle jiggle all over my shorts like you did during your entrance.
KC Evers wishes to culpa his mea:
This is all my fault. Had I not admitted to laughing at the Duggan reference weeks ago, none of this would’ve happened. I apologize, Mr. Szculzcewski.
KC, you’re a Regular. You’re allowed to spell my last name right. Get rid of the first “c”, swap the second “z” and the other “c”, and you’re fine.
Survive If She Lets You: So, Mamma endured the encounter with the retard. They’re going through the freaky elements pretty quickly with her. Hopefully that doesn’t mean they’re running out of ideas this quickly. We all love Thea, and we want to see her succeed in this role beyond their wildest dreams. I still say that they have to make her commissioner, probably after WM and just before the Draft, when she suddenly shows some wrestling acumen. It’d make Raw a lot more fun, especially if Bisch comes back to try to retake his job.
How To Spread Oral Herpes: Oh, that kiss that Cena gave Maria had two obvious effects. It pissed off the adolescent males of every age in the audience, and it began a flood of a thousand bad Cena/Maria fan fics. For both effects, it deserves censure. And a strong mouthwash for everyone in the audience to get rid of the germs.
Chris Arrington thinks it might be worse than H. zoster: Well, I know one thing. Maria is going to have to get a tetanus shot for what Cena did to her.
An Extra Three Days Of Employment: So that’s going to be our special Sports Entertainment segment for a Thursday night Raw next week, the Shawn Michaels Retirement Bash. I’m a little disappointed in the Atlanta audience. Instead of yelling “Fuck You” at Vince, they should have started chanting “T-N-A” at Michaels. Come on, you’re reasonably close enough to Orlando to be aware of that, guys. And God knows that Vince gets off on “Fuck You”, but he might be a tad upset with “T-N-A”. Know your target, sheep.
Okay, next week, we’ve got the Westminster Dog Show. I’m going to evaluate whether or not there’s any real wrestling news to do. Then I’ll evaluate whether or not there’s any world news I’d like to cover. If not, then there’ll be no column. However, next week, there will be a Triple Threat Short Form with Raw, Smackdown, and Impact. Just wanted to warn you ahead of time. Who knows if that column could take five hours of crap?
