The Smarmy Carny

According to USA Today, here are the commercials we can expect tonight during the Super Bowl:

• Aleve: Leonard Nimoy's hand pain gets in way of an appearance.
• Ameriquest: Patient's family walks in on medical misunderstanding.
• Ameriquest: Plane turbulence creates awkward situation.
• Bud Light: Office manager motivates employees with hidden bottles.
• Bud Light: A secret fridge stocks Bud Light.
• Bud Light: Man saves himself from scary bear.
• Bud Light: Men pretend to work on rooftops, but relax instead.
• Budweiser: Young Clydesdale dreams big.
• Budweiser: Sheep is a big fan of big game.
• Budweiser: Stadium crowd turns a wave into a Bud promotion.
• Burger King: Whopperettes sing and dance.
• CareerBuilder: Chimps celebrate strong sales quarter.
• CareerBuilder: Employees commiserate about workplace animals.
• Degree for Men: People living on the edge in Stunt City.
• Diet Pepsi: Jackie Chan appears in an action film.
• Diet Pepsi: Diet Pepsi sings with Diddy.
• Dove: Dove promotes self-esteem fund for young girls.
• Emerald of California: Machete men love Emerald Nuts.
• ESPN: Fan is in sports heaven when he uses ESPN's mobile phone.
• FedEx: Cave man uses prehistoric overnight delivery.
• Ford Motor: Kermit says green is good when he sees Escape hybrid.
• Gillette: Five-blade razor is a top secret until now.
• GM Cadillac: New Escalade truck poses on the catwalk as fashion model.
• GM Hummer: Monsters marry and have a Hummer baby.
• GoDaddy: GoDaddy woman sends man for oxygen again.
• Here's to Beer.com: Drinkers toast to beer in different languages.
• Honda: Ad for Ridgeline pickup brings trucking icons to life.
• MasterCard: MacGyver buys lifesaving gadgets with MasterCard.
• Michelob Ultra Amber: Touch football gets ugly.
• Motorola: Meteoric explosion helps create new Pebl phone.
• Nationwide Insurance: Life moves fast for romance novel cover star Fabio.
• New Line Cinema: Ad for new action movie Running Scared.
• NFL.com: Vote for Super Bowl MVP.
• NFL Mobile: Fan checks scores at checkout line.
• NFL Network: A nation of NFL fans and players.
• NFL/United Way: Players support United Way.
• Paramount: Ads promote Tom Cruise's Mission: Impossible III.
• PS Cleaning Products: Some people avoid germs by living in green suits.
• Sierra Mist: Sierra Mist can't clear airport security.
• Sprint: Sprint phone doubles as theft deterrent.
• Sprint: Man downloads music for any occasion from Sprint phone.
• Toyota: Boy compares bilingual father to hybrid vehicle.
• Toyota: Tacoma pickup rides out the incoming tide.
• Walt Disney: Chris Berman calls play-by-play on The Shaggy Dog.
• Warner Bros.: Poseidon.
• Warner Bros.: V for Vendetta.
• Warner Bros.: 16 Blocks.

Puppy Bowl II

If you're not a sports fan, or if you're entertaining children, or if you're an animal lover, be sure to check out Puppy Bowl II.

It's currently airing (from 3pm to 6pm EST) on Animal Planet.

At halftime, the Kitty Halftime Show came on.

As horrible as it sounds, I actually watched a bit of it. It was more entertaining than hearing the lifetime stories of every single Pittsburgh and Seattle player.

Watch videos from Puppy Bowl II.

IE7's beta 2 preview has been released for public download, so long as you're using Windows XP SP2.

The beta boasts features such as tabbed browsing, toolbar search boxes, streamlined user interface, and instant RSS feeds . . . all items that I have been using with Firefox for well over a year.

Surprisingly, the developers bothered to listen to feedback posted on some sites such as Position Is Everything's "Explorer Exposed" page. Of course, the key word (their choice) was that they fixed most of the bugs posted there. They also enabled :hover on all elements, not just on <a> tags, which is welcome news to me.

All in all, reading through the changes, I am pleased that Microsoft has finally gotten on the ball, fixed some of their most heinous issues, and actually started conforming to standards, instead of expecting the standards to conform to them.

But still, so what? Even if IE7 is created equal to Firefox (which I am not going to claim), it won't matter for long, because Microsoft doesn't fix their bugs. Firefox bugs are fixed even before they can be exploited. Use Firefox, not Internet Explorer. End of story.

Happy Groundhog Day!

Unfortunately, Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow yet again, thus predicting another six weeks of winter.

Sadly, this is usually the case. Currently the score is Shadow: 96, No Shadow: 14

Here's Phil's pronouncement from this morning:

It is said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
Around the country there are many imitators of me.

In Harrisburg there is Gus who appears on TV
working for the lottery.

Then all around town,
Cute groundhog statues abound.
They all look like me, I found.

Today on the Knob as I'm doing my job,
I don't like this likeness of me.

It's my shadow I see. Six more weeks of mild winter there will be.

In other news, Dunkirk Dave also saw his shadow, but in the Buffalo area, I think that means six more months of winter.

If you want to hear the "That's right, woodchuck chuckers, it's GROUNDHOG DAY!" audio clip, head over to The Movie Quote Quiz's Groundhog Day page.

This article has been re-posted at Idle Idols, the site for the funniest American Idol auditions.

The sixth episode took place in Austin. More wacky auditions from the freaks trying to get onto American Idol 5 any way they can. Of interest was a group of zombies wandering around outside near the lines. Where did they come from? I'd love to know.

Here is the list of the most interesting auditions from this American Idol 5 audition episode:

• Paula Goodspeed #55896 — Paula wore some interesting clothes. The reason is that everyone calls her a "fashion genius." She is a huge Paula Abdul fan. Apparently, she likes to draw life-size pictures of Paula Abdul. In addition to the eye-catching clothes, she also had some prominent braces with pink and green rubber bands that Simon just had to talk about. He said things like "You have so much metal in your mouth," "that's like a bridge," and "How did she get through the metal detector? It must have gone crazy!" Here is Paula's audition video:

• Tessie Mae Reid #52967 — Tessie "sang" "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" for the judges, but the sound was horrendous, despite her claim that she sounds exactly like Avril Lavigne. Her hair was of interest, with two long, bleach-blonde braids falling down on either side of her face. Why should Tessie advance to the next round? In her words: "I think I should be a pop star because I could be like the next big famous person." I'm not sure if she was using "big" to describe the famousness or the person. Tessie's outfit included a black shirt and too-tight, bright pink pants that showed off her figure. What was her figure like in those pants? Here's Simon's description: "You know when you buy a sack and you try to stuff it full of potatoes and you just keep pushing and pushing . . . It's like 'No — I can get another potato in there, hang on.'"

• Michelle Lapoint #52900 — Michelle sang "Lean on Me," but forgot the words two lines into the song. She froze at that point and, on cue, her contestant number sign fell off onto the floor, as if embarassed by the whole thing. Watch Michelle's audition video.
• Arthur Mayfield #53119 — Arthur performed some sort of weird, indescribable dancing. The worst part is that the awful dancing seemed choreographed, which would infer that it was thought out in advance and passed as acceptable. The bright red scarf and matching shoes didn't help much, either.
• Donnell Bolton #? — Donnell sang in an extremely high-pitched voice. It was higher than Mickey Mouse. In fact, it was so high, the lyrics were indecipherable. Update: Apparently, this song was not decipherable because it is Jigglypuff's Lullabye. The lyrics are a repetition of "Jigglypuff." Watch the brief Donnell clip.
• Danielle Zamora #54252 — Danielle kept it simple by singing an old classic, "Amazing Grace," in a tone-deaf manner.
• Chanequa Jackson #54231 — Chanequa sang "Fire and Desire," which includes the lyrics "It was pain before pleasure." Simon interrupted to say, "Let's take out the pleasure."
• Anisa Olaniyi-Oke #59320 — Simon told her that "even the out-of-tune notes were out-of-tune."
• Jason Horn #52605 — Jason sang fine and made it through to the next round, but his choice of song was entertaining. Jason works as an embalmer, and he chose Josh Grobin's "You Raise Me Up." Watch Jason's audition video.
• Cierra Johnson #52731 — Cierra appeared to have what the judges normally look for physically in an American Idol. She looked the part and talked the part, but looks can be deceiving. Simon even admitted that he expected her to sing really well, until she killed "Silent Night." Randy told her, "You've got twelve keys going on." After Cierra asked if she could try a different song, Simon told her to sing "Silent Night" without the "Night." He also commented that it sounded more like the soundtrack for The Nightmare Before Christmas. Watch Cierra's audition video.
• Allison Schoening #53697 — Allison "almost died" on her plane trip to Austin because the seal on one of the plane doors failed. Allison said (and I quote): "I recommend going through that at least once in your life." Yeah, I'll be sure to schedule a faulty plane ride in the near future. Thanks for reminding me. Allison's singing was so poor that Simon likened her to a cat with its tail slammed in a door. Allison said that she knew she had sung poorly, and wanted to give them a second chance to hear her, so Simon agreed to have her come back in after thirty minutes. As she was leaving, Simon told her to imagine Randy in his swimming trunks when she came back in. Allison replied, "I was already imagining you [Simon], but that's probably why I sucked so bad." Paula gave out a cheer, and Randy gave her a high five for that comment. Allison returned and sang just about as bad as before. Allison admitted that she knew she still didn't perform that well, but she argued with the judges about whether she sang better the second time around or not. Allison was also featured during R.J.'s audition segment as well. (See R.J.'s description for more details.)
• Jeffrey Pollock #? — We didn't get a chance to see Jeffrey's audition, but we did see his pre-audition interview. He was (presumably) asked to explain why he was the next American Idol. After a moment of reflection, he says, "I think I'm the next American Idol because . . . I don't know . . . [significant pause] . . . Can I think about it?" Jeffrey gives a few more moments to think about it, with no response, before they cut away for some more auditions. Later, they show poor Jeffrey again, still contemplating his answer.
• Julian Riano #53511 — Julian performed a full split for the judges while wearing boots. After failing to sing well enough to advance, he gave his parting words: "Keep following your dreams. Always." He then rode down the escalator, singing "On the Road Again." Watch Julian's audition video.
• Ashley Jackson #53504 — Ashley is a fit model. (Fit models work for manufacturers and fashion houses as a real person with real contours who must be of "average" size and maintain certain measurements.) She sang for a bit, but failed to impress Paula. Paula stopped her by saying "Thank you very much," and her reply was "Oh." It was then mentioned that she could sing with her mouth closed. She asked Paula if she should sing that way, and Paula told her that it wasn't going that well thus far in the audition. She went ahead and sang The Star-Spangled Banner in this manner. Somehow, Randy gave her a "Yes" vote. Paula refrained from voting and asked Simon what he thought. Simon gave a "Yes," so Ashley is Hollywood-bound. I'm guessing that Paula wanted to say "No," based on the footage shown. This just goes to show you that models have it easier than the rest of us, and that American Idol cares about the viewership numbers. Watch Ashley, her audition, and her closed-mouth singing.
• Ronnie "R.J." Norman #53550 — Pre-audition, R.J. said, "My friends call me R.J. Actually, everyone calls me R.J. . . . Everyone's my friend." Ryan's narration continued on regarding R.J. being a ladies' man, and we got to see several shots of him flirting with various women. Allison Schoening (the woman who got a second chance to sing) asked him if he liked baseball. After R.J. told her that he didn't like baseball because it was boring, he informed her that she just made it awkward. Yikes. Apparently that odd line didn't scare Allison away, as she hugged him as he left with a golden ticket. Learn how to be a ladies' man by watching R.J.'s audition video.
• Kevin Mitchell #55798 — Kevin beared a strong resemblance to Randy Jackson. Before Kevin sang, Simon told him, "We're looking for one big difference [from Randy]: Do you have talent?" Despite Kevin's poor vocal abilities, Randy made a point to tell him repeatedly that he was very handsome. Watch Randy Jackson lookalike Kevin Mitchell's audition video.
• The Zombies — I mentioned the zombies at the beginning of the post. Just in case you missed the video, here they are in action:

This post will be updated as pictures and video clips are available online, so bookmark this page or the American Idol page.

If you enjoy Napoleon Dynamite, then you'll like this Robot Chicken sketch titled "Napoleon Bonamite."

[Rod Serling impersonation]: Picture, if you will . . .

. . . cross the two famous Napoleons with each other. Put Napoleon Dynamite in Napoleon Bonaparte's position. What would he do in battle? Watch the video for yourself:

If you can stand this and find it funny, you'll probably like most everything else you see on Robot Chicken. Catch it on weekend late nights on Cartoon Network.

This article has been re-posted at Idle Idols, the site for the funniest American Idol auditions.

The fifth episode of American Idol 5 brought us auditions from Las Vegas. Of course, the usual assortment of freaks showed up.

Here is the list of the most interesting auditions from this American Idol 5 audition episode:

• Erica Davis and her sister, psychic Bobie May #78409 & 78408 — Erica sang briefly for the judges. It was fine, but certainly not American Idol quality. Clearly, she made it that far because her sister, made popular on a previous season's audition episode, had joined her. Post-audition, the psychic claimed that she did have predictions about American Idol 5, but she prefered to keep them to herself. (If you remember Bobie May's audition, she predicted that she was going through to Hollywood for one of the top ten seats. After Bobie May sang, guest judge Kenny Loggins told her, "I think you've ended two careers at once. This is the first time I've seen that.")
• Ryan Hart #74130 — Ryan gets off to an odd start by answering Paula's "What's your name?" question with "I'm Ryan, what's yours?" During the interview section of the audition, Paula told him, "You just cursed. You you're not allowed to do that, it's a family show," but Ryan replied with "Oh, well I'm not a family guy." Ryan sang Silverstein's "Smashed into Pieces" which includes some death-metal-like screeching along with some so-so alternative crooning in the middle. After Ryan left, Randy just had to try the screeching for himself. People posting over at alternative/independent entertainment site HYAMP.ORG seemed quite annoyed that the poser claimed to be "too hardcore" for the judges. Let's hope they don't get a hold of Ryan's MySpace profile. The band Silverstein posted on their site that Ryan is invited out to any one of their shows at any time. Oh, and if you want to hear the original version of the song (screeching included), listen to the sound clip from Disc 2 of the 2005 Warped Tour Compilation or download it from purevolume.

• Jason Andino, a.k.a. Pepe or Josephe Francisco Andino #78201 — Jason works as a gondolier in Las Vegas and works under the aforementioned pseudonyms. Jason sang "Stand by Me," but he didn't sing it well enough. Simon suggested he stick with the gondolier job. So, in Jason's words, "American Idol 5 is going to be Pepe-less, my friends."
• Crazy Eyed "JC" Gray #74435 — JC returns again this year, except this time, he has grown a mullet. Simon told him that sometimes, he mentally says "No" before the person starts singing, and he did just that. I can't be sure that JC didn't sing, but that's how it was portrayed on-air. If you've forgotten JC, he's the one Simon asked in a previous season, "Are you aware that when you sing, you do a stabbing motion?"
• Anthony Andolino #75439 — Anthony's singing style was distinctly off-tune. Watch the video again, and you can see Simon's expression immediately sour as Anthony begins singing. Of course, Simon threw in a weight joke as the undeniably large Anthony left. His background story included the fact that he and his girlfriend own 75 animals.
• David Mandzak #73245 — Often, you can tell from someone's speaking voice that they probably won't be the best singer in that city, and David was no exception. David chose to sing a Backstreet Boys song. His singing style was nasal and off-pitch. Hopefully, a video will come along soon to save me the worries of explaining it further.
• Haggai Yedidya #72892 — Haggai is becoming an American, and he wore an American flag shirt for his audition. He claimed that he was going to make the judges excited with his singing. He ensured the judges that he would sing in tune because he had a keychain to help him with his pitch. Simon noted that it sounded a little low, so Haggai asked him if he had any batteries. After Haggai desecrated “God Bless the USA,” the judges turned him down. It probably didn’t help that when he sang “the men who died,” it sounded like he was gargling. Haggai told the judges that, with a vocal coach and a couple months, one can become a good singer, and after a year, one can become a great singer if they have perfect pitch, like he does. If Haggai has perfect pitch, then apparently the rest of the world doesn’t. Post-audition, Haggai explained that he had tried to grab the judges’ attention. He said that the “right judge” (Randy) was most impressed because he maintained eye contact, Paula was looking at his dancing and his body, and Simon was reading a book.
• Princess Brewer #78285 — Princess claimed to be a conceited, blunt, sassy perfectionist that sounds a lot like Aretha Franklin. For a perfectionist, Princess missed a whole lot of notes and basically screamed the off-pitch lyrics at the judges. Simon tried to stop her, but she kept on singing. After even more horrendous singing, Simon whispered “Will you shut her up? Shut her up.” followed by “Stop it. Stop it. Stop it.” Finally, Princess stopped, and Paula’s best compliment was that “there were sweet moments in there.” Simon quickly added, “Yeah, the end.” He also told her that she was actually giving him a headache with her singing.
• CSI: Criminal Singers Investigated — Various Unnamed Contestants — If you think the legal issues ended with the Brittenum twins, think again. This episode also included a segment of several numbered-but-unnamed contestants who had been brought up on various humorous charges. Watch for yourself below, but here’s the full list first:
  • Contestant # 2550 charged with: Passing a Counterfeit C-Note
    2550 attempts to show off his extremely high range, but simply ends up destroying glasses and setting off car alarms instead.
    Sentence: 5 years
  • Contestant # 32367 charged with: Mimes Against Humanity
    32367 used some fairly distracting gestures during his song. It appeared that he may have been signing the song. Since American Idol wouldn’t have him, perhaps he could join the Happy Hands Club from Napoleon Dynamite.
    Sentence: 10 years, minimum security
  • Contestant # 889 charged with: Bouncing Czechs
    889, a Czech performer, “sings” Lady Marmolade.
    Sentence: 12 years, community service
  • Contestant # 62092 charged with: Hummicide
    62092 sings poorly, and follows it up with some poor humming.
    Sentence: 12 years in Sing Sing
  • Contestant # 72722 charged with: Performing with a concealed weapon
    72722’s singing style mostly involved plenty of Elvis-on-Viagara hip swinging.
    Sentence: 18 years, maximum security
  • Contestant # 34603 charged with: Writhing without a License
    34603 throws one arm up into the air (almost Rodeo-style), writhes for a bit, and gives off a series of moans or . . . something like that.
    Sentence: 18 years, solitary confinement
  • Contestant # 37113 charged with: Assault and Battery
    37113, a large woman, sings “I Like Big Butts.” Fortunately, she has a fun time, as she spins around, shakes her booty, and starts spanking herself.
    Sentence: Life: No parole