How Green Were the Nazis?

No? How about "The Stray Shopping Carts of Eastern North America," or perhaps "Tattooed Mountain Women and Spoon Boxes of Daghestan." Vote now for the oddest book title of the year.

Stop the presses!
I love those ridiculous studies where some group spends years finding out something that we all knew already. My favorite was the "peer pressure leads to teens trying cigarettes for the first time" bombshell.

Now there's this article where five psychologists who apparently have nothing better to do, have concluded after a study that "today's college students are more narcissistic and self-centered than their prececessors."

We needed a study to prove that the majority of young people today are so selfish and egocentric that they really do think they are the center of the universe?

Gosh, glad those findings are in.

Snarky About Made-Up Words and Camping
In the ongoing decline of American language, we now have "glamping" "shorthand for glamorous camping", as created by someone who obviously hates English.

Glamping? Well that's wrong on two levels.

First off, I'm sick to death of smooshed together words that mean nothing and exist only because people are in too much of a hurry to get back into their SUVs to actually take the time to pronounce two whole words!

Second....um.....glamorous camping? The article refers to a "wilderness resort" in British Columbia where tents have "Persian carpets, down duvets, and even electricity." So why bother? Why not go the whole way and hold out for actual walls?

Now don't think I'm being condescending to those too precious to go out for "real" camping. Personally, I hate camping. I was raised in a conservative, Catholic family which means I'm physically incapable of peeing into a bush. But the fact still seems hilarious that if you don't want to rough it, why are you even trying? Why bother to stay in a tent (even one with Persian carpets) if what you really want is room service and a jacuzzi?

As for the term "glamping" personally I think it's such a stupid concept that anyone who goes in for it deserved to be referred to as a "glamper."

Geography 101
Stop the presses! Forget Darfur, a larger world crisis has gone all but unnoticed by the media.

Switzerland, that dark horse, has invaded Liechtenstein. Ok, Ok, so it was dark and they were lost and tired but I mean really! War in Europe and we're all "ooh...Ann Coulter said bad word."

Heresy
Ok, I'm going out on a limb here. But I just want to say, for the record, "I don't give a fuck about Anna Nicole Smith."

Phew....I feel much better.

I mean really, people, why should we care? I feel the same vague sympathy for her family and friends that is appropriate at anyone's death, but beyond that my reaction is one of relief. Oh good, one less media-created semi-celebrity to annoy us. At least once her funeral coverage is over. But why in the world was she famous anyway? She had hooters and married rich. And that's all that is necessary for fame in this century. Alexander the Great had to conquer Persia in order to be a household name. Oh, if only he'd had hooters think of all the time he would have saved.

She was nothing. She did nothing. She didn't seem to make the world a better place. She didn't seem to do much of anything, and yet for years her clothing, her weight, her affairs...were all watched as if knowledge of her hemlines could cure cancer. How useless and superficial the world has become when someone so useless could be so famous.

So she's dead. So what? Forgive me if I seem heartless, but is this really a national tragedy?