Top Ten from the Sunday "Roanoke Times"............White Rabbit Jokes Never Get Old

AAAAUUUGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!

We can't seem to find the time to blog any more, so perhaps we will soon take up ice-fishing in North Dakota.

Here are our top ten comic strips from the Sunday "Roanoke Times."

"Pearls Before Swine" wins with a funny take on the Easter Bunny as he is met up with some angry little chicks, almost as if he were Bill Maher stumbling upon a tea party rally in Eden, NC, which is just outside the Roanoke newspaper's jurisdiction.

Second place goes to "Zits," as Jeremy prepares to hurriedly scramble out the door when his i-Phone shows it's 7:59 a.m., along the way he eats Pop Tarts, perhaps the most popular American breakfast product for those in a hurry.

And, "Non-Sequitur" has a revamped update on Goldilocks and the Three Bears, which concludes with the fairy tale protagonist meeting up with Little Red Riding Hood for some 'girl talk.'

Note: We didn't get around to posting our favorite "Roanoke Times" strips from last week, but we have that survey at the end of this one.


1. "Pearls Before Swine"

2. "Zits"

3. "Non-Sequitur"

4. "Dilbert"

5. "Doonesbury"

6. "Get Fuzzy"

7. "Speed Bump"

8. "Agnes"

9. "Funky Winkerbean"

10. "Garfield"

Results from April 13th:

1. "Garfield"

2. "Doonesbury"

3. "Pearls Before Swine"

4. "Agnes"

5. "Non-Sequitir"

6. "Get Fuzzy"

7. "Dilbert"

8. "Speed Bump"

9. "Funky Winkerbean"

10. "Baby Blues"

http://www.roanoke.com

http://www.dilbert.com

http://www.doonesbury.com

Tweets from Saturday Night_ Middle East Madness

The finger-pointing from Republican presidential team Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan, or DynoMutt and Blue Falcon as we call him here in the office towards the Barack Obama administration for catastrophic riots which started in Egypt on Tues., the 11th anniversary of Sept. 11th, and then fostered into a even more horrifying frenzy in Libya, where American Ambassador Chris Stevens was killed along with three other American diplomats and ten Libyans who were providing security to the embassy in Benghazi, which is not actually Libya's capital.

Today, we also learned that a mosque in Harrisonburg, Va., a city that is home to James Madison University, which is a two-hour drive from both Washington, DC, (to the north) and my hometown of Roanoke, Va. (to the south), was vandalized with the words: "This is America." Harrisonburg is also the city where a FBI agent arbitrarily raided the home of a man of Arab heritage during this country's Sept. 11th period.

All of these events are very disturbing to those of us who are Americans of Middle Eastern heritage, as it reminds us of the quote from the late great Japanese film director Akira Kurosawa: "In an insane world, only the mad are sane."

Some of the other tweets of the night dealt with the presidential election here in America.

Here are some tweets from the 20:00 or 8:00 p.m. hour, New York time, this evening:

1) @Wolf Blitzer (CNN host Wolf Blitzer): "So sad to hear US evacuates families and non-emergency personnel from Tunis. I was there last year when things were encouraging."

2) @BillMaher (Outspoken liberal comedian Bill Maher): "These middle east protestors r different these days- taking pics of themselves throwing rocks and yelling: 'hashtag down with America."

3) @NPRInskeep (Steve Inskeep): "Top religious authority lists reasons why murder of US ambassador was against Islam."

4) @TheMuslimGuy (Arsalan Iftikhar): "TV ALERT: I will be on 'CNN Sunday Morning' tomorrow @ 8:30 a.m. EST on anti-Islam movie and protests around the world...Fun Stuff, I know...Sigh."

5) @Terry-McAuliffe (former Democratic strategist Terry McAuliffe): "Met some llamas for Obama at the Albermale Dems BBQ."

6) @Coffeepartyusa (Coffee Party): "The man who made the anti-Muslim video has a foreign-sounding name. Let's hire Trump and Kobach to declare he's not American."

7) @WSOC-TV (WSOC is Charlotte, NC's ABC affiliate): "Mitt Romney's son goes door to door for his dad in Charlotte."

Status Update- Thank God, It's Spring Break

It may be ironic that as someone who is not quite a religious person, such as myself, is praising an almighty deity which may or may not exist (we will let Bill Maher and Glenn Beck debate this, both of whom are coming here to Greensboro, NC, for lavish ticket prices soon, but we are much more inclined to agree with Maher).

But, as a teacher, I am glad that spring break has arrived. I would never share this with my students (who hopefully never read my blog) but I actually have Alice Cooper's original 1975 version of "School's Out," which has been covered by the heavy metal band GWAR, on vinyl!

While I was in Chapel Hill, NC, a few weeks ago, I noticed that evangelicals and fundamentalists were meeting each other (nicer word for confronting) on the campus of The University of North Carolina.

According to "The Daily Tarheel," UNC student Nick Sienerth, a freshman from Burlington, NC, held up a sign for the Church of the Spaghetti Monster, a group formed in Oregon to make fun of fundamentalists, while the Rev. Gary Birdsong, who is seemingly as radical as his counterpart the Rev. Johnny Robertson of Martinsville(who we believe has publicly said some not very nice things about gays), was 'visiting' campus.

During that sojourner, I also visited the Internationalist Bookstore on Franklin Street, where I found a nifty book about the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche who said that 'God is dead.' Assuredly, those sentiments are not too popular in Eden, NC, which is 'considerably' more conservative than Chapel Hill.

Incidentally, we chose Richard Pryor for this photo because we thought he provided the 'voice of God' in the early '80s Biblical satire "Wholly Moses." Through modern technology (well Wikipedia and the IMDB) we were proven wrong! Pryor was a pharaoh instead.

Status Update_ The End of An Era

Since I am actually trying to get things done and make blog entries more economical, in the time-spending sense, and use Facebook and Twitter less often, I have decided to start a new Status Update series on this blog.

Of course, in the end, it will probably meet none of my objectives, but at least we can't canned by the WB before our scheduled 13-episode run.

So, we start today with this Status Update:

"I have retired my George Costanza wallet after a good solid six and a half years of usage."

The character of George, as played by Jason Alexander, was based on the show's co-creator Larry David, who is now a household name because of "Curb Your Enthuiasm," but the character's name was taken from Jerry Seinfeld's real-life pal Mike Costanza.

The Urban Dictionary says that a George Costanza wallet refers to a wallet that is overstuffed with junk. In the sitcom, the wallet forced George to sit in a stilted position.

Reruns of the 1990s sitcom "Seinfeld" air on WGHP in the Greensboro, NC, market from 11:00-11:59 p.m. each night. Tonight, they will show "The Finale" episode in the 11:00-11:29 slot.

I must profess that I find the newscasts of WGHP, the local Fox affiliate, about as objective as Glenn Beck, who is coming to Greensboro on April 8. But, my hero and his nemesis Bill Maher will also be performing at the Greensboro Coliseum on April
23.

Currently, Greensboro is getting a lot of media attention for hosting the U.S. National Figure Skating Championships, which will feature Brian Boitano, Kristi Yamaguchi and Michelle Kwan.....yes, I know they are all (to our knowledge retired from skating) but I am not exactly hip to what's going on in the skating world, so I thought I would joke about it.

I actually had a crush on Yamaguchi, who is a year younger than me, but now she is married to some hockey player, raising a family and competing on "Dancing with the Stars," so of course I'll have to develop a crush on a female figure skater who is some 20 years younger than her!

Know Your Congressional Reps and Senators (18 of 21)- Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.)

Today, we are featuring Mark Pryor (D-Ark.) in our series. Pryor represents what is becoming the norm for red state Democrats that is a political figure who would be conservative enough to be a Republican in New England, but it is progressive enough to be a Democrat in Dixie.

Pryor was born on Jan. 10, 1963, in Fayetville, Ark. He is currently the third youngest U.S. senator behind Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Col.) and Kristen Gilibrand (D-NY), who is Hillary Clinton's succesor.

Pryor is the junior senator from Arkansas behind Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark) who is also out of favor with some national Democrats for being too conservative.

Pryor was elected in 2002. He beat out incumbent Sen. Tim Hutchinson (R-Ark.) in part of the Republican's divorce from his wife of 29 years which subsequently lead to his marriage to a congressional aide.

Mark Pryor holds the same seat that his father David Pryor held from 1979 to 1997, when the senior Pryor was replaced by Hutchinson. Mark Pryor was the only Democrat to unseat an incumbent Republican in the U.S. senate during the 2002 election cycle.

Pryor was featured in the Bill Maher documentary "Religulous," which questions the reasoning and logic behind the world's three most popular faiths: Christianity, Islam and Judaism.

In an interview with Maher during the film, Pryor was very open about his evangelical views. Pryor is also a member of the secretive evangelical politicians group known as The Family, which has recently been plagued with scandals since two of its members Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev) and Gov. Mark Sanford (R) of South Carolina have publicly acknowledged extra-maritial affairs.

Pryor was one of 12 Democratic senaotrs to vote for the controversial Military Commisions Act of 2006, which admits evidence obtained through torture. He was also one of six Democrats to vote for the confirmation of former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales though he called on him to resign in 2007 when questions about Gonzales' handling of the office came into light.

The Arkansas senator endorsed Hillary Clinton over Barack Obama for the Demoratic primary.

Pryor surprsingly faced no Republican opponent during last year's election cycle, and his term will expire in five years.

Political Confusion Quiz (Entry 13 of 21)

It has come to our attention that liberal tv talk show Bill Maher who more or less shares my views on religion (I hope a supreme being or my mom isn't reading my blog) will debate Anne Coulter, a right-wing extremist who we firmly believe once had a wee wee.

If you are joining me in rooting for Maher, you are clearly not a Republican, and these days that is most certainly a very good thing.