It's called self-respect ... look into it!

Just read a piece on the internet about a woman from Tennessee who put her name up for bid on eBay and got an offer. Terri Iligan, 33, sold her name to Internet site Golden Palace Casino (henceforth known as Satan), and she will officially be named goldenpalace.com once the legal work is complete. The casino paid $15,199 for the name.

Iligan said she got the idea when she found out how much it would cost to send one of her children to a golf school Tiger Woods attended. I think this needs repeating...golf school!

"To my kids and to my husband, I will always be Terri. My husband is real supportive," she told WATE-TV in Knoxville. "He thinks it's funny." Hell in a handbasket folks.

Others are renting sections of their bodies to Satan (see above) to be human billboards. Their foreheads and pregnant bellies will be marked with the company's name for the world to see.

So, how much is your soul worth?

Scion's t2B

Check out the latest vehicle from Scion by clicking on these two links:

http://autonet.ca/Autoshows/story.cfm?story=/Autoshows/New_York/2005/03/29/975861.html

http://www.scion.com/

Baby got back, just like my Big Mac

From the Advertising Age website:

McDonald’s has hired entertainment marketing firm Maven Strategies to help the fast-food giant encourage hip-hop artists to integrate the Big Mac sandwich into their upcoming songs. The lyrics should emphasize the sandwich’s name alone, and not necessarily McDonald’s or the Golden Arches.

McDonald’s receives final approval of the lyrics, but it will ultimately allow artists to decide how the sandwich is integrated into the songs.

Maven receives a consulting fee for its services. Music acts, however, will not receive payment upfront. Instead, they will earn anywhere from $1 to $5 each time their song is played on the radio.

If I had posted this on April 1st most of you probably wouldn't have believed it but it's true!

She came through in the clutch

On my drive in to work this morning I ended up behind a car at a stop light which had a sign taped to its trunk. Under the drawing of a happy face, the sign read "New Driver ... Learning Manual."

Well, when the light turned green it was quite obvious as it took her about 5 seconds to actually start moving. I followed for a few minutes, curious to see how the new driver would tackle the road. The only thing that gave her away was the 40 km/h pace she was setting on the 70 km/h posted road. But, because of her sign, she didn't give me a coronary like most "turtles" would on the road.

Thanks for the warning and good luck with your driving!

Sport energy drinks bad for teeth

From Sun Media:

Sport energy drinks may give your body a boost but they can wreak havoc on your teeth -- even more so than conventional soft drinks like Coke or Pepsi, a study says. This study found the enamel damage caused by non-cola and sports beverages was three to 11 times greater than cola-based drinks, with energy drinks and bottled lemonades causing the most harm to dental enamel.

Non-cola and canned ice teas were actually more harmful to dental enamel than cola.

"Enamel erosion doesn't happen overnight. When you eat or drink anything, it takes 30 minutes for saliva to recover to its natural protective range," said lead author Dr. J. Anthony von Fraunhofer, professor of biomaterials science at the University of Maryland Dental School.

Most cola-based drinks may contain one or more acids. However sports beverages contain other addictive and organic acids that can advance dental erosion, according to the study. These organic acids are potentially very erosive to dental enamel because of their ability to break down calcium, which is needed to strengthen teeth and prevent gum disease.

"When drinking a soft drink people tend to sip it continuously instead of all at once. This does not allow the mouth to recover and the acid stays there because you keep refreshing it when you take another sip," van Fraunhofer said. "If you're going to drink this stuff, don't sip it. Drink it down quickly and try to rinse with water afterwards.

"It's not a good idea to brush your teeth because the toothpaste is too abrasive."

The study, published in General Dentistry, exposed enamel from cavity-free teeth to a variety of popular sports beverages, including energy drinks, fitness water and sports drinks, as well as non-cola beverages, such as lemonade and ice tea for a period of 14 days. The exposure was comparable to approximately 13 years of normal consumption.

The drinks which cause the most damage to the enamel are: KMX energy drink, Snapple lemonade, Red Bull, Gatorade lemon-lime, Powerade Arctic Shatter, Arizona Ice Tea, Fanta Orange, then Pepsi and Coke.

Another tsunami?

A massive earthquake killed dozens of people and destroyed hundreds of homes in the main town on Indonesia's Nias island Monday evening, a local government official told Metro TV. The massive 8.2 magnitude quake struck off the coast of Sumatra Monday close to where a quake triggered a tsunami that left nearly 300,000 people dead or missing across Asia, residents and officials said.

National Post gives bad delivery

Complaint: We get the National Post delivered at work and whenever it rains or snows outside, our newspaper gets wet. The delivery moron...er, person, does bag the paper but never seals it. Today, after the snowfall last night, the paper was in a bag but both ends were open and both ends of the paper were wet. After two complaints you'd think this clown would give a little effort. It's almost as if he/she is mocking us! The subscription would have been cancelled a long time ago except our boss loves The Post.

I called to complain again, for the last time, and they promised to double-bag and seal both ends. We'd also get a week's credit and a dry paper today. Would they get the hint that we're miffed if we send them wet cheques when paying? I wonder if accounting would do that for me?

Dave Allen passes away

I'm not sure how many of you remember this Irish comedian but he had a television show, in the early 80s, called Dave Allen At Large. He would tell jokes and hilarious stories while sitting down in a chair on stage and having a smoke and drink.

To you, Dave Allen, I use your favourite sign-off ... "Goodnight, good luck, and may your God go with you."

Here are some of his most famous quotes:

• I still think of myself as I was 25 years ago. Then I look in a mirror and see an old bastard and realise it's me.
• I don't go out of my way to be outrageous, I just go out of my way to look at things.
• I'm an Atheist...thank God.
• I've stopped smoking...I think the cost was a lot of it, and not being able to breathe. I first gave up smoking when I was eight.
• A good storyteller never lets the facts get in the way.
• We spend our lives on the run: we get up by the clock, eat and sleep by the clock, get up again, go to work - and then we retire. And what do they give us? A clock.

Chucking from 900 feet!

In the seats at right, Stratosphere spokesman Mike Gilmartin (L) and a reporter take a spin on "Insanity," a new thrill ride, over 900-feet above the Las Vegas Strip at the Stratosphere Tower in Las Vegas, Nevada, March 10, 2005.

Would you go on this ride?

Help is a four-letter word

What pressures must you endure in your life before you snap and throw your daughter off a bridge? I don't know what demon told that guy to toss his 5-year old daughter off the overpass and onto the 401 but couldn't anyone get this man some help before this happened. There must have been some signs! If you feel like crap, then jump yourself...no need to hurt anyone else in your family; especially an innocent kid.

Asking for help has become synonymous with weakness. Everyone forgets how challenging life can be. Some of us have better coping mechanisms and can get through some of the tough times. Others need to or should rely on people to help them through certain situations. These people should not be made to feel sub-par. We need to change our ways and the government should give more money to "help" agencies so incidents like this happen less frequently.

Call me Frankenstein

I've been walking funny the past two days (or should I say funnier). I played hockey last Sunday night instead of watching the apparently hum-drum Academy Awards. Due to my recent period of sloth in which the only exercise I get is shoveling the driveway, my body is a little sore from the hour and a half skate. The aches and pains that are screaming from my "muscles" I can handle. The bleeding blisters that formed just below my ankles on both feet is what makes me want to curl up in the fetal position and bawl like a baby. I would like to thank my new skates for this pleasure. I feel like James Caan in the movie Misery after Kathy Bates puts the sledgehammer beating to his feet. The conclusion I have come to is that after only wearing them twice, they must be returned, traded-in, sold or burned. Play It Again Sports, here I come!

Update (Mar 3):
I went to National Sports, where I bought my skates, and they wouldn't take them back because I didn't have the receipt...not even a store credit because "they're skates"...whatever that means. I threw the receipt away last month after keeping it for a year. Go figure, one of the few times in my life when I "live on the edge" by throwing out a receipt and it bites me in the butt! I then took my burden (skates) to Play It Again Sports where the dude who worked there proceeded to offer me, with a straight face, and I don't know how they get these numbers, 40% of $150 in store credit. Needless to say, I still have the Mission skates, retail value $230. They did, however, have a pro-shop on premises which will fix the cracked blade on one of my old skates for $30. So, the evening wasn't a total waste of time.

If anyone is interested in Mission skates, size 9.5, write a comment. $100 or best offer!