Yes, this is something the Russians could never have put together.

Thanks to a website advertising some damn car, we can combine photographs to MAKE OUR OWN BABY. Take your photo, the photo of a loved one, and with a bit of technological wizardry, the program squishes them together into something resembling offspring. Just to think, the internet was originally invented to make the military converse faster and now just LOOK! You can combine faces into a single person.

Amazing! Fantastic! Awesome! This internet that sends emails around the world, files your taxes and translates documents can now be used for a tangential advertising campaign for a car! A car and a baby have nothing to do with each other! And lo and behold, there it is! Thank you, internets! You are awesome!

Why, you could expand your mind by reading Wizard online, or research historical characters like Sir Fredereck Gas on wikipedia, or even watch women urinate on any number of websites, but NOOOOOOOOOOOO, you’re spending your time squishing faces together to see what your kids would look like. Does it work? Well, judge for yourself.

Native Baby Pouch Sling Papoose - Bundle with Love -NEW

If you can’t tell, it’s a little sling that looks like a duffel bag made in a third world country. But that’s not the important part. The important part is that it looks like Matthew McConaughey is endorsing this through his use of devil horns. I doubt that’s true, and if it was, is Matthew McConaughey really the face you want associated with your brand? He’s not well-known for being level-headed or clear thinking. The rest of the auction is filled up with about 50 pictures of other celebrities using the papoose, mostly Kerri Russell looking not interested.

Psychic love reading from Flora - unlimited questions

Bidders beware! You are not bidding on this fetching young(ish) lady! You are giving money for a phone call so she can talk to dead people for you! And then dead people will tell you about your love troubles! Don’t believe me? Here’s the description, the capitalization is hers (the dead are hard of hearing and she must yell):

MY NAME IS FLORA.

I FEEL SPIRIT FEELS EMPATHY, AS THEY HAVE ALSO EXPERIENCED THESE PROBLEMS, WHEN ON THE EARTH PLANE AND I WOULD LIKE TO OFFER YOU THE CHANCE TO USE MY INSIGHT AND SPIRITUAL GUIDANCE, IN ANY LOVE PROBLEMS YOU MIGHT HAVE.

Why limit yourself to love, Flora? If the dead are speaking through you, don’t they have better things to tell you than “tell him he’s going to meet a brunette”? This is our channel to God and what’s it being used for? Crush advice. You make me sick. And that’s even without reading feedback by her fans, one of whom is named “!galadriel!”

The Man Who Loves Women! - Dimples (CD 1994)

Dimples is a man who wants give you the sex thing. He’s not too skilled with design tools, as evidenced by his CD, and I’m guessing his grasp of English isn’t too hot, as evidenced by the Borat-esque title. To that end, I’d like to give his commentary for his track listings (ok, I’m making it up):

I Wish Mama Was Here Tonight!: A soulful ballad where I have sex thing with woman but I think of mother.
Don’t Turn Your Back On My Love: My love am here to stay, it will not go away on you with others. Okay!
Natural High: I get drink drunk on wine and sex thing.
I Do The Job: I work daytime at Payless, but I makes money to buying nice things for woman. I love woman!
Rainbow ‘95: I make mistake in Bangaladesh college in 1995 and go to wrong door for sex thing.
Good “N” Plenty: I will buy you candies if you having sex with me. I live two blocks away from drugstore.
I’m Hooked On Your Lovin’: Dimples is lonely man.
Meet Me Tonight!: Internet date is cute but she no email me so I propose meet tonight! Aha!
Freaky Lover: I have not met one of these, but I read about them in book.
You Can Have My Heart: I gave heart to woman in Bangaladesh college but she no go there and I cannot find her. I feel ashamed.
Sugar Boom Boom: This comedy song. Big hit at shows.
I Want Love In My Sex: I am not serious, I will take sex thing without love. I will pay money or pay off your student loans.
I’ll Try Something New: This is a Smokey Robinson cover.

Lee Middleton ” HONEY LOVE DUCK Green ” NIB

Last time I saw a doll with that face and the word “love” in its name, let’s just say it wasn’t for sale on eBay.

3-X SIGN LANGUAGE T SHIRT..I LOVE SIGN LANGUAGE

The setup and the punchline don’t work together. No one should be warning someone that they love something, especially something as benign as sign language. I could understand a shirt that said “WARNING! I love Hitler’s ideals and his book Mein Kampf!” or “WARNING! I love rubbing against girls on the train”, especially if it’s a part of a community service deal, but sign language? Maybe it’s warning people that you’re wearing a 3XL shirt and approaching you rapidly.

Jail Bait Bird PRISONER OF LOVE Costume S-M CONVICT HAT

This is a STRICT prison, if you’re not allowed to keep your head attached to your torso. “Prisoner of Love” my ass, Prisoner of Taliban more like it. One of the costume’s previous wearers is modeling this, but unfortunately she was caught outside after 4PM and well, you can see what happens to law breakers.

Stunning Mother’s Love oil painting by William Schimmel

This painting is being made available to people who live in an area where they can’t get this airbrushed on their van. This is, quite possibly, the ugliest thing i’ve ever encountered, and I’ve watched both the Elephant Man and the GG Allin biography. A snow leopard and cub in front of blue and red mountains and a moon floating underneath. Is this missing a band logo somewhere? Should there be a wizard in this?

Buuuuuut, here’s more fun and enjoyment. You see, Halloween is right around the corner, and that means costumes. I haven’t chosen mine yet, or even if I’ll have an occasion to wear one, but it doesn’t stop me from looking. How can I not, with pop-up ads launching at every comic-themed webpage I visit? Here are a few I found this morning.

I don’t see this Joker as being that scary. In fact, I think of him more as a talk show host giving a monologue. Sure, his face is a little bobble-headed, and his mouth is a little tiny, but he’s more or less Leno. They’ve taken a truly horrifying character and turned it into…well, they cleaned him up. Purple lab jacket and green vest do not a Joker make.

The Scarecrow costume from the Warner Brothers store doesn’t fare much better. The smock is a little too nice, although they did a good job with the asylum straps. But the face? Is he Booger Head Scarecrow? Is it a leftover Star Wars mask? How do you get Scarecrow out of that? Maybe they had to clear out their stock of “Last Starfighter” masks and figured they could unload them on Bat-fans.

That’s the Last Starfighter dude. Not 100%, but way more accurate than the Scarecrow mask that, if memory serves, is supposed to be made of fabric.

Wanna know where you’ve seen Sonic Troopers before? 4th-rate costume catalogues. They are the generic versions of Power Rangers for kids who aren’t that into details. Any kid would look at these and say, “Dear God, this is a pile of rip-off s***.” I did an internet search for Sonic Troopers and the only things that came up were more costume sites offering the same knock-off crap. The scary part is that these would be perfectly acceptable costumes for a Japanese TV show. I wouldn’t be shocked if I saw these on japanese TV as some new superhero squad. As an aside, I’d like a street gang to name themselves the Sonic Troopers, kill and rape a few dozen people, then destroy a building. Then, out-of-touch grandmothers could buy their grandkids these costumes and say “oh, it’s a Sonic Trooper costume, honey,” and cause controversy.

Hey kids! Love that great movie Jurassic Park? Sure, it came out before your parents were married and you may have been absolutely frightened while watching it, but didn’t you love the triceratops? You remember, it was the dinosaur that was sick and didn’t get up and move or anything. You remember that, right? Well, here’s a costume that’s tangentially related to that movie! It’s…well, it’s a nifty triceratops mask! And pajamas with a triceratops on it! Mostly blue, not much triceratops, but it still qualifies as a costume! Mostly just the mask part. An absolute must for out-of-touch grandparents.

There’s little to be said about this Batman costume, other than he looks sad. His ears are shrunken, his nose is awkwardly pointy, and his face isn’t angry or menacing, it’s more of a “poor me” expression. Poor Batman. You look like a damn fool.

And there’s Muppet costumes too! Here’s Animal! Yes, the out-of-control drummer for the Electric Mayhem is faithfully rendered into a costume for your child by someone who has not seen an episode of the Muppets in their lives and designed the costume based on someone’s description over the phone. More or less looks like Elmo with squinty eyes, an underbite, and a unibrow. Any kid would love to wear this costume, especially if they love being stuffed in lockers and forced to eat dog poop.

But there’s not much that’s going to beat Fozzie Bear, who looks like he’s been drunk for the better part of the week. The nose is huge and red, the eyes are shifty and the wrong shade of purple, and your child will be emerging from Fozzie’s larynx. Here’s a photo of the real Fozzie for comparison:

Notice that his mouth isn’t a small red line, and that his fingers aren’t black. This costume is probably unlicensed, since the Henson company actually have some pride in their creations. Drunk Fozzie would not have passed muster.

Of course, they have an American-themed gift shop. Replicas of the Constitution, books about Ben Franklin, Mickey Mouse shirts where he’s wearing red, white, and blue, and all that fun stuff. And, for some reason, this:

It’s a David Beckham t-shirt. Of course, he plays for the US now, but only for a year or two. He’s still remarkably British, I doubt he changed his citizenship just to play on a team. Not only that, they had a selection of David Beckham biographies. IN THE AMERICAN EXPERIENCE GIFT SHOP. Did we not have enough American athletes we could spotlight? Why is a chunk of the AMERICAN EXPERIENCE gift shop devoted to an athlete from a country we proudly fought to free ourselves from?

David Beckham, GET OUT OF OUR GIFT SHOP. Britain has a lovely gift shop who’d be happy to host your biography.

Thankfully, his shirt wasn’t being sold for full price, so he’s not making much off them. USA! USA! USA!

I got to see Song of the South in the theaters when it was re-released in 1986, the 40th anniversary. If I’m not mistaken, it’s been closely-guarded since, and there’s intense pressure to keep it buried. And I can understand why. Uncle Remus is an unrealistic portrayal of a slave as “happy” and “well-behaved”. It’s not what Disney is all about now, and like I said, there’s pressure to keep it buried.

Still, there are websites that offer versions of Song of the South. And, sadly, not all of them are sensitive to the issues behind the film. For instance, this site.

Remastered. Nice one, guys.

Apples are cute! (but not as cute as Bouncy Bee) They can be used to describe careers! This one’s a nurse! That one’s a teacher! O ho, that one’s even a clown! And then there’s a…

So…when you become a cop you get bizarre facial hair? A Fu Manchu mustache and a goatee? That’s what being a cop means to this artist? Do you automatically get this cheesy hairstyle when you join the force? Unless…

No, it can’t be that. It just can’t. You don’t need to go to school for that.