I don’t have a TV anymore, so while visiting my parents I took the time to surf as many channels as I could. Today I came across something called bpmtv, which is ridiculous silly crap. But it did have one segment featuring the “cheesiest” dance videos of all time. Some were just atrocious. So I thought I’d share a few with you.

First up is, um, “I Need A Vacation” by Paul Lekakis:

I like how Paul adds some hot chicks to the video just to …you know… preserve some doubt.

Next is one that is clearly intentionally ironic, but nonetheless ridiculous. It’s “Biker Shorts” by Canada’s Stink Mitt:

I’ve saved the cheesiest for last. It’s by the excellently named German band Moonbootica, a song called “Roll The Dice“. It’s mesmerizingly atrocious in its transcendent douchebaggery:

After all that, I think we all need some ear bleach. I give it you now in the form of the wonderful Susan Boyle appearing here on “Britain’s Got Talent”. I implore you to watch the whole thing. It will make you happy.

Quick post today. I just watched the 2009 Easter special of Doctor Who, titled “Planet of the Dead“. Ohhh, it was atrocious! As much as I love David Tennant’s version of The Doctor, I’m now pleased that he’s leaving the show, if this turd of an episode is what we can expect from the franchise’s future.

On the other extreme is a little noticed gem on Fox TV called Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. The 2nd season finale aired earlier this week, and it seems unlikely that the show will be picked up for a 3rd season, making the episode the likely series finale. (See Skiffy.ca’s review of the first season.)

Originally, I’d complained that she show has a stylistic dysfunction: everyone clearly drew their wardrobe from the same trailer. They all wear the same brand of jeans and cowboy boots. But once you’re over the growing pains, Terminator benefits from one fantastic quality: it’s unpredictable. This second season in particular, I had no idea where any of the story lines were headed –a rarity in American television! But the finale was singularly powerful. Its final scene, in particular, was touchingly acted with much depth and gravitas. If it really is the final moment for the whole show, then it ends on a very high note.

It’s so good, in fact, that I’m not particularly intrigued by the new Terminator movie, which apparently does not adhere to the TV show’s fascinating canon.

In Other News

Thanks to Richard von E. for this: LED sheep art! Must be seen to be believed.

And if sheep aren’t your thing, Dawn L. sends us this and this.

News from England: a girl has 7 shots of double espresso, has to go to the hospital, and is now on a campaign to warn everyone about the evils of caffeine.

Why is it that every time some dumb-ass overdoses on something banal, they then think it’s their right and responsibility to preach to the rest of us –who aren’t overdosing on it– about how horrible a thing the banal item we aren’t abusing is?

And why is that the preceding sentence is so poorly constructed? I blame the double espresso I just had.

Meanwhile, religious groups are pissed about losing their rights to deny the rights of others. Seriously. Leads us to this.

That’s all I gots for you today… except to add that Deonandan.com is now up to version 4.0! Yayyy, I’m a big boy!

Every week crusty newspaperman EK Hornbeck sends me further reports of classic old newspapers going bust. The internet is killing traditional print media! But what to do? Here’s an idea forwarded to us from Cousin Ajay. It’s from Saving Newspapers: The Musical:

So I saw Watchmen. It’s not for everyone, but of course I enjoyed it. EK Hornbeck sends us this disturbing bit of Watchmen-related news.

Hey remember my trip to India a couple of years ago? It seems my lecture at JNU (Nehru University) in New Delhi is listed under “distinguished visitors” on the university’s website. Apparently I’m a “renowned Canadian writer”. If only Canadians thought so!

Meanwhile, JJ sends us this entertaining talk from TED by Elizabeth Gilbert on “genius”. Yes, this is the woman who wrote, Eat, Pray, Love, that annoying book that pops up on every reading list of every woman whose profile I’ve browsed on a dating site.

First off, from Dawn we get….

From Chamika comes news that the old 1960s Spiderman shows are now available free online. Speaking of Spidey, Nasty Nicky B sends us this.

Meanwhile, don’t get me started on this guy.

Special Ed sends us this list of the top 20 all time heroes of pop culture. James T Kirk only made #12. Bastards.

From Darth Vadum we get news that blow jobs can cause throat cancer. Or at least that’s my boil-down from the very vague article. The BBC article states that [men and women with newly diagnosed throat cancer] who had evidence of prior oral HPV infection had a 32-fold increased risk of throat cancer. Of course they didn’t specify whether we’re talking about fellatio or cunnilingus here, and that might make all the difference. To the article’s credit, they made no causal links, since this is an associative study. But still, causation is fun. And that’s what blogs are for.

Ack! I’m wearing reading glasses right now. READING GLASSES! How did this happen?

Don’t know if you’ve heard, but it seems a RyanAir “air hostess” has been outed as a porn star. The best part of this story is the way the airline is sticking behind her (so to speak). Instead of playing the ridiculous anti-freedom moral card and insisting that the hostess’s personal activities have some relevance to her job, their position is “What people do before or after they work for us is their business.”

Hallelujah, brother!

Mind you, their highly ethical stance might be a bit more worthy of celebration if this wasn’t the same company that is considering putting pay toilets in their planes and on making calendars of their employees in bikinis.

In Other News…

For my fellow writer friends, be sure to visit the Google Book Settlement page and to assert your rights over whatever content Google might have digitized without your permission. Now, I’m on record as being a fan of piracy and open access…. and that includes piracy of my written works. But if you’d a chance to get some cash out of a billion dollar corporation that made profit out of your works without your permission, go to it. The Writers Union of Canada advises writers not to opt out of the settlement.

Lastly, want to see some great presentation software? Check out gapminder.org!

Happy birthday to William Shatner, who turned 78 on Sunday. Wow. 78. Further wow: I know William Shatner’s birthday.

Apropos of nothing: Melissa G. sends us Hamlet’s Facebook page! And as usual, Dawn L. sends us someone’s top 5 weirdest fetishes. Does this count as a Daily Perv Link (TM)? Heck, why not. The piggy-back rides sound particularly odd to me.

As I currently await the most recent episode of Heroes to finish downloading, I’m reflecting on the series finale of the “re-imagined”Battlestar Galactica, a show considered by many to be the best American TV show ever witnessed on free television. I had previously listed what I consider to be the best sci-fi finales in TV history. I’m not quite sure Galactica lives up to that list, but it is an extraordinarily well produced and evocative ending. Unlike many who’ve written about it, I’m not the least disappointed.

Expect a full review of the finale on Skiffy.ca sometime very soon. I will say, though, that I’m unsure of how I feel about Bob Dylan’s “All Along The Watchtower” playing such a prominent and unironic role in the finale. Music has long been BG’s “other” character, pushing mood and content further than I think any previous TV score has managed.

The secret Cylon “summoning” music was one of this season’s open secrets. Composer Bear McCreary has been candid about borrowing heavily from the Dylan song to elicit the summoning tune. Without giving away too much of a spoiler, it was a bit of an anachronism to have the Hendrix version erupt later in the show, even having Starbuck utter the line, “There must be some kind of way out of here” before engaging the Galactica’s FTL drive.

The brilliance of the finale, as I hope to make clear in a future article, is in its reliance on character, rather than plot, to tie the elements together. No plot could have satisfied the legions of rabid fanboys eager for resolutions to all the show’s lingering mysteries. The right approach, then, was to relegate exposition to deus ex machina, and to focus both on the rightness of character reaction and on some underlying theme or messaging.

Here’s a fan-made compilation of scenes from the series, accompanied by McCreary’s version of “All Along The Watchtower”.

In Other News…

And further apropos of nothing, here are a few random photos from the past couple of weeks.

Giving my talk at the WHO simulation in Montreal.

At a "bhangra and Caribbean" party in Toronto this past weekend.

From E.K. Hornbeck comes this story of John McCain’s idiot daughter complaining about her love life. Cry me a river, baby. Sample of her idiocy: “I am not only turned off by people who voted for Barack Obama, but I am also turned off by people that voted for my dad.” Really? So you’re essentially turned off by pretty much anyone who voted… unless he spoiled his ballot or voted for a loser third party candidate.

Jeez.

Meanwhile, Nadya “Octomom” Suleman’s story is so ridiculous that I found myself talking about her to my class of first year undergrads today. Here’s an interesting take on our own hypocrisy when dealing with her.

Speaking of Octomom, I think I found my Hallowe’en costume for next year:

And here’s the “Octomom” Denny’s special: “14 eggs, no sausage, and the guy next to you has to pay for it.”

Meanwhile, know of an interesting immigrant in Canada? Why not nominate him/her for the Top 25 Canadian Immigrant Awards?

Meanwhile, Brad Parker sends us this great collection of art work done by prisoners in New Delhi. Here are two of my favourites:

By the way, everyone and his/her dog has been sending me this article about inter-racial dating. I’m not sure why. I have no comments.

I have no more meanwhiles for you today.

This is pretty cool. I got it from Dawn’s Facebook page. It’s a list of history’s weirdest cases of mass hysteria. People are so lame.

Also in the cool category, Richard sends us this video of something called “Red Bull Crushed Ice“, which is a sort of extreme skating event:

It gets better. Nasty Nicky B points out that I’m not the only one noticing the clearly Irish origins of President Bartholomew Paddy O’Bama, with the song, No One As Irish As Barack Obama.

Check out the following drawing by artist Dusty Abell, showing all the skiffy icons from the 70s. Amazing how a crap decade can seem some awesome in retrospect, no?

What to hear something fascinating? It’s something I’ve noticed about my own records keeping practices with respect to this and my other websites. In the digital age, content is updated so rapidly that there is little or no record of what came before. In other words, for the first time in history, the written word is no longer a record of history. One fellow is taking it very seriously, and is taking steps to combat this trend. But it’s an aspect of the paperless revolution that few saw coming.

Lastly, in a sign of the arrival of the genre, The Guardian has a list of the science fiction novels “everyone must read”. Some questionable choices there, such as Margaret Atwood’s The Blind Assassin, a lot of books I’ve never heard of, and a saddening tendency to confuse space opera and fantasy with true skiffy. Oh when will they learn? IO9 takes a crack at them here.

In the final minutes of 2008, I have nothing important to share with you. Instead, you get, from EK Hornbeck, a fascinating list of Ten Things That Won’t Survive The Recession. And over at Skiffy.ca, we have a new article: 2008 Science Fiction Year in Review.

Tomorrow I will have my traditional New Year’s post of things I am thankful for. So until then, have a drink for me… ’cause I’m sick in bed!