Paris-elephant update

This from the wire: "Lori Berk, a publicist for Hilton, says she never made any comments about helping drunken elephants in India."

If it was indeed a hoax, please let the record show that we totally called it - not that the story was that widespread anyway.

Furthermore, if the hoax was started by someone in India, we officially declare it the second-weirdest story from there today. Behold the first-weirdest:

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NEW DELHI - A man in southern India married a female dog in a traditional Hindu ceremony as an attempt to atone for stoning two other dogs to death — an act he believes cursed him — a newspaper reported Tuesday.

P. Selvakumar married the sari-draped former stray named Selvi, chosen by family members and then bathed and clothed for the ceremony Sunday at a Hindu temple in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, the Hindustan Times newspaper said.

Selvakumar, 33, told the paper he had been suffering since he stoned two dogs to death and hung their bodies from a tree 15 years ago.

"After that my legs and hands got paralyzed and I lost hearing in one ear," he said in the report.

A ringing endorsement

I sometimes write about music, which means I sometimes get press releases about bands. Today it was Rockfour, and their album "Memories of the Never Happened." Peep this fantastic blurb:

"Arguably Israel's biggest rock export" -Harp.com

I, for one, would like to hear that argument. My other demand is a t-shirt featuring nothing but the band's name, so people will ask me, "What's a Rockfour?"

Seriously, though, the band sounds pretty good. Click over for some solid jangle rock.

Wh-wh-wh-what?

It's now time to set aside Porkchop's long-held policy of denying the existence of a certain vapid socialite. After all, who doesn't enjoy a quick game of "How many things are wrong with this picture?"

I'm pretty sure they made up a problem just so she could pretend to be helping something. They made it sound as cutesy and ridiculous as possible, to trick bloggers into spreading it. It won't work, though, mark my words.

Elsewhere on that same news site:
His charges will be reduced to third-degree ducking-while-being-photographed.

Creep-you-out Friday

Behold the ghastly splash graphic at preciousmoments.com:*


There are several spine-chilling elements to this picture. First, there's the fact that at this resolution, you can't see any facial features except the gigantic, black, soulless eyes of the supposedly cute dolls.

But then there's the unspeakably evil tagline, "Celebrate precious blessings," juxtaposed with the rictus of pain on the face of the girl, who appears to be celebrating, if anything, some kind of hernia. We could call her eyes soulless as well, but it would be to miss the implicit cry for help:

"Please, mister," they say, "save me from this lifetime of forced labor. Take my bushel of apples and put me out of my misery quickly."

Maybe the "precious blessing" is cheap apples at the supermarket - but at what price?


*It's probably best not to ask what I was doing on preciousmoments.com in the first place.

Hence the phrase "stranger than fiction"

Look closely at this photo from BBC's pictures of the day and tell me what's happening:

OK, time's up. What did you come up with? Is he pleading with the bus not to hit him? Perhaps he belongs to some strange bus-worshiping cult? By all means, leave your best guesses in the comments, then come back and read this actual cutline:

All right, one more question: what exercises do you have to do in order to gain this capability?

Creep-you-out Monday

Then he stepped to the microphone, cleared his throat and intoned: "Brains. Braaaaaaains."

Seuss or Kafka?

MARVIN'S GLORIOUS DISCOVERY

Marvin learns that he is a Magnificent Nubian goat

That's the amusingly cryptic headline on a release faxed to us by Xlibris, home of every kind of book you can think of . I especially got a kick out of it because I saw the headline before the letterhead, so it looked like a news release.

Anyway, the book is "Marvin the Magnificent Nubian Goat" by Carol Hair Moore, and it appears to be more Seuss than Kafka: "This is the story of Marvin, who lived on Moore Farm, as he tries to find out who he is - a peacock, a horse, or a kitten?" It seems to me like the title kinda spoils the ending, but if you're still intrigued, you can check it out here.