Expletive not deleted

A member of Congress ends a letter to a constituent with this: "I think you're an asshole." Apparently, it's all a big mistake, and apologies are being made.

DULLARD FLASHBACK: I had a similar embarrassment, but mine's from childhood. I was visiting a family down the street, a traditional Catholic household with five kids, a stay-at-home mom and a dad who was an officer at the local Navy base. A baseball game was on TV. One of the teams playing was the Oakland Athletics. "My dad calls them the Oakland A-Holes," I said. After a hush, I was told to go home.

Halliburton building immigrant detention centers

Gah!

Bennett's latest gamble

Conservative commentator/moralist/high roller Bill Bennett says Pulitzer winners should get jail time, not awards, for reporting on activities of government.

It's a girl!

Katie Holmes gives birth — probably very quietly. The status of the placenta is unknown at presstime, but we're sure the parents are happy as clams.

Ben Folds Laundry

Then lets his cabbie jam with the band on stage.

Dullard Blog being manipulated by terrorists

Either that or Rumsfeld is frickin' bat-shit crazy.

Tom Cruise rehabilitating image

Says maybe he won't eat the placenta.

So unsexy it hurts

The Boston Phoenix offers a list of the 100 Unsexiest Men in the World. Among the unlucky guys:

• film critic Roger Ebert
• terrorist-at-large Osama bin Laden
• "American Idol" runner-up Clay Aiken
• Ron Howard and brother Clint
  
• Rep. Dennis Kucinich
• Mike Mills of R.E.M. fame

For Jody

Penguins in sweaters.

U2's "One" wins VH1 lyric poll

Brits say this line from that song is the best ever:

One life, with each other sisters, brothers

The Smiths, the Who, Eminem, Pink Floyd and Coldplay are included in the top 20.

Discuss!

Our lives at 45 rpm

Fifth in a series of posts on one Dullard's collection of 45s

Song: "Wishing (If I Had A Photograph of You)"
Artist: A Flock of Seagulls
Year released: 1983
Highest U.S. chart position: 26

DULLARD TAKE: You can't talk about A Flock of Seagulls without mentioning the band's greatest claim to fame: the singer's hair. The wacky "flying wedge" style sported by Mike Score is a true fashion disaster for the '80s, even worse than shoulder pads and Members Only jackets. But hey, at least he took a chance.

The Seagulls' tunes were not as risky as their fashion statements. The British quartet produced mushy, pre-programmed music that seemed more calculated at cashing in on "New Wave" than committing to it.

"Wishing" is symptomatic of the band, a synth-drenched dirge for dead-end love. In the wide spectrum of droning music, this song lies somewhere between Pink Floyd's "Shine On You Crazy Diamond" and late-80s Cure.

On top of layers of drum machines, keyboards and distorted guitar, Score bleats on about unrequited love, concluding:

If I had a photograph of you,
It's something to remind me.
I wouldn't spend my life just wishing.

What, pray tell, would he have done with his time if he had that photograph? It seems reasonable to assume the singer would take some sort of action to relieve his malaise. But what? One can only recommend that "Wishing" be included on the era's list of odes to Onan. Some others:

• "Turning Japanese" by the Vapors
• "Relax" by Frankie Goes to Hollywood
• "She-Bop" by Cyndi Lauper

"Wishing" is also similar in theme to the band's bigger and better hit, "I Ran." Both songs exhibit a fatal combination of longing and fear in relationships. Perhaps the Gulls should have listened to Duran Duran and Adam Ant for cues in romantic bravado.

Memo to motorcyclists: Shut up!

Spring has sprung, and with it, another season of neighborhood-rattling group rides by pent-up motorcyclists expressing their "individuality." I'd go into a rant here about how irritating these aging Harley hounds are, how their need to blast their engines is probably a result of their diminishing libidos and how there ought to be a noise-pollution law to make them shut the hell up.

But I can't make that argument nearly as well as this column from The Onion does.

An excerpt:

The mere act of sitting astride a stationary motorcycle and manipulating the throttle for the express purpose of creating vast amounts of ear-splitting noise is the most impressive display of power known to man.

By the way, I am not alone in my desire for peace and quiet.

Null news is good news

My employer has a page on its site that allows people access to e-mail via the Web. The page includes some seemingly random headlines from the day's news. Earlier today, there was apparently no news whatsoever, as seen here.

The wrong Jon

A Utah school lures a big name to be a guest speaker: Jon Stewart. Unfortunately, the Stewart who agreed to the visit was a Chicago wrestler, not the host of TV's "The Daily Show" as intended. Fortunately, it all got straightened out before the event.