Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Now THIS is scary


You don't come by chestnuts like this anymore. Thank god for 70's television.

Happy Halloween!

Friday, October 26, 2007

We're going to be fine - now get the hell out of here, your plane to D.C. is about to leave

The past week has been surreal. One laced with hyperbole outpacing reality. It was a week where those of us whose houses still stood, felt nothing but guilt. Where no amount of giving or grieving would make us feel any better. The air stank of chemicals and the sky was a toxic orange. You stayed inside or got a headache. It was that elementary.

But it must be said, that when the rebuilding is done and the pain subsides, San Diegans will stand proud knowing that their neighbors stepped up, stepped in and made the pain much less. When you watch national news anchors marvel at the scene at Qualcomm Stadium and find it to be nothing more than the stark antithesis to Katrina, you know we had to have done something right. When amongst the grief counselors and insurance representatives there are live bands, day care and free massage for displaced families you know San Diego is a place to be praised.

Back in the 70's it was often joked that California could successfully secede from the Union and do just fine. Hell, the state's own GNP is higher than France. But it was never more apparent that this state could stand on it's own when a mayor and a governor along with their capable staff brought calm and confidence to a shaken populace. That a 90's action hero, a portly ex-cop and volunteers from every walk of life could be held up as an example for citizenry at home and abroad is nothing short of fantastic. Somewhere around Tuesday night with fires still blazing, the vast majority of San Diegans began to feel that we were going to make it and it was going to be okay. And then, the assholes came.

There was something tainted and incongruous seeing the patronizing ghoul/Department of Homeland Security Chief, Michael Chertoff standing next to Mayor Sanders and Governor Schwarzenegger. You had the feeling that there was this collective snort of disgust being expressed all over the county. As if San Diego residents were saying, "thank you but no thank you, we'll take it from here baldy. Get back on your plane and get the f*ck out of here." Then, only to add insult to insult: The next day he arrived.

Swallowing resources and stalling recovery efforts just so he and his parade of minions and morons could get to Rancho Bernardo to appear concerned before whatever camera would click. The President (I capitalize it our of respect for the office and not the man) stood with the people doing the real work trying to look like he understood the gravity of the situation when you knew he really couldn't grasp what the hell was going on outside of the simple connection he had with clearing dry brush in Crawford. Although, being associated with evacuees and smoking husks of populated areas in arid climes is his oeuvre. But all things equal, he and his kind were unnecessary this week. They distracted from the real heroes in our midst and delivered promises that had the weight of the very ash that fell on his silly polished cowboy boots.

In short, families lost homes, farmers lost millions and the months to come will be virtually Sisyphean; but the county will rebuild and San Diego will become that much more of a destination. Not because of the sun and sand but now because of generosity, tenacity and self-sufficiency; making it a true American city.

Monday, October 22, 2007

Yeah, It's as bad as it sounds

It's clear as a bell outside the Cerebral Itch corporate offices, but you take a breath and it smells and tastes like you're standing about two feet downwind from a campfire using treated lumber and PVC piping as fuel. You look to the north and it's a sick brown haze that covers the sky; the same looking to the south. We seem to be in the eye of an unprecedented firestorm. North, South and East County San Diego are burning with no relief promised till Thursday. All we can do in Downtown is just look on and pray.

Follow the latest fire news from the Twitter string our local NPR station has established

Friday, October 19, 2007

We're exposing ourselves...so to speak

In the interest of transparency and cheap web traffic, we have fired up a Twitter account and plan to let every member of the Cerebral Itch staff to twitter their little fingers off on all things happening in the office.

We already started this experiment and it seems to have already sparked six fights, five missed deadlines, an exposed office romance and a close call with a DUI. All in all, a typical week. Start following the Cerebral Itch Twitter string and get real-time notices of who is doing what, where and to whom. Plus, we may throw some prizes in the mix at any time to be claimed only by followers of our Twitter string; how's that for getting our knees dirty?

So Veejay, Silvio, Dawn, Big Pete, the new marketing guy and others will be just another set of reality media whores. Except there is really no prize money involved and nobody's really watching; just like the CW.

Thursday, October 18, 2007

...and the world is now a little less classy and a little less cool

When you co-starred in movies like From Here to Eternity, The King & I and An Affair to Remember and proved a mighty match for guys like Burt Lancaster, Yul Brenner and Cary Grant, you were a tour de force. But to do it with incalculable class and genteel wit meant that you were Deborah Kerr. A classy lady who never slid into the scandal sheets like her contemporaries (Liz Taylor, et al) but only did her job...unbelievably well.

If you made Sinatra, Martin, Davis laugh their asses off and partied with them as Vegas grew into puberty you deserve a place on the mantle of eternal swank. Joey Bishop did that along with killer stand-up and laying out venerable talk show hosts and audiences alike. Somewhere the Rat Pack is all back together and that is a very cool thought indeed.

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Oh, you know we weren't going to let this one go quietly



What newscasters across America should've really said:

"So the affable boy-woman lesbian comedienne and corporate spokesperson, Ellen Degeneres was reduced to tears at the outset of her television show today under the enormous weight of grief she carries daily surrounding the loss of both civilian and military life in Iraq. What? no, that's not it? Then okay, Ellen Degeneres was reduced to tears yesterday by our bellicose and moronic president as well as the impotent congress who is playing political chess to suit their interests for the '08 election. What? wait - okay, I think I got the right copy now; let me try that again. Ellen Degeneres was reduced to tears yesterday by the death of her recently adopted pet dog that...Huh? No?! Then what the f&ck are we reporting on here?! What? You're kidding me? Seriously?!

Ellen Degeneres was reduced to tears yesterday by a dog adoption snafu that resulted in her complete loss of professionalism and using her show as a bully pulpit, scratch that, a place to beg to a national audience so pressure would be applied to a fly-by-night pet adoption service. Sources close to Ellen agree that any respectability and clout she had amassed since coming out as a lesbian went down the crapper. Several lesbians we spoke to feel that if Ellen is going to dress like Gilligan then she shouldn't cry like Mrs. Howell.

Good night."

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

UPS=Useless Pinhead Sketcher

Last night while the Cerebral Itch editorial department was at the local sports bar watching the Falcons get some jail house love courtesy of Eli Manning, we were repeatedly assaulted by one asinine commercial in particular: UPS and their whiteboard douchebag.

At least two TVs were smashed in by shot glasses and beer bottles when this chestnut came on for the oh, 76th time. Who the hell wants to see a commercial with a spokesperson emulating the one smug Dockers-clad asshole in the office no one likes? We all have one - The "jump up and assault the Expo® dry erase board mulit-colored pen set with giddy aplomb" idiot who then proceeds to draw on the board with great conviction as if he is conveying the AIDS vaccine all while everyone else thinks he's actually less qualified for his job than originally thought.

What is most shocking about this commercial is that it was conceived by the folks over at The Martin Agency. They're the group who are responsible for the classic Geico commercials using celebrity relics (i.e. Burt Bacharach, Peter Graves and the like) telling actual policy holder's stories. Now that stuff actually worked. This dreck was most likely pitched to UPS marketing pinheads who think they're great managers/collaborators all because the secret to team communication lies in the magic that is the dry erase board.

All this makes us happier than ever that Cerebral Itch uses FedEx Ground for all our shipping needs.

Thursday, October 11, 2007

we're punting



New stories and opinions to be unleashed, but in the interim, a classic - enjoy

Wednesday, October 03, 2007

Reality TV safety tip: Don't dry hump Danny Bonaduce if you have no dental plan



So for those of us that actually saddle up to the trough of reality TV slop, the above video is about the best piece of Schadenfreude you could ask for.

A little background: The moron speaking to the audience is "Johnny Fairplay". A self-made media whore who struck it rich by parlaying his lack of moral fiber the season of Survivor - Pearl Islands. The beginning of his ascent to full-blown televised assholishness was when he curried the sympathies of the other survivors by lying about his grandmother dying (she's still alive by the way). Ever since he's been showing up anywhere there's a camera. With swaggering aplomb, Danny Bonaduce, who should be dead, decides to exact some drunken justice on the asshat. Enjoy

Tuesday, October 02, 2007

This is where we've been - so get off our ass

So many people have been asking "where the hell have you jagoffs been the past week?" And to that inquiry I really have no defense. We have been dodging our responsibilities as well as the law and we're finally back to pay the bill of life we cannot afford. If that all seems a bit maudlin, allow us to give you a daily breakdown of our exploits and then perhaps we can gain back the loyalty some of you were dumb enough to give us in the first place.

Monday, September 24th
San Diego, CA - We knew we had to cover Ahmadinejad speaking at Columbia University. The only problem is that we put our new intern Silvio in charge of making travel arrangements. Instead of getting us tickets to New York, he got us tickets to Colombia and reservations at a hotel in Bogota that was reviewed by some guy from New York on TripAdvisor. Suitably marinated from an extended stay in the Airport lounge, we didn't realize this error until we landed.

Tuesday. September 25th
Bogota, Colombia - Veejay, Silvio and I got to our hotel in Bogota only to find that the place was shot up the week before in a minor skirmish between families over shall we say an "agricultural" issue. The bell captain's arm was in a sling and his head was wrapped in dirty gauze; but jaunty and polite as anyone could ask for in a one-armed indigenous citizen tasked to carry my bags. Once in my room, (I made the two idiots sleep in a free room that had been given to us by the management because the toilet was plugged up by ziploc bags full of "flour" and it's windows were blown out in the previous week's firefight - I found this hilarious considering the rainy season was upon us) I frantically dialed every ex-girlfriend with either State Department or travel industry connections, left messages and then decided to make the most of Silvio's error by soaking up some local color.

Wednesday, September 26th
Bogota, Colombia - If I had a nickel for everytime I woke up face down in a town square at dawn unable to name the city, I'd have $5.80. Make that $5.85, because Bogota can now be added to the list. Veejay and Silvio are nowhere to be found and my hangover is made less by the possibility I may have finally shaken those bozos without the cost of COBRA.

Thursday, September 27th - A.M.
Bogota, Colombia - I get a call from the U.S. Embassy. Silvio and Veejay have turned up courtesy of the Colombian Police who got them from the Colombian Army in a sweep of a FARC rebel compound in the city. Guess who sincerely thought they were at a suspiciously well-armed youth hostel? Yep, the boys. The authorities didn't even question them. They just knew by looking at these two rubes that their terrorism threat level was pink.

Thursday, September 27th - P.M.
C-130 Transport plane - Apparently one of my old flames had some pull with the state department and once they de-liced the boys we were on a C-130 transport plane headed home with a busted up Humvee, 16 palettes of sugar and a USO troop that included Alan Thicke and Gloria Estefan. Miami was our next stop.

Friday, September 28th
Miami, Florida - Wearing the same clothes we started all of this in, we got off a bus our G.I. buddies packed us on in Miami and walked straight into a PETA International Hug a Vegetarian Day rally. I had some fierce jet lag and was bitch cranky but I'll still swear on a stack of bibles that the banner over the stage said "Hit a Vegetarian Day". I thought it was too good to be true, but I went with my first instinct and took out three vegans with two haymakers; you read that right. Two punches - three hits. They're vegans for crissake. I knocked one into another and they both went down like you'd expect malnourished soy-lovin scarecrows to do. Next thing I know I'm pushed to the ground by three cops with one of them whispering in me ear, "you have no idea how many of us have been wanting to do that all day - you're our hero. Play nice and we'll get you out of here." I struggled a bit to look tough in front of the ladies, but otherwise took my cues from the constabulary. Two hours later I was sippin' mojitos at a South Beach bar with Gloria's backup singers.

Friday, September 28th, Saturday, September 29th and Sunday, September 30th
drunken hedonistic haze with memories best chance to be recovered through hypnosis.

Monday, October 1st
San Diego, CA - I woke up in my condo not knowing how or when I got there. Only to find "the rhythm is gonna get you {smiley face}" written on my ass and 47 missed calls from Veejay.

And that my friends is how you lose a week