Bad Breeders

There are a lot of differences between American and English football (the English version: much more “foot”, much less steroids), but there’s one sad similarity – the behavior of a few bad fans/parents. The British news site Biggleswade Today (no, I did not pull that name from a Monty Python skit) reports that some locals are incensed over the boorish behavior exhibited by some parents at a youth football/soccer match/game.

Yeah, we in the States have our share of loser dads taking out their feelings of inadequacy on fellow spectators, players, and refs. But the British can put a classy spin on anything. Here’s how the site puts it: “Coupled with the sight of one of the fathers relieving himself publicly in the dividing hedge, this does little to encourage support of more pitches on the new field – particularly when the pavilion was open and available for such calls of nature and is a public order offence…With such examples is there any wonder some youths are behaving anti-socially.”

Or, in American English: “Dude. Don’t piss on the field. Use the shitter. There’s kids watching, jackass.”

I hate Mondays. The weekend’s over, it’s raining, I have a ton of work to do, and now I gotta read about Michael Gravelle trying to justify keeping his kids in cages. That is the cherry on the cake of my day.

Reading this article begs the question: does Gravelle’s lawyer have any hair left? ‘Cause I’m quite sure that he pulled large swatches of it out of his scalp upon learning that Gravelle gave a guided tour of his happy home to a local news reporter, who in turn shared the story with the AP, who in turn shared it with the entire planet. When your client a) shows off his house’s urine- and feces-stained walls and baseboards and b) tells the reporter that making them sleep in the cages was “necessary” – well, you got worries. To paraphrase the late Johhny Cochran: the glove? Fits. So let’s take in comfort in the fact that someone else is having a worse Monday than us.

Beware the Gay Agenda! That’s the message that David Parker is teaching to his son, a Lexington, Mass. kindergartner. As if fingerpainting and learning the words to Wiggles songs weren’t enough for a kid to deal with. Now the kids have to worry about secret armies of Gays trying to turn them Gay with their Devious Gay Ways!

The Parkers, it seems, were a bit miffed when their son brought home a picture book that included families with same-sex parents. The school has refused their request to pull their son out of class whenever homosexuality was discussed. And, I gotta tell you, Mr. Parker does make a good point about tolerance. “Real respect, real tolerance”, he was quoted as saying, “is not pushing your beliefs on other people.” Although…this is kindergarten we’re talking about. And a teacher telling kids that some people have two mommies is a bit different than a teacher reading a Dan Savage column to the class. And I’m pretty sure that “real tolerance” doesn’t involve teaching your kids to fear and loathe people who are different from them.

Still, there are those who believe that The Gay Agenda is a real and tangible threat to Decent Society. I’m not too sure that there is a Gay Agenda, but I HAVE had plenty of nice young men in white shirts and clip-on ties knock on my door and tell me I’m going to Hell if I don’t become a Christian.

I was a bit nervous going into this post. What happens, I wondered, when you Google “Google”? I imagined some horrible Philadelphia Experiment rupture in the space-time continuum, or the Gates of Hell opening up, or me getting sucked into the computer like Jeff Bridges in Tron, which would be bad because I’m not really good at the video games and would probably end up dying a horrible death, my lightcycle splattered across the virtual landscape. Luckily, none of that happened. Whew!

Why was I Googling “Google”, you ask? Because I needed a pic to go along with this entry. You might be surprised to learn that there really aren’t a whole lot of good images of “Google”. It took me a while to find one that worked. I came across some interesting shots along the way, including one that’s definitely NSFW (it involved a woman’s breasts replacing two of the vowels in the word “Google”. I’m sure you can guess which ones). Really a lot of wasted time and wasted pop culture references, not to mention anxiety over potentially destroying the universe, just to let you all know that a couple of dipshits in Sweden named their kid after the most popular search engine in the world.

(I know – lots of buildup, disappointing ending. Kind of like most of Spielberg’s recent movies. Thanks to Blogging Baby for the story.)

Ever see the movie Monsoon Wedding? I watched it with my wife a while back, and really liked it. I won’t go into details; I’ll just say that it’s pretty much the exact opposite of this story.

A couple of questions. First, a dowry? Really? I thought those went out of style years ago. Like right around the time Napoleon checked into his digs on St. Helena. Second – the guy stood to get Rs five lakhs – in cash! – and a house valued at Rs 13 lakhs! Dude – come on! That’s Rs 18 LAKHS WE’RE TALKING ABOUT! Why so greedy? (No, I have no idea what that means either, but it sounds like a lot.)

Y’know, call me culturally insensitive, but isn’t this a bit, you know, Dark Ages? You have one set of parents attempting to sell off their daughter, and the other set killing said daughter over the deal. And the guy and his dad were cops. Guess they skipped class the day the police academy went over the stuff about dowries being illegal in India since 1961.

Sacre bleu! After racking up an incredible amount of debt (250,000 Euros – that’s a lot of Royales With Cheese, my friends), Emmanuel Cartier and his wife Patricia did what any sensible parents would do – they tried to poison all of their kids and themselves with insulin injections. Sadly, the couple’s daughter Alicia died as a result.

This is not to say that they were bad parents; after all, the Cartiers used their 15 credit cards to buy each kid their own TV, two of the kids had their own computers, and three had “hi-fi” (after reading that particular bit of Euroslang, I had to check to make sure this story was written in 2005 and not 1975). Well, ok, maybe they were bad parents. Why didn’t they buy ALL the kids their own “hi-fi”? It’s wrong to play favorites. Clearly, these two have issues. Poor Emmanuel – you have to feel something for a guy named after the popular heroine of a series of soft-porn flicks made famous by “Skinemax”. Looks like they’re bound for the Bastille. Au revoir, putains.

Here’s a Fun Fact: Joseph and Lamoy Andressohn are from Homestead, Florida – the town where I was born. Unlike the Andressohns, however, my parents didn’t try to raise me on a diet of peanut shells and lawn clippings. And unlike their little girl, I didn’t starve to death.

The Andressohns have been charged with neglect and manslaughter following the death of their child, who died after subsisting on coconut water, wheat grass, and some sort of beverage made from almonds. The little girl weighed only 7 pounds at 6 months of age. Defense lawyers are contending that the child’s death was due to a rare genetic condition; prosectuors are countering that claim with evidence supporting abuse and malnutrition. The Andressohns themselves face an uphill battle against what their lawyer Ellis Rubin refers to as “prejudice”. Yes, there does seem to be prejudice against parents who force their kids to eat stuff that’s only suitable for “Survivor” contestants and blame some imaginary genetic defect when the kid dies. It’s a tough old world, Mr. Rubin.

To clarify: by “alone”, I don’t mean mean “in the den watching The Wiggles while Mommy and Daddy play backgammon in the breakfast nook”. This is more along the lines of “on a freezing cold sidewalk in the middle of the night inhaling exhaust fumes”. Elias and Felicia Dominguez have been charged with abusing of endangering the health of a child; seems they left their little girl sitting on the sidewalk by herself while they flitted off to do church-related things.

Yes, God-fearing folks that they are, the Dominguez’s were visiting the Bay Area for a church conference. At least that’s what they told the authorities. Because that’s what Church People do – they crash their friends’ house at 2:oo in the morning, leave their kid on the sidewalk next to the still-running SUV and vanish for a few hours. It’s all very wholesome. It’s like something you might see in an Amy Grant video. (Seriously – a church conference? Is that the best these two idiots could could come up with? Well, I guess it beats “visiting the Bay Area to score some kind weed”.)

There’s nothing I can write that can possibly do this story any justice. It’s breathtaking (and not in a “Ooooh! Niagara Falls!” way. More like, “Ooooooh! I wish I could surgically remove the piece of my brain where the memory of this article will be stored!”). Really. It’s too much. I got nothin’.

“I know now I never should have owned a horse.” True dat, McKinley. True dat.

Congrats to Michelle Duggar and her husband, the aptly-named Jim Bob, on the birth of their 16th child. That’s right – SIXTEEN KIDS. To illustrate how many kids 16 is, let’s say you had 8 kids. The Duggars would have twice as many as you.

Now, we here at PBB are all about being fruitful and multiplying. So why are they featured here? Taking their cue from Mr. and Mrs. Nathan Arizona, Sr., the Duggars have bestowed each of their progeny with a name beginning with the letter “J”. Toss in a couple of Biblical names (Jeremiah, Jedidiah, Josiah – I assume that’s from the Bible, ’cause I somehow doubt they’re “West Wing” fans), and the PBB-appropriate “Jinger”, and…did I mention the husband’s name was Jim Bob? The family plans to take a few vacations in the months ahead – King’s Island, the Grand Canyon, and some spooky cursed idol- laden caves in Hawaii are on the itinerary. No word on whether or not they’re bringing Cousin Oliver.