Cuppacafe

Just in time to (potentially ) ruin the most important holiday in Ireland, there is a severe shamrock shortage which could seriously impact on the “wearing of the green," according to leading botanist Dr. Declan Doogue of the Royal Irish Academy.

The shamrock was “hit hard” by the severe winter weather and “won’t be easily found” this week, said Doogue, who also stated the national plant was under threat because of modern farming methods.

In its place, bogus shamrock plants are being used, he said, stating that he hoped the shamrock that President Obama would receive from Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen would be the real thing.

Now all we have to do now is eat green bagels and drink green beer.

The O'Perfessor

Some things simply defy explanation...

How ever did that river turn green?

Oh, I see

And then there's this:

"These are not the stormtroopers you are looking for."

Happy St. Paddy's day.

The Perfessor

Yes boys and girls, it is Groundhog’s Day. Time for us to turn our weather forcasting over to an over-sized rodent (no, not your local weatherman, a real rodent!) Which is what we all do when we look to Punxsutawney Phil.

Well, as it turns out, the little rodent saw his shadow! You can just imagine how very, very unhappy I am right about now.

You wanna know what I like best about Groundhogs right about now?

They taste just like chicken!

The Perfessor

So, the holiday toy shopping season is long since past but there are those of us toy geeks who like looking back over the past years and remembering not only toys from our youth, but the really cool items. Well here’s a nifty site that has tracked the hottest-selling toy for Christmas for the past 50 years.

As can be expected, toys have become more electronic over the years, with some of them being truly odd. In 1960 it was Barbie, 1970, Nerf balls held the high spot, 1980 Rubic’s Cube, While 1990 was the Super Soaker, and 2000 was the Razor Scooter. Anyway, you can check out the whole list here.

The Perfessor

I’ll see you Santa peeing in lights, and raise you Santa hammered...

And, last but certainly most cringe-worthy...

Just think there there are only 354 more shopping days ‘til Christmas.

The Perfessor

Yeah, you got that right, apparently we have been saying the year wrong for the past 10 years. It is not Two Thousand Ten, but Twenty Ten, so say the Grammar Police.

Coming off of "two thousand nine," you'll probably say "two thousand ten." In fact, 4 out of 5 YouTube videos randomly reviewed by The Chronicle have people pronouncing it that way.

But you would be wrong, so wrong, according to the National Association of Good Grammar.

"NAGG has decided to step in and decree that (2010) should officially be pronounced 'twenty ten,' and all subsequent years should be pronounced as 'twenty eleven,' 'twenty twelve,' etc.," proclaims the association's news release.

The Perfessor

That’s right, I managed to score a web-load of Spidey-related gifts for Christmas. Some of you might think this is very lame or even geeky, and perhaps it is both, but I enjoyed the hell out of it.

Oh yeah, everything was wrapped in Spidey Christmas paper, and I even got the extra Spidey paper as an additional gift!

How cool is that? If you want to see all of the wicked-cool Spidey gifts I got, you can jump here.

The Perfessor

Well, as you all know, we love our zombies here at Cuppacafe, and well, as this is the holiday season, we decided to mix our metaphors as it were, and well, we did just a quick search, and, well, this is what we came up with:

And, then there was this:

He doesn't care if you are naughty or nice,
He doesn't care what you want for Christmas,
He only wants to know how you taste!
Forget the cookies and milk,
You'd better peek this Christmas 'cause
Zombie Santa is checking his list
And your name might be on it!

And of course, if you want to send your friends out a zombie Santa card, all you have to do is check out this site.

Sure, sure all of that is fun stuff (seriously, you should play the Santa Zombie game above, it is wicked-cool fun!), and that Zombie santa poem is kind of creepy (visit the site, and then when you are there, you can even email him, if you dare), but then we came across this little bit of straight-up silliness, and well, it just proved to be the icing on the zombie Santa cake, and well, here it is for your viewing pleasure!

When we first started this post, we were doing just in fun, and weren’t even sure we could find any zombie Santas, but a quick Google search proved to me what odd stuff you can truly find.

The Perfessor

No, really, today is actually Festivus. Yes, I realize that most of you think that Festivus was just a made-up holiday that we saw on Seinfeld, but apparently (and I just learned this a few moments ago), that is an actual holiday that was made up in 1966 by Dan O'Keefe and introduced into popular culture by his son Daniel, who was a screenwriter for Seinfeld as part of a comical storyline on the show.

(Hey, Kwanzaa is a made up festival, why can’t Festivus be a real “fake” holiday!)

So, as we all know, the holiday’s celebration, as shown on Seinfeld, includes an aluminum Festivus pole, practices such as the Airing of Grievances and the Feats of Strength. All of this information can be found on the Wikipedia web page for Festivus.

Celebrants of the holiday sometimes refer to it as "Festivus for the rest of us", a saying taken from the O'Keefe family traditions and popularized in the "Seinfeld" episode to describe Festivus as "another way" to celebrate the season without participating in its pressures and commercialism.

Today, we here at Cuppacafe, celebrate Festivus for the rest of us.

The Perfessor

Given that this is the holiday season (I can tell by the skin that Walt posted), I thought I’d link us to this “New Holiday Classic” as brought to us by Jimmy Kimmel and Norah Jones courtesy of YouTube.

While this is cute and all, I still prefer Bob & Doug McKenzie’s truly classic version of The 12 Days of Christmas.

And in the interest of ecumunical unity, we also present (the original version) of Adam Sandler’s Chanukah Song

Merry Whatever!

The Perfessor

Check out this photo essay about the wacky doings of Santa, courtesy of Time Magazine.

here are a couple of images from the slide show.

I strongly urge you to follow the link. It is quite fun.

The Perfessor

The other day, Walt posted a pic of a Star Trek Menorah which got me to thinking if there was a Marvel Comics Menorah. I’m still looking, but in the mean time, I thought I’d share with you some pics I have of a couple of other holiday-themed items I own:

If anyone finds (or knows of) other, similar stuff, let me know.

Mean time, Happy (belated) Chanukah to all, and it is Festivus for the rest of us!

Enjoy!

The Perfessor

This from the final episode of The Daily Show with John Stewart of 2009:

And the debate continues...

Psst...Obama is a socialist, who is not only brainwashing children, but is destroying Christmas while running up your tax bills, pass it on...

Don’t you just love this stuff?

The Perfessor

I know how much Walt so loves all those “all singing, all dancing” vids that he posts, so I thought that I’t post one of my own (no, not one that I made), that was more holiday-centric. (Sound required)

Remember, we are still inside the Chanukah holiday, so happy Chanukah my friends.

Oh, and while I find the clip entertaining, I was irritated by the constant (and disruptive) use of on-screen titles.

The Perfessor

This just in, television evangelist Oral Roberts passed into the great beyond on Thursday at age 91. Interestingly enough, the Christian leader’s last message from the great beyond came in the form of the following image:

Yeah, we were amused too.

The Perfessor