I never thought it could happen. While playing in a beach volleyball tournament this past weekend, the temperature outside rose to 33 Celsius. We had a thermometer on the sand and it registered a mind bending 49 Celsius. Converted to Fahrenheit, that is roughly equivalent to the temperature of HELL!

For the first time in all my years of playing in the sand, my feet developed heat blisters. I never knew it was possible. I just didn’t think you could heat up sand that much without turning it into glass. Next time I’ll wear galoshes.

Here is a link to an amusing video of how the moon landing would have been covered by TV news if it happened today, not 40 years ago.  And they wouldn’t have gone 40 years ago without our help. Thanks Tom in Edmonton for these.

Here’s little tune from our contributor Dick Prober (yes, that’s his real name - it’s not like he’s proud of it or anything) inspired by a recent court case in Germany.

Giant-wiant spider was in the dark gargage

In came the haus-frau’s cleaners to clean up webs and other garbage

Clever spider hid so the maids prounounced it clean

Then giant-wiant spider dropped down and made the haus-frau scream….and break her wrist.

And so she sued.

Thanks for spinning that one out, Dick!

It’s not exactly news that customer service sucks like a Turbo-charged Kirby but what people are doing about it IS making the news. Check out this brilliant letter to Best Buy Co’s CEO from a customer by the name of Elizabeth. In the same vein, United Airlines crashed and burned when they tangled with Sons of Maxwell, or rather when they mangled the lead singer Dave Carroll’s guitar. United Breaks Guitars, the first of three songs the band plans to write and release about the airline’s incompetence is a YouTube sensation. And it’s actually pretty catchy, even if it’s a little on the country side. Best of all, people aren’t taking crap from corporate baddies anymore. Thanks to anonymous customer service reps at Future Shop and Air Canada for the links!

This link is giving Design Guy ideas about how to add to his new driveway’s curb appeal with a little garage door enhancement. By this time next week, I predict that his garage will be full of axe-murderers or perhaps a submarine. Want your own? Creator Thomas Sassenbach sells and even custom-designs them for about $300. Thanks Jeannie Wilcox for that one!

One of this week’s best Lab-ready headlines comes to us from Down Under:
“Theft ends in torn genitals“. Good on ya for that one, Billy Jenkins in Perth! Indian farmers fight bad monsoon with frog marriage is a sound runner-up, thanks for that goes to Mikey in Montreal. Last butt not least: Chandler woman burns her bun on hot penny in car. With video goodness. Slow news day in Arizona, folks? Thanks JB in Tulsa.

Some people have racoons in their yards, others get squirrels; this family gets giraffes. With
the-strangest-pics-you’ll-see-all-day goodness. At least they’ll get their tree tops trimmed for free.

Would you turn TOWARD a burning car to pull people out? This video shows a bunch of people who did. Thanks to Howard Jenkins for the vid-link.

Because bacon is a food of the Gods and because we at the Lab are devout, we can never get enough bacon…or post enough stories about innovations to this miraculous, healing food. We give you the Bacone, the newest creation out of the BaconCamp food event featuring, unsurprisingly, quite a bit of bacon. Mmmm….bacon.

Okay, that’s it. Go back to work or something…

…and to that end, that’s where I’m going this weekend,… to drink many, many beer. Which means I won’t be doing “Friday” here… I should be drunk in a ditch by then. However, all the guys and gals here at the Lab are putting their collective heads together to pick up my slack and go through all the great links we get sent in… so Friday will happen, it’ll just taste a little different… I call it “improving the recipe”…

As I write this on the eve of the 40th anniversary of the moon landing, Apollo 13 (the movie) is currently showing on my TV. No doubt wherever you live there has been an overabundance of information, new and old, about that fateful day 40 years ago. As you probably know, I am somewhat fascinated by how the space program came into being, so I feel uniquely qualified to expose one last, (and hopefully unknown to you) tidbit.

John Diefenbaker was the Prime Minister of Canada from 1957 to 1963. One decision made by him, may have been the deciding factor in NASA’s ability to deliver a man to the moon before Kennedy’s deadline of Dec 31 1969.

In the 1950’s, some of the most brilliant Canadian scientists of our century were working on a super sonic jet fighter called the Avro Arrow. To this day there are people who proclaim that this aircraft was 20 years ahead of it’s time. In 1958, Prime Minister Diefenbaker grounded the hopes and dreams of many by killing the project. The decision was extremely controversial, but news travels fast and NASA took full advantage of the situation by coming up to Canada and conducting job interviews with the now unemployed rocket scientists. A great number of these Canadian men and women took up President Kennedy’s challenge, uprooted their lives, and moved the the USA to start work on a new project. It was called, “Have a man walk on the moon and return safely; how the hell are we ever going to do that.”

Okay, I lied. It wasn’t called that, but you get my drift. Canada played a huge role in getting Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Micheal Collins, to the moon and back, thus creating one of the most memorable days in history. The American flag may never have been planted on the moon before Kennedy’s deadline, if not for the actions of John G. Diefenbaker. I guess you could say, that was his one.. small… step for mankind.

Back from vacation and ready to roll, kinda…

First from Victoria F., a link to what turns out to be a banner ad with “ad-ittude”. I clicked all the way thru it, so it does end…

“From time to time I wish I could think of an idea that would make me a millionaire and be some sort of activity I enjoy, like being with pets, giving advice, etc. Now I read that not only can this be a profession, but that a person can make $600 an hour as a pet psychic! “Yes, yes….I see… he tells me he loves going in the car, and he hates that little pink jacket you make him wear. Oh…and he wants a treat. That’ll be $600 please.”" - Wendy Ulman, “Cat-ologist”.

Greg Felton sends us a little story and a link about how: “Among the many, many things that drive me batshit insane when a menu tried to pass off ordinary food by describing it with fancy-schmancy language. ‘Tugid mass of fragrant effluent on bitumen and mineral crusted slab dusted with sweet granuals’ is still shit on a shingle with sugar”. Here’s the link to other culinary canards that, for reasons passing understanding, still appear on menus everywhere. Bon appetit!

“Dumbest”, it seems, isn’t just a Red State thing. The town of Orissa in India is has earned membership in a dumbass club with this story about a fatality caused by fishing with dynamite. Welcome, new Asiatic buddies! Come to think of it, deer hunting would be a whole lot easier if we just herded the buggers to a meadow full of landmines… thanks to Delores Gentry for that one! While the story is quick and simple, it’s the comments of the readership that are the funniest…

It’s coming up on lunchtime, my stomach’s grumbling and I’ve got food on my mind so here’s a link to one of the original ads plugging a (Acid) Trip to McDonaldland. I love the quasi-porno music guitar. Nowadays, this place would scare most kids shitless… apple pie trees with big bulbous noses… (oddly, I do remember watching the ad on television and questioning it’s possible existence).

From Blabber Travel Agent Kirby Q., “Planning a summer getaway but don’t want to do all the regular touristy things like visiting Europe or the Caribbean? Afghani officials says that by the end of October, the major historical sites are expected to be landmine-free and that locals are up for giving tourism a ’shot’. No, really… course, if that’s still too tame for you, a Russian luxury yacht company is now offering pirate-hunting trips that promise the chance to be attacked by real sea bandits. $17.50 a day for an AK and 100 rounds? Hell, I’m in…

Remember that link I posted about David Carradine?  I was sure it had been sanitized? Well, here’s a link to a more descriptive story of the finding of his body. That particular page is about something else, I just wanted to draw attention to the copy as written. Mind you, you might just wanna poke around that site, there’s some pretty funny shit there, like “If Web Sites Were Movies” and other BBlooper’s like ”Cruising for kids“.

Ok kids, I’m done! I don’t even have a song quote for ya! See ya next week, maybe… if I remember…