Winter Vacation

After receiving a series of complaints regarding yesterday's lack of posts, we decided we would take the time to let you know The Daily Hated is currently on winter vacation. You're welcome.

We had assumed, apparently incorrectly, that our readers were smart enough to realize that Thursday's seasonally-appropriate and wildly-well-received Kathie Lee Gifford post was our way of saying, "Merry Christmas or whatever, and we'll be back on December 29th January 5th with all-new posts!" presumably as our silhouettes, back-lit by a full moon, waved to you as we flew away on a magical sleigh.

Goodbye! Goodbye, Daily Hated!! Thanks for saving Christmas! Goodbyyyyyyyyyye!!

But as it turns out our readers are not that smart, so:

Merry Christmas or whatever! (And now just imagine our silhouettes, back-lit by a full moon, waving to you as we fly away on a magical sleigh)

160) Kathie Lee Gifford

We truly wish this post were outdated by a decade, but unfortunately NBC made the brilliant decision to drag Kathie Lee out of America's Favorite Retirement and bestow her and her shockingly unbearable vowel-deficient co-host Hoda Kotb with their own unbelievably long daily segment on the Today Show.

Some of you might still be saying, "Really, the Daily Hated? Kathie Lee? Isn't that kind of obvious?" And the answer is "yes". It is obvious.

But it's also Christmas time, and at this time of year, everybody does their best to not be annoyed, which is impossible to do when Kathie Lee is hawking her new Christmas album (imagine songs you never liked in the first place, sung by a tone deaf mannequin who really loves Christmas).

And while we appreciate the opportunity to see what happens when two people with a combined IQ around room temperature get to talk about themselves on national television for an hour every morning (the result is something close to a really well-manicured train wreck), and equally appreciate having a quick on-hand answer to questions like "why do some people hate Christmas?", "why do some people hate white people?", "why do some people hate the name Cody?", and "if God exists, why does Kathie Lee happen to good people?", we were having such a pleasant largely-Kathie-Lee-free decade and would gladly trade all this to have it back.

159) The Use Of The Term "All-New Episode"

When the dramatic, possibly psychologically distressed guy who does voiceovers for NBC promos tell us about the "all-new 'ER', NBC tonight", or when his cousin over at ABC yells out "all-new 'Lost'", we often wonder exactly what the networks are expecting us to see.


In this supposed "all-new 'Friends'", Ross makes a reference to having been on "a break", despite the same reference being made in roughly 113 other "Friends" episodes

As far as we can tell, most "new episodes" we have seen of television shows have been "all-new" episodes. Despite three hours of brainstorming, nobody at the TDH office was able to come up with a single instance of an episode of 'ER'** that began with the first 22 minutes of a previous episode and concluded with the 21 minutes of new material. If the voiceover guy just said "new episode", we would, in fact, expect the entire 43 minutes to be new. We do not consider this to be outside boundaries of that which is reasonable.

This wouldn't bother us so much if the term "all-new" weren't still applied to "new" episodes that include flashbacks to other episodes. Because it still is applied to said episodes, despite being a fucking lie.


**In the interest of full disclosure, none of us can recall a single instance of watching an episode of "ER" in the past decade, either.

158) Carlos Mencia

You know when you're sitting at home, watching a really, really awesome movie, and it's like three-quarters of the way over, and suddenly it goes all garbled and freezes, right in the middle of one of the awesomest parts? And then you try to fast-forward around it and hope it clears up? And then you have to give up and take the disk out and wipe it in case it has any smudges on it? But then you put it back in and hope it works, so you skip to the scene you were on, but it still doesn't work, and the preceding awesomeness of the movie is totally ruined, along with the rest of your day?

Well, it's not the movie's fault. Nor the DVD manufacturer's. Nor anyone involved with the production of the movie.

It's the fault of whichever asshole decided to put a huge, loud, unfunny scratch into a disk that otherwise contains nothing but pure awesomeness.

TDH Presents: Great Moments in Shoe Politics

In light of President Bush's recent shoe-related ambush during a press conference in Iraq, TDH has decided to take a look back at some of the greatest moments in shoe-related geopolitical incidents in the last fifty years.

October 1960: Nikita Khrushchev - "We will bury you!"


Khrushchev awards British actor Jude Law with the coveted Soviet Medal of Handsomeness

Russian leader Nikita Khrushchev removes his right shoe and angrily declares "My vas pokhoronim!" ("We will bury you!") in front of the UN's general assembly. In the shadow of Cold War paranoia, this declaration was generally construed by the capitalist West as a challenge, if not a threat. However, Khrushchev, the liberal-leaning anti-Stalinist, was in fact attempting to lighten the atmosphere at the normally dour General Assembly by referencing the punchline to a popular Russian comedy sketch that, unfortunately, doesn't translate well to other languages. In English, the sketch would read as such:

VLAD - "Dmitri, my father has had Bolshevic leanings for some time. What makes you of this brand of vodka?"

DMITRI - "To me, it seems to be wood-grain. This displeases the proleteriat, no?"

VLAD - "Is not your woman-mate of Georgian heritage?"

DMITRI - "Dah. If Old Man Trotsky could see us now!"

THE GENTLEMAN POUR A SHOT OF VODKA EACH AND RAISE THEIR GLASSES

VLAD - "To the West!"

DMITRI - "May their innovations touch the shores of Vrestlgrngrad and cast waves of renewal accross the Soviet heartland!"

THE GENTLEMAN CLINK GLASSES TOGETHER AND DRINK THEIR SHOTS OF VODKA

(Beat)

VLAD REMOVES HIS RIGHT SHOW AND MERCILESSLY BEATS DMITRI INTO UNCONSCIOUNESS

VLAD - "We will bury you!"

(SCENE)

March 1977: Disgraced President Richard Nixon chews on shoe during interview with David Frost.



In 1977, not-well-respected semi-popular celebrity interviewer David Frost sits down with disgraced President and noted lunatic Richard Nixon for a roughly 28 hours spanning the course of 12 days. Frost famously and unexpectedly pried something like an apology and an admission of guilt from the former President.

The interview itself and the events surrounding it are now counted in the canon of United States history. However, among the lesser-reported revelations from the marathon interview sessions: that the coffee was "pretty good this morning"; that Nixon and Frost both had an aunt living in Nebraska; that if you sort of looked at the wallpaper in just the right way, you could sort of see the shape of ducks; and that, when both nervous and bored, Richard Nixon would remove his shoe and chew on it.


November 1984: Walter Mondale wins Thom McAn gift certificate/13 electoral votes


Mondale celebrates his historic win with his former boss

Mondale, a progressive and populist former Vice President to Jimmy Carter, finds himself the unlikely one-millionth customer at his local shopping mall's Thom McAn shoe store. He walks away with a gift certificate worth $200.

Later in the month, Mondale's hot streak continues as he wins his home state of Minnesota as well as the District of Columbia and walks away with 13 electoral votes in a Presidential race against b-movie actor Ronald Reagan. Reagan however, ultimately edged out Mondale by winning the states of Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.

December 2008: Iraqi journalist throws shoes at President Bush during press conference; Bush walks away unscathed; journalist tortured at Camp Cropper



In the last days of his administration, President Bush, whose unprovoked, premeditated, unilateral, illegal, inept invasion of Iraq cost his own now-bankrupt country hundreds of billions of dollars and left over 4000 military men and women and anywhere from 100,000 to one million civilians dead and created a puppet government sympathetic to neighboring state (and American policy foe) Iran, is the victim of a ruthless series of attacks at the hands of Iraqi journalist Muntadar al-Zaidi, who, after throwing a shoe at the President during a farewell visit to the new nation he helped create, surprises the stunned and defenseless President by throwing another shoe.

Zaidi yells, in Arabic, "This is a farewell kiss, you dog. This is from the widows, the orphans and those who were killed in Iraq," apparently confusing the Western custom of kissing with the Western custom of shoe-throwing. In the Arab world, shoe-throwing is not like a kiss at all, but rather the severest of insults.

Zaidi, critical of the US who selflessly delivered American democratic values like free speech, the abolition of cruel and unusual punishment, and individual liberty to the Iraqis, is taken into custody at Camp Cropper and tortured by US military personnel. He no longer has use of his right arm. Additionally, fairly-elected Iraqi leader Nouri al-Maliki suggests Zaidi be put behind bars for 7-8 years.

The unharmed President will also be returned to US protection, where he will be given a library.

157) Wet Socks

We're not sure why this problem was never addressed, when so many non-problems have been.

For instance, when humans were smart enough to consciously say to themselves, "Fuck, it's cold," they invented the coat. Similarly, when the thought, "Crap, my stuff keeps getting stolen. And I keep getting rained on. And eaten by bears," crossed the mind of primitive humans, they invented the house.

Yet somehow, the thought, "Fuck, it's raining and I'm on my way to work and, shit, I just stepped in a puddle, and now I'm gonna spend the first couple hours of work with my goddamn feet making squishy sounds and, even when they dry, my feet are going to itch like an em-effer until I can change my socks, which normally would be in like eight hours, but I have to go straight to a stupid Christmas party after work, which means I won't be home til like ten, which means I have two options: either immediately get wasted as soon as I get to the party so that I won't notice the incessant itching from the layer of fungus growing on my foot or go to Rite Aid at lunch and buy a new pair of socks, which, on top of being a waste of money, will probably just get soaked as soon as I leave the office anyway. Fuck," never garnered enough attention from the human race for a solution to be developed. Like, say, the universal and exclusive availability of the water-proof sock.

Instead, the decision was made to skip straight to problems like, "Hmmm...my cellphone is about a gram too heavy..."

156) Safety Scissors

Just like real scissors, only useless.

155) the Simpsons (lowercase "t")

Among publicly endorsing soon-to-be-former President Bush, continuing the genetic lineage responsible for Pete Wentz, and being Joe Simpson (just to name a few), it's difficult to decide which crimes against decency and humanity committed by the Simpsons rank highest.


When you look at the guy on the left in the pink shirt, don't you just think, "Now there's a guy whose genes is gonna raise him up some effin' talent!"?

Still, the Simpsons can do us all a favor and remember the important lesson we learned from The Simpsons: after ten years, pretty much everything has run its course.*




*lesson void when applied to prison sentence of OJ Simpson

154) TV Guide Crossword Puzzles

With its pre-elementary school level of difficulty and TV-centric clues like "___ & Mindy", "Law and ___", "Friendly Melmac native in the 80s (abbr.)", "Sam Malone's Bar", "___ Wants To Be A Millionaire", "___ or No Deal", "Longtime 'Price is Right' Host Barker", "The Cosby___", "Long-running Thursday night NBC medical drama", "TV host Philbin", and "Sesame Street resident ____ Bird", completing TV Guide's crossword may be the only way for a person to solve a puzzle and feel both lazy and stupid at the same time.

153) Overly Generous Definitions of "Stars"

Neither of us are 70, and so we're neither of the generation that considers watching others performing ballroom dancing routines a significant or authentic form of "entertainment".


And now, here's your host: that guy you're pretty sure you remember hosting that other show you saw a couple times!

Therefore, there is nothing intrinsically interesting or alluring about the "dancing" aspect of "Dancing with the Stars".

But, wait a second...stars? Really? Hmmm, well...while we wouldn't pay to see if Tom Cruise can tango without the assistance of a sports car and meticulous John Woo choreography, or to see Justin Timberlake attempt a little salsa with someone other than himself, or what would happen when someone applied a force greater than a minor wind to Anne Hathaway, or if Steve Carrell is, in fact, awesome at everything, the general idea is still intriguing enough that we might spend an hour a week to find out, since it's free.

This would not be true, however, if the producers of "Dancing with the Stars" decided that the definition of "star" included Justin Timberlake's former fellow boy-bandmate Joey Fatone; Justin Timberlake's former fellow boybandmate and noted closet-coming-of-outer Lance Bass; former "Saved by the Bell" star and current host-for-hire Mario Lopez; noted one-dreadful-hit-wonder and one half of the team biologically responsible for Miley Cyrus, Billy Ray Cyrus; Osmond Marie Osmond; non-famous brother of former Jessica Simpson husband and member of a second-rate boyband Nick Lachey, Drew Lachey; former Joey Lawrence and noted "whoa"-sayer Joseph Lawrence; and legitimate stars if it were still 1993, Jennie Garth and Ian Ziering.

Dictionary.com provides 22 definitions of the word,"star". Not one of them applies to Harry Hamlin.

Just to be sure, we had our research team check to see if the title "Dancing with the C or D-List" was already taken when "Dancing with the Stars" debuted in 2005.

It wasn't.

152) Mysterious Bearded Old Chinese Men

Most of the time when someone gives you something as "a gift", it's usually pretty cool and useful, like a dollar, or a beer, or a Best Buy gift certificate, or a reasonably good book.


Do not accept this puppy

However, mysterious bearded old Chinese men, who typically reside in the rear sections of urban Chinese antique stores that, for some reason, are always open very, very late at night, have some kind of compulsion to give gifts that will end up endangering your life, the lives of your loved ones, and, at times, the fate of the world. There's an old adage that says "never look a gift horse in the mouth", but remember: many old adages were coined by old, mysterious bearded Chinese men, so you must be wary that such adages are nothing but propaganda, designed specifically to trick you into becoming instrumental in spawning a deadly race of Gremlins.

151) Ethos Water

Unless you suffer from a rare condition that physically prevents you from going in to things*, it is statistically certain that you have been inside a Starbucks, which means it is at least very likely you have come across Ethos Water.


To be fair, the water I pour from my own tap is usually not scanner-ready...

Starbucks owns the Ethos Water brand. What makes Ethos different? Unlike other bottled water, which white liberals will be mad at you for drinking due to a) the wasted plastic, b) a supposed, hysterical, largely inaccurate accusation that Poland Spring is trying to buy the Great Lakes or c) a made-up reason, Ethos is "known for its campaign to raise ten million dollars by donating between five and ten cents from every sale to a non-governmental organization working to increase access to clean drinking water in the developing world." Also, unlike other bottled water, Ethos is manufactured by Pepsi.

Still, because of that first thing, about the nickel going to the poor, the same bandwagon activists will not scold you for drinking Ethos.

Or, to put it another way:

In a country where (literally) nearly everybody has access to clean, high-quality, non-toxic drinking water for free, rather than sending two dollars directly to the people who are dying from dehydration, it is the socially responsible thing to spend two dollars on a small bottle of that very same, universally-available free water so that "between five and ten cents" of those two dollars goes to providing potable water to the poor in far off lands, and "between one hundred and ninety and one hundred and ninety-five cents" will go to Starbucks and Pepsi.

Or, to put it another way:

The terrorists hate us because of our freedom.

*Which, like ADD, probably doesn't really exist

150) Canvassers

We're sure Save the Children is a wonderful endeavor, and we think Barack Obama is just gee-whiz great (or, sorry...I guess the proper term is gee-whiz great elect).

But college students on summer break working for commission to raise money for Save the Children or Barack Obama pretending to care about either of these things when what they really care about is the twenty-five bucks they make when they get your credit card number mean we have to needlessly walk on the opposite sidewalk so as not to be flagged down and made to feel guilty by their awe-shucks earnest scripted faux-enthusiasm. Feeling like you don't care about poor people (or poor children, or whatever) is not a nice experience, but at least it doesn't take long for the fleeting sense of guilt to subside as you come to realize that what you really don't care about is college students, which isn't so bad.

Just make sure that when you get back to your office with your $8 latte and Whole Foods buffet lunch you make sure to make such points to your coworkers as "if these organizations really cared about poor people, they would hire poor people to do the canvassing; two birds with one stone" and "what a hypocritcal enterprise, isn't hiring students to raise money for poor people just a needless insertion of a middle man, propping up the status quo while you pretend to dismantle it?"

Just be sure to act mildly outraged, as mild outrage is usually construed as a sincere commitment to social causes by your upper-middle class peers.

149) Band Reunions

Even the best band reunions are usually pretty forgettable anyway. The Pixies reunion basically amounted to paying to stand around with thousands of annoying art school students who probably stole their first Pixies record from their parents just for the equivalent experience of listening to "Death to the Pixies" on an enormous sound system. And, sure, we all spent like two decades clamoring for any and all indication that The Police would get back together, but when they finally did we realized that the things we really wanted back were the young Sting, an awesome new Police record, and the 1980s, none of which we got, despite spending $120 each.

And as terrible a band as Extreme (discounting "More Than Words") was, at least when VH1 tried to get them to reunite, they all stared blankly at Gary "I will be in any band that asks" Cherone and went immediately back to work at their construction jobs, as any self-respecting terrible band should.

Earlier this year, we were subjected to the New Kids reunion, which even came with a terrible new album, just as we were learning to let go of the pain caused by the decade-long White Boy Band trend they unleashed upon us and accept Donnie as an actor, Joe(y) as a solo artist, Jordan as a novelty, Danny as gremlin, and Jonathan as the gay one.

And now, this - Rock act Creed in talks to reunite



Scott Stapp: forever finding newer, "Christian"-er, sweatier ways to piss us off.

148) Precision Parenting

The fact that terms like "co-sleeping", "attachment parenting", and "babywearing" are deemed socially acceptable, coherent, and employed to sell books is a reflection of a deep failure of capitalism and, in a broader sense, the human race.


Will smiling this wide at your infant stunt his or her growth and instill latent dependency issues that will ultimately inhibit his or her fiscal stability and digestive system?

Speaking of the human race, I'm pretty certain that it and its offspring have managed to survive a couple hundred thousand years largely without the play-by-play assistance of Parenting magazine, which will do you the service of confirming your suspicion that your child is crying because it is hungry, or tired, or pooped itself - all for the low, subscription-only cost of $24/yr.

And sure, for many hundreds of generations within those many thousands of years, the average life expectancy was roughly 20, but that had a lot less to do with the absence of "The Baby Book" and a lot more to do with the presence of tuberculosis, cholera, and the plague.

147) The Culture of Monday

The world is as saturated with annoying, meant-to-be-witty anti-Monday merchandise as it is with the annoying, overly-eager receptionists and marketing assistants who are most likely to purchase, display, and/or wear such merchandise, often - but not always - on Mondays.

Aside from the fact that anything primarily associated with post-1988 Garfield cartoons should immediately and forcibly be stripped from our pop culture lexicon and civilized discourse, we don't even hate Monday that much. At least on Monday no one expects you to care or not be hung over, because you will likely not be either of those things. And at least on Monday you can still cling to the fresh memories of your long, apathy-steeped weekend.


BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! I get it!! Oh, computer that generates Garfield cartoons every day...you are SO edgy!

What we hate is Tuesday, especially Tuesday morning, when it's pretty hard to deny the work week has actually started again, when it's no longer socially acceptable to be hung over, apathetic, and lazy, and when you realize there are four days to get through before you're once again in the clear.

But until Garfield's ready to admit that, don't expect the receptionist to, either.