The Booberry Alarmclock posted some photos of a ventriloquist doll (it’s no dummy!), and this reminded me of this public safety tip: How to tell if your ventriloquist puppet is evil:

1. Make a large, roaring fire.

2. Within earshot of the doll say “Well, I think it’s about time I get rid of this ventriloquist doll … it’s not doing me any good no more”.

3. Pick up the doll and say “I think this will burn up real good in the fire”

4. Walk towards the fire.

5. Make like you’re going to throw the doll into the fire on the count of 3.

At this point, if your doll is evil, you’ll feel a bite on your arm, or a punch, or some other violent reaction. The doll will try to get out of your grasp, and, if successful, will run away, most likely with an evil cackle out of it’s smiling mouth. Be careful … he’s not fleeing from you; he’s only looking for a place to hide in order to attack you later.

If nothing happens, your doll is probably not evil. You now have 2 choices: Throw it into the fire anyway, or put it away.

Warning: If you do not throw the doll in the fire, it is suggested that you take a knife with you to bed. It’s possible the doll is evil but knew you were testing it, and is waiting for you to go to sleep before attempting to strangle you.

They love us in the UK! Well, at least someone who was charged with finding stuffing for a sidebar in a weekend filler part of a newspaper in the UK found us a little amusing. Big thanks to Mr. Bali Hai of Eye of the Goof for both letting us know that we got a mention in this past weekend’s Guardian, and sending us a copy of the scanned page.

We feel like we could take on all foes, including those who are well-dressed and gaze vaguely threateningly from behind a shiny table. A bunch of the other blogs who got mentioned are also favorites of ours, making us feel extra-fancy for being included in such a group. Congrats to Dusty Sevens, Eye of the Goof, Branded in the 80s, The World of Kane (who is the fellow who scanned the article for us continentally-challenged folks — thank you!), The Booberry Alarm Clock and Swapatorium.

Click thumbnail for full-size view

It hasn’t appeared on the website for the Guardian yet, but it looks like it will appear on this page soon. In the meantime, click here for a scan of the full page.

This picture made my head fall off:

Baby kitten OMG

Via Cute Overload, natch.

For your Friday afternoon/evening enjoyment, a fine selection of strange videos. Have a spectacular weekend — we’re headed to Kaleidoscope tonight, and Forbidden Island on Sunday. I sense radness in our immediate future.

This is my second post in a row about Book of Ratings — Part One, about Hobo Signs, is here.

So, this is my actual introduction to Lore Sjöberg: he’s upgraded. This is his first Rating in newfangled videocast form, friendly for YouTube glory. Here’s Lore’s rating of the state quarters of California, Minnesota, Oregon, Kansas, and West Virginia.

[via Spectre Collie]

This is a two-part post — I found a very funny website, and I’m pretty sure that I must have been living under a rock to have not seen it before now. I also couldn’t choose just one thing on it to post, so I’m doing something completely unheard of, and posting two things. HA! Enjoy.

Lore Sjöberg takes lists of things — anything from ” Pasta Shapes” to “Aspects of Santa Claus” and rates them on a grading scale. He gives out a lot of Cs and Ds, a few As, and practically no Bs. And he’s really goddamned funny.

Given our penchant for hobos ’round the old Junkyard Clubhouse, I couldn’t help but love his rating of Hobo Signs, the chalk symbols hobos used to communicate what they knew about a town to the hobos that might come after them. They’re a sort of Hobo Fodor’s. Here’s a sample of Lore’s assessment:

The Owner Isn’t Here

This doesn’t seem very good. Unless the owner is thoughtful enough to erase the symbol on his way back in, this is about as useful as a symbol meaning “it’s six-thirty.” I suppose you could carefully inscribe it somewhere where it’s going to get concealed whenever the ower gets home, maybe by putting it in his driveway or writing it in dust on the welcome mat, then spreading some dirt around the walkway so that the owner wipes his feet when he comes home. But that doesn’t seem like the sort of things that hobos do. When you’re playing word association, “hobo” is rarely followed by “elaborate plan.” D-

Lore’s three-part series on Hobo Signs can be found here, here and here. You can find all his ratings at, appropriately enough, Book of Ratings. And of course, there is a book, if you want to take your ratings reading on the road. [via Spectre Collie]

Today, I would like to discuss one of the true classics of the Disney live action canon: Monkeys, Go Home! This 1967 film has it all… monkeys* — four of them, and they’re <dramatic echo>SPACE MONKEYS</dramatic echo> … Dean Jones … ’60s protests … Love, Frenchy Style … and as if that weren’t enough (no, stop! no, really!) … Maurice! Chevalier! And! The! Title! Ends! In! An! Exclamation! Point! Can you feel the hilarity?! So zany!!!

*phew* … I’ll take it down a notch or two now, before someone reaches through the screen to throttle me.

Dean Jones puts his chimps to work, in Disney’s "Monkeys Go Home!"

Alright now, where was I? Oh yes. Monkeys, Go Home. I mean, Monkeys, Go Home!. In this delightful, fun for the whole family maybe some of the family film, Dean Jones plays Henry Dussard, an American who has just inherited an olive farm he has never seen, in the south of France. Ooh la la! Being an American, he’s got some nutty ideas about how to turn this olive farm into a profitable venture — by hiring chimps instead of people to work the farm. Luckily, he previously was a chimp trainer for NASA, so he’s got a team of recently-retired space chimps at his disposal. So wacky!

In the ’60s, even the chimps were protesting

The little French town doesn’t like the idea of having to compete against a chimp-run farm, and they mount an underground resistance against Dussard. The chimps strike back by mounting a protest of their own, fighting for their right to work just as humans do. At the same time, a boozy French broad shows up claiming to be Dussard’s long-lost cousin (and she is truly fabulous, played by Yvonne Constant), staking claim to half of Dussard’s farm, and threatening Dussard’s budding relationship with a barely-legal French tartlet, played by Yvette Mimieux.

Maurice Chevalier, with the French corner of It’s a Small World

And just for good measure, Maurice Chevalier plays the town priest, who shows up now and then to impart some heavily-accented wisdom, and sing a song or two.

This is quite possibly the slapstickiest, monkeyest, wacknuttiest of all the Disney films. The hilarity, it ensues. This film… well, it’s sort of the Disney version of the Star Wars Holiday Special. I can’t help but wonder why they’ve released it on DVD, but I’m so glad they did. I kind of love it.

Oh! The music! The music is the best part, and I’m not kidding around here — I would sincerely buy Robert F. Brunner’s soundtrack/score. It’s great ’60s light-quirk-funk-pop stuff.

* Technically, chimps aren’t monkeys, but for the sake of simplicity, today we’ll say they are. It’s Topsy-Turvy day! Shrimp are fish! Tomatoes are vegetables! Mama’s Family was funny!

QUOVADX? Really? Was VZOXYDM taken?

The Island of Misfit Toys has nothing on these things.

[via cribcandy]

Oh. Dear. Lord. I love these, but I wish they made them back when I was twelve.

[via cribcandy]