Hey, What Are You Lookin' For? (Winter Edition.....Stay Warm, My Friends)

Its time once again to check out just what topics people are logging in to read about on this blog....and to heck with current events and politics. Its all about personalities for the month of December. And maybe its just as well. All of the rankings are in reverse order, and come from information courtesy of GOOGLE DIAGNOSTICS.

(10).Mike Kim/Cash for Clunkers. Don't ask me how this happened, because I'm not some tech wiz. Somehow a post I did back in July about Mike Kim's appearance on THE DAILY SHOW got read as something to do with "cash for clunkers". Mike Kim is a man who smuggles dissidents out of North Korea to safety in Japan and in the west. Blame it on the blasted "Google-bots".

(9) Slit Skirts. The ninth most queried topic on this blog for the last month was probably from pervy dudes looking for pics of women in "slit skirts". What they got was this video from Pete Townshend and the story about how I couldn't get the song out of my mind after hearing it played in an Hungarian Deli in New Brunswick....true story!

(8.) Home shopping queen blogspot. People drop into this blog, I suppose, to see if there is any news about "Queen Bea" and if there is any news about her blog. Sadly, there is no news to report. No activity, no posts...no news since last summer.

(7.) Colleen Lopez. I mentioned Colleen Lopez last February about her video where she started laughing uncontrollably and had to go to break, and posted the video here. To this day it remains one of the most queried posts on this blog. Some folks just can't get enough of the ladies of home shopping.

(6). and (5) both tie in to the #1 most queried topic of December 2009. Relax! It'll all work out.

(4). Bobby Bowden Trivia. Coach Bowden got several mentions towards the end of 2009. Topics included his forced resignation, the Gator Bowl victory....and the idolatry practiced by that duo from ALLSTATE, Bergwood and Hamm, for the former Florida State coach. But there really wasn't a heck of a lot of Bobby Bowden trivia.

(3) Kim Parrish. Kim remains one of the most queried persons on this blog, month in and month out. She's moved her KIM PARRISH COLLECTION to ShopNBC, and her line will be featured January 13, 20, and 21. Click here for times and more information.

(2) Davinia Palmer. Yes, another personality from the world of home shopping. Welsh born Davinia was the second most queried person on this blog in December. She made a splash at QVC in the United States several years ago, then left abruptly. After connecting some dots, and doing some searches, we've found Davinia based in Southern California and doing voiceover work. With her distinctive accent Davinia should do the voice for a "lady lizard" so the Geico Gecko won't have to spend Valentine's day alone.

But the most queried topic (1)....along with numbers 5 and 6...."Molly Evans Monk"(1), "Judge Rickover" (5), and "Monk Molly Evans"- all which referred to the entries written about the last episode of MONK, the comedy-mystery which ended its long run on USA network last month. Judge Rickover, the murderer of Trudy Monk, was played by Craig T. Nelson, and Trudy's daughter Molly Evans was portrayed by the lovely young Israeli born actress Alona Tal.

And these, ladies and gents, are the people who you wanted to read about on UT&MR in the month of December. There's a lot of homeshopping fans and a lot of "Monkish" folks spending time here.

Its Bergwood Nation!

You all know Bergwood and his buddy Hamm. They're the two not so bright tailgaters in the ALLSTATE INSURANCE commercials. Billy Mays and Sully they are not- two guys usually found in a parking lot prior to a college football game who collectively worship the ground former FSU coach Bobby Bowden walks on.

Here's a video featuring some outtakes with "The Coach"....Daddgumm!!!!



I had no idea these two guys have become so popular. ALLSTATE has given the boys their own website, bergwood.net, and their own FACEBOOK page.

But with celebrity comes danger....and sadly, Bergwood has a semi-dangerous female stalker!

Check it out!

Quick Hits- "For The New Decade, And Beyond, Mr. Spock"

To any and all...Happy Twenty-Ten!!!!!

(1). "Y2k"....it seems like only yesterday. And obviously there are a few young readers who have no idea what I'm referring to.

(2) Biggest story of the last decade....obviously 9/11 and its aftermath. Runnerup- the economic meltdown of 2008. Also- Hurricane Katrina, the rise of Barack Obama, the collective Bush Years, Iraq, Afghanistan, the proliferation of "reality TV"....and the how technology changed our lives forever.

(3) Holding that thought about how technology changed our lives- for some reason I was thinking about 2001: A Space Odyssey- probably because we are now in the year of its sequel, 2010. Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick created a scenario in the original 2001 where the computer, "HAL 9000" actually becomes a villain when it senses that the mission of the Jupiter-bound spacecraft is in jeopardy, and begins to kill off the crew members. In the real New Millennium we don't have murderous computers trying to systematically whack us. But what has happened is a dependency on this wonderland of new technology in which we feel lost when we are denied it, even for short periods of time. Do you think that's a stretch? Well, look at what happened a couple of weeks ago with the glitch that prevented Blackberry usage. People seemed lost; some even went into a panic. How many people have the need to have their devices on all of the time, and never- ever- turn them off.

No....mankind has no morphed into robots. But there is a kind of cyborgization that is going on- the technology is starting to rule and dominate lives rather than be there to serve us. And that is dangerous on a psychological level.

"Man does not live by bread alone". But he has voluntarily added a variety of electronic appendages which it seems have taken over aspects of life...."down time" is a thing of the past, and everybody is "on", 24/7. Frankly, I don't think that's a good.....or a healthy....thing.

(4). Charlie Daniels plays a mean fiddle, Ed "Too Tall" Jones is still "too tall", and Elmer Fudd still has trouble with the letter "R". OK GEICO, we get it. The same commercials on again and again and again.

But I suppose we have to live with these new ads. The Cavemen appear to be occupied.

(5). I will give him some credit where it is due- Rush Limbaugh seems to be coming around, if ever so slightly. He was recently hospitalized for chest pains while vacationing in Hawaii. he was treated at Queen's Medical Center in Honolulu, and according to a report from ABC News the doctors found nothing wrong.

But here's what I found interesting....at least he is, by implication, admitting that President Obama might be a native US citzen after all.

Stay with me, OK? Limbaugh came out with this quote at his news conference...

"Based on what happened to me here, I don't think there is one thing wrong with the American healthcare system. It is working just fine".

So he admitted to the press that he was treated by the American healthcare system, while in Hawaii; therefore, by implication, the worldly Mr. Limbaugh is saying that Hawaii actually IS part of the United States.

And if that is the case, and Barack Obama has a birth certificate (plus a birth announcement in a local paper) from Hawaii he, our Chief Executive and Commander-In-Chief, must have been born in the United States.

So to any "birthers' out there....your man Rush just dissed you and your moronic theories.

So stop mouth breathing and deal with it!

(6). I went to the Rutgers women's basketball game this afternoon and watched them almost snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. A ten point lead with less than four minutes to go shrank to two with less than 15 seconds left....they survived with 60-57 win over DePaul. They still have a ton of growing up to do.

(7). The destruction in the Sugar Bowl of Cincinnati by Florida 51-24- and record setting performance by Tom Tebow- will give the critics of the Big East more fuel for their fiery rhetoric that the conference is not worthy of an automatic BCS bid. As a Big East fan, it was too much to watch. I turned it off at halftime and watched old reruns of the 1950's western HAVE GUN- WILL TRAVEL with Richard Boone for the duration. Paired with the loss by West Virginia at the Gator Bowl to Florida State 33-21, New Year's Day wasn't so good for the Big East. Today UCONN handled South Carolina rather easily 20-7 in THE PAPA JOHN's, and USF beat Northern Illinois in The INTERNATIONAL BOWL 27-3. Overall the Big East finished the bowl season 4-2. Its nice to have a winning record, and it is good for the conference. But its hard to spin a beating of the conference champion in a BCS game the way Cincy was destroyed- it was men vs boys, the Washington Generals vs the Globetrotters....it was a situation where one team didn't appear worthy of sharing the same space as the other.

And I'm pulling my punches here.

In order for the Big East to regain the respect it had before Miami, Virginia Tech, and Boston College bolted for the ACC the conference has to schedule out of conference better, and it has to be competitive in BCS games, year in and year out.

And that goes for my beloved Rutgers Scarlet Knights as well...no more two 1AA opponents.

(8). In closing......thank you Coach Bowden! There will never be anyone quite like you again.

"Daddgummitt!"

Bobby Bowden- Saying Goodbye To A Legend

I just wanted to get my two cents in regarding the "resignation" of Florida State Head Football Coach Bobby Bowden....and I did put resignation in quotes, because the man was forced out. Like Casey Stengel with the Yankees in 1960, Coach Bowden's major offense was he just got old. His 6-6 record and 4-4 in the ACC made the Seminoles bowl eligible once again, but it wasn't good enough for the administration. Bowden has been the coach at FSU since 1976 following a successful run at West Virginia. FSU didn't start playing Division One football until 1947, didn't give athletic scholarships until 1951, had some success in the 1960's under head coach Bill Peterson, but by the 1970's the program was a disaster, going winless in 1970 and not much better in the first half of the decade.

Enter Coach Bowden, the witty, affable, good old boy who was even a better man than he was a coach....and a damn fine coach he was. He won 388 games in his career, second only to Penn State's Joe Paterno. He led his team to a record 27 consecutive bowl games; 15 of those were on New Year's Day. His teams won 10 or more games for 14 seasons in a row. All along he and his wife have lived in the same house in Tallahassee, had the same phone number, and turned FSU football into a family affair, having his sons and son in law serving as assistants.

And I forgot to include that he did win two national championships...sorry 'bout that!

There was a Florida State football team before 1976, but Bobby Bowden became the Florida State program. What he did for FSU football is similar to what John Thompson did for Georgetown basketball, or what Geno Auriemma and Pat Summitt did for UCONN and Tennessee women's basketball- he built something that will forever be identified with him in history.

When Jimbo Fisher was added to his staff several years ago as Bowden's designated successor the writing was on the wall. Bobby Bowden was forced out by the administration and boosters at FSU, plain and simple. They already built a statue to him in front of Doak Campbell Stadium, so I guess that made it OK to turn him loose.

He deserved better..Bobby Bowden should have been allowed to come back for a farewll tour in the ACC one last time. Its so sad.

I did get a chance to see his team play back in the early 1990's when they blew out Kansas in a game held at Giant's Stadium. That group included Derek Brooks and Heisman winner Charlie Ward. I got to see a legend....and I feel good about that.

For more on the Bobby Bowden legacy, click here.

And for the Florida State Football website click here.