Friday night in the Candy household. The Old Man is freshly back from a week of torture in Atlanta. There’s a bottle of sparkling wine (New Mexico’s finest) waiting to be drunk, and a meal being prepared. But what we don’t have is… the right movie to watch. We needed suggestions. Now, in a perfect world, we’d probably ask LT Fish or Ted S for advice, since these guys know movies and have excellent taste. But since we needed an immediate response, we were limited to people whose phone numbers we had on hand. Sloopy? Fuck no, he thinks dull Spielberg flicks with big rubber fish are entertaining. Francisco d’Anconia? Even worse, he thinks that Tom Cruise movies centered around homoerotic beach volleyball games are high art. Spudalicious? The last time we asked him that question, we ended up with a movie called Fuck My Face, which, although it had its moments, was somewhat repetitious. Riven? I’m not interested in Jeff Goldblum masturbatory material.

SP had a brainstorm: let’s ask Mad Scientist! His suggestion? Beverly Hills Chihuahua. “Ok, you’re going to to think this is stupid, but it’s surprisingly endearing. When my wife rented it I thought it was going to be horrible, but it turned out to be surprisingly not bad!”

Never take movie advice from Mad Scientist. I think we may have lasted 15 minutes before we said, “I’M MAD AS HELL AND I’M NOT GOING TO TAKE THIS ANY MORE!” and turned it off. Now, you know a movie has to be incredibly awful for a Jew to not sit through it after we had paid money for it.

And what amazes me the most is… THERE WAS A SEQUEL! Who says that originality and creativity in Hollywood is dead?

OK, today is August 11. What makes this date auspicious? It is the birthday of Erwin Chargaff, whose rule, A=T and G=C, provided the main clue for Watson and Crick to unravel the structure of DNA (fun fact: Chargaff hated those guys), relentless self-promoter Marilyn vos Savant (but she was right about the Monty Hall problem), and fantastic street artist Pavel 183.

What else makes this date auspicious? Yes, some interesting news stories.

Why did Constantinople get the works? That’s nobody’s business but the Turks’.

“Before it is too late, Washington must give up the misguided notion that our relationship can be asymmetrical and come to terms with the fact that Turkey has alternatives. Failure to reverse this trend of unilateralism and disrespect will require us to start looking for new friends and allies,” Erdogan said.

Good luck with that, Recip.

Adjacent Jew Haters at it again.

The military said a tank fired shells at a Hamas positon after Palestinians threw explosive devices and a grenade at forces stationed near the border. It was not immediately clear whether the Hamas protests at the border were included in cease-fire negotiations.

“You didn’t say we couldn’t throw grenades! Unfair! Unfair!”

Remember when Global Warming (since rebranded to “Climate Change,” and recently rebranded to “Hothouse Effect”) was going to destroy agriculture, cause massive crop failures, leaving millions to starve from lack of food? Pepperidge Farms remembers.

U.S. farmers are expected to produce a record-high soybean crop this year, according to the Crop Production report issued today by the USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service… Soybean yields are expected to average 51.6 bushels per acre, up 2.5 bushels from last year. Record soybean yields are expected in Alabama, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Nebraska, Ohio, and Pennsylvania.

Average corn yield is forecast at 178.4 bushels per acre, up 1.8 bushels from last year. If realized, this will be the highest yield on record for the United States. NASS forecasts record-high yields in Alabama, Illinois, Nebraska, Ohio, South Dakota and Tennessee.

Wheat production is forecast at 1.88 billion bushels, up 8 percent from 2017.

See, this is just a sign that disaster is right around the corner!

Ladies and Gentlemen, this is who Team Blue is positioning to be our next president.

I’ll tell you. Umm. One of the things that I think, for me, is most important is the role that I serve on that various committees that I’m on — umm — which are oversight committees. Let’s be clear. Those committees exist to watch and question what is going on with our government, the United States government. So, I’m on Senate Intelligence, I’m on Homeland Security, I’m on Judiciary and the accomplishment then is for me is a function of what I think my role should be.

You know who else was being positioned by Team Blue to be our next president and substituted resume points for accomplishment?

JournoList 2. But this time, we’re not even bothering to hide it.

A Boston newspaper is proposing a coordinated editorial response from publications across the U.S. to President Donald Trump’s frequent attacks on the news media.

“We are not the enemy of the people,” said Marjorie Pritchard, deputy managing editor for the editorial page of The Boston Globe… The newspaper’s request was being promoted by industry groups such as the American Society of News Editors and regional groups like the New England Newspaper and Press Association. It suggested editorial boards take a common stand against Trump’s words regardless of their politics, or whether they generally editorialized in support of or in opposition to the president’s policies.

I’m sorry, but this shit’s hilarious. Especially when viewed in light of amazingly lame rationalizations like this of transparently partisan attempts at doing hit pieces. And failing miserably, of course. But we’ll get that Roadrunner next time!

Old Guy Music is inevitable. And I’ll be brief: every time I hear Victor Wooten play, I wonder, “How the fuck does he DO that????”