November 2006 - Concerning my alien abduction

Posted by Jeff on 11/01/2006 12:06:00 AM
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I recently came to the conclusion that I was once abducted by aliens.

This realization began last May while I was writing my Last Call column on arachnophobia, which you probably remember reading. What's that? Oh, you're not my mom? Then I'll give a brief recap.

I was first made aware of my abduction in high school, thanks to a certain astronomy teacher of mine. His argument was based on the fact that I suffer from a paralyzing fear of spiders, which he said was a common trait among abduction victims. It's probably worth mentioning that my teacher turned out to be a total nutjob.

He explained to me that the reason I didn't remember being abducted was because the aliens zapped my brain once they were done. This would also help to explain why I thought majoring in English would be a good idea.

But I didn't pay too much attention to my teacher's diagnosis at the time, mostly because he was arrested and jailed a few weeks later for child molestation. Which is inconvenient for me, because child molestation is really, really hard to joke about. Hopefully next time he'll have the courtesy to get arrested for something funnier, like farting nonstop during a court trial.

Which brings us to last May. While researching arachnophobia for my column, I was shocked to discover that what my teacher said all those years ago was true: Most alien abduction victims do have a fear of spiders! Therefore, by applying some simple logic, we can also conclude that most people who are afraid of spiders have been kidnapped by aliens at some point in their lives. For more on this type of logic, visit www.republicans.org.

By that point, I knew I had probably been abducted, but I needed more proof. So once again, I turned to that irrefutable fountain of facts I like to call the Truthnet.

The first irrefutable fact I learned was that, according to www.aliensthetruth.com, abduction victims often suffer from headaches. Get this .. I totally get headaches! Things were really starting to get freaky. But what really sealed the deal for me was the website www.kuro5hin.org, which reports that people who have suffered alien abductions also tend to suffer "fairy abductions and demon attacks," which is totally in line with that time I was kidnapped by Lance Bass and beaten up by Orcs.

I don't mind admitting I'm a little freaked out by the fact that I've been abducted. It's not every day you learn you've been kidnapped by little space men, paralyzed via mental telepathy and, more likely than not, anally probed. I was going to put another joke here, but I think we can all agree that the phrase ..anally probed.. is funny enough.

It was some compensation for me, however, to learn that I'm not alone in my abduction experience. You wouldn't expect this in a place as grounded in science as the Truthnet, but as it turns out, there are many, many online accounts of alien abduction. I even stumbled across a blog at www.iwasabducted.com from a guy who is being tortured by aliens right now! Each day he gives a play-by-play commentary on the various probing he's being subjected to. At least the aliens are nice enough to give him free internet access.

You might be thinking, "Oh my gosh! Maybe I've been abducted by aliens and don't even know it!"

Yes, you probably have. But the only way to know for sure is to take this quick survey.
1. Are you afraid of spiders?
2. Have you ever gotten a headache?
3. Have you ever been to a Star Trek convention?
4. Does it hurt to sit down?
5. Were you ever abducted by aliens?

If you answered yes to one or more of these questions, then I can say with certainty that you have been abducted by aliens at some point during your life. I'm sorry to have to be the one to tell you.

It gets worse. According to the Truthnet, once someone has been abducted, the chances of a second abduction increase dramatically. Now, I don't know about you, but I personally am not a fan of the anal probe. Or the Ford Probe, for that matter. In fact, I'm pretty much an all-around anti-probe kind of guy. So it goes without saying that I'd like to avoid additional alien abductions as much as possible.

But is a human really capable of preventing an abduction? Is there any way to defend oneself from the aliens' telepathic powers?

Yes, thanks to what might be the single most awesome invention in human history: the Thought Screen Helmet.

While the Thought Screen Helmet may appear to the untrained eye to be little more than a piece of leather with a chinstrap, it is actually a very sophisticated device. According to the website www.stopabductions.com, the helmet is capable of preventing aliens from controlling your mind by both blocking their thoughts and keeping yours safely inside your head. In fact, the site says the Thought Screen Helmet is already credited for stopping several types of aliens from abducting people in America, Australia, Canada, South Africa and the U.K. Amazing!

The website even includes step-by-step instructions for how to create your very own Thought Screen Helmet at home. Basically, all you need is a piece of leather, some anti-static flooring material called Velostat and a chinstrap, and wammo .. you've got yourself one first-rate alien mind-blocker! The Thought Screen Helmet is also a great way to pick up girls. Or at least Paris Hilton, who will be too drunk to notice your hat.

Please understand, I'm not trying to alarm anyone with this column. I'm simply trying to make sure that you, the reader, are mentally and physically prepared if, by which I mean when, you are abducted.

OK, my work is done here. Good luck out there, everyone. Nanoo, nanoo.

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October 2006 – Satanic panic

Posted by Jeff on 10/01/2006 12:03:00 AM
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We've finally reached October, which means that Halloween is drawing nigh.

Halloween is a special time of year for Team Last Call, when we not only get to use Halloween-y words like "nigh" and "thither," but we get to dress up our Jack Russell in his little cowboy outfit and tell really, really bad Halloween jokes, like this one:

Question: Why didn'.t the skeleton dance at the Halloween party?
Answer: It had no body to dance with.

And this one:
Question: Why did Dracula take cold medicine?
Answer: To stop his coffin.

And this one:
Question: How do you know if a ghost is lying?
Answer: You can see right through him.

This month, Team Last Call decided to do a little research on the history of Halloween so that you, the reader, can look smarter at parties. Now, as you know, we here at Team Last Call are sticklers for facts. As frontrunners in the field of investigative journalism, we don't rest until we're sure we've delivered the most factual facts available. That being said, we knew there was only one resource we could turn to for a story like this: the Truthnet. So thither we went.

But as it turns out, the history of Halloween is really, really boring. It's not nearly the satanic jamboree some people make it out to be. Most of the reports we read just babbled on and on about things like "Celtic traditions" and "harvest festivals" and other boring topics that should be banished behind the walls of the Renaissance Faire for all eternity.

Unlike Christmas or Independence Day, Halloween doesn't have any kind of exciting back-story .. no bombs bursting in air, no baby saviors lying in mangers. But if you look hard enough .. which we did .. it is possible to find a historian or two who link Halloween straight back to the chicken-slaughtering, broomstick-riding, pentagram-wearing pagans we all know and love. No, not Republicans. We're talking about real, live Satanists!

Now keep in mind, these are some of the same sources Team Last Call turned to in the past for such hard-hitting exposés as our profile on Mark Wahlberg's third nipple and our report on the scientific link between driving a Hummer and having extremely tiny genitalia. But you have to admit, while our sources might not be "legitimate" or even "real," they make for much more interesting reporting.

And so, like so many Fox News reporters before us, we will spare you the parts of the story that get all truthy and boring and skip right to the fun stuff. Our story of Halloween might not be the actual "truth," but it's truth-like, and that's good enough for us.

ORIGINS OF THE HOLIDAY
According to our sources, Halloween stems from an ancient Celtic festival called Samhain, which was a feast held in honor of the Lord of Death (www.wikipedia.org), during which the pagans did many appalling things such as sacrifice humans (www.jeremiahproject.com), drink their blood, eat their skin (Natural History Magazine) and vote republican (Team Last Call). (1)

So in short, what your "teachers" in your "schools" with their fancy "textbooks" would have you believe is an innocent holiday full of fun and joy and candy is really an extension of a bloody, gory, cannibalistic demon-worshipping ritual. (2)

TRICK-OR-TREATING
There are a lot of fluff stories out there concerning the origins of trick-or-treating. For example, the BBC claims it can be traced back to an old Irish custom during which peasants would go from door to door on All Hallow's Eve and ask villagers to contribute food for the next day's harvest festival.

This, of course, is total crap. What Team Last Call discovered on a very reputable website (3) is that trick-or-treating actually comes from the pagans' Halloween ritual of sacrificing virgins, which they would find by going from door to door asking villagers for the donation of their daughters. If the villagers refused, a hexagram was painted on their door in blood to indicate that the people living in the house were wicked and should be punished by the gods. In modern terms, this would be the equivalent of having a Hummer parked in your driveway. (4)

So now you know the truth. Nice try, BBC! Maybe you should change your name to CRAP. Nice!

COSTUMES
The tradition of dressing up in costumes comes from the ancient belief that, on Halloween, the disembodied spirits of all the people who died throughout the preceding year would come back in search of living bodies to possess. In order to scare away the spirits, the villagers would dress up in costumes, parade noisily around the neighborhood and recklessly destroy everything in sight, a tradition that lives on today in such American activities as "mischief night" and Operation Iraqi Freedom. (5)

JACK-O-LANTERNS
Apparently, Jack was a legendary drunkard who used to wander around Ireland. One day, Jack tricked the Devil into climbing an apple tree and then quickly carved a cross into the tree trunk, preventing the Devil from coming down. Jack made the Devil swear that he would never come after his soul, which the Devil did.

Years later when Jack died and arrived at the gates of heaven, he was turned away, presumably because he voted Republican. Desperate for a resting place, he went back to the Devil, who, true to his word, also turned Jack away. However, showing that he's not a total bad guy, the Devil tossed Jack a coal from the fire of Hell to light his way. Jack, who was eating a turnip at the time, placed the coal inside, and wammo, the first jack-o-lantern was invented.

As for the Devil, he eventually escaped the tree and went on to live a prosperous life of evil and terror until eventually he won the presidential election and tricked America into invading Iraq. (6)

The end.

(1) Other sources, by which I mean most sources, describe Samhain as a simple harvest festival.

(2) Not really

(3) Not reputable at all

(4) Also a sign of small genitalia

(5) Zinger!

(6) We still have some fact-checking to do on this one.

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September 2006 – Team Last Call Turns 30

Posted by Jeff on 9/01/2006 12:03:00 AM
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There are worse things in life than turning 30. It's just that right now I can't think of any.

I turn 30 in exactly one week, meaning that, basically, everything that was once good and joyful in my life is about to come crashing down around me in an avalanche of darkness and despair and other words that start with a "d" that in my senility I can no longer remember.

The situation is dire, my friends. This is a full-on crisis. In a matter of days, I will officially be closer to 40 than I am to 20. That's a sobering thought for someone with no savings account, no investments and about as many marketable skills as Paris Hilton. Actually, one less skill, if you count her porn video. What's also sobering is the realization that I'm probably just a few years away from my first prostate exam. I'll give you a few moments to enjoy that visual.

Everything changes once you hit 30. There is no graceful transition, no way to ease yourself into the situation. You simply wake up one day and realize that you have entered an entirely new phase of life, during which your primary goals are to save money for retirement and try to resist the urge to pull your socks up to your knees when you wear shorts.

I can already feel my body preparing for what I like to call the Comb-over Phase, during which the hair from your head falls out and plants itself in places you need two mirrors to see. It's like watching yourself turn into a Wookie one follicle at a time. The irony is that I still cant grow a full beard, which everyone knows is the balding man's number one compensation. Unless you count the beards that are forming on my earlobes. I know, gross.

Did you know it's a common belief among scientists that balding is actually caused by high levels of testosterone? That's actually very good news for me, because although I may end up losing all of my hair, at least I have a good chance of winning the Tour de France.

With each day that passes, my body becomes less like that of a human male and more like that of a marshmallow on estrogen. I'm like a plum on a one-way street to Prunesville.
Now I know what Jeff Goldblum felt like in "The Fly." It's probably only a matter of time before I grow wings and mandibles and develop an inexplicable hunger for sugar and feces. Which is why old people like Old Country Buffet.

I'm starting to feel like the weird uncle who sits at the kids' table at Thanksgiving dinner and tries to sound hip by name-dropping bands he's heard on the radio. Except you know he's not really hip, mostly because he still uses the word "hip." And because the band he name-dropped is Ace of Base.

My under-30 friends have started looking at me with this mixed expression of amusement and apprehension, like at any given moment my adult diapers could spring a leak. Which they almost never do. It's the kind of horrified fascination you normally save for those Discovery Channel specials on liposuction. You can tell that my friends want to look away, but the carnage is just too compelling.

But the reaction I've been getting from my younger friends is still much less disconcerting than the reaction I've been getting from the older ones, who can barely contain their glee that I'm about to become one of them. They keep coming up to me and saying things like, "Welcome to the club!" and "It's all downhill from here!" Then they give me a pained smile and a slow pat on the back, the kind you give to a friend who just blew his children's entire college fund on a single hand of poker.

My birthday is especially hilarious to my wife, who has been waiting anxiously for this day ever since I ran a column making fun of her 30th birthday about a year ago. Actually, it was closer to a year and a half ago. Because, you see, my wife is older than me. Some might say a lot older than me, but I don't think it's necessary to point that out.

Even more upsetting than the fact that I'm turning into a Wookie is the fact that I can't think of myself as a kid anymore. No one's going to think of me as a "hotshot" anymore. No one's ever going to call me a "wiz kid" again. Unless they're trying to make a joke about my adult diapers.

When you're in your 20s, no one really expects you to have your life in order. Your 20s are all about "finding yourself," about being poor and pursuing your dreams and eating lots of Ramen noodles and going without health coverage and not being able to afford new underwear.

But when you're 30, you're supposed to have your act together. You can't run around in your old underwear anymore, because A, you've got cottage cheese thighs, and B, you're a grownup, and grownups are supposed to be financially sound. Not only should you be able to afford new underwear, but you should also have nice khaki slacks and a mortgage and your own set of golf clubs and should probably be able to type the word "underwear" without giggling. Underwear.

Underwear.

Of course, there are plenty of examples of people whose lives were only just beginning at the age of 30. Like Mr. T, who had already hit the big 3-0 by the time he made his big-screen debut in "Rocky III." Plus Jesus he got started at the age of 30 and didn't do all that bad for himself.

So there's still at least a little hope for me. Who knows? With some dieting, a gym membership and lots and lots of steroids, maybe I could be the next Mr. T. Or at least the next Tour de France champion.

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August 2006 – Team Last Call Goes On Vacation

Posted by Jeff on 8/01/2006 12:02:00 AM
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Team Last Call recently ran off to Europe for a month to delivering unprecedented amounts of rock and roll to the areas of the world where unprecedented amounts of rock and roll are needed most. Guess who wasn't happy about that? Our boss, who was kind enough to put together this "best of" column for us. Hey, it's better than nothing.

On His Wife's Driving: Whether she's putting on her stockings or trying to balance her checkbook, you can be sure that at any given point while she's driving, my wife is performing at least one other task that requires the use of both hands and usually a foot or two. I'm pretty sure I once caught her in the middle of a yoga pose while she was driving us to the mall, although I couldn't prove it.

On Dentists: Once things were under control, the dentist began the process of anesthesia by stabbing me repeatedly in the gums with what I could only assume was the harpoon they used to catch Anna Nicole Smith. In between stabs and this is way too weird for me to make up the dentist thought it would be a good idea to tell me about a horror movie he once saw called "Dentist 2," in which a crazed dentist ties a woman down and systematically pulls out all of her teeth. I found this to be exceedingly creepy and inappropriate, but forced out a little laugh anyway since he was the one with the harpoon.

On Spinning Rims: It's time to take the silly spinning rims off of your wheels. Nobody thinks they're cool but the guy who sold them to you, and that's just because he works on commission. Surely there is some better way you could put that $2,000 to use. Like by feeding the poor, for example. Or by donating the money to the Women & Babies Hospital. Unless you hate babies. It's OK if you do. If that's the case, just leave the rims on. That way we'll know for sure.

On Babies: Babies can't hold their liquor. Not only that, but they're terrible at video games and it takes them forever to work their way through a piece of beef jerky. And that's why, for my friends and me, having a baby is simply not an option. A baby would threaten everything that we, as a group of young, spirited and most of all, flatulent males, hold dear. By which I mean Guys Night.

On High-Fives: High-fiving is something that frat boys do after one of them lights a fart. It's cheesy and primitive, and usually means that you were born with the mutant chromosome that makes you wear your hat backwards and listen to rap-metal. So basically, you need to find a new way to express your happiness. However, in the event that a high-five becomes unavoidable (i.e. you just made out with Eva Longoria), under no circumstances are you to attempt a high-ten, which is never OK.

On Theater People: Theater people should be herded together and shipped off to a desert island, where they could start their own country. They could call it the United Federation of Flamboyance, or maybe the Republic of Obnoxious Peoples. Their national anthem could be "Theres No Business Like Show Business," and their flag could have a picture of a dozen or so men snapping their fingers and doing that crouch-walk.

On Bellybutton Piercings: Apparently, my belly didn't get the memo that the rest of my body had decided to stop growing. In the six or so years since I had gotten my piercing, my belly had expanded from a normal, boy-sized tummy to a bulbous mound of jiggly, wiggly pudge. Suddenly my bellybutton ring was less like a cute little accessory and more like a giant flashing beacon perched on top of Mount McPlumpy.

On His Wifes 30th Birthday: When I first told my wife I was going to be writing about her birthday for my next column, her head started spinning around in circles and blood came out of our walls. Then she started talking backwards Latin and flinging large pieces of furniture around the room with her mind. Our poor little Jack Russell still hasn't stopped shaking. Of course, that could just be because he's a Jack Russell. And because I fed him a bag of espresso beans.

On Hummers: As far as I'm concerned, driving a Hummer anywhere in Central Pennsylvania is like trying to pick a piece of broccoli from your teeth with Ruben Studdard sometimes the situation just calls for something a little smaller. Like Clay Aiken. I mean, maybe, maybe if you're living in the frozen tundra, then perhaps you need a vehicle with a little more oomph to it. Something with an engine the size of, say, an Alaskan oil drill. But otherwise, driving a Hummer down our Pennsylvania streets is like trying to remove a splinter from your thumb with a bazooka.

On Hummer Response: We at Team Last Call are taken aback by the Hummer owners' angry response. We certainly meant no offense in our columns. Team Last Call would never deliberately ridicule Hummer drivers or the various insecurities that compel them to drive a truck the size of a river barge. Like tiny genitalia, for example. We would never make fun of that. Or impotence. Again, not funny.

On Paris Hilton: Stop having sex with Paris Hilton. If you're one of the many, many people who have slept with the hotel heiress and statistics show that most of you are it's time to stop. If we all work together to keep Paris from having sex, thereby cutting off her only real contribution to society, then maybe, just maybe, people will stop caring about her and she'll finally go away. Together we can make a difference.

On Writing: In the past, some of my readers have accused me of exaggerating in my columns, of "embellishing" the "truth" just to get a "cheap laugh." To those "people," I have this to say: Yeah, totally, I do that.

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July 2006 – Ding-dong, the Hummer is dead

Posted by Jeff on 7/01/2006 12:01:00 AM
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There are a few days each year when we Americans celebrate the people and events that shaped this great nation of ours.

There's President's Day, of course, when we honor America's greatest presidents, and Groundhog Day, when we honor America's greatest groundhogs.

This month we have the Fourth of July, when we celebrate our country's independence by drinking our body weight in Milwaukee's Best and tying roman candles to our cat's tail. Not that Team Last Call would ever do something like that. But we bet it's really, really funny. And disgustingly inhumane. But really funny.

For those of you who have some extra patriotism to work out of your systems and/or leftover Milwaukee's Best, Team Last Call has some exciting news: Something wonderful has happened that has given Americans yet another reason to celebrate.

No, George Bush hasn't been impeached. Yet. And no, Kevin Federline's album hasn't come out yet. What Team Last Call is referring to is the May 12 announcement that the Hummer, that laughably obnoxious vehicle-of-choice for balding, impotent white men across America, has officially been discontinued. Terminated. Schmutzed.

General Motors made the announcement after sales of the Viagra-pill-on-wheels fell sharply in 2006; by mid-May, fewer than 100 had sold across the country. This, of course, is hilarious.

In fact, according to the Washington Post, the entire Hummer group has been outsold this year by the Toyota Prius, a gas-electric hybrid. That's a pretty remarkable thing, if you think about it. The little guy is finally winning. It's like that scene at the end of "Revenge of the Nerds" when they have the big talent show and the nerds win the crowd over with their crazy techno-rap-Elvis song, and then the head nerd puts on a Darth Vader costume and has sex with the football captain's girl in the Moon Room. Know what I mean?

There are currently two main theories explaining the Hummer's decline in popularity. The first comes down to money. The H1's basic model has a price tag of $140,000, which, in case you were wondering, is more than you paid for your house. Add in the fact that Hummers average less than 10 miles to the gallon, and that gas prices have surpassed the $3/gallon mark in most parts of the country, and it's understandable that people are starting to look for alternate ways of showing the world just how big their testicles aren't.

Here's the funny part: if this theory is true, then we have George Bush to thank. We never would have been able to break the $3/gallon mark without him! And here we thought his only contributions were leading America into a war under false pretenses, creating a culture of fear in order to manipulate popular opinion and teaching children everywhere the wrong way to say "nuclear."

The second theory explaining the declining popularity of Hummers is that Americans are finally starting to realize that driving a Hummer makes you how can I put this delicately? a turd.

If this is the case, then clearly there is only one group of people to thank: Team Last Call.
Youre welcome.

For years, we here at Team Last Call have been active members in the fight against Hummers and the people who drive them (turds), as well as the fight against the music of Nickelback and the fight against people not having sex with Team Last Call. But mostly in the fight against Hummers.

We took it on as our personal mission to educate our readers about Hummers. It has been our goal to deliver the facts in a fair and balanced way, so that our readers can make their own informed decisions as to whether or not people who drive Hummers carry the mark of Satan. It would do no good for us to just cram rhetoric down our readers' throats; we find it's much better to arm the people with facts and then let them judge for themselves if people who drive Hummers are trying to compensate for certain shortcomings, by which we mean teeny, tiny genitalia. It's like that old saying: give a man a fish, and he eats for a day; teach a man to fish, and people who drive Hummers are impotent.

Granted, it doesn't take a genius to recognize that Hummers are morally reprehensible; their size alone makes them the most obvious symbol of over-consumption, wastefulness and selfishness (and tiny genitalia) in American culture. Team Last Call is not the first to notice this, and we're certainly not alone in our disdain for these five-ton ass-mobiles. (Check out the website FUH2.com, where thousands of people have posted photos of themselves giving Hummers the one-finger salute. It's kind of glorious.)

And now, at long last, the giant has fallen. Again, you're welcome.

Does this mean the crisis is over? No, I'm afraid not. While we've managed to kill off the Hummer, its evil spawn the smaller but no less offensive H2 and H3 continue on.

It's kind of like one of those horror movie series where the original monster is dead, so you think you're safe, and then BAM! Out of nowhere you learn that the monster somehow found time between all of its maiming and killing to make some sweet, sweet monster love, and now its son is picking up exactly where its father left off. After "Dracula" there was "Son of Dracula." After "Frankenstein" there was "Son of Frankenstein." After "George H. W. Bush" there was well, you know.

It's a similar story with the H2 and H3. They may not be as obviously craptastic as the original Hummer, but they're just as evil in their own special way. General Motors isn't fooling anybody, and neither are the people who buy these things. Just because the vehicles are slightly smaller doesn't make you any less of a turd for driving one. It's like going out in your backyard and trying to dig just half a hole; no matter how you look at it, its still a hole. A-hole.

The way I figure it, if you're going to be a turd, then be a turd. Don't be half a turd. Don't be a card-carrying member of the turd union and then try to hide it. Be a turd with pride. That way, the rest of us can be more certain about whose house we should be egging.

Today, readers, we celebrate. But tomorrow we continue the fight. We must persevere against all opposition, including the incoherent letters we'll be receiving from Hummer drivers after this column is published. Now if you'll excuse me, I've got a meeting in the Moon Room. Has anyone seen my Darth helmet?

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June 2006 – Team Last Call Versus The Spiderdoodle

Posted by Jeff on 6/01/2006 12:00:00 AM
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I really hate spiders. I hate them more than I hate anything else on the planet, with the possible exception of Nickelback's music, recipes with eggplant in them, racism, the phrase "freedom fries," Bill O'Reilly, backwards baseball hats, the words "ointment" and "slacks," Hummers, people who drive Hummers, people who make Hummers, people who sell Hummers and people who fail to flip off a Hummer when they see one on the highway. But right after all that stuff, I hate spiders the most.

I mean, I hate spiders. And when I say "hate," I mean I'd rather pierce my tongue with a telephone pole than touch a spider. Which brings us to today's story.

A few weeks ago, during one of the first few warm days of spring, I was leaving the house for work when I spotted on the roof of my car what I could only assume was a poodle that had somehow been turned inside-out.

Upon closer inspection, however, I discovered that it wasn't an inside-out poodle at all. It wasn't even a right-side-out poodle. It was, in fact, the biggest, ugliest spider in the history of planet earth.

This caused a real predicament. I worked too far away to walk, but there was just no way I was going to get within 10 feet of the Spiderpoodle. So I did the only thing I knew to do. I ran back into my house, called in sick to work and hid in bed for the rest of the day.

I used to feel ashamed about my little phobia. But after doing some research on the internet, or as I like to call it, the Truthnet, I now realize that there are plenty of other men out there who are just as afraid of spiders as I am. Like Justin Timberlake, for example. And Andre Agassi.

And Robert Redford.*

I also learned on the Truthnet that Mark Wahlberg has a third nipple. Just so you know.

I had an astronomy teacher in high school who once tried to convince me that most adults are afraid of spiders because they were abducted by aliens as children. Here's what happens: the aliens who apparently have long, spider-like arms and legs kidnap little children and perform terrifying experiments on them, which may or may not explain how Bill O'Reilly turned out the way he did.

Afterwards, the aliens zap the children's brains and erase all memory of the abduction. However, the sight of spiders often awakens the terror locked in their subconscious. Makes sense, doesn't it?

No, of course not. It's crazy, which is why that teacher is in jail now. For real.

On the Team Last Call Scale of Craziness, it comes in somewhere between the swan dress that Björk wore to the Oscars and the episode of "Oprah" when Tom Cruise jumped the couch.

Did you see that episode? Oh, wait. That's right. You were probably busy working. Well, those of us who surf the internet and eat Krispy Kremes for a living witnessed Cruise jumping up on a couch, pumping his fists in the air and dancing about in front of poor, startled Oprah while declaring his undying love for his child-bride, Katie Holmes. Cruise worked himself into such a frenzy that the phrase "jumping the couch" is now used as a slang term for "losing your marbles." It's even an official entry in the Urban Dictionary (www.urbandictionary.com).

"Jump the couch A defining moment when you know someone has gone off the deep end. Inspired by Tom Cruise's recent behavior on 'Oprah.'"

Sample sentence: "When I saw the spiderpoodle in my car, I totally jumped the couch. I also jumped the mailbox and the rhododendron and didn't stop until I was in bed with three locks on the door and a fully charged Supersoaker by my side."

I discovered the whole "jump the couch" phenomenon while I was scouring the Truthnet to see if the whole fear-of-spiders theory holds up. How I ended up watching clips of Tom Cruise on "Oprah" is something for me to know and for you to not tell my boss about.

Heres the kicker: Apparently, the alien abduction story checks out (aliensthetruth.com). Many people who were abducted by aliens now claim to have a terrible fear of spiders. Therefore, by applying some simply logic, we can conclude that anyone who is afraid of spiders has been abducted by aliens.

The Truthnet also says that abduction victims sometimes get nosebleeds. Here's the thing I sometimes get nosebleeds. I mean, not often, but I get them.

I guess what I'm trying to tell you is that I've been abducted by aliens. On one hand, this explains a lot about my life. On the other hand, it's sort of a disturbing thing to realize, especially right in front of about 42,000 readers, most of whom are on the toilet.
I'd better go get this all sorted out. Until next month, live long and prosper.

* While Robert Redford isn't technically afraid of spiders, he is playing the voice of Ike, the arachnophobic horse, in the new version of "Charlotte's Web" (www.rottentomatoes.com). Which is good enough for me.

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May 2006 - Team Last Call Takes A Victory Lap

Posted by Jeff on 5/01/2006 11:59:00 PM
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This month, Team Last Call completes its fourth year as the World's Funniest Columnist, as voted by our mommy.

Over the past four years, Team Last Call has become something of a local celebrity. People are always coming up to us in restaurants and asking us things like, "How do you manage to be so funny all of the time?" and "Doesnt it ever get tiring being such a comedic genius?" and "Which is worse, being 29 and balding, or being 29 and still not able to grow a full beard?"

The answer is C) being 29 and still thinking that flatulence is funny.

You see, we here at Team Last Call have a little problem with maturity. We're basically like a gigantic toddler with a receding hairline. Which is the long way of saying we're like Fred Durst, except without the homemade porn films.

At times, our immaturity can be disheartening. But we know we're not alone. After all, you're the one sitting here voluntarily reading a column destined to be filled with fart jokes, so it looks like we're in this together. Toot!

Which brings us to our point: Team Last Call's immaturity is actually the secret behind all of our success. By "success," we're referring to the millions of readers we've earned over the past four years. And by "millions of readers," we mean our mom. Thanks, mom.

But for real, it makes us feel a lot better to know that you're out there, that we're not the only ones around here whose idea of a good time is a room full of friends, a can of beans and a lighter. And possibly an extinguisher.

Our four-year anniversary is a very momentous occasion for us here at Team Last Call. We're proud of what we've accomplished during our tenure here. We're an example of the American Dream in action. Our career is a victory for the little guy. We know what you're thinking: "Team Last Call's career is a victory for Ryan Seacrest?" Yes, but not just Ryan Seacrest. It's a victory for all tiny TV show hosts, including Sylvester Stallone (host of "The Contender"), who, Team Last Call recently learned, is rumored to be as short as 5-foot-7.

We also read that rapper Ja Rule is just 5-foot-6 (he's just a little thug!), Madonna is 5-foot-4 and Prince measures in at a teeny-tiny 5-foot-2. We discovered all of this priceless info on www.shortsupport.org, which is an actual online resource designed to "provide inspiration to short people to help better their lives and attitudes." Heh. Heh heh. Ha ha. Hahahahahahahahaha!

See, as respected heavyweights in the field of journalism, we here at Team Last Call consider it our duty to stay well informed on topics such as current events, politics and, most importantly, Lindsey Lohan. As part of our unswerving commitment to you, the Last Call reader, we literally spend hours of our time each day researching these topics (especially Lindsey Lohan) on such valuable resources as the E! Channel and People magazine. Sometimes our research involves napping.

But when you're looking for factual facts such as the kind we use in our columns, there is only one resource you can really trust: the internet, or as we like to call it, the Truthnet.

The Truthnet is where we stumbled upon www.shortsupport.org (no pun intended). It's also where we visit sites like www.weirdpicturearchive.com, which features such eye-opening photos as a mouse with a human ear growing out of its back and a dude who can stick his finger up his nose and poke it out through his eye socket. Oh, by the way, skip this paragraph if you just ate.

The Truthnet is also home to such classic sites as samugliestdog.typepad.com, the online home of the ugliest dog to ever walk the planet. And don't forget about www.selfnutpunch.com/enter.html, a site devoted entirely to videos of young men smacking themselves as hard as they can right in the how-do-you-do.

I guess what Team Last Call is trying to say is that the secret to our staggering success thus far has been the combination of our immaturity (Toot!) and our hopeless addiction to the Truthnet specifically to ebaumsworld.com, where this morning we saw a video clip of a man squirting milk out of his eyeball.

Being a famous columnist can sometimes be a thankless job. Each article requires countless hours of painstaking research, during which we consume as many as two boxes of Krispy Kremes. But when the going gets tough, we ask ourselves where the world would be without our monthly dose of witticism. We picture a world without fart jokes, a world where no one is brave enough to call out Hummer owners for the obnoxious turds they are, a world where people float through life without ever suspecting that Rocky is practically a midget. And to that world, we boldly say, "No, thank you!"

If you're an adult who's obsessed with flatulence and has high-speed internet access at work, then you too could be a famous columnist. Not only can you exercise your creativity but if you market it properly you could be raking in literally tens of dollars each month! It worked for us, and it could work for you! Just send $10 (check or money order) to Team Last Call, c/o Fly Magazine, 22 East McGovern Avenue, Lancaster, PA 17602, and we'll get you started with our no-risk beginner's kit, including a pen, a notepad and a Team Last Call figurine, complete with receding hairline and a lifelike potbelly. Toot!

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