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Thursday, a new collection of memorabilia from the doomed ship Titanic was auctioned at Christie’s. One of the rarest items was a survivor’s handwritten account of the disaster.

[PIX] “It sucked.”

That went for $8,400 per word. I’m clearly in the wrong business.

Other items included postcards—
[PIX] “Sorry if my handwriting’s bad, but the ship is sideways”

—and photographs. of passengers. “Here’s one of me strangling the idiot who was driving the boat.”

The Titanic was on its maiden voyage when it struck an iceberg on April 14, 1912. In one of the worst diasters in maritime history, nearly 1,500 people were killed…and millions more had to endure that horrible song.

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The bald eagle, once nearly extinct, has been taken off the endangered species list. As a result of the ruling, the eagle will now be known by its new name: “chicken.”

“We think every American should be pleased by this news,” the White House said. “Now can everybody please shut up about the environment?”

The eagle has been under the protection of the Endangered Species Act. At least that’s what liberals call it. Conservatives call it “which animals to make fun of when we want to build a power plant.”

Since this is the Bush Administration, you have to wonder: are the eagles really safe, or have they just been voting Democratic? “We’ll thin those bastards out!”

The birds’ comeback is largely due to an unexpected ability to adapt to urban sprawl.

By the way, do you know how French people pronounce “Mall of America”? “Le redundant.”

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Variety reports that Hugh Hefner is set to be the subject of a new biopic. The movie will be called, “A Beautiful ‘Gine.”

It’ll be directed by the guy responsible for X-Men: The Last Stand. Get ready for some really unique CGI.

Hefner is a sort of sexual superhero. “Look! Up in the sky! It’s a bird!…Wh-what’s it doing to that other bird?”

In the 60s, Hefner was an active supporter of civil rights; in the 70s he championed freedom of speech. In the 80s and beyond he’s been a tireless advocate for girls who look like strippers.

After all these years, and all those women, you have to wonder: What’s Hef looking for? A surprise in the box?

Still, he’s a genius. Every teenage boy masturbates, but Hugh Hefner was the only one who thought, “Hey, there might be some money in this!”

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Every year here in California, the Marin-Sonoma County Fair holds a contest for the World’s Ugliest Dog. This seems pretty crazy, until you remember how much wine people must be drinking.

Here’s this year’s winner. Honest to God, it looks like something you’d cover with underwear.

He’s a 2-year-old mutt named “Elwood.” “But that’s not the only name he recognizes,” the dog’s owner, Karen Quigley, said. “He also responds to ‘Holy shit!’”

Elwood got $1000 for winning the contest. They would award more, but they don’t want to start causing reverse plastic surgery.”

Most of the contestants were the same breed: Chinese Cresteds. People aren’t sure why they’re so homely. One theory is that poison-conscious Emperors used them to induce vomiting.

I predict that this is only the beginning for Elwood. For one thing, the Troma brothers have just found their “Lassie.”

Ms. Quigley calls Elwood “the cutest thing I’ve ever seen.” Which begs the question. Can life get any easier for straight men?

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A two-year-old from Britain has been admitted to Mensa. On her last IQ test, Georgia Brown racked up a score of 152, which means that, compared to the average person, she’s over 50% more annoying.

The toddler’s score puts her in the same range as Stephen Hawking. That’s the good news. The bad news is, there seems to be a strong correlation between being really smart and having to wear diapers.

A Mensa official thought that Georgia would fit right in, saying that “most members consider personal grooming to be an arbitrary social construct.”

As young as she is, Georgia isn’t the youngest member ever admitted by the group. “The younger the better,” the official said. “True social awkwardness takes a lifetime.

“I say, ‘It’s never too early to start looking down on other people.’”

The Daily Mail reports that Georgia can already use the word “arrogant.” Well, she’s about to get a lot of practice.

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Yesterday, a 15-year-old in India successfully performed a C-section birth. The boy was trying to become the youngest surgeon ever—at least that’s what he told his parents.

“But doctor, I thought we were doing a C-section?” “Be quiet and let me shave you.”

The kid got more than he bargained for. “I thought it was going to be hot,” he said. “But it wasn’t. I think I might’ve turned myself gay.”

Police in Columbia, S.C. are trying to piece together how a naked couple fell from a downtown office building. From the clothes scattered around the roof, they suspect the dead pair may have been having sex. Gives a whole new meaning to the term “foul play.”

I like to call stories like these “evolution in action.” Then again, maybe it’s the work of a really awesome serial killer. I think I just found Michael Bay’s next movie.

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Naturalists report that a lake in Southern Chile has mysteriously disappeared. “We checked it in March,” said Juan Jose Romero of Chile's National Forestry Corporation. But when Romero’s team went back in May, there was nothing there. “Then everybody started saying, ‘Juan took the lake!” “You totally did.” “I did not, shut up…Idiot.”

Chilean officials are appealing to the community, going door-to-door and asking them to report any suspicious activity, “especially by wet people.”

“We’re not interested in prosecuting,” one local resident said. “Just hurry up and give it back—I can’t pee on dry land…It’s a thing I have.”

There was nothing left at the bottom of the lake but a few chunks of ice. “At first, I was thinking, ‘Supervillain,” Romero said. Then he saw the note: “If you can’t take care of this planet, I’m going to have to take it away from you. Signed, God.’

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A new hotel in Berlin aims to recreate the experience of living in Communist East Germany. “Of course all the rooms are bugged,” said the hotel’s owner, “but then again, you never have to call room service.
“You just shout your order into the chandelier.”

The rooms at The Ostel don’t have cable, but there is live surveillance. There’s even pay-per-view…Or, as we like to call it, “The Honeymoon Suite.”

The hotel’s restaurant is supposed to be pretty good. I say “supposed to be” because nobody’s been able to make it through the Wall.

The Ostel’s goal is to be a contrast to the “dog-eat-dog world" of today. That’s right, folks, there are only two choices: dog-eat-dog or everybody-eat-turnips.
In the future, people will look back on us and think, “What were they smoking? And how do we destroy it?”

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Last week the staff of an Applebee’s restaurant here in California mistakenly served a two-year-old a margarita. The mother of Julian Mayorga didn’t understand why her son kept refusing to drink from his sippy cup. Then she sniffed it, and realized what was wrong: “Oh—he wants salt on the rim.”

“It was an honest mistake,” the bartender said. “I thought that order was for the bachelorette party two tables down.”

Is it too much to say when you’re getting it in a sippy cup, you’ve been overserved?

Customs officials in Australia are reporting that rare and endangered reptiles are being smuggled in garden gnomes. Now that’s a Travelocity commercial I’d like to see.

“Hello! Watch me reenact that famous scene from Alien.”

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British police announced today that they had smashed a global pedophile ring. Well, that’s a relief—the Global Pedophile was the creepy real-life inspiration for comics’ Green Lantern.

Child abuse stories are never pleasant, but the most disturbing thing about this one is that Canadians were involved. Sure, they seem nice…

A Japanese man has been certified by the Guinness Book of World Records as the oldest person alive. Tomoji Tanabe is 111, and clearly lovin’ every minute of it.

This photo is called, “Why Japanese people commit suicide.”

And finally, the Tennessee Aquarium says that they’ve hatched an extremely rare type of turtle. As this photo shows, this species is one of the few in the animal kingdom with an extreme attraction to money.

Don’t let him know your PIN number. He’ll rob you blind.

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In a surprise visit to Iraq, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates called our war there “a very mixed picture.” Yes, mixed, as in all the components of vomit.

Gates’ comment came after a week of speculation that the US military was not being candid about the war. General David Petraeus talked about pockets of “normalcy” in the country, singling out things like soccer fields sporting real grass. Yep, there’s no end to what billions of dollars can do—just ask kids in the ghetto.

It’s all part of a nefarious plan to get poor kids to enlist. “I joined up for the Parks and Rec. Can you believe it? All the hoops over here have nets!”

Petreaus also mentioned Iraq’s thriving amusement parks. “Step right up, and win an George Bush kewpie doll. You can stick pins in it, hang it in effigy…You sir—wouldn’t your girl like her own American flag? 100% flammable!”

Sunni, Shi’ia or Kurd, Iraq is united in one thing: they all think this guy’s creepy.

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Fifteen years after they became popular, a Louisiana town is outlawing baggy pants. “We’re getting better,” said Carol Broussard, the mayor of Decambre, Louisiana. “Last year, we were burning Beatle records.”

The Dalai Lama made an appearance today at the zoo founded by “Crocodile Hunter” Steve Irwin. The Tibetan spiritual leader praised Irwin for showing kindness to all living creatures—at least when the camera was off.

“Loving kindness makes for extremely boring TV,” the Dalai Lama said. “Imagine me hosting ‘Hardball.’”

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It appears that a 3-year-old boy is not being allowed to join his parents in the United States because his first name is similar to that of the founder of Hamas. “Hey, lay off,” officials at the US Department of Immigration said. “They all look alike to us.”

We need the War on Terror to be like D-Day, but instead Bush is running it like the DMV. Actually that’s not fair; an inept War on Terror actually kills people, but the DMV only makes you wish you were dead.

Still, I think it’s great that the toddler is being blocked. Children are our future, and it’s important that people start hating the US young, before they start liking the movies and video games and stuff.

The Soviets screwed it up. They waited until puberty. All throughout the Seventies, teenaged boys all over the Eastern Bloc were saying, “Oh man, I gotta get over that wall and go have sex with Farrah Fawcett-Majors.”

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The AP reports that health officials trying to stop a groom-to-be infected with a dangerous form of tuberculosis got little help from his family, including his future father-in-law who is a TB expert. They suspect he was trying to drum up business.

The man disagrees, saying, “Epidemic, schmepidemic—obviously none of them have ever had to pay for a wedding.

“That guy was going to get married if I had to prop up his corpse.”

Monday, an international team of scholars unveiled a digital reproduction of ancient Rome. Speaking as a Roman history buff, I have one thing to say: if they did it right, parts of this will be really, really dirty.

Months after an international scandal involving poisoned pet food, toothpaste, and other products, the Chinese government says that it has food safety issues under control. That’s the good news. The bad news is, if it happens again, they’re doing it on purpose.

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A judge in Atlanta has ordered the release of a man sentenced to 10 years for having consensual oral sex with a 15-year-old girl when he was 17. Lawyers for Genarlow Wilson said, “This is a great day for varsity athletes everywhere.”

Amazingly, the state Attorney General is planning to appeal the decision, to try to keep the poor guy in jail. A spokesman said, “This decision doesn’t make the girl any less white.”

In the two years Mr. Wilson has spent in prison, many prominent citizens have come to his defense, including former President Jimmy Carter. I bet you thought I was going to say “Bill Clinton.”

I just had a thought…the guy was an honor student, so maybe he was doing it to her. Ladies, don’t press charges—we’re doing the best we can.

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Today a screaming Paris Hilton was sent back to jail to serve out the rest of her forty-five day sentence for reckless driving…A ”screaming Paris Hilton” ? Sounds like something I used to drink in college.

Hilton had been under house arrest in the Hollywood Hills. A sheriff had sent her there after only three days in jail, citing an unspecified medical condition. This raises an interesting question: is “whining” really in the DSM-V?

Still, Hilton will probably get out a lot sooner than we all hope. According to California law, inmates are given time off for good behavior, and even more time off if they agree to do post-prison interviews. What, you think everybody just liked Oprah?

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...of all Newsbreaks all the time, but occasionally something must be said. I plan to break this rule a couple more times in the next few weeks, as the relentless tides of my obsessions have thrown up an gnarled, weed-strewn essay or two.

Friend and fellow Record alum Mollie Wilson is in the midst of an iKerfuffle (sorry Apple) over The New Yorker's recent profile of Paul McCartney. The backstory can be read here at HuffPo.

Was the commenter "John" on Mollie's blog truly the author of the piece? If so, didn't anybody tell him never to drink-and-comment? Jon Schwarz thoughtfully addresses the psychological fissures of the old-media writer here, but I don't care about that. I'm not interested in feeling anybody's pain over being disrespected by the peons. True talent forbears and wannabes complain; we all do it once in a while to dull some sting, but hiding behind a credential is a always a punk move.

As a Beatle head (bona fides here), you might expect that I'd have an opinion about the article itself. But I haven't read it, and probably won't. This is what made me stop reading The New Yorker: whenever I'd read an article that touched on something I knew about, I would come away from the experience frothing with rage. Semi-informed at best, the articles were invariably smug, trite, and managed to leave the object of their subtly malign attention a dull and lifeless thing.

But I could live with that--after all, this is magazine journalism we're talking about, just filler between Cartier ads. What pushed me over the edge was how every author in The New Yorker radiated self-satisfaction. You could tell they thought they'd reached the mountaintop, and insisted you agree. Particularly on cultural issues, this imbued the writing with an arm's-length ex cathedra that is actively opposed to appreciation, and perhaps even understanding. In other words, precisely the snotty mindset shown by the poster on Mollie's blog. So if he's not writing for The New Yorker, he should be. That's quite a gift for parody.

My wife likes the fiction, and the cartoons are always good for a wan laugh, but I'm done with it--poor Kate has to steal the occasional issue from the "who wants it" basket down the hall. The New Yorker is like The New York Yankees. They assume they are synonymous with the sport. When they're good, they assume everyone agrees that all is once again right with the world; when they're bad, they get petulant and defensive. Spoiled, entitled, coasting on the past, generally unworthy of the attention that they get, both are a collection of high-priced names assembled by an impossibly rich jerk. Both are trying to dominate a dying sport, and confuse snapping up more of less with authentic excellence. Bonds will break Hank Aaron's record--The New Yorker will still launch stars--but it will never matter, not like it once did. And that's okay, because the alternative is stagnation and death. But then, those have always been a New Yorker specialty: cue "Tiny Mummies."

Whatever The New Yorker was, it's not that anymore, and hasn't been for decades. What it did under Ross and Shawn--the pieces we all read in high school--has nothing to do with what it is now. The New Yorker's relentless branding of itself as some way to commune with The American Century is as ersatz and self-serving as any other piece of marketing. Accept the fantasy if it pleases you, make money off it, even, if you're a writer. But don't confuse it with reality. Warts and all, the web is the greatest explosion of written communication in the history of homo sapiens. Asserting the primacy of any one collection of talent, especially one assembled by the corrupt and intellectually hamstrung mag biz, seems absurd. I don't need The New Yorker or John Colapinto to tell me what to think about Paul McCartney, and that magazine's wrongness about stuff I know about makes me skeptical about everything else.

Understand: I, too, grew up with the idea that The New Yorker was Valhalla on 43rd Street. And, after lots of struggle, reached the mountaintop. But I remember exactly when I realized that the mountain was a lot shorter than it used to be. It was the day that Jon's and my editor there told me she was leaving for a job at WWD. Or was it W? My point is, it didn't matter.

[UPDATE: The New Yorker has confirmed that the poster "John" is indeed the author of the piece. Wow. I mean, we all Google ourselves when something comes out, but...wow.]

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Scientists in San Francisco said they have discovered a new, potentially deadly strain of bacteria previously unknown to medicine. In microbiology, this is called “looking for trouble.”

The strain was contracted by a woman who was traveling in Peru. Scientists don’t know how it’s spread, but they think it might be that creepy music.

DNA samples from the extinct wooly mammoth reveals that the demise of that species was not caused suddenly by a comet, disease, or overhunting. Instead, it happened slowly, through a gradual loss of genetic diversity. In other words, the red states will go away, but it may take a little time.

After months of tension over a proposed American missile defense shield, today Russian President Vladimir Putin unveiled his own counterproposal. Instead of basing the missiles in the Czech Republic, Putin suggests “…how ‘bout not and say we did?”

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Today in Vatican City, a man managed to grab the back of Pope Benedict XVI's open popemobile before security guards pulled him away. According to one guard, the man was yelling, “Chinese fire drill! Chinese fire drill!”

After 50 years on the air, today was the last taping for “Price is Right” host Bob Barker. Barker’s replacement will be the “iBob,” an animatronic robot that has been used secretly every Thursday since 1997.

Because the only times I ever watched it were when I was home from school, “The Price is Right” always reminds me of being sick. Just seeing this picture makes me throw up in my mouth.

And finally, Gay groups are determined to fight President Bush’s new nominee for Surgeon General. Kentucky cardiologist Dr. James Holsinger wrote in 1991 that gay sex is unnatural. You know what else is unnatural? Cardiology.

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Officials at Virginia Tech have decided to reopen Norris Hall, the site of April’s mass-murder. “It’s time to move on, to heal,” President Charles Steger said. “Let the nicknaming begin!”

“Uh, President Steger? Mr. Norris is on the phone. He wants his money back.”

Ben Bernanke, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, said today he expects the US economy to shake off its currently anemic growth. “And if it doesn’t,” Bernanke said, “I will shave off my exquisitely well-groomed beard.”

Look at his neck…The more I look at this photo, the more convinced I get that the Bernanke men all have a “sweater problem.”

And finally, a woman in Salt Lake City was recently the victim of a very odd robbery. As she was filling her car with gas, a man came up behind her, stuck a gun in her back, and forced her to fill up his SUV…This perfect metaphor for the war in Iraq has been brought to you by ExxonMobil.

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A high school senior in suburban Chicago has been arrested for instigating a massive food fight. Even the kids at the special-ed table got into it. They were trying to throw noodles.

“People were actually buying food to throw it,” said one kid. I can just imagine the marketing meeting. “Think, people! How do we make our pizza more aerodynamic? How can we give our slushies more stopping power!”

A man in Poland has awakened after spending 19 years in a coma. Reportedly, his first words were, “George Bush is still President?”

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In great news for joke-writers, Doctor Jack Kevorkian left prison today, eight years after being locked up for helping 130 people kill themselves. In a short statement, Kevorkian said that he found prison quite tolerable: “They even let me sleep in the gas chamber.”

“This wasn’t a treat, it was for his protection,” the warden said. “The other inmates got angry after they found him hanging around Death Row with an erection.”

All kidding aside, I think Kevorkian’s a genius businessman. Did you know he started out as a pathologist? All this suicide stuff was just vertical integration.

He is moving back to the Detroit area, which is a good idea, too. Let the city do your marketing.

The terms of Kevorkian’s parole say that he cannot treat anyone who is older than 62 or disabled. “Oh well,” Kevorkian said. “There’s always Morrissey concerts.”

And this is me, getting my hack on for Friday, June 1, 2007…

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