Ask the Magic Internet a Stupid Question No. 0044.

So I see that the FDA just unveiled new graphic warning labels for cigarette packs in the USA. We’ve had those in Canada for quite a while now. Let’s have a look at some of the designs the U.S. MAD-ministration of Food and Drugs Men came up with.

She’s blowing smoke right in the baby’s face! Who does that? She’s either incredibly ignorant or knowingly blowing smoke in her child’s face as a form of abuse. That means she’ll probably kill that baby through ignorance, neglect or a plain old shaking long before it dies from second hand smoke. They should slap this picture of the kid’s dad on the other side of the pack.

That raccoon’s got my smoke! Get it back for daddy.

We have a teeth one here too but it only warns about mouth disease.

The US seems to have one uped us with that gross lip sore though. Oh yeah? Well we beat you at hockey.

Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

Now that’s not even a warning. That’s more like good advice. And with his shirt open like that he’s kind of like Superman. Maybe they’re trying to say if you quit smoking you’ll feel invincible like Superman. But he doesn’t really look happy about it, does he? He looks pissed off like he’s going to punch me. He looks more like that mean drunk Superman from Superman 2. I wonder how many shots it takes for Superman to get wasted. I wonder how many smokes he could smoke!

Probably like this many!

This one is pretty effective. Those trach. holes are pretty creepy. And it’s even worse when you see someone smoking out of one. It always reminds me of Juno the social worker from Beetlejuice.

And you know what the worst is? All the public servants in the afterlife in Beetlejuice were suicide victims. So does that mean she slit her own throat?! That’s pretty hardcore. They should put her on the pack with a message that says, All you smokers are committing suicide just like me, only slower. And then you’re going to have to deal with a bunch of no-nothing shitheads everyday in the afterlife equivalent of the passport office.

Or just put picture of Beetlejuice on the pack.

That creepy little fucker would scare anyone away.

I don’t know. That starched white shirt and loosened silk tie are a warning sign also. This man could just as easily be a product of the rat race. All those rare steak power lunches, coffee fueled Johnson report all-nighters and heart rate throttling the CEOs are in town lap dance grinds can take their toll on a man.

See these business guys don’t appear to be smoking AND they work out.

Don’t get me wrong it’s a good warning but maybe they should add something about the counter-productivity of smoking to the package for business men. All that time spent outside smoking when you could be working.

There you go, that’ll do. Just don’t give out butts with that picture on it to guys in prison. Cigarettes in jail are the same as money. (And so are prison guys butts.)

What is that, a cartoon baby? Who cares about a cartoon baby? What, you could blow smoke in a real toddlers face for the first one but for a baby you have to use a cartoon? And it’s not even a good cartoon. What is that thing on its arm, an iPod? You should have at least got a better cartoonist like John Pound. He’s the guy that drew Garbage Pail kids. He could have drawn a baby way grosser than that.

See! SEEEEE!

Ewww gross! Wait, which ones am I supposed to be grossed out by? This reminds me of that great stand up routine Norm McDonald used to do about smoking.



The pair of lungs on the right look camouflaged. Maybe hunters should smoke so if they’re ever attacked by a bear and it rips open their chest, they can still hide.

Roooaaaar wait, wait a minute what? There was a guy here and I was eating his chest and now he’s gone?! There’s just a pile of leaves. A pile of bloody, heaving shaking, screaming leaves. Oh well I’m off to the dump.

I don’t know. It seems like they’re spending an awful lot of money trying to reinforce something that every idiot should know by now. And isn’t smoking on the decline in the west? You can hardly smoke anywhere in North America. I’m pretty sure that’s why sexy Johnny Depp moved to France.

Which is funny because didn’t America invent smoking? Or wasn’t it at least discovered there and then passed on to the Europeans? Oh Magic Internet. I am sending you heap big smoke signals.

Question 44: Is America responsible for smoking?



Hmm, this is an interesting question and one of your least stupid yet. The answer is yes with an underlying no. You see smoking can be traced all the way back to sometime between 5000-3000 BC. Early South American civilizations would burn incense during rituals, a practice that was later adapted for pleasure.

Well that sure stood the test of time.

Although Columbus reported seeing American Indians smoking tobacco in the 1400s and was even given dried leaves as a gift, it was reported that he threw them away and tobacco was not properly introduced to Europe and Asia until the 16th century where it followed common trade routes.

Way to go Columbus. Another reason while you’ll never be as cool as Andrew Dice Clay.

Why don’t you go discover planet Fagatron, Ohhh!

Yes, yes, Johnny. Enough of that buffoon known as the Dice Man. Early American settler John Rolfe was credited as the first person to successfully raise tobacco as a cash crop. This became a boon for early American settlers with much of their harvest being shipped to the old world. But it was Jean Nicot who first introduced it to Europe through France and it is from his name that the word nicotine derives from. So you see although smoking may have originated in the Americas and appears to be first discovered there it was in fact a Frenchman who was to cause it’s spread throughout Europe.

Always blame the French, huh?

Oh well. Thanks for the info. Magic Internet. I think we all had fun today. Oh and Chris, sorry for saying that Andrew Dice Clay is cooler than you. I think you could definitely give him a run for his money now.

Check ya later folks. Don’t smoke em if you got em.

Segway to Heaven.

Jimi Heselden, the owner of Segway scooters died yesterday after riding his Segway off of a cliff! Here’s footage of him hours before the crash.




Ok that wasn’t him but I’m guessing he never saw Quadrophenia. Because if he had, he’d know you’re supposed to jump off before it goes over the cliff. Right Jimmy?



My condolences to Jimi Heselden but what a way to go. Not only is it a lock for lamest/most ironic death of the year but it also leaves the Segway Company with a PR nightmare. Let’s just pray that they don’t try to cheapen his funeral with some sort of Segway honor guard.

But they say every cloud has a silver lining. Maybe the silver lining to this tragedy is that they will finally stop manufacturing and selling these stupid, STUPID machines.



This quote from the article says it all,

They use gyroscopes, computers and electric motors to cruise to 12 miles per hour.

12 miles per hour?! You know what else does that? A bicycle! And a bicycle doesn’t need gyroscopes, computers, electronic motors, or a cheque from some shithead for $2,000! That’s right. There are people paying out $2,000 to look like complete assholes. In fact there isn’t a single picture out there of someone riding a Segway where they don’t look like king of the wanks.

See.

See.

See.

See.

 (And if you think that’s gross, you should see him back it into the handicap stall and take a shit.)

They also come in handy for bad, half assed parenting.

Segways even make some of the lamest jobs even lamer.

Thank you for your order sir. Delivery comes with a free glimpse of saddest fucking thing you’ve ever seen.

Mall cops already get 0 respect from teenagers and skater kids. This will only cause them to actively seek HIM out for abuse. Target indeed.

Speaking of skaters, there’s even a handful of dorks into extreme Segway.

I haven’t seen anything that lame since those 80s scooters with the breaks disappeared.



They should get the extreme Segway guys to remake the movie RAD.

And call it SAD

There are only three instances in which the riding of a Segway should be tolerated.

1) Any time a chimp rides one.

Monkey Riding a Segway on Japanese Television! - Watch more amazing videos here

Because a chimp Riding anything is awsome.

2) When George Bluth rides one on Arrested Development.

Because he’s so lame he’s awesome.

3) And when Weird Al rides one while singing White & Nerdy live. Because it’s so lame, it’s awesome.

Play me out Al.

Time to straighten out my Longfellow

Back to school today! Time for mommy and daddy’s precious little shit stains to go and get themselves an ejumacation.

I like this day and I’ll tell you why. It’s the one day when you can look at a teenager and ascertain just who they think they are. Today is the day that they will dawn what they consider to be their best/image changing/life altering/new look/this is who I am now outfit.

It’s time for people to know I discovered the Grateful Dead this summer!

And I will ride by and laugh at them.

Now before you all go getting your  Fundies. in a bunch, let me tell you something. On my first day of grade 9, I wore a leather jacket, a skull and crossbones ear ring and a thin pair of baggy pants with cartoon pictures of Popeye all over them.

I can’t quite recall what I was trying to say about myself back then (I don’t think I even liked Popeye) but I do know what that says about me now. It says that I’ve paid my dues and I’ve won my fair share of awkward teen choice awards so I now reserve the right to be the one shaking my head and laughing.

I could go on and on about the things I’ve seen. The release of the Matrix back in 1999 produced an achingly embarrassing crop of Neo wannabes.



And just last year I witnessed so many girls in near identical outfits it was like watching Village of the Spray-Tanned Damned in Rolled Up Jean Shorts.

You WILL take us to Hollister.

But there are 2 things I see every year. The first is the handful of kids that have decided to go punk. This year’s punk protégé was sporting a blue Mohawk and a t-shirt with the symbol from the London Underground on it.

Fuck, it’s like he looked punker up in a dictionary. A word in your soon to be pierced ear little Lars, girls haven’t liked boys with funny coloured hair since Dookie came out and no one’s been shocked by a Mohawk since the mid 80s. (Apart from your grandmother and she thinks you should be wearing a shirt and tie to Red Lobster.) For more on what you as a teenage punk should be doing, see the late great Feargal Sharkey.



The second thing I see every year is a handful of kids discovering rock & roll. Despite what modern parents and Kideo say kids can’t rock and roll.

These guys are in no position to make any decisions regarding rock & roll and I don’t think they should be allowed around children.

But once they hit puberty they start to figure it out and many of them decide to express their newfound interest in the genre by donning a selection from what I like to call the rock & roll t-shirt hall of shame. I see one of these 5 t-shirts every year. And high school is just the beginning. Lovers of the rock & roll lifestyle will continue to phone in their rock & roll style with one of these babies right up through college and into adulthood. Here’s the first week of school set list:

Monday: The Jack Daniels shirt.

I like Jack Daniels but man do I hate this shirt. I’m assuming that when a rock & roll guy puts it on, he sees himself as a hard drinkin’ sonofabitch like Slash from GNFNR or Johnny Cash. He pictures himself alone in a dusty dive bar pounding shots with impunity or backstage after a gig hurling an empty bottle at a band mate or manger. (That just made me think of that episode of Growing Pains where Ben goes to see his idol, rock star Jonathan Keith and he turns out to be a huge dick.)


Bonus: That was Brad Pitt!
Double Bonus: What was with that bouncer dude’s face??!!

There was a guy in my Grade 9 metal shop class that used to where the Jack Daniels shirt. Someone asked him why he wore it and he said that he loved Jack Daniels and that he drank a mickey of it every morning before school. Everyone laughed and for the rest of the year everyone called him J. D. Cool. I still couldn’t tell you his real name. That about sums up that shirt.

Tuesday: The Johnny Cash Finger Shirt.

Speaking of the Man In Black, there’s this doozy. I mean yeah Johnny Cash was a great song writer and yeah here he is giving everyone the finger which tends to equal rock & roll too but I don’t know. Something tells me Johnny Cash hated this picture and something also tells me he’d hate the kind of people who wear it. Do you really think Johnny Cash high-fived anyone for doing a shot?

Bonus: Johnny Cash Jack Daniels t-shirt!

Wednesday: The CBGB’s shirt.

Yes! The shirt that screams I love Punk Rock! (Or Country Blue Grass & Blues depending on how you read it). I’m not sure where kids keep getting this shirt. CBGB closed about 4 years ago and last I heard it’s now a cheap women’s clothing store. I can’t quite figure out why someone would want to wear a shirt advertising a place they’d never been too that no longer exists. Although most rock & roll shirt guys’ CBGB knowledge seems to begin and end with the Ramones played there. Well the Ramones played the Horseshoe as well and guess what? It still exists.

Why not go down there and check out some local bands and pick up one of their t-shirts? At least it’s more rock & roll then going to Back Stage Pass in the mall.

Thursday: The Ramones shirt.

I like the Ramones too. I’m not a huge, huge fan but they were a good band. I’d even wear this shirt. If I didn’t see it on about 100 shitheads a day.

Good band, decent shirt but that about sums it up.

Friday: The Nirvana shirt.

Nirvana was a decent band and Kurt was a decent musician but does he really deserve this John Lennonesque rock & roll god status? For what? For saving another generation of mall rats from having to listen to more Warrant albums?

And at least John Lennon didn’t shoot himself. Maybe I’m being hard on Kurt but I can’t believe he left his daughter to be raised by that drug addicted mess of a wife.

And guess what? Now she’s a drug addict too. If you really want to pay tribute to the legacy that Kurt Cobain left why not pick up a pair of Kurt Cobain Converse with his diary written all over them. I’m sure he’d really appreciate that.

Well there you have it soft cocks. Your back to school shopping is complete. Maybe you should have saved that money for a pair of tube sox. Smell ya later.