I just saw a television ad that prominently featured Santa Claus… before Halloween. This is wrong. Very, very wrong.

Uhoh. I tried to discover my fate by drawing a Silicon Valley Tarot card, and got The Stockholder, which sounds like a bad omen if I’ve ever heard one.

Amazon has published online the first three chapters of “The Stingray: Lethal Tactics of the Sole Survivor“, a rather angry look at CBS and Richard Hatch (remember him?). C’mon, it’s never too early in the week to do some trashy tabloid reading.

British duvet maker Du Pont has released a report arguing that people would work harder if they had a few days off a year to catch up on their sleep. Now I’m just waiting for some chocolate company to announce that everyone will work even harder if they have bedside truffle service on their new days off, and I’ll be all set.

I went on a trip to Washington State on the weekend, mostly to window shop for electronics. Everything went smoothly, except.. can someone please tell me why, why, why all the employees in Old Navy were wearing microphone headsets? It gave me the eerie feeling that at any minute they were all going to break out in some synchronized dance routine, and I’d find myself trapped in the middle of a Britney Spears video. Bleaaagh.

Canadians– keep up to date with the latest in creepy Stockwell Day news stories at Alliance Exposed. (For the non-Canadian readers, Stockwell Day is kind of like Pat Buchanan, only with actual political power. Scary stuff.)

I love late night Halloween television. It’s one last round of gore before the onslaught of holliday treacle and distrubingly frequent showings of “Scrooged” hits the airwaves. Anyway, I just happen to agree with most of E!Online’s choices for the Top Ten Horror Films, with particular emphasis on Evil Dead (for all three of you who haven’t seen it yet), and my all-time favourite, Dawn of the Dead. If you’ve seen those two, try and find a copy of Dead Alive, once billed as the goriest movie ever (“I kick ass in the name of the Lord!”). I’m really a sucker for a good zombie movie… got any suggestions?

Why do I find adjusting some stranger’s thermostat over the Web so very entertaining? Is there a pill or something I can take to raise my level of amusement? I think I have to go read a book now.

Playstation 2, anyone? I’ve examined my budget, and I’m pretty sure I’ll be able to afford my own box of polygon goodness sometime before 2010. I hope.

The U.S. Senate is planning a vote in the near future on the “Public Safety Officer Medal of Valor Act”. And, hey, who doesn’t support giving good people shiny medals? It’s almost enough to make one overlook the teensy little acts that were tacked on, granting the FBI one hundred million dollars to fight “computer crime” and protect “Internet security”. I tell ya, democracy would work so well if only those damn citizens weren’t always sticking their noses in where they didn’t belong.

I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to look for it, but, oh yes, I now know the Caramilk secret. (Thanks, Internet, for providing yet another useless fact to fry my precious synaptic pathways with.)

Despite vocal protests from both civilians and provincial officials, Eminem was allowed into Canada to perform a show in Toronto last night. Said immigration department worker (and today’s personal hero) Derik Hodgson, “If all the people who made bad music were kept out of Canada we could have stopped disco.” Heh.