Japan, Mel Gibson and Colonel Sanders

So I was trying to explain to beeform about how a post on BoingBoing went from Passion of the Christ posters to KFC for Christmas in Japan. Unfortunately, after two Unisom, my ability to justify and defend myself is somewhat impaired, and I don't think she believed me.

Just thought I'd point out that the reason the Japanese go to KFC during Christmas isn't because Colonel Sanders looks like Santa. While it's true that it's a strange practice, this one falls on the PR Machine. When KFC was first introduced to Japan in 1970, they ran advertisements saying that KFC was what all Americans ate during Christmas. Since the holiday itself was a relatively new concept to the Japanese, KFC was able to make a connection right from the get-go. Years passed pressing the same idea, and now it's tradition. Yes, they DO put Col. Sanders in a Santa Suit come Christmas time, but I'm pretty sure i've seen that stateside too.

Blood, truth and more blood

I think these were all mentioned in Revelations at some point. Anyhow, the miscellany:

A page from Fillerbunny #3, featuring his new friend Bee Bee. I don't even need to tell you how it ends.

brucha gets props from Lore for disproving the "Penn Jillette is screwing with us" hypothesis. The Force is strong with this one.

BoingBoing's Cory Doctorow reacts to the revelation that Apple's new OS will use Intel's "Trusted Computing" hardware. This may prompt Cory to remove his Mac tattoo on his right bicep (no, really). Could alienating your core support group -- one which could be fairly accurately and occasionally charitably described as fanatical -- be the big red fruit's death knell?

Via MeFi: Urban Dead, the browser-based zombie game! It's like Neopets, but...not...really.

Today's Image of the Day: porcupine vs. dog. That didn't make me cringe as much as watching the awesome Bloody Suckers on PBS last night, though (instead of The Simpsons -- how sad).

Romenesko's media bloopers

My favorite page has disappeared from the Romenesko sidebar, but I hunted it down via the Internet Archive: Whoops!: MediaNews readers share their favorite news bloopers

Examples:

"When I was working at the Foothill Leader, a small weekly in La Crescenta, California, Laurence Powell, one of the officers accused of beating Rodney King, went to the local high school. Well he played on the golf team with me at Crescenta Valley High and I told the city editor this. He thought it was a brilliant idea to write the headline: "C.V. golf star keeps on swinging." The paper was almost sued and printed a retraction the next week. Amazingly, the city editor kept his job."

"When I worked for The Chronicle-Telegram in Elyria, OH, a woman was injured at the Lorain County Fair. We ran a headline following up the accident that said: Woman kicked by horse upgraded to stable."

"The Milwaukee NBC-TV affiliate, WTMJ-4, had sent a reporter to cover a plane mishap at Chicago's O'Hare Field. The reporter had done a reasonably good job on what turned out to be one of those 'it could have been a lot worse' stories. After chatting live and on-camera with the airport manager, the reporter then addressed the co-anchors back at the station. 'You know, Mike and Carol, I think it is important for us to remind the viewers that air travel is still the safest way to fly.'"

Newspaper: go on, take all her stuff

Worth its own post:

Lawrence police are investigating a burglary at a Tennessee Street apartment in which the tenant lost more than $3,500 worth of possessions, including her 7-month-old kitten.

The woman arrived home Tuesday and saw people leaving her apartment and loading up cars with her things. She confronted them and was shown a classified ad in The Lawrence Journal-World stating that if the items in her apartment went unclaimed by July 28, they would be thrown away. The ad contained the wrong address. A correction ran in Friday's newspaper.

Lawrence Police Sgt. Dan Ward said the case was being handled as a burglary and theft. He said there was no forced entry into the apartment.

Ralph Gage, speaking for the newspaper, said the company is appalled by the burglary, is gathering information, and has arranged to meet with the victim Monday.

Also: Bryan said the people she confronted returned her things, but unfortunately, her TV, DVD player, movies, furniture and a 7-week-old kitten had already been taken from her apartment.

Losing the stuff is one thing. But the kitten? That's not right.

omg omg omg

So I sent media guru Jim Romenesko an e-mail about the aforementioned LJWorld blunder that cost a woman her apartment's content -- it was so scary to me, not just the idea of losing everything you own, but of such a simple little mistake that I'm sure I've made dozens of times but in this context being responsible for such a horrible loss -- mentioning the thread which prompted it. I figured he'd be as intrigued with the story as I was.

What I didn't expect -- but is a pleasant surprise -- was for the news bloopers link to get reposted to the left-hand bar of the Romenesko page -- with credit to the LJ post!

If I were biologically capable of doing so, I would express this emotion pulsing through me in a sound I believe you refer to as "squee," possibly with exclamatory emphasis added. But I'm not. So let's just say I am...pleased and flattered. I think I'm at about 1.45 Percocets of happiness.

Also: taunt not Nathan Fillion.

Also also: rewil! Paper critters! Paper hedgie!

A^3: The LJ database is acting weird today. I've seen comments disappear, reappear, reappear only after I post another comment, comment counts go from five to one to seven.... There's a glitch in the Matrix somewhere. Must be Agents.