After a stressful summer with her children, Alabama mother of three, Jena Willingham took to Facebook to post a “Happy First Day of School” photo of her in the pool drinking a glass of wine and the kids in the background with backpacks on.  Her oldest son, Billy Willingham, had the last laugh though, as he took to live.ly showing someone filling the same wine glass from the toilet.

2.  When asked if Americans should be concerned, Secretary of State Tillerson replied, “I think Americans should sleep well at night.  Trump is using language Kim Jong Un can understand…well…he’s not actually speaking his language, he’s using a harsh language.  Or a tone…in a way he’d understand if he understood English…Damn it!  Someone get Dennis Rodman on a plane!”

3.  A new study shows marijuana might do more damage to your cardiovascular health than cigarettes.  Marijuana supporters disagree, displaying the long list of items that are healthy to light on fire and inhale the scorched byproduct.

4.  With the purchase of two passenger planes for team travel, the New England Patriots are the first NFL team to go to the air… unless you count their fleet of spy planes they’ve been using for a decade.

5.  Texas Rangers reliever Ernesto Frieri cleared waivers and was available for trade today.  The Seattle Mariners won him for a grand total of $1…beating out a woman from Kalamazoo who was trying to get someone to clean out her gutters.

6.  After receiving threats unleashed by President Trump, Kim Jong Un warned that considering a strike that would create “an enveloping fire” around the island of Guam as soon as his new General Daenerys Targaryen is finished with her current mission.

1.  Little Caesar’s is adding a new wrinkle to their operation by selling pizzas in their store through two machines that accept payment and avoid interaction with store employees.   They are calling it ‘Pizza Portals’, which is extremely disappointing since I was saving the title ‘Pizza Portal’ for from The Jetsons and would attach directly to my sofa.

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2.  Solar Eclipse chasers are excited to get people out to see the big event in two weeks and tell newbies that there can only be one ‘first time.’  Meaning that one can be looking forward to it for years and, when it finally happens, it’ll be so disappointing that you’ll end up crying in the bathtub when it is over.

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3.  A shipwreck off the coast of Hong Kong resulted in the spilling up approximately 5000 gallons of congealed palm oil.   Although the environmental impact is negligible, local are reporting some remarkably tanned carp in Hong Kong fish markets.

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4.  Phoenix resident Mark Ohman, after being stranded for days in the Arizona desert, was forced to drink his own urine to survive.  After the press conference his wife greeted him with a hearty and loving fist bump.

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5.  A Google employee was fired yesterday after he posted on a company message board that women don’t get jobs in technology because of Biology.  I don’t understand all of the outrage, my high school guidance counselor said that I lost out on my academic scholarship because of Biology.

Off the wagon…here we go…

1. With accusations that the current administration threatens to end Affirmative Action Initiatives, Vijay Jojo Chokal-Ingam is making the news for claiming to get into college by pretending to be a black man. Chokal-Ingam insists this isn’t a publicity stunt and that, even after short-lived success on the beach volleyball circuit, he isn’t trying to live out C. Thomas Howell movie scripts.

2.  Fox News has suspended Eric Bolling while it investigates reports that he sent lewd messages to three female colleagues. He claims this being just misunderstanding their request to see an example of “Fair and Balanced” and not “Nair and Phallus.”

3.  With the upcoming solar eclipse this month, on-line scam artists are targeting consumers looking for special ultra-dark sunglasses. The first sign of a trouble should be noticing a ‘folding walking stick’ in your Amazon recommended list.

4.  The Russian Government released photos showing off a bare-chested Putin successfully hooking several fish in the cascade mountain lakes this week on vacation.  The U.S. Government is countering with photos of their own after they photo shop the Cheetos out of President Trump’s chest hair in Jersey.

5.  Two women and one men are filing a lawsuit against Usher claiming he failed to disclose he has an STD before sexual contact.  I’m guessing that Usher left a few things out of all of those ‘Confession’ albums and remixes.

Before today, if you would’ve asked me how long it had been since I posted here, I would have said about six months…maybe eight.

Story telling and joke writing have been a part of my life for ever.  It began as a distraction and grew into nothing more than a larger distraction, with a twist.

Funny stories turned into a period of stand-up comedy, then to joke writing…which evolved into script writing and peaked with an interview for an NBC Late Night program…which evolved into nothing.

It was immediately after that interview that I realized that I had peaked in the comedy writing world.

Throughout the stand up and initial writing years, I had a leg up, in my eyes, on everyone else because it was just a hobby for me.  The other comedians I spent time around we very serious about comedy being on their career path and they would become depressed each and every week as nothing happened.  

I was happy there. 

Content.

I had a job, a family and I could make people laugh during my free time.  I had it all.

Then it became serious for me.  

It was going well selling jokes and having my day job and then I reached for more and took a punch to the stomach.  

Looking back at it all, it just turns into a part of my life story.

Army, Navy Reserve, leaving home, coaching football in Germany, standup, sitcom scripts, a web series, marathons and ultra marathons, coaching and officiating multiple sports, living in three states, a wonderful family…we working on year 23 together.

I’ve done a lot and have it all.

It is great to sit and look at where it started and where we are now.   There were a few rough patches, but nothing too large to throw us off track.  I’m pretty sure ‘funny’ even cost me to lose a job by someone who didn’t think I should be doing that wi my free time.

I don’t know if life will ever allow me to get back into ‘funny’ again.  

I hope so.  I miss that part of my past and it is much easier to get back into comedy than into coaching professional football.

1.  Hillary Clinton is facing a backlash for saying that “all lives matter” in a Missouri Church a few miles north of Ferguson, Mo.  She quickly apologized saying that she accidentally confused it with another slogan from her campaign, “All Donations Matter.”

 

2.  Today, Google add an undo feature to Gmail, which allows a sender to ‘undo send’ any email.  Or the more useful option of getting back the email from your grandparents they sent to the ‘wealthy’ man stranded in Africa who is a poor speller.

 

3.  Krispy Kreme, which abandoned Chicago three years ago during the recession, announced yesterday that they are coming back to Chicago and a reappearance of ‘Big’ Oprah is soon to follow.

 

4.  Millennials are upset and telling Hillary Clinton that if she wants to inspire them that she should pay her interns and get them off of unemployment.  Hillary said she’d be willing to settle for something short of ‘inspiration’ if ‘willing participation’ was enough to get some front yard signs installed.

 

5.  British students have invented a condom that changes color when it come into contact with sexually transmitted diseases.  The invention would be perfect to help cut down on STDs if they could warn people five minutes sooner by inventing underwear that changed color.   

6.  Chris Christie is expected to announce next week that he is entering the arena of 2016 Republican Presidential candidates. He really should hurry, though, since a lot of the seats are taken…and if someone needs, say, an extra seat…for whatever reason someone might need a seat…and a little extra…he just might not want to be the last one trying to sit.

7.  In an attempt to draw more fans to hockey, NHL General Managers are expected to vote over the weekend to cut overtime play to only three skaters for each side.  It is a part of the long term plan to eventually end up with just two guys in the middle of the ice beating each other with sticks with the loser being the first one to lose all his teeth.

 

8.  The flight of the Solar Impulse, a Japanese plane that generates power from the sun’s energy, had its initial long flight from Japan to Hawaii delayed after they were unable to provide a flight plan for the potential 115 hour flight.   U.S. officials indicated they are still uneasy about Japanese planes flying unexpectedly into Hawaii.  

1. In a Bleacher Report interview, NY Knicks President Phil Jackson criticized the individualistic style of play of LeBron James. Jackson indicated that he longs for the days when non-athletic pasty guys could get together in an empty gym and pass a basketball around while wearing testicle choking shorts.

 

2.  Passengers aboard a United Airlines flight from Rome to Chicago finally reached their destination late Sunday after a 30-hour delay due to a disgruntled passenger.  Upon arriving in Chicago, the unruly passenger apologized, saying he mistakenly thought the plane was being diverted to Cleveland, explaining his reaction.

 

3.  KFC says tests of a viral photo of an oddly-shaped fried chicken tender was ‘a hoax,’ and not a rat.   Sadly, the analysis was actually a comparative taste test at a local Korean restaurant, confirming it wasn’t a rat.

 

4.  Following the recent events in South Carolina, Walmart, Amazon and eBay quickly proclaimed that confederate themed goods would be pulled from their stock. Sears attempted to join with in the other major retailers, but unfortunately, it wasn’t 1990 and they were forced to sit in the room and wait to announce with JoAnn Fabrics.

 

5.  A Stanford study warns that the earth has entered its sixth mass extinction phase and the time we have to avoid dramatic consequences is rapidly running out.  Scientists advise that we must not repeat the mistakes made during the Paleozoic Era not heading the warnings of the Einsteinasaurus. 

 

6.  The first major lead into the whereabouts of escaped murderers Richard Matt and David Sweat came with the discovery of prison-issue underwear in a remote hunting cabin in upstate New York.   The mothers of the two escapees issues a joint statement announcing that they were pleased with their boys for packing clean underwear before their trip.

1.  President Obama, at a Tyler Perry fundraiser in Hollywood yesterday, compared his life in the White House to a prison sentence.  Which explains why Obama has been hitting on the Presidential seamstress for the past two weeks.

 

2.  The BBC admits that their prototype app, ‘Mind Control TV,’  needs to have a few bugs worked out before release.   The application allowing users to change the channels to whatever they were thinking about seemed to get all buggy when the programmer’s TVs kept scrolling through channels, only stopping when finding boobs.

 

3.  Def Jam founder Russell Simmons says that Kim Kardashian would make a better president than Donald Trump.   Evidently, Trump’s billions in net worth doesn’t carry as much weight as Kim Kardashian’s assets.

 

4.  After successful trials in San Diego, McDonald’s is expanding their all-day breakfast test to even more cities that just can’t manage to be bothered getting up for breakfast before 10:30 am.

 

5.  Marvel sources deny that they’re not attending the San Diego Comic-Con for the first time in years just because Star Wars will be dominating the July event, but they can’t help but look like small dude in the men’s locker room waiting to shower after all the big guys are gone.

 

6.  Researchers announced that they’ve developed a vaccine that can protect against chlamydia.   They can finally confirm success after conducting the six week trials at the most like transmission location–Madonna’s 2015 Tour entourage rehearsals.

 

7.  The streaming music service, Spotify, celebrated landing former Netflix executive Barry McCarthy.  McCarthy is credited with coming up with the creative practices that led to the success of Netflix, but disappointed the team with his idea to relaunch Spotify by sending red sleeves stuffed with music disks in the mail.

 

8.  Warner Brothers executives are concerned about the creative differences on the upcoming Captain Sully film, since the team can’t agree on who will play the co-pilot.   Star Tom Hanks wants the role to be played by a half-inflated volleyball, but director Clint Eastwood thinks it is a great idea is to have Hanks spend the entire film talking to an empty chair.

 

9.  Despite the Apple Watch only being two months old, rumors of upgrades in the next release are already being leaked.  The next version is believed to include a video camera on the watch to allow wears to use the newest app PeeTime.

 

10.  Despite the apparent increase in shark attacks, a study of animals caused deaths from 2001 to 2013 indicates a person is more like to be killed by a cow than attacked by a shark.    A representative of the Shark Union denies that any of their members sponsored the study and invites everyone to get back in the water.

1.  During an interview on the Today Show, Rachel Dolezal denied she is a white woman pretending to be black, claiming that she’s not sure her white parents are her real parents by saying, ‘I haven’t had a DNA test.’   Producers immediately ran to the roof and turned on a signaling beam, alerting Maury of the emergency.

2.  It is being reported that Brian Williams, who became embroiled in controversy over the exaggeration of events in his past, will not return as the NBC Nightly News anchor, but  will be assigned to handling emergency events on MSNBC…like fixing Ronan Farrow’s hair during commercial breaks.

 

3.  Insiders are revealing that Donald Trump hired $50 actors for his Presidential announcement.   The Donald was able to get them on short notice since he had a lot of connections with out-of-work and available actors from Celebrity Apprentice.

 

4.  AT&T is claiming a bait and switch tactic was used after saying they were offered a deal for $75 million by the Justice Department only to have an extra 25% tacked in the agreement fine print that went unnoticed before signature.  AT&T officials were heard initially protesting, saying that, “… they recognize this tactic because they…er…nevermind.”

 

5.  Planned Parenthood announced that they are launching a new service allowing people to be screened for chlamydia and gonorrhea by simply using an app on their cell phone.   Fortunately the app, once installed, will not be able to be removed and will render it ineligible for service provider return programs regardless of the test results.

 

6.  The Florida village of Wellington is forcing a Bill Gates Trust to pay $30,000 in fines.  The court documents are only referring to a ‘horse manure issue.’  Insider information from Wellington officials indicate that ‘Horse Manure’ was the project name given to the installation of Windows 8 as their new operating systems.

 

7.  Frederic Auburtin, the director of ‘United Passions’, the $30 million propaganda-filled film about the world soccer body FIFA that grossed only $918 in the U.S. says that he’s now I’m seen “as bad as the guy who brought AIDS to Africa” or the guy “who caused the financial crisis or FIFA President Sepp Blatter.

 

8.  An official at the California Labor Commission dismissed Uber’s claim that their drivers are actual employees and not independent operators of their smart phone-based ride hailing service .   The ruling opens to door for drivers to obtain insurance, but they will probably not be able to touch as many of the riders.

President Obama selected Ashton Carter as his new Secretary of Defense.   He should really consider coming up with a tougher sounding guy.   ‘Ashton Carter’ sounds more like a person to appoint as ‘Secretary of Boy Bands.’

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A New York City woman holding her baby in a chest carrier was kicked in the back by a local mugger.   It is a part of Kinder/Gentler Bronx Mugging Initiative.

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DTE Energy reported massive power outages in Detroit this week.   Officials indicated that it has nothing to do with Detroit not being able to pay it’s bill.

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Earlier this week, Snooki’s husband agreed to plead guilty to Driving While Intoxicated, but is holding onto his ‘insanity’ plea for Marrying Under the Influence.

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Iowa Police say that Marvin Hill became upset and a McChicken sandwich at his wife because he doesn’t like them.  Mrs. Hill is responding by giving him a month of McFlurry.

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Papa Johns stores in Philadelphia delivered on their promise to give out free pizzas when the 76ers ended their 0-17 skid with an 85-77 victory over the Minnesota Timberwolves on Wednesday night.   Minnesota fans were rewarded by getting free boiled cabbage crammed into their mailboxes.

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Japan’s Takata Corporation has refused to impose a mandatory recall of their airbags that could explode and soot out shrapnel.  They have passed that decision onto someone who they partner with their business partners…automakers, which is almost as good of an idea as letting local prosecutors investigate local law enforcement personnel.

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The Justice Department is accusing two Florida for-profit colleges of using strippers to lure students to their schools.    Law Enforcement officials were tipped off to the scheme when other local businesses reported shortages of toupees and red convertibles.

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Baltimore Ravens’ lineman Haloti Ngata was suspended 4 games by NFL for Adderall use and his parents were fined for improper consonant use on his birth certificate.

K-Mart announced their big holiday sale of a 50% discount on all Hasbro games, establishing themselves as the place old people can go who have no clue what to buy anyone under the age of 20.

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RedBox Announced today that they’ll be raising DVD rental rated by 25%.  This move solidified RedBox’s position as the K-Mart of the TV and movie distribution industry.

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Interviews on the street with protesting Boston cab drivers indicated their issue with Uber wasn’t actually with the ride sharing service, but with the fact that most the cabbies were just ex-Blockbuster employees frustrated by making poor career decisions.

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The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to rule on whether Facebook posts are considered a 1st Amendment privilege and the larger question of ‘Which Disney Princess is Antonin Scalia.’

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American officials announced that a U.S. businessman has been imprisoned by Russian police for breaking a window.   Russian officials scoffed at claims by U.S. criminal justice authorities who called this too severe of a punishment for the crime.

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Amazon rolled out 15,000 foreign manufactured robots prior to today’s Cyber Monday rush.  House Republicans are complaining that these robots are taking jobs from perfectly capable American robots with families to support.

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The NY Jets play the Miami Dolphins tonight on Monday Night Football.  Coach Rex Ryan announced that he’ll be giving Gino Smith another shot at being skewered by the New York press.

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Critics are questioning President Obama for meeting with Ferguson activists late this afternoon.  President Obama responded by saying, “What?  It gets dark too early to get in a round of golf?”