Welcome to another installment of SCHIZOTRICHIA and another new article delivering the most thought provoking insights you'll ever see. Schizotrichia is society's alarm clock, waking everyone and bringing them back to harsh reality! Continue on at your own risk!

THIS WEEK: It's Howard Stern, Warner Brothers, Libel Lawsuits, Nazis, Chain Letters, Dennis Tito and a lot of other stuff that just goes to show you that lead paint chips, while tasty, shouldn't be eaten by anyone.

Howard Stern, on his radio show recently, claimed he would get "revenge" for everyone ever shamed by the hostess on Weakest Link (if he decides to appear) by refusing to answer questions when on the show, instead reading from tabloid stories about her years of alcoholism. Pot calling the kettle black? This is Marlon Brando calling Callista Flockhart "Fatso".

Oh, and Howie? The secret to pulling off stunts like this is to 1) NOT announce them ahead of time, and 2) NOT do them on a show that's Taped And Edited In Advance.

And you also have to stop and think; Is there anyone out there who wants to appear on Weakest Link who *doesn't* know what they're getting into when they sign on to be a contestant?

It's bad enough to send us one of those idiotic Email Chain Letters. Sending it as an attachment to an attachment to an attachment...

Warner Brothers, having learned little from the past mistakes of people like FOX, went on a rampage, sending out CEASE AND DESIST letters to many people running Harry Potter Fan Sites, especially those who had used Copyrighted Character Names as their registered domain names. They later backed off when they discovered 99% of these sites were run by kids. Way to promote that new Potter Film of yours, WB.

MSNBC has an interesting trick on their web site. When you click on some of the internal links, you are first directed to a full-page ad, then forwarded to the info you want. Yes, nothing makes us want to return to a web site again and again like a trick that makes it take that much longer to get to the crap on the site we came after...

Note to Dell Computers; Commercials featuring a teenager who badly needs his face punched in is no way to get us to purchase your wares.

Ah, Blonde. Finally, we get to see the biography of Marilyn Monroe, because we've *never* seen one before. At least, we haven't seen one with all the cool icky parts left in. What, you're under the impression that we watch this kind of clap-trap to discover their Acting Motivations?

Matthew Perry was let out of his rehab so that he could film the season finale of Friends. Uh, gee, thanks.

There's an important lesson for you there, kiddies; If yer gonna get busted, make sure you're Rich And Famous, so you can Frequent Leaves from your punishment and go to work. Hell, if you look at Robert Downey Jr.'s hand, we bet you can see the rubber stamp on the back of it so he can get back into his cell without having to pay admission again.

CRAPWELL PREDICTS: In 2083, Napster, in compliance with the last of the lawsuits, includes a bit of Stealth Code in the latest version of it's software. This code will ensure that absolutely no copyrighted music is being illegally copied or used by searching the hard drives of all persons connected to the "network" and erasing all the sound files it finds.

Note to Cartoon Network; Should you really be showing ads proclaiming that "all" the Looney Tunes are on Cartoon Network, now that you've made the decision to shelve even *more* of these classic cartoons because they're not Politically Correct?

You know why it's always poor folk that get busted on Cops? Because rich folk don't rob Convenience Stores, steal cars, or sell drugs out of abandoned houses. That, and they can afford really good lawyers.

Looks like that nasty old Writer's Strike is going to be averted. First the XFL might be folding, now this. Almost makes doing this column actual work. Almost.

Tom Cruise is suing a "Star" of Gay Porns for libel, because the Star in question claims he and Cruise had an affair. So, what, is Cruise saying being Gay is Wrong, here? Hardly the typical Hollywood Enlightened View there, Tommy.

Napster usage has dropped 41% since they started "blocking" Copyrighted Music. So much for the "It's an experiment in peer-to-peer File Sharing" excuse...

McDonald's is opening McCafe, a chain of restaurants that reportedly resemble Starbucks. And for anyone looking to invest in one of these establishments, we got 2 words for ya; Hearth Express.

Explanation for those way too lazy to look it up; Hearth Express was McDonald's experiment in Sit-Down Casual Dining. They quickly went out of business when it was discovered that no one wanted to eat a McDonald's Meatloaf, nor order soup via a Drive-Thru Window. Can't imagine why...

"The company is showing Improved Earnings" :translation: "We discovered that we can fire people until the company shows a Positive Cash Flow! And you laughed when you read that on my Dilbert Coffee Mug!".

Note to the Marketing Companies of Video Games; You might want to remove any quotes from Daily Radar from your ads. You really want quotes from a web-site that just went belly-up?

So, from the "Sam And Kate" Aztec Commercials, we're to assume the vehicle in question is so expensive that we'll be forced to sell our houses and live in the damn thing.

Florida is, at the time of this writing, voting through Election Ballot Reform. This means, of course, we can look forward to getting many more "wacky" Fake Florida Ballots in our Email...

And be prepared for the first set of elections under these new ballots, where someone's gonna end up whining over the results, claiming people screwed up while voting because they weren't used to the New Design and thus voted Wrong.

Cliff Hillegrass, he of the "Cliff's Notes" collection of study aids, passed on last week. Yes, without the dauntless work of Cliff, millions of school children would have actually had to read, and interpret, such books as Moby Dick and Hamlet on their own. Make of that what you will.

Boozoo Chavis, the "King" of Zydeco Music, also passed on last week. Just thought you needed to know that.

And no, we're not a bit ashamed that we comb the obits looking for Column Fodder. Hell, we're still making Callista Flockhart Anorexia Jokes, and we're supposed to feel shame because we make light of a few celebrity deaths?

Every once in a while, we see these articles making claims about how difficult it is being a Video Games Tester. And we're quite sure these stories aren't planted by the games testers themselves, so as to eliminate any competition for a job that let's you play video games 12 hours a day for 50K a year.

According to a headline in our local paper, Donkey Basketball is on the wane due to pressures from Animal Rights groups and lack of general interest. You might want to make any necessary changes to your vacation plans accordingly.

Of course Dennis Tito raved about how much fun he had up there in space. If you payed 20 million and raised that much of a fuss to get to go, would you come back and say you spent the whole time either nauseous, bored, or both?

Recent polls say that the typical German is tired of feeling guilt over the Nazis. We're assuming that they're talking about the idiot tourists that do "Seig Heil" poses for pictures, and news stories where some goof claims that the occasional Skinhead attack is a prelude to the Forth Reich. Of course, it could just be that they're pissed because they don't get a cut of any Nazi Stuff sold on Ebay.

Balthayzr knows Ebay said they'd stop allowing Nazi stuff to be auctioned on their site. Ebay says a lot of things when the reporters and lawyers come knocking.

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