Pineapple Upside-Down Casket

Former dictator and human pineapple, Manuel Noriega died at the spry age of 83.

Noriega put the “Dick” in Dictator.  He ruled Panama in the 80s where he helped the US, helped Cuba and sold a lot of drugs.

He was known for brandishing a machete during speeches.

He lived a lavish, libertine life off drug-trade riches, complete with luxurious mansions, cocaine-fueled parties and voluminous collections of antique guns.

Most importantly, he liked to display his teddy bears dressed as paratroopers.  

Noriega, shown here doing his impression of Dick Cheney.

Oh, how I Googled and Googled the hell out of “Manuel Noriega’s Teddy Bear Collection.”  Alas, not even a thumbnail could be found.

In 1989, George Bush #1 got tired of his antics and shenanigans, even if it did keep Crockett & Tubbs employed.

With operation “Just Cause” (a name Bush came up with at retreat called “Operation: Lame Names”) the US invaded Panama (because invading is what we do) and deposed Noriega (because deposing is what we also do.  Ain’t that right, Chile?).  

A separate operation to keep Noriega from escaping was deployed.  This was Operation “Nifty Package.”  No.  Really.  Bush got his money’s worth at that retreat.

Noriega ended up holed up in a mission set up by the Vatican.  He came in and claimed sanctuary, just like Quasimodo.

To flush him out, the US used what is called Music Torture.  A fleet of Humvees mounted with loudspeakers rolled in, and blasted music, 24 hours a day, in this densely populated area.  I believe it was Operation “Neat-o Tunes.”

The playlist included The Clash, Van Halen, U2, Bruce Cockburn, Guns-n-Roses and The Doors.

Thee Office of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff maintains that the music was used principally to prevent parabolic microphones from being used to eavesdrop on negotiations.  In other words: they lied.  Again.  It’s what they do.  (Ain’t that right, Weapons of Mass Destruction?)

After ten days of this, Noriega surrendered.  It was later noted that if country “music” was played, the standoff would have only lasted two hours.  But we couldn’t do that to the brave soldiers manning the Humvees.

Noriega then spent his time traveling the world.  He stayed in Jails in the US, France and… well, Panama.

Later that year, “Miami Vice” was then cancelled.  Coincidence?  I think not.

Then Noriega died.

This hit goes to: Team Sushi!  Their swath through 80s mediocrity continues!

Happy pooling,

SPMI

Current Standings:

Wes: 140 – (Holly Dunn – 50, John Glenn – 10, Debbie Reynolds – 20, David Penrose Buckson – 10, Erin Moran – 50)

Josh: 120 – (Florence Henderson – 20, Grant Tinker – 10, Gordie Tapp – 10, Terry Edwards – 60, Chuck Barris – 20)

Jami: 100 – (Fidel Castro – 10, Bernard Frost – 20, Zsa Zsa Gabor – 10, George Michael – 50)

Team Sushi: 70 – (Jimmy “Superfly” Snuka – 30, Roger Moore – 20, Manuel Noriega – 20)

Tailgating w/ Jesus: 70 – (Ralph Branca – 10, Craig Sager – 40, Sam Ard – 30)

Lee Kwang Soo!: – 60 (Alice Drummond – 20, Dr. Henry Heimlich – 10, Hashemi Rafsanjani – 20, Lola Albright – 10)

Morrigan’s Mirror: 60 – (William Christopher – 20, Mary Tyler Moore – 20, Moulton “Pete” Marston – 20)

M: 30 – (Sir John Hurt – 30)

Gianna: 20 – (Leonard Cohen – 20)

The Mumblers: 10 – (Don Rickles – 10)

Mary: 10 – (Chuck Berry – 10)

Joanne: 10 – (Judge Joseph Wapner – 10)

Is He Dead… or Alive?

Singer and poster-child for aging gracefully, Pete Burns died at the spry age of 57.

Burns was the singer/songwriter for the 80s one-hit-wonder Dead or Alive.  He is now the former.

Their hit was “You Spin me Round (Like a Record).”  You remember that song: “You spin me right round, baby / Right round like a record, baby / Right round round round.”

And now the song is totally in your head.

Burns took the money from one-hit-wonder-dom and invested it.  He invested it poorly.  He invested it in over 300 plastic surgery procedures.  

He ended up looking like a Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade balloon honoring RuPaul… like Steven Tyler had been found floating dead in his pool for a week… like a Spitting Image puppet of Cher from the “Land of Confusion” video… like a failed audition for “White Chicks”…  He looked like shit wrapped in a plastic bag and run in the microwave until the bag was just about to burst.

He didn’t look good.

As any washed-up celebrity worth his salt, Burns went to reality TV.  The last bastion for the untalented.  

He appeared on BBC’s Celebrity Big Brother 2006, eventually reaching fifth on the show’s final episode.  I mean, talk about living the rock-n-Roll dream.  

He was only a reality star in England.  We already have Flava Flav, we don’t need any more of that crap

…like the underside of a trash bag filled with pudding and left in the Arizona sun.

On the show that he claimed that his coat was made out of gorilla fur – causing outrage with animal rights’ activists.  Unlicensed gorilla fur is illegal in the United Kingdom.  If he just took the damn test and got his license, everything would have been just fine.

Police confiscated the coat and tests revealed that it was not gorilla, but the fur of colobus monkeys. Colobus monkeys are also an endangered species whose fur requires a licence, although experts [experts in what, exactly?] believed that the fur had been imported in the 1930s or ’40s, before it became illegal to import colobus fur in 1975.  For more, I refer you to the legal precedences listed in “The Legalease of Wearing Dead Shit in the UK.”

This hit goes to Gianna!  She gets a whopping 50 points which brings her above the 3-digit mark!

Happy pooling,

SPMI

PS: Draft night is 11/5 – a mere 9 days away!

Current Standings:

Jami: 210 – (Scott Weiland  – 60, Pat Harrington, Jr. – 20, Umberto Eco – 20, Rob Ford – 60, Erik Bauersfeld – 10, Edward Albee – 20, Chris Sizemore)

Tailgating w/ Jesus: 140 (Dolph Schayes – 20, Meadowlark Lemon – 20, Monte Irvin – 10, Muhammad Ali – 30, Pat Summitt – 40, Buddy Ryan – 20)

Joanne: 130 (Joey Feek – 60, Joe Garagiola – 10, Julius La Rosa – 20, Buckwheat Zydeco – 40)

Lee Kwang-Soo (Giraffe): 130- (Daniel Fleetwood – 70, Abe Vigoda – 10, Nancy Fucking Reagan! – 10!, George Martin – 10, Elie Wiesel – 20, Mike “Mighty Atom, Jr.” Greenstein – 10)

The Girl on Fire: 120 (Wayne Rogers – 20, René Angélil – 30, George Gaynes – 10, James Noble – 10, Doris Roberts – 10, Marni Nixon – 20, Fyvush Finkel – 10, Steven Hill – 10)

Gianna: 110 (Robert Stigwood – 20, Lois Duncan – 20, Herschell Gordon Lewis – 20, Pete Burns – 50)

Harmony: 100 (Harper Lee – 20, George Kennedy – 10, Frank Sinatra, Jr. – 30, Gene Wilder – 20, Arnold Palmer – 20)

Occupy the Casket: 100 – (Natalie Cole – 40, Vanity – 50, Boutros Boutros-Ghali – 10)

Team Sushi: 80 (Chyna, aka Joanie Laurer – 60, Morley Safer – 20)

Mostly Mike: 60 (Marvin Minsky – 20, Mihaly “Michu” Meszaros – 30, Janet Waldo – 10)

Age of Aquarius: 60 (William Guest – 30, Merle Haggard – 30)

Nathaniel: 50 (Alan Young – 10, Kenny Baker – 20, Glenn Yarbrough – 20)

Mortician’s Daughter: 50 – (Justice Antonin Scalia – 30, Bud Collins – 20)

Imaginary Steve: 20 – (King Bhumibol Adulyadej – 20)

Smurfed!

Singer, songwriter, dancer actress, model, born-again Christian and smurf, Vanity, died at the spry age of 57.

Created by Peyo, Vanity always carried a mirror around because she was obsessed with her looks.  Her name was a little on the nose.

In the 80s Vanity started smurfing with Prince… which always leads to smurfing down a rabbit hole.

Price smurfed her up as part of a trio called Vanity 6.  The six referring to the amount of breasts in the group.  The Ghoul Pool Administrator has been scouring the internet to bring you images of these breasts.  I haven’t found those precise breasts… but I shall keep looking.  That’s how dedicated I am!

The blue beauty went on to smurf in such classic movies as “Terror Train,” “Never Too Young to Die,” and “52 Card Pick-up.”  That last movie is about throwing a deck of cards on the floor… and picking them up.

While evading Gargamel, Vanity smurfed crack cocaine, smurfed rock stars like Adam Ant and Billy Idol (who smurfed his look from Spike) and sold her nude pictures of Smurfette to any takers.

This last action smurfed the divide between Vanity and Smurfette.  Smurfette famously lost it on an episode of Springer: “That Smurfer-smurfing smurf in the smurf can smurf

Screw you, Prince!  I’m keeping your gloves!

my smurf, the smurfing smurf!”  (Springer bleeped most of it out… but you can tell what they’re saying.)

One night in 1944, Vanity over-smurfed on some extra smurfy crack.  It was that night that she smurfed Christ.

Vanity became a smurfed-again Christian and went around smurfing her evangelical message.  In other words: she became smurfing insmurfable.

Apparently, last night, Azreal snuck into her hospital room and finally got a taste of sweet, sweet Smurf blood.

He didn’t care for it.

Officially, she died from “sclerosing encapsulating peritonitis.”  But we all know that’s just fancy medical mumbo-jumbo that means that she was killed by a cat with a hole in his ear, then boiled into a stew prepared for a feast at chez-Gargamel.  

This hit goes to: Occupy the Casket!  Yes, Pirate smurfed Vanity, for a smurfy 50 points!  And this means that the inevitability of me losing my lead has come to pass.  

Congrats to Pirate on the lead!

Nancy Reagan, somehow, still continues to live.  

Happy pooling,

SPMI

Current Standings:

Occupy the Casket: 90 – (Natalie Cole – 40, Vanity – 50)

Lee Kwang-Soo (Giraffe): 80- (Daniel Fleetwood – 70, Abe Vigoda – 10)

Jami: 80 – (Scott Weiland  – 60, Pat Harrington, Jr. – 20)

The Girl on Fire: 50 (Wayne Rogers – 20, René Angélil – 30)

Tailgating w/ Jesus: 50 (Dolph Schayes – 20, Meadowlark Lemon – 20, Monte Irvin – 10)

Mortician’s Daughter: 30 – (Justice Antonin Scalia – 30)

Age of Aquarius: 30 (William Guest – 30)

Mostly Mike: 20 (Marvin Minsky – 20)

Gianna: 20 (Robert Stigwood – 20)