When You’re Doomed…
New studies have found that Utahns are rude and don’t brush their teeth. Geeze. Yecht. The foul news is just the latest in findings from statistical analyses intended to make Americans more aware, or at least keep the grant funding flowing to universities and think tanks that continually analyze data so we’ll all know what to eat, how to sleep, and whether our children will be complete failures.
Actually, the truth is that Utahns, generally, aren’t rude. Passive-aggressive, maybe. But rude, almost never. A national study, however, conducted by Public Agenda, a non-profit research group, indicates that 79 percent of Americans think we, as a nation, have become more rude. Often-heard gripes are against loud cell-phone users (you loudmouths know who you are) and aggressive drivers (you know who you are, too, you freakin’ maniacs).
Forty-one percent of those interviewed admitted to becoming more rude themselves as the contagion spreads—even here in nice, polite Utah. You haven’t heard the end of this, pal.
• Of course that sort of rude behavior has little to do with recent findings suggesting that here in Utah, we brush our teeth less than any place in the country with the exception of South Dakota. The study by Impulse Research of California found that 66 percent of Utahns admitted to going three days without brushing their teeth at all. Talk about air pollution and the greening of society. Fortunately, this news came out after the Olympics. “The world and gingivitis are welcome here.”
• Speaking of rude behavior, Liza Minnelli’s 94-year-old stepmother is suing the singer, claiming elder abuse and breach of contract. According to the lawsuit, the famous daughter of Judy Garland and Vincente Minnelli, who gained accolades for her starring role in the musical Cabaret, had the electricity shut off at the old woman’s residence and then sold the Beverly Hills house where Lee Anderson Minnelli was guaranteed housing by the will of the performer’s father.
Liza Minnelli, 56, recently made headlines for her lavish fourth wedding to producer David Gest, 48. “While defendant is honeymooning all over the world, having fed 850 of her closest friends a 12-foot cake, plaintiff is alone in a cold, dark house,” the lawsuit states.
What good is sitting alone in your room, come to the cabaret. … Life is a cabaret, old chum, life is a cabaret …
• Speaking of hard acts to follow, here’s something from our “Live Entertainment”-file: An Orem man reported to police that a pair of strippers he hired to entertain at his home ripped him off. According to the police report, expensive perfume and body lotion from Victoria’s Secret disappeared with the strippers. The man claims his checkbook disappeared too and his account has been emptied.
The staff here at SmartBomb has but one question: Would Gayle Ruzicka feel sorry for this sinner?
• And finally this from our “Armageddon”-file: Scientists at NASA say a giant asteroid is speeding unabated towards Earth and may strike here in 878 years with the force of millions of tons of TNT. That’s pretty darn frightening compared to the Salt Lake Tribune’s semi-annual warning of the devastating earthquake that will rattle the Wasatch Front sometime in the next 13,500 years.
As Chops, an infamous barroom philosopher once surmised, “When you’re doomed, you’re doomed.”
