Tucson Weekly: Stuff You Missed (October 8

Not To Worry--Our Professional Irony Collector Is On The Job.
By Tom Danehy
SOME OF THE stuff you might have missed last week:

The Arizona Diamondbacks, on Fan Appreciation Weekend, announced they're raising ticket prices next year an average of about $10 per.
It's like, "Here's how much we appreciate you: POW!! Right in the wallet!" Of course it won't matter much to the corporate clods who pay huge amounts for the great seats--they can write off the cost. And, as always, you're welcome to stand in line for hours in the Phoenix heat on game day for one of the 900 available $1 seats.
But if you're the average fan who wants to go to a game, you'll want to buy your tickets in advance. This means that instead of forking over the obscene $26 per seat you did this year, you'll be paying $36.50 next season. And you'd better smile when you do it or Jerry Colangelo will call another secret joint-session of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors and the Phoenix City Council and make everybody bend over for another tax increase.
I generally support Colangelo's vision and his hardball way of dealing with the sissy-ass politicians, but this ticket-price increase sucks moving trailer hitches. He should be ashamed of himself, and I called him and told him so. Now I'm probably going to get my legs broken.
While we're on the subject of the Diamondbacks:

The D-Backs exulted over the fact that they didn't lose 100 games in their inaugural season.
Arizona Republic headlines actually trumpeted "D-Backs won't lose 100!" Some of you who actually give a shit about baseball might remember that the team had set a .500 mark as their goal for the first season. Well, .375 is almost .500. Sorta. Besides, if they had played .500 ball, who knows what the price increase would have been?

Despite strong objections by the former boxer's attorney's, the results of Mike Tyson's psychological examinations will be released to the public.
And?!
I read a bizarre true story once about a young recruit whom the Army had sent to see a psychiatrist. The recruit had been the target of hazing, verbal abuse, and even a physical assault at the hands of his barracks mates.
When the shrink asked the young man what might have caused the problems, the soldier explained that he was from deep in the backwoods. Trying to make friends, he had told his fellow soldiers that while he was growing up, he had, with disgusting regularity, engaged in sexual activity with his mother, his father, his sisters, his brothers, his cousins, and some (but not all) of the farm animals.
Aghast, the psychiatrist told the young man that his time in the Army was over and that he would need a lot more professional help down the road. The shrink asked the young man whether, upon his return to civilian life, he or his family would be able to afford to send him to a private therapist.
The young man, having just put a Deliverance spin on the retelling of Noah's Ark, replied, "Gee Doc, that's kind of a personal question."
This story leapt to mind when I heard the protests of Mike Tyson's lawyers. Here's a convicted rapist, a man with the IQ of a paper towel, someone who bit off another man's ear in front of 100 million viewers just to avoid taking a second straight ass-whippin'.
What could we possibly find out in his psychological profile that would shock us?

From USA Today: "A West Virginia school teacher who forgot she had dropped her toddler off at day care reported the child missing, triggering a massive search before the child was discovered. "I'm going to go home and hang my head in shame," said (the teacher). She was sent to a nearby mental health facility for a psychiatric evaluation."
I sat and stared at that paragraph for nearly an hour trying to think of something to add to it... Meanwhile, I wasted a whole hour. That's usually the amount of time it takes for me to do the entire...never mind.

The PeTA dweebs are at it again. They're protesting a Nike commercial where a defensive lineman sews a Packers jersey for a chicken, puts it on the animal, then chases it around a barnyard. He's later seen cooking a chicken.
This is somehow offensive to some people. And these are the same people who not long ago raided a mink farm and released 1,000 of the critters from their cruel captivity. Nearly 800 of the minks immediately became food for natural predators and/or roadkill.
"Run, little fella, run! Hey, watch out for that 18-wheeler!!"
PeTA is the classic example of something Dave Barry once wrote: "The main accomplishment of almost all organized protests is to annoy those who are not in them."

Next year's highly-awaited Star Wars movie will be titled "Star Wars: Episode I--The Phantom Menace." Fans on the Internet are disappointed WITH THE TITLE!!! Some have called it "hokey" and "comic-bookish."
So, the unseen army of 30-year-old men who still live upstairs at Mom's house are upset with the proposed title for a movie which won't even be in theaters until a year from now. That's right, you're going to have to leave your room to go see it.
Do you guys realize that you'd have to get on your cyber-cycles and travel many, many parsecs before you'd even reach a spot from which our cries of "Get a life!" could be heard?
The best we can actually hope for out of you is that some time in the next year (that's real years, not Star Date) you go outside and get within 20 feet of a real live human being without shaking or making that little squeaking noise deep down in your throat. And be sure to warn people so the glare off your skin doesn't hurt their eyes.

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