While performing some routine maintenance on Wriphe.com last week, I counted that in the past 60 days my email address had received 17,776 junk emails. That's an average of 8,888 per month, more than 296 per day, more than 12 per hour, or more than 1 spam email every five minutes.

That made me a little curious, so I did some research. In the same 5 minute span between my spam emails, 24 Americans died, 40 Americans were born, 62 Americans were in car accidents, the average American heart beat 350 times, the Earth moved 5,584 miles around the Sun, Americans consumed 1,045,624 servings of Coca-Cola, and the United States Federal Government spent approximately $25,655,864 (before any bailouts).

Now, every time I receive a spam email, I have the urge to spend $25 on a glass of Coke.

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The American economy is in shambles, banks are closing, the housing market has crashed, gasoline shortages have strangled travel, and none of the Presidential candidates or their seconds appear appropriately qualified for the job. Making matters worse, actors are on the verge of the second crippling strike on entertainment in as many years, potentially destroying the one industry that traditionally performs well during economic recessions.

The good news? Newnan, Georgia is in the headlines: "Rough Economy Felt at Redneck Gourmet," reports CNN. When a place named Redneck Gourmet is suffering, you know times are tough.

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Everyone wears black to funerals.

I've made it no secret that I hate the black Georgia jerseys. I hope that the memory of this week's debacle, a 41-30 loss to Alabama will keep them in the closet for a long time. The final score isn't even close to describing the 31-0 beating that we were taking by halftime.

Even the fans got on my nerve at the game. Though I was quite surprised that the crowd kept trying to rally the Dogs (we're usually so quick to throw in the towel when the chips are down), there seemed to be more jerks around than usual. Within reach or me were the drunk Georgia Tech chick who kept reminding us that she had seen more lopsided defeats at Tech, the asshole behind me who took a break from talking on his cell phone to insist that I sit down because he didn't want to have to stand to see the mess on the field, and the Bama fan dressed like Bear Bryant who kept chanting "overrated" and "blackout." Fun, fun, fun. I travel for hours each way to see UGA play this poorly while surrounded by these strangers? Something must be seriously wrong with me.

Still, I'm not too down on the loss. We started the season with a lot of hype, and if there's anything for which hype prepares me, it's disappointment. There's a long way to go yet this season, and if the Dogs can learn from this fiasco, we might earn a rematch in the SEC Championship game come December.

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There's a new Batman video game on the market, and I don't own it. There's not much new about that. The last Batman video game that I bought was Batman Vengeance for the PS2. (In fact, that's the ONLY Batman video game I've ever bought. I was given a copies of the late 1980s Batman: The Caped Crusader for PC and 1989 Batman: The Video Game for the SNES. I played the atrocious Batman: Dark Tomorrow briefly on the Xbox, but when I discovered that Batman couldn't overcome a simple chain-link fence, that was the end of that.)

It's kind of surprising that a character as fantastically popular as the Batman has appeared in so many video games (at least a dozen) that have all been so poorly received. It is even more perplexing when you take into account how forgiving the public has been about the personality of the Batman. The character has been reinvented more times than the wheel and continues to be among the world's most popular fictional characters.

I'm pretty sure that making the perfect Batman game wouldn't be that hard. Design a fun game, then make the lead character Batman. Don't work it the other way around. That's how you get Tom Cruise movies.

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Some days, you know that the world is passing you by. Take Monday Night Football, for example. I used to really enjoy watching football on Monday night. I used to sit in a bar with a bunch of friends, each of us sacrificing our voices in order to talk over the excessive decibel levels of 30 television sets with their volume turned to "Deafen." And we enjoyed the hell out of watching a football game. But lately, football on Monday has turned into a chore.

Ever since ESPN, "the Worldwide Leader in Suck," has taken over Monday Night Football from ABC (both stations are owned by the Evil Empire: Walt Disney Co.), they've stocked the press booth with in-house announcers from other shows in their line-up, making watching Monday Night Football more like watching a spin-off of Sportscenter than a live football game. It has become the sports-world equivalent of Baywatch Nights, an unsuccessful attempt to cash in on the name recognition of characters from other popular shows who aren't quite suited for their new roles.

Worse still, desperate to reach the lowest common denominator of sports fans, MNF encourages Tony Kornheiser, once a respected sportswriter for the Washington Post, to act the part of beer-swilling, amateur buffoon and armchair quarterback for three hours every week. While Kornheiser's role as devil's advocate is perfectly suited to his op-ed show Pardon the Interruption, it is a grating distraction from the action during a football game. Like all other original programming on ESPN, MNF's producers hope that by creating stories and generating ungrounded controversy, the legion of bottom-feeding members of society incapable of forming opinions by way of anything other than emotion will be drawn to their programming. Unfortunately, their strategy has proven highly successful.

Sure, MNF has always been a program obsessed with the celebrity and popular culture that surrounds an NFL game, but they used to be focused on celebrating the game, not disparaging it. The best example of the change in the show's culture is Dennis Miller. After years of populating the press booth with former players (with such notables as Don Meredith, Frank Gifford, and Dan Dierdorf among others), Miller was brought in to give the "average" fan a voice on the show. Miller was rehearsed and focused on the game, but his obscure researched and rehearsed cultural references proved unpopular in the role of MNF color-commentator. Just a few short years later, Kornheiser's selfishly crass and unprofessional on-air cheers for players on his fantasy football roster and complaints about blowouts -- even going so far as to encourage the television audience to turn off their sets, no doubt to the anguish of his advertisers -- has changed the perception of what exactly the "average" fan is as it has steered intellectual discourse of the game to a new low.

I can't help but recall that once, now seeming so long ago, the broadcasts were not about grabbing a market of people interested in the personalities in the booth or how they felt about football, but what was happening on the field. I suppose that the real shame is that all those years of bar room televisions didn't completely destroy my hearing, sparing me from Kornheiser's irreverent and irrelevant blather.

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It's International Talk Like a Pirate Day again. Seems to be about this time every year. It keeps interrupting Batman and Football Month. Sooner or later, I will run out of pictures of Batman with pirates, you know.

It's not that I want to be a stick in the mud, but what's with modern America's love affair with the pirate? I've studied enough history to know that pirates were the terrorists of their day. In two hundred years, will we celebrate Talk Like an Islamic Fundamentalist Day or Talk Like the Unabomber Day?

But nevermind me. I'm just a stick in the mud. Go, enjoy your day, lovers of terrorism.

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First the "Goddamn Batman," now the "Fucking Batgirl"? There's not much mystery to what she's saying when you can actually READ THE WORD, now is there?

DC Comics was in the news briefly last week because it shipped a comic book containing inappropriate "printing gaffes" revealing that Batgirl has a mouth like a sailor. The book, of course, was All-Star Batman and Robin, one of the worst things to ever happen to the Batman mythos, and that includes the movie Batman and Robin.

I know I've complained about All-Star Batman and Robin before: Jim Lee's truly sublime art is completely wasted on Frank Miller's willfully libelous interpretation of the inhabitants of Gotham City as sociopathic characters in a pornographic snuff film.

Personally, I'm much more offended that people are still buying this title rather than by any fucking foul language.

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If I told you that I had NOT been carrying these in my wallet since 1989, would you believe me?

No, I didn't think so.

Card number 2 up there guarantees a ride in the "Batcar" to the scene of a crime in progress. I'm sure that's some bait-and-switch for those poor rubes who show up expecting a trip in the Batmoblie only to find themselves seated in an aging Citroen driven by some descendent of John Batman. (Historical note: in the mid-19th Century, Mr. Batman, self-proclaimed "greatest landowner in the world," attempted to found a settlement that would eventually became known as Melbourne, Australia. Only he had planned to call it "Batmania." Seriously.) Knowing the unscrupulous nature of Mr. Batman, the advertised crime scene would probably be your own mugging. Just like with real credit cards, membership privileges only extend so far.

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I think Jack Webb would have made a good Batman. While he may not have Bruce Wayne's playboy good looks, he certainly describes the Dark Knight's lust for Justice. The two famous crime fighters have more in common than may at first be assumed. The facts:

Â	Joe Friday	vs	Batman
Â
"The story you are about to see is true."	True	Â	False
Â
"Names have been changed to protect the innocent."	Victims of crime	Â	Bruce who?
Â
"This is the city."	LA	Â	Gotham
Â
"I have a badge."	Sergeant 714	Â	Honorary Deputy
Â
"My partner is..."	Gannon et al	Â	Robin I - IV

Notably, Friday's solid detective work solved hundreds of crimes, all without portable crime labs, super-computers, or ninja training. And Joe Friday was as hard as stone. He wouldn't hesitate for a second before disarming perps of live hand grenades, scaling buildings to save suicidal jumpers, or launching into a gravel-voiced lecture to anyone (store owner, senile senior citizen, drug-addled child, disillusioned police officer) about their misunderstanding of the LAW.

The only thing missing from Dragnet? Giant props.

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Football season is now fully underway.

The Bulldogs ran up their record to 2-0 against a surprisingly competent Central Michigan yesterday. It appears that they worked out all of the lingering kinks from week one: the "B" was painted the right color, the flag was fixed, and they even moved the "SEC" logos to the 25 yard lines -- someone must have worked overtime this week!

CMU played well in a 56-17 defeat, but were clearly overmatched for size, strength, and depth of talent. Besides, the Dogs played like they had a chip on their shoulder following last week's drop in the polls. Knowshon Moreno in particular looked fantastic, punctuating the day with a Superman-sized leap over a standing CMU defender during a long run in the third. (See for yourself here.) It certainly justifies all the fans wearing the "He Is (the) Man" (as in "Heisman Trophy") shirts featuring the letter "K" in the familiar Superman diamond.

Note: Before the game, I lamented to my brother that unlike our previous opponent, the Georgia Southern Eagles, the Central Michigan Chippewas did not parade a live version of their mascot around the field on a leash before the game.

Unfortunately, the start of NFL play found the Dolphins participating in more of the same from last year. I'm pretty sure that right now, in a head-to-head matchup, the Dawgs would win. You'll be pleased to note, loyal readers, that the downfall of the Dolphins was Chad Pennington's weak arm. As disappointed as I was by the loss, I'm always filled with a warm happiness when my predictions of doom and gloom turn out to be right on the money.

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