Search Results for: armageddon

Whether you call it Ragnarork, Armageddon or just the plain old Apocalypse, astute readers of this blog know that it’s come and gone hundreds of times thus far. And is due to do so again. In fact the end of the world is coming again this October and again in December of 2012 and again ….. well, you get the idea. Obviously, if you’re like me – and I’m beginning to think that many of you are, you see this as an excellent reason to hold a party and hoist a toast to the great and mighty Zarquon. Or to Sanforized toupees, whichever you prefer. No matter what you decide, it’s an excellent excuse to party. And, for single geeky guys, it may be the one time they’ll actually get some. After all, what girl could resist a pick up line like “C’mon babe, it isn’t like there’ll be anyone left who can make fun of you tomorrow”? Without fear of recriminations it’ll be a big ol’ FESSSSTIVAL!

“But wait a minute there, Uncle Big Bad,” you whine, “what about those of us who would like to wake up the day after the end of the world and keep living our sad little lives? What are we to do?”

Fear not my dear poopers of the ultimate party, there’s hope for you too. David Moye reports that you can grab the next spaceship out of Dodge for under $25.00 (tax not included).

Some people see the 2012 doomsday prophecies as a sign the world will end on Dec. 21 next year.

Others see the apocalyptic predictions as nonsensical hogwash fueled by superstition and misconceptions about the Mayan calendar.

But Jack Dowd, an entrepreneur in Fairfield, Iowa, sees the fears of Armageddon as an opportunity to make some cash.

Dowd, 27, a former writer’s assistant on the sci-fi series “The Dead Zone,” is capitalizing on doomsday hype by offering escape packages to people who would like to leave Earth should the apocalypse strike four days before the 2012 Christmas shopping season ends.

There are two packages available at his website. The first-class package for $24.49 includes a one-way ticket aboard the USS Ark 2012 Escape Ship to an Earth-like planet, one single sleep pod and an intergalactic Passport ID Card that Dowd promises will allow passengers to “seamlessly make it through any wormhole checkpoint or space customs.”

However, folks who purchase the $44.99 “Superluminal” package get upgraded to the luxury suite sleep pod that comes with a flat-screen TV, starlight window and mini bar. They also get a 2012 edition guidebook and “VIP access to exclusive areas of the USS Ark 2012, including the Officers Lounge, 360-degree Stargazing Deck and Zero Gravity Room.”

It’s hard to tell what’s more amazing, the package itself or the fact that a few people have actually purchased it, mostly as a gag gift.

Dowd himself admits he started the site as a joke and is still surprised he’s getting orders.

“I didn’t expect anyone to actually purchase one,” he told AOL News. “I initially saw this more as entertainment than a product to sell. I figure I’ve sold somewhere between 50 and 100 tickets.”

Dowd came up with the idea around the time the movie “2012” was released in theaters.

“I had been hearing more and more people begin to talk about the Mayan Prophecy of 2012,” he said. “When I saw a preview for the movie, the idea popped into my head to take it to the next level and actually allow people to purchase Escape Earth tickets for 2012.

“I hoped it would be fun or at least entertaining and maybe a fun novelty gift to give someone, as you actually receive the 2012 travel package in the mail.

Dowd admits he is “slightly poking fun at the hype surrounding a 2012 apocalypse,” but insists the site isn’t meant to offend anyone or to be taken seriously.

But some 2012 true believers like Robert Richardson fear that others may fall for Dowd’s product and believe incorrectly that he is prepared to transfer them away from Mother Earth should a planet-destroying calamity take place next winter.

Richardson, who runs Off Grid Survival, a website that helps people prepare for worst-case scenarios such as, well, the end of human civilization as we know it, recognizes that Dowd’s product is a novelty gift, but says a small percentage of humanity may throw good money after bad.

“I think some people don’t take things like the 2012 insurance as a joke, and I think the people selling it are more than aware of that fact,” Richardson said. “While the average person would never buy into believing in such a product, there is a small segment of the population that takes it very seriously. Look at the Heaven’s Gate cult who committed a mass suicide because of the Hale-Bopp Comet.

“I think products like that prey upon the weak and do a huge amount of damage to the survival/prepping movement.”

Richardson insists no one knows what will happen in the year 2012, but admits it bothers him when people exploit the date for financial gains.

“I think that it takes focus off the fact that people should be prepared for whatever is to come,” he said.

Meanwhile, 2012 survival advocate Peter Kling, author of “Letter to Earth: You Can Survive Armageddon!” (Eloquent Press), sees a benefit to products like Dowd’s.

“I’m doing everything I can to warn people, and a product like this brings more attention to it,” he said. “The media is using scare tactics.”

Dowd says he’s heard only one complaint from someone who found the product distasteful, which is why he offers money-back guarantees. However, they are available only to those who perish in an apocalyptic situation on Dec. 21, 2012.

“Obviously, that’s part of the absurdity,” he helpfully pointed out.

To the serious Mr. Richardson, I’d like to point out that while the Bible promises a world without end, it says nothing about it having any people on it. In other words, lighten up and enjoy the time you’ve got.

To the dour Mr. Kling, I would note that the reason the media comes off as using scare tactics is because the extinction of all sentient and related life forms in a single day makes for very poor comedy.

Go ahead, give it a try.

“Good evening nobody. I’m the last person alive on the planet. TA DAA!”

Nope. Not even a chuckle.

Look at it this way, if the world does end tomorrow, or any other day, there’s nothing you can do about it. So you may as well live as though your life has some meaning and enjoy the gifts that surround you.

Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG AM 1280, every Thursday morning around 9:10!

What a glorious wonderful way to start a Thursday! If my knees weren’t made of balsa wood and I had any rhythm, I’d be dancing for joy. Even the usual cacophony of car alarms and screaming couples sound like music to my ears. Suffice it to say that, without getting into the gory details, I’m in a good mood. In fact, I’m in such a good mood that I’m going to forgo my usual litany of Apocalypses and Armageddons. Instead, today, I’m going to write about a subject that most of you probably never consider. Well except for my good buddy, Gregg Potter. This kind of stuff is all he thinks about. When he’s not winning Emmy’s or playing drums in mega-hair-bands, that is.

Today we’re going to talk about the joys of senior citizens who star in porn.

Now, before you start running around, hiding your eyes from all the nakee folks and demanding a smiting or two, keep in mind that there’s been porn for as long as man has made graphic art. Even back in the legendary city of Pompeii, scholars and plebeians alike have found thousands of examples of art featuring naked people doing naked stuff with other naked people.

Far from being ashamed, they put that stuff on their living room walls.

“Oh, hi Sparticus. Yeah, that’s Bathsheba and me from last Tuesday. I think it really shows off her good side, don’t you?”

As time went on and cameras were invented, do you think everyone was out taking pictures of nature and family portraits? Of course not. They were taking pictures of naked women. And men. And whatever else struck their fancy. You’ll have to Google for that stuff yourself. I don’t want to be held responsible for your moral decay.

In the last few decades, thank to the Internet …. wait, actually the Internet should thank porn. All of the advances required to post high quality graphics and videos on line were developed in the porn industry and nowhere else. In other words, the internet owes more to the disciples of Hugh Hefner than Al Gore. Keep that in mind the next time you watch a video on You Tube.

What was once relegated to smoky back rooms and seedy bachelor parties is now feted with award shows. Chicago’s very own, and regular guest on Nude Hippo, Jim “Mr. Skin” McBride recently hosted his annual Anatomy Awards. With categories like “Breast in Film” and “Nudecomer of the Year,” starlets the world over anxiously anticipate winning a trophy. Seriously, the Anatomy Awards get more pub than most any other accolade.

So I guess this all explains why a former U.S. Army Lt. Colonel made a career change at the tender age of 54 to become a porn star. As David Moye at AOL News notes, not only did he become a porn star, he’s been added to porn’s ultimate Hall of Fame.

The phrase “do something you love and you’ll never work a day in your life” seems completely apropos for porn actor Dave Cummings.

Although Cummings (born David Connors) turns 71 in a few weeks, an age when many of his contemporaries have retired, he is still working hard at his craft, almost 17 years after entering what insiders refer to simply as “the industry.”

The efforts have paid off: Cummings is one of this year’s inductees in the X-Rated Critics Organization’s Hall of Fame Class of 2011, an honor handed out to, as the press release says, “only the best and brightest in the world of porn.”

“I feel like I’ve accomplished something I never would have imagined,” Cummings told AOL News.

There is no physical address for the Hall of Fame. Cummings’ induction ceremony in April will also honor Tricia Devereaux, Jessica Drake, Lynn Lemay, Juli Ashton, Manuel Ferrara and Peter Van Aarle.

He is the oldest inductee ever, four years older than actor Jamie Gillis, who died last year at the age of 66 from AIDS.

But Cummings sticks out among these luminaries of lust, not only because of his age but also because of his rep for not relying on, shall we say, performance-enhancing drugs.

“I pride myself on never using Viagra,” he said. “When I started out, I never did. Now I might use it if I’m working with a particularly demanding director, or if I’m doing two scenes right after each other.”

According to XRCO member Gram Ponante, the Hall of Fame honor is given only to performers who show some kind of staying power.

“For those of us who appreciate adult films, this is very prestigious,” Ponante said. “We don’t bestow the awards lightly.

“I live in Los Angeles, and when I go to lecture in other parts of the country, [Cummings] is one of the few names people know. He bridges the gap between ‘creepy uncle’ and the person the creepy uncle wanted to be,” Ponante said.

Cummings is only four years older than the second oldest inductee, Gillis, but he is a bit of a late bloomer. Gillis started his career in 1970s, while Cummings only entered the world of porn at the age of 54 after a long career in the military, where he worked his way up to lieutenant colonel. Along the way, he served as an Army unit commander with the 4th Infantry during the Tet Offensive in Vietnam.

He was awarded a Bronze Star and, later, had a stint teaching personnel management at West Point before moving to San Diego.

“That was a great experience,” he told AOL News. “My teenagers were surrounded by more than 4,100 role models.”

Cummings was working as a mortgage loan officer (which he still does on occasion for some of his fellow performers) when his life changed forever at the age of 54.

“My wife left me after 22 years of marriage,” he said. The story he tells is that she left him for a man with more hair. Although he claims he was faithful during the marriage, once he was single he decided to explore the swinger lifestyle.

But being a single male in the swinger world is hard (and not in the good way), and Cummings took his lumps. Still, he had a chance meeting in the biblical sense with famed porn actress Nina Hartley.

“We were having sex two rooms away from where I’m talking to you now,” Cumming said proudly. “And I asked her why they had a guy younger than her playing a judge that was supposed to be older, and she told me I should try out.”

Cummings had to pay his dues, though. His big break came when he was holding a light during a scene and the male talent was unable to, er, finish the job.

From there, he started getting steady jobs, in films with titles like “Every Granny Has a Fantasy” and “It’s A Daddy Thing,” often playing doctors, politicians, judges and, occasionally, a military officer.

“I never wanted to desecrate my uniform,” he said. “So I changed it by adding a medal for Antarctic exploration, and I changed the name on the name tag from my real name to ‘Cummings.'”

As much as Cummings enjoyed being on camera — and still does — he quickly realized that the real money is in production.

“When I started out, I was paid $300 per scene,” he said. “I won’t do that. I might for $500.”

He currently has three successful series, “Dirty Dave’s Sugar Daddy,” “Sex Fun” and “Kneepad Nymphos” and prides himself on the way he treats his talent.

“Some of the girls who enter the business are a little skittish at first, so sometimes their agents will send them to me because I’m nice.”

Believe it or not, much of what he learned in the military for dealing with soldiers in the heat of battle is transferable to dealing with young actresses who are in, well, the heat.

“It’s important to be thorough and do lots of pre-planning,” Cummings said. “For instance, when booking girls for ‘Kneepad Nymphos,’ I give an advance fact sheet to the agents, I set a private bathroom for the actress with her name on a star and I pay cash on the spot. Some people might just give hundreds, but I break it down a little because I understand they might need gas and the station can’t break a hundred-dollar bill.”

The extra touches are why Cummings has a good reputation among former co-stars such as Jewels Jade, who is currently on the cover of Penthouse.

“He’s done a lot for me,” she said. “When I was starting out, I didn’t know a lot of people in the business. He took me under his wing and told me who I should and shouldn’t work with. He also helped me get in Playboy.”

Trisha Uptown, who has never worked on film with Cummings, as she only does girl-girl scenes, also has high words of praise for him.

“He’s always a gentleman. He gives me his jacket if I’m cold. He’s so adorable. He’s just this old man who does what he loves,” Uptown said. “I always say that if I ever transition to boy-girl, he’d be on top of my to-do list.”

Cummings doesn’t just have admirers among professional porn actresses. He claims he’s got a few groupies made up of coeds from the University of California at San Diego, which is a few blocks away from his condo in San Diego.

“I call them the ‘groupie girls,'” he said. “They are students, many of them Asian, who need to relieve stress so they can study hard. Some jog, some go to nightclubs and some call me up.

“But I have rules. I insist on using protection, and I tell them they’re not spending the night. Also, if it’s within my birthday month, I insist they bring chocolate chip cookies.

Since Cummings turns 71 on March 13, he expects the cookies to start coming in soon.

“I can tell which are homemade and which are made with store-bought cookie dough,” he said.

Cummings also has admirers among his own gender as well, so much so that he keeps a hat and glasses in his car so he can avoid being recognized by guys who wish they were him.

“It happened just today,” he said. “I was having lunch with a friend, and a guy recognized me and wanted his picture with me. One picture led to four questions and, basically, my friend gets to eat his lunch while mine is going cold.”

It might sound strange that a man who spent so many years fighting for our country might choose to spend his golden years having sex with women old enough to be his great-granddaughter, but Cummings feels that one of the freedoms he defended was the right to make or watch porn.

“It’s all about freedom, whether it’s the freedom to do porn, or to worship in a church, or to be a parent or to vote,” he said.

The official induction ceremony isn’t until April 13, but Cummings is already working on his acceptance speech during his daily run.

“I will probably talk about the problem of piracy, remind the audience of the soldiers fighting for us and then I will probably remind everyone to vote,” he said.

“Gosh Grandpa, while that Bronze Star is nice and all, the kids really love your work in Kneepad Nymphos 3!”

Yeah, the lighting is fantastic and the plot is scintillating.

I’ve taken up enough of your time today. Go, frolic, watch some porn and have a great day. If you need a soundtrack for your day you can’t do much better than the video from, Chicago’s very own, LaTour.

Your kids want to save the planet one rodent at a time. They’ve even gone so far as to make a DIY Mousetrap that treats the little critters humanely. They beg and whine about the cruelty to animals that humans inflict. The burgeoning intellectuals you’ve spawned may even go so far as to quote the famous e. e. cummings’ poem about “manunkind.”

Well folks, it’s time to duct tape those little radicals to a chair, jam a burger in their gullet and set the record straight. Let them know that enough is enough and that you’re getting yourself a vicious mousetrap that kills without remorse. If that doesn’t work, tell them you’re going to go ahead and get a gun. And then do it!

Why?

Radioactive rodents are preparing to take over the world!

MU HU HA HA HA!

Michael McLaughlin of AOL News has all the scary details.

Just because a mouse has been doused with radiation at a nuclear weapons site doesn’t mean that it has acquired superpowers, can shoot laser beams from its eyes and will soon come to subjugate humanity.

But at the same time, it’s more than a bit unsettling.

Workers at a former plutonium-production facility in Hanford, Wash., are hunting for a radioactive mouse after finding polluted droppings.

Earlier this month workers also trapped a radioactive rabbit in what is the nation’s most contaminated nuclear site, according to The Washington Post.

Washington State Department of Health officials told the Tri-City Herald that the atomic-age animals are probably harmless and noted that the suspicious droppings appeared in areas closed to the public.

Anti-nuclear activists at Greenpeace agree that the critters don’t pose a direct threat to humans — even though they’re loaded with hazardous waste. However, the organization says the tainted wildlife is evidence that there are long-lasting environmental hazards in the area that must be taken seriously.

“The radioactive bunny is a lead indicator that these site are contaminated,” Greenpeace nuclear policy analyst Jim Riccio told AOL News. “I don’t know how you put the genie back in the bottle after you contaminated these sites so terribly.”

The federal government created the Hanford site in the 1940s as a leading nuclear facility that produced weapons-grade plutonium throughout the Cold War.

In 2008, the federal government launched a $639 million decontamination plan that is expected to take decades to carry out. Workers are demolishing some of the most polluted buildings in the 586-square-mile zone.

About 60 mousetraps are in place, but the two mice snared so far haven’t shown traces of contamination.

Last year, 33 contaminated animals popped up in the off-limits area, the Tri-City Herald report said.

For Washington residents, the polluted wildlife is a hotly debated issue, but across the country it led comic book buffs on a stroll down memory lane.

Some of the most popular characters in the genre’s history, such as Spider-Man, the Incredible Hulk and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, acquired their powers through freak nuclear accidents.

But these days, atomic creation has gone out of style — meaning there probably won’t be any comics starring the Hanford Mouse, according to a clerk at Fat Jack’s Comic Crypt in Philadelphia.

“It’s comic book-esque in a classic setting,” said the employee who only give his first name, Matt, to AOL News. “It’s kind of a shallow incident. These days there are usually deeper qualities that set the story.”

Actually, only Spiderman was directly involved with conventional radiation. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were exposed to a substance called Mutagen and the Hulk was created by gamma rays.

I just felt someone should set the record straight.

And to Matt at Fat Jack’s Comics, “Shut up.” No one likes a smarmy smarty pants.

The Hanford Facility offers tours as long as you agree to leave your machete at home.

Me? I’m not taking that risk without a flame thrower and a Hazmat Suit.