The Week in Review

WEDNESDAY, JAN. 26: What's black and blue and runs south? Janet Moncrief's mascara as she tearfully congratulates Lois Tarkanian. Ba-dum bum! But seriously: Embattled Las Vegas City Councilwoman Janet Moncrief was given da boot by voters Tuesday night, the R-J reported Wednesday, in a recall election that saw the former ward-trollin' underdog nurse lose to professional old person Lois Tarkanian, who walked away with 41.6 percent of the vote. Figuring in the abysmally low turnout, that comes to...13 people and one particularly enterprising cocker spaniel in a hat and sunglasses. Hurray for democracy-type things!

THURSDAY, JAN. 27: Sure, downtown redevelopment is a great, but, you know, it's hard to cheerlead le cultural renaissance when your eye sockets are weeping bloody smoke because of the mysterious, unholy poo-stankie permeating the place. Indeed, the Downtown Stench has befuddled experts for a decade--and rankled noses of tourists and locals (i.e., the homeless) alike. But after deploying a handful of robo-probes to detect the source of the odor, officials discovered it: construction junk jammed in the storm drain system under Fremont Street, which in turn trapped stagnant water and putrefying garbage. Next project: tackling the visual pollution clogging Fremont Street in the form of kiosks selling airbrushed beach-scene T-shirts. My eyes! My eyes!

FRIDAY, JAN. 28: This particular news riblet is so juicy with fun-gravy that we just hafta create a clever spinoff show we'll call "The Retardo Files." On Oct. 31, 2002, Nevada Highway Patrol Sgt. Jim Olschlager ran a red light, wrecked resident Donald Fagan's car and now--to add the chocolate icing of insult to the savory doughnut of injury--is suing Fagan for negligent driving and causing injuries that prevent Olschlager from performing "his normal duties as a husband" (i.e., poor guy probably structurally compromised his wiener). According to the Friday R-J article, police investigators and highway patrol officials said Olschlager was at fault, but that hasn't stopped him from trying to pass the buck and cash in. Cha-ching! (That's the sound of a cash register or, alternately, a broken wiener filled with windshield glass.)

SATURDAY, JAN. 29: At the Swiss ski resort of Davos--the alpine air a bracing complement to the dry white Riesling and peppered veal bruschetta--Angelina Jolie was thinking about the poor. The actress, best known for Tomb Raider, the movie about a fabulous pair of tits confronting ancient evil in catacombs of doom, criticized celebrities who grandstand about global poverty. "Celebrities have a responsibility to know absolutely what they're talking about, and to be in it for the long haul," she told biz tycoons at the World Economic Forum. So fret not, poor children of the world whose only pets are flies drinking your eyeball juice. There are plenty of crispy, crunchy Life or Something Like It: Platinum Edition DVD sandwiches to go around!

SUNDAY, JAN. 30: Braving the bombs, they came out. Facing down the threat of terror, they cast their ballots. Waiting in long lines while shit exploded around them and U.S. Marines listened to Godsmack on their iPods, they learned firsthand the perils of democracy. Iraqis voted Sunday, in an august form of representative government called democracy. Lo! May Iraqis know its many pleasures for generations to come: the hyper-produced candidate ads clogging the TV when all you wanna do is watch "The Bachelor" in your underwear, the televised debates in which a warmonger incumbent cheats thanks to an iMac stuffed in his suit, the "moral values" voters hijacking the election from the urban-tards who now won't stop braying about moving to Canada. Welcome to the age of democracy, Iraq. Welcome.

MONDAY, JAN 31: Not many of us will ever sell hundreds of millions records, crown ourselves the King of Pop and become ghost-white in the process, but look on the bright side: Neither will we hafta squirm in our seats as this sentence floats in the courtroom like a nuclear chili fart: "Now, honey, show us on the doll where the King of Pop touched you." Oh! We violently recant our lurid dreams of fame! Michael Jackson's child molestation trial got under way Monday. The pop star faces four counts of child molestation among other charges, all of which Jackson has vowed to fight by standing atop his limousine and waving vigorously to fans.

TUESDAY, FEB. 1: Can Microsoft best Google in the never-ending search engine wars? No, but still. The world's largest software unveiled the full version of its search engine Tuesday in a bid to snag profits--and bragging rights--from search giant Google. Microsoft's secret weapon: It'll supplement search results with entries from its online encyclopedia, giving web surfers twice the untruths, misinformation and skewed facts. May the power of the badly researched college term paper be available for one and all!--ANDREW KIRALY