Help Christmas light-smashing Hulk win a year of KFC

Update: As an eagle-eyed blog commentor pointed out, the voting for the KFC contest ended yesterday and the winner has already been announced. Turns out we were so awed by the Hulk’s majestic green majesty we just plain screwed up. The good news is that our man Komarnitsky won the…

The most popular Westword.com news stories of 2008

The St. Pauli Girl’s beer-pong exploits ranked among westword.com’s best-read stories in 2008. But what was No. 1? The new year is almost here. But before you look forward, you have to look back, to assess where you’ve been, and to make sure you didn’t drop any bras or underwear…

My lovely parting gift from Rocky Mountain PBS

More evidence of the changing economics impacting old-technology journalism. For reasons that were never entirely clear to me (but always appreciated), Rocky Mountain PBS has paid an appearance fee for guests on its public-affairs programming. Ever since the folks there began asking me to gab, the sum’s been $25, although…

LeBron, the Nuggets, and the mascot who poops lightning

My obsession with LeBron James is no secret. After spending 27 years ignorant of everything sports-related, I fell head over heels for the King while living in Cleveland, and watching one absurdly talented athlete lift an entire city from its jobless, weather-beaten depression. It got so bad that I once…

Why is the Colorado Lottery so good to us?

Those hucksters at the Colorado Lottery can’t do enough for us poor gambling fools. Check out this announcement about an exciting new development for Powerball players. The minimum payout is increasing from $10 million to $20 million! The odds of winning a measly three bucks will improve from 37-to-1 to 36-to-1!…

An alternate view on the upcoming robot apocalypse

I must take a moment to respond to my esteemed colleague Dr. Jason Sheehan, Chief Intelligence Officer of HARDON, who has, in his usual semi-coherent way, attempted to offer some thoughts on the so-called upcoming robot apocalypse. In full disclosure, I find Dr. Sheehan informative and amusing in a rather…

Denver Health to City Auditor: You aren’t the boss of us!

Denver Auditor Dennis Gallagher presented his office’s long-awaited report on the city’s emergency medical response system yesterday, saying that the information his team has compiled “speaks for itself.” His choice of such a careful phrase to describe the scathing assessment is indicative of the bitter inter-agency politics that have hovered…

Dr. Shmuckburn, Senator from Oklahoma

We like our doctors. We trust our doctors. They are highly trained and they know what is good for us, what makes us feel better. So Dr. Tom Coburn, a family practitioner who specializes in obstetrics and allergy treatment in Muskogee, Oklahoma, must be right when he called the Fort…

No escaping the prison system’s dirty little secret

The Colorado Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice is proving to be one of Governor Bill Ritter’s more promising ideas for finding ways to trim the hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars dumped into the state’s prison system every year. The CCCJJ just released its annual report, which is full of hard…

About that time LeBron froze me out of the Cavs’ locker room …

It will happen tonight, no doubt: At some point during the Nuggets-Cavs game at the Pepsi Center, probably late in the first quarter, LeBron James will step into a passing lane. He’ll lurk, and lurk, and lurk, carefully measuring his distance from things — close enough to make the steal,…

Wake-Up Call: Ritter’s vote is in for Colorado Secretary of State

At 9:30 a.m. this morning, Governor Bill Ritter will announce Colorado’s next secretary of state, the culmination of a six-week process that officially started on the night of November 4, when Mike Coffman was elected to replace Tom Tancredo in the sixth congressional district. Although Ritter had the power to…

The Westword.com blog shortcut, December 18 edition

Welcome to blog central. Today in Cafe Society: • Jax turns twelve with a dozen deals. • La Chaumiere bids au revoir after more than thirty years. • Up for auction: French 250. • We’re rooting for Root Down. • It’s time for a Cricket burger! Free parking today in…

Denver Blogs: Macrophenomenal!

A daily roundup of stuff maybe worth reading about Denver. Send tips. A basketball book with the word “macrophenomenal” in the title. No, it’s not by Charles Barkley. (Denver Stiffs) The good, the bad, and the unknown about Ken Salazar. With hats like that, the ugly goes without saying. (5280)…

The Lance Hering story continues

Lance Hering, the marine who faked his own death in Eldorado Canyon and disappeared nearly two years ago, days before he was to report back to active duty, will face a summary court-martial Friday at Camp Pendleton, where he is currently being held. Hering will be charged with one count…

Today’s Night & Day featured event: Unspoken

Choreographer and dancer Robert Sher-Machherndl is a local treasure. As artistic director of the Lemon Sponge Cake ballet company, he gets to play around with the meaning of movement and the line between theater and dance all the time. But his current project, Man Made Men, takes experimentation a step…

Kenny Be’s Worst-Case Scenario: Predictions 2009

Click here or on the cartoon thumbnail to see a larger image; it’ll take a few seconds.In my many years of making fake forecasts for the future, I have learned one truth. I have learned that predictions are a lot like holiday office parties, family gatherings and sex, in that…

Some thoughts on the coming Robot Apocalypse

My fellow humans, This week, unabashed robot lover Joel Warner wrote a fine cover story for Westword dealing primarily with the robot Basil, manufactured and programmed by James and Louise Gunderson of Gamma Two, Inc. And while I take no issue with the article per se — having found it…

Denver Post names alleged penis exposer Michael Garcia as mayoral candidate

At this writing, “Mayor Move Would Roil City’s Politics,” a Denver Post piece by Christopher Osher, lists “several city council members” as possible Denver mayoral candidates should John Hickenlooper be appointed to fill the senate seat presently occupied by Secretary of the Interior-designate Ken Salazar, including “Michael Hancock, Michael Garcia,…