The i's of my Apples

Does anyone know what the “i” in iPod, iPhone, iPad, etc. means because iDon’t.

We have Apple to thank for making the language sound more selfish than anytime in spoken history.

It’s iThis and iThat. iMean -- Aye! Yi! Yi! Yi! Yi! Me thinks it’s too much.

iThought about writing this a couple of months ago, but kept putting it off. Then today, of course, when iStarted digging around to see what the now ubiquitous “i” means iFound iMissed the boat.

Paul Aertker beat me to it. He wrote this fun Yahoo story that appeared way back in September.

Aerkter writes: “Like everyone, I have run out of words to describe the awesomeness of Apple’s iProducts. iMean who doesn't love their iPod, iPad, iMovie, iMac, iPhone, iCal, iCloud, or even iPO?

iDo.

Standing in a sea of iShoppers, it hit me, really hit me. Everything was named, iSomething.

Why?

Before 2001, there was no iPod; there was no iAnything. In 1998, the iMac started the iEverything movement. Before that, Everything actually started with an 'e'.”

I’m generous in my attributions to Aerkter here because iWouldn’t want anyone to infer iStole his idea, an act that would lead them to justifiably conclude iSuck.

In fact, iCulture has even shifted the very definition of “iSuck.”

According to UrbanDictionary.com, iSuck is more noun than verb and a catch-all pejorative for any Apple product. From the site:

“iSuck -- Any Apple product that starts with an ‘i.’ Mostly derived from conversations about the iPod: ‘Wow, I can buy an iSuck for $260 on woot.com!’ (said with a hint of sarcasm).”

George Orwell wrote of a day when an all-seeing Big Brother would watch everything everyone was doing, but iDoubt even he could conceive a day when we’d be seeing i’s instead of eyes.

There’s iThinkInc.com, an online marketing research firm, and iDrink, an on-line mixology site. And the delightful and profane iQuit’s worth a look.

The now-reeling Pittsburgh Penguins feature a team of young lovelies who clean the ice between action. They’re called the Ice Crew, but if I understand sports marketing -- and iDo -- then it’s a deliberate corruption of an innocuous term to provoke men into thinking about sex (iScrew) when they should be thinking about sloppy goaltending.

Works for me.

Some i’s pre-date Apple’s iMania and lack conventional iSpelling. There’s IAM, a French hip hop band whose name means in French ‘Invasion Arrivee de Mars,” (Invasion from Mars, Mars being a metaphor for Marseille).

Stock car race fans know IROC, the International Race of Champions, the oval-track competition that in 1985 became the inspiration for the popular Camaro IROC-Z.

Ido has been around since 1907. It’s a form of communication that aspires to become a universal second language for the linguistically diverse. The Ido Wikipedia entry says there are about 100 to 200 people on the planet who are fluent in Ido, which makes it iRrelevant.

Then there’s “I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do,” from “Mama Mia.”

But iDigress.

I found a blog that seemed to have all the answers. It’s called “What does iPod Stand For?”

And you thought a blog named “Eight Days to Amish” takes narrow aim.

The site says:

“The iMac was the first Apple product to feature the leading “i” in its brand name. It was marketed as “The Ultimate Internet Appliance.”

And iApologize for all the iTalics. Hope they haven’t made you see-sick.

The “i”, it says, morphed into being more personal and self-centered, to me a sign of our increasing cultural iSolation.

Of course, that’s just me, one guy railing against the monoliths shackling the language.

iCan’t help it. To paraphrase an iConic thinker, “iYam what iYam.”

Besides the people have spoken. The i’s have it.

That’s enough for now.

I’m going to grab some breakfast to try and clear my mind.

All of a sudden I’m thinking IHOP.

North Koreans could benefit from giant slingshot

I’ve been reluctant to share this brainstorm for fear of appearing treasonous, but I think I’ve divined a way to deliver rocket-like technology with North Korea that will earn us their beleaguered citizenry’s everlasting goodwill.

Behold! The giant slingshot!

Slingshots used to be boyhood staples. Youths would take them to school and use them on the way home to plunk trash cans, tree trunks, slow-witted squirrels and each other.

Times change. Minor injuries led schools to ban slingshots as dangerous. Kids can no longer take them to school.

Today, they take Glocks instead.

I never took a slingshot to school -- more for reasons of chronic truancy than devotion to non-violence.

But there are about 200 people who when they hear my name zing straight to one word: Slingshot.

Not just any slingshot, mind you. A towering 40-foot behemoth capable of flinging spray-painted potatoes more than 500 feet.

It was the summer of 2000. Our old house, the one with the big apple tree out back, was located on the slopes of a lush field at the base of a sturdy mountain that belched big gusts of wind when the storms developed. It was like living in a wind tunnel. I’d be out there at least once a year amputating damaged limbs.

It was always what I’d call a five-beer job.

I’d open a beer and study the problem, work for about 20 minutes, open another beer and resume studying, repeat.

During the fourth beer break, I vividly recall having a “Eureka!” moment.

“You know,” I said, “if I cut that upper left branch just so, I could turn this sturdy old apple tree into a dandy slingshot.”

“What a great idea! I think you’re really onto something, handsome!”

Takes me about four beers to overcome my shyness about talking out loud to myself.

The hardware required four eye-hole screws and about 80-feet of strong, flexible surgical tubing. I spent hours duct-taping and massaging a thin square of cardboard until it was supple enough to use as a delivery pouch.

It was the summer of 2000. Val was eight months pregnant. It was our last child-free party and our best. It may have been the best party ever that didn’t involve at least a little nudity.

The crudely-drawn invitations depicted a giant “Y” towering above the Pittsburgh skyline. Extended pull lines stretching clear to Ohio crowded the left side of the page. In the middle was the Atlantic Ocean. The far right had a bullseye straddling the once disputed border region between France and Germany.

The copy urged everyone to bring baskets of objects that weighed less than 12 pounds. Suggestions included over-ripe fruit, discarded children’s toys and the cranky neighbor’s cat. One guy brought a basket of goo-filled surgical gloves.

We spent an afternoon spray painting 200 potatoes various colors for gambling purposes. Less inebriated judges would stand in the field and gauge whose potato flew farthest.

The pot got at as high $325.

It is a true thing of wonder to see volleys of silent potatoes soaring through the dusky sky with barn-penetrating velocity. I think it’s something even sober people would appreciate.

I remember lying on my back in the grass and watching those inanimate objects sailing over my head and saying, “I’ve really done something noble for mankind here. This is something we’ll all fondly remember forever.”

“You got that right!” I replied (the day’s beer consumption had long rendered my self-talking shyness moot).

Well, today, I’m going to do it one better.

I propose we suggest the powers of the giant slingshot to Pyongyang. Let’s help them build one capable of launching what they said was a satellite needed to aid crop production.

Really, I think it’s something NASA should consider, too. Slingshots are eco-friendly and I have to believe rocket fuel’s pricier than even unleaded.

We do this on the condition that they allow us to monitor all slingshot activity and that they accept Western aid to feed their starving people.

If the tyrannical regime refuses our assistance, the international community will justifiably come down hard.

But what can we as individuals do to ease the suffering of the North Korean people?

How can we bypass traditional trade methods and flood the needy people in the North Korean countryside with life-saving food stuffs?

Hmmm . . .

I wonder.

Honk if you're for increased airline safety!

It’s been nearly seven days since the crash of the Navy F/A 18-D Hornet into a 40-unit Virginia Beach apartment building and I still have a lot of questions.

Chiefly, how come planes don’t have horns?

Every plane on the planet has multiple safety overlaps intended to help ensure the gargantuan machines defy gravity.

But I doubt any of the flight manuals include instructions for a pilot to yell a courtesy, “Head’s up!” when those systems catastrophically fail.

Regular readers know my office is above my favorite tavern. And, sidebar, the happenstance always reminds me of an old country song, “If I Had My Life to Live Over, I’d Live Over a Tavern.”

Yes, everyday I thank my lucky stars.

But what if those stars one day turn unlucky?

See, me and the bar are both directly in the landing path for the Arnold Palmer Regional Airport about two miles away. It’s a great little airport. It serves Spirit flights clear from Ft. Lauderdale and is a real boon to the community. We’re all excited about the Blue Angels appearing here June 23-24.

Many days I look out my window and marvel at the majesty of the big jets zooming by.

I wonder about the people inside. Did they enjoy their vacations? Were their business trips fruitful? Are they happy to be heading home?

And I think about the pilot. Is he sober? Does he feel like showing off? Is he about to go crazy like that JetBlue guy did a couple week’s ago? (favorite headline: “This Is Your Captain Freaking!”)

I think, too, about the great hand of fate and how about 30 times a day it could impetuously send a plane crashing into my happy little life and I’d never have the faintest clue of my pending doom.

Worse, it might happen when I was actually up here attempting to work. That means I’d die a fraction of a second before my buddies, not near enough time for them to hold a decent wake, toast my memory, or even express a good bitch about all the money and drinks I died owing them.

If a plane had a horn, the pilot might be thoughtfully honking it as the plane was spiraling into oblivion. I could look out my window and have time to say a quick ass-kissy prayer taking back all the sacrilegious stuff I’d written the last few years.

Just in case, hang on a sec while I take a peek . . . all clear. Whew.

And I stand behind everything I’ve ever written!

This isn’t idle speculation, either. A few years ago I read a news brief that made a great impression on me, and I say that understanding it made a more profound impression on the hapless victim.

It involved the death of a beach jogger who was struck by a little Cessna that needed to make an emergency landing and did so right on top of the jogger. That it was one of those freaky things didn’t make the guy any less dead.

I spent a lot of time thinking about that stranger. A health-minded individual, he may have felt euphoria at having the opportunity to jog along the beach at sundown. He may have been hoping to appear fit and refreshed for an exciting dinner date with a cute girl or boy.

The story lacked detail so I’ll make no prejudicial suppositions.

One thing he likely never considered was the one thing that cost him his life.

He wore earbuds.

He never heard the approaching plane bearing down on him or the hollered warnings of fellow beach combers.

Instead, he probably heard Adele.

I remember thinking, if it were a flying car, a typical driver would have honked the horn, flipped the guy off and executed a routine landing, a better result than executing a routine jogger.

I never followed up, but I would have loved to have heard why the pilot didn’t just ditch in the surf. The only thing I can figure is he must have been wearing dress slacks.

But that was the exact moment when I began advocating mandatory plane horns.

That’s at least one death that could have been prevented if planes came equipped with horns.

So let the swingers have their mile-high club.

I won’t be satisfied until it’s the planes themselves that are horny.

(To every truck) Turnip! Turnip! Turnip!

I vowed two weeks ago that the very next time I heard or read someone claim they “didn’t just fall off the turnip truck” I was going to investigate.

Boom, there it was in yesterday’s letters to the editor.

And by investigate, I didn’t mean I was going to check their knees for scrapes or turnip truck tire tread tracks.

No, I was going to dig at the very root of the claim, and that would be:

Just what the hell is a turnip?

I swear, I’ve spent my entire life, nearly 50 years, and have never tasted a single turnip.

I’m unashamed of the admission. I’m friends with many who’ve never tasted a single vegetable.

Yet, judging by much of the political commentary, our nation’s highways are coursing with interstate trucks that are forever ejecting stick-whittling idiots incapable of sensible thought.

So let’s get to the root of this turnip business. And with turnips, the root is a great place to start.

Turns out the turnip is all root. It’s been a cultivated root vegetable since prehistoric times and became popular during the Middle Ages because its heartiness made it a staple for poor folks.

It enjoyed a heyday in the 1730s when a British politician named Charles “Turnip” Townshend began importing Dutch turnips to feed cattle. It’s a chicken and egg question about whether Townshend was nicknamed “Turnip” before or after he began dealing with the Dutch, but it must be a relief to vegetable historians that he wasn’t nicknamed “Eggplant” Townshend.

That common beasts of burden seemed okay with turnip did nothing to elevate its reputation. Today, turnip doesn’t even crack the top 10 vegetables which, in case you’re scheduled for some vegetable game show later today are: potatoes, iceberg lettuce, tomatoes, onions, carrots, celery, corn, broccoli, gummi bears and cucumbers.

(I put gummi bears in to see if you’re paying attention; no. 9 is green cabbage).

Still, I’ve never heard of anyone falling off a potato truck.

Of course, there’s nothing to say turnip trucks don’t vastly outnumber the turnips they’re duty-bound to transport. Certainly, people who drive turnip trucks are more apt to tumble off them and the falls may hinder their ability to calculate profitable freight loads. A turnip truck could conceivably have just one turnip rolling around in the bed.

An internet search for actual vehicles transporting the vegetables turned up nothing. For the sake of ironic observation, let’s say it was fruitless.

I did find a quirky little organic market called The Turnip Truck in one of my old stomping grounds, the grungy Nashville neighborhood known as The Gulch, not far from where I got my start as a newspaper reporter. I’m going to try and stop there on my next visit if for no other reason to see if they can afford delivery trucks.

I imagine insuring Turnip Truck delivery vehicles would be exorbitant.

One place you’re likely to see actual turnip trucks is Wardsboro, Vermont, pop. about 900, and home to the Gilfeather Turnip Festival, named after the father of the American turnip, John Gilfeather. He began growing turnips nearly 100 years ago, hoarding the seeds and severing the tops and bottoms so no one else could replicate the produce.

I wonder why he’s not nicknamed “Turnip.”

Me, I’d have called him “Fish Tickler” Gilfeather and see if anyone caught on.

The late October festival allows visitors to enjoy turnip soup, turnip bread and purchase things like turnip educational videos and pro-turnip t-shirts.

As you can probably surmise, yesterday was one hell of a productive day.

In fact, it’d be proper to conclude anyone looking into the origins of the falling-off-the-turnip-truck phrase must have been run over by one.

Well, my digging was not in vain.

My quest for the originator of the phrase signifying bucolic mental incompetence led me to Hollywood and Johnny Carson.

Sources say it was Carson who popularized the phrase.

To mimic another popular Carson coinage, “I did not know that!”

I admit to being disappointed. I was hoping the story would have had a much more colorful history involving bouncing vegetable trucks and bloody bumpkins.

It is not to be and once again we must bow to the power of pop culture.

So there. I hope that’s all you’ll ever need to know about turnips, a vegetable you can really root for.

Because it’s really rooting for you.

Lottery losers should decide winners

For purely comedic reasons, I’m hoping Mitt Romney wins the presidency and announces at his inaugural address, “Oh, by the way, remember that unclaimed $656 million jackpot from back in March? I won! Ann found the ticket in the glove compartment of one of her Caddies. Just thought you might like to know.”

The bi-partisan impeachment proceedings would conclude before C-Span had time to remove the lens caps from all their cameras.

Second to winning it ourselves, the most important aspect of our national lottery mania is complaining when the actual winner turns out to be an undeserving jerk, goon or garden variety moron.

We feel cheated, as if there’s been some colossal cosmic mistake. How could karma have gotten it all so wrong?

That’s what we’re all feeling with this crazy escapade involving Mirlande Wilson, the Maryland nut job who claims to have the winning ticket -- and says it’s not from the stack she agreed to buy for her now-incensed McDonald’s co-workers. If she’s intent on spending the rest of her life being an object of public scorn and hatred, her plan is succeeding brilliantly.

Winning tickets sold in Kansas and Illinois have so far gone unclaimed (Romney’s recently been in both states, by the way).

Experts say the winners are wisely waiting for the attention to die down before making a claim that’s certain to be anonymous.

I think that’s wrong. A desire for anonymity should be a disqualifying factor. You shouldn’t be able to use your fresh millions to insulate yourself against all of us losers who just forked it over to you.

In fact, this being a democracy and that states reap financial benefits from hosting the lotteries, I think lottery rules should be refined so everyone who plays has a say in how the winner spends his or her money.

Say if one $100 million winner is a common hillbilly. We should all get to vote if he gets to blow it all on hookers and fireworks of if he has enough of an intellectual spark that educational improvement is warranted. Either way, we should all get to watch.

In fact, I’d go even further. I think each lottery jackpot of more than $100 million should include a dozen winning tickets.

Anyone with a winner would have to step forward and agree to take part in a “Survivor” -like reality show where the jury is the American people. People who wish to remain anonymous can drop out and be given a parting gift, like maybe a toaster.

The remainders have to persuade America why they deserve the entire jackpot.

Then over the course of three months, once a week, we’d get to know these individuals and decide if they’re deserving of the money. We’d find out who was miserly and who was generous. We’d learn who was caring for a sick loved one and who abandoned his family for the cheap cocktail waitress.

Phoned-in or texted votes could cost $1 with proceeds going to pay down the national debt.

The result would be we’d get a winner who was generous, deserving and jolly enough to be bestowed with instant riches.

He’d be the kind of guy who cares about the environment, is sportsmanlike in victory and defeat and understands the importance of overtipping friendly breakfast waitresses. He’d be handsome, but not in a pretty boy way. He’d really need the money, but would be stable enough that he could be counted on to be neither miserly nor wasteful with a gaudy windfall.

He’d be articulate, witty and offer three to four times a week solutions to vexing global problems on his humble little blog.

Still looking for someone deserving -- besides yourself -- to root for the next big jackpot?

One more hint: I don’t mean Mitt.

Don't hate me 'cause I'm (still) beautiful

Scorn's being heaped upon British journalist Samantha Brick for daring to reveal the difficulties she faces because her face is lovely (she thinks). My instinct is to jump to her defense, as opposed to jumping her bones.

But as I've already covered this ground before and it's Friday, I'm going to re-post this September 2010 offering which I think pretty much says it all. I've noticed a rush of traffic to the blog from people who found it based on the search term, "Don't hate me 'cause I'm beautiful," the original post's title.

Please excuse the occasional re-run. I'm trying to balance accommodating new readers with keeping things fresh and lively three to five times a week. Who knew doing something for free would cause so much professional angst?

I never hated women because they were beautiful. I used to try to sleep with them because they were beautiful.

For years, it was my habit to approach beautiful women in dark bars and ask them straight-faced and in my most sincere voice, “Was it as difficult for you growing up beautiful . . . as it was for me?”

It was this question that led me to conclude that beautiful women share one other appealing characteristic: They love to laugh. Hard.

I’m maybe the last sensitive guy on earth who understands that, yes, it is difficult for a woman to be born beautiful.

Certainly, beautiful women have their god-given advantages.

They can sleep with any shallow man they choose. They can coast through life on their dazzling smiles. Doors closed to the homely swing wide open for them.

Wait a second. Which side am I arguing?

Oh, right.

It ain’t easy being beautiful.

I mention all this because of the furor over the way members of the New York Jets treated bombshell Mexican reporter Ines Sainz in the locker room. Apparently, some of the Jets whistled and made adolescent comments when she was interviewing QB Mark Sanchez.

It was so bad Jets owner Woody Johnson personally sought out the comely Sainz to apologize for his team’s inappropriate behavior -- and, yes, the bones in my fingers are practically splintering to keep from typing a lame joke about a man named Woody Johnson thrusting himself into a discussion about sexual harassment.

Woody Johnson! It’s the greatest unintentional porn name since Andy Roddick.

This set off a predictable round of hand-wringing about whether Sainz’s fantastic looks, tight outfits and playful questions provoke such a reaction in a room full of naked, smelly men who can’t catch poorly thrown passes or skillfully block men like Ray Lewis.

First of all, let’s consider Sainz. I saw her picture and immediately made a snap judgement based purely on her looks. It was: Not my type.

She looks like someone Tiger Woods would date, which means she looks like a hooker or someone who’s undergone extensive plastic surgery to make people think she’s a hooker.

Then I heard her being interviewed on one of the morning shows and did an about face. She seemed comfortable with her beauty and didn’t take herself too seriously.

I appreciate that in a woman. I’m married to a lovely woman who is shy about her beauty. It’s very sweet but like a lot of pretty women the fair Valerie lacks confidence in her looks.

I wish she could see herself as I’ve always seen her. She’d be blown away.

Me, I don’t suffer from such trifling modesty.

Believe me, you don’t want to spend a day mirror shopping with a guy like me.

It’s clear Sainz is the kind of woman who can handle herself in any social situation and that puts the 300-pound meatheads who play professional football at a disadvantage.

I tried to think what I’d do if I was naked, in that locker room and had a status and physique that might be attractive to a woman who in 1997 was Miss Universe.

Here’s what I came up with: Nothing.

I’ve been in locker rooms as player, coach and reporter for huge chunks of my life. It’s not a sexy atmosphere.

If Sainz was in any of them, sure, I’d note to myself her beauty, but I wouldn’t act on it. I wouldn’t clown around and make junior high jokes about her. It’s just not the place for such hi jinx.

Heck, that’s what blogs like this are for.

That some Jets players acted the way they did diminishes them more than even their sloppy Monday night loss to the Baltimore Ravens.

You mean professional football players in New York City needs to making leering comments at busty reporters to get their jollies?

What? Have all the groupies simultaneously danced back to their stripper poles?

I just don’t get it.

Maybe I’m just stupid. That’s yet another pejorative ascribed to women who labor under the burdens of being born beautiful.

People just automatically assume beautiful people are balloon-headed dunces.

Happens to me all the time.

It's a bobblehead world

Today the world embarks on four of the most joyful days of the calendar. It’s something the faithful look forward to all year and celebrate with adulation that is refreshed anew each spring.

Now, that statement may cause confusion between groups secular and sacred.

The sacred will, of course, think I’m referring to the Easter holiday.

The sports-minded will offer a secular amen because they think I’m referring to baseball’s Opening Day and the return of The Masters to Augusta.

I think I’ve found a way to bridge the conversational gulf.

It is the bobblehead.

I was thinking of the bobblehead phenomenon yesterday when I was sitting in the bar contemplating the bobblehead of St. Francis of Assisi, one of the most revered religious figures in history. It is said no one in history showed more devotion to imitating the life of Jesus Christ than St. Francis.

His bobblehead is between one celebrating Pittsburgh Penguin’s goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury and Moe Syzlak, the repulsive bartender on “The Simpsons.”

I asked Dave, the owner, how he came to possess a bobblehead of a major religious figure who I at first mistook to be a Friar Tuck bobblehead.

“It was at an Altoona Curve minor league baseball game,” he said. “St. Francis is the college nearby and they had a St. Francis bobblehead night.”

I didn’t think about it until later, but intend on asking him today if the St. Francis bobblehead, made in honor of the patron saint of animals and the environment, has had any spiritual impact on the clientele. Like do customers behave less wolflike than before he acquired the bobblehead and maybe show a greater propensity toward recycling.

Dave’s great for that. You can ask him anything and he’ll give you a thoughtful answer.

Just the other day I asked, given the immutable laws of gravity, why did the Coyote always without fail fall more swiftly than the anvil?

Dave said the laws of slapstick cartoon comedy supersede the laws of physics.

Dave’s got 80 bobbleheads on display in The Pond, and I’d put his collection up against a more widely touted one being unveiled this week at the lavish new Miami Marlins Ballpark, home to what is mistakenly billed as the Bobblehead Hall of Fame.

It features 588 bobbleheads and it looks like fewer than half of them represent real players inducted in the actual hall of fame. What is cool is the display is geared to shake so the bobbleheads are always bobblin’.

The news made Dave envious. He said he’s going to try and think of a way to generate some energy that will make his bobbleheads bobble. I told him coordinating the bathroom breaks of three or four of his more bobble bellied customers would probably do the trick.

His collection takes a back seat to none.

It includes bobbleheads of Albert Einstein, Pirate announcer Bob Prince, Dudley Do-Right -- and this is key -- the great Arnold Palmer.

The Pirates gave away Palmer bobbleheads on AP’s 80th birthday in 2009. I think it’s one of the greatest bobbleheads in bobblehead in history. Palmer represents all that’s great about sports and life. In fact, there’s only one bobblehead superior in that regard.

That would be bobblehead Jesus.

Of course, there’s a Jesus bobblehead. In fact, there are dozens of them. My favorite is “Buddy Christ,” which has the bearded one winking and giving the thumb’s up signal.

I even saw one bobblehead that showed Jesus wearing a t-shirt that reads “Jesus hates Obama.” And I don’t believe that for a second. If a Jesus bobblehead hated anyone it would be probably be bobblehead LeBron James for his Judas-like betrayal of Cleveland, but I don’t believe that either.

Like the man, bobblehead Jesus is all about love. And that’s as it should be.

The St. Francis bobblehead had me wondering if there were any apostle bobbleheads. You’d think there’d be at least a Judas bobblehead because there’s a Osama bin Laden one.

I learned this when I read that the Gettysburg Museum store was pulling its John Wilkes Booth bobbleheads after a controversy erupted over having the Derringer-wielding villain within firing range of the bobblehead Abraham Lincolns.

Matt Powers of the Kansas City-based Bobblehead company said they’ve made more than a million bobbleheads and have never had one pulled until the bobbling Booth.

Lincoln scholar Harold Holzer -- and I assume he’s a living, breathing scholar and not a talking bobblehead -- said it was in bad taste, like “selling Lee Harvey Oswald dolls in a Kennedy museum.”

I respectfully disagree and cite as my role model the Jesus bobblehead.

He’d forgive the Booth bobblehead. He’d forgive the Judas bobblehead, if there is one.

Yes, bobblehead Jesus would surely turn the other cheek.

But then again, isn’t that what all bobbleheads do?