'I wouldn't be here today without a certain mermaid ...'

It seems the U.S. Army Ranger Hall of Fame inducted Tom Hanks as an honorary member Thursday, even though he's not an actual ranger, citing his role in "Saving Private Ryan." This was, of course, a huge, collosal mistake.

We need to stop encouraging this man. He's already walking around under the delusion that he's an actual soldier, astronaut and gay guy. The only thing that's kept him from thinking he's a creepy fake train conductor is that he's not computer generated.

But sure, keep inducting him into your halls of fame and tapping him to host your NASA documentaries, you enablers. If it was up to me the man would be strapped to a gurney on a thorazine drip.

Mmmm .... what great mouth-feel quality!

Sure, it may seem like the end of the world is nigh, but that doesn't mean there's no good news to report. St. Louis-based Solae LLC has announced that it's perfected the hybrid hamburger. And you know what that means. That's right, a hamburger that gets more than 50 miles to the gallon. Al Gore has just ordered up a gross.

Wait, my mistake. Actually it's a hybrid of actual beef and soy protein, which means it has less fat and calories than a regular hamburger, but it doesn't taste like a piece of rubber that's been melted down and poured into a hamburger-shaped mold. Unfortunately you still have to kill the cow, which means Paul McCartney remains out of luck.

According to MSNBC, SoleCina "converts a blend of vegetable and meat protein into a meat substitute or hybrid with the consistency of cooked, whole-muscle meat." To quote Jonathan McIntyre, Solae’s vice president of research and development, “You get the chewiness and mouth-feel quality."

Suddenly I'm not so hungry.

Meanwhile, Kenny Chesney cried himself to sleep

I'd just like to take this opportunity to congratulate Nicole Kidman on her latest gay husband. I really hope that this fake marriage works out better for her, and that she doesn't wind up repeatedly slapping her forehead over Crown Lagers with Renée Zellweger.

A wedding guest told People, "Nicole cried all the way to the church in the car and then she cried all during the ceremony and had to wipe her eyes under the veil." But I'm sure that's because she was overcome with emotion, not because she was marrying another gay guy.

Meanwhile, her new hubby Keith Urban reportedly signed an extensive prenup, authorizing Nicole to leave him for Harvey Fierstein if she so decides.

This week's column:Mowing old gracefully

As a columnist who’s both male and a father, I get a lot of e-mails each June from people trying to publicize their fatherly items and services, which, unlike the e-mails I get around Mother’s Day, almost never involve spas. (Why doesn’t anybody think Dad might like a good seaweed wrap?) They tend to feature things like mowing and grilling, which American men are required to master before they’re allowed to procreate. That’s in the Constitution somewhere.

For instance, I recently got a press release from the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, who are apparently trying to cut down on their workload by preventing lawn-mowing accidents. The surgeons have some fine tips, including:

• "Before mowing, conduct a simple walk-through of the yard to look for any debris." Of course, this can be difficult when the grass has inexplicably grown to knee-level since the last time you mowed it. A better plan might just be to mow at night, so nobody sees it when dog toys, baseballs or squirrels come blasting out of your mower and lodge themselves in your neighbor’s siding.

For the rest of this week's AT LARGE by Peter Chianca, click here.

Khaaaaaaaaannnnnnnnn!

They've announced the latest inductees into the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Hall of Fame, and they're all worthy choices: Tom Brokaw, Regis Philbin and William Shatner. But I think it's worth asking, which of those men truly stands out as most worthy of the honor? Let's try a simple quiz to find out:

1. 10 points to any candidate who's brought us the news of important world events;
2. 25 points to any candidate easily identifiable by his first name alone;
3. 1,000 points to any candidate who was Captain Freakin' Kirk!

I think that settles this little argument. And to that end, Comedy Central is planning to roast the estimable Mr. Shatner, although hopefully not with radiation like Captain Pike in Star Trek: TOS Episode 16. That was pretty gruesome.

And who knows what she found in her bed

Yes, you heard right: A woman in Canada came home to find a bear eating porridge in her kitchen. And just like in the Goldilocks story, when the bear found the porridge to be too hot, it was shot to death by Mounties.

Wait, my mistake, it actually just ambled away on its own. But before we laugh at the situation, consider the horrified homeowner. Can you imagine coming home and finding this in your kitchen?

Of course, it's no secret that those lo-rise briefs are too freakin' tight

Five secrets about the upcoming movie "Superman Returns":

1. Fortress of Solitude? Actually a matte painting.
2. Critics already calling Marlon Brando's performance "his best post-death work."
3. Al Gore turns up to explain how Kryptonite caused by global warming.
4. Fanboys pan special effects, saying that none of them compare to the sight of Valerie Perrine's bosoms (above).
5. Superman? Actually not gay.

This week's column:Rich folk offer a wealth of information

Do you ever find yourself thinking that no matter what you do, you just can't get ahead? Well, if so, I've got good news: It doesn't matter what you think. You should just leave the thinking to the top 1 percent wealthiest Americans, so you can concentrate on non-wealthy activities, like delivering mulch.

I know this because I recently received in the mail the results of the "U.S. Trust Survey of Affluent Americans XXV." Not to be confused with Super Bowl XXV (Giants vs. Bills), which centered less on opinions of affluent Americans and more on point spreads estimated by bookies with names like "Fat Bob."

But before I go into those results, you should probably determine whether you are among that 1 percent of wealthiest Americans. To do so, you may want to take the following simple quiz:

For the rest of this week's AT LARGE by Peter Chianca, click here.

'Stop hassling me, man -- I just gotta be me!'

So Bill Gates is removing himself from hands-on day-to-day operations at Microsoft, and who can blame him? Now he can finally take some time to find himself, maybe by traveling cross country in a VW van or taking a backpacking trip around Europe.

I'm sure his parents don't like the idea, but I say it takes real guts to walk away from the steady paycheck in search of something really fulfilling. Of course, the fact that he's worth $100 billion is a nice cushion.

Now just watch those endorsement offers come pouring in

Yes! Yes! Donald Hall has defied the odds to be named the new poet laureate of the United States! Hall, dude, you rock!

I feel kind of bad for Oates, though.

That's what she gets for breaking up the Beatles

Poor Paul McCartney. First it was the sex book, then the call girl allegations, and the bombshells about his wife Heather Mills McCartney just keep on coming. In fact, this blog has acquired the story budget for the next week's worth of editions of The Sun, and from the looks of it her troubles are just beginning. Highlights include:

• "The Heather-Clinton connection"
• "Heather pushed Richards from coconut tree"
• "Heather was Nazi spy during WWII"
• "WMD found in Heather's prosthetic leg"
• "Heather actually thought Wings sucked"
• "Here are some more pictures of Heather's bare bosoms"
• "Heather: 'I ate a hamburger -- and I liked it!'"

We can only hope Walter Cronkite doesn't own a computer

Please join me in choosing the Comcast home page Headline of the Day:

1. POLAR BEARS TURNING TO CANNIBALISM?
2. BRAIN-DEAD WOMAN GIVES BIRTH, DIES
3. NUDE CYCLISTS DEMAND RESPECT

It's so hard to pick just one.

This week's column:Calling all clueless fathers ...

I got an e-mail from a new-father friend of mine recently that ended, "By the way, thanks for telling me how much work kids are. Sheesh!" The irony is, I'm sure I did tell him, but he was probably too busy doing those things childless people do -- having conversations, going out at night, sleeping -- to pay attention.

But now he has an infant, which means he spends a lot of time making bottles and trying to type while someone drools on his keyboard. And I, being the sympathetic person that I am, just laugh and laugh and laugh. It's a maniacal laugh, like a cartoon supervillain.

But that doesn't mean that I don't have my own challenges as the father of a 7- and almost-5-year-old - I'm a man, after all, meaning my nurturing abilities are theoretically limited to charcoal fires and unruly patches of lawn. But I have garnered a few tips that might someday be useful to fathers who haven't yet reached this point, if they survive. With that in mind, here are this year's Tips for Clueless Fathers:

For the rest of this week's AT LARGE by Peter Chianca, click here.

Coulter was also quoted as calling the kettle black

Yes, right-wing pundit Ann Coulter has gotten herself into the headlines by calling 9/11 widows "witches" and "harpies" in her new book "Godless." "How do we know their husbands weren't planning to divorce these harpies? Now that their shelf life is dwindling, they'd better hurry up and appear in Playboy," she wrote, after which she most likely rubbed her bony little hands together in ghoulish delight before devouring a live weevil.

But what's most surprising is that those comments were among the most tame in the book. Some of Coulter's other remarks:

• "Isn't it about time all the whiners who've lost family members to drunk drivers just had a scotch and shut up already?"
• "What's the deal with all these orphans? Do these dirty little losers think they actually deserve parents?"
• "Can someone tell me why puppies think they're so cute? We should just crush their little heads like beefsteak tomatoes."
• "If Mother Theresa were alive today, I would personally kick the sh** out of her."
• "Oooooooh, genocide! 'My whole family was killed in front me!' Get a life already."

This weeks' column:What's new Pussycat? Bible dolls, of course

Well, it seems Hasbro has shelved its idea to sell toys for 6- to 9-year-olds based on the Pussycat Dolls, a pop group made up of buxom women who go around wearing lingerie and singing about physical acts that, if done right, are illegal in Kentucky. (Apparently these dolls would have given a whole new meaning to the term "action figure.")

But now that the executives at Hasbro have come down off their crack high (thousands of calls from angry parents will do that), there are still repercussions to be dealt with from their reversal. First of all, the move is bad news for anyone hoping to one day see dolls based on Hooters waitresses, porn stars or Anna Nicole Smith (old rich guy whom she can marry and then throw under her Malibu Camper sold separately). But more importantly, what will fill the resultant doll gap?

I think I may have the answer. On the exact same day that Hasbro backed down, I got a press release from a company touting its new line of "Talking Bible Dolls." You get the sense that if the Pussycat Dolls had been made, the Talking Bible Dolls would have been the ones to beat their little plastic wrists with rulers until they'd traded their bustiers for sensible pantsuits and gotten themselves to a nunnery playset, pronto.

For the rest of this week's AT LARGE by Peter Chianca, click here.

Duck season! Rabbit season! Duck season!

Yes, between the floods and the earthquakes and the global warming, things on earth seem dire, but finally here is a good piece of news: Staffers at a bird rescue center in California, in x-raying an injured duck, found the severed head of an extraterrestrial alien. So for those of you whose friends had scoffed at your theories about how aliens would first make their presence known at bird rescue centers, you can lay on a big "told ya so."

The reason this is such good news is that now we know we have nothing to fear from an alien invasion, because if they do attack, they will quickly and efficiently be consumed by the planet's waterfowl. Or at least their heads will be. We're still working out the details.