"Snark Bites" 02/1-7/09

2/6
Knox County to Host 'Big Mouths' Festival
"It's the perfect fit!" proclaims Mayor Ragsdale

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. The idea behind the Big Mouths Festival, organized by AC Entertainment, is to meld some of the most creative and important experimental entertainment acts with the perfect backdrop for cognitive dissonance - Knox County, Tennessee.

"Yes, being headquartered in Knox County gave us the idea for the festival," confirmed AC Entertainment President Ashley Capps. "Avant-garde or experimental music and entertainment can seem to be abrasive, atonal and dissonant, but it can also be meditative, droning, somnolent, and occasionally, it even makes sense - which pretty much sums up Knox County politics. So we thought, 'Why not bring these elements together and put on a really big show?' That's how the Big Mouths Festival came about."

The resulting event is a sprawling music and entertainment festival that kicks off today at the Knoxville Museum of Art with an "Alive After Five" performance by Romanian Gypsy Punk band The Luminescent Orchestri. The weekend then rolls on, pairing eclectic avant-garde musical acts such as composer Phillip Glass and chamber-pop act Antony and the Johnsons with a variety of entertainment performed by local officials from both city and county.

"The Big Mouths Festival is an important step in the evolution of Knox County entertainment," said Dwight Van de Vate, PR specialist and talent scout for Knox County Mayor Mike Ragsdale. "As you know, Mayor Ragsdale has been honing his 'Stand-Up Mayor' routine for months, anticipating an appearance on a revival of 'The Gong Show.' But this festival may be the chance for him to get his foot in the mouth- errr, door."

"The Big Mouth Festival is the perfect fit for Knox County!" exclaimed Mayor Ragsdale. "What could be more appropriate? I mean this is no one-size-fits-all type of foot-in-mouth measurement we're talking here! We're talking big mouths, large mouths, mouths of stature. And nobody's got mouths of more stature than us!"

Besides classic bits from Ragsdale's stand-up routine, such as "Seven Words I Wish You Couldn't Say in Knox County (Audit, Investigate, Impound, Impeach, Impanel, Indict, Imprison), "Take My P-Card...PLEASE!" and "When I Think about Me, I Clear Myself," the mayor is expected to add a magic trick to his repertoire. Word of the stunt has already generated considerable buzz.

In the act, Ragsdale, in tandem with Knox County Commissioner Paul Pinkston, will attempt to make $154,000 in discretionary funds for the county mayor and county commissioners vanish. The two will then fight a duel of words to determine who actually gets to take credit for the magic trick...

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Knox Meteorologists: Secret Masochists?
"We enjoy being wrong," say prominent weather casters

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. In light of their latest round of missed snow predictions, local forecasters are coming forward and acknowledging that they enjoy having jobs in which they're usually wrong.

Matt Hinkin, a member of WATE Channel 6's 6 Storm Team, said it was hard at first to admit he took pleasure in being wrong so often. But once he got accustomed to it, the pain grew on him.

"I have to say, I didn't want to admit it to myself, but what really made me want to be a TV meteorologist was knowing that I'd have the chance every day to sort of go into hundreds of thousands of households and embarrass myself by telling folks something they basically knew was going to be wrong," said Hinkin. "The constant humiliation, the neighbors yelling in the morning, 'Hey, Matt! You forecast sunny skies! Better take an umbrella, har, har, har!" - all of that, it kind of hits you like an adrenaline rush. Once you get used to it, you don't want it to stop. It keeps you going. Seriously, to do what we do, you have to like the pain."

It's the constant challenge of delivering the same inaccurate forecast that delights WVLT Volunteer TV Channel 8 Super Pinpoint 8 chief meteorologist Scott Blalock.

"You want to know how I ended up forecasting in Knoxville, Tennessee?" said Blalock. "When I was in weather school, I asked my advisor, 'Where's the most miserable place to try to forecast the weather?' That's how I ended up here. With the plateau on one side and the mountains on the other and the air getting trapped in the valley sometimes and the heat absorption as we continue to cut down and pave over formerly forested areas, it's absolutely brutal to try to forecast the weather here. Doing your absolute level best to get the prediction right, knowing full well that come the morning, thousands of people are going to be stepping out their front doors saying, 'Well, Blalock got it wrong again.' It's addictive. It's painful. And I like it..."

2/1
Knox Area Super Bowl Predictions
Knox officials weigh in on NFL championship game

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. With Pilot Travel Centers President and CEO Jimmy Haslam rooting in Super Bowl XLIII for the Pittsburgh Steelers, a team of which he is now a minority owner, other area officials weighed in on the big game. Haslam's brother, Knoxville Mayor Bill Haslam, said that he would be rooting for the Arizona Cardinals because of "friendly sibling rivalry."

"Jimmy and I have always been a little competitive," acknowledged Haslam. "So if he's got the Steelers, I'm taking the Cardinals. D'ya hear me, redbirds? Whup some Pitt butt!"

In his last official act before resigning his term-limited seat on City Council, Knoxville Vice Mayor Mark Brown said that the Knoxville City Council would unanimously line up behind Mayor Haslam.

"We discussed it among ourselves on Market Square the other day, pulling in several passersby to share their opinions so as not to violate the Sunshine Law," said Brown. "We were all in agreement that we saw no reason to fight the mayor on this issue and could unanimously support him on his Super Bowl initiative. Go Cards!"

Former County Commissioner Diane Jordan, who is rumored to be interested in Brown's council seat, is also supporting the Cardinals, but not out of solidarity with the mayor.

"No, it's because those Steeler outfits are so drab, although those Cardinal costumes could use some sprucing up, too," remarked Jordan. "Accenting those helmets with some strikingly iridescent plumage would be a fashionable touch. And if elected to council, that's what I'll bring: innovative ideas and fashion sense..."