— Jeez, you can hardly turn around these days without another beloved celebrity passing away…and so once again we mourn the passing of one of the truly great furry ones, Gidget, the former Taco Bell chihuahua, who died of a stroke Tuesday night at the age of 15.
Yes, Gidget was really a female playing a male dog who was voiced by Argentine-American actor Carlos Alazraqui! The commercials featuring the chihuahua haven’t aired in nine years, essentially killed by a rash of political correctness. In their peak in the late 1990’s, the canine actress traveled by limo and went first-class in planes. Following her retirement, Gidget is said to have lived “like a queen.”
The hugely-popular commercials which immortalized the phrase, “Yo quiero Taco Bell” drew the ire of Hispanic watchdog groups which claimed that it promoted stereotypes, and demanded that the commercials be taken off the air. I, for one, never saw the chihuahua as being anything but hip and cool, an articulate and bright furry spokescanine that could be appreciated on a variety of levels.
In one late commercial of the series lampooning a variety of fast-food spokesmen, I’ll always remember the chihuahua driving up in a tank, and saying, “Hey, look what I found!” Rest in peace, Gidget…you were among the best!
— If you missed today’s solar eclipse that was visible across much of Asia, tough luck; there won’t be a longer one until 2132! In parts of Asia, today’s eclipse lasted as long as 6 minutes and 39 seconds, the longest since July 11th, 1991; it will not be equaled again in this century.
–My people are moving on in…to Detroit, that is. That’s right, the Motor City! ‘Ya see, Detroit had a population of 1.8 million hyoomans in 1950, and it’s down to 900,000 now. With the big economic meltdown and GM goin’ belly-up, Detroit has an unemployment rate of 23%. Bad for hyoomans, good for us foxies; we’re movin’ in, ‘ya see. We figure we just might be able to do somethin’ wid da place…
— On this 40th anniversary of the first lunar landing, it is sobering to think 
— Woo hoo!–The Green Lantern is coming to the big screen!–Just not real soon…think June 2011. At least we’ll get a chance to see it before the Mayan calendar runs out in December 2012…
–When I was a kid, I had a big collection of hard rubber dinosaurs which I regarded with love and veneration. 
–More convincing than other installments, the latest episode of MonsterQuest re-examined the classic Patterson film footage (vintage 1967) of a supposed Bigfoot as well as looked to the “Cripplefoot tracks” of 
— If you haven’t heard, the Sci Fi channel has been re-branded Syfy; 
— In his planned comeback concerts in London that now we’ll never see, Michael Jackson reportedly planned a nature theme which heavily involved live creatures; for his entrance, there was talk of Michael riding an African elephant while panthers were led on gold chains and parrots and other birds flew behind him. PETA and other animal rights groups understandably filed protests with officials, pointing out that “Animals don’t want to perform stupid tricks on a stage surrounded by screaming people, bright lights, and stage explosions.” Jackson subsequently announced that he would not be using any live animals in his concert series.
FOXSYLVANIA 
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