Yom Kippur is the holiday your Jewish friends feel the most guilty about not observing.

German ladies selecting a designated driver.

The ride is called The Devil's Wheel, and probably began years ago as a way for German men to see up the dresses of inebriated fräuleins, then became an Oktoberfest tradition after they realized how well it worked. The idea of the game is to be the last girl left on the giant wheel. The prize for that accomplishment is getting roped like a rodeo calf by a bully in a red Izod shirt. Doesn't seem like much of an incentive, but I'm not going to argue with tradition.

The game looks like fun. Although, "Devil's Wheel" is a bit of stretch. You have to think Satan could come up with something more sinister than a giant Lazy Susan spinning at 5 mph. But again, tradition.

(by Jonathan Corbett)

Here at Happy Place, staffers spend their days ten fingers deep inside the bowels of the Internet. They've dedicated their lives (between the hours of 10 and 6) to untangling the Web, and in the course of that task, have come across the best and worst that cyberspace has to offer. It would be a waste to not share that knowledge, so in the spirit of bookstore clerks making "staff picks," we asked our staff to share the wrongest thing they laughed at on the web this week. 

1: Why I don't dance
(Staffer Bob Powers)

Worst DJ name ever. pic.twitter.com/TxlfI6Aksn

— Tim Grimes (@digitim) September 30, 2014

Upon his release, he has a job waiting for him as music director for the NFL.

2: Two bros at an outdoor concert getting played like fiddles.
(Staffer Jonathan Corbett)

(Via)

I shouldn’t laugh at these two young suckers, because we’ve all been there before. You can tell from the smile on their faces they’re convinced the older chicks will be going home with them once the show is over. But the only heat they’ll be feeling is from an Icy Hot patch on their necks.

3: Cock wet cock!
(Staffer Shira Rachel Danan)

(Via)

Will kids inadvertently misspelling stuff as "cock" ever stop being funny? No. I laughed so hard I vomited up a bunch of moshmebs.

4: This Dude's Flesh Wound
(Staffer Johnny McNulty)

(Via)

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(Via)

With all the news about Comic-Con's new zero-tolerance policy for cosplayer harassment, and with the creepy pictures that end up at the top of online forums, you'd think cosplaying was just about being sexy (jeez, whoever thought that would happen?), but it's not. It's about being the most committed nerd in the room, and whatever room this kid is in—he's that nerd. Just don't try to get past him in line.

5: ClickHole gets some kids riled up for pizza and then leaves.
(Staffer Dennis DiClaudio)

I can't stop laughing at this video. I don't even need to watch it to start laughing. Just thinking about it sets me off. I can't really even explain why I think it's so funny other than to offer that it's just so absurdly mean-spirited and non-sequitous.

6: These mannequins create unrealistic expectations.
(Staffer Myka Fox)

(Via)

These disturbing hat-wearing neck-feet make me angry and then I die laughing. I don't know why.

1. Hollywood Stars To Sue Google For Not Inventing A Way To Make Their Naked Pictures Vanish From The Internet

Hollywood attorney Marty Singer is threatening to sue Google—on behalf of more than a dozen celebrities, including Jennifer Lawrence and Kate Upton—for $100 million for allowing users to upload stolen nude photographs onto its various Internet services, such as Blogspot and YouTube. Google fas responded by stating that it has already removed "tens of thousands" of the images from its servers. If true, that would mean that there's only tens of hundreds of thousands left to delete.

These nude celeb leaks are whatever - I'd rather see pics of Jay Z and Beyoncé arguing in the paint department at a Home Depot.

— Paul Danke (@pauldanke) October 1, 2014

2. Unemployment Drops To 5.9% As Americans Settle Into New Lives As Fast Food Workers

The U.S. unemployment rate dropped to a six-year low of 5.9 percent this month, meaning that a large percentage of American workers are finally beginning to consider hanging out at Home Depot and waiting to see if anybody needs rocks moved as a full time career.

The good news is the unemployment rate has fallen to 5.9%. The bad news is everybody at work is infected with Ebola.

— Warren Holstein (@WarrenHolstein) October 3, 2014

3. 'Homeland' To Bring Preposterous Storytelling To Foreign Markets

Showtime's Homeland—a Emmy-winning TV thriller about how foreign cultures are unsettling and dangerous—is making itself available to a number of foreign cultures. The series, itself based upon the Israeli show Prisoners of War, is being adapted for people in exotic locations like Latin America, Russia, Turkey and South Korea to watch in those few moments when they're not plotting to take down the U.S. government.

I'm glad people are talking about the racism in Homeland. Can we also be brave enough to discuss how overrated it is as well?

— Jamie Kilstein (@jamiekilstein) October 2, 2014

4. Science Finally Invents A Bunch Of Pointy Needles That You Can Swallow

For eons, people have been trying to figure out how to shove dozens of sharp-tipped needles down their throats without subsequently choking to death on their own blood and gore. At long last, researchers from MIT and Massachusetts General Hospital have figured out how to insert those needles into a pill which can be easily swallowed so that it can begin jabbing medicine into your body from the safe confines of your intestinal tract.

If you really want to gamble, take a sleeping pill and a laxative at the same time.

— Jane (@jane_bot) September 25, 2014

5. New 'Star Wars' Movies Probably Won't Be Slapstick Comedies

Lucasfilm's Vice-President of Development Kiri Hart told the Wall Street Journal that future films taking place within the Star Wars universe may break away from the familiar space opera format usually associated with the franchise, allowing for some odder and more-interesting genre-bending experiments. “I think there are boundaries, but we don't want to rigidly define them," she explained. "It's obviously not slapstick comedy, but there's room for many different stories and genres that still feel like Star Wars.” So, no slapstick comedy, which is kind of a bummer. But we still might be getting the all-Wookiee historical romance we've all been pining for.

I wish Star Wars had like two or three scenes of the characters playing basketball.

— sean oconnor (@seanoconnz) October 3, 2014

(by Dennis DiClaudio)

Clarence Thomas is a U.S. Supreme Court justice who treats the Constitution like his own personal Coke can.

Where do I click "Like"? What do you mean, this picture isn't about getting likes?

You probably like to think of yourself as a good friend, but odds are, you've undertaken one of the most unpleasant tasks of the Facebook age: the cold-blooded purging from your friend ranks of those losers with the audacity to have grown apart, but not the ruthlessness to have deleted you first.

Just catching up on our favorite Kenya and North Korea stories, natch. 

That's exactly where Matt Kuleza found himself last month—with his finger on the mouse, prepared to tell a few hundred people they were dead to him. Then, somehow, the 28-year-old Australian from Melbourne got this crazy idea that maybe, just maybe, he should try talking to his friends. Like, for realsies IRL. 1,088 real, human friend interactions, complete with coffee. As a student and a digital strategist, he had the time and wherewithal to do this and turn it into a blog: 1000+ COFFEES. 

I'd say more like a cross between Macauley Culkin and Gomez Addams.

He expects the project to take around 3 years, or a bit less than a coffee a day, and calls it "An exercise in remembering to socialize with and get to know people outside of the 'book." Each coffee date gets a picture, the details of Kuleza's past friendship with them, what they've been up to, and what their future plans are. Kids, if you're reading this, this is what old people called "catching up." What's most amazed Kuleza, however, is how willing and happy everyone was to meet (even his ex-girlfriend), and how impressed he's been with all his old friends, some he hasn't seen since the 90s, or ever met in person. It's almost like everyone grew up into more mature people who aren't incredibly awkward just because it's been a while.

Naming your band GAY was an option? There's a frat guy somewhere kicking himself.

See way more of Kuzela's friends (with much more detail) at 1000+ COFFEES.

Wow, it's so nice to see you again. I see you haven't gotten rid of your dick sweater.

(by Johnny McNulty)

Walking around as a woman is safe and fun!

Lucky women! For us, walking to work isn't just a boring walk down the street. It's like "competing in a beauty pageant every day." 

Daily Show correspondent Jessica Williams totally nails this piece about what catcalling is like for an ordinary woman. A hidden camera captures how many male strangers talk to her on the street on an average day. Williams sarcastically claims to love the attention, but if she wants a break? She simply goes an hour out of her way to avoid construction workers, teenagers, and "really, any men." 

It's not the first time Williams has tackled the subject of catcalling, and considering how many men still think it's a non-issue, it probably won't be the last.

Just trying to get close, babe.

Five scared swimmers had to be rescued from the waters off of Galway in Ireland this week because they were scared by an "intimidating dolphin."

Galway RNLI described witness reports of the incident, "the dolphin had circled the swimmers then swam at them in an intimidating way and glancing off them, coming and going, with his tail and nose."

Witnesses alerted the Valentia Coastguard, who then called in the Galway lifeboat station. 

Mike Swan (no relation), Operations Manager at Galway Lifeboat Station told the Independent, "Before we arrived, the dolphin apparently approached the swimmers and essentially began to round them up. It wasn’t exactly an attack but the dolphin began prodding and slapping them with its flipper.” 

This does sound pretty terrifying... and embarrassing. No one wants their night to end by getting bitch-slapped by a dolphin.

But what was on that dolphin's mind? What did he want?

Dolphins are constantly complimented on their hunting technique of herding fish together into a devour-able cluster. Is that what this dolphin intended? Was that dolphin going to eat those people?

Not necessarily, he could have just wanted to maim them for no reason. According to an old NY Times article, dolphins have been found to have "murderous urges unrelated to the need for food."  

So, this dolphin was going through some stuff, and was looking to work out his misplaced aggression on the limbed freaks who didn't realize they'd swam into the wrong part of the water.

Or, maybe, the dolphin was just looking for some very precious and very gentle sex.

Before things got to that next level, a fishing vessel got in between the swimmers and the finned assailant. Eventually the lifeboat sent by the coastguard joined them, and the two boats kept the dolphin at bay until the swimmers were able to get safely to shore. 

Swan reported that, "The swimmers were very shook up by the incident and one in particular was very shocked but did not require medical assistance."

I can almost hear the PTSD support group testimonial from that one in particular now. "It was awful! He smiled so wide but it was a lie!"

(by Myka Fox)

Not Pictured: All the really good parts of life.

Eisaku is an artist from Yokohama, Japan, who creates Vines that usually display his drawing process, but in this case he did something different, creating more of a flip-book style short film showing the growth, life and old age of a woman in 7 seconds.

As I mentioned, his other Vines usually start with a blank piece of paper, and advance in stop-motion fashion towards a finished product. Completing the effect are the snippets of loud, fast-paced music that practically scream "this is what I listen to when I'm concentrating on something else."

Yeah and that weird-looking dude at the end is kind of his personal avatar. Either that, or a much more horrifying vision of aging. Check out more of Eisaku's Vines here.

(by Johnny McNulty)

Joe Biden, working blue.

While speaking at Harvard University's Institute of Politics on Thursday, Joe Biden dropped a quip that revealed what he really feels about being Vice President, while reminding everyone why he'll never be President. He's simply way too honest. After six years of being as muzzled as Joe Biden can be, he's ready to chew through his leash and hop the White House fence.

A senior at the school was asking a question and mentioned that he is the student body vice president, at which point Biden cut him off to ask him a question, VP to VP.

Then, to perfectly illustrate what a bitch "the Vice President thing" must be, he felt the need to follow up his off-the-cuff remark by pointing out that he was "joking" six times. 

(by Jonathan Corbett)

It's kind of a metallic, red taste, and it oozes out of your eyes and ears.

The 55-year-old Dallas Weekly is the most widely-read African-American newsweekly in North Texas, and they accidentally had some really bad timing with their most recent edition. Their cover story was on the "Taste of Africa: Family Fun Festival" a free event that was held on Saturday, Sept. 27 and included food tasting from many African countries and a host of speakers. It looked like a great event, and it wasn't going to be ruined by the Ebola scare, which was still only in Africa (and the opposite page) at the time:

See? There's no Ebola threat! It's all the way on the right-hand side of the page.

Unfortunately, Sept. 26th turned out to be the day Thomas Eric Duncan was first admitted to Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital and sent home with antibiotics, and Sept. 28th was when he was rushed back to the hospital with they finally realized was Ebola, following a trip to Africa. So, even though their cover story for the week of 9/25-10/1 was supposed to be the taste of a continent's worth of cuisine, it inadvertently turned into a scary propaganda poster about how we're all about to bleed out through our orifices.

You won't, though. You have to actually touch someone's bodily fluids. Someone who has Ebola. So, maybe just no blind dates for a while.

(by Johnny McNulty)

"What's the deal with these transparent podiums in front of a black background?"

The Clio Awards are pretty much the award in advertising, by which I mean there have been many name-drops and an entire episode in Mad Men about the Clios (Don Draper won one, you guys). Of course, advertising is advertising. It's creative, but it's also the subjugation of creativity. It deserves recognition, but it's important not to let the industry forget that they are lubrication that lets corporations insert their products into your brain. And Jerry Seinfeld does not let them forget that as he accepted his Honorary Award for his recent Acura commercial. His sarcastic praise of the industry bit in with all the sharpness and precision of an X-Acto knife. "I love advertising because I love lying," he semi-joked, before thanking advertisers for giving us sublime moments of illusory happiness between the time we see their ad and when we are faced with the disappointing reality of the product.

And you know what? He's right. Everything sucks and you may as well enjoy the brief moments of amusement and happiness you get, even if they're completely artificial. So, go ahead and scroll down and enjoy our many moments of brief amusement that will distract you from your long, slow trudge towards oblivion. 

Oh, by the way, if you've never read about what happened at the 1991 Clio Awards, you should read the Wikipedia entry for how the owner of the Clios became addicted to drugs, forgot to pay for the television coverage or organize a host for the event, leading to a 2-hour delay and several fill-in speakers who got frustrated and eventually left, ending in the dogpile on stage to grab unclaimed trophies. Yay, humanity!

(by Johnny McNulty)

5. The middle school principal who dabbles in sexy slasher flicks.

(via WFSB)

Hopefully, the horror films being made by Moongoyle Entertainment become moneymakers, because one of the company's owners has been suspended from his job as the Principal of Granby Memorial Middle School in Connecticut. Evidently, some uptight parents objected to the guy supplementing his income by making slasher movies that contained "nudity and sexually charged language." One concerned citizen said, "If you're dealing with anybody underage, you need to have a complete clean slate." Good luck filling that position! The guy makes movies. Parents in Connecticut need to lighten up, and be thankful their kids aren't going to school in Louisiana.

.

4. Former Secret Service Director Julia Pierson.

Do you think you have what it takes to protect the world’s most powerful person? Hell, even if you don’t, if you could come up with a decent plan to keep crazy people from being able to enter his home and take a high-speed tour of the place before being apprehended, it would be a vast improvement compared to the person who just stepped down as Director of the Secret Service. That person is Julia Pierson, who is responsible for the recent open house at the White House where an intruder was able to penetrate the security systems by conceiving and executing a brilliant plan to hop the fence and run across the lawn.

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3. University of Cincinnati football program employee, penis rubber.

(via WLWT)

The University of Cincinnati will be looking to fill a position in their football program next week, after learning that their Director of Player Welfare and Development was arrested in May for rubbing his genitals on a 73-year-old woman in a grocery store. Antrione Archer may know a lot about college football, but his pick-up technique still needs some development. Because his current go-to move is asking elderly women to help him find vitamins, and when they bend down to look, pulling out his penis and rubbing it on their backs. The only good news for Antrione is, since the incident was caught by surveillance cameras, he'll at least be able to study game film.

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2. Possibly racist Boston Herald cartoonist Jerry Holbert.

(via The Fix)

Boston Herald cartoonist Jerry Holbert either has a tiny, slightly racist bug up his ass, or he's so tone deaf in regards to race that he has no business working as a political cartoonist for any major newspaper. I would say he'd be fired from even a college newspaper for a cartoon about Obama with a random, unfunny watermelon reference, but he wouldn't, because no editor of a college paper would've run the cartoon. "Watermelon flavored toothpaste?" Really? He's so clearly trying to push people's buttons with the "yeah, bitches-I went there!" reference, that the whole thing seems like it was Holbert's way of going out on his terms, before the door to the entire newspaper industry closes on his ass.

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1. The loony lovebird owners from everyone's favorite episode of Kitchen Nightmare.

(via Twitter)

Anyone familiar with the Amy's Baking Company know that owner Samy Bouzaglo and a knife are a bad combination. Whether he's using one to cook, or waving it around on the sidewalk while trying to gut a loud drunk who was thrown out of his restaurant by his equally unstable wife. The craziest thing about the incident is learning that Amy's Baking Company is still in business. Are people still going there to eat, or has it become an Arizona tourist attraction that people stop by to taunt the owners like they were monkeys at a third-world zoo? No charges were filed, but Scottsdale police are still investigating the incident. Whether Bouzaglo gets charged or not, Amy's Baking Company needs to be stopped, so its owners are forced out of the restaurant business, and back in the reality TV game where they clearly belong. 

(by Jonathan Corbett)

Think twice before carbo-loading.

What one Colombian woman needed was some good advice, what she got was a potato. 

At 22 years old, a sexually active Colombian woman, (her real name has been omitted for reasons of privacy and embarrassment, so from here on we will respectfully refer to her as "Mrs. Potato Crotch") went to her mom with the big question of how to prevent pregnancy. Mom told her she had a "fail proof method," all she had to do was shove a potato up her lady parts. Put a whole potato in the oven, you won't make (tater) tots. 

In a sense, this worked. Although the efficacy of potato contraception is yet to be determined, Mrs. Potato Crotch did not become with child. Soon, however, she was to become with chives. Instead of a post-intercourse starch removal, she left that tuber in her tube! To anyone who has stored potatoes (in their reproductive organs or otherwise) this is obviously a mistake. Potatoes need to be kept in a cool, dry, well-ventilated place, or they will grow. 

And grow this crotch-potato did. The poor woman left it in for two weeks before abdominal pain caused her to seek medical attention. By the time she got to the hospital, nurses could see roots escaping from her vagina, and not members of The Tonight Show's band, either. The potato, though buried, had come back to life. 

Thankfully, medical staff were able to remove the potato (and its roots) without surgery, and the woman should be fine. Hopefully Mrs. Potato Crotch has learned some valuable information from the experience, and in the future, as she woos prospective partners, she will not offer fries with that shake.

(by Myka Fox)

Kid Rock is the people version of an above ground pool.