Howzit! Thanks, eh? All right! It’s Funny Names In The News Friday!

Why did I introduce FNITN this way? Because my Nordic Correspondent Arto introduced me to this paragraph from the Shaka Sign Wikipedia page, and it’s solid gold!

Boom Shakalakalaka!

“Hawaiians use the shaka to convey the “Aloha Spirit”, a concept of friendship, understanding, compassion, and solidarity among the various ethnic cultures that reside within Hawaii, lacking a direct semantic to literal translation. The shaka can also be used to express “howzit?”, “thanks, eh?”, and “all right!” Drivers will often use it on the road to communicate distant greetings and gratitude.”

Snazzy Jazzy Pizzazzy Correspondent Amb! took a break from questioning whether I can write FNITN during an interview week to bring us the Amb-mazing news that Jada Pinkett Smith has been cast in Gotham. She’ll play Fish Mooney, who is described as “a sadistic gangster boss and nightclub owner.” She sums it up thusly:

Because, you know. Fish. Scary stuff.

Pithy.

Long live Pussy Riot!!

Moving on to the 2014 Winter Olympics at Sochi, where our PR Directors Davember nearly simultaneously reported that my favo(u)rite Russian Women^{[citation needed]} are behind bars again. The fine young ladies of Pussy Riot, headed by Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, Maria Alyokhina and Yekaterina Samutsevich (plus numerous anonymous, but presumably awesome-named, members) were beaten by Cossack police and then detained in the process of filming their first music video since being released from jail. That whole episode was previously described in pictorial form here.

On to non-Russian sporting news, our esteemed Mountweazel correspondent Mark Sackler informs us that Keegan Michael Key and Jordan Peele (who tweeted a link to our blog about a year ago) posted an ABSOLUTELY AMAZING SPOOF of the College Football Bowl intro sequence, chock full of amazing funny names. Watch the whole thing, it’s totally worth it. So many good names, but Nyquillus Dillwad is definitely one of my favorites.

Time is short folks, so I’ll have to knock the rest of these out in “quick hits” style:

• Footballer Thomas Hitzlsperger announced recently that he is gay, and the Guardian talks about the ramifications.
• 

  Janicza Bravo – looks as awesome as her name sounds!

  Funny Sunny Honey Bunny correspondent Amb lets us know that Gregory Go Boom won the top prize for US Fiction in Sundance’s short films competition. The best part: the film is directed by Janicza Bravo! Bravo indeed!
  

• As many of you know, legendary folk singer and Arto’s wife’s personal hero, Pete Seeger, passed away late last month. What you may not know is that the news was announced by Seeger’s grandson Kitama Cahill-Jackson. We wish the family the best during an unquestionably difficult time.
• And last, but certainly not least, nuclear fusion made a huge step forward as researchers have found a way to get a net energy gain out of the notoriously energetically-unfavorable reaction. And who better to participate in this than Omar Hurricane! That’s the name of a born winner, right there!

That’ll do it, ladies and germs! Enjoy the remainder of the Sochi Olympics, and we’ll catch you on the flip side. FNITN out! <mic drop>