Was there anything funnier than watching John Kerry "play" the guitar at that Democratic fundraiser in New York last week? I mean, we like Kerry, really, we do, sure, but it looked about as natural as Stephen Hawking on a Segway. There were all kinds of great Awkward Kerry photo ops this week. Who didn't love watching him trying to "frolic" with John Edwards' five-year-old son, Jack? You could almost read the thought balloons: Activate "smile" to interact with young humanoid … cue "laughter" when humanoid does something Crowd reacts to as "cute" … hope Teresa doesn't give me another dirty look …

John Kerry is a war hero, an accomplished Senator, a decent man and, most important, not George W. Bush. But he does not, and likely never will, resemble a real live human being with real emotions and real interactions. That's okay, of course … as long as he isn't holding a guitar.

We have 11 Black List reviews this week; we've been getting a ton lately, and we thank you. But keep 'em coming! The form on the right is so easy, you can practically hump it without buying it a drink first.

-- BT

The Black Table needs your help! Every week, we need reviews of the latest media-related crud, new products from Capitalists and odd idea, concept or trend. All you need to have is a sharp opinion that you can distill down to one paragraph of 150 words and give a letter grade. To submit, please fill out the form below. Entries may edited for length, style and clarity. Hit us with your best shot. Fire away.

SEEING YOUR EX-GIRLFRIEND AND THE 30 POUNDS SHE PUT ON: Sure, when you dated her, she had that lithe college swimmer's body toned by pre-dawn hours in the pool. And when summer came around, she looked like the Queen of Adult Swim in her red bikini, lotioning and oiling, lotioning and oiling, lotioning and oiling ... But when she dumped you for that Hasselhoff-wannabe, you gave serious consideration to joining a monastery -- if only because you flew into a violent rage every time you heard the "Baywatch" theme music. But that phase was recently terminated when you saw her at a friend's wedding. Picture Yasmine Bleeth's coke-addled mugshot, plus 30 pounds. And the Hasselhoff-wannabe she recently married? As defeated, depressed, and pale as a man can get. Not to put too fine a point on it, but … I win! A -- Segg

GORILLA LOVE MAKING: I saw on the news the other day that a gorilla in the San Diego Zoo is having trouble, well … getting it up. For one reason or another, the male is not attracted to the female gorilla that was placed in his cage last week. It was the hope of the zoo that the gorilla would mate with the female to help further the species. So what did the zoo do? It decided to make a VHS tape of other gorillas having sex to help the male figure out what to do with the female. Now stop, go back and read that last sentence again.

Yup, they were going to make a monkey porno. Don't get me wrong; I believe the gorilla is an intelligent animal … but what the fuck? Do these "scientists" really believe that if they wheel a television in front of a primate, he will get all riled up and make a beeline for the female? Of course not. The TV to a gorilla is just some magic box of lights and sound. Once they start the tape, Kong will smash the TV and smear poo on the zookeeper's face. D -- Josh

PERFECT STORMS: "The perfect storm" is an apt and pithy phrase with which to describe a rare meteorological event over the North Atlantic. It is not, however, a useful way to describe a hotel slump, revenue problems facing the California Attorney General's Office, or even the UK Independence Party. Yet a search for "perfect storm" on Google News turns up hundreds of results, almost none of them having to do with the book, the movie or the weather. Even The New Yorker recently got in the game, describing the impending expiration of drug patents and growing consumer concern over high prices as a "perfect storm" facing the otherwise phenomenally wealthy pharmaceutical industry. That is not a perfect storm. It's more like a forecast of moderate rain that may or may not be headed your way. Somehow the meaning of this phrase has gone from "an extremely unusual coincidence of weather factors resulting in an extremely violent storm" to "a thing with multiple causes," or even just "a bunch of similar things," as in a Christian Science Monitor headline that uses the term to describe the recent trend of "issue films." As such, I am declaring a perfect storm of idiotic uses of the phrase "the perfect storm." It's time to toss the phrase overboard and bury it at sea. D -- Joshua Ross

BEING ABLE TO USE YOUR REAL NAME FOR YOUR GMAIL ACCOUNT: It's been a long road of email accounts with numerals, articles and strange abbreviations hitched to my name. Not to mention a few email accounts named after comic book characters. So when it came time to give my Gmail account a name, I eschewed "pussyinspector" or any kind of retarded permutation of my godgiven bland name, and went for my godgiven bland name for the first time ever. It's one thing for people named Mordecai or Z-Rob to stake their own claim in the Hotmail universe, but for people named Frank Smith, you really have to get their first or else it's "fsmith47", "thefranksmith" or "antmanfan" for you. Watch out all you other Frank Smiths, I got there first. A -- Frank Smith

PEOPLE AND THEIR SILLY GMAIL ACCOUNTS: I'm sorry, but if I see one more dork proudly showing off their Gmail account, I'm going to hurl. (And yes, if you are proudly showing off your Gmail account, you ARE a dork.) I've seen people go about this account-brandishing in a number of ways, from saying things like, "I'll leave as soon as I'm done checking my *Gmail* account," to gratuitously CCing me on emails where they talk about their new *Gmail* accounts, to the outright, "I have a *Gmail* account, and it is soooo cool!" Wise up people. It's a stinkin' email account. I don't care if you had to be "invited." It's still not that cool. Besides, Yahoo offers 100MB and doesn't invade your privacy. So there. D -- Jeremy

MARINOL: Marinol is a drug prescribed to terminally ill people to stimulate their diminishing appetites. Marinol is a gel cap of THC and some other shit to make you not paranoid and stuff, I think. It's basically bong pills. My friend has some, and he gave me some to try out. So I washed one down with an ice cold Sparks, and let me tell you, Marinol is the bee's knees. Imagine being as stoned as you've ever been, stoned as 50 really stoned dudes, but you're not too paranoid to leave the house and go buy some food and shit. Cop cars don't scare you when you're floating down the street on Marinol; they just look funny. Everything does! I laughed at a dog tied up outside a deli until I got lockjaw. Then I saw a Chinese man drop a mango and nearly shat my pants. A -- Gary Sandwiches

MAKING PLANS FOUR MONTHS IN ADVANCE: Recently, two people told me about events happening in October, asking if I was free. Of course I'm free; I can barely think as far ahead as next week. Having lost my planner a few months ago, and never replacing it, I've been relying on my memory to serve me about whether I have plans on a particular night (with mostly accurate results), but I certainly have no idea what I will be doing four months from now! I guess it's a good idea for those who love to plan ahead, but hearing about people who know what they're doing already for, say, New Year's Eve, makes me feel like even more of a slacker than I already do. I can barely keep track of all the fun events that I want to go to and then decide which one to attend tonight, let alone four months from now, and when I hear people rattling off these dates I'm torn between admiration and fear. So yes, I'm free all of October, November and December, you can pencil me in, but just remind me a wee bit closer to the actual date so I will actually show up. C -- Rachel Kramer Bussel

FESTIVE HOLIDAY MOSQUITOS: Bugspray is for sissies, or people who like the outdoors enough to remember about that sort of thing. I am neither. As a result, I received approximately elevendy-hundred mosquito bites at my friends' Fourth of July BBQ/Wedding Reception/Keg Party last weekend. Fortunately, my polka-dotted sundress matched my polka-dotted hide. Unfortunately, not much goes with Equine Encephalitis, which I'm sure I'll be coming down with any old day now. F -- Jen Hubley

MANHANDLING: At the beach the other day, some freckled squirt in water wings was heckling me and my lady friend, asking us if we wanted "to touch the ass?" I was first confused, then enraged, as he bobbed in the waves repeating his taunting question. An old solution occurred, and I waded toward the antagonistic little imp, snarling that I'd indeed touch the ass. When I caught him up in my meathooks, I gave him an old-fashioned manhandling. That is, I shook him fiercely, a strange kid, no more than eight years old, until he apologized. Then I tossed him into the waves like the dirty trash he was. Afterwards I felt righteous and strong; I'd taught someone a useful lesson on manners while dusting off my old manhandling technique. A -- Bobbi Gula

MANHATTAN BRIDGE BIKE PATH: I've been told that the newly opened Manhattan Bridge bike path is the work of Giuliani. As much as I loathe to give that man credit for anything other than upstaging our picture-book reading president on September 11, the long-awaited bike lane is a wonderful thing. No longer must I risk life and the paralysis of limb navigating Flatbush Ave. No longer must I just hope for the best while attempting to cross an unmarked exit lane and jump the four-inch curb that leads to the stairwell of the old entrance. No longer must I holler at oblivious pedestrians who are sadly under the impression that the world will move around them regardless of how they may weave, unannounced, at the most inopportune moments. The path is not perfect, but it beats the hell out of the roller-derby that is the Williamsburg Bridge, or the Contiki tour Mecca that is the Brooklyn Bridge. A -- Glynnis MacNicol

KLEENEX NAZIS INTERRUPTING MY DRUG BINGE: It never fails. A long weekend of partying, the 7 p.m. bus back to Jersey on a Sunday after being up for 48 hours, and some do-gooder shoves a Kleenex pack in your face, "helpfully" offering one to you so that you can wipe the blood off of your nostrils. So I sniffling a little … get off my back and mind your own fucking business, you uptight freak. Here's a clue: If I have headphones on, and my fingers are twitching as I wipe the toxic sweat off of my forehead … back off. I am in no mood for your precious sensitivity to the fact that I have a river of chunky drug-ridden snot running onto my lips. And you can trust that the last thing you want is for me to blow a wad of nasal cartilage into my hands while you watch. So keep your damn Kleenex, and let me sniffle and suffer in peace. F -- Aatom Smith

CLICK HERE FOR THE BLACK LIST ARCHIVE.

Each and every week, Black Table readers like you write the Black List and get absolutely nothing in return. Ain't that some shit.