Rating: 
Summary: "The Booger Beat" would be a great name for a rock band!
Review: This latest collection of Dave Barry's humor columns is predictably and uniformly hilarious. Barry has always had the knack of surprising the reader no matter how familiar his formula is. The collection is made all the more valuable with the inclusion of two serious columns about 9/11. These are as sensitive, even elegaic, as anything anybody else wrote about that horrible day. He wisely puts them at the end, for fear of ruining any gags that would follow them. Another top-notch collection from south Florida's funniest (funny on purpose, that is) character.
Rating:
Summary: "The Booger Beat" would be a great name for a rock band!
Review: This latest collection of Dave Barry's humor columns is predictably and uniformly hilarious. Barry has always had the knack of surprising the reader no matter how familiar his formula is. The collection is made all the more valuable with the inclusion of two serious columns about 9/11. These are as sensitive, even elegaic, as anything anybody else wrote about that horrible day. He wisely puts them at the end, for fear of ruining any gags that would follow them. Another top-notch collection from south Florida's funniest (funny on purpose, that is) character.
Rating:
Summary: Not his best, but still pretty good
Review: This new Dave Barry collection is a mixed bag 'o boogers. Some of the columns are his usual silliness (and I mean that in the nicest way), where he follows up on Alert Reader Notifications of bizarre events. None of the Alert Readers came up with anything as hysterical as the exploding whale, or quick-starting a barbecue with liquid oxygen (some of his classic columns that bring a DB fan to teary laughter in just THINKING about them) in this book. His best non-assignment piece, in my opinion, was the one on using the DECORATIVE towel as a real towel and upsetting your hostess forever. His analogy of "purely for decoration" was brilliantly off-the-wall: imagine you're in a mechanic's shop, and he needs the (let's say) 7/32" wrench, so you head over to the wall to take it down for him. HOLD IT, those wrenches are PURELY FOR DECORATION! The real wrenches are in the closet! Well, I was laughing out loud at the one.Most of the better columns in this book will be found in his coverage of the two 2000 political conventions (although the recurring motif of journalists in search of parties started to wear thin), the 2000 Election (he observes this is the state that put the "duh" in "Florida"), as well as the 2002 Winter Olympics (which has some great comments about the pairs skating scandal). The miscellaneous columns at the end (other than the DECORATIVE TOWELS) are too formulaic for me, having read too many of his older columns that did the same topics only better. The ones on his 2 year old daughter are pale imitations of the columns he wrote about his son 15 years ago. (Sorry, I'm still snorting over "Rob Barry, report to the Weinermobile.") Although he had one more excellent column in this section, on gift tips for men to buy for women. (Which is more useful, a 72,000 candlepower halogen torch with built-in can-opener, or a one-candlepower candle with bee poop stuck in it?) If you've never read Dave Barry, you could start here, and if you like this book, then when you move on to his classic stuff, you'll enjoy that even more. If you have read him and were getting tired of his schtick, well, here's some more schtick (with the exception of the serious columns at the end) and it's about the same as you'd expect. I'll gladly still read whatever he writes, even if I only smile at most of it instead of busting a gut. But I do thank him so much for the idea of purely decorative wrenches. I'm off to decorate my garage.
Rating:
Summary: Not his best, but still pretty good
Review: This new Dave Barry collection is a mixed bag 'o boogers. Some of the columns are his usual silliness (and I mean that in the nicest way), where he follows up on Alert Reader Notifications of bizarre events. None of the Alert Readers came up with anything as hysterical as the exploding whale, or quick-starting a barbecue with liquid oxygen (some of his classic columns that bring a DB fan to teary laughter in just THINKING about them) in this book. His best non-assignment piece, in my opinion, was the one on using the DECORATIVE towel as a real towel and upsetting your hostess forever. His analogy of "purely for decoration" was brilliantly off-the-wall: imagine you're in a mechanic's shop, and he needs the (let's say) 7/32" wrench, so you head over to the wall to take it down for him. HOLD IT, those wrenches are PURELY FOR DECORATION! The real wrenches are in the closet! Well, I was laughing out loud at the one. Most of the better columns in this book will be found in his coverage of the two 2000 political conventions (although the recurring motif of journalists in search of parties started to wear thin), the 2000 Election (he observes this is the state that put the "duh" in "Florida"), as well as the 2002 Winter Olympics (which has some great comments about the pairs skating scandal). The miscellaneous columns at the end (other than the DECORATIVE TOWELS) are too formulaic for me, having read too many of his older columns that did the same topics only better. The ones on his 2 year old daughter are pale imitations of the columns he wrote about his son 15 years ago. (Sorry, I'm still snorting over "Rob Barry, report to the Weinermobile.") Although he had one more excellent column in this section, on gift tips for men to buy for women. (Which is more useful, a 72,000 candlepower halogen torch with built-in can-opener, or a one-candlepower candle with bee poop stuck in it?) If you've never read Dave Barry, you could start here, and if you like this book, then when you move on to his classic stuff, you'll enjoy that even more. If you have read him and were getting tired of his schtick, well, here's some more schtick (with the exception of the serious columns at the end) and it's about the same as you'd expect. I'll gladly still read whatever he writes, even if I only smile at most of it instead of busting a gut. But I do thank him so much for the idea of purely decorative wrenches. I'm off to decorate my garage.
Rating: 
Summary: narraor or executioner?
Review: What seems to be a perfectly decent and funny book is turned into an audible nightmare by Mr. Hill. A less professional reading I could not imagine. How on earth Dave Barry let this audio version get released is beyond me. I would love to see the negatives Mr. Hill obviously must have in his possesion to get away with this. What's next, a stutterer announcing the Tonight Show?!
Rating:
Summary: You Should Buy This Book!
Review: Yes, this book is standard Dave Barry, but that is good, if you like to laugh.
The section on the 2000 presidential election is in itself reason enough to buy the book.
I'll admit Dave takes aim at some pretty easy targets,such as the infamous "butterfly" ballots, Florida drivers, women's magazines, guest towels, etc.But it works!
As you struggle to become capable of inhaling again, you'll whimper, "But that's so TRUUUE!"
But buy it. You've got the rest of your life to breathe.
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