Todd Hartley

When I was about four years old and dinosaurs were my favorite thing in the world, I desperately wanted to change my name to Pachycephalosaurus Hartley. You see, I never crawled, and I wasn't a very good walker, so I spent a lot of time falling flat on my face....

Are you tired of hearing nothing but bad news? I know I am. It seems like every time I turn on the TV or surf the Internet or pick up a newspaper, all I hear or read about is government gridlock, partisan bickering in Washington, war, terrorism, murder, unemployment, obesity,...

By now we've all heard so much about the alleged obesity epidemic threatening America's waistlines that if you're anything like me, you stopped paying attention years ago. Everyone in America is overweight, a single restaurant entrée could feed a family of 23 Somalis, deep-frying everything greatly reduces its nutritional value,...

I'm not usually one to jump on the latest food fads. For instance, it took me until my mid-20s to catch on to such current trends as sushi and Mexican cuisine. Occasionally, however, a food product comes along that is all the rave, and I can't get enough of it....

Last week I wrote a column about skiing -- specifically my fat rump skiing Corbet's Couloir at Jackson Hole. It was a little self-serving, admittedly, but it wasn't intended to be that way originally. In fact, the whole reason I wrote a column about skiing in the first...

Last Saturday was St. Patrick's Day, and I think my son might be confusing leprechauns with the Easter Bunny. I heard him and his friend discussing something about how leprechauns now offer a choice of a pot of gold or -- for people unfamiliar with the concept of purchasing power...

I've always wanted to do one of those stream-of-consciousness-type columns that are written in one mad rush, and this week I wasn't able to find anything in the news that I deemed column-worthy, so I've decided to take the plunge. Here's to hoping it doesn't end up quite as badly...

Shock waves rippled through the ski industry last week with the announcement that Broomfield, Colo.-based Vail Resorts had acquired Kirkwood, a ski area located in California, south of Lake Tahoe. The deal, a veritable steal at just $18 million, brings the number of resorts controlled by Vail Resorts...

Last week, as some of you may remember, we here at I'm With Stupid tackled the story of Seamus, the Irish setter that Mitt Romney stuck in a cage on the roof of the family car for a 12-hour drive to Canada in 1983. We're not going to...

I've always thought Mitt Romney's name sounds like a way in which you would order wiener schnitzel at a German restaurant -- "Can I get mine mitt romney? Danke schoen!" -- as if romney were a sort of smelly purple cabbage that came on the side. So I actually went...

Based on my routinely exhibited ability to make grandiose statements that can't be proven wrong but for which I nevertheless have no proof, I've always thought I would make an excellent astrophysicist. As such, I like to stay apprised of the latest trends in space exploration, and last week I...

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away -- actually, it was last month in Portland, Ore., but just go with me -- a valiant knight of the revered order of Jedi suffered two great injustices at the evil hands of the galactic empire. Such aggression...

Three weeks ago, as some of you might remember, I wrote a column about the three-week health-food cleanse upon which I was then embarking. I thought I'd take this occasion to update you on how it went and answer the question of whether I made it the whole...

I'll admit it: I've got nothing this week. Not one measly original thought in my head. So in order to stretch this poor excuse for a column to 750 words, I'm going to follow up on some of my more recent diatribes, written back when my brain still occasionally functioned....

I have to give you vegetarians credit. You folks must be the strongest-willed people on Earth not to break down and eat meat. Seriously, I don't know how you do it. And the fact you've convinced yourselves that vegetarian meals are delicious and satisfying is even more impressive, though possibly...

A friend of mine asked me recently when I was going to chime in on the whole Tim Tebow thing. At the time, I said I had no plans to, but evidently I lied because I'm about to throw my two cents out there. I'll admit, however, that this column...

I have a confession to make: Unlike all you good Christians out there, I've never actually read the Bible. (You have read it, right?) I am pretty sure, however, that when people say "the Bible," they're all referring to the same book. Sure, there may be different translations, but I...

You might not be able to tell this from my picture, but once upon a time, I had the thickest hair in the world. My head had a thread count that was higher than you'd find in the finest hotels in Europe. We're talking thousands of follicles per inch. I...

Here's what I know about mistletoe after two seconds' research on Wikipedia: it's a plant that grows "attached to and within the branches of a tree or shrub." To prove the point, the article included a picture of a "hemi-parasitic" European strain of the plant in the branches...

I've noticed a bit of a disturbing trend recently, and I'm wondering if any of you have, too. Ever since Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly famously called pepper spray a "food product, essentially" in the wake of the pepper-spraying incident at UC Davis, people have apparently decided it's...