A woman who recently lost her job dressing up as “Buddie,” a sentient bud of weed who has saucy eyebrows and the body of a humanoid superhero, says she was unfairly fired for raising concerns about on-the-job safety.

What is the saddest thing? Possibly: a heroic lion mascot in a cape who has become too drunk to stand and collapses on the soccer pitch, his giant fuzzy head lolling and falling off in his hands. Underneath, he is only human, like the rest of us. He is also drunk, like the rest of us.

California legislators are considering a bill that would prohibit public schools from having the racial slur “Redskins” as the name of their school mascot. What next—the acceptance of Galileo’s heresies? It boggles the mind.

With Times Square's costumed characters in the news recently for being even more of a shitshow than usual, Triumph the Insult Comic Dog visited New York City's most notorious furry quarantine zone to add his insults to their injuries.

FiveThirtyEight is puzzled: Its computer analysis of Shakespeare finds that Romeo and Juliet speak less to each other than to other characters, or than Lady Macbeth speaks to Macbeth. Chosen mascot: the flexible-thinking fox, of fox-and-hedgehog fame. Better mascot: a hammer bashing anything vaguely nail-shaped.

When the huge invasion of snowy owls began this winter, was it wrong for us to feel delight? These beautiful raptors from the arctic tundra do not often show up on the American East Coast, after all. But the sheer number of snowy owls should have been a warning, both to the owls themselves and to our sense of wonder.

The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee sent a letter on Friday to the Coachella Valley Unified School District asking Coachella Valley High School to abandon its unbelievably offensive “Arab” mascot.

The London Olympics have taken a lot of flack in recent weeks, mostly from Mitt Romney but also from some other people, for making choices that seem, if not altogether bad, certainly weird.

Attention, residents of Strongville, Ohio! A possibly-violent banana (-costumed person) is on the loose, having assaulted a man wearing a gorilla costume outside a cell phone store. "I noticed a kid in the bushes. Then he just emerged, dressed up as a banana, and sprinted as fast as he could at our gorilla," manager Brandon Parham, told WJW-TV. "He just looked like a Spartan from that movie 300, except he was a banana." How does such a thing happen? Who is responsible? When will WJW reporter Melissa Reid get an award for this sentence: "Police say the person dressed up as a banana split and headed south on Pearl Road"? We may never know. Police, we are told, "believe it was a prank." [WJW-TV]

To impress his date, this guy practically puts the Wizards' mascot G-man out of a job with his awesome halftime dunk. I think we can all agree it worked.

Watch as a fight between two fast food mascots unexpectedly turns into a love story, complete with endearing, adolescent awkwardness. Video inside!

Ole Miss retired its Confederate soldier mascot, 'Colonel Reb.' because it's 2010. In a highly emotional vote, students have picked "Rebel Black Bear," as their new mascot. So now it's a bear fighting for the right to own slaves?

On last night's Real Sports With Bryant Gumbel, we got an inside look at the rigorous emotional and physical preparation it takes for a number of college students to don over-sized costumes and receive the brunt of drunken fratboy heckling.

The University of Mississippi's retiring its Confederate soldier mascot, "Colonel Reb." Gee, if football mascots can't openly celebrate slavery, what's next—no derogatory slurs for Native Americans as team names? What about the rights of racist football fans? [NYT; Pic]

Sunday officially rang in the new season of America's true past time. No, not football—laughing at silly sports mascots contrived antics. Ian Eagle, for one, is entertained.

After Dina Lohan called the cops on Carvel Ice Cream for denying her freebies, Carvel denounced "entitled" Dina. Now Carvel's mascot, an anthropomorphized chocolate whale named Fudgie, is giving Dina the smackdown on his blog, Twitter, and Facebook page.

If it wasn't a meteor or the Ice Age that killed off the dinosaurs, then it might have been the invention of stairs and roller blades that did them in. The inflatable breed of dinosaurs at least.

Wow, a pair of gay, one-eyed spacemen named Wenlock and Mandeville are the mascots for London's 2012 Olympics. Before you judge: We've exclusively obtained a transcript which shows how a London design studio came up with the mascots.

The history of sports mascotting is fraught with violence. Well, not really. But sometimes mascots can take things a little too far, resulting in pissed off fans or people dressed as cartoon animals punching one another in their plush faces.

Everyone, including their own creator, thinks that Beijing's Olympic mascots suck. Slate asks: "Or are they really good?" [Slate]