Would anyone like to guess in what state this sign was found?

Via Best Week Ever:

John Lennon: "Jesus was all right, but his disciples were thick and ordinary. It's them twisting it that ruins it for me."

ETA: And in other news from Tenn, the state is preparing to go for the silver medal in executions, scheduling five to take place in one day. The gold is held by Virginia, where eight men were once excuted in a day.

Keep the line moving:

Prison officials say they just need two to three hours between them so they can get the families of one inmate out and the next one in.

So you want to see Hermione Granger "all dolled-up like a street-walker circa 1985"

We here at Dictionopolis In Digitopolis have anticipated your every need.



The quote is from Pink Is The New Blog, the photo is from ohnotheydidn't!

Jezebel! Harlot! Begone!

From Anne Hathaway's "I'd kill to work with" list in the June 23 Entertainment Weekly:

Tim Burton.
Hathaway calls the director a "visual artist and genius storyteller, adding that she has to do a movie with him "before I die."

I call the so-called artist an overrated, talentless hack who makes terrible, bloated movies.

I'm right.

Next, Cartman makes her eat her parents

Poor Bush daughter. She likes Radiohead enough to come to their show, and they think she's dumb.

PS: In case you're not hip to the reference in the headline, dig.

Unfortunately, those three are not Bush, Rumsfeld or Rove

U.S. Army charges three with murder in Iraq

Oh, happy day!

The teriffic animated adaptation of Jules Feiffer's Munro, about a four-year-old boy who is accidentally drafted into the army, has been posted at YouTube.



And I figured out how to post embedded video clips on this blog, though at the moment it seems to involve changing more HTML code than I should probably be entrusted with. There must be an easier way, but you know the old saying, there's the right way, the army way, and my way...

Oh look, a Democrat. Who knew?

Yesterday morning, Jack Murtha had a few things to say about Karl Rove's recent "stay the course" speech.

"He's in New Hampshire. He's making a political speech. He's sitting in his air-conditioned office on his big, fat backside saying stay the course. That's not a plan!

"We got to change direction, that’s what we have to do. You can’t, you can’t sit there in the air conditioned office and tell these troops they’re carrying 70 pounds on their back inside these armored vessels and hit with IEDs every day, seeing their friends blown up, their buddies blown up, and he says 'stay the course.' Yeah, it’s easy to say that from Washington, D.C."

Via Democrats.com.

Random Flickr-Blogging: IMG_0382

Garret would soon realize he had molested the wrong young lady as she turned to him, her eyes maddened, yet blood-red with lust, and tore his throat out with her teeth.

Like all women, he thought grimly to himself as he sank to his knees. Dying, he savored the comfort that at least there was an ending to it, a stopping place for a life that had seemed all too full of pain.

Suddenly he found himself on his feet again, not quite knowing how he had gotten there, his throat intact. Again his hands were rising to a too-friendly embrace of the woman he'd met just hours before, and again she rounded on him in savage attack.

This happened again and again and he remembered every time until finally, at last he was able to speak a few short, shocked words before she crushed his throat.

"Just want to go home...how...let me die!"

Her face lit up larger than the Circus Circus sign.

"We told you," she hissed, and he saw that her tongue was long, forked and dark red, not pink and soft as he'd hoped when he'd met her over drinks and lied about being a brain surgeon. "We told you," and here she began to cackle, softly at first but spiraling upwards...

"We told you...what happens in Vegas...stays in Vegas!"

Then he felt her teeth sink in and the warm spurt of his own blood flowing down his neck. It was not the first time...and would not be the last.

Original credit.

Shameless

A few years after the performer/writer/genius Peter Cook (Bedazzled, Beyond The Fringe) died, his widow Lin edited a celebrity-studded collection of reminiscences about him. It's a terrifically entertaining book, marred only by the fact that, as Cook's biographer the late Harry Thompson later wrote, "As editor, Lin was proud rather than embarassed to include unstinting praise of herself."

Amongst the things I've always admired about Garry Trudeau is his tendency to include the brickbats as well as bouquets on the jacket of Doonesbury books.

Mark Evanier has written a few times about the way he cringes at memorial services when people get up and talk, not about the deceased, but about themselves.

Which brings me to Memories Of John Lennon, a book edited by Yoko Ono.

This has been a review.

*If you want to see what I have to say at more length, that link is to the Amazon page for the book. I'm somewhere in there. But the above is all you really need to know.

And you can dance...For inspiration...Come on...I'm waiting

This week the AFI (American Film Institute) announced their selections for movies they believe most inspire us. Roger Ebert has the list. Looking at it, I find that only two or three would I say really inspired me personally-there are others that I liked, but not that I would say really inspired me.

One I don't get why it's considered inspirational.

The few that did are "Star Wars," "The Black Stallion" and "Fiddler On The Roof". The one I don't quite understand why it should be inspiring is "Thelma & Louise." I still don't get that. But anyway, it got me thinking, what does inspire me?

It's nothing very shocking if you know me (and probably not even if you've just been reading my blogs for any length of time). Let's define the term, inspire:

To fill with enlivening or exalting emotion
To stimulate to action; motivate
To stimulate energies, ideals, or reverence

What does that for me? Beautiful women, of course, represented here by Rebecca DeMornay. I've tried before, and I'll probably spend the rest of my life trying again and again, to get down what really happens inside a man when he sees a woman he thinks is beautiful. It is so much more than just the desire for seduction.



Then there's the best writers, like oh, say, Aaron Sorkin, who as chance would have it, had something to say about the above subject.

Jeremy: (voice over) One last thing: Dan finally got over his writer's block. He met Stacy Kerr at The Smoking Dog. Stacy plays on the women's professional beach volleyball tour. Turns out Stacy's a big fan of Dan's and was particularly taken by his writing....And in that moment, Dan was reminded once again why he wanted to write in the first place....It's for the same reason anybody does anything: to impress women.

-Sports Night, "Dear Louise," written by David Walpert and Aaron Sorkin

And then there is divine music. It is the gods among us, whether it's Kirsty MacColl or Cole Porter.

That's all, really. Not much, is it? Just all there is. Beautiful women, the best writing, divine music.

That's not so much to ask, now is it?

Stan Freberg , revered satirist, modestly presents...

...an old commercial (via News From ME).

MirrorMask

I think I understand why this film was not generally well-received by the critics, it probably helps to have come in predisposed to the collaborations of Dave McKean and Neil Gaiman, as I was. If you are so predisposed, one look at the trailer (which you can and should watch here) made you realize: This is a movie that looks just like a piece of Dave McKean artwork...which of course it is. That's the kind of spiral logic this film inspires.

Now I regret having waited for home video, I wish I'd seen it on a big screen. More, I wish virtual reality had actually worked out; if ever there was a movie that makes you wish you could strap on your goggles and step inside it, this is the one.

I believe it was also underrated by critics because at first viewing-I intend watching it again-the climax does not quite come off. And that sends critics home to their keyboards (trust me, I know) with a feeling that all the spokes of the wheel do not quite reach from the rim to the hub.

Yet as I think about it (or perhaps I mean reflect upon it given the title), I think that perhaps the seeds of the ending were planted earlier in the film and there is a logic to it, but dream logic. Which is all we should expect from Gaiman. I am being, of course, deliberately vague for your experience of this film should be your own.

I want to say: This is an amazing thing; something...

PS: As for the DVD, the "making of" documentary is worth it for the brief scene of Gaiman playfully bitching at his longtime collaborator alone."You were the one who had to have monkeybirds...mice on roller skates, I said, they'll be a lot smaller...but no..."

I've been reading a few books about Van Gogh recently

...though certainly nothing like enough to call myself any kind of an expert.

But I think this is my favorite of his portraits that I've seen. It's called Adeline Ravoux (for that is she) and it was painted 116 years ago this month.

You can find out a little bit more about the subject by following the link in her name.

Some of you might think these are gratuitious pictures of Anne Hathaway

Those of you who are foolish enough to believe there can ever really be such a thing, that is.



Sigh...



Whimper...

The Japanese are into some seriously fucked-up shit

But this is fucking hypnotic.

Cartoons at which to smile grimly

More here.

I actually think this is kind of funny

A local news team in Indiana has put together a little comedy commercial taking shots at Jon Stewart and The Daily Show. The sense I get is that it's of the "it's all good fun" variety. There's certainly nothing wrong with that, and I can't imagine Stewart sweating over it .

Some of the folk at Best Week Ever, where you can watch it, seem to think their hero has seriously been dissed. Some of the folk at Best Week Ever spend too much time thinking about the cast of Full House, Lindsay Lohan's pussy, and what goes into and out of Paris Hilton's mouth.

words and image

-Photo credit: Vincent.

Rain rain
Go away
I can't stand this
One more day
I'll close my eyes
I'll shut my brain
I can't stand this
Fucking rain
- Crush, Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark

Lord, I wish I were a drinking man

The Beatles "All You Need Is Love."

• Almost as naive as your average Howard Jones lyric? You betcha.
• But a genuine celebration, an artifact? Absolutely. If anyone cares I think Barry Miles' Paul McCartney-Many Years From Now is the best book ever written on the songwriter, at least in his Beatle years. Miles writes of this song:

  It was the philosophy of Sgt. Pepper and the era reduced to five words.

• It's the site of one of the great self-quotes in pop music history, when Lennon starts singing "She Loves You" at the end.
• And of course, influencewise, it's all over Tears For Fears' "Sowing The Seeds Of Love," something they never hid-they used to follow performing that song in concert by covering the Beatle tune.

Yes, "All You Need Is Love" is all those things and even more.

And now it's the soundtrack to a commercial for credit cards.

The dream is over, yesterday.

Someone finally suggests a use for the Bush twins

Rep. Walter Jones, the North Carolina Republican who invented the phrase "freedom fries," invited me into his Capitol Hill office Thursday morning, a cluttered space festooned from floor to ceiling with military memorabilia, Pentagon plaques and photographs of soldiers. Then he pulled out an e-mail he had recently received from an Army captain who served in Iraq.

The e-mail quoted another American soldier serving in Iraq, a voice that Jones wanted people to hear. "Tell all those assholes in D.C. to get us the f--- out of here. This is bullshit," Jones said, reading from the e-mail, but choosing not to pronounce the f-word in full. "Either that or tell them to tell Bush to send over the twins. They can bunk with me. That would be useful."

From Salon.

This is the kind of thing that makes one proud to be an American

A couple of girls drive to DC for the Pride parade. While there, they are propositioned by a fellow who gives them his business card and eventually offers "to pay for our room and give us a thousand dollars if two of us would fuck him."

Charming, no? Being in town for the Pride parade, they respectfully decline.

Fellow turns out to be prominent RNC spokesman, defender of Ann Coulter's assult on 9/11 widows, and one who compared Patrick Fitzgerald to Joe McCarthy, Jack Burkman.

One of the girls has a MySpace account. Wonkette has the beginnings of this sorry tale. BTW, let the clicker beware: If you follow the link on that page to the DC Pride Event pictures, be advised that there's a hell of a lot of them and they may take some time to load.

But you might want to anyway, one or two of them are quite adorable.

PS-Girl adds:

he asked if i made exceptions for men at all, and i was like, "not for republicans."

PPS: Girl is from Tennessee, and I just don't know what to think about that.

That's a bad idea.

Okay...Logo, the (nominally) gay and lesbian network that wouldn't run an ad by the UCC promoting their message of acceptance has announced their plans for new original programming.

These include

a reality show that gives lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) participants an opportunity to confront friends and loved ones who have disowned them because of their sexuality.

That's a bad idea. That's a really, really bad idea. It's also, unfortunately, so typical of reality and talk shows which however much they may spew about building bridges, are about creating confrontation and never mind the consequences.

Even allowing that I haven't seen this reality show, I can't imagine how it's going to be about anything other than making a bad situation worse and exploiting the pain of others in hopes of good ratings.

Does anyone remember the Jenny Jones "gay crush" killing?

Also in their programming:

-- "That Gay Ghost," a half-hour sitcom pilot that centers on the members of a conservative family whose lives are changed when they discover that a gay ghost named Cosmo is living in the closet of their new home.

Wait a minute...that's Topper!

Source: ohnotheydidn't

Is it wrong that I don't even know who Dan Brown is?

According to Raving Road Warrior Queen magazine...I'm sorry, Forbes magazine (via Bricks and Stones),

The top ten most influential celebrities are as follows:
1. TOM CRUISE
2. THE ROLLING STONES
3. OPRAH WINFREY
4. U2
5. TIGER WOODS
6. STEVE SPIELBERG
7. HOWARD STERN
8. 50 CENT
9. CAST OF THE SOPRANOS
10. DAN BROWN

Now-leaving out what I may personally think of any of these celebrities-at least, I know who nine of them are.

Sweet god.

Oh dear.

You know, you try not to stereotype conservatives. Sometimes you fail to resist, but you try not to.

My quoting and agreeing with Mark's post about Ann Coulter attracted a comment by a fella who blogs under the name of (allow for fanfare)...Texas Truth. TT cordially invited me to visit his blog and read what he has to say, so I did.

Molly Ivins once wrote, of Rush Limbaugh fans or "dittoheads,"

I wouldn't say that dittoheads as a group lack the ability to reason. It's just that whenever I run across them they seem to be at a low ebb in reasoning skills.

When I read conservative blogs, I tend to jump on spelling errors, especially if there are more than might generously be explained as typos. My default joke is usually something about "the right's trademark original relationship with literacy."

Well, here's where a joke becomes sad. TT's blog has a number of such errors, including one he makes twice even though he's quoting an article in which the word is spelled correctly.

TT's occupation, as listed in his Blogger profile?

I am a public high school educator in my early 50s, who has been teaching for 28 years.

I've really got to stop watching television after 11 o'clock at night

The commercial kind, anyway. So I'm watching Moonraker on AMC and coming over all nostalgic-it was my very first Bond film. Then they cut to a commercial. It was for some erectile disfunction aid or other.

In the ad, a middle-aged-to-elderly couple are about to go upstairs, meaningful looks in their eyes. Just then, a knock comes at the door. Oh no! It's the kids and grandkids, making an unscheduled visit.

A voiceover informs us that if, just when you think the "right time" has arrived, you're interupted by such flotsam and jetsam, don't sweat it. Because this little pill is good for up to several hours. Thus gratified, they welcome the kids in to play.

So you're telling me...this guy is going to spend a few hours...playing with children...with some huge fucking boner on.

All right...

You know, normally my default response to news of a bookburning...

...is a Paula Poundstone quote: Did we learn nothing from Footloose? But for some reason, this worries me a little more.

Pam in da House:

Someone set fire to the gay and lesbian book section of the John Merlo Library in Chicago's Lakeview neighborhood, and there's speculation that this was a hate crime.

Blender Greg G. initially emailed me about this story; he called the library and was told by a staffer they think it was definitely arson and one target was the LGBT collection.

WMAQ Chicago has additional information on the arson.

Chicago police said they were calling Tuesday's incident arson, but representatives of the gay community said on Wednesday that the timing with the upcoming Gay Pride Parade and proposed laws dealing with gay marriage in the works, the incident is too coincidental.

..."Lakeview and the city of Chicago represents some of the most accepting, tolerant communities in the United States," said Art Johnston, a board member of Equality Illinois. "The fact that this could happen in a library, of all places, is scary for all of us. In my experience, an attack on any of the communities is an attack on all of us."

[A local "pro-family" (right wing) activist is] angry at Mayor Daley because the mayor welcomed the 2006 Gay Games -- and declined to bid for the next Republican National Convention...Then he was mad at Kraft and Walgreens, two sponsors of the Gay Games (Walgreens is providing HIV/AIDS awareness education as well) that refused to back out when he started throwing a tantrum.

Pam has several examples of the activists delightful tantrums at the link above. She concludes,

So, it's not as if there hasn't been a sufficient amount of wingnut activity around that would make it possible for some fool in Chicago to think burning gay books is A-OK with the moralists.

Or maybe I'm just bummed this happened before Bob's book could be part of it, let alone mine.

The last Ann Coulter post you'll see here for a while

It strikes me that all her invective and "controversial remarks" have but one purpose: The financial enrichment of Ann Coulter.

The section of Coulter's new book that's making headlines and getting her on highly-rated TV shows is her attack on a small group of 9/11 widows whose main sin seems to be that they made commercials for John Kerry. (Has anyone asked her if she'd object to 9/11 widows making commercials for Bush-Cheney?)

If memory serves, at least one 9/11 widow did just that.

Last night, Jay Leno had Coulter on, paired with George Carlin for what NBC press releases promised would be mano a mano combat. But that was a false promise because Carlin, even if he thinks Coulter is utterly wrongheaded, is not about to fault someone too much for saying things that some find offensive. He kind of makes his living doing that, after all. Leno offered a feeble challenge to her views but since she's good at this kind of thing and since her supporters packed The Tonight Show audience to cheer her, she came off as a superstar, at least to the kind of viewer likely to ever buy her book. I suppose Jay and his producers thought it was worth it because of the ratings they'd get with the great Carlin-Coulter Slap-Off...but they didn't even get that. The numbers for last night were about average for a Wednesday, maybe even a few tenths of a point off. I'd like to think it's because America, like me, is already bored with this bogus controversy.

Mark's right.

I'm not much one for cute pictures of kids

Especially kids I don't know. But come on.

I kinda like this. I don't know why.

Click to enlarge. It's from a webcomic called Sinfest (You can look at other strips here) that's new to me but which seems very well drawn and pretty funny. Here's a little information about the cartoonist.

Seven movies that apparently more of you need to see

...because none of you got them in my little movie-quote quiz last week.

Mother? I love art.

...was from It's My Party. One of the things I like most about this movie is the way it uses its large ensemble cast. The story's about a gathering of friends around one person; but there isn't time to map out every detail of all their relationships to him. So you just get enough.

"...who's Ann Miller?"
"Leave this house."

...was from Jeffrey. I adore this film for its performances, especially Steven Weber as the title character, Patrick Stewart getting to show more warmth and humanity than he ever did as Picard and Nathan Lane in a memorable cameo. And because the jokes are very, very funny.

I resent you. I resent everything about you. You had Mom and Dad's unconditional love, now you have the world's. How could I not envy that? I wish I could say it was because you're so much better looking than me. No, the real pain is that it's something so much harder to bear. You got the good soul; I got the bad one. Think about leaving me yours...

...was from Love! Valour! Compassion! I put these three films together because they're all about gay men. Two of them are also based on plays, the third, It's My Party, might easily be seen as a play since it's mostly on one set and takes place over the space of two days.

I've often joked with my friends that my personality, certainly my musical taste, would make so much more sense if I were gay. If I could just get over this darned "attracted to women" thing. In LVC we meet (among others) a character who I believe is very much the kind of gay man I would be if I was: The loving, apparently happy-go-lucky Buzz, played by Jason Alexander.

Except for Alexander, all the cast are veterans of the stage version. He was cast presumably to capitalize on his fame but it's a touching performance that I personally prefer to the overrated Seinfeld.

Also featured in another strong ensemble is Stephen Spinella, who turned up this season on 24 as the treacherous, ambitious Miles. The quote in question, though, comes from John Glover, who plays twins in the movie, reprising a role for which he won the Tony onstage. It's a performance of stunning brilliance and grace, aided immeasurably by the superb script.

"He just came in for few hours to uh, to uh, fuck me."
"It takes a few hours."

...was from My Best Friend's Wedding. Amee, this is the movie that you and I watched over here once when we weren't paying attention to other things.

This film stands for me as one of the best uses of a movie star (as opposed to an actor) in recent cinema history. Cast with someone who doesn't have the audience dazzled as much as Julia Roberts, the protaganist of this movie could come off as downright psychopathic.

But with her and a sturdy screenplay, it's as sweet a confection as a good wedding cake. Great soundtrack, too.

Oh, and there's another gay man in it. Means nothing.

"Now what the Good Master is telling us all right now is that up in Heaven, there are about a hundred million little tiny angels about 'yea' by 'yea', and they all take shorthand. And every time you do something silly, they write it down..."
"No, no."
"That's not what the Good Master is telling us."

...is from Godspell, one of my all-time favorite movie musicals. I love it, so sue me.

"Are you nervous?"
"No."
"Good. My nervousness exists on several levels; number one, and this is in no particular order, I haven't done this in a pretty long time. Number two, uh, any expectations that you might have, given the fact that I'm... you know..."
"The most powerful man in the world?"
"Exactly, thank you. I think it's important you remember that's a political distinction, it comes with the office."

Now this one, I'm kind of disappointed that none of you got. Even if you hadn't seen it or just didn't remember that particular dialogue, from the context, it would seem to be a romantic comedy, wouldn't it? A romantic comedy about The American President.

Which was only written by Aaron Sorkin, who if you don't know I think is one of the strongest writers of film and television we have today, you haven't been paying attention.

"You were wonderful! We're free!"
"Kara, we're inside a Russian airbase in the middle of Afghanistan!"

Sherman came closest to getting this one, remembering it was from a James Bond movie but not which one. It's The Living Daylights, still one of my favorite Bond films. It always makes me a little sad that Timothy Dalton didn't get to play the part more than one other time, in the much-less successful Licence To Kill. He deserved better than to only do twice as many as George Lazenby.

It's also got John Barry contributing his last musical score to the series; it's one of his most exciting. And this is fucking self indulgent, but what the hell it's my blog: At the quiz in My Girlfriend's Boyfriend, this is the movie which end-credits song they're trying to remember, and there's an in-joke reason, beyond just that I like it.

That's the darndest callback I've ever seen

So I'm watching George Carlin on the Leno show, and they show a clip from Cars, in which he plays a VW van with the character of a hippy. In the clip, he's staring at a traffic light like a Pink Floyd fan at a black light poster.

And one of the other cars says to him, "The '60s weren't good to you, were they?"

Now-what you gotta understand about me is that I'm a George Carlin fan from way back, and I have a freakishly good memory. So the first thing I think of is a joke from Outrageous Fortune, a 1987 movie in which Carlin took a small part.

In that film, he played a cowboy/hippy type who, when Shelley Long and Bette Midler describe the convoluted plot so far to him near the end of the movie, replies, "The '60s were good to you, weren't they?"

Whoa...

Ford every stream, and so on

You Should Spend Your Summer in the Mountains

You're quiet, introspective, and a great thinker. You need a summer vacation that gets you away from the crowds and the heat. So retreat to the mountains, where you can clear your head.

Where Should You Spend Your Summer?

See, what I love about Anne Hathaway...let me rephrase that...

...amongst the things that I love about Anne Hathaway, is that even though she already has my love, she keeps on trying to earn it:

"I was raised Catholic. When I was 11, I felt like I got a calling from God to be a nun. But when I was about 15, I realized my older brother was gay, and I couldn't support a religion that didn't support my brother."
-Anne Hathaway

Sigh...

(quote via ohnotheydidn't)

I believe the expression is "Like she's been ridden hard and put away wet"

Mary-Kate Olsen, ladies and gentlemen.

Anyone else ever get the feeling that Bush couldn't outsmart the Trix rabbit?

Ok. You should all know how I feel and what I think about President Bush by now. And if by some chance you're new, scroll down two or three posts and you should pick it up in a hurry.

But, I know what you're saying.

You're saying, if only there was footage of him making an ass out of himself by making fun of a blind man.

Well, guess what.

There is such footage.

Some like it hot and some sweat when the heat is on

So there's this fella named Bob Corker, Republican of...you know it's coming...Tennessee. He's either a cynical opportunist or a homophobe (if you support a Constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriage, there just ain't a third choice).



The girl on the left is his daughter.

Thank you, Wonkette.

La la la, la la la la, la la la la la la la...

There's a sun shining in the sky, but that's not the reason why I'm feeling warm inside

A commenter who wished to remain anonymous (but who almost certainly hails from Bolingbrook, Illinois-home of the second IKEA outlet in the state!) went looking for messages of support for Ann Coulter.

Unfortunately for them, since Ms. Coulter's most recent remarks are indefensible even by her low standards, what they mainly found were postings like mine of earlier today. Postings from Democratic bloggers suggesting that what Ann had said was, like what she usually says, stupid, false and silly.

This confused and infuriated them, and he/she/it wrote me with a list of questions. I'm here to please (and don't you ever forget that, ladies), so let's take a look at those questions and see if we can't help make things clearer for our new friend.

Who writes:

What do you know about conservatives?

I know that Dick Cheney is willing to cynically exploit people just like his daughter for votes. I know that he and Bush are incompetents who have run this country much the same way the Skipper and Gilligan ran the Minnow. I know that conservatives love to pat themselves on the back even (if not especially) when they don't deserve it. I know they're armchair warriors who love to talk a good game about supporting a war but get kinda queasy when you suggest they join up and fight in it. I don't know, but I suspect they like Larry the Cable Guy.

Next question?

Why don't you talk from your malcontent liberal heart!

Um...I thought I was. BTW, Malcontent: "One who rebels against the established system." With Bush's approval rating having hit 29%, there sure are a lot of us, aren't there?

Why don't you say what you mean - something like - "I wish conservatives were turning against Ann Coulter because she scares me.

Again, possibly because that's not what I mean. I mean that there's something really wrong with Ann Coulter.

[or]If all conservatives start talking like her, it looks like I'm in for the fight I've looking for."

Putting aside the right's trademark original relationship with literacy...if all conservatives start talking like her, we'll get a Democrat elected President in 2008 by a landslide.

Please don't hesitate to write again if you have any further questions.

There are some things to which only John Lydon songs seem to be an appropriate response

Things like this. Via Firedoglake:

The prosecutor in the C.I.A. leak case on Monday advised Karl Rove, the senior White House adviser, that he would not be charged with any wrongdoing, effectively ending the nearly three-year criminal investigation that had at times focused intensely on Mr. Rove.

The decision by the prosecutor, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, announced in a letter to Mr. Rove’s lawyer, Robert D. Luskin, lifted a pall that had hung over Mr. Rove who testified on five occasions to a federal grand jury about his involvement in the disclosure of an intelligence officer’s identity.

In a statement, Mr. Luskin said, "On June 12, 2006, Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald formally advised us that he does not anticipate seeking charges against Karl Rove."

Mr. Lydon?

This is a world destruction
Your life ain't nothing
The human race is becoming a disgrace
The rich get richer
The poor are getting poorer
Fascist, chauvinistic government fools
- Time Zone, World Destruction

Vocals: John Lydon and Afrika Bambaataa
(by Bambaataa / Laswell)

Anything else you'd like to say, Mr. Lydon?

What's it all about
They scream and then they shout
Don't ask me
Cause I don't know
What's it all about
They scream and then they shout
Don't blame me
I told you so
-DON’T ASK ME
(Public Image Ltd)
(by Dias/ Lydon/ McGeoch)

Well, that about sums it up.

Whoever's booking The Tonight Show these days has a delightful sense of humor

It was only last week I was marveling at the cross-booking of the Blue Collar Comedy fellas with Tim Russert and David Lee Roth. Tomorrow, Ann Coulter...and George Carlin. This should be at the very least, an interesting interview or two.

"For the record, both Cruise and Travolta have said repeatedly they are not gay."

If Tom Cruise's recent public displays weren't evidence enough, Scientologists Jenna and Bodhi Elfman prove that they, too, are willing to go to great lengths to defend their religion.

Indie film director John Roecker tells TMZ he was walking to his car with a female friend in LA's trendy Los Feliz neighborhood last Sunday when he was approached by a shirtless man and a tall blonde. "Hey, man, you're making fun of my religion," said the stranger angrily.

Roecker quickly recognized the couple as actor Bodhi Elfman and his wife, 'Dharma and Greg' star Jenna Elfman. Mr. Elfman's ire was apparently drawn by Roecker's self-made t-shirt, which had a picture of Tom Cruise on the front under the caption "Scientology is Gay!" and a 'Stayin'-Alive'-era John Travolta on the back with the words "Very Gay!" For the record, both Cruise and Travolta have said repeatedly they are not gay.

Roecker says Jenna repeatedly said "What crimes have you committed?" and began screaming at Roecker, "Have you raped a baby?" as motorists on Los Feliz Boulevard drove by in snarled traffic.

There's more if you can take it.

Okay, the bloggers in Vegas thing

As you may have seen elsewhere, this past weekend there was a convention of lefty bloggers in Las Vegas, complete with high-profile political guests like Wesley Clark & Nancy Pelosi and a certain amount of attention from the traditional media.

Those who were there have been blogging it. Hoo boy, have they ever been blogging it, in a disturbingly snake-chasing-its-own-tail manner.

Tom puts his finger neatly on the problem when he says:

The problem is that people seem to be taking themselves rather too seriously.

Yes, precisely that. And moreso-there is a palpable eagerness to be "legitimized". I recognize it from my days as a comic book and/or science fiction and fantasy fan. There were always people who were only too willing to talk to any local camera crew, in hopes of helping fantastic literature gain its proper place in the American Pantheon.

I happen to think it deserved such a place. I also happened to notice that the crews only ever stopped to talk to the loons in Superman costumes.

The conservative blogs are turning against Ann Coulter

As we haven't played in a while, I thought about doing this as a nice, rousing game of...Who Said It?

This time, though, I'm just gonna tell you who said it. Because this time, it's not just who said it, it's who they said it about and what it is they said.

Via Hullabaloo, someone at Daily Kos has come up with a sampling of prominent con-bloggers calling out Ann Coulter for her attack on the 9/11 widows. See, they want us to believe they find things like that just as morally repugnant as we do.

Almost as though they had a moral compass. Right.

In my favorite, Ace Of Spades sez:

this nastiness is uncalled for. Even if something is actually felt deep inside -- even if you're filled with toxic hatred for very annoying, very presumptuous, very left-leaning women with an overweening sense of entitlement -- most people would find less abrasive ways to express such an emotion. Does that mean that Ann is just more honest than us "nancy boys"? Not really. A lot of the time the excuse of "I was just being honest" is just a code for "I'm basically an inconsiderate [butthead] who cannot be bothered to modify my behavior in even the slightest fashion in order to observe basic conventions of social decency."

Now--put aside for the moment that AoS's argument is basically, "dude, I know it's true that the 9/11 widows are whores but you shouldn't say it."

As Digby points out, this sudden awareness that Ann Coulter is so utterly wrongheaded I doubt the happiest feminist would deny she needs a slap across the face is somewhat new to the right-wing community.

To refresh our memory, Dig's put together his own selection of quotes that these self-same Republican bloggers were only too glad to support, if only by their conspicuous silence, when they were in high cotton.

These were my favorites:

"When contemplating college liberals, you really regret once again that John Walker is not getting the death penalty. We need to execute people like John Walker in order to physically intimidate liberals, by making them realize that they can be killed too. Otherwise they will turn out to be outright traitors."

"it's far preferable to fight [terrorists] in the streets of Baghdad than in the streets of New York where the residents would immediately surrender."

"My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York Times Building."

"Liberals can't just come out and say they want to take our money, kill babies and discriminate on the basis of race."

Digby concludes:

So what has precipitated this new wingnut sensitivity? Republican popularity, that's what. That's when the movement starts casting its dead weight overboard.

You can say this for the Republicans. They have the courage of their convictions.

And Huff this season has been just as smartly written as the first.

Okay...I know this isn't exactly a new question

...but could someone please tell me what L.A. does to some women? Let me explain what I'm talking about.

Once or twice around here and in my old blog, I've expressed my horror at redheaded actress Laura Prepon going blonde. My tongue is somewhat in my cheek when I say these things but not entirely. I considered the way her red hair set off her carnal, sensual face to be one of the most strikingly attractive things about her.

Now, as a blonde, her face just kind of disappears into the woodwork.

Jennifer Grey is another, and probably the most extreme, version of what I'm talking about. As most people probably know by now, she had a nose job that rendered her unrecognizable. And completely destroyed what was most distinctive-and I'd always thought kinda sexy-about her face.

So here's what brought this on. Early this morning, I'm watching the Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson. Sara Rue, star of the sitcom Less Than Perfect is to be a guest. I've never actually seen an episode of Less Than Perfect, but I'd caught glimpses of Rue here and there. From what I saw on Celebrity Poker Showdown and the like, she seemed to have a decent sense of humor about herself, always attractive in a woman. And she was a big-sized girl, but damn if it didn't look great on her.

So-as if you're not already ahead of me-Ferguson introduces her and this walks out:


As I say, I know this isn't exactly a new question. But could someone tell me what L.A. does to some women that makes them want to remove what's most striking, attractive, distinctive, sexy and great-looking about themselves?

In favor of looking like everybody else?

And the human condition goes on and goes on and goes on

Good afternoon. Back in November, I mused, "Sometimes I wonder at what point Madonna was replaced by a robot." This was, obviously, before I'd declared the cease-fire that is still in effect.

Now then:

Sometimes I wonder at what point Denise Richards was replaced by a robot...




...no, no I don't. Actually, I'd always kinda figured she was...

Pic via Best Week Ever.

The Real Larry the Cable Guy

This is the kind of information that should be shared with as many people as possible, so I encourage you to pass it along to your friends. It's a clip of Larry, A.K.A. Dan Whitney, as he was in the '80s.

For those of you who didn't know that "LtCG" is a character designed to appeal to stupid people and sexists played by a cynical opportunist, prepare yourselves for a shock. Those of you who always kinda suspected that, prepare yourself to meet the conniving hack behind the sleeveless shirt.

Colbert is going to be all over this story

Via Hullabaloo:

WEST MILFORD, N.J. - A black bear picked the wrong New Jersey yard for a jaunt earlier this week, running into a territorial tabby who ran the furry beast up a tree — twice.

Jack, a 15-pound orange-and-white cat, keeps a close vigil on his property, chasing small animals when he can, but his owners and neighbors say his latest escapade was surprising.

"We used to joke, 'Jack's on duty,' never knowing he'd go after a bear," cat owner Donna Dickey told The Star-Ledger of Newark for Friday's newspapers.

Be sure to click on the link above for the photos.

Random Flickr-Blogging: IMG_9369

(If you don't know what RFB is, go here)



Three songs and a book:

Take me out tonight
Take me anywhere, I don't care
I don't care, I don't care
And in the darkened underpass
I thought Oh God, my chance has come at last
But then a strange fear gripped me
And I just couldn't ask
-There Is A Light That Never Goes Out, The Smiths (song)

There's a club, if you'd like to go
You could meet somebody who really loves you
So you go, and you stand on your own
And you leave on your own
And you go home
And you cry
And you want to die
-How Soon Is Now? The Smiths (song)

'You aren't meant to be alone. None of us are. Now come on back inside, where there are people, where it's warm.'-Happy Endings, Paul Cornell (book)

When the dance floor clears, I walk home alone with their voices still in my ears. The ghosts of dead teenagers sing to me while I am dancing. They're sad and young, and they'll be sad and young forever.
Homeless Club Kids, My Favorite (song)

Original source.

A "Huff" revelation

Each week during the hour of torture that used to be my new favorite TV show, "Huff," I find myself devoting at least part of my brainpan to trying to figure out how a series that I liked so much went so bad.

One of the more schizophrenic things about this season for me has been that I've noticed a lot more women's names in the producing, writing and directing credits. I admit I haven't made a direct comparison, but it seems like a lot more than in the first season.

As I think most of you know, I'm a man who likes writing women characters. And I think, he said modestly, the consensus among both women and men who've read my work is that I do it well. I would never suggest that women couldn't produce or write a show where the protaganist is a man.

A theme this season has been men trying, in their variously fucked up ways, to get things right and getting no sympathy from the women in their lives, who are never called on their own bullshit.

The last thing I want to sound like is a "men's rights" advocate here but it's getting ridiculous. Not least because it's completely out of key with the writing last season, which was supposed to have ended a couple of weeks (at best) before this one started.

Yes, characters evolve, people change. But in two fucking weeks of character time, I'm supposed to accept this new Beth, Izzy (and Bird) as though they were the same people?

What I couldn't figure out-and I've been asking myself for the past two weeks or so--is why, if more women are writing them, the women characters this season have turned almost uniformly nasty and unpleasant.

In tonight's episode, the answer flashed before my eyes like a searchlight. I think it was during the scene when they decided to turn Huff's son Bird into a violent criminal.

It's not that this season of "Huff" was written by women. It's that this season of "Huff" was written by women who, clearly, hate men. They are like the cliche of the man-hating, "feminist" (in the most wearisome sense of the term) lesbians.

I didn't think such women really existed. Yet once I imagined the characters and writing this season being shaped through such a perspective, it all made frightening amounts of sense.

That's why Huff is taking all the punishment for his marriage falling apart and Beth's holding dinner parties. Beth cannot share the responsibility, she can only be the victim. That's why Bird has suffered arguably the most wrenching character change-he's a boy, and boys are icky.

That's why the only exception to the above-stated theme of men who are fucked-up but trying getting no sympathy from the women in their lives is Teddy-because Teddy is completely dependent and childlike.

That's why Beth gets to have her hot tongue-kissing action with a girlfriend, but then is freed from the responsibility of dealing with that further. By a frickin' woman priest, no less, who dismisses it as "multi-tasking." How modern.

That's why the girlfriend is then exposed as a "drunken train wreck" about whom Beth says "her problems aren't my problems." Suuuuure they're not, Bethy. That's why Beth gets the thrill of being offered a night of string-free sex with a British stud but turns him down, because all of a sudden she's got morals and strength of character.

And that's why, meanwhile, Huff is betraying his wedding vows with an Asian hooker. In the kind of place where men lie in tubs while women pee on them (as they're all-too-happy to show us in a quick, explicit, "It's Showtime!" flash).

Men can be degraded, but women must be allowed to keep their dignity. They can flirt with being immoral, because that's dirty and sexy and fun, but only men, those callow beasts, can actually cross the line.

Because man is irredeemable unless, like Teddy, he is completely dependent on women.

"Huff" has been written this season by women who clearly hate men.

And I don't think I should suffer to endure it any longer.

non-verbal poetry

Ok, "Cars" has been out for two-three days now...

...it's time to start looking forward to the new Pixar movie, out next summer. It's called Ratatouille, bringing to mind one of my favorite Fawlty Towers jokes.

It's co-directed by Brad Bird, who made The Incredibles and (much closer to my heart) The Iron Giant, plus that "Family Dog" episode of Amazing Stories.

You can check out the trailer here. Click on "trailers" on the left side of the screen.

Patton Oswalt is Ratatouille and reportedly, Bird himself is the French waiter (he was also Edna in The Incredibles) you see in the preview.

Liz Hurley has a fair amount of cleavage

And apparently, French Elle felt it was important that we know that.

Okay, the al-Zarqawi's death thing

At Unclaimed Territory, guest-blogger Hume's Ghost does a fine job articulating my feelings on the matter.

• Is it a good thing? Sure looks that way.
• Will it lead to a more peaceful, stable Iraq? Well...that's considerably less certain but I think it's fair to say anyone with the least scrap of human decency hopes it will.
• Does it, in one shot, rationalize everything and everything the United States did in the lead-up to the war and has done in the war itself? Absolutely not.

Hume says it a lot better.

What we talk about when we talk about blogs

A site called Blogometer did an interesting poll; they asked the most popular bloggers to name their favorite blogs. Results are here. There's some good stuff, especially in the top 15.

This is it...I have reached the top.

I...am being linked to by a Paris Hilton web page.

It's a hap-hap-happy day

Just gotten in trade at used book store:

• Hot Seat, Theater Criticism for the New York Times, 1980-1993, Frank Rich
• Dazzler: The Life And Times Of Moss Hart, Stephen Bach
• Rewrites, A Memoir, Neil Simon

Total cost in trade: $5.00

A History of Violence

Saw this film last night. It's very well made and well-acted (Viggo Mortensen is especially good), but I did not find it the revelation that many critics seem to have. Scanning the quotes in the Rotten Tomatoes balance of reviews, I found myself concluding that a lot of reviewers saw things in it that simply weren't there.

But, a well-made, well-acted thriller is never a waste of time, and I'm going to listen to Cronenberg's commentary before I return the DVD to see if he can convince me there is more there than meets the eye.

Another thing I did like is that when the violence comes in this film, as you know it's going to given the title, it is in no way fetishised (if that's a word). As opposed to the way it might be in a X-Men or Mission Impossible movie (and I liked the first two X-Men films, haven't seen the third).

The violence in this picture is quick, it's messy. And without lingering on it, Cronenberg makes sure we see the actual results of such violence.

Ann Coulter is making me rethink my previously hardline stance against hitting women

She's comparing herself to Mark Twain and [H.L.] Mencken.



ETA this illustrative cartoon-and I'm pleased to see that my Alien=republican prediction is being bourne out in the mass media.

Garrison Keillor is just like Maureen Dowd & Arianna Huffington

...in that he's not one of my favorite performers or writers, but when he writes a good piece, he writes a good piece. He's written a good piece for the Baltimore Sun, in which he gives his opinions on why the Republicans have run aground.

As I say, it's a good piece. My only problem with it is a couple of times he makes clearly intended-to-be-ironic statements to which I reacted with all the hope of a young boy at Christmas.

As with:

I see by the papers that the Republicans want to make an issue of Nancy Pelosi in the congressional races this fall: Would you want a San Francisco woman to be speaker of the House?

Will the podium be repainted in lavender stripes with a disco ball overhead? Will she be borne into the chamber by male dancers with glistening torsos and wearing pink tutus?

Will she?

And then:

You might not have always liked Republicans, but you could count on them to manage the bank. They might be lousy tippers, act snooty, talk through their noses, wear spats and splash mud on you as they race their Pierce-Arrows through the village, but you knew they could do the math.

To see them produce a ninny and then follow him loyally into the swamp for five years is disconcerting, like seeing the Rolling Stones take up lite jazz.

I wish.

Look what we can do

Via Yahoo! News:

KATMANDU, Nepal - Just days after a British climber was left to die near Mount Everest's summit, an American guide abandoned his second bid to stand on top of the world so he could rescue a mountaineer mistakenly given up for dead.

Not only did Daniel Mazur not scale the world's highest peak from the northern side, he also failed to get his two paying clients to the top.

Mazur, his two clients and a Sherpa guide were just two hours from the 29,035-foot peak on the morning of May 26 when they came across 50-year-old Lincoln Hall, who was left a day earlier when his own guides believed he was dead.

"I was shocked to see a guy without gloves, hat, oxygen bottles or sleeping bag at sunrise at 28,200 feet height, just sitting up there," said Mazur, who scaled Everest once before, from the southern side, in 1991.

Mazur said Hall's first words to him were: "I imagine you are surprised to see me here."

Mazur said he knew Hall was OK because he was not crying for help and still had a sense of humor.

While Mazur's team was busy assisting Hall, two Italian climbers walked past them toward the summit. When asked to help, they claimed they did not understand English. On his return to base camp, Mazur discovered they did.

"I don't know why they didn't want to stop to help," Mazur said. "I hope when I am there, in that state, and someone passes me ... I hope it is someone like me."

Look what we can do.

His show's still not my cup of tea, but...

...Marc Cherry seems like an admirable guy. At least, that's the impression I gleamed from the new book Desperate Networks, by Bill Carter; my Amazon review went up yesterday.

Let's go to the movies, let's go see the stars

Okay, these are quotes from 15 of my favorite movies. How many can you name? And no fair cheating by looking them up; I'll know.

One:

When teenagers complain that they want to be treated like human beings, it's usually because they are being treated like human beings.

Two:

"...nothing I ever do is good enough. Not beautiful enough, it's not funny enough, it's not deep enough, it's not anything enough. Now, when I see a rose, that's perfect. I mean, that's perfect. I want to look up to God and say, 'How the hell did you do that? And why the hell can't I do that?"

"Now that's probably one of your better con lines."

"Yeah, it is. But that doesn't mean I don't mean it."

Three:

Mother? I love art.

Four:

"...who's Ann Miller?"
"Leave this house."

Five:

I resent you. I resent everything about you. You had Mom and Dad's unconditional love, now you have the world's. How could I not envy that? I wish I could say it was because you're so much better looking than me. No, the real pain is that it's something so much harder to bear. You got the good soul; I got the bad one. Think about leaving me yours...

Six:

"He just came in for few hours to uh, to uh, fuck me."
"It takes a few hours."

Seven:

"Now what the Good Master is telling us all right now is that up in Heaven, there are about a hundred million little tiny angels about 'yea' by 'yea', and they all take shorthand. And every time you do something silly, they write it down..."
"No, no."
"That's not what the Good Master is telling us."

Eight:

Then, I was inspired. Now, I'm sad and tired.

Nine:

"Are you nervous?"
"No."
"Good. My nervousness exists on several levels; number one, and this is in no particular order, I haven't done this in a pretty long time. Number two, uh, any expectations that you might have, given the fact that I'm... you know..."
"The most powerful man in the world?"
"Exactly, thank you. I think it's important you remember that's a political distinction, it comes with the office."

10:

"What's the boogeyman?"
"As a matter of fact... that was."

11:

I don't want you
You bust me up
I don't need you
You burn me up
I don't love you
You plug me in
Leave me alone
You switch me on
I'm self-contained
You light me up
Just go away

12:

"You were wonderful! We're free!"
"Kara, we're inside a Russian airbase in the middle of Afghanistan!"

13:

"It is symbolic of our struggle against oppression."
"It's symbolic of his struggle against reality."

14:

"I'll meet you at the place, near the thing, where we went, that time."
"Okay, I'll meet you there."

15:

Every meal's a banquet! Every paycheck a fortune...I LOVE the corps!

You are so rare to me (UPDATED)

Since he figured out how to post embedded video clips on his blog, something that still eludes me (I'm so ignorant of technology we're lucky I can understand the chair), Mark Evanier has been something of a precious resource.

Well, he kinda already was, but...skip it. I was just looking for a cute way to link to Mark's presentation of a clip from the great old Sid Caesar show. It shows Sid, Carl Reiner and Howie Morris doing a takeoff on the then-new phenomenon of rock n' roll groups and teen idols.

Sometimes when you look back at things like this the people taking the shots come off as smug and condescending jackasses who are about to be left behind by the freight train of history. Not so here.

The trio take the shots where they deserve to be taken and they do it with such commitment and they're having such obvious fun that this clip is still funny some 50-odd years (give or take) since it was first broadcast.

Also, at one point, I swear you can see Caesar inventing breakdancing. Enjoy.

UPDATE: And Shakespeare's Sister found the DS desk segments I mentioned. If you're anything like me, you'll laugh till tears come out of your eyes.

PS: Or if clips from great comedy shows of the past aren't your thing, Mark also found the entire Stewart vs. Bennett debate from the night before last.

Well, duh

You Belong in San Francisco

You crave an eclectic, urban environment. You're half California, half NYC. You're open minded, tolerant, and secretly think you're the best. People may dismiss you as a hippie, but you're also progressive, interesting, and rich!

Where Does Your Inner Californian Belong?

A cheap shot

Ashlee Simpson displaying the endearing young charms that have made her what she is today.



Via Bricks and Stones.

Priorities

GOP Senator David Vitter says of gay marriage: "I don't believe there's any issue that's more important than this one"

David Vitter is the GOP Senator from New Orleans.

Via AmericaBlog.

Jon Stewart shows why he's a national treasure

I assume that most of you watch The Daily Show...well, daily. But if by any chance you missed last night's you owe it to yourself to look for a re-run. Stewart started out by taking on the supersition surrounding yesterday's date better than I've ever seen it done.

The rest of the show was about gay marriage; first in a desk segment with Jon (later joined by Rob Cordry) that was TDS at it's make-you-laugh-so-hard-you'll-think-you're coughing-up-blood best.

Then, a debate with the racist Bill Bennett. Crooks and Liars has a clip and partial transcript, but you'll want to see the whole thing.

Bennett Look, it's a debate about whether you think marriage is between a man and a women.

Stewart:I disagree, I think it's a debate about whether you think gay people are part of the human condition or just a random fetish.

Tell it, brother. C&L adds:

Jon always boils the debate down to it's simplest form which usually causes people like Bennett to look foolish.

Five words (and a long, satisfied sound) on those couple of new templates I was trying recently

There's no place like home...ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh...

The greatest talk show lineup in recent televisual memory

The list of guests for tonights episode of The Tonight Show, with Jay Leno:

Jeff Foxworthy, Larry the Cable Guy, Bill Engvall and...Tim Russert.

David Lee Roth, too.

Now that is a party.

I resent that slur on my dancing

-and driving too, come to think of it.

Your Personality Is Like Alcohol

You're the life of the party, a total flirt, and probably a pretty big jokester. Sometimes your behavior gets you in trouble, but you still remain socially acceptable. You're a pretty bad driver, and you're dancing could also use a little work!

What Drug Is Your Personality Like?

This could be promising

Winona Ryder is reuniting with the scribe who wrote "Heathers" and helped establish the actress as the edgy "it" girl for Generation X.

Ryder has signed on to star as a feminist vigilante who becomes an urban folk hero in "Sex and Death 101," which Daniel Waters wrote and is directing.

Ah, Dan Waters. For me, one of the big question marks among writers. I mean, like it says up there he wrote "Heathers," one of the more perfect movies of the past 15-20 years. He then spent the rest the '90s writing (or at least having his name attached to) varying degrees of crap (Two words: "Hudson Hawk").

But there's no way of knowing how much the final results of those movies reflected his scripts. I do know in the case of "Batman Returns" he's criticised Tim Burton's treatment...which makes him even more my brother.

I have not seen his direct-to-video directorial debut, "Happy Campers" but perhaps I should.

And Ms. Ryder has quite simply never done anything else in her career as...again I come back to the word perfect...as "Heathers" was. So their working together again could be quite promising...quite promising indeed.

I wonder what the story's about?

The story follows a man (Simon Baker) whose life is upended by a mysterious e-mail containing the 101 names of every woman he has had sex with and, eerily, every woman he will have sex with in the future. He is stopped in his tracks when he meets Ryder, a femme fatale who targets men guilty of sex crimes against women.

Cool! Sounds like a Martin Scorcese film of a Harlan Ellison story, which I would certainly want to see.

Julie Bowen ("Boston Legal") also has joined the cast and will play No. 29 on the long list of Baker's libidinous conquests.

Cooler! The star and writer of one of my favorite movies reunited for what sounds like an interesting story, and joined by a star of one of my favorite TV series. Who could ask for anything more?

The movie will be "hard R" for nudity, sex scenes and frequent references to sex, said producer Cary Brokaw.

No comment.

Source: Yahoo! News.

I'm a weak, pathetic shell of a man

I don't like Jessica Simpson much. Believe it or not, I have no respect for her as an artist. As for the question that occasionally gets raised of Is she an airhead? Or is she playing one on TV and in the movies?

I've always thought, doesn't matter. Either she's really a dumb woman making it on the basis of her looks, which I don't like. Or she's cynically pretending to be a dumb woman, making it on sexist appeal, which I don't like.

And I've never even thought she was that cute compared to, say, the Chicks of Dixie. But...

God help me, she looks really, really good in these pictures.


I don't know if I can sleep with myself tonight...

"The hills are aaliive...with the sound of muusic..."

Shakespeare's Sister's latest "caption this photo" fun.

Hey you fool, watch out! You'll get mauled by...

A man shouting that God would keep him safe was mauled to death by a lioness in Kiev zoo after he crept into the animal's enclosure, a zoo official said on Monday.

"The man shouted 'God will save me, if he exists', lowered himself by a rope into the enclosure, took his shoes off and went up to the lions," the official said.

"A lioness went straight for him, knocked him down and severed his carotid artery."

Reuters.com.

I thought Monty Python settled this years ago! God exists, by two falls to a submission.

Do you ever wonder about Ann Coulter's relationship with her father?

Because lately when I read her statements, I get this image of a forlorn 13-year-old girl in heels too high for her, too much makeup and earrings too big for her head stamping her little foot and saying "Goddamnit, daddy! Pay some attention to me!"

Statements like these:

Ann on the widowed wives of September 11:

"These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling in their status as celebrities, and stalked by grief-erazzis. I've never seen people enjoying their husbands' death so much."

To which I have only to say, this.

Do you know what this quote has to do with this picture (and vice-versa)?

When the individuality of the artist begins to express itself, what the artist gains in the way of liberty he loses in the way of order, and when you're no longer able to attach yourself to an order, basically that's very bad...

Should I be worried that they don't think I'd make an excellent writer?

Your Career Type: Artistic

You are expressive, original, and independent. Your talents lie in your artistic abilities: creative writing, drama, crafts, music, or art. You would make an excellent: Actor - Art Teacher - Book Editor Clothes Designer - Comedian - Composer Dancer - DJ - Graphic Designer Illustrator - Musician - Sculptor The worst career options for your are conventional careers, like bank teller or secretary.

What's Your Ideal Career?

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

You Belong in 1961

If you scored... 1950 - 1959: You're fun loving, romantic, and more than a little innocent. See you at the drive in! 1960 - 1969: You are a free spirit with a huge heart. Love, peace, and happiness rule - oh, and drugs too. 1970 - 1979: Bold and brash, you take life by the horns. Whether you're partying or protesting, you give it your all! 1980 - 1989: Wild, over the top, and just a little bit cheesy. You're colorful at night - and successful during the day. 1990 - 1999: With you anything goes! You're grunge one day, ghetto fabulous the next. It's all good!

What Year Do You Belong In?

This can't be right. 1961? Oh great, just in time for the Bay Of Pigs. I can see whether Kennedy really was all that and a bag o'chips.

On the bright side, maybe I can find Boy George as an infant and tell him not to mess with Dr. Dream.

I could take in certain classic Disney movies on the big screen...but thanks to their pre-video rerelease policy, I did that anyway. But I could also still see Warner Bros. cartoons that way!

But still, 1961? The year the Rolling Stones musical career began? Me? (Don't pretend you're not enjoying this, Sherman) On the other hand, I would get to experience the rise of the Beatles. And there's always the beginning of Sinatra's Reprise years. And Motown, can't forget the Motor City.

But...me, some 20-25 years before the rise of electro? This can't be right.

Although you know, I could go see a few of the last classic Broadway musicals, including one of my favorites, Carnival....

1961, hmmmmm...

(We're not going-Keitha)

That settles that.

I was gonna make jokes, but that's almost spookily accurate

You Are Iceman

You tried to live a normal life, but it just wasn't possible A bit of a slacker, you rather tell jokes than cultivate your powers Powers: turning self and others into ice, making ice weapons, becoming nearly invisible

Which of the X-Men Are You?

The world is coming to an end

• Haditha.
• Militants in Palestine (or actually, anywhere).
• It now costs almost $40 to fill my tank with gas.
• George Bush is once again cynically (and kind of inexplicably, as Mark Evanier writes) exploiting homophobia for political purposes.
  
• Unattractive photos of Kate Winslet.

Well, that about wraps it up for this lifetime.

It's been some time since I indulged in a little gratuitious Tennessee-bashing

...so let's take care of that right now. This is from Frank Rich's Sunday NY Times column, via True Blue Liberal...

The current Senate majority leader, Bill Frist, has proudly put on this month’s legislative agenda constitutional amendments to stop same-sex marriage and flag burning. “Right now people in this country are saying it’s O.K. to desecrate that flag and to burn it,” he said on Fox News last Sunday, though it’s not clear exactly who these traitors are. A Nexis search turns up only one semi-recent American flag-burning incident — by a drunk and apparently apolitical teenager in Mr. Frist’s home state, Tennessee, in 2005.

Ahem. "Duck-humping, homophobic, rock-stupid, anti-sex, illiterate, flag-burning hillbillies!"

Ahhh. I feel much better. It's not good for me to hold those in too long.

Unfortunately, the rest of Rich's column is not funny at all, as he concludes:

We know that even as coalition partners like Italy and South Korea bail out, we are planning an indefinite stay of undefined parameters: the 104-acre embassy complex rising in the Green Zone is the largest in the world, and the Decider himself has said that it’s up to “future presidents and future governments of Iraq” to decide our exit strategy.

Actually, the current government of Iraq already is. On Thursday the latest American-backed Iraqi prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, whom Mr. Bush is “proud to call” his “ally and friend,” invited open warfare on American forces by accusing them of conducting Haditha-like killing sprees against civilians as a “regular” phenomenon. If this is the ally and friend we are fighting for, a country that truly supports the troops has no choice but to start bringing them home.

Random Flickr-Blogging: IMG_1339

Hi there; I'm participating in something that Tom Hilton came up with.

Here's how it works:
Every week, we all start with the same randomly-generated four-digit number (call it ####).

Go to Flickr and search for "IMG_####". There should be anywhere from a few hundred to a couple thousand results.

Choose an image from among the results, post it to your blog (be sure to include attribution and a link back to the page where the image appears--this is done automatically if you use the 'blog this' feature in Flickr).
The rest is up to you. Write about the place shown in the image. Make up a story about it. Connect it to some issue you care about. Or just post it as an image you really like. Do whatever you want.

I think I like this one because this kid looks like he's already pushing his boundaries and he's only five months old. Also, in a neat bit of freaky symmetry...his name is Tom. Careful, kid, push too hard and you're gonna fall off the other end of that sofa.

...and if that isn't a metaphor for life, I don't know what is...

What he said

From Vincent van Gogh: Genius and Disaster, by A.M. Hammacher:

Poetry is actually more terrible than painting, he once said, for painters can at least keep silent.

I KNEW it!

So, you've heard me mention Bryan Adams, specifically, that I have a rant about him. It goes a little something like this: If I ever snap-I mean up on the water tower with a high powered rifle snap-and they come to you and they say, you read the man's blog, what do you think could have pushed him over the edge?

Two simple words: Bryan Adams.

Now, I don't think I've ever mentioned Voice Farm here, but they were a synth/punk (mostly synth) duo from San Francisco, Myke Reilly and Charly Brown. They achieved local radio success with a 1987 self-titled album, one of the coolest records ever.

They then released an inferior (to my ears, but it's got a couple of great songs) album, Bigger Cooler Weirder on a major label, Morgan Creek. Hitting the national dance charts with the samplejam "Free Love" & torch song "Seeing Is Believing."

I was just idly Googling them, as you do, when I came across this article from the SF Weekly seven years ago. The emphasis in the below quoted paragraph is mine.

Then Voice Farm all but disappeared. Blame Bryan Adams. Just as Bigger Cooler Weirder hit the streets, the film arm of Morgan Creek was getting set to release the Kevin Costner vehicle Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. It went looking for synergy -- and found it in "Everything I Do, I Do It for You," the soundtrack's putrid single, which would be jackhammered into the public consciousness throughout the summer of 1991. The bulk of Morgan Creek's promotional energies went into "Everything I Do," which left Voice Farm in the lurch. "The consensus was, 'Yeah, why put money into this experimental San Francisco band?'" says Reilly. "After all those years of working and developing our act ... it was sort of a hard blow. So I guess I lost my faith in the music industry."

And then they were assimilated by the Borg-I'm sorry, I mean, and then they started producing music for television commercials. As if I needed more fuel for the fire of my Bryan Adams hatred...

Come in, London...

Kind of a nice blog here by a couple documenting their trip across England with blog entries and photographs.

Kristen Bell IS Rory Gilmore in...

Actually, that's (top) a picture of Bell in costume for her upcoming film, Fanboys. But the headline is the first thing it made me think of.

Rory Gilmore (or more properly, Alexis Bledel) is seen above. Next season, Veronica Mars will air right after Gilmore Girls on their new, shared CW network.

There was a time, really not all that long ago, that this news would have excited me. But now, with my returning to Veronica Mars still very much up in the air after its writing spun out of control during the second half of last season; Gilmore Girls a definite "thanks, but no thanks" following its season finale (and the Palladinos departure)...well, it's funny how quickly things can change when your favorite shows go down the drain.

I feel like letting out my inner bitch, so...

...Let's play fashion police!

See, this is almost a nice outfit, and then...oh dear.

Veronica Mars cleverly disguises herself as a piece of luggage.

...and then she transformed herself into a helicopter and flew away...

How to get global warming through to comic book fans

Elliot S. Maggin, a longtime comic book writer, points out that if this were Krypton and Al Gore were Jor-El...

[Jor-El,] you will recall, is Superman's Kryptonian father, an eminent scientist whom the ruling "Science Council" of his world laughed out of the room when he told them that they were facing a planetary crisis: "Gentlemen, Krypton is doomed."

Like the Science Council, our leaders reacted with guffaws when one of our own rose to sound an earthshaking alarm. As a professional fabulist, by contrast, my reaction to Al Gore's 1992 book, "Earth in the Balance," was one of enormous excitement. It had pathos and drama, and extraordinary ideas expressed clearly and simply: a proposal for a new paradigm for the relationship between humanity and the planet.

Fiction, when it's any good, is a fantasy that tells the truth. Given the characters and degrees of suspension of disbelief with which you seed your story, you have to be internally consistent. A hero, for example, cannot choose as a matter of preference to let a bad guy get away with murder — or theft, or extortion, or environmental exploitation. And a group of characters established as a stodgy, priggish oligarchy of entrenched rulers cannot choose to accede to the warnings of an upstart — a rival, really — who makes a case, no matter how compelling, for an extensive and costly solution to a pressing problem. More likely, the rulers would deny that the problem exists.

Veritasiness

At the close of his commencement speech before 250 graduates (and 4000 others) at tiny Knox College in Galesburg, Ill. on Saturday, satirist Stephen Colbert left them with a piece of advise: Get your own TV show. “It pays well," he observed, "the hours are great and you have fans. Eventually, some nice people will give you an honorary degree for doing jack squat.”

Colbert, who slipped in and out of his rightwing blowhard TV persona on Comedy Central’s “The Colbert Report,” received an overwhelmingly positive response compared with the mixed reaction at the recent White House Correspondents Dinner. Afterward, students presented him with a purple “Veritasiness Tour” t-shirt (which translates, very roughly, as “truthiness”).

Colbert had opened his speech with: "My name is Stephen Colbert, but I play a person on TV named Stephen Colbert ... who says things with a straight face that he doesn't mean."

In that vein, Colbert considered the immigration debate: “It’s time for illegal immigrants to go — right after they finish (building) those walls." People keep saying immigrants built America, “but here's the thing, it's built now." His suggestions for securing the U.S.-Mexico border went beyond walls to include moats, fiery moats and fiery moats with fire-proof crocodiles.

He added that the border with Canada also has to be secure so Canadians cannot bring their "skunky beer" into the country. He backed English as the official language of the United States — “God wrote (the Bible) in English for a reason: So it could be taught in our public schools.”

Noting the college was founded by abolitionists, Colbert came out against slavery. “I just hope the mainstream media gives me credit for the stand I’ve taken today,” he said.

Source.