Week # 49 in Review

It was announced that pop star Britney Spears was the number one person researched on the Internet for the year according to online analysis and this week she proved to be no less noteworthy. In the week during which Spears turned 26 and had a small gathering of friends sing to her and then give her close to fifty thousand dollars worth of leather, fur and diamonds, she also failed to turn up to the shooting of the music video for her single “Piece of Me” and when it became apparent she was not showing up, her record company Jive Records began dressing the set so that one of their other artists could use it. As soon as Spears heard that this was happening she turned around and arrived on set 12 hours late. Later in the week Spears released a statement saying she had sent a letter to reality TV personality Paris Hilton requesting that Hilton start being nicer to her and her friends or she would release a lesbian sex tape of Hilton online.
Pop star Lindsay Lohan was reported to have broken up with her boyfriend Riley Giles and was then reported to have been sleeping with actor Heath Ledger. Apart from that Lohan was relatively innocuous prompting blogs to simply post pictures of her and talk about the size of her breasts.

Comedienne Sherri Shepherd spoke openly on The View about how in her understanding of history Christians historically pre-date everything and everyone and she later went on to say that she would not tolerate her own son wearing a dress at pre-school, the New York Post reported that Greek shipping heir Stavros Niarchos and his friend fell into a pool together and his friend required stitches as a result of the accident and Jody Foster essentially outted herself in a speech in Los Angeles where she referred to her partner Cydney Bernard as “my beautiful Cydney who sticks with me through all the rotten and the bliss”.

Cowboy from the Village People Randy Jones told the media that he remembered the parents of Paris Hilton, Kathy and Rick Hilton, scrambling around in the carpet at Studio 54 to find a rock of cocaine; a charge that they denied, Google founder Larry Page married his girlfriend Lucy Southworth on billionaire Richard Branson’s private island in the Virgin Islands in front of 600 guests who were all flown in on private jets, and while in Australia aspiring actress Tara Reid attempted to shop around her presence at various parties after she hosted the Hooker’s Ball in Darwin but had to lower her demand price from $35,000 to $3,500 due to lack of interest.

The driving instructor who appeared as himself in the Borat Film announced he was suing the production company on the grounds that he was misled about what type of film he was appearing in, former president Bill Clinton attended the Spanish Institute Gold Medal Gala dinner and was seated next to Editor of US Vogue Anna Wintour but swapped seats so he could sit next to actress Penelope Cruz, reality TV character Sharon Osbourne hosted a fundraiser for World AIDS Day and took off a ring worth 30,000 pounds so she could throw it from the stage into the crowd simply because she was having fun. Her daughter, Kelly Obsourne appeared shocked.

High School Musical star Ashley Tisdale announced that she was having a nose job entirely because of a deviated septum and not simply for aesthetic purposes, soccer star David Beckham bought 5 diamond bracelets; one for each of the Spice Girls as a good luck token before they began their world tour, and Fall Out Boy’s Pete Wentz talked on NPR about how he doesn’t consider himself straight as part of a discussion about gender in rock and roll.
In the UK the oldest Rolls Royce in the world, built in 1904, was sold at auction for 3.5 million English pounds and Meredydd Hughes, one of Britain’s most senior policemen was caught driving 30 miles an hour over the speed limit.

In Europe, Daniele Emanuello, one of Italy’s 30 most wanted mafia criminals was shot dead by police but not before he swallowed a piece of paper upon which was written the names and numbers of what was presumed to be a list of his closest allies, the Catholic Church decided to start promoting the sale of photos of saints and prayer that can be bought for cell phones while nuns in a Greek Orthodox church were found to have been duped by a collective of men who had taken over their garden and been using the Church’s garden to grow marijuana.
A giant species of cobra named the Naja Ashei that contained enough venom to kill 15 people was discovered in Kenya, while in Asia the world’s biggest Asian elephant had been missing for a year and was feared dead, an 8 month old boy was found to weight 41 pounds making him obese and in preparation for the Beijing Olympics, the Chinese government put word out that it expects Chinese cab drivers to act as informants regarding any kind of drug use from now on.

In the US, a study found that chimps are more adept at short term memory tests than university students, the late billionaire Leona Helmsley’s dog Trouble, to whom she left 12 million dollars in her will, was receiving so many death threats that it was relocated to Florida via private jet, Christie’s auction house in New York was planning its first auction of liquor since prohibition was introduced and it was announced that professional daredevil David Blaine would be attempting to break the world record for staying awake.

“It’s been tried before,” he said. “In 1959, Peter Tripp stayed awake for eight days but it resulted in permanent brain damage.”

Today in Extraordinarily Odd

Here’s a story about a really fat kid. Yep, this kid in China is 8 months old and weighs 41 pounds. It always comes down to the same thing with these fat kids – I watch Entertainment Tonight, I know how it works. The parents are lame and spineless and they just shovel food into the kid because the kid screams. Then it spirals out of control because the kid learns that any time it’s uncomfortable it can scream and it gets pie. Fat kids mean only one thing. Dumb ass parents. The thing is, it’s one thing to have this problem with a petulant teenager but with an 8 month old who can’t even freaking talk? Get a grip parents. Besides, fat kids are unpleasant to look at. Get an eating disorder damnit. [source]

A mothering giant species of cobra has been discovered in Kenya and apparently it has enough venom to kill 15 people. They’ve called it a Naja Ashei. I just love it when people discover new species of animal. It makes me feel like we’re back in explorer times and that maybe we’ll discover a new island somewhere and that maybe the Lost City of Gold is totally real. Where are the explorers these days? Well, what am I talking about – they’re in Kenya discovering snakes. But maybe that isn’t a new type of snake. Maybe it’s just where Bernard King has been hiding since he may or may not have faked his own death. Oh, alright, that’s ludicrous but he was bitter. [source]

Christie’s in New York are planning a really swank auction of booze for the first time since before prohibition. Among the items to be auctioned are bottles of 60 year old Scotch and of course, because this is New York, everything costs 10-20,000 dollars for a drop. Where the hell did this insane payment strata begin? The $25K dessert, the $14K pie. I guess this crap is ok because it’ll get your kid smashed when they crack into your secret, vaulted stash of old Scotch and drink it after getting home late drunk from a high school party. Yeah, that’d suck wouldn’t it. It makes you not want kids. Like, I wouldn’t have kids just so I could avoid that particular experience. And yeah, I totally read Cigar Aficionado. [source]

Just when you think nothing is happening, Britney Spears threatens to release a lesbian sex video of Paris Hilton by sending her a letter. A source says, "The letter warns Paris that if she continues being rude to people, the footage will be leaked online."

And good on Britney Spears for coming up with a threat that’s so clearly thought out and specific. Actually, good on her for coming up with something in general. As in, something to do. Now she’s got herself a little task and she can fixate and set about achieving her goals.

Not surprisingly, Paris Hilton responded to the threat by saying that it was “crap”. And even if it isn’t, what does she care? Her career is based on a sex tape and her coke scrambling parents will probably congratulate her if it’s true for cornering a new market, lesbian porn. Then they’ll be able to get the imported tiles for the spa.

It’s interesting how generic you feel when you type the words “Britney Spears”, “Paris Hilton”, “Leaked”, and “Lesbian Sex Video”. [source]

Hollywood Tuna just ran an entire post about Lindsay Lohan’s breasts. It’s honestly the slowest news day since I can’t remember when. Most of the postings on other sites are entirely centered around random photos picked out of a whole heap of paparazzi shots and then a couple of mindless observations are made – so, it’s like the posting isn’t even about an actual item of news.
This one about Lohan’s breasts is completely substanceless and it’s even more pointless because she hasn’t been out in ages and hasn’t really done anything recently besides maybe sleep with Heath Ledger.
And yet, here we are…
Lohan’s breasts. I suppose it’s better than TMZ’s posting about how she hasn’t quit smoking.
[source]

All of a sudden the gossip blogs are writing up the newspaper gossip column news from a couple of days ago which is that Randy Jones from the Village People once saw Kathy and Rick Hilton doing a rock of cocaine off the floor of Studio 54 sometime back in the 70s. They were that desperate and base. Gatecrasher at the Daily News seems to have fabricated or perhaps not fabricated – who knows – a date discrepancy in his report so Ben can claim that he wasn’t propagating the story and not anger anyone unnecessarily.

Gatecrasher reports:

But the Hiltons suggest Jones might not have the clearest memory of the '70s. "Never happened," Rick said yesterday, adding that the couple didn't move to the city until 1979.

But who really cares what date it was; as if they DIDN’T do that at some point and even if they didn’t I am pretty ok with still believing it. I mean, the Hiltons scrambling for free crap? If I were ten years old I would have thought they’d practically invented the notion of entitlement.

The weird part about this is that I actually went out with Randy Jones last night and to see all the blogs talking about this story – which incidentally he told to me directly on D List Radio about 12 months ago and the segment is on my radio showreel – is kind of bizarre.

We went to Joe Allen’s and Anne Meara walked up to Jo-Anne Worley and said, “You old cunt.” They then verbally abused each other like top quality showbiz broads. As in, it was their way of being nice. Then I was almost completely ignored by Rex Reed. [source]

Today in Extraordinarily Odd

Professional attention seeker David Blaine is now planning on staying awake the longest anyone ever has. It’s his newest party trick. He has to sit in a chair while he does it. What a fascinating life he leads. He basically makes a living sitting in a chair and not sleeping and he also has to lose weight to do it. Ok, so what else is there to this story. Oh yeah, some kid did it for 11.5 days once for a school project and that means that Blaine now has to beat that. I can’t remember what else I was going to say except that, oh yeah, that’s right, he’s sort of like Criss Angel really. He’s this attention seeking kid who just pulls pranks and then everyone cheers and buys him a beer. That’s his career. Free beer. [source]

In preparation for the Beijing Olympics, the Chinese government has put the word out that it expects all taxi drivers in the city of Beijing to be spies with reference to drug use during the games. They should tip off police. It’s astonishing how even though it takes a lot of work, the Beijing Olympics are going to be a really stressful time for pretty much anyone who goes because there are so many rules. I have started to think the Chinese Government are kind of hilarious though. I’m not so astonished at their outrageously, irrational control freak behaviour anymore. No, I like them. They’re like this hugely powerful but very very scared broadway diva who lashes out irrationally all the time. How gay that I would like that. Come on China, belt out a number. [source]

Following on from blind items that ran earlier this week in the New York Post about a movie star that was about to come out, LA Daily News reports that Jodie Foster thanked "my beautiful Cydney who sticks with me through all the rotten and the bliss." Which is presumably referring to Cydney Bernard – her widely reported life partner.

It’s so weird how movie stars in the closet suddenly decide they want to come out, how they do it and then how they act all nonchalantly as though it was never something they ever guarded against talking about.

It will be genius when Tom Cruise finally comes out and then sort of walks around with his hands in his pockets, whistling to himself with his eyes looking up. As though he had never done anything to even remotely suggest that he could other than what he says he is in this very moment. [source]

Niarchos with a random blond woman. Probably Paris Hilton


Why the hell does “Greek Shipping Heir Stavros Niarchos” get press? It’s got to be “Greek Shipping Heir Stavros Niarchos” too, it can’t just be Stavros Niarchos.
Page Six reports that something happened with him and a friend where he and his friend fell in a pool and his friend had to get stitches. Ok, gee great. I mean give me something to work with here.


So, he fucked Paris Hilton once. Does that REALLY mean anything? Isn’t she sort of just a vagued out town bike when you’re an heir? Like in the town of heirs? There’s probably a town. It’s in LA. Or, it’s an underground town in New York. Whatever.

Niarchos reaching for depth

It would be different if he hung from the rafters and lashed out with racial tyrades at a doorman like Ecuadorian heir Fabian Basabe did in the Hamptons a while back but there’s no angle here. So, he drank something. This is almost as bad as these press releases I keep getting from John E or whoever he is, this New York party promoter I’ve never even met where he gets quoted in some lame ass article about whether New York nightlife has been destroyed by bottle service. There’s nothing to talk about there.

Paris Hilton with Niarchos - he's in a yellow t shirt.

You know what? I’m amazed I actually managed to get this far into the post. I mean, you just know Niarchos is a fucking stupid, entitled douche bag.

Here’s Elizabeth Taylor howling.

[source]

Ok so while good natured idiot Sherri Shepherd won’t ever be as good at creating controversy on The View as Rosie O’Donnell was, she’s actually a semi-good reason to watch it now. In the clip above she is engaging in dialogue about whether boys should be allowed to play around with dolls and wear dress costumes when they’re at pre-school. Basically, she comes across as an essentially confused but well meaning woman who is out of her depth in terms of arguments but that is accessible to most people who watch the show so who cares? She rattles off the line about accepting her son if he were gay and loving him unconditionally but then damns everything else about behavior that could be considered even mildly subversive in the most inconsistent way.

Besides, it would only be considered subversive for a boy to put on a sparkly dress in the dress up corner at pre-school if you’re an ill-educated bogan anyway.
Social dialogue has hammered the phrase “I love my gay son” into the public consciousness and people will now say that but they won’t say “I love my dress wearing son” yet.

When Rosie’s statements on The View that got the most press were either calculated attacks on an equally profiting game player Donald Trump or they were essentially well researched political observations with a showbiz angle that made them reaction provoking. Sherri Shepherd on the other hand really seems as though she barely considers what she is saying until after it comes out of her mouth. But it gets her press so, who knows? Maybe she’ll get her own radio show.

Shepherd is funny when she does the physical comedy routines but anything else is eye-roll inducingly pathetic. But still, the hard fact remains, she probably represents the intelligence level of a chunk of the demographic for that show so she’s actually a good choice. It’s the annoyance factor. The annoyance factor always profits.

Today in Extraordinarily Odd

Raja Gaj, The World’s biggest Asian elephant (those are the ones with the smaller ears) has been missing a Nepali Wildlife reserve for about a year and it is feared dead. Why no one thought of the most obvious explanation – that the elephant ran away to LA or New York to become a famous and big earning elephant in the entertainment industry – I have no idea. I mean, the first thing that came to mind for me was that it’s got a job standing in the room. The bedroom of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes. See, that’s the kind of quality material you don’t get other places. Sometimes we all think a bit too hard and we miss the top quality material but it’s when you’re relaxed and not thinking too hard that you can come up with unbeatable lines like that. I mean, it’s not my best work but it felt right. It really did. And you know what? I’m really not well today at all probably because all of a sudden it’s bitterly cold in New York. The puddles are frozen on the ground. It’s colder than when it snows. That missing elephant doesn’t care though. It’s raking in the dough and probably will for years to come. Until the contract between Holmes and Cruise runs out. Then it’ll move on to John Travolta and the Republican religious conservative club. [source]

Meredydd Hughes, one of Britain's most senior policemen and the former chairman of roads policing at the Association of Chief Police Officers was just arrested for driving 30 miles per hour over the speed limit in England. See, with all the religious conservatives, prize fighters and Republican senators getting embarassing press for all manner of sexually compromising activities at the moment you’d be forgiven if you thought high powered hypocrisy was something that only pertained to sex. I think most of these people feel so much pressure from their roles in society that they long to be caught just to remove the pressure. I’m sure it’s no different in the high impact, glamorous world of traffic monitoring. Why, Meredydd was just at his wits end trying to be what his parents wanted him to be and in the end, he just couldn’t fake wanting to go the speed limit any more. Poor guy. This is painful for him now but it’s the turning point for him. [source]

One of Italy’s top 30 most wanted mafia criminals, Daniele Emanuello, swallowed a piece of paper with important numbers on it just before he was shot dead by police. That makes two hilarious mafia deaths in a week so far. And both were in Italy. One was some guy watching a movie about the mafia where the character gets burst in on by police on TV and then the real thing happened in real life and now this. Hilarious. Of course, the piece of paper isn’t gone, it’s stuck in the guy’s esophagus meaning that all the police have to do is smash him open and get it. Stupid guy. The first guy was funnier. This is just disappointing. Wait, I’m over it now. [source]

The Borat film came out what, like 13 months ago? Yet here we still are, learning that some of the Americans in the film are only now figuring out the joke AND they’re suing. Almost immediately after the film’s release there were the chauvinistic, right wing southerner boys who got drunk in the RV and talked openly about how women aren’t to be respected who decided to sue under the premise that they were misrepresented.

Now there’s the driving instructor who feels that after he signed the release form he wasn’t properly informed about what the project actually was and that’s just fine and understandable.

Meanwhile, exactly what IS the problem? Was his credibility actually harmed in any way? I mean, it’s a pretty safe bet that the driver’s ed company he works for in Smalltown, Fly-over state X is still doing the whopping amount of business it was doing prior to filming. Additionally, the driver reacted the way any extremely average, humourless person would act when confronted by something as absurd as Borat; he avoided all possibility of laughing at the ludicrousness of the situation and got away.

Isn’t evidence that they’re unequivocally the status quo all these tired ass people want? Why sue at this point. Even those drunk boys basically said all they needed to say to run for public office as Republicans. They probably secured their future with the KKK just by getting drunk and mouthing off. They should be paying Borat for that. Where the hell else were they going to end up? They were going to end up working for daddy and marrying their sister, that’s where. [source]

The other day I made the assumption that the only people in the world who were delusional enough to consider Tara Reid an A-list star worth $35,000 per appearance were desert dwelling Darwin, Australia residents in the middle of an Australian summer. I mean, what else would explain the fact that that’s essentially what she was paid to host the aptly named “Hookers Ball” at the weekend.
Not so, according to the New York Post who report that while she was shopping her presence around Australia for around 25K an appearance, no one would bite so she lowered it to 3500. Quite a drop in self worth there although let’s be fair, her original price was a private joke she was having with her manager, right?
Wait, she has a manager? [source]

Google co-founder Larry Page is marrying his girlfriend Lucy Southworth this weekend on Richard Branson’s private island in the Virgin Islands and he’s flying in 600 guests on private planes so they can attend.

Seeing as Page is apparently worth about 20 billion dollars, the entire thing is obviously destined to be one of the most extravagant events ever; guests are being flown in from all over the world and another entire island worth of hotels has been rented for them to stay in.

Even though this wedding is a huge extravagant money blowing deal and it sounds alright if you read the newspaper reports about it – especially the part about how Southworth is a biomedical informatics doctoral student at Stanford University so you know she’s not just some gold digging LA underwear model skank and that they’re at least partially on the same computer nerd level – just like Posh Spice, underneath all that spending there’s something that doesn’t quite spell “class”.

I just can’t shake the idea that after the marriage ceremony, Page and his close circle of friends, the circle that no doubt includes the skinny Asian guy who is scared of his parents, the fat porn obsessed Indian guy and the tall lanky white guy with floppy crazy big hair who has dreams of asking a girl out one day will all go to a special room that has posters of Cindy Crawford circa 1987 on the wall to play Nintendo wii while the other guests wander around looking for them. The guys feel pretty sure they won’t be found though. This underground lair is undetectable by all homing devices known to man. [source]

Today in Extraordinarily Odd



A bunch of nuns in a Greek Orthodox church in Athens were asked by a couple of shifty eyed crooks if they could plant a garden and when the nuns said yes, they planted marijuana in the back yard. So, now the police are after the crooks. This sounds just like the plot to that amazing movie “Nuns on the Run” which starred Robbie Coltrane and Eric Idle back in the early nineties. Except it’s real. My guess is that actually the nuns are behind it and now Mother Superior has tied those two nuns to a chair and she’s interrogating them and also she’s making them feel bad for failing her. And God. They have failed God. The crooks are really just two scape goats. Nuns are even more shrewd at underworld activity than beauty pageant contestants. [source]

Good old Catholics. I never get tired of saying that. The Catholic Church decided to make a little money by saying that everyone had to have a card with a saint on it to help them get into heaven and it worked pretty well. Now, seeing as times change and the kids like their new fangled mobile phones rather than simple little cards, the Catholic Church adapts and you can get pics of your favorite saint on your mobile phone and for a little extra the phone company will send you a prayer. If you don’t want to pay, however, you get fuck all. Damn you. Pay or go to HELL. Yay! [source]

The New York Post reports that there was a dinner for the Spanish Institute Gold Medal Gala and a whole lot of top notch people were there. Bill Clinton was seated next to Anna Wintour and the Queen of Spain who was seated next to Oscar de la Renta who sat next to Penelope Cruz. Incidentally, if we could just lock the five of them in a house it would be a really interesting but probably exhaustively high maintenance reality show full of intrigue and demands.

So, the whole thing was that Bill Clinton swapped seats with Oscar de la Renta so he could talk to Penelope Cruz which essentially meant that he snubbed Anna Wintour. Anna Wintour’s bruised ego and her therefore dangerous temperament aside, it seems sort of understandable that Clinton would do that. After all, what would you really talk to her about all night?

“Ok, alright, so …yeah…um…what is your….um….dress made out of?”

“CHILD.”

“Right…ok, that’s …ah…that sounds expensive.”

“IT’S PRICELESS AND PAINFUL TO WEAR”.

“Great…gee, is there a waiter anywhere? Can I get a freakin beer?”

Bill Clinton may have saved his own ass when he moved seats but he may also very well be to blame if someone interning at Conde Nast ends up in small pieces and thrown out a window any time today. [source]

Nothing has been enough of a motivation to get Britney Spears to get it together and just put her head down and work despite what appears like the entire of Hollywood offering to assist her. Her record label put out a record and then let her not promote it for Christ’s sake. Nothing could get that ass moving.

Until today apparently.

Page Six reports that Britney Spears was meant to be filming the music video for her single, “Piece of Me” and when she didn’t turn up for several hours, Jive, her record label just quickly got to work dressing the set for a newer, younger version of Britney.

When word got to Ms Spears that at 26 she was nearing the precipice of her youth she high tailed it back to the set like Gloria Swanson in Sunset Boulevard.

So, it seems that Ms. Spears isn’t entirely out of her mind unhinged. She still knows that she can be replaced and the fact that her record label is already getting ready to focus their energies on other, younger, more compliant wannabe starlets she suddenly sobered up and wiped the foam from her chops. How intriguing. It's possible they've found her on/off button. [source]

So basically, there’s not a whole lot going on today apart from dumb ass giggling Sherri Shepherd again saying stupid things on television because it’s more convenient for her to block out reality and be a Christian than it is to not:

God, she’s a freaking moron. I knew her whole assertion about the world being flat wasn’t a mistake. She said once she didn’t know if the world was round or not because she hadn’t thought about it having been distracted from pondering the universe by the fact that she constantly worried about putting food on the table for her son. Then the next day she came in and asserted that she was just overwhelmed or something. Yeah, overwhelmed because suddenly she was being introduced to the notion of rational thought and her synapses exploded.

Actually, here’s that video clip too:

Ok, now it makes sense that she’s on The View. The Relentlessly Smiling Good Natured Idiot Factor must be a lucrative ratings earner.

David Beckham has apparently gone and spent a half a million dollars on diamond bracelets for the Spice Girls as a good luck charm for their pending world tour. What a trooper.

What a trooper and yet…indeed this action is entirely and scientifically predictable.

While reports emerge on a seemingly daily basis that illustrate ways in which Victoria Beckham is a talentless, heavily marinated slab of fermenting tuna, the theory of relativity suggests that there has to be an equal amount of reports that illustrate how enchanting and pure David Beckham is. As a pop cultural dichotomy they can’t really exist without each other. She must and successfully does embody horrific ego and the notion of a walking talent deficit even worse the Kim Kardashian and he must and successfully does embody humility and natural, seemingly effortless sporting excellence.

Of course he bought them those diamonds. Of COURSE he bought them those diamonds.
Why only the other day in Australia he flew in and accidentally ignored some cancer surviving children who were waiting for him at the airport. The children were crying, they were cancer survivors, Australians get really furious at things like anxiety and ego so it was just a horrific scenario all round. Beckham, however, was quoted at a press conference saying:

"I would never have done that. Never have done, never will do. I'm more than willing to meet them wherever they want and at whatever time that they want," said a surprised Beckham when journalists asked him why he had snubbed the children.

Even the vicious linguistic genius harpies at TMZ couldn’t spin that badly. He nipped it in the bud. What was Victoria Beckham doing at this point? Why she was eating children and laughing at international sadness while demanding more fur and jewels, not eating and sucking in her cheeks, standing legs akimbo in front of nine hundred automatic flashing cameras of course.

I actually wonder if the tour bus shakes with magnetic overload when Victoria and David Beckham are in it at the same time and I also wonder if their children have super powers because of how much power must have exploded when they were conceived. Perhaps Brooklyn and Romeo will be some kind of demi-Gods when they grow up. Well, that's if they aren't drug addled, entitled brats who drink and drive and get fat. I just know one of them will end up an oversensitive gay book nerd who thinks his mother is frivolous.

[source]

Today in Extraordinarily Odd

The late Leona Helmsley’s Maltese Terrier “Trouble” to which she left 12 million dollars, has received so many death threats that the dog has not only been re-located to Florida, it’s been relocated there under a false name. It’s also interesting that this is a news story because one would assume that if you were the caretaker of a dog worth 12 million dollars you’d be able to employ a media consultant who would advise about keeping the story out of the papers. Although, let’s also just remember that we’re talking about a dog that inherited 12 million dollars. Maybe the dog is a primadona like Dina Lohan and actually wants to be followed by a stalker because she would love the attention. Sure she could die but someone is passionately interested in her and that’s love. Other reasons why people might want to kill the dog include that it was always a total shit to everyone. Reports say it bit people and Leona just laughed. What a cranky old biddy. [source]

The world’s oldest Rolls Royce, built in 1904, was just sold at auction for 3.5 million UK pounds to a private collector. 3.5 million pounds is about 680 trillion American dollars right now. That private investor could have actually paid off the national debt of the US or he could have bought that car and I think he made the right decision. It was a good decision also because the car is still drivable – even though it only goes 40 miles per hour but then, that’s about the speed you need for going down to the shop for milk and cigarettes in the morning. Nothing more. It’s a well spent 3.5 million on a once a week milk and cigarette carrier. After he collects his car, perhaps the investor would like the buy Sydney’s Queen Victoria Building, gut it and keep one toothpick in it. Yes, that would be culturally helpful. Meanwhile, children are dying etc. etc. [source]

This is how the Washington Post crafted its opening line for this story: It may be a case of monkey see, monkey do better - a new study finds young chimpanzees beating human adults at remembering numbers. The only thing that comes to mind from that is that Fred Willard from Waiting for Guffman was reading the news after having never even previewed the teleprompter. Anyway, that inane point aside, apparently chimps beat out university students in a scientifically conducted memory test which should prompt a general sense of satisfaction in those annoying people who get drunk and argue that going to university is meaningless and a waste of time. After all, they went to the University of LIFE! They don’t need a freaking la di da expensive degree to prove their worth. Cause, no one is better than them. What are you looking at? [source]

People Magazine has reported that High School Musical cast member, Ashley Tisdale has gone in and had a nose job but of course, Ashley’s particular brand of appeal wouldn’t allow for anything like THAT so her people have gone into damage control.

This isn't actually her, I'm just illustrating what a nose job looks like right after

Here are the genius quotes she’s offered up:

"Growing up I always knew I had a deviated septum on the right side of my nose, which caused trouble breathing," a bandaged Tisdale told PEOPLE on Monday from her Los Angeles home.

Oh my God Damned mothering lesbian GOD, you did not. Remember that period of time on Melrose Place where Lisa Rinna’s character was living with Dr. Peter and he said the word “barbiturates” a few times and so she kept saying the word “barbiturates” and finally “barbiturates” didn’t freaking mean anything anymore. It was just a repetitive plot device. In this case, “deviated septum” is the new “barbiturates”. Except it’s not even new.

"The older I got, the worse it got. I went to get it checked out, and the doctor told me the septum was 80 percent deviated and that I had two small fractures on my nose."

And you clapped for joy and immediately told him you wanted Double Ds. Then the doctor reminded you he was talking about your nose.

The recuperating 22-year-old adds: "I'm not feeling great today. It's uncomfortable and I hope this is the only time I ever have to go through something like this."

Well, you can hope all you want but the minute you hit 29 and there’s a new guard of perky, one dimensional blonde twits getting all the children’s TV work you’ll be re-visiting it. Just you watch Tisdale. And stop lip syncing badly. It’s imperious and it demeans us all. Imperiousness counts as a form of negativity and negativity links to depression and depression is not sexy and it’s certainly not marketable. Well, not in your genre. Smile dammit.

The best thing about these reports is that they're clearly a joke the journalist is having with anyone who reads these stories. It's not news that she had a nose job, it's news the extent to which she has to deal with it as a media issue. That's the entertaining part.

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Just a few days after she decided to reincarnate a publicity mustering feud with Courtney Love about who gave her son oxycontin to which he later became addicted, Sharon Osbourne was hosting a charity event for World AIDS Day in the UK and she decided to throw a ring worth thirty thousand pounds into the audience as a gift to them seeing as she was “having such a good time”.

If you were hosting a big charity event, and you decided to give away something you own wouldn’t you give the thirty thousand pounds worth of diamonds to the actual charity? I mean, she can do what she wants but this seems kind of mindless.

Still, there’s nothing greater than reader comments from suburban English people when it comes to celebrity behavior so here is the best reaction to the original news story from the UK’s Daily News People who write in to newspapers are either elderly, infirm or insane – I think that’s a well understood reality:

I love Sharon and every thing that she does and I know she does so much for charity, but isn't this going to far?I mean with that ring she could have bought new equipment for hospitals, given more funding to childline, etc But by doing this, as kind hearted as it was, its a waste of £30,000, dont you think?What is to stop the person who caught it from wearing it and not giving anything to charity, or worse yet, selling it for ill gains. drugs, etc.

Yes, if you’re in the front row of an AIDS charity concert hosted by celebrities it’s more than likely that you’re a well developed, heavily addicted heroin addict. Those tickets go to just about anyone.

The lack of charitable society out there makes me wonder,

* whether Sharons in touch with reality – good question. Good question and also a clear and unvague one.

* If this was just a silly publicity stunt – What?! A satellite celebrity?! Do something for attention?! NO! Stop it! STOP THE LIES!

* Or if the ring was really a fake and she knows that it isnt worth all that much.

Who Knows, other than Sharon herself, but what I do know is that Sharon is a wonderful person, she rocks out loud AND she's...."Fabulous Darling"

Keep it up Mrs 'O'

What? No invitation to Sharon Osbourne for tea at the reader's house?

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Britney turned 26 on the weekend and she got a whole lot of leather and furs and jewels and sunglasses as you’d expect. Although, it doesn’t explain who gave her the gifts; only that her poor ass mooching friends Alli Sims and Sam Lufti were there so who knows where they got the money to buy them.
Wait, actually, they probably got them free by saying they were for Britney. “It’s actually for Britney Spears” is a really useful phrase if you’re a little broke and you are ever seen with her in public. Sam Lufti buying Britney a birthday present is sort of the equivalent of Loni Anderson buying Burt Reynolds a small African nation for his birthday. He’s got to be appreciative on the outside but deep down, he knows where it came from and he’s anxiously revising his plastic surgery wishlist to incorporate the cost.

Anyway, kudos to her mooching friends for choosing a sensibly small chocolate cake for her even if they did use her celebrity clout to get her gifts.

Another great part of the article is the way they quote Sarah Ivens from OK! Magazine:

Editor-in-chief Sarah Ivens says that the pop princess seemed to be in a much better state that the last time the two were together; during a disastrous photo shoot that resulted in an unfortunate incident with Spear’s dog and a Zac Posen dress. “Britney looked slim and pretty,” Ivens says. “I just kept thinking how much better it was this time around than the last time we spent time with her. We really hope this birthday and her new age will be a turning point.”

Except that there’s no clear indication that she was even there. That’s not ever really a problem though. Especially when it comes to Brit. Estimations are all that is necessary. [source]

NPR interviewed Pete Wentz about the way he challenges traditional notions of gender and he’s made more noteworthy comments about his own personal proximity to homosexuality.
The thing is, when you look at what he’s talking about in addressing the issue, everything just comes right on back to marketability.

The film he made a while back for People Magazine about how he wears eyeliner but he calls it “guyliner” because guys have to smudge their makeup rather than have it look perfect (so, what – he’d wear badly blended foundation?) is completely about re-naming eyeliner so it’s not culturally threatening to men who might be drawn to him as fans. “Hey guys, eyeliner is for girls and I wear eyeliner but if we call it “guyliner” it means I’m still in charge because I’m a guy.”

This rhetoric and speculation about his sexuality is no different. While it’s intriguing and essentially admirable that he’s talking openly about something at all, the whole sexually ambivalent/vagueness thing is entirely about cornering a certain market in the industry of desire.

Sure he’s covered in tattoos and considers himself a trainwreck of sorts. He’s a crafted emo character. It doesn’t change the fact that he’s dating Ashlee Simpson, one of the most culturally generic LA produced Barbie doll closet Republicans in recent history. It’s only been since she started dating him that she began regularly visiting the East Village for street cred.
Pete Wentz is totally successful at being what he needs to be for commercial reasons but it doesn’t mean that character goes any deeper than some mid-range moisturizer would permeate his epidermis.

Speaking of Pete Wentz, here’s his recent sex based music video or whatever it is. I half expected the scene to break to an CGI island landscape with floating ribbon and a slim, urn like bottle floating above the moonlit water it looks so much like an ad for a fragrance.

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Week # 48 in Review

In Touch magazine reported that pop star Britney Spears was pregnant with music producer J R Rotem’s child. The reports involved direct quotation from Rotem coupled with photographs of the text messages received by an In Touch staffer from Rotem. Spears denied the rumours and suggested she was deliberating over whether or not to sue In Touch. Other reports about Spears included the news that she has a sex toy vault in her home. While speculation about whether she was with child continued, Spears’ single “Piece of Me” was released and so was a competition in which fans of Spears were asked to submit their own music videos of the song.

Reality TV and sex tape character Kim Kardashian made the claim that she had 50,000 dollars worth of Cartier jewelry and computer equipment stolen while at JFK but subsequent investigations by media outlets revealed that no police report had been filed in conjunction with the theft. Kimora Lee Simmons invited her ex-husband’s girlfriend to a party in his honour prompting reports that despite the pleasantry there was aggressive bitchiness coming from Simmons herself and it was reported that Lindsay Lohan would release the third album as part of her record deal and that the album would potentially be titled “Nobody’s Angel”.

Bindi Irwin, the daughter of the late television conservationist Steve Irwin, appeared on the Today Show to perform her new single “Trouble in the Jungle”, a rap about endangered species, country music star Dolly Parton released a new single, the music video for which starred actress Amy Sedaris as both herself and her character Jerri Blank from the TV series Strangers With Candy. It was announced that aspiring actress Tara Reid was to host a ball in Darwin, Australia named the Hooker’s Ball and it was also reported in the Daily News that while Reid guest starred on the TV show Scrubs it was unlikely that she would be invited back as she apparently stank of booze while filming.

Actress Kirsten Dunst was announced as the new face of fashion brand Miu Miu and Spice Girl Victoria Beckham was announced as the new face of Marc Jacobs. Reality TV character Sharon Osbourne re-ingnited the fued between herself and rock star Courtney Love by again claiming in public that Love was the first person to provide Osbourne’s son Jack with oxycontin, to which he later became addicted. Love denied Osbourne’s allegations.

Ex-Savage Garden front man Darren Hayes performed acoustic sets in New York which included a virtuosic rendition of Britney Spears’ “Gimme Gimme”, it was announced that radio talk show host Don Imus was scheduled to re-appear on radio with a co-host on December 3 and pop star Boy George was headed to court for the beginning of his trial for allegedly imprisoning a rent boy in his apartment and threatening him with sex toys.

In records and numbers news, a 1.5 kilogram black truffle was announced to be on sale in Macau and was expected to fetch upwards of 150,000 Euros.

In the United States, Alexander D. Smith from Georgia walked into a bank and attempted to deposit a million dollar bill and was promptly arrested and Greenpeace began a survey to establish the most popular names for a pod of whales and included in the list of names was Mr. Splashy Pants. In Africa officials in Cameroon were holding two smugglers from Ghana after they were caught attempting to smuggle 500 Grey African Parrots out of the country.

In the UK the woman who speaks the announcements for the London Underground was fired for making up her own announcements and speaking them over the loud system. Her announcements included “We would like to remind our American tourist friends that you are almost certainly talking too loudly.” The invention of Sat Lav a satellite navigation system designed to locate public toilets with a mobile phone was announced in England.

In Europe, Austrian males from the city of Salzburg who would normally be dragged around the shopping centers with their wives completing family Christmas shopping were able to find refuge in a tent called the Maennerhort which included computer games, a bar and magazines like Playboy and mafia boss Michele Catalano was sitting in his living room in Italy watching a movie about a mobster who is arrested in his own home when police burst through the front door and arrested him in his own house.

In Asia, organizers of the Beijing Olympics officially banned the sale of fireworks within a hundred meters radius of any official Olympic venues, a Thai politician was under fire for attempting to bribe elderly men to vote for him by giving them Viagra, members of a TV production team filming a documentary about the Yeti in Tibet discovered footprints which, in their opinion, were not those of a bear and were large enough to warrant further investigation.

In Puerto Rico, beauty pageant contestant Ingrid Marie Rivera claimed her clothes and makeup were laced with pepper spray and that she simply kept the tears at bay while going on to win the contest anyway but Puerto Rican investigators suggested that they were suspicious of her claims and a Chilean hooker named Maria Carolina raised 4000 dollars for a disabled children’s charity as part of a telethon run by the Catholic church by donating 27 hours of sex with her.

“There are people who are going to be donating money that’s a lot more questionable than mine,” Carolina said. “The only thing I did was publicise it.”