Is this really David Beckham naked? If it isn't then, my goodness, what extraordinary photoshopping. If it IS, then all I can say is it's about damned time. [source]

If the recent cell phone message left for his daughter by Alec Baldwin is anything to go by then Alec Baldwin is a big fat pompous, mean spirited ass hole. If you listen to the entire message two things stand out. The first is his Champagne-quality estimate of her actual age. She could be 12, she could be 11 – he can’t remember at all but JESUS, that’s not the point is it? The point is that she didn’t answer the phone and he’s just outraged! With all the things he has to remember; like for instance, the names of all his brothers for one, how on EARTH can he reasonably be expected to remember the age of his daughter? Or, for that matter, that with every breath he takes – and here’s number two: as he delivers his spectacularly well spoken diatribe (it really does sound like a well crafted audition piece), he’s pushing young Ireland Baldwin/Basinger whatever, closer and closer to the fate of someone like Nicole Ritchie. Push away Alec, sooner or later you’ll be calling her to flash her Fred Quimby while getting out of a limo so you can then invite her to help promote the sale of your newest political rant novel. It more or less happened to Lionel Ritchie. [source]

In a strange and mysterious set-up off the coast of Australia, an eerily calm catamaran containing a set dinner table, laptop and other things you’d take with you on a pleasant boat trip were found set up but there were no people to be found on board. No one can figure out exactly what happened seeing as there’s no real evidence of a struggle, there’s no one around and the life jackets are all intact. Consequently, the only rational thing to do would be to make up what happened, make it as inane as possible and then get really freaked out about it. Paranoid even. After all it is 4/20.

Clearly what’s happened here is that actually this vessel was sailing near Bermuda a few moments before it appeared off the coast of Australia but as is the case with the Bermuda triangle, it sort of hiccups or whatever happens there and the boat was transported instantly to the other end of the world. If you think of the world as a giant human body, then perhaps consider that Bermuda is the mouth and Australia is, as former Prime Minister Paul Keating once famously suggested, the ass end of the world. Consequently, this is really just about global energetic digestion. The people are probably someone in the jungle covering the Andes in Venezuela.

The other explanation could only be that this is merely the whimsical, nautical version of the Blair Witch Project happening in real life. All that is missing is a soundtrack. That is all. [source]

In a strange moment, although, let’s face it, not an entirely unfamiliar one President Bush visits Ohio to talk about terrorism and he ends up just rambling on making the suggestion that he is, in fact a highly sophisticated remote control man just that bit more likely. Perhaps this time his wiring was a bit damp. Or, alternately a rat got loose inside his ass and chewed away the microchips that deal with coherence…either way, there’s something mechanical going on.

The decisions his brain made to talk and just say lines like, _"There are jobs Americans aren't doing. ... If you've got a chicken factory, a chicken-plucking factory, or whatever you call them, you know what I'm talking about." But, it seems, not only did the chicken plucking factory owners not know what he was talking about…neither did anyone else.

So, while this is all merely speculation could it be that the usual scenario is that he simply walks out and gives speeches while Dick Cheney and Karl Rove are giggling to each other in a room accessed through a hole in the ground of the Oval Office? They sit in there in big black leather chairs taking turns to say things into the microphone that connects to Bush’s brain. Maybe that explains the subtle reference to the rug at the end of his speech. It certainly explains what he possibly meant by “_"The best thing about my family is my wife. She is a great first lady. I know that sounds not very objective, but that's how I feel. And she's also patient. Putting up with me requires a lot of patience." By “putting up with”, he’s of course referring to the exhausting paperwork required to get any maintenance done on him due to the non-customer service friend warranty the White House has on him and the daily polishing his torso requires seeing as it’s probably brass and oxidizes quickly. Yes, that seems reasonable. [source]

Finally those few, unmanaged and unreasonably crippling moments between getting out of bed, having a shower and downing that first cup of brain shaking caffeine are a thing of the past with the introduction of caffeinated soap called shower shock. Has inventing things now just become about getting something, like anything at all, and putting caffeine in it? There’s nail varnish with green tea in it, moisturizer, donuts, coffee with so much caffeine in it it’s called Meth coffee, caffeinated drinks with twice the caffeine, water, gum, aspirin, mints. What we seriously need here is caffeinated pants, not another consumable product like gum or toothpaste. Actually toothpaste would be great but really, if one of Alexander the Great’s people was killed with a poisoned shirt – indeed, what exactly is a poisoned shirt? – then it shouldn’t be too hard to get caffeine into pants. Imagine the walking you’d get done! The goal here is to make sure there isn’t a natural moment where caffeine isn’t available without having to think about it. [source]

And just like that, the ethereal wunderkind that is Sanjaya is gone. But, hi - like we were ultimately surprised. Sanjaya’s cultural impact was steered largely outside of him through the mock support of people like Perez Hilton, Howard Stern and it grew and grew, like a hilarious national joke until it burst the night before he was knocked out of the running. He really couldn’t come up with anything else to do because after the hair and the cockiness, anything else would seem contrived and so, sadly, without anything to really convince people he was worthwhile (certainly vocal talent was non-existent) the smoke and mirrors tower holding him up vanished. The interesting thing about this is that he could do a William Hung and cash in but actually in a much bigger way. Hung’s schtick was obvious and he no physical appeal. Sanjaya has a couple of angles he could work now – like one off appearances, hair product endorsements, ironic fast food ad contracts…there really are so many options for him. Just not singing. Please. Particularly after that forcibly playful insertion of the phrase “Let’s give them something to talk about…other than HAIR.” Hmmm, not likely, young man. [source]

While people are playing it earnest and heralding the possibilities of inflatable breast implants for woman as a viable option for cancer patients etc. it’s virtually impossible to find the bottom of the list of things that are great about this genius new beauty option.

First and foremost, these are obviously an undeniable godsend for your average model who may have to dabble in street level porn every now and then to keep herself in coke and furs. One minute she could pump those mothers up to the size of soccer balls for a toothy grinned bukakke scene with a bunch of amateur frat boys and then, jump into a cab, press deflate and moments later, play the emaciated skeletal clothes rack with the body of a 10 year old boy that is so marketable in high fashion – all in the same day! With adjustable sized breasts you just doubled your chances at a career as both an emaciated, breastless high fashion model and a grotesquely over enhanced porn star.

Also, who can go past the fact that on a really basic level too – with inflatable breast implants one may never fear a dark and horrifying death through drowning. Sure you may be trapped on a transatlantic flight that’s plummeting from the sky into the ocean – there’s no stopping that from happening – but while the other passengers are scrambling to figure out how to put on the life vest like bickering caged rats who didn’t study the night before the exam you can just sit back, press inflate and have that one last mojito before the unpleasantness.

In fact, no matter what the scenario inflatable breast implants seem to spell freedom and choice in no uncertain terms. [source]

Airport officials in New Zealand would have done well to watch Fight Club before jumping to outrageous terror-based conclusions about what was in the mysterious package that showed up from China. Mysterious and frighteningly foreign wiring inside prompted them to immediate quarantine it for fear that it was a bomb but in reality, it was just a sex toy. To be fair, what the hell sex toy shows up on an x-ray machine as even vaguely similar to a bomb? Maybe it was the kind of industrial strength thigh pummeling jackhammer machine used by someone like Joan Collins or Michael Jackson. The extra Chernobyl strength radiation ray inside the main hollowed out shaft chamber provides a guarantee of sensation for anyone whose soul has gone missing. Sort of like those insistent old guys who show up to parties wearing a cock ring. Just so you know they’ve thought about it and came prepared. They need a whole lot more help to feel anything that most people know. Plus, just to rope it back in to a reasonable level of focus, perhaps there are a few airport baggage handlers in New Zealand who were in need of a little excitement at tired old Auckland Airport. Understimulated at work? Desperate for a little attention? What terrorist would bomb Auckland? Try a more believable emergency next time. Why not – sheep stampede or swallowed vowel crisis? Just a few options…[source]

Speculation surrounds who on earth would actually send a death threat to adorable polar bear cub, Knut after a letter that read: “Knut is dead!” arrived at the Berlin Zoo. Since being abandoned by his mother a while back, Knut has made international headlines and become a media sensation, most notably appearing on the front cover of Vanity Fair magazine with Leonardo diCaprio. He is safe and in good spirits," said zoo official Ragnar Kuehne – the “good spirits” part, of course, being a given in the sense that he’s a freaking bear and can’t in any way actually perceive that some freak wrote a note and sent it. His notoriety has actually pushed the value of Berlin Zoo stock up prompting the Stockholm Zoo to try and bolster THEIR stock’s value by having a press release and attempted media conference about Bilbo, the baby lemur. Hmmm, do we really need to draw a diagram here? [source]


A man in Israel has a part of his tongue bitten off by a woman after a particularly aggressive make out session which should serve as a reminder that, as religion teaches us, all forms of physical intimacy are punishable by physical dismemberment. It is God’s will that their sinful embrace was met with bloodshed. While the tongue was reattached by a doctor, obviously a Devil worshipping heathen, it’s bound to be a lesson he’ll not soon forget. Thankfully. [source}

Irrationally fearing the wolf of averageness lurking outside his gilded apartment door due to a lack of mindless media attention, Trump drags the old feud out of the closet again (what’s he flogging? A book? Oh, that’s right, his ratings are chronically low…) and sends Barbara Walters the actual underwear Rosie O’Donnell wore in her 1994 cinematic triumph with Strictly Ballroom star, Paul Mercurio, Exit to Eden. Incidentally, so critically acclaimed was it that Mercurio hasn’t REALLY been seen again and Rosie had to just consciously go for shock value rather than just hint at it to stay culturally relevant by getting her own show and now the View. Barbara Walters, in a moment of triumph in terms of being able to milk the underpants delivery story for publicity and yet, still seem completely above all the “caged rat scratching” technique employed by Rosie O’Donnell to prove she’s worth her own show, said: (from the NY Post) "But this is for me to say. This was sent for me, it was not sent to you." O'Donnell: "Go ahead, you say it." Walters: "No, I don't want to." O'Donnell: "You don't want to?" Walters ended the conversation, "I really do not want to stir up the whole Donald Trump thing again".

See how she gets to have the cake and eat it too? In taking ownership of the Donald Trump issue forcibly from Rosie, Walters gets to start her climb back up to the controller’s seat of the show – which she sort of desperately needs to do. When Bill Maher was on Wednesday morning, Walters didn’t even ask questions.

Power struggles aside, what a genius idea of Trump’s to do that. So totally insulting and undermining and humiliating. But also, hilarious. He’s such a bottom feeder. [source]

NBC blatantly exploits the media kit they were sent by the Virginia Tech Killer for ratings by justifying why they’ll be parceling out bits of the footage, photos and manifesto they were sent, obviously prior to the shooting rampage, under instruction from the FBI. After all, the kit needs to be analyzed. Of course it does. But NBC also need to ensure ongoing ratings so it seems they might just have taken a little cue from the Entertainment Tonight school of Anna Nicole Smith coverage, and get all the footage they need up front, maintain total exclusivity, and the ration it out in bits as the ratings ebb and flow. While the coverage of Anna Nicole’s death and the circus that followed was pretty ridiculous and clearly the product of outrageous hype, the actual events that made it up were more or less average. Anna Nicole died, she was sick and depressed, she was pumped full of drugs and there is and was a lot of money at stake. For the most part though, the players who kept the story going were, to one extent or another, opportunists who remain, at best, innocuous. The story was followed by the American people out of sheer self negating annoyance and a desperate need for escapism.

The massacre in Virginia actually involved people who were innocent victims of the core event, the shooting itself, that made this news. They weren’t there with a hand in the till or an ulterior motive and the implications of an event like this resonate on a real level for the rest of humanity. And yet, to a certain extent NBC’s treatment of this manifesto material, with their logos plastered all over everything etc. is, in essence, no different from the way ET dealt with Anna Nicole exclusives and that is pretty ghastly to think about. [source]

Simon Cowell and then Perez Hilton adequately sum up the Sanjaya situation at this point. With reference to his performances, there’s little remaining to be said. He more or less hits the notes and he’s totally beautiful but either he ups the freak factor or suddenly sings better or it feels like the schtick could fade a little. The best part about this is actually that Simon Cowell slaps Ryan Seacrest down and rightly so. God, Ryan Seacrest is a perky, sell out shit. He’s so conventionally and blandly attractive and so obviously in the closet for commercial reasons and it’s just so tiresome in the most insistently Cooperian way. Actually, that would be interesting; Cooper and Seacrest actually hooking up and then obviously hinting at it on TV in a Jonathan Rhys Meyers fashion. They could do it and then both refuse to talk about it but make out on CNN. The sex itself would be sex awash with meta narrative. Perky, meta narrative with the tiniest hint of sarcasm. A sarcasm that is really only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to dark dark secrets. Wait, wasn’t this about Sanjaya? [source]

Not missing a beat in her quest to make it clear to the entire universe that she really is completely incapable of basic rational thought, Lindsay Lohan makes the concise and socially reassuring statement that her friends and family are only safe when they are around her. For someone this marketable, where is her publicist? Tom Cruise managed to keep his insane, bipolar freak outs a secret from the media – or at least, he kept the media too scared to write about the REAL Tom Cruise due to Pat Kingsley. Li Lo isn’t anywhere near the manic instability of Tom Cruise and yet, this kind of crap keeps getting into the media. But, who knows, maybe it’s her schtick. She’s the unstable lunatic prodigy who gets to work with Streep despite herself. In that case, drink up and prattle on, dear. It’s sort of all you’ve got really, isn’t it? [source]

Richard Gere is being sued by three different people in India for kissing Bollywood star, Shilpa Shetty on the cheek in public at an AIDS benefit. That’s it. Kissing. He didn’t relentlessly penetrate her against her will in public, he simply hugged and kissed her. And people in India freaked out and burnt pictures of him. The interesting thing about highly strung religious conservatives who waste public funding by clogging up the courts with inane legal proceedings like this is that you KNOW the people involved are merely capitalist opportunists looking for some cheap publicity. This is the equivalent of a gold digging skank staking a claim for a geriatric billionaire’s fortune despite having no actual basis. Gere and Shetty provide the media viability and, under the guise of moral outrage, the conservatives collect. Of course Gere and Shetty aren’t exactly going to lose out. What’s the bet Shetty shows up in Hollywood 10 pounds thinner in three weeks and then later in the dramatic reconstruction of the Virginia Tech massacre? [source]

In saying he thinks Sanjaya is sexy, David Spade joins the Felix Dennis club of straight men who are mysteriously attracted to Sanjaya Malakar. The thing about this is that it’s not actually that unusual or strange that straight men would be reacting to Sanjaya at all. He has an angst free, playful muse-like quality about him. In addition to a forgiving and facilitating public, he has to have something mysterious going on to have gotten this far without having any talent and that’s why men might be attracted to him. He hits a cultural nerve somehow. Sort of in the same way that there is a flow on sense of sexual continuity between bricklayer type guys with wives from suburbia and pre-op transsexuals. The dress enables a level of sexual or sensual exploration otherwise forbidden. So, here with Sanjaya, his lack of status angst or whatever it is that keeps people running back for more creates a certain sexual/sensual/social panic because it opens up desires usually kept under wraps.

The rumour is that Lindsay Lohan has taken time out from her busy schedule of rambling mindlessly on her blackberry and sending brilliantly crafted thoughts to half of the media in the Western world, relentlessly guzzling alcohol in public, falling over and continuing to allow her parasitic social climbing mother to sponge off her - to chew ravenously on a side order of the steaming and freshly marinated meat curtains of DJ Samantha Ronson. To say it another way; apparently the Li Lo has been making oyster soup with the boyish young female DJ who likes the pink. But truthfully, good on her. Follow your nose young Li Lo to the carpet of your desire. There’s really nothing here worth actually elaborating on. Li Lo could be a lesbian, or bisexual and that’s wonderful. Similarly, she could just have really blurry vision whenever she’s out in a nightclub. The gay aesthetic for both men and women always seems to boil down to attributes only naturally found on 17 year old boys anyway so, you can’t really blame her if she didn’t know the difference. She doesn't usually seem at her sharpest when outside her house - but then, who knows what she gets up to inside, so feasibly that contributes to the whole culture of whatever this is too.[source]

Today in Extraordinarily Odd

A man whose middle (or last?) name is Jesus, Jose de Jesus Miranda has achieved a publicity and cultural coup and actually been banned from three ENTIRE South American nations for claiming to be the anti-Christ. People work for years to get banned by the Catholic Church because it pays enormous dividends thanks to the hipsters and intellectuals who buy whatever is banned and the Catholics who also buy whatever banned but who do it late at night and while high on crystal meth. Sure, there's no doubt he's probably a bipolar, megalomaniac, cult leader exploiting weaker minds to his own benefit, not to mention that he's homophobic which, actually, is not usually something you find among true Satanists. So, apart from all the obviously horrifying things you do which I, more or less across the board, think are reprehensible, congrats to you Mr. de Jesus Miranda on your recent banning. [source]

The most hilarious part about the fact that Miss Mexico’s dress being considered too violent for the Miss Universe pageant, apart from the fact that you get to use the word “violent” in connection with soft core, plastic porn covered by a thin, arbitrary veil of family entertainment is the fact that because you have to be so disciplined, Miss Mexico was probably just ok with it, she’s rationalized it in her mind and she went out there, teeth vaselined up, stomach sucked in, vampiric narcissistic harpy within her soul that pushes her to relentlessly punish her body in order to win her father’s withheld love kept under control, smiling and ready to win. The fact that she was wearing a dress that had images painted on it showing hangings of the Roman Catholic uprising in the 1920s (if squint you can almost see the cardinals screwing whores and pilfering public funds to fuel their drug habits) wasn’t a bad fashion decision at all, it was just the best way to make viewers think of Mexico (!?). Through portraying violence based on religion. Great. Fire your stylist. Immediately. If you want to go there, which Miss Mexico did: where were the bottles of tequila, burritos and peyote? AND, what about a contemporary homage to the downtrodden underclass of kitchen workers who prop up the economy of New York City? Where’s THEIR Miss Universe dress montage? [source]

180,000 bidets in Japan were found to be dangerous while sadly not penetratively, in the sense that they could easily burst into flames while in use which, when you think about it, is actually kind of hilarious. There is definite comedic potential for a sketch that relies on the idea that someone sits down on a bidet, pants down and all of a sudden smoke rises from the back of the person but obviously they don’t notice (the audience does and they start to point and yell) until their ass is on fire (despite this being totally physically impossible) and they run around in a circle making a train noise until they quicky sit in a bucket of water and sigh with relief. Relief which, too, is totally unrealistic seeing as they’d actually have sustained fourth degree burns made worse by the needless running in circles. The company responsible is offering free repairs.[source]

In a gesture that not only serves as a stunning display of well orchestrated publicity grabbing as much as it shows how blunt, oafish Maxim readers or editorial staff have got to be to make this kind of thing viable, Sanjaya Malakar – the American Idol finalist whose appeal is simply not based on actual vocal talent – is voted today Today’s Girl at Maxim online. Wow, how fucking hysterical! Sanjaya?! A Girl?! Well, he is a little effeminate. Now, look, I don’t want to get excited here but we could have some good old fashioned school yard fun with THIS!

So, here’s an hypothetical guess as to what made up the internal thought process of Felix Dennis or the Maxim editorial gang member who came up with THAT genius editorial idea:

“Gee, he’s kind of effeminate but, wait, he’s a guy. Shit, what does that mean? About me? I can’t stop thinking about him and I’m having trouble with the fact that I’m secretly attracted to him and the fact is that I would probably let him top me if I were drunk at a party. Yeah, but I’d be sure and punch him in the stomach afterwards, though, just to feel like I didn’t really do it… God, I really CAN’T stop thinking about the pretty, playful, light hearted American Idol finalist and it’s making me feel weird about myself. I know, I’ve got a plan that will fix everything! I’ll just quickly make fun of him and call him a girl.” Yeah, no one will suspect I jack off to a photo of Sanjaya at night if I suggest we call him a girl!

And SCENE.

Scene 2: the playground at school. Sanjaya gets his sandwich stamped on by Felix Dennis and the Maxim gang in the playground and moments later a permissive macho ex-marine PE teacher comes over and good naturedly wrestles with the Maxim gang, urges them to try out for the foot ball team this year, stares loathingly at Sanjaya and walks away, turning a blind eye to their bullying which continue throughout lunchbreak. Sanjaya doesn’t say anything but when he gets home from school that day his mother wants to know why he’s got a black eye.

Cut to years later, Sanjaya is performing on TV and (albeit inexplicably) winning the adoration of hundreds of thousands of viewers and Felix Dennis is busy trying to buy his soul back by touring the world in a lavish display of self indulgence, reading his crap baby boomer poetry to people who will only listen if he gives them free wine…oh wait…hang on a second… [source]

A little while back there was an outrageous (and quickly banned) company selling a (z-list) celebrity and (mad/hack) scientist endorsed skin cream on Chinese TV that claimed it could remove freckles called, evocatively enough "Magic Freckle Removal Gel". [source] The ad for the product showed that it was safe by delicately applying some of the treatment to a fish to show how gentle it was. Sadly, what the ads then didn’t immediately show was that the fish died of massive burns and the skin cream was leaving people hideously scarred. When all was revealed the product was banned, people were informed, the horror faded blah blah blah.

But while that notion of linking fish to skin treatment served only to reinforce the probability of hideous disfigurement and death due to massive product development negligence proved to be unpopular with “people” in 2006 in China (or any place else come to think of it) the idea of bringing fish into the world of skin care has been calmed down, roped in, packaged again in Turkey and can be added to the list of brilliant new, off the wall beauty treatments that already includes skin serum made from placenta extract and specks of pure gold, emergency weight loss brought on by purposefully ingested stomach viruses, hair conditioner made of bull semen, oxygen bars, shots of wheatgrass juice and apparently life changing Kombuchu tea.

Now, if you’ve got psoriasis or eczema, you can pay to sit in a tub of water that contains hundreds of tiny toothless fish who are craving tiny stomachfuls of diseased human flesh that will literally eat the dead skin off your legs and ass while you sit there reading a book. Why do they love to eat dead skin and diseased weeping open sores so much? Because the water they swim in has no floating organisms in it because it’s too warm. Consequently, they literally ARE starving and they just seem to LOVE diseased flesh. They kind of have to really, what choice do they have? In fact, the more diseased the better because the more disease there is, the more hard dead calloused skin there is and therefore the more hunger satisfaction and culinary delight those fish experience. But apart from more or less being a psoriasis treatment this is also a Godsend for people afflicted with psoriasis or eczema to the point where, when you stop to look at them on the street and can’t help but picture them naked, you get a general but powerful and almost crippling sense of nausea. While those people’s bodies may be so dominated in rashes that they are too hideous to deserve human love, this is also an experience for them to experience what it’s like to be physically wanted – albeit by fish – but still, it’s something as well as a potential cure.

You’d certainly have to have a high level of disposable income and time and, for that matter, patience to really commit to a treatment like this seeing as the recommended amount of time spent in the pool being literally eaten alive by those tiny fish is 8 hours a day for 21 days which will set you back about 4000 US dollars (all inclusive). To make that clear: you have to sit in the pool in Turkey for 21 days straight, 8 hours a day. Sure, that kind of commitment to a treatment is fine for something like cancer but psoriasis? Jesus, you’d be better off just getting out the blow torch and a pair of pliers and doing it yourself at home. Plus, it’d be cheaper.

But, really – think of the ultimate scenario involving inner and outer beautification if all these treatments were done at once; as you sat in a bath being literally eaten alive by tiny, flesh hungry fish, you could have your hair soaked in fresh bull semen (extracted while the bull was at a guaranteed optimum level of sexual arousal to ensure top levels of hair shining testosterone) and your face in sparkling human skin extract while intermittently downing shots of wheat grass, inhaling pure oxygen and vomiting up your stomach lining. Could the quest for beauty be any more beautiful itself? [source] [source]

Ok so, there’s nothing more effective at mustering up sincere shock than an unchecked macho-ego mixed with a touch of unforgettable horror. Oddly enough, if they're German, why is it just that bit worse? Remember a few months ago when there was the horrifying incident involving German soldiers playing around with the skulls of humans in Afghanistan? Photos of German soldiers holding dismembered heads next to their dicks were published and the incident proved enough to sicken and disgust even the Germans themselves (something that takes some work when you look at the porn that comes out of Germany). Oh, bless those unchecked male egos that are left to fester within a small group isolated from the rest of civilization so no one is there to ensure mature, managed behavior.

Well.

While it’s true that a tendency to lose a grasp of reality and to descend into unacceptable torturous and violent behaviour isn’t exclusively German at all, although when Germans act out it’s historically weird and often unnervingly fecal, the Germans are at it again and this time, a video has been released showing a military drill instructor urging his trainees to really focus their rage and anger by imagining the figurative target as an African American from the Bronx. What interesting about this is what the individual drill instructor said in this instance. When you’re in Germany, why specifically think about an African American from the Bronx? If you're going to choose to be prejudiced against black people and you're in Germany then why choose those from the Bronx? Black people live all over the globe so, this is such a strange and arbitrary choice of origin. The instructor’s actual words were: “You are in the Bronx. A black van is stopping in front of you. Three African-Americans are getting out and they are insulting your mother in the worst ways. ... Act.” Which sounds so specific it could almost be a strange rape fantasy than anything else.

Anyway, the Bronx borough president, Adolfo Carrion has stepped up to the plate in what amounts to what can only be an unexpected moment in the of global political and demanded an apology from Germany to the Bronx. Just from another perspective as well; it’s genius timing in terms of professional PR for Carrion what with the Imus outrage and the US being on edge about words. It’s racism AND it’s global.[source] [source] The actual video can be seen here.

Ordinarily I’d start off the week by scanning the Internet for stories about celebrities, weird Chinese and German people or the Catholic church that I felt a pang of furiousness over and as such felt a violent need to deconstruct and expose the people or institutions involved as exploiters of arbitrary myth to their own gain or simply as slightly odd. This morning however, things are slightly different. Yesterday afternoon thanks to the biggest storm to hit the east coast of the US since 1992 [source], my apartment flooded due to the fact that the building is poorly designed and, after 2 years of berating my lame slum lord, nothing has been done about it.

Anyway, so there are wooden floor boards in my apartment which look great but they hide a terrifying secret beneath them – no water proofing. When you also consider that I live in a basement apartment, rain means leaks. Every time it has rained over the last 2 years a little more water has seeped up through the floor boards and the boards themselves are actually buckling. This time, the water didn’t seep. It was almost geyser like and it was also really dirty water; the color of coffee. After about an hour, of rain on Sunday afternoon, most of my apartment was one inch deep in water. What did the puddle fiasco actually look like?

Well, I’m glad (I have taken it upon myself to assume) you asked because Chris, whose ass (see left) is the Official Ass of www.reluctantwhore.com took time out from tirelessly and selflessly lying about my apartment naked and went to the trouble of documenting the minor oceans gathering in my apartment – for anecdotal use at parties. Those photos are posted below.



Then, with the help of a water vac like this one:

I must have removed like 20-40 gallons of water from four different areas of my apartment both last night and this morning. Having to do that gets in the way of doing a blog about current events.

In many ways, the scenario here bears remarkable similarity to that of Hurricane Katrina. There were the years of pointing out the problem citing inevitable tragedy as a consequence to any failure to reinforce the space, the rain storm and the horror laden flooding. The only thing missing really was a bawling Anderson Cooper who, if you read the latest column by Michael Musto in the Village Voice is apparently far too busy reinforcing the speculation surrounding his sexuality by being forcibly visible at Xes bar in Chelsea no doubt refusing to answer questions about his sexual orientation to get to my apartment to dress down senators. [source]

Having said that, if my apartment didn’t look like this right now:

I’d point out that Britney Spears grabbed a member of the paparazzi and recorded an impromptu public statement which makes us all wonder if she’s actually a genius, ironic, post modern trail blazer in terms of how to deal with endless speculation surrounding your own personal life in the media rather than just the victim of a prolonged public nervous breakdown. Here’s the actual footage:

Similarly, I would point out that you could find out about how Richard Gere kissed a Bollywood star and massive disapproval erupted in India because that kind of public display of intimacy is not acceptable in Indian culture. People burnt effigies of Gere. What a waste of fire. [source]

If I weren’t having to quickly deal with leaks in my bathroom as they arrive to avoid the situation becoming worse than this:

then I’d certainly write more about how the absurdity that has become American Idol (avec Sanjaya), has actually seeped over into the Presidential race and someone called in for a radio interview with Hilary Clinton and asked what the US could do about Sanjaya Malakar and she said it was the best question she’d been asked in a long time. [source]

Also, if you look at these photos:

you’ll see that my desk is currently surrounded by water, making it actually an island of sorts and as such, it’s kind of difficult to write about how GLAAD, always with their finger on the pulse, gave Grey’s Anatomy an award for the way it has dealt with GLBT characters on the show despite the fact that the show’s main star escaped any real punishment for calling his co-star a “faggot” several times. It’s especially outrageous that this happened seeing as Don Imus was just fired for making a comment that was no less offensive on radio. [source]

Seeing as it’s so completely not news, I don’t really need to go that far into the reports that Lindsay Lohan actually fell down on the way to her car on the weekend [source] probably because she was drunk but it’s also likely that her pesky general lack of anchor to reality contributed to her equally pesky lack of equilibrium. Similarly, the fact that Anna Nicole’s diaries didn’t actually sell on ebay.com over the weekend [source] could indicate a decline in public apathy towards the massive corruption currently sweeping the Executive Branch of Federal Government [source]. But sadly, it seems unlikely with all the hysteria surrounding Don Imus needlessly taking up air space.

Also, incidentally, the ceiling near my bed looks like this: