Because baseball is pretty much dead to me as a sport, I am glad that With Leather will keep their eyes peeled and sound the alarm when something of mention happens...like thus:
There apparently has been some clamoring about how the Los Angeles California Angels of Anaheim United States North America Earth incorporated the jersey of their late pitcher Nick Adenhart into their champagne-soaked celebration of their AL West title. The jersey of Adenhart -- who was killed in a hit-and-run by a driver under the influence earlier in the season, was soaked in champagne and alcohol during the celebration, which angered a lot of people hoping to see laundry treated more humanely. The Angels defended themselves yesterday.
“We wanted to celebrate with him like he was here,” reliever Kevin Jepsen, whose locker is just a few stalls away from Adenhart’s, said Tuesday. “If he was still here with us, we’d be pouring beer on him just like everybody else in here.
Said third baseman Chone Figgins: “He’s our teammate. We’re allowed to do what we want.”
Manager Mike Scioscia said the gesture was meant as nothing more than homage to the 22-year-old…”You have to understand these players and the tribute, what it really means when you pour champagne on somebody,” Scioscia said. “That’s the tribute, not the fact that it was alcohol. It’s like getting a whipped-cream pie in the face after an interview. It’s part of the tribute. . . . I think it was very sincere, very real and I know it was meaningful to us.”
The dearth of convictions of “Driving While Pie-Faced” notwithstanding, I’ve never found it appropriate to judge other people’s reactions on how they handle death. Some people want to cry, some people get angry. Others just want to climb back on while the body’s still warm and “pay their final respects.” Pay them all over her chest and face. But that’s why America loves baseball, right?
Codex Pictures, who did all the Bionicle DVD movies for Lego, will be making a CG DVD movie based on Warhammer 40,000 called Ultramarines. Their web site doesn't say too much - in fact, this is literally all the info available on the project:
The moment fans have been waiting for is finally here... for the first time, the Warhammer 40,000 universe will be realised in a feature-length movie on DVD.
Ultramarines is a 70-minute sci-fi thriller that will use CGI and state-of-the-art animation production techniques. Games Workshop is delighted to be working with UK-based production company Codex Pictures, who have the momentous task of bringing the Warhammer 40,000 universe to the screen.
Okay then..but really, 40K (as we called it) was an awesome hobby. Between playing the games and developing strategies, to the intricate modeling that usually outlasted the time spent playing, it was one of the most fun things I'd done in my pre-teen years. If they make the movie right, even you non-geeks might take a liking to the gaming realm. The concepts, not the actual games.
Superdive is a frat bar in the East Village that allows you to buy a keg to share with your friends. College? It's still on! Starting tonight, "twenty bucks and an appetite for champagne and destruction gets you all the bubbly you can drink, and, yes, that champagne will be sabered and served to you by a little person named Nick wearing a pirate outfit." Yes, that is him in the pictures.
AK-47 Used For Political Fundraiser - Genius idea! I usually use it for bank robberies or small paramilitary excursions, but this really opens up the coercive partisan weaponry market. My the next election year you can count on Rockets for Republicans and Drone Bombers for Democrats!
Egypt Anger Over Virginity Faking - You expect a virgin when you pay for a virgin. These countries wouldn't seem like such fanatical zealots if some of these easy to fix issues were really dealt with. You tend to worry less about the infidels at your borders when you're not watching for infidels in your woman.
Apple App Store Hits 2 Billion Downloads - Wow, that's a whole lot of people playing Bejeweled 2. Now somebody tell me how many of those apps are free and how many are paid downloads...
Khloe Kardashian And Lamar Odom Get Married - He'll get that annulled once he finds her dick. It's small, but that's the kind of thing that can ruin a marriage a month after first meeting.
Homeless Ga. Sex Offenders Directed To Woods - This feels like the opening of a joke, but it's not. Is it infested with bears? Or has hunting season begun? As long as its not the same woods with Little Red Riding Hood and Hansel and Gretel, that's okay.
Police Baffled By Woman’s Disappearance - I mean, she was right here! Where could she have gone? We looked away for one moment, and poof! We're the police and this never happens!
Lucy Of Beatles' 'Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds' Dies - Apparently she succumbed to her longstanding ailment, kaleidoscope eyes. She will be buried at the Strawberry Fields Forever cemetery next to the Eggman and Sgt. Pepper.
Baby Is Killed In Apparent Gang Shooting - Toddler gangs have been squabbling over nap time and formula, and it looks like there's no end in sight. Maybe potty training will bring about a truce.
Not only did they perform the show in it's entirety, but they also added a few extra songs into the musical. And the McPoyle brothers made a surprise cameo. And to top it all off, they showed the future episode "The Gang Reignites The Rivalry" as well as an insane (as in pandemonium and a bloodied, maimed mall Santa) preview from their Christmas DVD. Just awesome.
Supercool good times tonight - The Nightman Cometh...Live! More on that Monday with a review, but onto the top and bottom of the week...
Best of the week: Crashgate resolved!
This weekend is the second Singapore Grand Prix, and it's going to be a very scrutinized and highly important. With four races left, the duel between Brawn GP teammates Rubens Barrichello and current points leader Jenson Button for the title may well be determined in this race as only 14 points separate them out of a possible 40 left. But even with the dogfight at the top and the Red Bull squad still maintaining a mathematical chance to top the drivers championship, it's the spectre of last year's inaugral race and the year long effects that finally resolved this week.
Rewind to 2008: Despite being close to the top in practice, Renault had a poor qualifying session and started well down the grid, with Fernando Alonso starting in fifteenth place, and Nelson Piquet, Jr. alongside him in sixteenth. Alonso was the first driver to make a routine pit stop for fuel and tires on lap twelve, rejoining the race at the back of the field. He had put in a light fuel load in an attempt to pass the cars in front of him; most drivers that qualify in low positions tend to do the opposite.Three laps later, Piquet hit the circuit wall at turn seventeen, one of the turns on the circuit which did not have a crane nearby, necessitating the deployment of the safety car.
Felipe Massa was leading for Ferrari before the crash. The long-standing rule was that the pit lane remained open during safety car incidents, and because the cars had to travel slowly behind the safety car, teams took advantage of this to pit immediately and re-enter the race with less loss of track position. However, the regulations in 2008 ruled that the pit lane was closed until all cars were picked up by the safety car, meaning that the advantage of the lead cars would be eliminated before they were able to pit, and afterwards they would re-enter the race at the back of the queue. Under the previous regulations, the leaders could quickly pit before they were hauled up and their lead eliminated, meaning that they could still resume a front-running position. Some drivers needed to stop while the pits were closed to avoid running out of fuel, so they were handed penalties for their infractions.
Most of the leading cars ended up behind Alonso and some slower drivers, who proved difficult to pass on the narrow circuit, while those ahead of Alonso were lighter on fuel and were able to pull away, but had not pitted. After gaining the lead in the final third of the race, Alonso went on to win the race. No action was initially taken over the crash. Piquet characterised the crash as a simple mistake, and it was not odd given his abilities and consistant results in the lower half of racers.
Back to the present: Renault re-signed Piquet on a one-year contract for the 2009 season, once again alongside Alonso. By the tenth race of the season though, Piquet had failed to score any points, and was dropped by Renault in August. The departure was acrimonious, with Piquet criticising his former Renault F1 team and Flavio Briatore, the team principal, noted scumbag, and banger of some retardedly hot women (he put a baby in Heidi Klum!). By the month's end, word that Piquet was ordered to crash during the Singapore race prompted the governing FIA to investigate "alleged incidents at a previous F1 event".
In early September, Renault F1 were formally accused of interfering with the outcome of the 2008 Singapore race, conspired with Piquet to cause a deliberate crash with the aim of causing the deployment of the safety car to the advantage of Alonso.
Piquet's statement was that he was asked by Briatore and engineer Pat Symonds to crash his car at a specific corner. Alonso denied knowing of any plan and was absolved of any blame by the FIA, who confirmed Piquet would face no action after making his whistleblowing statements, even if the case was found in favor of Renault. In response, Renault F1 stated that it intended to take legal action against Nelson Piquet Jr "concerning the making of false allegations and a related attempt to blackmail the team". Symonds was also reported to have been offered immunity from action if he provided the FIA with details of the alleged conspiracy, though it was reported that he told FIA investigators that the initial idea of a crash had come from Piquet.
Before the meeting of the FIA World Motor Sport Council at the top of the week, Renault announced it would not be contesting the charges, and stated that " managing director, Flavio Briatore and its executive director of engineering, Pat Symonds, have left the team." Both men did not comment on the charges but essentially admitted guilt in drawing blame as to save the tarnished image of Renault. The FIA imposed a two-year suspended sentence on Renault (meaning that the team will be banned from Formula One indefinitely if a similar incident occurs again), while issuing a five-year ban to Pat Symonds and banning Flavio Briatore indefinitely from any FIA-sanctioned event. Furthermore, Briatore was effectively banned from managing drivers (such as current racers Mark Webber and Heikki Kovalainen) as the FIA stated that superlicences would not be issued or renewed to any driver associated with him in the future.
You could not ask for a more wildly interesting, unpredictable season in a sport. And it's not over yet.
Worst of the week: Burn, Hollywood, burn!
Fuck the studio system because it continues to pump out unoriginal ideas and make the worst possible choices. Here's a preview of what's coming to theaters soon...
• Diablo Cody’s heading back to high school, signing on to write and produce an adaptation of the “Sweet Valley High” book series for Universal. You recall the “Sweet Valley” novels, which followed the lives of identical twins with dissimilar personalities — the sensitive and practical Elizabeth and the flighty and boy-crazy Jessica — from the fictional town of Sweet Valley, right? There were more than 150 books in the series between 1983 and 2003 and a TV series with 88 episodes between 1994 and 1997. Good timing...
• No one actually watches Lost Boys sequels but they keep making them anyway, presumably as a way to keep Corey Feldman from making music. Anyway, here’s the plot of Lost Boys 3: The Thirst. See if you can spot the Twilight reference...
“When veteran vampire hunter Edgar Frog [Corey Feldman] finds himself destitute and almost friendless, he thinks his life has hit bottom - but wealthy vampire-romance novelist Gwen Liebling offers him a small fortune to go on the vampire hunt of a lifetime and rescue her son Peter from the Alpha Vampire D.J. Dusk. With the help of his friends Zoe, Lars and Blake, Edgar heads into a bloody battle to exterminate evil.”
Is that besed on real life, with Feldman actually friendless and poor? And who think D.J. Dusk is not an actual disc jockey
• Dreamworks is in negotiations to buy “Xombie,” a pitch about a zombie who is also a policeman, from cop-turned-scribe Will Beall, with Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci in talks to produce.
A zombie policeman? Written by a policeman? I wonder how he came up with such an idea! Kurtzman and Orci may have lucked out penning the not bad Star Trek, but they also wrote both the piece of robo-shit Transformers films, The Island, and The Legend Of Zorro. "Xombie” is based on a Devil’s Due comic book by James Farr, itself based on his online animated series. Farr’s creation centers on a zombie cop named Dirge (that's lame) who attempts to saves humanity’s remnants, particularly a young girl named Zoe, from evil zombies (that's trite).
• The He-Man movie that had been in development at WB and since dropped, has been picked up by Columbia. Fuck.
• The trend of taking anything printed as a latest graphic novel to spawn an adaptation continues.
“Mal Chance” tells the story of Lola, part of an ancient clan of assassins targeted for death by a powerful gangster. Her only recourse is to bring down the gangster’s entire operation with the help of an honest FBI agent who is unaware of her true identity.
Hmmm...will Lola be a hot chick wearing leather? Do she and the FBI agent could fall in love? When he discovers her secret identity, will it threaten everything? I guess Wanted is also getting this unofficial sequel.
• According to Mattel, the 50-year old Barbie has 99% worldwide brand awareness, is the number one girls property in the toy industry, the top doll property in the U.S. and the number one worldwide property in the traditional toy industry. So that means a movie should be made!
Producer Laurence Mark (Julie & Julia) has begun to canvas writers and decide a creative take for a family-friendly movie. He said there is no shortage of plot possibilities, since Barbie has held more than 120 jobs over the years. “Barbie may be the most popular girl in the world, and has always been a wonderfully aspirational figure, so we must do her proud.” And nothing is full of more pride than marketing your product as a film license.
All of these were the trade and blog fodder this week. And that's not even counting Scream 4, the remake of the remade The Fly, or Ghost Rider 2, which everybody was looking forward to...not being made.
Runner up: Real Gold digging Useless Housewives of New York "star" Kelly Bensimon will strip down for the December 2009 issue of Playboy. At 40, the mother of two will only appear "partially nude" in the photos. Playboy is such weak sauce these days anyway, especially with the non-nude (read: partially) Heidi Montag and Olivia Munn pictorals, but would you even want to see that shitty boob job?
Like OMG!, I try to avoid the daily fantastic headlines and ridiculous sensationalism of Live Science, but such bullshit time and again is ultimately unavoidable.
With reporting that makes me want to raise a fist to their staff, spanking children is the topic of study in recent research. Their postulate is that while spanking can get kids to behave in a hurry, it can do more harm than good to their noggins. Well, you're doing it wrong. It's for their bottoms. But really, they claimed that the more a child was spanked the lower his or her IQ compared with others. Did that statement alone make any red flags go up? If not, perhaps you were spanked too much as a child.
One might ask, however, whether children who are spanked tend to come from backgrounds in which education opportunities are less or inherited intelligence lower. But while the results only show an association between spanking and intelligence, (study researcher Murray) Straus says his methodology and the fact that he took into account other factors that could be at play (such as parents' socioeconomic status) make a good case for a causal link.
"You can't say it proves it, but I think it rules out so many other alternatives; I am convinced that spanking does cause a slowdown in a child's development of mental abilities."
Right there in the article, the question of scholastic opportunity, and more importantly, genetic ability is broached - and then dismissed since the study only looked at how dumb kids were and how much they were spanked. And even that loose connection is only made because the researcher suggests it, based on a self-determined "methodology" and that he feels it rules out "other alternatives". Lack of proof for one thing does not in contrast establish proof of another. See how that flies when you go to your doctor with a pain and they tell you you have cancer just because they ruled out pregnancy. There's nothing better than a dipshit in guise of a researcher who'll come right out and let you know his study doesn't prove his point. Well, keep researchin' then until you have something to show...
The researchers tested 806 children ages 2 to 4, and 704 ages 5 to 9 to determine their IQs, and then again four years later. Both groups of kids got smarter after four years, but the 2 to 4 year olds who were spanked scored 5 points lower on the IQ test than those not spanked. For children ages 5 to 9, the spanked ones scored on average 2.8 points lower than their unspanked counterparts. They held their finding significant even after accounting for parental education, income, cognitive stimulation by parents and "other factors that could affect children's mental abilities". Nice blanket catchall for that.
Whether or not spanking equates with dumber kids is not known, and may never be known. That's because the only way to truly show cause and effect would be to follow over time two groups of kids, one randomly assigned to get spanked and another who would not get spanked. Barring that method, which is unfeasible, Straus considers his study the next best thing, as he looked back at a nationally representative set of kids who were followed over time.
Wow, I never thought that bad science was "the next best thing" to good science. Supporters of this study claim it rules out the possibility that children with lower IQs somehow elicit more physical discipline, but that presupposes that the behavioral mechanisms (and actions) that trigger a spanking response in parents are in no way tied to the existing intelligence. It doesn't take more than a whack or two understand something you did was wrong and that was the consequence of your actions. If you don't grasp that, one or one hundred more times getting smacked is not going to change your aptitude...but it will be increasingly necessary until that number correlates to you stupidity level.
Let's try and make that clearer if you were an oft disciplined child: there is no physical way to reduce your IQ no more than there is the converse to increase or maintain it. In the touchy-feely world where it's PC to soften everything, this study is just another attempt at pop-parenting. That kid doesn't have a learning disability, they're fucking dumb. And spanking them isn't going to make them any more stupid than they already are. Genetics holds the key, morons.
Steven and Kathryn share a well-organised home in bustling Las Vegas. They have a neat, if compact kitchen, a furnished living area, and a bedroom complete with double bed, wardrobe and bookshelf featuring a wide selection including a Frank Sinatra biography and Spanish phrase book. They make their money in some of the biggest casinos in the world. And along with hundreds of others, the couple are part of a secret community living in the dark and dirty underground flood tunnels below the famous strip.
Rather than working in the bars or kitchens they "credit hustle", prowling the casinos searching the fruit machines for money or credits left by drunken gamblers. Despite the risks from disease, highly venomous spiders and flooding washing them away, many of the tunnel people have put together elaborate camps with furniture, ornaments and shelves filled with belongings.
Steven and girlfriend Kathryn's base - under Caesar's Palace casino - is one of the most elaborate. They even have a kettle and a makeshift shower fabricated out of an office drinking water dispenser. But their bed and many of their belongings are on crates to keep them off the damp floor. Despite it being hot and dry outside, their tunnel is wet from water being sent down from nearby construction work. As he gives a guided tour of home, Steven explains: "We use our imagination a lot. "Our bed came from a skip outside an apartment complex. It's mainly stuff people dump that we pick up. One man's junk is another man's gold. We get the stuff late at night so people don't see us because it's kind of embarrassing." He later gives directions to the tunnels' own art gallery, a collection of graffiti by local artists and some by the underground residents.
Steven moved into the tunnels two years ago after he lost his hotel front-desk job due to a heroin problem he claims he kicked in January. He now works the same hotels credit-hustling, and his life retains other similarities with the one he left behind. "We work our way down the strip. The most I've ever found is $997 on one machine. I've found about $500 a few times. But normally $20 or so is enough to call it a night. We buy food and supplies like shampoo and soap. Last night I went and watched the new Quentin Tarantino movie Inglourious Basterds up at the Palms Hotel."
Despite his established set-up, Steven claims he eventually wants to leave the tunnels but can't because of two outstanding arrest warrants from drug possession charges two years ago. It is estimated the population of the underground community could be as many as 700. As well as credit-hustling, they earn their money off the wildly excessive city above by begging and "dumpster diving" - raiding bins and skips. There are around 350 miles of flood channels running under Las Vegas. Most inhabitants are in the area under the city's strip.
Another couple, Amy and JR, have lived in the tunnels for two years, having moved to Las Vegas in search of work, wealth and a slice of the famous Sin City action. Putting down the Twilight vampire book she is reading for the third time, Amy (33) explains: "My husband and I have been down here two years this week. We were living with my mom in California but the house was full and we had to leave. I heard Las Vegas was a good place for jobs. It's the city that never sleeps, with all the bright lights, and I'd always wanted to come. But it was tough and we started living under the staircase outside the MGM casino. Then we met a guy who lived in the tunnels. We've been down here ever since."
She continues, "I have my books, my CD player, crossword puzzles, some clothes and my picture of our son Brady, who was killed 11 years ago at four months old. The main dangers are the floods and the Black Widow spiders. But it's not a terrible place to be if you're homeless. It's much cooler than on the streets, we get a breeze coming through and the cops don't really bother you. It's quiet and everyone helps each other out down here. I hope to get out one day. But I want to stay in Las Vegas - I love it here."
Amy and JR met 13 years ago and even got married in one of the city's popular wedding chapels on Valentine's Day last year. Their wedding had some similarities with the 110,000 other couples who get hitched in the city each year. JR (36) explains: "We got married in the Shalimar Chapel. We went to watch a show, then to McDonald's for dinner. We got a little bit drunk and did the other normal wedding day things - only we had to come back down here rather than go to a hotel room."
Amy and JR's neighbor Jamie, showing off a wristband he found that gives him free food all day at a hotel buffet, explains: "I've been down here since May. I've worked at a lot of the hotels, mainly in building and construction, but not for a couple of years. The jobs are harder to come by now. Now I credit hustle but there are lots more people doing it these days. Hundreds and hundreds. You see little old ladies doing it." As for other entertainment in the tunnels, he adds: "We're big talk radio fans. And a few of us are accomplished musicians and have instruments here. One guy down here has a full-time job. I don't think gambling is the cause of many people being down here. It's more alcohol and drugs. We all gamble a bit - we're in Vegas."
Additional and similar info in this post. Charming folks, really.
Not to be upstaged by sisters Assy Pig Tank and the Brainiac, The Beast makes a power move!
The news is that Lamar Odom and Shrek Khloe Kardashian needed all of one month together to decide that they were going to get married. The wedding is this Sunday (and she "couldn't be happier" - of course, she's used to trapping and eating men, not marrying them), but the bachelor party is tonight. And it is going to be insane.
Why?
Joe "Raping Scumbag Assaulting Tax Evader" Francis is hosting Lamar’s swan song to bachelorhood at Les Deux nightclub in Hollywood. It is being described as a formal affair...with stripper poles and “midgets.” At least there's "tons of candy". And that's not code for anything.
Khloe’s brother Rob will be there to "keep an eye on Lamar", but he'll have so much little person ass covered in coke, I doubt he'll even know who Lamar is. The only wilder gathering will be the divorce afterparty. Does Lamar need a green card? Is he fighting the draft? I know brothers like white girls, but Khloe ain't white, and pending a South Africa track and field gender test, may not be female.
The heirs of Jack Kirby - the comics legend who, along with Stan Lee, made Marvel what it is today - are seeking to employ a little-used copyright rule that lets them wrest Kirby's creations away from Marvel (soon to be Disney-Marvel) and put them back under the estate's control. If they succeed, there will be trademarks covering the characters that still belong to Disney-Marvel; and the collectively created characters, stories, art and situations will be jointly held by two potentially hostile parties: Disney-Marvel and the Kirbys.
The legal notices expressed an intent to regain copyrights to some creations as early as 2014, according to a statement from Toberoff & Associates, a Los Angeles firm that helped win a court ruling last year returning a share of the copyright in Superman to heirs of the character's co-creator, Jerome Siegel.
Mr. Toberoff declined to elaborate on the statement. A spokeswoman for Marvel had no immediate comment. Disney said in a statement, "The notices involved are an attempt to terminate rights seven to 10 years from now, and involve claims that were fully considered in the acquisition." Fox, Sony, Paramount and Universal had no comment...
Sony has the film rights to Spider-Man in perpetuity, for instance, while Fox has the X-Men and the Fantastic Four. Paramount has a distribution agreement for Marvel's next few self-produced movies, including a second "Iron Man" film. Meanwhile, Hasbro has certain toy rights and Universal holds the Florida theme park rights to Spider-Man and the Incredible Hulk, among other characters.
It's likely that the Kirbys will end up with the economic right to the characters -- a share of the profits -- but not the moral right -- the right to veto various uses and licenses.
Masked gunmen used a stolen helicopter and explosives to engineer a spectacular raid on a cash depot in Stockholm this morning, breaking into the building through the roof and flying off with bags of cash. Baller!
The daring pre-dawn heist stunned police in the Swedish capital, who were unable to deploy their own helicopters to the scene because suspected explosives had been placed at their hangar. Double baller!
The security company that owns the facility, G4S PLC, said the thieves had made off with "an unconfirmed sum of money" and added it would offer a large reward for information leading to their arrest and the return of the loot. The company did not give an exact amount for the reward. One person was detained later in a Stockholm suburb in connection with the robbery, but wasn't officially declared a suspect.
Shortly after 5 a.m., the helicopter swooped down toward the cash depot and hovered over the building as the robbers hoisted themselves onto the roof in what police said was a carefully planned operation. What, it wasn't an ill-conceived, hastilly spontanious plan? "What we know is that they forced down some kind of wall to get in," they said. "We don't want to comment on how they did it." There were 21 staff members inside the building during the heist, but no one was injured.
Investigators said the robbers wore masks and were believed to have carried automatic weapons and used explosives during the 20-minute raid. Witnesses reported hearing loud bangs during the heist. A witness told channel TV4 he saw a gray helicopter hovering above the building for about 15 minutes. "Two men hoisted themselves down...they hoisted up money, too." A police commando team was seen trying to enter the cash depot in the Vastberga neighborhood with a battering ram.
Police later found an abandoned helicopter near a lake north of Stockholm, about 15 miles from the cash depot. A police spokeswoman said the chopper was reported stolen and was believed to be the one used by the robbers. The bomb squad was examining the suspected explosives left at the police hangar, which prevented their helicopters from taking off. Britain-based G4S PLC is one of the world's largest security companies. The Vastberga facility stores cash that is transported to banks and other businesses in Sweden.
The country has seen a series of spectacular robberies in recent years. Last year a group of men broke into a mail processing center in Goteborg, paralyzing large parts of Sweden's second-largest city after spreading out spikes, burning out cars in different areas and leaving suspected explosive devices in the center. In 2006, Goteborg's international airport was partially closed after masked men crashed through a gate and held up luggage handlers as they were unloading crates of foreign currency worth 7.8 million kronor ($1.1 million) from a passenger aircraft. Four years earlier, robbers pulled off a similar heist at Stockholm's Arlanda Airport, when staff were loading foreign currency worth 43 million kronor onto an aircraft.
This does not surpise me at all, since Sweden's neighbor is Finland, home of Kimi Räikkönen, and he is bad ass. It must rub off on them.
“Don’t hate my father,” Mackenzie Phillips says. Can you think of any reason we would?
In a tell-all book out tomorrow, the former childhood actress reveals that her dad, musician John Phillips of the ’60s band the Mamas and the Papas, engaged with her in a long-term incestuous relationship. Oops. Guess we're gonna hate him.
Phillips (49) who has survived drug addiction, arrests and divorce, writes in the book “High on Arrival” that she was already a star playing a boy-crazy teen on the TV sitcom “One Day at a Time” when her father had sex with her on the night before she was to marry Jeff Sessler, a member of the Rolling Stones entourage in 1979 (back then, that was a legit career).
“On the eve of my wedding, my father showed up, determined to stop it,” writes Phillips, who was 19 and a heavy drug user at the time. “I had tons of pills, and Dad had tons of everything too. Eventually I passed out on Dad’s bed.” And here's the perfect 70's conclusion to that part: “My father was not a man with boundaries. He was full of love, and he was sick with drugs. I woke up that night from a blackout to find myself having sex with my own father."
“Had this happened before? I didn’t know. All I can say is it was the first time I was aware of it. For a moment I was in my body, in that horrible truth, and then I slid back into a blackout.”
Phillips’ life began to spiral out of control. In 1980, she was fired from “One Day at a Time” because of her constant drug use. That same year, she went to rehab — with her father. She even toured with him in a band called the New Mamas and the Papas. Her sexual relationship with him had become consensual. “I was a fragment of a person, and my secret isolated me,” she writes. “One night Dad said, ‘We could just run away to a country where no one would look down on us. There are countries where this is an accepted practice. Maybe Fiji.’
“He was completely delusional. No, I thought, we’re going to hell for this.” Yep, and also because you're using it for book promotion. And with Chynna or Bijou, you could have done better.
There are many perils to life in Congress, but perhaps the worst is when screw-loose ex-staffers go over to the opposition and accuse you of betraying your country to Turkey while having a lesbian affair.
According to an American Conservative interview (that's already suspect) Sibel Edmonds, a Turkish and Farsi language translator who used to work for the FBI, claims that a Democratic congresswoman from Illinois was seduced by a Turkish secret agent. Adding another twist is Edmonds was hired by the FBI as a contractor right after 9/11, and she worked for them until they fired her for whistleblowing in 2002.
As reported by Vanity Fair in 2005, an internal FBI Inspector General's report stated that Edmonds had been improperly fired and it further said that "many of her allegations had bases in fact."
And she's made lots of allegations, too! Like the ones involving former Illinois Congressman and Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert, who, according to Edmonds, received tens of thousands of dollars in secret campaign payments from Chicago-area Turkish diplomats and Turkish-Americans. (Hastert then withdrew from House consideration one of those perennial resolutions acknowledging the Armenian genocide. Hastert now works for a lobbying firm hilariously named Dickstein Shapiro, where he lobbies for Turkey.)
Edmonds says in the interview that "in 2000 ... Turkish agents started gathering information on her, and they found out that she was bisexual." A female Turkish agent is said to have "struck up a relationship with her", and then, following the death of Schakowsky's mother, the woman is said to have attended the funeral "hoping to exploit her vulnerability."
"They later were intimate in Schakowsky's townhouse," Edmonds says, "which had been set up with recording devices and hidden cameras." The reason for attempting to get at Schakowsky, Edmonds believes, is so that they would be able to get both her "and her husband Robert Creamer (titter) to perform certain illegal operational facilitations for them in Illinois," along with Hastert, who was already on the payroll, and several other Chicago officials. Yep, the old lesbian honeypot seduction!
It's pretty hard to follow this insane story, so who knows if you should be freaked out about the Turkish spy ring selling nuclear secrets, or if their bribery and blackmail has thus far succeeded only in preventing Congress from officially recognizing this mass murder they perpetrated in 1915.
The Texas Department of Criminal Justice Web site has entries from as far back as December 7, 1982 listing quotations taken from inmates’ last statements. Their most recent was added after Stephen Moody was executed last Wednesday by lethal injection for murder. I find last meals and final words very interesting.
• Go ahead?
• Nothing I can say can change the past.
• I done lost my voice.
• I would like to say goodbye.
• My heart goes is going ba bump ba bump ba bump. • Is the mike on?
• I don’t have anything to say. I am just sorry about what I did.
• I am nervous and it is hard to put my thoughts together. Sometimes you don’t know what to say.
• Man, there is a lot of people there.
• I have come here today to die, not make speeches.
• Where’s Mr. Marino’s mother? Did you get my letter?
• I want to ask if it is in your heart to forgive me. You don’t have to.
• I wish I could die more than once to tell you how sorry I am.
• Could you please tell that lady right there — can I see her? She is not looking at me — I want you to understand something, hold no animosity toward me. I want you to understand. Please forgive me.
• I don’t think the world will be a better or safer place without me.
• I am sorry.
• I want to tell my mom that I love her.
• I caused her so much pain and my family and stuff. I hurt for the fact that they are going to be hurting.
• I am taking it like a man.
• Kick the tires and light the fire. I am going home.
• They may execute me but they can’t punish me because they can’t execute an innocent man.
• I couldn’t do a life sentence.
• I said I was going to tell a joke. Death has set me free. That’s the biggest joke.
• To my sweet Claudia, I love you.
• Cathy, you know I never meant to hurt you.
• I love you, Irene.
• Let my son know I love him.
• Tell everyone I got full on chicken and pork chops.
• I appreciate the hospitality that you guys have shown me and the respect, and the last meal was really good.
• The reason it took them so long is because they couldn’t find a vein. You know how I hate needles. ... Tell the guys on Death Row that I’m not wearing a diaper.
• Lord, I lift your name on high.
• From Allah we came and to Allah we shall return.
• For everybody incarcerated, keep your heads up.
• Death row is full of isolated hearts and suppressed minds.
• Mistakes are made, but with God all things are possible.
• I am responsible for them losing their mother, their father and their grandmother. I never meant for them to be taken. I am sorry for what I did.
• I can’t take it back.
• Lord Jesus forgive of my sins. Please forgive me for the sins that I can remember.
• All my life I have been locked up.
• Give me my rights. Give me my rights. Give me my rights. Give me my life back.
It is the Jewish New Year this weekend - 5770 for those keeping score at home, but to me, it is just like "last year", spending another Saturday working instead of enjoying the time off. "But Famous M," some of you will cry, "be glad you're busy enough to have to work on the weekends". Screw that. I'm busy enough to work the other five day a week like everybody else. Anyway, lets look back upon the week...
Best of the week (tie): College is kill crazy!
Sucks to be at Yale or UC Irvine, but at Johns Hopkins University, it's the students doing the killing, not the other way around. A student armed with a samurai sword killed an intruder in his garage, Baltimore police said. Asian studies? Perhaps.
Two laptops and a Sony PlayStation had been stolen by burglars on Monday from the home, located on University Parkway just blocks from the school. Early Tuesday, John Pontolillo, one of the four Hopkins students who live in the home noticed the garage door was open and took a sword with him to investigate. In the garage, Pontolillo told police he discovered a man and when the student told the man to get out, the man accosted him. Pontolillo defended himself with the sword, cutting off the man's hand and causing a severe laceration to his upper body. Let me repeat that in case you missed it: the student defended himself with the sword, cutting off the man's hand and causing a severe laceration to his upper body. Awesome!
Campus security and an off-duty city officer responding to a call for a suspicious person in the area around 1:20 a.m. Tuesday heard screams to call police, and the man, Donald D. Rice died at the scene. Rice had a long rap sheet of burglary arrests and was released from jail just two days before the altercation. Peggy Rice, his sister, told WJZ-TV in Baltimore that her brother did not deserve to die and that the student should be charged with homicide (he won't be). And to her, I say fuck you and your dead, thieving brother. That's what happens when you get caught with a B+E. Try that shit with me, I will not only kill you, but probably set you on fire and piss on you. And not all in that order.
Also: Birth(s) of a meme.
It is a rare privilege to see a new meme pop up, but we saw two of them. The big pop culture one was obviously the latest Kanye outburst, who can't help himself from being a total dickbag. He's less a victim of his success than his own superegotistical douchery, and it's almost better than when he was revealed to be a gay fish since he gets to be beaten down by his own actions. Granted, it has been exhausted in just under a week, but it even drew an off-record response from the president that made it's own mini-controversy when it came out publicly. And of all people to put him in his place, Jay Unfunny Leno was the one to ask what his dead momma would think.
But better than that was a more homespun, organic, typical meme that came from Topless Robot. Every Friday, they find the most deplorable fan fiction on the web and post it for your ridicule. And we're not talking about spec scripts or writing Episodes 7-9 for Star Wars, I mean pornographic versions of characters getting it on - the essence of interweb fan fiction! Thundercats, Harry Potter, even those gay little Hobbits having sex for the pleasure of the writer and six seriously fucked up creeps. But little did they know that the reaction from one of the writers would become, in the words of the interweb, epic.
Brickhousebunny21 said: WHOSE RESPONSIBLE THIS? I wanna know whose idea was this RIGHT NOW. Who did this on purpose, huh? I found this little secret and I'm so angry I wanna know who did this and why or I'll report everyone here to the site moderaters on this website and Yiffstar and have the one responsible BANNED FOR LIFE. NOW TELL ME WHO DID THIS NOW?
This was utterly, totally hilarious. My buddy Sean T. Collins immediately recognized the potential goldmine that Brickhousebunny21 had revealed to us and posted on his blog:
My friend Rob Bricken, aka Topless Robot, has a recurring feature at his site called Fan Fiction Friday, the goal of which is to plumb the abyss of horror that is the collective imagination of the nerd Internet. This week's installment is about a woman having sex with a baby Pokemon teddy-bear thing. But where it really takes off is when the author (search the page for Brickhousebunny21) shows up to complain and threaten. He leads with WHOSE RESPONSIBLE THIS?, as meme-worthy a phrase I've seen on the Internet since "I am aware of all Internet traditions." It's an ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US waiting to happen. I'm working it into my repertoire immediately. The next time I'm outraged by something on the Internet, I'm damn well gonna try to find out whose responsible this.
Somehow, Brickhousebunny21 also found this, and defended himself thusly:
Brickhousebunny21: Fisrt, nobody checks spellling on the internet!!!! SEcond, I"m only in high school, so give me a fucking break!!! Third, I am what they call the best of the best, so mock all you want, but I have my fans, and they lvoe my stories!!!!
HE IS WHAT THEY CALL THE BEST OF THE BEST, PEOPLE, AND HIS FANS LVOE HIS STORIES. Obviously, none of us have any business making fun of his pedophilic-bestiality fiction or his delightful typos.
Did it stop there? Oh, no...
Guys -- I know we've had our fun with this "WHOSE RESPONSIBLE THIS" meme, but I have some bad news. We're all in serious trouble here, because... well, I'll let the FFF author and not-so-proud-parent of the meme Brickehousebunny21 tell you himself, as per this comment he left just an hour ago:
Everyone here is in trouble now, I just sent a message to a site mod from Yiffstar and if this site doesn't delete all traces of this story or if anyone here doesn't get rid of this little joke they've made out of this story in three days, everyone here will be banned for life just like I've warned everyone else here like before, don't bother trying to lie to the site mods to save your own skins because the site mods are on my side and there's nothing you can do about it, they've already found out who Rob Bricken is and they're on my side as we speak, they agreed in three days time everyone here will be banned if the big boss behind all this doesn't get rid of all traces of this little joke they've posted, this is your last warning, I've warned you all but you didn't listen, deleting any evidance won't do you any good either, I've shown every piece of evidance to the site mods and it's all over for everyone here and Rob Bricken, if everyone here doesn't follow the warning and get rid of this in three days, than judgement day will come for everyone here and Rob Bricken, even if you had nothing to do with it, I don't care and the mods agree with me, you have three days and if this isn't gone when I get back, the mods will ban everyone here, even making all the bad comments won't do you any good. You all have three days or else.
I'm afraid... we're all going to be banned from Yiffstar.com (THIS IS NOT A SAFE-FOR-WORK LINK -- seriously, of the dozen or so Yiffstar banners I've seen since this debacle started, the one on top is the only one I've seen without furry bodily fluids graphically pictured in it), the internet's -- well, one of many places in the internet where furries post stories and art of anthropomorphic animals having graphic sex. I'm so sorry to do this to you all; I know how much Yiffstar.com has meant to us, especially me, during those dark times. And I shudder to think about the stories of Brickhousebunny21 that I may never get to read, including:
• Bigger Is Better
• Sexually Dominated By Two Horny Dragons
• My Busty Family• Hot Paradise
• Seduced by Mommy
• My Busty Family Part 4
• Naked Goddess
• Fucking Each Other Crazy
• My Busty Family Part 8
• Look what Big Daddy Found?
These are the consequences of our actions, people. I don't think any of us could honestly say we don't deserve it. On the other hand, I am a bit extra disturbed at the " they've already found out who Rob Bricken is" line. Really, the whole reason I'm posting this is that if I'm found dead in a semen-encrusted fox costume in the next couple of weeks, please know that it was NOT THROUGH NATURAL CAUSES AND YOU ALL NEED TO AVENGE ME.
It even earned a double meme, featuring Angry Hitler:
In one week, it spawned a Wikipedia entry, Facebook page, parody songs, tee shirts, and lots of attention. Here's the TR recap of the accolades and tributes.
Somewhere between bad and worse: When MILFs attack
Good news: There's an attractive older woman who wants to have sex with you.
Bad news: It's your birth mother, who secretly tracked you down after giving you up for adoption over a decade ago. Looks like Detroit has bigger issues than the Lions.
Aimee Sword fulfilled every young man's fantasy - except her actual son's by getting her bang on with him. That's a list of felonies that will put her jail, as the report says, forever. They don't say how she tracked him down or even if he knew she was his mother (he does now), but he's a minor, and that's a no-no. Unless you're an uncle living with your 12 other Mexican family member in a one room apartment.
Worst of the week: Bloodletting on the highway.
Officers can't hold down a suspect and force them to breath into a tube to take a breathalyzer test, but they can forcefully take blood — a practice that's been upheld by Idaho's Supreme Court and the U.S. Supreme Court. The ruling in 1966 says that police could have blood tests forcibly done on a drunk driving suspect without a warrant, as long as the draw was based on a reasonable suspicion that a suspect was intoxicated, that it was done after an arrest and carried out in a medically approved manner. If the results seem promising after a year or two from the current program in Idaho, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration will encourage police nationwide to undergo similar training. That is bullshit. How is it legal to forcefully take your bodily fluids if they can't take your breath?
The practice of cops drawing blood, implemented first in 1995 in Arizona, has also raised concerns about safety and the credibility of the evidence. Officer phlebotomists are generally trained under the same program as their state's hospital or clinical phlebotomists, but they do it under a highly compressed schedule, and some of the curriculum is cut. They are trained on the elbow crease, the forearm and the back of the hand. If none are accessible, they'll take the suspect to the hospital for testing.
Though most legal experts agree blood tests measure blood alcohol more accurately than breath tests, the tests can be fraught with problems, too. Vials can be mixed up, preservative levels in the tubes used to collect the blood can be off, or the blood can be stored improperly, causing it to ferment and boosting the alcohol content.
I'm all for cracking down on drunk driving, but taking blood - especially if you can't have your breath drawn from you, is something I do not agree with at all. I'm hoping somebody takes this back to the high courts so it can be overturned.
Runner up: Blue ribbon stupid.
And the prize goes to the Washington State Mental Health Department! Phillip Arnold Paul is a criminally insane killer who escaped during a mental hospital field trip to a county fair. Wondering why such a dangerous person was out in public? Me too!
Authorities believe he is heading to the Sunnyside, WA area where his parents and many siblings live, so if you're not somewhere near Spokane, don't sweat it.
Authorities at Eastern State Hospital are being criticized for allowing Paul to visit the fair despite his violent criminal past and history of trying to escape. The Spokane County Commissioner has called it unacceptable, and the state Department of Social and Health Services ordered an immediate end to such trips and launched an investigation into the practice. This was the second escape for Paul. In 1991, he walked away during a day trip in Medical Lake and was later captured. He attacked a sheriff's deputy in the jail booking area, knocking him unconscious, and was convicted of first-degree escape and second-degree assault.
Paul was committed after he was acquitted by reason of insanity in the 1987 slaying of an elderly woman in Sunnyside. He soaked the woman's body in gasoline to throw off search dogs and buried the remains in her flower garden. And was allowed to go on a trip in a location that was so heavily populated with families. Workers alerted superiors "within two to three minutes of discovering Paul's escape," but administrators waited nearly two hours before calling law enforcement, giving Paul plenty of time to disappear. Oh, and his brother says Paul was a high school and junior college wrestler and a martial artist, that even he would not want to approach. Terrific!
It is not unusual for so-called "forensic" patients, who are being held against their will, to earn the opportunity to go on field trips as part of their therapy, representitives said, since mental hospitals also treat people who are mentally ill but have not committed crimes. But clearly that makes little sense when there are criminal elements mixed in with their population.
Thirty-one patients from the mental hospital were on the trip with only 11 staff members. Patients must be cleared by a treatment team before they can go on trips to stores, parks, and other sites, but they wear street clothing and staff members are required to keep each patient within eyesight at all times. Three-on-one odds for keeping an eye on mental patients? Why did something horrible not happen sooner?
Trips to the fair were an annual event, and the last escape from the forensic unit occurred in 1992, which really translates into 17 years of amazing luck. Paul was an extreme escape risk as well as dangerous, and they should never have allowed him on the field trip. Outings for murderers, rapists and pedophiles committed to the hospital as criminally insane should not ever be allowed. What do you think led to Glenn Beck getting a television show?
