Sarah Palin's New Year's Resolution

"Bang-bang! That's for you, Lamestream! Momma Grizzly's gonna show you who's the Diana of the North, you betcha! I'm gonna charge TLC double to make me a new season of my okey-dokey show 'cause gosh darn it, if that Kate Gosselin can do it, so can I!  I wrote an okely-mcsmokely good book.  I'm also gonna sort through the potential candidates of the Republican party and see who's in my view qualified to run and then if I see no one can up my rogue, and you betcha I won't, well gosh-dang it I'll run, and beat that Obama in 2012! Bang-bang! I'm taking America back, and shoving my daughter, myself, and my giant hair down your throats, too!  Ha-ha!  I gotcha! Bang-bang!"

Timeless: Donna Summer

Disco wouldn't have been what it was without her---and she almost snubbed it in the early 70s.  Madonna as a dance icon (and every other one that has followed since ) owes her a huge debt, because she was the first one who sang sexually charged tunes and revolutionized what was appropriate, what you could sing about.  If you don't believe me, listen to her blissful multiple orgasms in 1975s  classic "Love to Love you Baby".  She was pop music's first super-star, scoring 4 consecutive number ones in a row.  She even revolutionized what is today trance music---the arpreggios and the almost monotonous synths that build the layout of "I Feel Love" is the blueprint of any classic trance song from the early 90s and is even referenced in Pet Shop Boys' song "So Hard" and Underworld's "King of Snake".  But above all that, me she's the diva who sang her heart out on McArthur's Park for 16 solid minutes, and to this day this is my favorite disco song---it's gripping, soaring, tragic.  Thank you, Donna Summer.

Please Don't Rain on my Parade

Tonight in the grip of sheer boredom I was watching an early Seinfeld episode.  Male Unbonding.  Jerry tries every excuse in the book to extricate himself from a needy friend who, much like attention whore Sarah Palin just won’t quit (and she has a rifle).  And while I’ve had the displeasure to have known these people in the past---some who have run the gamut from slightly petulant to full-blown psychopaths intent on stalking me into submission---I’ve never, ever gone into the lengths of creating wildly unbelievable excuses to avoid a snippet of my life going down the drain with someone who I just didn’t want to hang out with in the first place and was draining the crap out of me.

Don’t get me wrong: much in the wont of every normal New Yorker, I’ve done the Seinfeldian dance of lies and escaped.  Unscathed, I should add.  I don’t think you can consider yourself an actual Manhattanite if you can’t produce a neat hat trick that will preserve your sanity.  That of course happens when you decide that letting someone come down easy really isn’t kicking it.  Because, you see, some people just won’t get the amicable sidestep.  That seems to fuel their attention to invasion even stronger.  Which is why you begin to lie, to kill your mother (with her blessing and a special present come her birthday), to make yourself into this overachieving maverick who’s Doing It All, to turn yourself into Someone Out of Reach.  Busy, busy, busy, and no time for romance, or a little fuck.  Gotta live life in the fast-lane.  I’ll get to you later.

Of course, sooner or later you have to put your foot down.  Enough is enough, and very early on, during the period when Seinfeld ended, I learned that polite led to a never-ending slow-dance that could only produce an increasing sense of irritation and dysfunction speckled in pure anxiety.  So I began diverging from the changing of the guards with a smile and a story to just ending it right there.  “Listen, I can’t go out. Not now, not ever. I don’t think we’ve got what it takes to make it.” "It's not you, it's me. I'm the problem."  "We tried to make it work last time and it didn't. We're not doing this again."  Sure, I’ve been then called an insensitive, fat, disgusting pig.  I’ve received the nasty slew of emails with the threats.  I’ve turned some of these would-be boyfriends into the same raving lunatics who ten years later still glare at me from the opposite side of the bar.  Or worse, continue to approach me online with the “I still think your [sic] hot as ever let’s get together man”.  I’m perfectly fine with that.

You see, there is no greater pleasure than to be in the comfort of my own home, getting nary a call or text message on my phone, reading some good book or meditating or typing up a juicy story.  Diplomacy has left the building.  I’ve quietly entered the Age of the Curmudgeon.  And boy, am I enjoying it!

Classic Pop: Teena Marie - Lovergirl

I'll take Teena Marie over anything Christina Aguilera does, anytime.  This is natural singing, not overreaching vocals.  An enduring, sexy song.

A Whiter Shade of Soul: Teena Marie

Funny how time flies when you're having fun.  It was only yesterday it seems when I was bopping to songs like "I Need Your Lovin', which survived disco, was featured prominently in dance radio stations (and is referenced in Madonna's 2008 song "Dance Tonight" in its chorus), and her biggest hit: "Lovergirl".  I turned on the news yesterday and read that Teena Marie had just died of natural causes.  Then I thought, "She can't have... She's too young to have moved on that quickly."  And she was: at 54, people are starting second careers.  Marie, however, had had hers, and while she didn't achieve the super-stardom that her peers did (I always kept wondering what did happen after "Lovergirl"), she did leave a strong body of R & B hits that anyone looking for a diva with powerful lungs should listen to, and that is where she lives on.  In her music.  Rock on, girl.  You will be remembered.

Snowman, Taxman...

No comment necessary.

Fat Santa

As a stunt, New Jersey governor Christopher Christie (a.k.a. Governor Sandwiches) tries to impersonate another (kinder) Kris.  The results aren't very successful.  Sometime in the near future, blogger Ivanhoe Vargas, a man of a more 'ideal' build, is called out as a racist pig by voices he doesn't very much care about.

Christmas Musings

A week off, and thank God: I needed it and so did my ten lil' fingers that can throw quite a punch.  No need to read on the latest article on gay rights.  No need to keep up with the world's foibles and the crazy Joneses.  Just me and my privacy (i.e. books and soft music filling the space with a sensual beat), dispensing gifts galore and now, holed up in my apartment as my neighbors shovel the crap out of the sidewalk so I, the Cheshire Cat in question, can come Tuesday the 28th walk freely and feel no fear I may stumble upon a deep crevasse/imprint left by a previous city-dweller.  Yes, the first storm of the season is gone leaving piles and piles of record-breaking white, but so for the moment are the causes I'm into (let the laws be passed and lets move the fuck on)... and I'm going to return to write about what's really on my mind: nothing.

Never Again: DADT

The long awaited nightmare of DADT is over.  65 - 31, and among them a number of Republicans, doing the right thing.  Making history in the works, and allowing men and women to serve in the military as they ought to---for the love of their country, not their companion in bed.

Chop-Chop, Sweet Santa...

You wouldn't want to know his approach to "naughty or nice".

Pop XS: Will-o'-Whip Mah Hay-urr

I know, I've heard it all before.  It's not the first time a pop singer started belting out tunes when she was a tiny tot.  And I'm all for that.  To each their own.  Yay for talent!  But Willow Smith is what happens when pampering actor/parents push their kids into the limelight and allow them sing (terrible) songs that are wa-a-a-ay above their age grade and expose them to a camera that sexualizes them.  Then again, who am I to say... had my parents been filthy, rotten rich, I wouldn't be here typing away at this stupid desk at this hour of the night and phishing for readers while I attempt to get future stories into the spotlight.  Oh well.  It's an unfair world, isn't it.  Let's hear it for nepotism!

Palin's Vanity Fair

As if her insinuation into the eyeballs of unsuspecting television viewers weren't enough on Dancing with the Stars and Sarah Palin's Alaska, now she's decided that all this attention-whoring wasn't enough.  No.  She must now become not Sarah Palin the celebutante on the small screen, not Sarah Palin the one who has to be presiding over her daughter Bristol's Facebook notes, but Sarah the noble politician, bringing her very white self into a country of people of a race she's never been that close to.

And my response to that is "What on earth did Haiti ever do to you, Sarah?"

Does she truly think that her urging Americans not to forget Haiti is being listened to?  Well, unless you're one of her clueless followers who vote based on the necessity to "take America back" which well, is pitiful in the extreme and makes you a de facto moron: otherwise, no one truly cares unless it's to pelt it with the ridicule it deserves.  Because this is the actions of a woman who truly believes her own hype and envisions herself making some kind of change in the world.

Considering she couldn't make a change, or a positive mark, in her own state, and deserted her position to embrace cameras and reality shows.

What a dunce.  These pictures of her watching suffering Haitians are an insult to that country's decimated population.  She has no clue what it is to do an act of kindness without making it a self-serving, self-aggrandizing spectacle.  At least she can cross that off her to-do list: she was surrounded and really, really close to dark people.  And they didn't plant a holy curse on her.

Tent Pitchers

I promised myself I wouldn't type my fingers straight into the ground with comment after angry comment lashing out at either Obama's gargantuan ineptitude on DADT and the hate-mongering groups applauding the decision to once again, leave us in the back of the bus.  It's not worth it.  Things are going to happen in their due time.  If not now, tomorrow---and thankfully, the old-timers are dying.

So I went the opposite direction: stupid shit.

There's a website called Awkward Boners that hosts pictures of men caught with their bulge in full display.  Like an art gallery, it brings you tents from all angles, shapes, and sizes.  Let me show you a couple.

Here's a homoerotic tent...

One that looks like it has a life of its own and is aimed straight at the girl's ear...

This one is just priceless. And it involves everyone's favorite punching bag, Sarah Palin.

Of course I couldn't leave it to photos per se... you have to see the entire video to laugh at the entire spectacle.  It surfaced first on the Immoral Minority blog and is on youtube, naturally.  Here it is:

Scat-zenjammer Kids

Hey guys!  Christmas is coming and it's a great gift idea...spread it around---Um, wait...let me rephrase that....

Comics Fire Back: Kathy Griffin & Chelsea Handler

New Music - ADELE, Rolling in the Deep

Listen, America.

Think of Nina Simone, moving to the rhythm of a hothouse tribal beat and her broken heart, singing her fucking lungs out.  This is what Adele Adkins reminds me of in this absolutely smoldering song that is her newest hit to be released January of 2011 in the UK, but available on iTunes as a single.  From her upcoming CD 21.  Which means one thing: GET IT.

Childhood Oopsies

No commentary necessary.

Sex with an Ex

There's a woman in West Virginia who recently crazied herself into immortality by doing something not even a meth-head reeking of banshee desperation would do.  Melissa Lee Williams, it seems, decided she wanted sex.  No prepping up, no romance, just bang and there goes the dynamite.  Practical gal.  However, not content with doing what needy folk tend to do---which is scratch her itch or hire an escort---she trudged her way to her ex-husband's Danny Willaims' place located a couple doors down at the 77 Motor Inn.  She was also wielding a knife.  You know, for added emphasis.


She proceeds to ask Williams to eat her.  Yes, you read that right.  Williams declined but another guy who happened to be there decided, "Eh, what the hell...." However, he had second thoughts on approaching her when his sense of smell became overpowered by her stench.  You see, it looks like Melissa Williams was packing a repulsive stink-bomb between her legs.

It gets better: when the second man said "Thanks, I think I'll pass," she lost it and uttered this brilliant sentence: "Somebody is going to eat my pussy or I’m going to cut your fucking throat."

Wouldn't you?

True story. She's in jail, so we can say this story has a rather happy ending.  Hopefully next time she'll learn how to use Craigslist.  And leave the knife out of the picture.  I'm sure she can find men who are into the smell of dirty snatch.

Toon Faced

For a couple of weeks now I've seen status updates pop up on Facebook that go by the way of ending child abuse.  How?  Not by activism or social consciousness, but by---get this---placing a picture of your favorite cartoon as your profile picture.  I know.  Stupid, right?  It makes as much sense as ending the war on drugs by placing an icon of "your drug of choice" over where your face should be.  However, as memes seem to do, they don't end there---now it's morphed into something more sinister: pervs phishing for kids, scanning the net for profiles they could prey upon. So from falling for a ruse you're now putting yourself out there as a possible pedophile.  Sinister, huh?

The real culprit, though, seems to point at some users in Greece who wanted to eliminate human faces from Facebook profiles for one week and started this trend.  It was only inevitable it would snowball into a life of its own and our own fears and paranoia to mold it into something completely absurd.

The lesson here? If you're going to change your Facebook profile picture, do it because you're creative, you're bored with the one you have, or you're plain flighty---not because you see some status update that tells you to do so in the name of some cause.  And if you're one of the many who did change their profile picture in the name of ending child abuse... you might not want to know what I think of you.

The C Word

[Picture courtesy from E!]

Who would have thought that talking smack about someone would erupt into a fireball of controversy?  I sure didn't, and I was there, Section 1, seat 11 at the Pru Center in Newark with my friend John, watching it all unfold and laughing my cheeks into a permanent facial grimace even the Joker would admire.  Like everyone else.  I'm talking, of course, about Chelsea Handler calling Angelina Jolie a See You Next Thursday.  Big fucking deal.

Let me tell you, I like my comedy raunchy, nasty, and chock-full of darts aimed squarely at anyone within striking range.  That, precisely, is what makes it hilarious---that someone is willing to go out there and aim fire.  Chelsea even took pot-shots at her own public that night when a group of people kept standing up when she was in the middle of telling a story and another woman, it seems, was either not paying attention or something and she went off on her in what seemed to be a solid, uncomfortable minute.  Shit happens.  Pay attention, and enjoy the fun.  Comedians grab at anything within their arm's reach and use it to create situations.  They've been doing it for years since Lenny Bruce, and writing about it since the days of Dorothy Parker who minced no words if she saw someone worth laughing at.  There's no learning from this, just a good 2 hours of a good time had by all.

We were on the other side of this shot. A little closer, though. Note to self---bring camera!

Farewell, Elizabeth Edwards

"You all know that I have been sustained throughout my life by three saving graces – my family, my friends, and a faith in the power of resilience and hope. These graces have carried me through difficult times and they have brought more joy to the good times than I ever could have imagined. The days of our lives, for all of us, are numbered. We know that. And, yes, there are certainly times when we aren't able to muster as much strength and patience as we would like. It's called being human.
"But I have found that in the simple act of living with hope, and in the daily effort to have a positive impact in the world, the days I do have are made all the more meaningful and precious. And for that I am grateful. It isn't possible to put into words the love and gratitude I feel to everyone who has and continues to support and inspire me every day. To you I simply say: you know."  --  Elizabeth Edwards on her Facebook page.

Nothing, really, to say, on my behalf.  Just thank you, for supporting our community and same-sex marriage, even while your husband didn't.  We need more women like you.

New Music: Peppermint Winter by Owl City

Someone get me some nasty and rub me all over with it. This is what happens when you take an artist with promise and he can't go beyond the shtick.  Fireflies wasn't an original song---take away the electronica and it becomes a Karen Carpenter tune---but it shook the pop-tree hard enough to revitalize synthpop as a genre not only made for dance but schmaltzy contemplation.

Now we have a new entry: Peppermint Winter.  What a title.  Without listening to the song I already was envisioning something straight out of Lifetime where the missing father comes home just in time for winter, and a whole lotta tears get spilled---so much that the family nearly drowns in their own mess and are found weeks later marinating in their own stench. Wait---that might not be such a bad ending.

Listening to it I'm thankful (yet again, Thanksgiving) for samples.  They're only 30 seconds long, and I think this is how long this song should be.  Talk about sugary. Talk about so much optimism one gets the urge to leap out of the Empire State Building and fly-y-y-y-y....

Oy.  I need some stank.  My body aches.  My stomach hurts.  Hell, my ears are throbbing.  This song made me feel terrible about feeling warm and cuddly because let's face it, when you go into overkill you wind up beating a dead horse until it's ready to serve as brisket.

Two Palins, a Ghost Writer, and a Comic

...Or maybe I'm still in Thanksgiving mode.  I don't know. The thing is, for a solid week I was eyeball-deep playing the hostess with the most-ess for my dear friend John who came to visit me and come Friday night watch Chelsea Handler perform at the Pru Center in Newark without getting mugged or stabbed or approached by a crack-addict looking for some rock. For a solid week, I didn't write.  Not a thing. Not even a check.  Nothing. I also didn't entertain myself with all things frivolous, which fuels the bulk of my writings on my blog.

Right before I was ready to call it quits my Facebook page blew up with news and utterings I am "liking". One of them was Margaret Cho who quoted

The only reason bristol is so freaked out and everyone is asking me to retract what I said is because they know its true

Naturally, I wondered, "what the hell did she say this time? Great.  There goes my sleep.  I have to find out."  So I googled margaret cho bristol palin and got this. Allegedly, Mama Grizzly forced her daughter to apologize to America by dancing on DWTS (which now makes total sense, since she'd been appearing on that show like a Hitchcocok cameo, only unwelcome and just plain unnecessary).  However, I did say so a couple weeks back---that girl is going to be saying and maybe even singing "I'm Sorry" for the Rest Of Her Life.  Because Mama's honor has been, um... besmirched. "Nooooo boys," indeed, Sarah.

Embedded within the E! article: an earlier war of words Bristol Palin had with Keith Olbermann. Which I immediately devoured in a split second like it was the last juicy fat cock the color of blush, dripping and aching just inches before my hungry face.

Wouldn't you?

Anyhow. It wasn't what she said that interested me---I've read her postings on Facebook and they're pretty grade-level, typical of her age---it was the fact that it seemed suspiciously too adult for someone who has by all turns demonstrated her vocabulary is as basic as her PSA video with "The Situation" was perfunctory.  Which completely denies her claims that Mama, in fact, told her not to come.  [Love that Three Dog Night innuendo.  Wonder who's the 50 year old publicist choosing Bristol's music. I wonder if perhaps it might not be Mama herself doing the posting.]

You can read her entire, ghost-written note on Facebook here.  Three "dog night" guesses that Bristol thinks a canard is a French canary.

The Mayoress of Prudietown Doth Write?

This is what I get when I even contemplate getting into reading Stephanie Meyer's diarrhea of blah about a woman who would rather put herself in danger in order to be with two very dysfunctional men instead of using magick to actually overcome a terrifying circumstance.  Just in case I ever make the mistake of accidentally finding one of these incredibly stupid books in my roster, I'm also going to have a little vial of cyanide.  Life can't be that desperate.

It's also why I read bad books... but bad books that are good.