'TBH Politoons'
Thanks, again, Tim!
from Astro
Chimp In The Box
from Alvin
'Calling Cheney'
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Coastal Eddy is doing his job, keeping the morning overcast.
CostCo had lots of 'food ladies' today. The kid just loves sampling food - and he's discovering he likes more kinds of food than he thought.
Long Beach has a crapper-load of streets torn up, and getting around is not as much fun as it should be.
Tonight, Friday, CBS starts the night with a FRESH 'Big Brother 4', followed by a RERUN 'JAG', then
'48 Hours'.
On a RERUN Dave are Johnny Depp and Christine Todd Whitman.
On a RERUN Craiggers are Rick Reilly and Ludacris.
NBC opens the evening with a 2-hour 'Dateline', followed by a RERUN 'Law & Order: Special Victims Unit'.
Scheduled on a FRESH Jay are Burt Reynolds, American Choppers, and Sugar Ray.
Scheduled on a FRESH Conan are David Copperfield and Rich Hall.
Scheduled on a FRESH Carson Daly are Eliza Dushku, the Pussycat Dolls featuring Carmen Electra, and Camp Freddy featuring Dave Navarro.
ABC begins the night with a RERUN 'America's Funniest Home Videos', followed by a FRESH 'Whose Line', then another
FRESH 'Whose Line', followed by '20/20', where Barbara Walters interviews Angelina Jolie.
Scheduled on a FRESH Jimmy Kimmel are Johnny Cochran, Alf, and the Ataris, with this week's guest co-host Zach Galifianakis.
The WB offers a RERUN 'Reba', followed by a RERUN 'What I Like About You', then another RERUN 'Reba', followed
by a RERUN 'Grounded For Life'.
Faux has a RERUN 'Boston Pubic' followed by another RERUN 'Boston Pubic'.
UPN has the movie 'Gun Shy'.
Check local PBS listings for the BEST SHOW ON TV - 'NOW With Bill Moyers' - tonight, Jon Stewart guests.
A&E has 'Biography' (Lee Majors), followed by 'Murder, She Wrote', and another 'Murder, She Wrote'.
AMC offers the movie 'Shane', followed by the movie 'Young Guns', then the movie 'Motel Hell', followed by
'Tales from the Crypt: Let the Punishment Fit the Crime'.
BBC -
[7pm] 'Ground Force' - Leatherhead;
[7:30pm] 'Changing Rooms' - Birmingham;
[8pm] 'Parkinson' - Ardal O'Hanlon and Robbie Coltrane;
[9pm] 'The Office' - Episode 5;
[9:40pm] 'Manchild' - Episode 4;
[10:20pm] 'The League of Gentlemen' - Turn Again Geoff Tipps;
[11pm] 'So Graham Norton' - Trinny and Susannah;
[11:30pm] 'So Graham Norton' - Larry Hagman;
[12am] 'The Office' - Episode 5;
12:40am] 'Manchild' - Episode 4;
[1:20am] 'The League of Gentlemen' - Turn Again Geoff Tipps;
[2am] 'Parkinson' - Ardal O'Hanlon and Robbie Coltrane;
[3am] 'So Graham Norton' - Trinny and Susannah; and
[3:30am] 'So Graham Norton' - Larry Hagman. (ALL TIMES EDT)
Bravo has the movie 'Manhunter', followed by the movie 'The Brothers McMullen'.
History has 'Modern Marvels', 'Greatest Raids', 'Heavy Metal', and more 'Modern Marvels'.
SciFi has 'Tremors: The Series', 'Stargate SG-1', and a couple of 'Scare Tactic's.
TCM salutes Ava Gardner all day, then some macho men, a little Bergman & Bob Hope, too.
[6am] 'The Bribe' (1949);
[8am] 'The Great Sinner' (1949);
[10am] 'East Side, West Side' (1949);
[12pm] 'Show Boat' (1951);
[2pm] 'Ride, Vaquero!' (1953);
[4pm] 'Knights Of The Round Table' (1953);
[6pm] 'Mogambo' (1953);
[8pm] 'High Sierra' (1941);
[10pm] ;
[12:15am] 'Key Largo' (1948);
[2am] 'Smiles of a Summer Night' (1955); and
[4am] 'I'll Take Sweden' (1965). (ALL TIMES EDT)
Anyone have any opinions?
Or reviews?
(See below for addresses)
Former US President Bill Clinton warms up before a round of golf at the Royal County Down Golf Course in Newcastle, Northern Ireland, Sunday, July 6, 2003.
Photo by Matthew Fearn
The Information One-Stop
Moose & Squirrel
Toronto Concert
Rolling Stones
Ticket sales are nearing the half-million mark for the Rolling Stones-headlined July 30 concert in Toronto. Event spokesman J.P. Pampena has announced that more than 475,000 tickets have been sold for the show, 50,000 of which have been sold in the U.S.
Pampena told the Canadian Press agency that organizers will probably cap sales at 600,000, even though Downsview Park, a former military base, hosted more than 800,000 people for a visit by Pope John Paul II at the 2002 World Youth Day.
Also on the bill are AC/DC, the Guess Who, Rush, Justin Timberlake, Sam Roberts, the Flaming Lips, the Isley Brothers, Kathleen Edwards, and Sass Jordan.
Rolling Stones
On Board For Sci Fi's 'Twelve'
Martin Scorsese
The latest star to enter Sci Fi Channel's creative orbit is better known for "GoodFellas" than green fellas. Filmmaker Martin Scorsese has signed on to executive produce a Sci Fi Channel miniseries targeted to premiere in 2005.
Titled "The Twelve," the miniseries chronicles an FBI agent's confrontation with a bizarre series of events he suspects to be signs of an impending apocalypse timed for the Twelfth Day of Christmas. "Twelve" will run at least six hours, with its exact scheduling yet to be determined.
While "Twelve" marks the Oscar-nominated Scorsese's first foray into scripted longform television, luring A-list producers for longform projects is becoming routine business at Sci Fi. Since it soared into the Nielsen stratosphere in December with its 20-hour miniseries "Steven Spielberg Presents Taken," the cable network has recruited such feature producers as Gale Anne Hurd ("The Hulk"), Dean Devlin ("Independence Day") and Bryan Singer ("X2: X-Men United") for other new miniseries.
"Twelve" was originally written by David Pirie as a series of one-hour scripts for the BBC. Pirie remains involved with "Twelve," though another writer will be brought in.
Martin Scorsese
Sand sculptures representing the pyramids of Giza and ancient Egyptian pharaohs are illuminated on the beach of the Baltic sea coastal village of Travemuende near Luebeck July 10, 2003, during the opening ceremony of Germany's second sand sculpture festival. About seventy sculptors shaped the 'Seven wonders of the world - world of wonders', using some eight million kilograms of special sand. The festival runs from July 11 until September 7, 2003.
Photo by Christian Charisius
Marvel Scraps Planned Comic Book
Princess Di
A U.S. comic book publisher has decided to let Princess Diana rest in peace, dropping plans to reincarnate her as a mutant comic superhero this fall, the company said on Thursday.
Marvel Enterprises Inc. said in a statement that "upon reflection" it will remove Diana and all references to the royal family in its upcoming "X-Statix" monthly comics.
The about-face follows a recent announcement by Marvel Comics that it planned to introduce Diana as one of a team of super-powered mutants in a five-series storyline called "Di Another Day."
Princess Di
Shedding Square Reputation
Accordions
Rock 'n' roll and a square reputation nearly squeezed all the life out of the accordion - but the instrument that launched a thousand Lawrence Welk shows is back.
Forget earsplitting renditions of ``Lady of Spain'' and the accordion's dorky novelty in the hands of weirdos from singer ``Weird Al'' Yankovic to TV's Steve Urkel. Younger musicians are proudly playing the squeezebox, according to accordionists who gathered Thursday for their annual convention.
``It's fun, it's very social, and there's a real camaraderie in our community,'' said Frank Busso of the American Accordionists Association, which is celebrating its 65th anniversary at this year's festival. More than 500 people will attend seminars, perform in competitions and celebrate their instrument.
The instruments have appeared in recent recordings from acts like Grammy Award-winner Norah Jones and the Talking Heads, as wellas a solo instrument with the Philadelphia Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic and London's Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Modern classical composers from Lukas Foss to Ole Schmidt have written pieces for accordion.
Accordions come in dozens of sizes and degrees of complexity,and can cost from a few hundred to many thousand dollars. An average accordion weighs 20 to 30 pounds and is played by pushing and pulling the bellows to force air through the reeds, which are opened by pressing keys and buttons.
For more, Accordions
American Accordionists' Association
Thanks, Tim H!
In The Kitchen With BartCop & Friends
Posthumous Biography
Katharine Hepburn
Katharine Hepburn, who died less than two weeks ago aged 96, will reveal her most intimate thoughts about an intensely private life on Friday in a book the actress only wanted released after her death.
The authorized biography "Kate Remembered," by Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer A. Scott Berg, will be published by G.P. Putnam's Sons. The book, which will be available in bookstores on Friday, is based on conversations the author had with Hepburn over the course of a 20-year friendship.
Berg, who began his relationship with Hepburn in 1983 when she was 75 and he was 33, also details her final years, away from the spotlight.
He wrote most of the book between 1999 and 2001 and the publisher agreed to Hepburn's demand that it not be published or even discussed until her death. He said he wrote the book's final paragraphs in the last weeks of her life.
Berg won a National Book Award for his 1978 book "Max Perkins: Editor of Genius" and a Pulitzer for a 1998 biography of "Lindbergh," the famed U.S. aviator.
Katharine Hepburn
An X-ray showing a fork lodged sideways in the stomach of a 32-year-old woman who accidently swallowed it while using it to scoop a cockroach out of her throat is seen at the Poria hospital in the northern Israeli town of Tiberias Thursday July 10, 2003. The fork was removed with laparoscopic surgery, a minimally invasive procedure performed through a tiny incision in a patient's abdomen.
Photo by Effi Sharir
First Edition Fetches $36,000
Jane Austen
A first edition of Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice" has sold for $36,000 at a British auction.
The buyer, who wasn't present at Tuesday's auction in Edinburgh, Scotland, was identified only as British.
John Sibbald, book specialist for the auctioneers Lyon and Turnbull, found the three-volume edition among 70 boxes of books from an estate.
Jane Austen
To File Papers for U.S. Senate
Jerry Springer
Jerry Springer, the talk show host who put wife-swappers, strippers and skinheads on the air and then watched the punches fly, will file papers to run for the U.S. Senate as early as Friday, advisers said.
Springer, 59, the former Cincinnati mayor, will not decide whether to actually run until later this month, said Mike Ford, his political adviser.
Springer is airing 30-minute infomercials across the nation to raise money and build support for his possible run for the Democratic nomination next year.
The infomercial, paid for by Springer, is part biography and part fund-raiser. It explains how Springer's parents fled Nazi Germany for England, then moved to the United States just before Springer's fifth birthday. The ad seeks small donations and offers T-shirts, bumper stickers and CDs of Springer singing "rockabilly" music.
The infomercial focuses on a comment by National Review commentator Jonah Goldberg on a Sunday morning talk show several months ago. Goldberg warned of new people brought to the polls by Springer, including "slack-jawed yokels, hicks, weirdos, pervs and whatnots."
Jerry Springer
Jerry Springer campaign
Formerly 'The Vidiot'
'Universe' Expanding
Stan Lee
Stan Lee, co-creator of such legendary comic book characters as the Incredible Hulk and Spider-Man, is set to dream up a whole new universe of heroes under a partnership with leading kids entertainment company DIC Entertainment.
Lee, whose superheroes propelled Marvel Comics to cult status worldwide, will create a new programming stream to be called "The Stan Lee Universe" under the joint-venture agreement with DIC.
The first project slated for development is the animated series "Stan Lee's The Secret of the Super Six" -- described as a superhero-based animated series with a strong humanitarian component that features Lee as a key character.
Lee added: "Everything that I do I hope will be liked and enjoyed by young readers and young viewers, and I also hope that the projects will be compelling and intelligent enough for the older viewer to enjoy them too. I find that young people are smarter and hipper and catch on quicker than some older people might. I often find in the comics when I introduce philosophical elements that I get fan mail from young readers about it. I never have to write down to younger readers or to dumb stories down, and nothing will be dumbed down (in the new creative venture with DIC).
Stan Lee
The sun hangs in the sky above a mosque in Gaza City, Thursday, July 10, 2003.
Photo by Efrem Lukatsky
Sells for Record Price
Rembrandt
A Rembrandt self-portrait unrecognized for more than three centuries sold at auction Thursday for $11.3 million, a record price for a self-study by the Dutch master.
American collector Steve Wynn bought the work, which had been largely overpainted by a Rembrandt pupil. A recent cleaning revealed it as a self-portrait, a Sotheby's spokeswoman said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The signed painting — dated 1634 and depicting Rembrandt at age 28 — will be displayed at Wynn's public gallery in Las Vegas, the Wynn Collection, the spokeswoman said.
The Wynn Collection in Las Vegas features 19th- and 20th-century American and European art, including works by Picasso, Manet and Matisse. Its owner, who bid for the Rembrandt painting by phone, is a developer and former owner of Mirage Resorts.
Sotheby's said the painting auctioned Thursday is one of only three painted Rembrandt self-portraits in private collections.
Rembrandt
Sotheby's
Hired By NBC
Melissa Stark
Melissa Stark will be moving from Monday nights to early mornings.
Stark was hired Thursday by NBC to be a national correspondent for the "Today" show and to help cover the 2004 Olympics in Athens.
Stark recently left ABC Sports, where she was the lead sideline reporter for "Monday Night Football" the past three years. She worked last season's Super Bowl and also helped cover figure skating and golf.
She previously worked at ESPN from 1997-2002, covering breaking news, but has never worked at an Olympics. Her role in Athens hasn't been determined.
Melissa Stark
New Smithsonian Exhibit
Jeweled Art
Fishing would never be the same with a fly reel studded with hundreds of rubies and sapphires. And what mouse could resist a diamond "cheese wedge" in a solid gold mousetrap?
Those and other spectacular pieces of jeweled art by Sidney Mobell go on display Friday at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History.
Mobell, who has been called the architect of gemstones, delights in making everyday objects, from cell phones to sardine cans, out of gold and precious gems.
Items included in the exhibit are:
_A diamond eye designed in 1979. The eye, on a gold necklace, is made of white and blue diamonds; the pupil is a natural black diamond and there is a "tear" made from a 1.05-carat pear-shaped diamond.
_A full-size 23-karat gold Monopoly board with tokens, houses, hotels and dice in 18-karat gold with diamonds, rubies and sapphires.
_Thirty-two diamonds, 237 sapphires and 253 rubies encrust a working fly fishing reel....
_A 14-karat gold cell phone set with 39 diamonds, 215 rubies and 212 sapphires.
_Fifty-five Russian diamonds enhance a 14-karat gold sardine can designed in 1990.
_A set of 28-karat gold dominoes set with 420 diamonds.
Jeweled Art
Natural History Museum
Opens Music Church
William "Willy" Pritts
Feed maker William "Willy" Pritts wants to make music, but his local government says he can't because his property isn't zoned for moneymaking concerts.
So he's turned to a higher power — and formed a church.
Pritts, 40, founded a non-denominational parish when a county zoning office turned down his requests to hold concerts on 147 acres of woods and fields in southwestern Pennsylvania. He says the church is committed to spiritual growth through music.
Neither the Church of Universal Love and Music nor Pritts has the proper permits to host music festivals and concerts in Bullskin Township, about 30 miles southeast of Pittsburgh, said Fayette County zoning director Tammy Shell. She says the events have drawn complaints for noise and the hundreds of vehicles scattered over surrounding rural roads.
County officials say Pritts only started claiming he was running a church in the last few months, but Pritts said he has been incorporated as a church for two years.
In general, laws such as the 2000 Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act prohibit religious bias in zoning decisions, said Gene Kapp, a spokesman for the American Center For Law & Justice.
The music church is a place where people can pitch their tents while jazz, bluegrass and rock bands jam on a 60-foot-wide open stage. Instead of four walls and a bell tower, the church is in an amphitheater-like setting complete with a sound booth and archway.
Because music goes hand-in-hand with worship, Pritts says it's his right to host concerts on his property.
Membership to the church is $75 a year and it gives the church's 500 members access to all the concerts, Pritts said. While not all the acts have religious ties, the church has hosted Sunday worship services and a couple got married Saturday, he said.
William "Willy" Pritts
Church of Universal Love and Music
Polar bear at the San Diego Zoo beats the summer heat July 10, 2003 by enjoying a winter wonderland. Animal keepers created the snow this morning by blowing 18 tons of shaved ice into Polar Bear Plunge, the Zoo's summer tundra habitat. The unseasonably icy treat stimulated play behavior in the bears and is part of the Zoo's ongoing environmental enrichment program.
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'Ark of Darkness'
"The Ark of Darkness", a Political/Science-Fiction work, in tidy, weekly installments (and updated every Friday).
Grab a box of Kleenex and follow the adventurers as they confront their darkest inner demons.
Today
'The Osbournes'
'The Osbournes' ~ Page 4
'The Osbournes' ~ Page 3
'The Osbournes' ~ Page 2
'The Osbournes' ~ Page 1
