'TBH Politoons'
Thanks, again, Tim!
Country For Sale?
from Alex
If you ever wanted to own a country, Iraq is for sale, although soon it
might need a lot of work ---> here's the ebay link
~~ Alex
Thanks, Alex!
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Way too warm for the season today!
Went to a birthday party in Oceanside, and I'm really running late - stayed way longer than intended. Interesting people & great food can have that effect - Thanks, Linda & Larry!
Have bumped some things that I meant to put on today's page - check back tomorrow.
Tonight, Saturday, CBS opens the evening with a FRESH 'Touched By An Angle', then a FRESH 'The District', followed by a FRESH 'The Agency'.
NBC starts with a RERUN 'Law & Order', then a RERUN 'Law & Order: Special Victims Unit', and a
FRESH 'Meet My Folks'.
'SNL' is another FRESH - Al Gore hosts & Phish is musical guest.
ABC has the movie 'What Lies Beneath'.
The WB has the movie 'Die Hard 2'.
Faux starts the night with a FRESH 'Cops', then a RERUN 'Cops', followed by 'America's Most Wanted'.
UPN has the movie 'Fair Game'.
Anyone have any opinions?
Or reviews?
(See below for addresses)
A Pakistani boy flashes a victory sign at an anti-U.S. rally, Friday, Jan. 31, 2003 in Lahore, Pakistan. People observed nationwide anti-U.S. demonstrations to condemn possible American attacks on Iraq.
Photo by K.M.Chaudary
'De-Spectorizing' The Album
'Let It Be'
The surviving Beatles are planning to re-release "Let It Be" the way they intended: stripped down. The album will have the same track listing, but it will not have the orchestration that producer
Phil Spector added to it after the band broke up.
Ringo Starr tells Rolling Stone it will be "de-Spectorized." Starr says it fills his heart with joy to hear it and it's a beautiful CD. The produced version was always a source of irritation to
Paul McCartney, and Starr says he recently told McCartney how right he was about that.
Starr says George Harrison approved releasing the stripped-down version before his death. The project has been underway for at least two years. The revised "Let It Be" will be out in the fall.
The "Let It Be" movie will also be released on DVD, and this summer the originally 1996 "Beatles Anthology" documentary will also be released on DVD.
'Let It Be'
Church In Antiwar Ad
Bishop Melvin G. Talbert
A bishop of the United Methodist Church, resident Bush's denomination, stars in a new anti-war ad in which he declares that making war against Iraq "violates God's law and the teachings of Jesus Christ."
"Iraq hasn't wronged us. War will only create more terrorists and a more dangerous world for our children," Bishop Melvin G. Talbert, chief ecumenical officer of the United Methodist Church, says in the 30-second spot.
Slated to appear several times a day on the CNN and Fox networks in New York and Washington, the ad is part of a $1 million media campaign sponsored by a coalition of organizations and celebrities-including actresses
Janeane Garofalo and Susan Sarandon-opposed to Bush's Iraq policy.
Talbert, 68, also opposed to the 1991 Persian Gulf War against Iraq, which was waged by Bush's father.
Bishop Melvin G. Talbert
The Information One-Stop
Moose & Squirrel
Organize Anti-War Protest
U.S. Poets
First lady Laura 'Pickles' Bush may feel their dissenting words are unwelcome in her home, but a group of poets opposed to a war with Iraq plans to deluge the White House anyway with reams of anti-war verse in a national day of protest.
Their "Day of Poetry Against the War" is set for Feb. 12, the date Mrs. Bush had been scheduled to host a White House poetry symposium until she learned that some invited guests intended to use the event to criticize her husband's policy toward Iraq.
The gathering, titled "Poetry and the American Voice," was to have spotlighted the works of Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman and Langston Hughes, three poets known for speaking their minds.
Poet Sam Hamill, founding editor of noted poetry publisher Copper Canyon Press in Port Townsend, Washington, and organizer of the poets' protest, said the first lady's reaction shows "they clearly know very little about poetry or the nature of poets."
"Although poetry is written in solitude, it is social language, and all poems are political in one way or another," Hamill said on Friday. "So why they thought they could have a symposium on Whitman, and Hughes and Dickinson and have
no politics involved is utterly beyond me."
He noted that Whitman and Hughes, in particular, were strongly identified with their views on political and social issues of their day.
Former U.S. poet laureate Rita Dove, who like Hamill had been invited to the symposium but did not plan to attend, said the decision to call off the event reflects a hostility toward dissent on the part of the Bush administration.
"This White House does not wish to open its doors to an 'American Voice' that does not echo the administration's misguided policies," Dove, poet laureate from 1993 to 1995, said.
Lawrence Ferlinghetti, the famed Beat poet and founder of the City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco, said the idea of inviting a group of poets to the White House as the administration prepares for war was naive in the first place.
"The poet by definition is the bearer of freedom and love, and ... by definition he has to be an enemy of the state and everything the state does, and one of its primary activities, which is war."
U.S. Poets
Henry Ford Museum members watch as the bus in which Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat in 1955 is unveiled Friday, Jan. 31, 2003, in Dearborn, Mich. The museum purchased the bus in
October 2001 for $492,000 after it was found in a field in Alabama. It took nearly five months to restore the bus to its original condition.
Photo by John F. Martin
Criticizes BET
Spike Lee
Urging blacks to step into "gatekeeper" roles, Spike Lee criticized Black Entertainment Television, saying it lacks serious entertainment and that rap music promotes ignorance.
The director and producer of such films as "Do the Right Thing," "Malcolm X" and "25th Hour" spoke Thursday to a crowd of about 500 people, including students and Bermuda Premier Jennifer Smith. The lecture was sponsored by Bermuda College.
"I was told BET was big here and I shook my head," Lee said, referring to the cable channel that billionaire Robert Johnson founded in 1980. "If you get everything from BET you are getting the wrong thing."
Lee, 45, said black films were often dumbed down or pigeonholed into comedies or gangster movies. Striving for decision-making positions in the media would give blacks more control, Lee told the mostly black audience.
Bermuda, a British territory, is 62 percent black.
Spike Lee
Together Again?
Cheech & Chong
Cheech and Chong are ready to light up the big screen again.
Twenty-five years after their first celluloid toke, the professional stoners otherwise known as Cheech Marin and Tommy Chong are hashing out what will be a happily hazy reunion movie, tentatively titled Cheech & Chong Get Blunt.
That's the word from Tommy's daughter, actress Rae Dawn Chong, who wrote the script and is currently shopping the project to distributors.
The screenplay must have been good stuff, because both Chong and his formerly estranged comic partner Marin signed on.
The plot for Blunt, which will be Cheech and Chong's first major outing together since 1985's music-video compilation Get Out of My Room, follows our leafy heroes as they serve
community service as anti-drug preachers in a boys' home. Expect plenty of their trademark stoner musings.
Cheech and Chong had a falling out in the mid-'80s blamed on the usual creative differences. Chong continued to carry the Mary Jane mantle, appearing in 1998's Half-Baked, landing a
recurring role on Fox's That '70s Show and writing and directing the forthcoming pot caper Best Buds.
Marin, on the other hand, has staked out a career as a (sober) character actor, appearing in films like Ghostbusters II, Desperado, Tin Cup and Spy Kids, as well as costarring with
Don Johnson on the TV series Nash Bridges. He's also cultivated some family-friendly voice-over work, including paying lip service to Banzai the Hyena in Disney's The Lion King.
Despite their on-screen split, the two remained pals, with Cheech popping up in a cameo in Chong's 1990 film, Far Out Man, and the latter turning up on Nash Bridges a few seasons ago.
The two also had voice roles in 1992's animated FernGully: The Last Rainforest.
For more, Cheech & Chong
Unique Tape Found in Russia
Freddie Mercury
Last week Nikolay Torlopov, 14, from the Russian city of Rubtsovsk learnt that he would get 26 thousand euro. This is the sum that Germany's recording company RG Music is ready to pay for a rare record of Freddie
Mercury's "home" concert performed together with his group Queen.
The Russian boy lives in the Altai region, and the sum that is offered for the rare record is enormous for this place. Now Nikolay is making plans how to spend the sum. The story explaining how the Russian boy got this
record consists of several happy accidents, by the way, each of them could entail quite different results.
The first happy accident. Nikolay got a magnificent New Year present from his parents, a computer, which is still luxury for majority of Russian families. The boy immediately gave up his old Sony PlayStation and focused
all attention on the present. He was extremely happy to find that in addition to the computer, the parents also presented him with a modem for surfing the Internet.
In a couple of hours Nikolay successfully connected the computer, installed all necessary programs and entered the Internet. He knew perfectly well how to surf the web as he did it many times already from computers of his friends.
When the boy downloaded a porn website, his father unexpectedly knocked at the door of his room and asked if he could enter. Nikolay didn't want his father notice the website that he was surfing at that moment, that
is why he clicked the first link that he found on the site so that to download something instead of the porn site. The father wanted to know whether the computer worked well and to see what was interesting on the Internet.
The link that Nikolay clicked downloaded an Internet auction that are so abundant on the Internet now. The auction traded in badges, passwords to porn websites, a videotape recorder, a book about war, etc.
The father got also interested in the unusual auction. The name of the website could be translated into English as "Internet second-hand market", which made the man laugh. When he asked the son what he was going
to buy, Nikolay pointed to the first lot that he noticed. "An old cassette with records of an unknown group. Initial price 30 rubles (it is about one dollar)." The father got interested and allowed to buy the strange
record, especially that the price was reasonable. Nikolay filled the registration form and declared his intention to buy the record.
But when Nikolay filled the registration form on the Internet auction, he intentionally misspelled his email. As it often happens at unpopular Internet auctions, Nikolay turned out to be the only client who evinced
interest in the record of an unknown group.
For the rest, Freddie Mercury
In The Kitchen With BartCop & Friends
Now A Floridian
Ted Turner
Ted Turner, the TV mogul who called his apartment atop the CNN Center in Atlanta his official home, now lists his legal residence as his 25,000-acre Avalon Plantation outside Tallahassee, spokeswoman Maura Donlan said Thursday.
Turner's accountants had urged him for years to list Florida as his residence because it has no state income tax, but he resisted because of his connections to Atlanta as founder of Turner Broadcasting and CNN, Donlan said.
The 64-year-old announced Wednesday he'll resign as vice chair of AOL Time Warner Inc.
Meanwhile, he already has obtained a Florida driver's license, registered to vote in the Sunshine State and obtained Florida fishing and hunting licenses, Donlan said.
Ted Turner
Cathie Jung of Mystic, Conn., wears a corset during the Manhattan Vintage Clothing Show exhibition and sale Friday, Jan 31, 2003 in New York. Jung is the holder of the Guinness Book of World Records, smallest
waisted living person, 15 inches.
Photo by Frank Franklin II
'Clone High, USA'
MTV Apologizes
MTV US apologized Friday for offending Indians by airing in the United States a show that lampooned India's revered independence leader, Mohandas K. Gandhi.
Nearly 150 lawmakers and political activists had fasted at Gandhi's memorial Thursday to protest against the MTV show they said insulted Gandhi.
The show, "Clone High, USA," has not been aired in India, but a newspaper report about it has upset many Indians who revere Gandhi as a hero and an advocate of nonviolence.
"Clone High, USA" introduces a character called G-Man — a fictitious Gandhi clone who wears dangly earrings, eats junk food and is the ultimate party animal.
MTV US said it had "utmost respect" for Gandhi and that the spoof would not be shown outside the United States.
MTV Apologizes
Celebrates Birthday, LP Sales
Alicia Keys
Some people celebrate their birthday with a cake. Alicia Keys celebrated with a plaque recognizing 10 million in sales of her debut disc, "Songs in A Minor."
The five-time Grammy winner marked both milestones with a party hosted by her mentor, J Records founder Clive Davis.
Though she turned 22 on Saturday, the crowd of well-wishers sang "Happy Birthday" to her Wednesday night as she received the plaque from Davis.
With her long hair flowing from beneath a brown fedora, it appeared that Keys had taken out her signature braids. But when she removed the hat, the singer revealed the top of her hair — still in cornrows.
Alicia Keys
Formerly 'The Vidiot'
Trying To Stiff Sotheby's?
Michael Jackson
When it comes to art, beauty may lie in the eye of the beholder, but the cold cash should lie in the pockets of the seller, or so Sotheby's told pop superstar Michael Jackson on Friday.
The famous auction house argued in a lawsuit filed Friday that while Jackson may have changed his mind about whether two 19th Century paintings he bought at Sotheby's in October 2002 fit into his collection, he nevertheless has to pay nearly $1.4 million for them.
The suit, filed in Manhattan federal court, alleged Jackson's Los Angeles company MJJ Productions successfully bid on two paintings by French artist William Adolphe Bourgereau on Oct. 29, 2002. One of the paintings shows
Cupid removing a thorn from his foot and the other is a portrait of a young woman with a child and a sheep.
Sotheby's asked payment of $1,324,247 for the paintings plus at least $60,733 in late fees.
The auction house said Jackson does not dispute that his company bought the paintings or that he has been billed for them.
"Rather the reason stated for MJJ's failure and refusal to pay for the property is that Michael Jackson now believes the property ... no longer fits into Michael Jackson's collection contrary to his previous review," the suit alleged.
Michael Jackson
A Chinese entertainer performs with shadow puppets at a gala to mark the Chinese New Year in Guangzhou, the capital of China's Guangdong province, January 31, 2003. The Chinese New Year of the Goat starts on February 1.
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The Man Behind Gollum
Andy Serkis
For a classically trained British actor, it can be a lot of work to play a shriveled-up, power-mad freak of nature with bulging eyes and a bad comb-over hairdo, especially when it is not you on screen but a digitally done animation.
Just ask Andy Serkis. The veteran of some of England's top theatrical stages, who cut his teeth on Shakespeare, has spent the better part of the last three years playing Gollum in the film adaptation J.R.R. Tolkien's literary saga "The Lord of the Rings."
Serkis, in a recent interview with Reuters at his Los Angeles hotel, said he took the part of Gollum, a hobbit corrupted by the power of an all-powerful Ring, despite never having read the Tolkien books on which the films are based.
"Roles like that don't turn up very often," he said.
But he also bears a striking resemblance to Gollum, as he should: Animators based the movements of the creature's face on the actor's own muscle movements by painting dots on his face and shooting him with three different cameras.
For the rest, Andy Serkis
Convicted of Cultivation
Ed Rosenthal
An author of how-to books on growing marijuana and avoiding the law was convicted Friday of marijuana cultivation and conspiracy charges.
The federal jury concluded that Ed Rosenthal, the self-described "Guru of Ganja," was growing more than 100 plants, conspiring to cultivate marijuana and maintaining a warehouse for a growing
operation. Rosenthal, 58, faces a maximum of 85 years in prison when sentenced June 4.
"This was not a trial. It was called a kangaroo trial," Rosenthal, who remains free on bail, said Friday as supporters chanted: "We love you Ed."
The verdicts were a victory in the federal government's battle against California's 1996 voter-approved medical marijuana law. Rosenthal's arrest last year was among a string
of Drug Enforcement Administration raids on medical marijuana suppliers in California.
Under strict orders from U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer, Rosenthal was never able to tell the jury that he was growing marijuana as "an officer" for the city of Oakland's medical marijuana program.
Oakland's program and others throughout California were authorized under Proposition 215. Eight other states also allow the sick and dying to smoke or grow marijuana with a doctor's recommendation.
"There is no such thing as medical marijuana," said Richard Meyer, a DEA spokesman. "We're Americans first, Californians second."
Jury foreman Charles Sackett III said outside court that jurors were following federal law in finding Rosenthal guilty, but he hoped the verdict would be overturned.
The government essentially portrayed Rosenthal as a major drug supplier. Because federal laws trump state laws, Breyer ruled that Rosenthal could not defend himself under the color of California's Proposition 215.
Marijuana, under federal rules, has no recognized medical benefit.
Rosenthal said he's anything but a drug dealer, noting that the plants agents seized didn't have buds, the part of the plant normally smoked for a high. He planned to give out cuttings to seriously ill people.
Ed Rosenthal
Mallard ducks take to the air in Grand Isle, Vt., Thursday, Jan. 30, 2003. The birds congregate at the Polishing Pond at the Ed Weed Fish Culture Station, one of the few places open water can be
found after the recent cold snap. Forecasters are predicting more moderate temperatures for those taking off for the weekend.
Photo by Rob Swanson
'The Osbournes'
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Critical Date Approaches
Nick's Crusade
