Ted Rall: How to Save Books
You may remember such classics as "How the Internet Slaughtered Newspapers" and "How Napster Decimated the Music Business." It's always the same story: Digitalization destroys profits.
Paul Constant: The Road to Salvation (The Stranger)
Here's what 'Reverend America' isn't about: It's not about a quirky loner learning how to feel again. It's not about a moment of epiphany that leaves you clean and shiny-new. It's not an arch satire of a megachurch pastor. Instead, it's a novel that wonders about how to live a decent life and whether the American Experiment was ever or could ever be a success.
How to Find the Best Food in a Foreign City, According to Anthony Bourdain (Serious Eats)
Get online and write something along the lines of, "hey guys, I just had the absolute best chicken rice at [restaurant x] in Singapore, no questions asked, hands down, everything else pales in comparison," then sit back and enjoy the show as the internet foodie elite each jump into the fray to defend their own picks to the death.
Molly Eichel: New book reveals how big names make big bucks off their fame (Philadelphia Daily News)
Piazza, who splits her time between Philadelphia and Manhattan, is the author of the recently released "Celebrity, Inc.: How Famous People Make Money." The book delves deep into all facets of the celebrity economy, from making money off shedding excess pounds to selling pictures of progeny for eight-figure sums to the Machiavellian machinations of Kardashian matriarch Kris Jenner. Celebrities can even make thousands in 140 characters or less, by including endorsements in their tweets.
Adrienne Crezo: 11 Amazing Thank You Notes From Famous People (Mental Floss and Letters of Note)
Letters of Note is one of our favorite places to hang out. Since 2009 the site has curated hundreds of interesting letters, telegrams, memos and faxes, from famous people, regular people, and even fictional people. We took advantage of their hard work and rounded up these 11 thank you (and one thanks-for-nothing) letters from their archives. And there's a Letters of Note book in the works …
Jill Harness: The Real Life Inspirations For 14 Simpsons Characters (Neatorama)
I don't know about you guys, but I love 'The Simpsons' and I must say that getting to watch 'The Simpsons' while writing about the show was a dream come true for me. Getting to learn about the stories behind many of my favorite characters made this one of the most fun articles I've written for Neatorama so far. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.
David Hiltbrand: So, what's with all those car-insurance commercials on TV? (Philadelphia Inquirer)
You'll notice you're not getting bombarded with life-insurance ads. Auto gets the big push because it's mandatory. You have to be covered to get behind the wheel. And everybody in this country drives. So it's required. And it's expensive. That makes it a tougher sell than, say, beer. Or tortilla chips.
David Bruce has 42 Kindle books on Amazon.com with 250 anecdotes in each book. Each book is $1, so for $42 you can buy 10,500 anecdotes. Search for "Funniest People," "Coolest People, "Most Interesting People," "Kindest People," "Religious Anecdotes," "Maximum Cool," and "Resist Psychic Death."
The opening title credits of each episode was a depiction of Jason McCord's cashiering: his hat is pulled off, his epaulets are torn from his uniform, his buttons are pulled off, and his saber is broken. What was the name of this TV series?
ALF is an American science fiction sitcom that originally aired on NBC from 1986 to 1990, created by Paul Fusco. The title character was Gordon Shumway, a friendly extraterrestrial nicknamed ALF (an acronym for Alien Life Form), who crash lands in the garage of the suburban middle-class Tanner family.
Unsure what to do, the Tanners take ALF into their home and hide him from the Alien Task Force (a part of the U.S. military) and their nosy neighbors Trevor and Raquel Ochmonek, until he can repair his spacecraft. He generally hides in the kitchen. It is eventually revealed that ALF's home planet Melmac exploded because of a catastrophe involving nuclear war.
Source
Alan J was first, and correct, with:
Melmac
BttbBob wrote:
ALF was born on Melmac (which rumor has it was considered the 'New Jersey' of the planetary system it was part of... but, that's just a rumor, now :)
Jim from CA, retired to ID, wrote:
Melmac
Marian responded:
Melmac
Adam answered:
Melmac.
Charlie replied:
Melmac
Melmac was a planet located in the Aldente Nebula in the Andromeda Galaxy. It was the homeworld of ALF. Residents of the planet were called Melmacians and they were characterized as being short, furry creatures who have advanced age longevity and multiple stomachs. Melmac was located six parsecs past the Hydra-Centaurus Supercluster. Melmac was very much like Earth but it had two moons, it was oddly shaped and made of melmac. Melmac had green skies and blue grass, and it orbited a purple sun. (However, on "Turkey in the Straw: Part 2," ALF claims that Melmac has an orange sky and green clouds).
The restaurant scene in ALF's flashback dream in the episode "Help Me, Rhonda" is the only time Melmac is shown on the ALF TV series.
Melmac's national pastime was mining for yogurt. The planet was once the intergalactic convention site for the Federation of Incredibly Strange Food Groups.
Melmac was destroyed on Gary 71st, 45-7, according to the Melmacian Calendar (1985 on the Earth calendar), although ALF claims his planet exploded on his birthday (28th of Nathanganger), due to nuclear war. ALF wandered through space for a year before crash landing on Earth.
Sally said:
Gordon Shumway AKA Alf, was born the Lower East Side of the planet Melmac of course...
Here's a typical Melmacian man, Alf was the mutant version you know...
PS: Shout for the Newark, NJ police. In a city hard up for funding, and who had to reduce their numbers, they are struggling today with the thousands of Whitney Houston fans - balancing between the call for privacy from the family, and the passion of the fans. Our local TV stations are covering the event live, which is probably the way to go for the fans. OTOH, the fans loved and supported her, and want to show their support.
MAM wrote:
Lower East Side of the planet Melmac
Gordon Shumway whose Earth name of course is Alf
PS Thanks to Dale of Diamond Springs reminder, my support for the EPage is in the PayPal!
Joe S took the day off.
And, Dale of Diamond Springs answered:
ALF (Gordon Shumway) was born on October 28, 1756, on the Lower East Side of the planet Melmac.
Daily Kos: AZ-04: Republican Paul Babeu implicated in explosive scandal I live in Pinal County right down the street from a Supervisor who just spoke up for Babeu at the press conference, ( the same one who ragged on him for budget override of 3+million bucks). I couldn't care half a shit if the guy is gay, but if threats against the ex prove true, you can stick a fork in his "danged fence".
(Reuters) - Scientists say they have discovered a species of chameleon so small it can balance on the tip of a match. The miniature lizard - "Brookesia micra" - reaches a maximum length of 29mm, and was discovered by a team of German and American researchers on the island of Nosy Hara, just off the northern coast of Madagascar...
CBS starts the night with '60 Minutes', followed by a FRESH'Amazing Race', then a FRESH'The Good Wife', followed by a FRESH'CSI: The 2nd One'.
NBC opens the night with a 2-hour 'Dateline', followed by a FRESH'T-rump's Public Fluffing'.
ABC begins the night with a FRESH'America's So-Called Funniest Home Videos', followed by a FRESH'Once Upon A Time', then a FRESH'Desperate Housewives', followed by a FRESH'Pan Am'.
The CW fills the night with what passes for local news and other fluffery.
Faux has a RERUN'Bob's Burgers', followed by a FRESH'Cleveland Show', then a FRESH'Simpsons' (the 500th episode), followed by a FRESH'Napoleon Dynamite', then a FRESH'Family Guy', followed by a FRESH'American Dad'.
MY has an old 'How I Met Your Mother', followed by another old 'How I Met Your Mother', then an old 'Big Bang Theory', followed by another old 'Big Bang Theory', then still another 'Big Bang Theory', and yet another 'Big Bang Theory'.
AMC offers the movie 'V For Vendetta', 'The Walking Dead', followed by a FRESH'The Walking Dead', then a FRESH'Comic Book Men'.
BBC -
[6:00AM] Top Gear-Episode 1
[7:00AM] Top Gear-Episode 2
[8:00AM] Top Gear-Episode 3
[9:00AM] All About Apes
[10:00AM] Great Natural Wonders of the World
[11:00AM] Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares-Ep 11 - Fleming
[12:00PM] Batman Returns
[2:30PM] Batman Forever
[5:00PM] Rob Roy
[8:00PM] Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves
[11:00PM] Rob Roy
[2:00AM] Batman Returns
[4:30AM] Doctor Who: Voyage of the Damned (2007) (ALL TIMES EST)
Bravo has 'Real Housewives Of Atlanta', another 'Real Housewives Of Atlanta', followed by a FRESH'Real Housewives Of Atlanta', and another 'Real Housewives Of Atlanta'.
Comedy Central has the movie 'Beverly Hills Cop', 'Chappelle's Show', 'Key & Peele', 'Kevin Hart: Laugh At My Pain', followed by the FRESH'Bernie Mac Tribute: "I Ain't Scared Of You', followed by the movie 'The Original Kings Of Comedy'.
FX has the movie 'Ghost Rider', followed by the movie 'Star Trek'.
History has 'Ax Men', another 'Ax Men', followed by a FRESH'Ax Men', then a FRESH'Full Metal Jousting'.
IFC -
[6:00AM] River Red
[8:15AM] Trail of the Screaming Forehead
[10:00AM] An American Haunting
[12:00PM] The Increasingly Necessary Todd Margaret Recap Special
[12:30PM] The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret-Todd's Terrible Day Ends and His Next Terrible Day
[1:00PM] The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret-Todd and His Valet Arrive in Leeds and What They Saw There
[1:30PM] The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret-How The Liver and The Salad Conspired to Ruin Todd's Good Deed
[2:00PM] The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret-In Which Todd Accidentally Learns a Secret and Brent and Doug Get Closer to Furt
[2:30PM] The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret-The Crime Scene, The Storyteller and the Sanctimonious Tower of Morality
[3:00PM] The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret
[3:30PM] The Whitest Kids U'Know
[3:45PM] Black Rain
[6:30PM] Slow Burn
[8:30PM] The Bank Job
[11:00PM] Portlandia-Motorcycle
[11:30PM] Portlandia-Farm
[2:30AM] Slow Burn
[4:30AM] Larry Flynt: The Right to Be Left Alone (ALL TIMES EST)
Sundance -
[6:00A] Isabella Rossellini: My Wild Life
[7:00A] THE MORTIFIED SESSIONS - Modern Family's Eric Stonestreet
[7:30A] THE MORTIFIED SESSIONS - Will Forte & Jennifer Grey
[8:00A] Swedish Auto
[11:15A] Isabella Rossellini: My Wild Life
[12:15P] Swedish Auto
[3:30P] Isabella Rossellini: My Wild Life
[4:30P] Swedish Auto
[6:15P] My Year Without Sex
[8:00P] Fur: An Imaginary Portrait...
[10:00P] A Life Less Ordinary
[1:30A] Fur: An Imaginary Portrait...
[3:30A] A Life Less Ordinary
[5:15A] THE MORTIFIED SESSIONS - Nick Offerman & Megan Mullally
[5:45A] Next Floor (ALL TIMES EST)
SyFy has the movie 'Land Of The Lost', followed by the movie 'Signs'.
"The Help," which chronicled the experiences of black maids in the 1960s, and the comedy "Jumping the Broom" were honored at the NAACP Image Awards on Friday, and the life and career of Whitney Houston was celebrated with rousing gospel songs a week after the singer's untimely death.
"Jumping the Broom" also took home three award, for best actor Laz Alonso, Salim Akil and supporting actor Mike Epps.
In television, Tyler Perry's "House of Payne" won best comedy series and "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" took home the best drama series prize.
Regina King won best TV actress for the police drama "Southland," and rapper LL Cool J won best TV actor for his role in "NCIS: Los Angeles."
Grammy and Oscar-winner Jennifer Hudson took home the album of the year for "I Remember Me," Cee Lo Green was voted best male artist and jazz singer Jill Scott best female artist.
Actress Cicely Tyson poses with actors Harry Belafonte (L), Laurence Fishburne (top C) and Sidney Poitier (R) during the 43rd Annual NAACP Image Awards at the Shrine auditorium in Los Angeles, California February 17, 2012.
Photo by Mario Anzuoni
Dorothy's ruby slippers from "The Wizard of Oz" are being removed from a Smithsonian exhibit to be conserved.
Curators say the famous shoes are old and need to be prepared for a future display at the National Museum of American History. The last day to see the slippers in their current exhibit is Wednesday. They will return to public view April 5 in a new exhibit called "American Stories."
The slippers were donated anonymously to the museum in 1979 and have been on display almost continuously since.
The 1939 movie's costume designer altered red shoes by attaching netting on their tops and heels and covering them with red sequins. Curators say they were made quickly and cheaply.
While the shoes are gone, "Oz" will be represented by the Scarecrow's hat.
The James Bond star said in an interview published Saturday that she had been diagnosed with macular degeneration, an eye condition which can cause blindness, and that her eyesight was already so bad that she couldn't even read her own scripts.
The 77-year-old told the Daily Mirror that she was relying on friends and family to keep her up to speed with her lines.
"It's usually my daughter or my agent or a friend and actually I like that, because I sit there and imagine the story in my mind," she told the newspaper during an interview at a London hotel. "The most distressing thing is in a restaurant in the evening I can't see the person I'm having dinner with."
A dancer of the "Fraternidad La Diablada" group performs during the Carnival parade in Oruro, some 200 km (124 miles) south of La Paz, February 18, 2012. Partying and religion mingled in Bolivia's Carnival celebration in Oruro, a mining and commercial city of more than 200,000 people.
Photo by David Mercado
Veteran British rockers Black Sabbath have been forced to scale back plans to tour this year as guitarist Tony Iommi continues treatment for lymphoma, the band said on its website.
In November, the original four man line-up announced it would record its first new album in 33 years and stage a 2012 world tour, joining the long list of ageing acts hitting the road for lucrative live performances.
Since then, drummer Bill Ward has said he would not participate in the reunion recordings and tour unless he was offered a "signable" contract.
The setbacks mean Black Sabbath will now only perform one of their planned European dates -- Britain's Download Festival -- on June 10.
Lead singer Ozzy Osbourne will perform the remaining scheduled dates as "Ozzy & Friends," featuring himself, original Black Sabbath bassist Geezer Butler and Zakk Wylde.
Sports network ESPN apologized on Saturday for an anti-Asian slur that appeared with a story about New York Knicks star point guard Jeremy Lin published on one of its websites overnight.
The headline -- "Chink in the Armor" -- accompanied an online analysis that blamed Lin, a Chinese-American, for the Knick's surprising 89-85 loss to the New Orleans Hornets at a sold-out Madison Square Garden on Friday night.
In a statement, ESPN called the headline, which was up on the mobile website for about 35 minutes early Saturday morning, "offensive."
It said it was "conducting a complete review of our cross-platform editorial procedures and are determining appropriate disciplinary action to ensure this does not happen again. We regret and apologize for this mistake."
A Hindu devotee dressed as a demon participates in a procession ahead of Shivratri festival, in Jammu, India, Saturday, Feb. 18, 2012. Shivratri, a festival dedicated to the worship of Hindu God Shiva, will be marked across the country Monday.
Photo by Channi Anand
The hacking group known as Anonymous has claimed a new series of hacks against the U.S. Federal Trade Commission and consumer rights websites.
The loosely organized collection of cyber rebels said it attacked the FTC's consumer protection business center and the National Consumer Protection Week websites.
Both sites were replaced with a violent German-language video satirizing the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, or ACTA.
ACTA was recently signed by several countries, but restrictions on online piracy have prompted a growing protest movement.
Revelers hold hands as they fall back into the mud during the "Bloco da Lama," or "Mud Block" carnival parade in Parati, Brazil, Saturday Feb. 18, 2012.
Photo by Felipe Dana
A sheriff seeking the GOP nomination for an Arizona congressional seat was forced to confirm he is gay Saturday and resigned from presidential hopeful Mitt Romney's Arizona committee amid allegations of misconduct made by a man with whom he previously had a relationship.
Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu denied claims he tried to threaten the man, a Mexican immigrant and a former campaign volunteer, with deportation if their past relationship was made public. The man's allegations were first published Friday in The New Times, a Phoenix alternative weekly magazine.
Babeu, a first-term sheriff who has risen to national prominence with his strong opposition to illegal immigration and smuggling, said the accusations were an attempt to hurt his political career.
He vowed to continue his campaign in Arizona's rural western 4th Congressional District seat, but said he had called presidential candidate Mitt Romney's staff to say he would step down from his post as state campaign co-chair.
People dressed as giant syringes escort a float with a cyclist during the Nice Carnival in Nice, southeastern France February 18, 2012. The carnival, which starts on February 17 and continues to March 4, celebrates the "King of sport" this year.
Photo by Eric Gaillard
Jennifer Aniston had her naked boobs pulled from her new movie "Wanderlust," putting a last-minute kibosh on a frontal topless scene out of consideration for her boyfriend and "Wanderlust" co-star, Justin Theroux, an insider tells TheWrap.
The former "Friends" star demanded that the topless scene from the Judd Apatow-produced film, which hits theaters February 24, be replaced with a tamer version, an individual with knowledge of the movie told TheWrap.
A spokeswoman for Universal, which is releasing the movie, said: "The scene was shot a bunch of different ways, and we have the best possible version." (Which isn't exactly a denial.)
Aniston's publicist, Stephen Huvane, denies that the scene was altered at the actress' behest. "The scene is how it was always supposed to be," Huvane told TheWrap.
The scene in question features Aniston going topless in front of TV news cameras. In the version that will be included in the film, Aniston will be seen topless from behind, with her bare breasts shown pixelated on TV screens, as they would appear on a TV news broadcast.
Indonesian youths play puppets traditionally called 'wayang' during a carnival commemorating the 267th anniversary of the city of Solo, in Solo Central Java, Indonesia, Saturday, Feb. 18, 2012.
Photo by Gembong Nusantara
The eldest son of North Korea's late leader Kim Jong-Il is having financial problems after being cut off by the Stalinist state for doubting his country's succession policy, a Moscow newspaper said Friday.
The Argumenty i Fakty weekly said in its Internet addition that Kim Jong-Nam was recently kicked out of a luxury hotel in the Chinese gambling mecca of Macau over a $15,000 debt.
It cited Macau administration sources as saying that the eldest Kim -- seen as the likely successor until being caught entering Japan on a fake passport in 2001 -- had lived a luxurious lifestyle that included gambling and dinners at exclusive restaurants.
But a source at the prestigious Grand Lapa Hotel that Jong-Nam reportedly frequented told the paper that the eldest Kim was recently expelled from his 17th-floor room because of a cancelled credit card.
The same official said Jong-Nam's luxury apartment that he rented for his wife was paid for by the Chinese secret service while his spending money came primarily from North Korea.
"Tschaggatta", or masked participants of the traditional carnival cortege, walk in the streets of the village of Wiler in the Loetschental valley, southwestern Switzerland, Saturday, Feb. 18, 2012.
Photo by Jean-Christophe Bott
The remains of a 1.5 mile-wide, 10 billion-ton meteorite are causing problems for a small Iowa town, 74 million years after it crashed onto the Earth's surface at 45,000 miles per hour.
The Des Moines Register reports that the 1,600 residents of Manson, Iowa are struggling to locate a site for the town's well due to the geological impact of the meteorite. The crash created the underground Manson Crater-which has a diameter of 24 miles and reaches into four neighboring counties.
And now, after years of struggling to find a sustainable water source, engineers at Iowa's Department of Natural Resources say they may have come up with a solution: Drilling for water near the crater's center. They speculate that the crater's center is home to Iowa's softest water source.
"Water that comes out of the central part is naturally soft," Anderson said. "It's the only naturally soft groundwater in the state of Iowa," Anderson said.
The license plate on movie projectionist Arnie Herdendorf's Buick is 35MM MAN, a nod to his work in the booth at the 1925 Palace Theatre, with its velvet-draped stage and chandeliered mezzanine.
When he drove recently to a multiplex to watch as its film projectors were swapped out for new digital ones, the sight of old 35 mm workhorses "stacked up like wounded soldiers" had him wondering how long his title - or job - would be around.
The questions are even bigger for historic movie houses themselves.
With the future of motion pictures headed quickly toward an all-digital format played only on pricey new equipment, will the theaters be around? Or will they be done in by the digital revolution that will soon render inadequate the projectors that have flickered and ticked with a little-changed technology for more than 120 years?
"Our guess is by the end of 2013 there won't be any film distributed anymore," said John Fithian, president and chief executive of the National Association of Theater Owners.
The wife of Michael Davis, the bassist of influential late 1960s rock band MC5, says the musician has died of liver failure. He was 68.
Angela Davis said Saturday her husband died at Enloe Medical Center in Chico, California, on Friday afternoon after being in the hospital almost a month battling liver disease.
The bassist gained attention in the revolutionary Detroit band MC5 and later played in a version of the group called DKT-MC5 with former MC5 members Wayne Kramer and Dennis Thompson.
Michael Davis injured his back in a motorcycle accident in 2006, and afterwards co-founded the non-profit Music Is Revolution Foundation, dedicated to supporting music education in public schools.
Davis is survived by his wife, their three sons and a daughter from a previous marriage. His wife says a funeral has not been planned at this time.
You have reached the Home page of BartCop Entertainment.
Make yourself home, take your shoes off...
Go ahead, scratch it if it itches.
The idea is to have fun.
Do you have something to say?
Anything that increased your blood pressure, or, even better, amused or entertained?
Do you have a great album no one's heard?
How about a favorite TV show, movie, book, play, cartoon, or legal amusement?
A popular artist that just plain pisses you off?
A box set the whole world should own?
Vile, filthy rumors about Republican hypocrites?
Just plain vile, filthy rumors?
wrote:
took the day off.
