Fanfare for the common slug

Many moons ago, I went on one of my frenzied rants about that idiotic show According to Jim, which as of today, has been on the air for six years.

Today, I got a letter of response to that post from an anonymous reader. Hurray! Everyone knows I love to get comments, and it always floors me when I not only get one from someone I don't know (and therefore can't hound incessantly to read my blog) but when I get one in response to a post I did a long time ago. Thanks, anonymous!

Anyhoo, Anon sent the following thoughts on According to Jim:

I actually looked for this board as I watched a few shows on the ABC instant viewer -- and was just appalled at the level of stupidity of this program. There is nothing intelligent or witty about this at all. No, I cannot believe a woman like the blonde would marry Jim, but this show plays...or appears to play to blue collar males who feel alienated and think that despite their poor hygiene, fatness, anti-intellectualism, self-indulgence, incompetence and sex obsession, they really are ok guys. Jim is another Homer Simpson every man/dumb idiot.

This show is a disgrace, but I can imagine it appealing to uneducated, loser types. The epsiode I watched featured Jim talking about his major goal in life -- which consisted of getting laid in all 50 states...and his having to rush home from his conquest with his wife in order to tend to a neighbor who thinks she is in labor but is actually suffering from farts.

Ohhhh kaaaay.

Is this for real? Can you imagine the morons who wrote this sitting around the table coming up with dialogue/plot points? "Hey, what if Pregnant Barb wasn't really in labor, but actually just had bad gas? HAW HAW!!! The yahoos will love it!" Un-fucking-believable. If this is what the Writer's Guild is coming up with for us, then I hope the writer's strike lasts for all of eternity.

Anon's points about the show aiming for the lowest common denominator are spot-on. Just the other day I saw a billboard advertising reruns of this dreck that had Jim and Courtney Thorne-Smith on it with thought bubbles over their heads. He's thinking, "When's the game on?" She's thinking, "Where's he taking me for dinner tonight?" HAW HAW AGAIN! I bet there's a Christmas episode where Courtney gets Jim a thoughtful gift (probably some kind of giant grill) and he gets her a sports bloopers DVD that he wants. 'Cause he's just a stupid schlub, and she loves him anyway!

For more haw-haws, I looked up the episode list on IMDb. Here are just a few of the hilarious eps you may have missed:
• Dana needs to buy a new car and Cheryl offers to go with her, but Jim says chicks are no good buying cars by themselves, because they'll get distracted with other less important things like mirrors or cup holders.
• Jim debates on how to tell the family that he doesn't think the family pet is worth an operation.
• It's Cheryl and Jim's anniversary, and one of them forgot, which prompts a show full of flashbacks.
• Jim's plan to watch a big fight is jeopardized by Cheryl's romantic plans, until he plies her with wine to make her pass out.
• Jim's Halloween horror: His four-year-old son wants to go as Cinderella.
• When Cheryl feels unappreciated, Jim offers to cook Thanksgiving dinner, confident she'll step in to take over and make it perfect.
• After taking the girls to a scary action movie, Jim tries to hide it from Cheryl, who blames herself for their lingering fears.

Oh my god, I'm annoyed just reading this. Who wrote this shit, John Gray?? She's an overworked harpy, he's a clueless asshole. She wants him to be more sensitive, he just doesn't get crazy women and their crazy mood swings. And did they really do an episode where he tries to knock his wife out so he can watch boxing?? HAW HAW...hilarious! While we're at it, why don't we just go all out on stereotypes? He gets knock-out pills from a Mexican street hustler, gets overcharged buying sandwiches from the Jewish deli and then gets picketed by some women's rights dykes when the word gets out. And at some point, a mincing gay tries to give Jim a makeover and a loud black woman screams at Jim that something is "funky." C'mon, it's funny!

Remember the scene in A Hard Day's Night when George is mistaken for a teen model and the TV guy wants his opinion on a stupid show with a giggly teen host that is geared toward George's age group? George says, "The lads frequently sit around the telly and watch her for a giggle. We turn the sound down on her and say rude things." I certainly hope that most of those watching this show are sitting there shaking their heads in disbelief of its stupidity. I guess if you need a little escapism into the world of super-fun stereotypes then According to Jim is as comfortable as your favorite pair of slippers and ratty robe.

Although, I have to say that the wine/boxing match idea is pretty disturbing. Anyone know of a serial rapist in LA with this MO? If so, check the Writer's Guild and you may find your man.

Thanks for the note again, Anon!

Here comes your 19th nervous breakdown

"I'm a celebrity and I can do whatever the fuck I want!"

Immortal words from you, Blohan! You screamed these lines while on a coke-fueled bender that ended with you in cuffs by the end of the night and in a posh Club Rehab by the end of the week. Who do you think you are? Neeley O'Hara? If you've ever actually seen Valley of the Dolls you'll recall that after ripping the wig off the head of the woman who made her in a bathroom catfight, Neeley ended up drunk, strung out and sobbing in an alley, friendless, fanless and career in shambles.

This year, many celebs channeled their inner Neeleys with award-worthy meltdowns. Some actually had to pay for their actions. All were laughed at. Here are the years best and brightest.

13. Anna Nicole Smith
I've got big love for Anna Nicole. Poor thing ended up doing herself in after her son's death. My question is: whatever happened to her assistant Kimmy? I want to know where she is in all this. I'm actually kind of surprised she didn't come forward and claim to be Dannilynn's father.

12. Paris Hilton
Call me crazy, but I actually felt for this poor little simpleton when she was being toted away in the back of a police car sobbing like a poopy-pantsed toddler. I even felt a little bad for her when she wrote her fluffy little notes from prison, simpering about how frightened she was and how the bedsheets were itchy. But then when she sauntered out of the jail like she was walking a Heatherette show and then went right back to her uselessness. I was duped! Never again, Hilton, never again.

11. Joe Simpson
OK, so Jessica and Ashlee's creepy dad didn't actually have a breakdown, but he is so fucking ooky that there's no way he should be skulking among us. He is so hot for his own daughter that he will do anything to shine up her tarnished little star by foisting her upon us in horrible movie after horrible movie that all end up going straight to video. My guess is that he's got a basement full of heads, an attic full of dildoes and a few connections to missing kids, all who have dissed Miss Jessica at some point in the past. Next year, expect Ashlee and Wentz to disappear in the Rockys on a private flight.

10. Chris Crocker
This will be the last and final time I ever mention this douchebag on this blog because god only knows we should all immediately forget about "LEAVE BRITNEY ALONE! SHE'S NOT WELL RIGHT NOW! YOU'RE LUCKY SHE EVEN PERFORMED FOR YOU BASTARDS! WAAAAAAA!" even if it was pretty fucking funny the first time.

9. Vanilla Ice
The Surreal Life: Fame Games was destined to make TV history in some way. One of the most outstanding was Vanilla Ice's batshit breakdown when Ron Jeremy voted him off the show. He threw a total shit fit and destroyed the set, tossing drums at Ron's head and cymbals at a giant lit up "Vegas" sign. Stop, Rob! Collaborate and listen! You're bananas.

8. Jenny McCarthy
Jenny's been going around to all the requisite talk shows blaming her son's autism on his childhood vaccines. Don't forget this is the chick that got famous for picking her nose and eating it on a regular basis on MTV. (For the record, this bitch is an idiot and she is spreading dangerous conspiracy theories that are being validated by the likes of Oprah, Queen of the Hausfraus. Learn more here.)

7. Heather Mills
Late this year, the former Lady McCartney went on a frenzied smear campaign against the beloved Beatle. She claimed on any talk show that would have her that the guy that wrote the immortal lyric "The love you take is equal to the love you make" called her a "one-legged bitch" and drove her to suicidial thoughts. Her little Pity Party Media Tour only succeeded in making everyone hate her more.

6. Dog
I don't want to talk about it.

5. Owen Wilson
Poor Hansel! Who knew he was a tweaker? And who knew someone like Kate Hudson could have such a death grip on someone's manhood?

4. Lisa Nowak
Official announcement: starting in 2008, February 5 is Diaper Drive Day! Celebrate by donning some Huggies and driving from Houston to Orlando. No need to actually kidnap someone, but it does help to have a desperate crush on a hunky astronaut.

3. Blohan
Never minding the coke-fueled bender, frantic partying and speeding SUV chasings, what was up with her hooking up with that ugly dude in rehab? What was she thinking? Also, now she's boring. I never thought I'd want the crunked out Blohan back because I was so fucking sick of her over the summer, but I at least expected her to be knocked up before Ritchie. Someone needs to catch up.

2. Winehouse
I kind of love Amy Winehouse, sort of the same way I love Mary Kate Olsen. I just want to pick her up and put her in my pocket and keep her as my little pet. I'd comb her hair into a little tiny bouffant and draw little tiny Cleopatra batwings on her eyes. I'd give her little tiny hits of crack and take her to the little tiny jail so she can visit her crackhead husband Blake Fielder-Civil. But it wouldn't be my fault if she wandered around London at 5 in the morning in only a bra sobbing or being arrested for fraud, because she's little and tiny...AND CRAZY.

1. The most beautiful fall of them all
Ah, Britney. You've taken over my blog—your biggest accomplishment of '07. Among your other achievements this year, you:
• shaved your head and beat up cars with an umbrella,
• performed several "mini-concerts" by way of comeback and fucked all of them up royally,
• appeared on the VMAs in what was perhaps the most important show of your career and fucked it up royally,
• offered an exclusive, my-side-of-the-story interview to OK magazine and fucked it up royally,
• "fought" for custody of your kids and fucked it up royally,
• took your clothes off and romped in the Pacific for the paps in your bra and undies,
• exchanged clothes with strippers then puked all over yourself in the same night,
• got naked in a hot tub with some random frat specimen,
• performed multiple traffic violations, all captured on film,
• filed a restraining order against your mom,
• rambled incoherantly on your official website,
• made the lamest video ever,
and et cetera ad nauseum. Congrats, kook, and keep it up! I'm like Nero playing the fiddle while Rome falls through this beautiful disaster. Can't wait to see what '08 brings!

I know what sent Blohan on her coke bender!

I Know Who Killed Me! If my name had appeared anywhere in the credits of this movie (gaffer, key grip, bee wrangler, whatever), I'd be on a death-wish binge, too.

First, I should note that I've seen Glitter voluntarily. I saw Torque in the theater. I own Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle. So it should be of no surprise to you that I've been dying to see I Know Who Killed Me since I heard the hilarious review on the Reel Horror podcast in the hopes that it's really as bad as everyone says.

This is the movie that Lindsay Blohan took stripping lessons for and was famously unable to promote due to her coke-fueled bender, arrest and subsequent rehabbing back in July.

Well, I finally saw it and my consensus of it is pretty much the same as Reel Horror's: that the reports of this being the worst movie ever made are grossly understated. I have so much to say about this and I'm just going to let it fly. If you really want to be surprised, my condolences, but you can save yourself the agony and just read my spoilers here.

The "plot"
Blohan plays Aubrey, a smarty-pants high school student who plays piano and lives in a mansion with her parents, Neal McDonough and Smilla. After Aubrey is kidnapped by a serial killer who cuts his victims' hands off, she's found in a ditch alive and claiming to be Dakota, a poor, homeless stripper. Dakota is bad. We know this because she smokes and says "fuck" a lot. Is Aubrey just delusional or is Aubrey really bad girl Dakota or are these really two separate girls?

And does anyone care?

Oh, also, Aubrey/Dakota has a hairless cat. That isn't fixed. Know what I'm saying? The cat has the biggest balls ever. Made even more prominent by the fact that the cat is hairless. A hairless cat with huge balls! Brilliant. D&G should use that in their next campaign.

The acting
The world in I Know Who Killed Me is populated entirely of people with Asperger's Syndrome. Nobody reacts in a realistic, rational manner. When Blohan gets on a bus with blood literally pouring out of a gaping wound on her hand, she notices a guy casually staring at her and asks, "Don't you want to know what happened?" and he says, "People get cut. That's life." With blood POURING down her arm and smeared all over her face and clothes. The bus driver doesn't offer to take her to the hospital? The only other passenger on the bus isn't horrified? Even Blohan herself seems unfazed. Which is even weirder when I tell you that the gaping wound was caused by her finger turning black and FALLING OFF right before her very eyes!

I wish I was making this up, but, yes. Blohan plays a character who is missing a hand and a leg. Which brings me to...

The prosthetics
Also in the I Know Who Killed Me world, you can learn to walk on a prosthetic leg and use a mechanical prosthetic hand in a matter of hours (or minutes—who knows with this movie?). The artificial limbs are hilarious. They're like, twice the size of regular hands and feet. They may as well have put a giant Mickey Mouse glove and shoe on her. Additionally, her prosthetic leg needs to be "plugged in" at night so the "battery doesn't die." You heard me: her bot leg is battery-powered. Yeah, that's not going to come back later in the plot or anything.

Anyway, like I said before, Aubrey was allegedly the victim of a serial limb chopper-offer. However, "Dakota" claims that her hand and leg just fell off. This is shown in the aforementioned hilarious scene in which her finger rots off. Her reaction is like she burned a pot roast. "Oh! My! God! Ooh!" So what does she do? She picks her finger up...AND THEN SEWS IT BACK ON.

You may be wondering if I smoked crack before writing this post. That wasn't me. It was Jeff Hammond, the guy responsible for writing this screenplay.

The bizarre reactions
No one in the movie seems to be fazed by anything that's going on, except that Aubrey/Dakota's kidnapping and subsequent handicap seems to be a huge inconvienience to everyone. McDunnah and Smilla find out the latest news about their kidnapped daughter when they're laying on the couch flipping channels and see it on the news. No shit. These two should have been the number one suspects in Aubrey/Dakota's disapparance.

In addition, the FBI agents investigating the kidnapping are convinced that Aubrey/Dakota knows who chopped her hand and leg off and that she's covering for them. Wait, what?? It simply doesn't make any sense. Why didn't they just get Smilla to use her sense of snow to solve the crime?

OK, that sucked. Sorry.

The stripping
Speaking of a sense of snow, Blohan was obviously plowing through a drift before filming the strip club scenes. A three-toed sloth on a eucalyptus branch is more exciting than this listless slug on a stripper pole. She's also the only stripper in the whole club who doesn't have her top off. If those scenes didn't turn you asexual, then this certainly will, as it is officially the unsexiest moment in movie history.

The "sex scene"
So your girlfriend has just lost her leg and hand in a horrific attack by an unknown assailant who is still on the loose. She also seems to be suffering from some kind of amnesia that's causing her to not remember anything or anyone, including you. You are seeing her for the first time since this accident and she appears in the doorway with her prosthetic leg off. What do you do?

Why, take her upstairs and fuck her, of course! Loudly! In the middle of the day! With her mom downstairs listening to the whole thing! And pretending to clean as if nothing is happening! Instead of storming upstairs, busting the door down and screaming, "Get the fuck off of my legless daughter!"

The dialogue
The real dialogue isn't much better than that. Some fun examples:
• At a high school football game on the same day that a student's dead body has been found, the PA announces: "As you know Jennifer Tolin's body was found and we'd like a moment of silence. [two seconds of silence] Now let's go out there and win this one for Jennifer! WHOOOOO!!!!"

• FBI guy: "He was done with her...left her by the road to die."
Police officer: "But he wasn't expecting her will to live!"

• Aubrey/Dakota to her boyfriend after having legless sex with him: "Did she ever fuck you like that? Did she ever fuck you at all?"

The twist
So are you ready for the big twist? It's a good one! Turns out Aubrey and Dakota ARE two separate girls. Smilla's baby died at birth and McDonut paid off a crackhead in the hospital who had twins for one of the babies! But that's not all—Aubrey and Dakota are STIGMATIC TWINS. So if one of them gets hurt, the other one feels it! Which explains why Dakota's finger fell off!
Is your mind blown yet? No? Then get ready for...

The grand finale
Dakota sees where Aubrey has been buried alive by the killer in a dream, and your first thought is, "When did she become psychic?" All of this could have been avoided if she'd been psychic BEFORE, but whatever.

Anyway, she grabs McDoody and tells him she knows where his daugher is. No cops for these two—they're taking the law into their own hands by going to the killer's house! The killer tries to grab Dakota through a hole in the wall and she screams "Fuck you!" and then CUTS HIS HAND OFF, while the killer doesn't even try to fight and essentially holds his hand out for her to sever.

McLovin gets killed at some point and there's a pointless struggle between Dakota and the killer and then a super-dramatic death scene (but amazingly, he doesn't "come back" after appearing to be dead like Michael Myers). Dakota then wanders into the woods and miraculously picks the exact spot where Aubrey is buried to dig. She uncovers a casket and then—wait for it—uses her fucking bot hand to punch a hole into the casket and free Aubrey. Of course, Aubrey isn't even blue yet. Dakota then climbs into the casket and snuggles up with her twin sister who was just freed from being buried alive.

And scene!

That's right: the end. This movie is barely an hour and 20 minutes long, which is both a blessing and a curse. It's like, how did this get the greenlight in the first place? And if they were going to go for it, why didn't they just give us a two-hour Showgirls extravaganza with more amputee sex scenes and more hairless cat and more Smilla and McGillicuddy finding out important things from news reports?

The bottom line of this rambling, incoherant review is: THIS IS THE FUCKING FUNNIEST BAD MOVIE EVER AND YOU HAVE TO SEE IT. Don't pay for it, though. Wait until you get your 10th rental free or something. That's what I did. Then get all your pals together, stock up on bottom-shelf liquor and laugh your asses off. If anything, you'll get a kick out of the hairless cat with giant balls.

Bloodbath on isle 12

There are intense crowds on the day after Thanksgiving—led by the "doorbusters" who show up at dawn for early-bird sales.
—snopes.com

If you weren't too stunned by my announcement of The Pixy's engagement, you will probably remember that I referenced "the Doorbusters" and how much I hate them at the end of my post. A few people have asked me what the fuck "doorbusters" are. Linus, why don't you tell Charlie Brown what a Doorbusters Christmas is all about?

Lights please...

And there were in the same life-free jerkoffs abiding in the Wal-Mart parking lot, keeping watch over their watchess by night. And lo, the manager of the store came upon them, and the glory of the $899 plasma screen shone round about them, and they began to push.

And the manager said unto them, "Back up, the store opens at FOUR—NOT 3:56! Stop pushing! Christ the Lord, glory to God in the highest, you people are animals! Sir, please stop peeing in the decorative planters! Help, help, I'm being trampled! You're standing on my face! Help, help...nooooooooooooo!!"

Did this help?

"Like a chemical lobodomy"

As you may have noticed, all's been quiet on the Count front, at least on this blog. So it is with much emotion that I can finally tell you that your highly-anticipated Count update has finally arrived! If you haven't shit your pants already, then get ready to!

I reported back in May that a documentary about black metal called Until the Light Takes Us was in production and scheduled to release "sometime in '07". Can you guess where this is going? That's right: the movie is ALMOST DONE! Until then, the filmmakers have released a tantalizing teaser clip of the Count being interviewed in prison to get us foaming at the mouth for the movie's release.

Go to their Myspace page and you can check out the most boring Count footage you've ever seen in your life. The most exciting part of the whole thing is when a chime plays like it's dinnertime on a cruise ship and an intercom announces that it's time for the prisoners to get their meds. The Count then sniffs haughtily and snarks on the drugs as being "like a chemical lobodomy." Which is a totally great quote...if you're not Count Fucking Grishnackh! Doesn't he have anything meaner than that? Like how the guards are all freemasons and how the Jews are trying to keep everyone else drugged so they can take over the world? But then again, this is the guy who stole a Saab station wagon and led the Norwegian cops on a low-speed chase.

Once again, total let-down...

Also, please tell me this isn't part of the movie. If this is the teaser clip they are offering up that's meant to entice us to the theater to see the whole film, we're in for the disappointment of our lives. Where's the face paint? The animal skulls? The superficial cutting? If this is the best they've got, I will launch my Movie Meal at the screen and march right out of there for a refund.

You also may remember that parole is on the Count's plate for '08, and the Burzum site had a non-update on that as well:
In 2006 Varg Vikernes failed to release from the prison. And the court session regarding this issue was then postponed to 2008. However there is still no particular information when or even whether this happens. And I don't even bother to ask Varg about it to avoid the attraction of any unnecessary public attention to this event.

Let's review, shall we? The Count regularly:
• publicly posts lengthy white power screeds on his website,
• threatens anyone who mentions him on Myspace,
• throws shit fits over his domain name, and
• blabbers about how unfairly he's treated to anyone who will listen.
And yet, the one thing he wants to avoid shining public attention on is HIS FUCKING PAROLE? The Count: a mystery wrapped in an enigma dipped in riddles and sprinkled with WTF.

In other exciting metal news, here's a look at the tour rider for the metal outfit Cranial Impalement. It's so fucking ridiculously funny you won't even believe it. I totally thought it was made up. In fact, I thought this might be a fake band, a la Dethclok. But, unbelievably, this is all too real.

First of all, their contact person is Danny "The Cobra" Bernard, or "Cobra Sound" at soundofthecobra.com. This just gives you a taste of what's to come. The overcompensation is rampant from page one.

Behold the backstage requirements:
-We require access to a forklift for unloading the foam penis.
-Lead singer Bleedus Foetus requires an "electric foot spa" in his separate dressing room
-The band requires "1 CD-player or boom box with various pump-you-up CDs (i.e. Jock Jams)"

In the Meet & Greet Lounge:
-1 inverted cruicifix (large) encrusted with faux fecal matter
-2 fountains filled with believable blood
-1 banner flourescent under black light that reads: "DEATH TO GOD"
-3 couches (badly burned)
-1 gallon of fake ejaculation (the band prefers corn syrup and corn starch)
-1 large bowl steamed entrails, positioned to spill forth from a mannequin's stomach
-24 live bats (domestic) flying loose in room
-1 giant breast appearing to lactatae whiskey
-1 coffin filled with candy corn (awww!)
-1 edible model of the venue (burning or melting)

OK, now, come on! Who are these guys, anyway? Axl?

Refreshments are pretty run-of-the-mill with kosher hot dogs, a fruit tray and Cheez-Its. Sadly, one of the band members has a peanut allergy. But then we get to "Services":
-1 very old man in a cloth diaper to shuffle into and out of shadows at regular intervals
-2 topless models wearing PVC undergarments and gas masks and holding severed goat heads
-1 enormously fat woman with a keening or unpleasant laugh
-1 man who will wear a priest costume and eat simulated feces
-1 man completely covered in tattoos who can eat anything on command, up to and including human bones
-2 women with the heads of owls or falcons; a missing breast or nipple is preferred
-1 man with magma in place of blood
-1 man or woman who can turn into a giant crow.

Also, the band may want pizza after the performance. But they must be delivered by mutilated mules or shackled human slaves.

OK, OK, so they admit they don't HAVE to have all that stuff. But if anything, here's what they'll settle for:
-Gutter Pig wants lowfat American cheese
-Luciferus Bile wants a "local choir able to sing in cool-sounding Latin"
-Hate Mountain wans a Footsie Mozart Kick n' Play Piano for his daughter.
-Bleedus Foetus wants a poster of George Bush, which he promises not to do anything shocking to as "he has great respect for the office of the presidency."

And to think people used to be shocked about that Van Halen/brown M&Ms thing. Something tells me these guys would be way into the chemical lobodomy thing.

Take my hand...off to Never-Neverland

So sick of interacting with family that you can hardly stand it? Here's some news to make you feel a little better. Remember The Pixy? Of course you do: he was the Stupid & Contagious Person of the Year for 2006. You may remember that I also did a fangirl post where I simply couldn't find it in my little black heart to snark on him.

Well, there's big news in Pixyland: the Pixy got engaged! TO A CHICK! And they totally dress up as fairyland characters together and hang out at Renaissance Faires and whatnot. There's even a pic of them wearing matching Little Lord Faulterouy outfits. It's sickinengly fabulous and I love it. He promises a "fairy tale wedding" and you better believe you'll be hearing all about it.

Anyway, big congrats to The Pixy and his Tinkerbell lady friend! Stupid & Contagious salutes both of you and wishes you a happily ever after. And thanks for helping me get my mind off of the Doorbusters. God almighty how I hate the Doorbusters...

Drinking the Top Model Flavor-Aid

Sorry I have been neglecting my blog. I'm sure everyone is dying for some breaking news and important analysis from me. So here it is. And get ready—I'm already annoyed by the holidays, so I'm in full-on balls-out rant mode.

I've been meaning to post on America's Next Top Model for a long time now. I have a love/hate relationship with this claptrap. This season has the fugliest lineup yet. I don't care what Tyra Banks says. No way any of these butterfaces could ever compete with the 15-year-old Ukranians slinking around the Bryant Park tents during Fashion Week. The one that got voted off last week looked like Gary Coleman, for Christ sakes. I hate it and I hate Tyra. And yet I watch it every single week.

Don't you think Tyra looks like Gossamer after Bugs Bunny did his hair with dynamite rollers? I've provided a side-by-side comparison above as a visual. And like Gossamer, Tyra prowls around in giant shoes, procuring innocent dopes for torturous scientific experiments. Tyra Banks is the Jim Jones of the modeling world. She brainwashes, manipulates, preaches, evaluates, cuts down, builds up, controls, persuades, influences, rewards, deprives...a regular cult fuhrer of her very own People's Temple. To prove that things on the Top Model set are far more nefarious than UPN television would ever lead us to believe, here are five common traits of cult leaders. All hail Tyra!

(FYI, this article wasn't my idea; Radar published a story about this a while back. Although my interpretation is much funnier.)

1. Leader claims divine authority.
Tyra fancies herself a sort of Jill of all trades, boasting incessantly about her various career endeavors. She's more than just a model, people. She's also an author! A movie star! A television actress! A photographer! A producer! A talk-show host! A horrifically bad singer! She's one of the world's most influential people! As thus, every word that comes out of her mouth must be immediately absorbed and applied to life for success. To reiterate her dominance, she surrounds herself with a panel of judges and a phalanx of industry professionals who admonish those who don't comply with Tyra's Rulez of Fashion™.
"Tyra told you to stop wearing ponytails because it makes you look like a common high school girl!"
"But I am a common high school girl..."
"OBEY!"
"I'm sorry, Noted Fashion Photographer Nigel Barker*! I promise to try harder next time."
"In fashion, there is no next time!"

2. Followers become dependant on movement/leader for their view of reality.
Tyra is fond of analyzing a modeling shoot by saying, "You did this (makes model face), and you should have done this (makes exact same model face)" and the model in question nods emphatically, eyes wide, starstruck and basking in the almighty council of Tyra Fucking Banks. Everything Tyra says is gospel, even when she's contradicting herself (which is pretty much all the fucking time). Example: "As a model, you have to know your limits!" versus "As a model, you have to step out of your comfort zone!" The girls are often demanded to prove how much they "want this" by groveling, sobbing and performing ridiculous tasks, such as walking a runway with a basket of fruit on their heads.

If Tyra told the girls that only winners drape themselves in Cavalli and then drink cyanide Crystal until they swoon onto their single beds at the model compound with only their Jimmy Choos sticking out, they'd line up at the bar. Then Tyra would cattly evaluate them for not looking fierce† enough in death. Of course, no one ever mentions that the girls are taking modeling advice from the fattest, ugliest Victoria's Secret Angel with the most cellulite and the biggest ass. Take that, Miss Authority! OK, that was catty, but it's nothing compared to some of the things she's said about her little proteges.

3. Isolation.
The wannabe models are all forced to live in a super-phat pad, complete with a runway, confession booth and...gigantic, airbrushed pictures of Tyra everywhere. Reminds me of a little world leader we all know and love called Mr. Kim Jong-Il.

4. Important decisions are made for followers by others.
Each season in what usually ends up being the most popular episode, Tyra gives all the girls makeovers and tells them how they are going to look from now on. Painful bleachings, excruciating extension application and Sampson-style eradication of girls' secondary sex characteristics. For some of the tearful model wannabes, cutting their hair off is the equivalent of a clitorodotomy. What would Noted Black Author Alice Walker say about that, Ty-Ty?

Another prime example happened in "Cycle" (another veiled vag reference?) 6 when the final two girls, Danielle and Joanie, both got painful teeth revamps after Tyra threatened that they wouldn't move on in the competition if they didn't comply.

5. Leader is not open to discussion.
The most infamous instance of this is the Great Tiffany Tell-Off of Cycle 4. In this embarrassing clip, contestant Tiffany is voted off and sob enough for Tyra's liking. Tyra tries to get the last word in about how disappointed she is and, when Tiffany blows it off, she has a full-on head bobbing, finger-waving kiniption fit. She screetches about how her mother yells at her because she loves her and tells Tiffany to shut up about 50 times. Just try to watch it without backing away from your computer. Since that incident, no one ever questions Tyra for fear of unleashing the Five-Headed Demon.

Come to think of it, Tyra's more of a Charlie Manson than a Jim Jones. The incoherant rambling, the nonsensical advice, the questionable inspiration...she even once made the girls pose as dead bodies! Yes, it's all starting to make sense now: Heatherette = Helter Skelter. Squeaky Fromme is an anagram for "Queer for my mask"! Freaky, man.

Manson once said, "Look down at me and you see a fool; look up at me and you see a god; look straight at me and you see yourself.” Take a sip of THAT Flavor Aid, ANTM wannabes.

* What the fuck is he "noted" for anyway? Cat Fancy? Juggs? The Pamida ad from last Sunday's Koupon Klipper?
† Speaking of "fierce", can't we think of another adjective to describe awesome modeling? How about ferocious? Savage?Vehement? Cannibalistic? Next season they should issue each judge a thesaurus.

Super-scary-ass Halloween Hullaballoo 2!

And now for part two from my last post: the 13 Best Scary-Movie Bad Guys!

13. Billy Chapman (Silent Night, Deadly Night)
I saw this movie at a slumber party once and it scared the absolute shit out of me. I'm sure it was a horrible movie all around, if the premise is any indication: a boy sees his mom and dad brutally murdered by a dude in a Santa suit. So naturally, when he grows up, he starts killing people while dressed as Santa. Many a nightmare is had.
Best line: It's naughty to say bad things about old people. Santa Claus will punish you.

12. Patrick Bateman (American Psycho)
If there's anything scarier than a yuppie, it's a mentally unbalanced yuppie. Who likes to wax philosophical about "Sussudio", Whitney Houston's first album and "Hip to Be Square" while he axes other yuppies to death with nary a flinch. Not to mention, he moonwalks.
Best line: Try getting a reservaton at the Dorsia now, you fucking stupid bastard!

11. Freddy Kreuger (A Nightmare on Elm Street)/Chucky (Child's Play)
Because I love killers that say funny things before they slash someone to ribbons.
Best line: I'm your boyfriend now, Nancy.

10. Hannibal Lector (The Silence of the Lambs)
How can you not love Hannibal, the brilliant psychologist trapped in the body of a madman? While he became a bit of a parody of himself in later episodes, he still managed to win over audiences with his clever zingers and creative kills.
Best line: One more thing, Senator: love your suit.

9. Krug Stillo (The Last House on the Left)
It's a classic horror concept: two girls innocently trying to score some weed before a concert find themselves wrapped up with this freaky escaped convict and his gang. They are brutally killed, revenge is enacted by their parents, audiences are satisfied. But just try to get this chilling, low-budget film out of your head. Wes Craven's first movie.
Best line: You must think we're stupid right? No, we're not stupid. We might be horny old pigs, but, we ain't stupid.

8. Max Cady (Cape Fear)
Oh god, DeNiro. All pumped up. Sticking his thumb in Juliette Lewis's mouth. Quoting scripture. Beating up the thugs that were sent to rough him up. Smoking a cigar and laughing hysterically during a movie. All these crazy things, yes, but the part where he attacks Illeana Douglas is so horrible I can't even think about it.
Best line: Can I put my arm around you?

7. Norman Bates (Psycho)
"You see, when the mind houses two personalities, there's always a conflict, a battle. In Norman's case, the battle is over—and the dominant personality has won."
Best line: I think I must have one of those faces you can't help believing.

6. Jamie "Buffalo Bill" Gumb (The Silence of the Lambs)
Sure, Anthony Hopkins was brilliant, but Ted Levine was the real star psycho of this one. Each scene is intensely memorable, especially the infamous "junk tuck dance" sequence. Had I been trapped in a well in this guy's basement you better believe I would have dug a tunnel like a mole and gotten the fuck out of there.
Best line: Put the fucking lotion in the basket!

5. Count Orlok (Nosferatu)
You may not know that this character was only seen on film for a grand total of nine minutes, and yet he is one of the most famous and memorable monsters in movie history. Sweet Jesus, that was some scary-ass makeup!
Best line: [no lines; Nosferatu]

4. Captain Howdy (The Exorcist)
Who is Captain Howdy? Only Captain Howdy knows, but from what we've seen we can surmise that he is a bit of a schizophrenic, he can be summoned using a oujia board, he's quite good at impressions and he really, really, really hates crosses.
Best line: Your mother sucks cocks in hell!

3. Henry (Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer)
Michael Rooker plays a character loosely based on infamous slasher Henry Lee Lucas, a man who claimed to have killed anywhere between 2 and 300 people. This grainy film is unrelenting, and Rooker's performance as the most depraved person in a grotesquely depraved situation will leave you wanting to scrub off with bleach after watching it.
Best line: If you shoot someone in the head with a .45 every time you kill somebody, it becomes like your fingerprint, see? But if you strangle one, stab another, and one you cut up, and one you don't, then the police don't know what to do. They think you're four different people

2. Damien Thorn (The Omen)
Who would have ever believed a cherub-faced, English-accented little boy in short pants was the son of Satan? No, I'm not talking about Angus Young—it's Harvey Stevens as the cutest little sociopath you ever did see. He has no qualms about impaling a priest, beheading a journalist or even hacking up his own parents. In fact, he doesn't even have to do it—he mearly summons his minions to do the dirty work and just hangs out looking innocent.
Best line: [the smile at the very end of the movie]

1. Ben (Blue Velvet)
Frank was scary. Really scary. But it takes real skill to stand next to Dennis Hopper in kabuki makeup AND be singing a Roy Orbison song and make it one of the most unsettling performances ever recorded on film. There's something about Dean Stockwell, anyway—like, he reminds me of that senator that was having an affair with Chandra Levy.
Best line: Here's to your fuck, Frank.

Super-scary-ass Halloween Hullaballoo!

Whoopee! It's Halloween, my favorite time of year! Anyone going to Hell House? I think I'm just going to walk around Cowtown in complete disguise. I was thinking about going as bald Britney with an umbrella beating up cars, but it won't be complete unless I have my very own Chris Crocker following me around and screaming, "Leave her alone! She's not well right now!" I don't think I'm mentally prepared for that. So I'll probably just go as a ghost or Hatchet Face or something.

Anyway, while I think of a good costume, here's the first of two fun lists I've devised for you all honoring the 13 best scary-movie bad girls. Boo!

13. Cheryl Lang (Arlington Road)
This little-seen movie is actually super-underrated, in my humble opinion. I completely loved it and I think you should see it. Thus, I won't tell you why Cheryl is scary, other than that bitch is really up to something. And she's played by none other than Joan Cusack, which adds to the freak factor.
Best line: Couldn't find a good one, and I haven't seen it in a while. Sorry.

12. Annie Wilkes (Misery)
Kathy Bates is one of my favorite stars ever. She's just so fabulous. And in Misery, she's at the top of her game. At first you think, "Oh, how nice—she's a big fan of this poor author that she saved from certain death after a car accident!" And then the next thing you know, she's smashing his feet with a sledgehammer.
Best line: At the feedstore do I say, "Wally, give me a bag of that effin' pig feed, and a pound of that bitchly cow corn"? At the bank do I say, "Oh, Mrs. Malenger, here's one big bastard of a check, now give me some of your Christ-ing money!"

11. Hedda Carlson (Single White Female)
Poor Bridget Fonda. She's a successful power bitch who was just dumped by her cute yuppie boyfriend. What's a girl to do? Getting a roommate to move in to her posh loft seems like a good idea. But watch out; there are kooks out there. Like Jennifer Jason Leigh for example. She wants to be just like Bridget. In fact, she wants Bridget's whole life! Bye bye, doggie! Bye bye, boyfriend! She won't stop until she's a yuppie, too!
Best line: You know, identical twins are never really identical. There is always one that is prettier, and the other one does all the work.

10. The Blair Witch (The Blair Witch Project)
You never saw her, and you're never really sure if she's real. All you know about her is that she might just be an urban legend, but when people venture near her they find creepy stick people and piles of stones, lose their jawbones, get disembowled, and sometimes disappear forever.
Best line: [strange disembodied screaming]

9. Pamela Voorhees (Friday the 13th)
The actress who plays her looks exactly like my beloved high school art teacher who was just the sweetest person ever. If Mrs. B turned out to be a mad killer, I'd not only be shocked, but also intensely disappointed.
Best line: Kill her, Mommy! Kill her! Don't let her get away, Mommy! Don't let her live! I won't, Jason, I won't!

8. Pauline Parker/Juliet Hulme (Heavenly Creatures)
While not necessarily bad girls, these sweet-faced little Aussie BFFs have such an obsessive codependent relationship that you can't help but flinch. Also disturbing is that Melanie Lynskey and Kate Winslet (in her first role ever) portray real-life girls who offed one's mom so they could stay together forever. You can read about the true story at the Crime Library. Peter Jackson directs and the film is beautiful, if not completely depressing. The sheer amount of desperate sobbing will exhaust you.
Best line: The next time I write in this diary, Mother will be dead. How odd...yet how pleasing.

7. Samara Morgan (The Ring)
The little girl left for dead in a well comes back to make everyone else suffer. On top of it all, she plants a spooky-ass video precariously in the paths of innocents and then forces them to show others or face the consequences—she'll crawl through your TV and breaka ya face.
Best line: (in response to the line "You don't want to hurt anyone") But I do, and I'm sorry. It won't stop.

6. Minnie Castavet (Rosemary's Baby)
The other actor I love to bits is Ruth Gordon. She's in two of my favorite movies of all time. How absolutely brilliant to cast gleeful, fun-loving Maude as a gleeful, fun-loving devil worshipper.
Best line: He chose you, honey! From all the women in the world to be the mother of his only living son!

5. The Ghoul Man's Wife (Plan 9 From Outer Space)
Vampira is the super-hottest glamour ghoul of all-time and here she glams up one the notorious Ed Wood classic, oft called the worst movie of all time (until Lohan's new movie, that is).
Best line: [sexy, zombified lurching]

4. Rhoda Penmark (The Bad Seed)
Pure sociopaths are always scary. But when that unfeeling killer looks like Cindy Brady, it's just downright terrifying. Imagine a pigtailed girl who puts Kitty Karryall to bed then burns a snooping handyman alive. Patty McCormack as Rhoda was Samara before the writers of The Ring were even born.
Best line: You tell lies like that, you won't go to Heaven when you die!

3. Miss Gulch/The Wicked Witch of the West (The Wizard of Oz)
The green face, the pointy nose, the nicotine-stained teeth...her abject hatred for a cute little doggie. Shit, that was one creepy broad! Don't tell me she doesn't scare you to this day. I still can't watch that movie without having to turn away when she materializes out of that plume of red smoke and bosses around the winged monkey men.
Best line: Who ever thought a little girl like you could destroy my beautiful wickedness?

2. Baby Jane Hudson (What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?)
This one would be my number one if it weren't so campy. Bette Davis is just so over-the-top perfect as she torments a wheelchair-bound Mommie Dearest. She serves her dead pet birds to her for lunch under a silver dome then refuses to bring more food until she eats them, taunting, "I didn't bring your breakfast, because you didn't eat your din-din!" Awesome!
Best line: (in response to the line "You wouldn't be able to do these awful things to me if I weren't still in this chair.") But cha AAH, Blanche, ya AAH in that chair!

1. Asami Yamazaki (Ôdishon)
Was anyone able to make it through this movie? As big as a horror movie buff as I am, and I just couldn't do it. That was one crazy, fucked-up bitch! The lesson learned from this movie is to never hold an audition for a wife. That cute, demure little lady you set your eye on might be the type of girl to push needles right into your roaming eyeballs.
Best line: This wire can cut through meat and bone easily.

The death of Camelot

Readers, I'm afraid that I have bad news to report to you today. I am choking back tears even as I write this. After nine movies together, a reality TV show and years and years of drug-fuelled blackouts and meth binges, I regret to report that Corey Haim and Corey Feldman have called it quits on their legendary friendship. Feld-dog revealed this horrific news in a shocking interview to Us Magazine:

Us: How are things with the other Corey?
Feldman: We are not in great shape these days. We had a bit of a falling out.

Us: So you are not talking?
Feldman: No, we are not at all. He made some big mistakes and I am not sure why he made them. I am bit confused by it all. He has issues; big issues.

Us: How long has it been since you've not spoken to each other?
Feldman: Probably about two months now. He has to get his life together. He has some serious issues he must deal with. That's all I will say. He has to get it together very soon.

I expect this is all due to Haim's recent voluntary departure from the Lost Boys sequel. That's right: he left of his own accord after he talked non-stop about it on that stupid reality show, even sharing his own ridiculous plot ideas and then bawling when Feldman told him he wasn't asked to be a part of the movie. Either that or he decided to watch his Me, Myself & I video for the first time with a clear head.

In other depressing news, I just saw a commercial hawking the upcoming album from "the legendary Miss Britney Spears." Ugh. Where the fuck are my tranqs?

The 13 Creepiest Album Covers Ever

I don't know what to do with myself now that RoL has ended. Word on the street is that Bret will be coming back for a second season. You mean to tell me it didn't work out with Jes? Awwww. I believed in love, but no more. Instead we are left with ugliness. Blah. And so now all we have is this new fun n' scary list in honor of all the ugly and the impending Halloween season. I've marked the ones that are the least work-friendly. Enjoy, puppets!

13. Sounds of the Animal Kingdom, Brutal Truth
It reminds me of the Ramona Quimby books (Ramona the Brave, I think?) where Ramona had a picture book on her shelf that had a scary picture of a gorilla in it that she threw out of her room each night so she could get to sleep. OK, THAT was a super-embarrassing reference. Anyone else remember this? Couldn't you imagine throwing this CD cover of a man/ape hybrid screaming at you out of your bedroom at night so you can sleep? If you can look at this without shuddering, you are a braver soul than I.

12. Penis Envy, Crass
Crass is one of those true anarchist dirty grindcore punk bands in the vein of early Anthrax and Bjork's first band Kukl. This cover, picturing a face-on shot of a wide-eyed blow-up doll's face in a box and behind plastic is an absolute perfect representation of what the genre is about: in-your-face, full-frontal disturbia. The text on the box "Teenage Doll, An amazingly life-like companion" adds to the funk.

11. ...And The Glass Handed Kites, Mew
It's not graphic and it's not blatant, but there's something about this picture—or should I say the layout and design of what appear to be headshots of the band—that is totally disconcerting. It's the visual representation of a bunch of church bells all ringing against your head. In fact, I think I'm getting a migraine...

10. Come To Daddy (EP), Aphex Twin
Last summer, I declared the video for this song to be one of the creepiest ever, so conversely, the cover for the album, which features a still shot from the video should also qualify as frightening. Once again, we have the chilling Aphex Twin guy's mug superimposed multiple times onto children's bodies and grinning hideously. Honestly, it was kind of hard to narrow down which Aphex Twin album had the scariest cover. One featured the dude's head on the body of a buxom, bikini-clad chick. I guess he's into Photoshop or something.

9. Family Man, Black Flag
Here we have one cartoon kid dead, another cartoon kid bleeding from the eye and a cartoon dad with a cartoon gun to his cartoon head. The lone cartoon teddy bear reminds me of the following lyrics, courtesy of Korn: Nursery rhymes are said/promises in my head/Into my childhood, they're spoonfed/Hidden violence revealed, darkness that seems real/Look at the pages that cause all this evil.

8. Klaus Nomi, Klaus Nomi
While not flagrantly disturbing like some of these other covers, this is one of the weirdest pictures I've ever seen. Klaus, who is a (surprise!) German electronic artist, is depicted as a sort of mannequin mime with ghostly face paint and a strangely elongated body and exaggerated bow tie. Maybe I'm just being a big wimp, but I hate it! It's so freakish! And I can just imagine the industra-pop synth music playing behind it with lyrics like "We will fix your robot/dance with the monkey/fly, fly, fly, little gnu! Raisins."

7. Electriclarryland, Butthole Surfers (NSFW)
This one is like one of those veiled threats you'd get from your mom come to life. "Don't stick that pencil in your ear, or it will bust your eardrum and get stuck in there forever!" It's one of my favorite albums, but just looking at the cover makes me want to clap my hands over my ears.

6. The Dwarves Must Die, The Dwarves (NSFW)
If there's anything that generates more controversy than crucifixion scenes and nudity, it's dwarf abuse. This cover flaunts all three. The Dwarves are no strangers to stirring the pot; the guitarist He Who Cannot Be Named once faked his own death by stabbing as a publicity stunt, and the singer Blag Dhalia recently got into a backstage brawl with QOTSA frontman Josh Homme. So it should come as no surprise that the band sticks it to the man through album covers, and incorporates the dwarf cover model in the most jarring of ways (as we'll see again in a moment).

5. Virgin Killer, Scorpions (NSFW)
Be careful: Chris Hansen might show up at your door just for looking at this one. As one of the most controversial album covers of the last 30 years, it not only got shocked response from audiences, but also from the band. Allegedly, upon seeing this picture of a nude, provocatively posed child with the illusion of broken glass over her crotch area, the lead singer was completely stunned and disgusted and actually claims that the record company wanted to release it, but the band didn't. So basically it's Smell the Glove in reverse. This link also shows you the horrible replacement cover with a really lame-o picture of the band—was that horrific pic really what the band wanted? God, the Scorpions are lamer than I thought...

4. Heavy Petting Zoo, NOFX (NSFW)
Two words: beastiality. Yikes.

3. Matando Güeros, Brujeria (NSFW)
Controversy saturates every inch and pore of this album, from the title (which is a deragatory slang term for white Americans), to the content (which includes 19 songs mainly about killing said Americans), to the shocking, graphic cover (which depicts a disembodied hand holding the severed, decomposing head of a man who was allegedly killed by a Mafia-like faction--by being tied down to train tracks. Um, ew. I'm officially scared. The band themselves are notorious for supposedly engaging in human sacrifice rituals. Guess we shouldn't be looking forward to their cover of "You Are My Sunshine.")

2. Blood, Guts & Pussy, The Dwarves (NSFW)
The Dwarves are back, and so is the strange little person that appeared crucified on the cover of The Dwarves Must Die. But this time, we get to see him engaging in some boom-boom! WITH A RABBIT! As we saw in #4, nothing spells controversy like a little beastiality, but when it involves a dwarf, I think we've stumbled into a whole new underground world of creepy kink. If that isn't enough, we also have naked chicks splattered in blood posing in modelesque fashion, as if they're on the runway showing off the latest in bodily fluid chic. I wouldn't expect any less from the band that also gave us "We Must Have Blood."

1. Dawn of the Black Hearts, Mayhem (super-hella NSFW)
Seriously, DON'T click on this link if you are faint of heart...it's intensely graphic. We all know the story behind this little gem, but it's always fun to recap: pictured here is Mayhem's singer, the aptly-named Dead, moments after he slashed his wrists and then blew his brains out with a shotgun. His caring roommate, Mayhem guitarist Euronymous, happened upon the grisly scene and took pics of the carnage for their album cover. Oh yeah, and he also saved some bits of Dead's brain to dine on later, and his skull to create some lovely keepsake jewelry. With all the other mayhem Mayhem has been involved in, we shouldn't be surprised that they would have been the one band to display a photo of their lead singer's sad demise, and on an EP no less. The poor guy's legacy is relegated to a 5-song ancillary disk! Not only that, but the band makes history thanks to his tragic death. It's the very definition of creepy.

Jesus doesn't want me for a sunbeam

So I heard that I Know Who Killed Me, Lohan's last movie before she went back to the drug hole, may possibly be the worst movie ever made. I admit that I kind of wanted to see it. And now, after hearing this, I want to see it even more. That link will take you to the hysterically funny audio review offered up by the guys of the Reel Horror podcast. Seriously, I laughed so hard at the description of this movie that I almost puked. Rest assured that when it comes out on DVD in November that I will watch it and offer up a review of my own.

To hold you over in the meantime, here are a couple of reviews in honor of the season. For the record, I am sick and I have a lot of time on my hands this week, so I thought about catching a couple of docs I've been wanting to see, coincidentally both "godly." What does this have to do with the season? Um, one's sort of about Halloween, I guess...

Anyway...

First off, we have the Oscar-nominated Jesus Camp, a film about an evangelical childrens' camp and ministry called (wait for it...) "Kids on Fire." It's far scarier than Zodiac (which I totally loved, by the way, and if you haven't seen it, please do), but provided me with so many laughs that I actually felt a little bit bad. I think it's safe to say that no matter what your belief system is, if you are a rational person, you will find this movie as laughably fucked-up as I did. I mean, these are kids and they are not old enough to really know exactly what they are saying. When you weigh that depressing aspect against the hilarious double standards and other crazy shit the adults around them are squawking, it's hard not to snicker at least a little bit. Especially when the kids really get going to appease their elders.

One of the campers, a 9-year-old named Rachael, parrots to the cameras that Jesus doesn't like "dead churches" and prefers to "be there" for congregations that are jumping around, shouting and singing, an idea I'm sure she came up with all by herself. The organizers make the kids say a blessing to a cardboard cut-out of George Bush ("Talk to him. Say, 'Welcome, President Bush! We're glad you're here!'"), then later on, Pastor Becky Fischer (who runs the camp) tells a radio talk show host that she's "not going after [her] kids politically." They all finish up with the exact same smugly satisfied grins and with the exact same mission statement that they're just on a crusade to "win the lost."

Here are a few fun quotes from the movie:
At five I got saved because I just wanted more out of life.
—Levi, a 12-year-old with a rat tail

I can go into a playground of kids that don't know anything about Christianity, lead them to the Lord in a matter of, just no time at all, and just moments later they can be seeing visions and hearing the voice of God, because they're so open. They are so usable in Christianity.
—Pastor Becky Fischer, operator of the camp. Later in the movie she admonishes the devil for "going after the young, those who cannot fend for themselves."

Father, we pray over the electrical systems, we pray over the electricity will [sic] not go out in this building in Jesus' name, because of storms or any other reason. I just pray over this equipment, we speak over the PowerPoint presentations, all the video projectors and we say, 'Devil, we know you love to do in meetings like this' and we say, 'You will not!' No microphone problems in Jesus' name!
—Becky, while praying over the meeting hall before camp

Warlocks are enemies of god...and had it been in the Old Testament, Harry Potter would have been put to death!
—Becky, to a roomful of campers. She later accuses the kids of being "a phony and a hypocrite" for calling themselves Christians when they KNOW that they are one person at church and an entirely different person at school, where they "talk dirty just like all the other kids." This causes the majority of the kids to beging crying and pleading for forgiveness.

It's like, we're being trained to be warriors, only in a much funner way.
—Rachael

Next to the speaking in tongues scenes, the best part is when meth fag Ted Haggard shows up in an interview to smarmily discuss how kids love the evangelical scene and then actually declare straight to the cameraman, "I think I know what you did last night! If you send me a thousand dollars, I won't tell your wife!" Do I really need to make fun of that? It goes along with the clip that I think unintentionally sums up the entire movie: little Rachael prays to Jesus to help her roll "a good one" during a church bowling trip and he answers her petty request by granting her a big, fat gutterball.

Speaking of gutterballs (or gutters, I guess...or balls), I also recently watched the documentary Hell House, which chronicles a Halloweenie season with a Texas church that puts on a "real-life" house of horrors every year. This is one haunted house that won't feature Freddy, Jason, Leatherface or even clowns. No, these are scenes of horror and carnage that can occur to those who don't accept Jesus Christ as their lord and savior. This movie is a little more breatheable than Jesus Camp, which I found stifiling from all the rigidity, but it's still drenched with folks full the same self-congratulation and dumb-ass stereotypes. Oh, the stereotypes in this one. I couldn't stop laughing at those crazy stereotypes!

The movie starts out with the planning of the latest Hell House and, since they already did Columbine and Padukah recreations, a discussion of how they're going to cover the school-kid-goes-nuts-and-kills-himself scene commences. One perv helpfully suggests, "Why don't we have a gay bar scene with two girls hitting on each other?" and the pastor shoots it down by saying they "don't want to go there." As in Jesus Camp, "reaching the lost" is mentioned ad nauseum.

Tryouts come next and we're treated to lots of overacting and more fun typecasting. The church members will be acting out vignettes in each horror scene. A Latino kid approaches the casting committee and says he wants to do anything but the drug-deal scene because that's all he ever gets. "If the spirit leads you," he says, "let it lead you for me to not do the drug deal scene." True life is far funnier than fiction, everyone.

The rehearsals of the scenes also showcase more woefully archaic ideologies, including the ever-popular "one wrong choice that seems innocent can lead you on a downward spiral straight into the hands of beezlebub" rap. The Trinity Church's twist on this old favorite is how Harry Potter leads to Ouija boards, which leads to Magic cards, which leads to RPGs, which leads to—dun-dun-DUNNNN!!!—the OCCULT!

I was chiefly annoyed by the "cool dude" at the church, Thaddeus, who is a DJ and has actually been to raves so he knows what they're like and what goes on there. He appoints himself in charge of the completely bizarre rave/suicide scene (which I'll get to in a minute) and he keeps blowharding to all the younger kids how at raves "people will take what is put in their hand" and, when one girl starts acting spastic after she pretends to take ecstasy, smugly directs "I've seen people on this drug and it doesn't make girls spaz out. You need to act more like you're really relaxed." I wished someone would have punched this douche nozzle in the face, but you know...it's, like, church and everything.

The group records voiceovers that will be played in the final, epic "hell" scene of the sinners repenting. Naturally, the "alternative lifestyle" voice guy performs in a slurry, high-pitched tone with accompanying mincing gestures. You'll never believe it: the truth is that when the gay guy was a kid he was touched inappropriately and he made the wrong choice in life, thinking it was natural! The voiceover guy also expresses fears that people out in the hall might hear him. Uh-oh, they might all think you're gay!

The final hour shows the actual opening and operation of Hell House, so we get to actually see some of the scenes. Surprise! More pigeonholing! We see what happens with a gay guy with AIDS (of course, because in Trinity's world, only gay men can get AIDS) doesn't accept Jesus into his life on his deathbed, and conversely, what happens when a girl who has just gotten an abortion does. She's saved, baby! Miracle! Oh, and in case you're wondering, the Latino boy did not get the drug dealer part...instead that role went to one of the few black guys in the church. So, you know, progress.

OK, now for the rave scene, which pissed me off to no end. Thaddeus hams it up as a ghoulish DJ and some innocent chick is slipped a mickey and then gangraped at the rave. The next scene shows her wailing in her bedroom with some twat in a demon costume chastising her that she has "no idea how many guys had you!" and "no boy will ever want you now!" and "remember when daddy used to touch you?" The girl then pretends to commit suicide and she is condemned to hell. OK, what the motherfucking fuck are they trying to convey here? It doesn't make an iota of sense! Why is *she* going to hell for being drugged and gang-raped while the rapists get away from hell scot-free? And why in the world was everyone molested?? What kind of fucked-up logic dictates that a victim of sexual abuse is sinful? Even more troublesome is that the young lady who played "suicide girl" interviews that one year she saw the guy who raped her two years earlier standing in line to view Hell House and, that night, she did the "best acting of [her] life." WHAT??? They don't give any more information than this, so to be fair, I don't know if she reported this crime or what. However, the guy is free walking the streets and seemingly not required to stay away from the victim, so the only conclusion I can draw from this is that perhaps Hell House (and the condemnation that goes along with it) is all too real for some of these kids. Perhaps *she* herself is also being typecast.

Happily, some of the attendees of the haunted house weren't buying it. One group of teens starts ranting to one of the church members about the hypocracy and stereotyping. Then one girl makes the most coherant comment I heard from either one of these films: "What we saw in there is why people are turned off by Christianity. You make it black and white; there is no gray area, which is what life is."

Amen, sista!

(Psst...if you want to check out these docs for yourself, go here for Jesus Camp and here for Hell House.)

Here's to the Panty Police!

I think I've seen every episode of Law & Order: SVU at least five times, mainly thanks to USA's ad nauseum nightly repeats and frequent holiday marathons. I've had a love/hate relationship with the show lately because I started getting sick of it and the new episodes are really scraping it for freaky crimes (Santaria again?). Also, when did Benson get a brother?

A slight case of the sniffles and sheer boredom has inspired me to start watching again, and in an effort to spice up my relationship with SVU, create this very special L&O: SVU drinking game! Remember those? If you don't (geek), here's what you do: simply settle down in front of the telly when the show comes on (doesn't matter which episode) with your favorite adult beverage and sip, drink or chug appropriately each time one of the items on the list occurs on the show. If all goes as planned, you should be ass over elbows in 60 minutes flat! If you're sick like me, replace liquor with NyQuil—trust me, it's just as effective. I created this list from my own ideas, as well as some found online. Have any to add? Comment away! In the meantime, if you crash on the way home, don't blame the bartender.

Sip once every time:
• the “ching ching” noise is played.
• someone says “Do you have children, Detective?”
• Olivia says “Sonofabitch!”
• Miranda rights are read.
• one of the detectives hangs up the phone and says, “That was Warner. She’s got something for us in the crime lab.”
• Cragen yells, “Benson/Stabler, in my office...NOW!”
• Cragen says, “Where are we on this case?”
• one of the detectives gets too close to the case.
• someone says, “Is that enough for a warrant?”
• Munch wears his trilby.
• Stabler threatens a suspect.
• cops from another squad put down SVU, calling them “panty police”, “sex cops”, etc.
• Olivia has to break a date to work on the case. (1 drink if she shows up on the scene in an evening gown.)
• a witness at a crime scene says, “Can I go now?”
• Stabler worries about his kids’ safety.
• Stabler squints.
• someone refers to a suspect "lawyering up."
• Elizabeth Donnelly (Judith Light) acts bitchy.
• Munch refers to one of his ex-wives.
• Finn says, “That’s messed up.”
• someone tells a detective to “go do your job.”
• someone screams, "You're out of line!"
• the detectives go undercover.
• Huang suggests interrogation techniques.
• one of the guest stars was also onOz.

Take 1 drink every time:
• someone actually says, “You’re getting too close to the case.”
• the crime takes place at Hudson University. (1 drink if Stabler says, “Maureen goes to Hudson!”)
• Novak/Cabot says, “I can’t just send you out on a fishing expedition.”
• Stabler kicks in a door.
• Stabler’s USMC tattoo is visible.
• one of the detectives is found in contempt of court.
• Elizabeth Donnelly personally blames Novak/Cabot for the loss of a case.
• DNA is obtained from a coffee cup or soda can left in the interrogation room.
• someone asks, “Who could have DONE this?” and Olivia replies, “That’s what we’re trying to find out.”
• the detectives make smartass remarks to a suspect as they arrest him/her.
• Munch talks about conspiracy theories.
• Finn wears his hair down.
• one of the main characters is seriously injured or shot.
• a witness is killed or commits suicide.
• there is a courtroom outburst.
• missing body parts are discovered.
• there is a mob hit.
• a guest star who typicially plays nice characters plays someone sadistic (i.e. Henry Winkler as a black widower, Fred Savage as a serial rapist).
• a guest star who has been on the show before appears again as a totally different character.
• Olivia investigates without backup.
• the detectives are shown in their “NYPD” jackets.
• the detectives' cover is blown.
• Huang actually does the interrogation himself.
• Novak is shown doing something athletic.
• Munch flirts with ME Warner.
• the case is obviously “ripped from the headlines.”

Chug if:
• a sexual perversion you’ve never heard of is mentioned.
• Munch kicks in a door.
• Ice-T's wife Coco makes a guest appearance.
• it's the Michael Pitt episode.

Another Stupid/Contagious poll!

RoL Finale: Where land ends and the party begins

It's the final episode, everyone! Can you believe it? It seems like we met only yesterday. All of our little friends...we need to let them know we haven't forgetten them! Brandi C. and her boobs, Tiffany and her drunken blatherings, Rodeo and her Hulk transformations, Magdalena and her manliness. Sigh. I'm going to miss this silly little show!

So we may as well dive right in. To the ocean. In CABO SAN LUCAS! Whooo! Bret has packed up Jes and ASHeather and whisked the Gruesome Twosome south of the border for a few days of sun, fun and sand in their ass cracks, to a place where the nights are long and the whores are cheap. Would you have expected anyplace else for a super-fabulous Bret Michaels getaway? What are the odds that we'll be treated to a Sammy Hagar cameo?

The plane lands and everyone immediately has frou-frou drinks with all kinds of fruit and umbrellas and flamingos and shit in them shoved in their hands and a gaggle of bikinied natives squat-thrusting in a circle around them. ASHeather shoves Bret aside, announces which one of the skanks that she wants to bang and immediately starts feeling the girl up, Mai Tai cocktail flying. You'd think Bret would be all over this, given the rampant fake lesbo action that has been going on this whole season, but he makes a bizarre statement to the effect that he's unable to pay attention to ASHeather properly if she's skanking it up with other chicks. Bret Michaels: a mystery wrapped in an enigma with a big steaming pile of WTF on top.

Like any good reality TV producer, VH1 gives Bret his own fabulous suite and crams the final two competitors into a standard double, but soothes the blow of having to share a room by loading the girls up with gifts. Like booty shorts, which make ASHeather blow a gasket. Whatever floats your boat, I guess. Luckily, they didn't load them up with sharp objects because when Bret, Jes and ASHeather all meet downstairs for a romantic three-way dinner together, the two girls decide to engage in a staring contest showdown. Bret tries to break the tension with "More bread?" and ASHeather responds, "She's too young for you! Are you ready for kids at 23, Jes? Hmm? Hmm?" Oh, silly ASHeather! Like she can slam anyone else. Jes makes everyone proud by saying what we're all thinking, "Yeah, well at least I'm not an aging, strident stripper!" Touche! ASHeather takes another hit when Bret confronts her about humping the dancing girl when they got off the plane and her response is to the tune of "I'm not a hater, I'm a congratulater!" Apparently, Bret never saw the drawings that ASHeather and Hatchet did of all the girls in the house. Congrats, skanks!

Finally, it's individual date time, aka Go Time! This is the last chance for the final two to make lasting impressions/sexual favors on Bret to help him in his final decision. ASHeather gets the first go, and she and Bret spend the day puttering around on dune buggies. Well, let's rephrase that: ASHeather spends the day having the time of her life, while Bret spends it trying not to die, either from ASHeather's reckless dune buggy driving or from a mega-sugar crash he's having thanks to his diabetes. When she returns to the room to change and tease her hair appropriately for dinner, ASHeather boasts about how awesome the date was to Jes, and how she and Bret are in love and how no one can get in her way when it comes to her man. All Jes has to do is say, "Your dress screams stripper" and she's won the argument yet again. For the record, ASHeather is wearing a teal blue remnant from the scrap bin at Jo-Ann's and Bret thinks it "may be the sexiest dress [he's] ever seen."

Next we're treated to yet another awkward dinner when Bret tells ASHeather that he feels they've bonded on a "party level" and that he considers her a friend...uh-oh. That's the kiss of death, right there. So what does ASHeather do? Douse it in gasoline and sets it aflame by telling Bret she's in love with him. Done and done. But only after a little roll in the hay. That's right: Bret's not well enough for dune buggy-ing, but if he gets to break his dick off in a stripper, time to start chugging the Mountain Dew.

The next morning, ASHeather shows up poolside where Jes is having breakfast still in her teal blue eyeglass wipe and with uncombed hair. She informs Jes over eggs and toast that the date was "amazing" and she and Bret were "naked all night" and that she doesn't want to "wash his scent off". Gross. I imagine the smell is something like new bandanna, tanning bed, leather and hair sweat. Unfortunately, Jes doesn't comment that Bret's probably showered all of the aging, strident stripper scent off of him, because she's got a date to get to. As she leaves, ASHeather screams down the hotel hallway, "When you kiss him, you'll be lickin' me!" and you can practically hear the ring of 20 phones all calling the front desk at the same time over that one.

So Jes's date involves going sailing on a bigass boat. Actually, I believe this is what Robin Leach would refer to as a "luxury yaught." No dinghys for Jes (yet)! They float around a bit and then meet up for dinner where Bret immediately hands Jes an Epipen and tells her that she's going to have to stab him in the butt. If he goes into diabetic shock, that is. I wonder if CC has ever had to do that? Actually he says she's going to have to "jam that in my ass" and we all know that CC's been there during one of those mid-80s blackout periods that Poison is so famous for. Jes tears up and Bret takes it as one sign that she cares. The other sign is when Jes takes her dress off and saunters into the hot tub. Me-ow! Just try not to go into sugar shock over that sweet ass!

The time has come, kids—it's final elimination! It all comes down to this! Jes arrives first looking darling in a sparkly black dress and then ASHeather shows up with the biggest hairdo yet and a yellow dress held together by macrame headbands. ASHeather makes one last jab by whispering to Jes that she's surprised she even bothered to show up, and Jes interviews that ASHeather's "'80s porn hair is bad...really bad." Finally, Prince Charming enters the room (security goon Big John apparently was left at the airport) and begins speaking. This may be the strangest moment of the show so far: Bret asks the girls if they would both consider dating him. It's unclear if he is being serious or not because he's voiceovering that this is a test, but you know he wouldn't turn that shit down, no matter what kind of "one girl man" posturing he spouted earlier. ASHeather of course answers "Yes, baby!" and Jes says she would not. Bret then calls ASHeather down and tells her that he thinks she's pretty n' stuff and she's totally his best friend, buuuuutttt....she's just not the girl for him. Ooh, holy shit! He basically just told her she's nothing more than a fuckbuddy! ASHeather storms out to a waiting car, rips her necklace off and calls Bret every name in the book. That's right, ASHeather—now you've got that fuckin’ liar phony fuckin’ piece of shit disrespectful asshole motherfucker's name on the back of your neck! Ten bucks says she's changed it to "Brat" by the time we get to the reunion show.

That makes Jes the winner! Yay! Aw, nice girls don't always finish last! Too bad the prize wasn't that yaught they were cruising around on earlier.

So that's it! Now what did we learn from Rock of Love?
• Anything and everything can be a turn-on, especially for Bret Michaels.
• Strippers, rock stars and Hooters waitresses need love, too.
• Never, ever under any circumstances tell your fuckbuddy that you love them.

The history of ASHeather's hair

Tonight's the night, kids! Who will Bret choose: Aging, Strident Stripper Heather or Pink-Haired Cutie Jes? And more importantly, how big will ASHeather's hair be for the final elimination? Let's take a look back, courtesy of super-fab blogger Rich Juzwiak at the Celebreality Blog, at the bad, the worse and the truly horrifying of ASHeather's 'dos throughout the last 10 weeks.

The world according to Haim

I'm totally depressed and it's all Corey Haim's fault. Thanks to the guys over at Reel Horror, I've been made privy to the 1989 straight-to-video blockbuster Corey Haim: Me, Myself & I, a short film that Corey put together for his "fans." According to IMDb, the real point of this masterpiece was to serve as damage control, as this was around the time that Corey started getting bad press about his drug use. Obviously, the powers-that-be behind the Corey empire are just as deluded as as the people that keep allowing Britney out into public, because, well...you have to watch it. Here, I'll even embed it so we can watch it together (sort of). Just do it. I'll wait. Then we'll analyze:



Warning: this is going to be a long post because, as you just saw, there is oh-so-much to cover. Let's start at the beginning: Corey and his frost n' tip hair are sitting on a cushy white couch as the camera zooms in on him. He does this weird sideways smirk thing with his mouth and makes that little chin-up head nod thing that K-Fed always does and says, "Whassup? Hel-lo!" I think he's trying to be sexy here, but it comes off like he's the 25-year-old burnout working behind the counter at Chik-Fil-A who tries to hit on all the 12-year-olds that come in. Also, he's clearly on something; my guess is 'ludes. And are those rubber Madonna bracelets I see there, Calvin Klein??

Next they show some hapless flunkie pumping air into a giant inflatable alligator, which is for Corey to float around the pool on. I guess this is supposed to give us a taste of the glam Hollywood lifestyle that Corey leads. I mean, it's not like any of us can blow up an alligator float and laze around in a pool all day. We are also not on the forefront of the fashion scene, like Corey is with his Ray-Bans and '80s neon-yellow parachute swim trunks. He also affords the luxury of having an entirely separate duckie-shaped float for his drink that is floating along behind him. We see cuts of him on the alligator interspersed throughout the segment, including riveting "behind-the-scenes" footage of PAs jerking the float around to get a better shot and also pulling the float over to the side of the pool. The soundtrack features this totally tubular background music that sounds like the jukebox at The Max on Saved by the Bell. This is what living large in Tinseltown is all about, kids!

We're then treated to some outstanding Corey quotes about what he's been up to and his favorite "projects." Bear in mind that this was made in '89, when Jimmy Hollywood had a whopping nine feature films under his belt. Here are some of of his riveting statements, all delivered with a smug little grin and a pseudo-intellectual haughtiness:

• The direction in my life right now, that I'm trying to, I guess, proceed with, in the business is, gradually, from being the little boy, from the younger, you know, brother, to trying to be the older brother. Or the only brother.

• Is there someone I look up to? Uh, yeah. Um. I look up to John Ritter, just because, I guess, he's a physical comedian. Um, and I enjoy that. (followed by Corey inexplicably screaming, "My man Three's Company! Jack Tripper! Furrr-laayyy!")

• I'm trying to get in the habit of, you know, picking up a book and learning how to write my feelings down. Not my feelings, but my thoughts, about things.

Someone sign this guy up for Toastmasters, stat. This is worse than watching Bush try to debate.

Now we come to my favorite part: the "music" segment. Corey reveals the bombshell that he likes to "slap on the headphones and dibble-dabble on the keyboards", which is followed by a clip of him sitting in front of about eight synthesizers and pushing one button with one finger one time. Does anyone remember Praga Kahn? It's kind of like a horrifying version of that with some shitty, Corey-added C+C Music Factory-esque overdubs "dibble-dabbled" in. I'm surprised he isn't just sitting in his bedroom with his Casio keyboard set to bossanova and plinking away on one key to create his awesome music.

I bet you're wondering what kind of music this man-of-many-talents likes best. The answer is: "That Japanese funk!" OK, Corey, what the fuck is that? I'll tell you exactly what it is: there's no such thing! Corey is clearly one of those guys that makes up genres so he sounds like he's the cool, hip guy in school that knows all about some underground scene that no one else has ever heard of. Everyone knows someone like this: "Nah, Duran Duran's too mainstream for me. I'm into Japanese funk. Oh, you've never heard of it? Well, it hasn't made it over here yet." Ug! I hate that!

Get ready, because it gets worse: while the production team is setting up, Corey occupies himself by jamming out on the synths, because he obviously just can't stop himself from creating, and voice-overs "We are all born with a certain inner rhythm! Hearing a certain song can remind you of a time or event in your life that was special!" Sort of like how "Head Like A Hole" reminds me of the 1991 Haim hit Prayer of the Rollerboys? Oh, wait, no it doesn't! Because that time or event in my life wasn't special. Corey is obvs into his own special little moment because he embarrassingly flails around playing air guitar and banging his head like Rainman and exclaiming, "Let's get all funky!" while the idiot director eggs him on. Looks to me like someone might have bumped into something on the way to the studio, if you know what I mean. Here's more evidence. Next up, we see him at a photo shoot wearing a vest with nothing underneath it. Here we can see that he has what looks like the bat symbol tattooed on his arm. Jesus Christ, he is seriously K-Fed...

Can't take the heat that is emulating from your computer screen? Then let's take it down a notch with a few more thought-provoking quotes. Prepare to have your mind blown:

• I have to say, the way I'm feeling, nowadays, would have to be: intense. Powerful.

• I think maybe ten years from now, I'm hopefully going to be, in like, Tahiti or something kicking back like in my huge mansion, if everything goes right, it's all up to me, just watching like the dolphins, and the porpoises and the sharks and the little sea horses and all that fun stuff go by in a whole different country, while things happen back here.

• What does kissing really mean to me? To me, if you feel, when you kiss a girl, that certain feeling of all those dolphins, like, swimming through your bloodstream, and you get those good tingles inside your stomach, I don't think there's anything better than kissing. It basically comes down to that word: Love. I guess that's what it's all about.

Does crack consumption make you see dolphins or something? Because I think he's obsessed. What in the name of all that's holy is the matter with this guy?? I can't get over it. I'm thinking it's just some unfortunate combination of ego, fame, stupidity, and drug consumption. Is this where Lohan is headed? If so, please let her handlers be smarter than Corey's and never allow her to release a "fan video" to strengthen her tarnished image. I don't think I could handle seeing Lohan in something like this. Anyway, interspersed with these profound musings are more modeling shots of Corey, including one of him doing a drunken, off-balance karake kick and one of him wearing a badass leather jacket with skulls on the back...with a color-block shirt buttoned all the way up to his neck.

For the final scene, Corey dons a suit and treats his fans to some final words of wisdom:

Growing up on movie sets has its ups and its downs...all of it sounds like fun. But when you're 12 or 13 years old, you're very, very impressionable and I know it's easy to get off track...so be smart. Don't get messed up. Stay in school. Be anybody you want to be.

It should be noted that this inspirational message is delivered with a glassy-eyed stare, figety hand gesticulations and through several cuts that make it obvious this wasn't done in one take. That big faker is high as a fucking kite! Do you think your fans are stupid, Corey? We can see right through your Revlon Frost N' Glow hair...that shit was done at home! I swear I remember seeing some show where Corey was blathering about his "rock bottom" and how he did an anti-drug commercial while he was strung out. Could this be it? I don't think this was even near his rock bottom. He stole pizza and took 85 Valiums a day! Doesn't seem like things went right, unless he's on enough stuff that he thinks his mom's apartment is a mansion in Tahiti with dolphins and seahorses floating by the windows.

God, I'm utterly humiliated that I used to like this guy. I mean, I had my wall plastered with Corey posters! If there had been a Corey Haim hotline, I would have been like Lisa Simpson, running up the family's phone bill with late-night calls to hear the latest Corey news. Readers, I am ashamed of myself! All that time wasted when I could have been obsessing over someone more worthwhile, like John Taylor or Michael Hutchence. Please don't hold it against me; I was only 12! And I got over it and moved on to Nikki Sixx and Duff McKagan. That's a step up, right? Even so, it still makes me want to run into the path of an oncoming train. Maybe I need more dolphins in my life...or keyboard dibble-dabbling...or something.