The Geriatric Journalist

At a press conference Wednesday, President Bush assured that America wasn't headed toward a recession...to the OLDEST JOURNALIST IN THE WORLD. This lady must've started her muckraking career back when they were transmitting news via Morse code and the Pony Express was actually express.

Why—or more importantly how—is she still working? Seriously, she is like half my grandmother's age and my grandma makes no sense most of the time.

Lady, at some point it's time to drop the pen and pad and pick up the oven mitts because somewhere out there there's grandchildren who need you to bake them a pie. Or in my grandma's case, make them a martini then bake them a pie because they are a drunk and hungry lout.

Solar-powered Bible

And I thought the bible was powered by blind faith and a healthy fear of God. Leave it SkyMall to prove otherwise.

Back in the tire business

Ex footballer John Elway was once a demi-God in Denver, and to be quite honest I didn't think anyone else gave a shit about him outside of that conspicuously rectilinear state (from which I hail). But apparently the muckrakers at TMZ do: yesterday they blogged about a picture of the—well, not so hefty as he is flabby—former QB along with commentary on his questionable physique.

In lieu of the posting, I thought I should share with you the tale of the day I met Elway, the superlative Bronco, the apotheosized number 7, at DIA a few years back. So gather 'round kiddies, break open the boxed juice and listen up...

The scene is late 2006. The air is cold and the night had been long. My flight to New York was canceled due to a last-minute engine failure, and as we of the flight-that-never-would-be queued up at the customer service desk, I realized I was standing right next to none other than John Elway. Destiny, it seems, was my lady.

When he sat down at the new gate, I took a seat beside him. I wanted to know what a man of his caliber did when he was idle. Count his laugh lines, maybe? Polish his Superbowl rings, perhaps?

What did happen was even odder: He began cutting out newspaper articles about himself. Mind you, this was back when Florida-based AutoNation declined to renew their contract with him, a partnership that had yielded 16 or so high-profile dealerships (John Elway AutoNations) across the Denver Metro area. As you might imagine, each of the two major papers were on the story like flies on a dead hooker. But why would he cut them out? Could the clippings be for his "Scrapbook of Failure" where he documented all his fumbled passes?

We may never know. What is certain, however, is that this activity left ole' Elway at least a little cantankerous, for when a pig-tailed fan asked for his autograph, he sneered, huffed (albeit signed her plane ticket), then quickly sloughed off her starry-eyed gaze and returned to hacking up his newspaper.

All the while I am thinking, maybe he his John freakin' Elway, but that is no way to treat a fan! So to remind him that he was a mere mortal despite his athletic prowess and wind-blown hair, I leaned over and asked, "hey, where is your private jet?" hoping that it would be like grinding a knuckle in his side.

"In the shop," he says (and with a much more congenial tone than he had used earlier, which I chocked up to my having tits).

"Ahhhh," I replied knowingly.

Then I took a deep breath, and he smelled of sea salt and pig skin.

Back to the future

Recreating iconic photographs may be the kiss of celebrity death. When the Mistress of Rehab, draped in sheer cloth and captured in various states of (familiar) repose, she bucked up Nymag.com's page views by 40 times, a testament to her popularity (or at least to that of her bare nipples). But, Lilo, look at what happened to your equally ambitious predecessor...



Just like the famous shoot from 2003, when Britney Spears mimicked Angie Dickinson's pantless pose for the cover of Esquire magazine, Brit-fans had little premonition that the bubblegum-pop bombshell was teetering in those 4-inch heels on the brink of mega-disaster. Within a year-and-a-half after the cover was published, Spears was hitched to Kevin Federline, knocked-up with their first child and the star of the eye-opening reality show, Chaotic.



One can only imagine what Britney is thinking now: "See you in hell, Lohan. See you in hell."

Times, they are a-changin'

They just don't make ex like they used to. According to a recent finding by the Office of Drug Control Policy, 55 percent of ecstasy seized in the U.S. last year was laced with meth, a ten percent increase from 2006. Back in my day, in college, ex was so clean that when you snorted it, it wouldn't make your nose bleed or your head go numb but 2 out of every 3 times. Now, we might as well just start calling it "mecstacy," much like "brunch" or "Brangelina," but more fun and way more popular.

Fidelo my hobo

World, you have been duped yet again. Despite reports, the ample-bearded leader of Cuba didn't resign today—no. That would be impossible because he has been living in the dollar-store-lined confines of Washington Heights, where I too reside. Just look at this picture that I took with my camera phone a few months ago.

Put that in your embargoed tobacco leaf and smoke it.

Barack Carbama

Photo courtesy of cocktails.org

The Barack Obama Drinking Game: for every state Barack wins, drink one Irish Car Bomb (a shot of Jameson and Bailey's mixed together, dropped in a half pint of Guinness).

I wish this had been my idea, but alas it wasn't. The credit goes to a Mr. Brett Goldberg of New York City, whose name I will shout to the heavens as I cry into my Carbama when Hilary goes down in a blaze of glory—though no doubt her hair will remain unfettered.

The Eloquent Mr. Cuomo

Chip East/Reuters

It was like a Gambino family reunion behind bars after police nabbed 80 mobsters, many of them higher-ups. Good thing jail cells don't have a weight limit. The sweeping arrests also provided Attorney General of New York, Andrew Cuomo (an Italian himself, mind you) with a platform for his prosaic verbiage:

“The message today is clear: organized crime still exists in the city and the state of New York. We like to think that it’s a vestige of the past. It’s not. It is as unrelenting as weeds that continue to sprout in the cracks of society."

And then he took a bow.

Jerome Kerviel, Sista B invites you to MySpace

Photo courtesy of telegraph.co.uk

As if having his mug plastered on the front page of every major newspaper in the world wasn't enough, shortly after "Rogue Trader" Jerome Kerviel was exposed as the mastermind behind a historical $7.2 billion fraud, he was shunned by all but one of his Facebook friends. No more poking or frivolous online network game-playing: the delinquent extortionist was out on that limb—or should be say lam—alone.

MySpace friends would never do that; they are true-blue-stuck-like-glue-loyal, and that is why I am officially extending an invitation to Monsieur Kerviel to be my MySpace friend #168.