zEN mAN (observing an unprecidented and genuine display of respect and dare i say affection between a republican governor and a democratic US president.....in what could be described as show of true cooperation and what seems to be a "love fest" between heretofore enemies....but in the wake of a true disaster..."Sandy" ...the storm of the century....this is the "October surprise" and Mitt is throwing a "shit fit"...after all it was Chris Christie who delivered the keynote speech at RNC convention for the Romnesiac.....who would have thought that truth and integrity could come out of such a debacle...the storm and the presidential race)
Greg Sargent: Romney expands false Jeep-to-China ad campaign (Washington Post)
Mitt Romney's new television ad suggesting that the auto bailout will result in American jeep jobs getting shipped to China has been widely pilloried by news organizations, both nationally and in Ohio. The Romney campaign's response: It is expanding the ad campaign. … The Romney campaign has explicitly said in the past that it will not let fact checking constrain its messaging, so perhaps it's not surprising that it appears to be expanding an ad campaign based on a claim that has been widely pilloried by fact checkers.
Froma Harrop: The Romney Myth About Helping Detroit (Creators Syndicate)
Of Mitt Romney's many costume changes, the new Superman outfit portraying him as the would-be savior of the American auto industry wins for most imaginative. Understood: His infamous "Let Detroit Go Bankrupt" op-ed has proven a great inconvenience to winning votes in the industrial Midwest. But continually insisting that one didn't say what one said is severely not honest. Romney is the kind of politician you ask, "Trick or treat?" and he answers "both."
Mark Morford: All our splendid monuments (SF Gate)
Let's just say it outright - there is no better reminder - not death, not illness, not orgasm, not birth or marriage or divorce, not surgery or getting fired or going slightly mad on a cocktail of laudanum and cocaine and savage karmic dread - there is no better reminder that we know nothing, own nothing, and are powerless to do anything about it anyway, than the weather.
Donald Hall: THANK YOU, THANK YOU (New Yorker)
For better or worse, poetry is my life. After a reading, I enjoy the question period. On a tour in Nebraska I read poems to high-school kids, a big auditorium. When I finished, someone wanted to know how I got started. I said that at twelve I loved horror movies, then read Edgar Allan Poe, then… A young man up front waved his hand. I paused in my story. He asked, "Didn't you do it to pick up chicks?"
Some publishing industry pundits have poo-pooed B&N's U.K. entry as too little too late. I think the pundits are underestimating Barnes & Noble, and not just because they're flush with $300 million cash from a recent Microsoft investment.
M. Alice LeGrow: Entertainer vs. Parent (bizenghast.com)
I've had a lot of people write in to me because of this thread, and a disturbing number of people have ended their letters with, "I just know you'll make a wonderful parent someday!" Folks, there's a HUGE difference between being good with kids and being able to raise a kid.
David Bruce has 42 Kindle books on Amazon.com with 250 anecdotes in each book. Each book is $1, so for $42 you can buy 10,500 anecdotes. Search for "Funniest People," "Coolest People, "Most Interesting People," "Kindest People," "Religious Anecdotes," "Maximum Cool," and "Resist Psychic Death."
Harry Alonzo Longabaugh (1867 - possibly November 6, 1908), better known as the Sundance Kid, was an outlaw and member of Butch Cassidy's Wild Bunch, in the American Old West. Longabaugh likely met Butch Cassidy (real name Robert Leroy Parker) after Parker was released from prison around 1896. Together with the other members of "The Wild Bunch" gang, they performed the longest string of successful train and bank robberies in American history.
Source
Alan J was first, and correct, with:
Sundance Kid
Charlie wrote:
The Sundance Kid (I actually remembered this).
Adam answered:
The Sundance Kid.
Jim from CA, retired to ID, said:
Sundance Kid
Marian responded:
Sundance Kid
Sally, thanks to Sandy, is still without electricity.
Dale of Diamond Springs replied:
BttbBob said:
The Sundance Kid... and I did know that, straight out the gate...
Remember my high school 'steady' girlfriend, Melody, I spoke of yesterday? Yeah, she really did exist and she really was my 'steady'. That part was true. The other... well, you know... Anyway, I took her to see
at one of our local 'passion pits', the Star-lite Drive-in Theater, summer of '70. I was 'amped up' to see the flic being a 'Western Shoot 'em up' teenager and a Redford and Newman fan. Melody, the sweet thing, wasn't quite so, but was for other reasons. See, that sweet thing Melody was feeling rather amorous that beautiful summer's evening. How very nice that is. Except for one thing. I was enjoying the movie exceptionally and - Dagnabbit, girl! I'm watching the dagnab movie! Stop doin' that!... I remember, quite well, Melody not being very pleased. Underline not... That beautiful summer's evening ended kinda frostily with no good night kiss for me at her door, I'm tellin' ya... Ah, well. She got over it, by-and-by... and I got to see the movie.
SallyP update: Our E! pal got her phone back up and called me, but is still without power. Outage map icon says repair estimate indeterminate. She lost water pressure, but it has since returned. Not sure if it's safe to drink, but she has plenty of bottled H2O. The lady she sits the 'morning kids' for has a gas range and is keeping SP in warm soup and suchlike. SP is also socializing at their house playing 'Go Fish' with the kids while the school teacher mom tries to find something to do about the house and not go crazy. SP stated that she needed to hike to the store for more candles and is not ready yet to break into the one bottle of wine and one can of beer she has on hand. That's a good sign. Emergency rations, that. She does sound upbeat, albeit irked with no electricity, of course. She says to tell you all that she misses you...
MAM wrote:
Sundance Kid ~ Was an outlaw and member of Butch Cassidy's Wild Bunch, in the American Old West.
Randall responded:
Why, that'd be the Sundance Kid
"Raindrops keep fallin' on my head..."
And, Joe S answered:
Better known as the Sundance Kid. The Sundance Kid, his brother The Cisco Kid, along with Butch Cassidy and Butch's brother Hopalong formed the Wild Bunch created havoc all along the Old West. They were called the Wild Bunch because when they were robbing trains they would come up to the most scared guy who would be all weepy and shaky, and they would say, "Don't get your panties in a bunch." Then they would give him a wedgy and say, "Oh that's wild," and laugh and carry on. Then they would shoot him.
This is a true story. Paul Ryan told it to me. He seemed very sincere
I am so happy and grateful that our family in Baltimore is safe and sound. So close to the devastation and only suffered a little water in the basement. I hope our friend Sally is doing well.
This is a picture of my granddaughters and their big cousin ready to go Trick-or-Treating.
CBS begins the night with a FRESH'Undercover Boss', followed by a FRESH'CSI: The 3rd One', then a FRESH'Blue Bloods'.
Scheduled on a FRESHDave are Jason Sudeikis, Michael Che, and Ultraista.
Scheduled on a FRESHCraig are Michael Sheen and Ophira Eisenberg.
NBC starts the night with a FRESH'Sandy Telethon', followed by a FRESH'Grimm', then 'Dateline'.
Scheduled on a FRESHLeno are Marion Cotillard, Olate Dogs, and Third Day.
Scheduled on a FRESHJimmy Fallon are Christina Aguilera, Colin Quinn, Joshua Topolsky, and Joey Bada$$.
On a RERUNCarson 'The Scab' Daly (from 9/25/12) are Chris Hayes, Rob Delaney, and Regina Spektor.
ABC opens the night with a FRESH'Last Man Standing', followed by a FRESH'Malibu Country', then a FRESH'Shark Tank', followed by '20/20'.
Scheduled on a FRESHJimmy Kimmel are Kelly Ripa and Alicia Keys.
The CW offers a FRESH'America's Next Top Model', followed by a FRESH'Nikita'.
Faux has a FRESH'Kitchen Nightmares', followed by a FRESH'Fringe'.
MY has an old 'Monk', followed by another old 'Monk'.
AMC offers
[6:00PM] The Reaping
[8:00PM] House on Haunted Hill
[10:00PM] The Walking Dead (Walk With Me)
[11:00PM] Comic Book Men (Ghostbusting at the Stash)
[11:30PM] House on Haunted Hill (ALL TIMES EDT)
BBC -
[6:00AM] BBC WORLD NEWS
[7:00AM] BBC WORLD NEWS
[8:00AM] THE GRAHAM NORTON SHOW - Season 7 - Ep 6 - Andrew Lloyd Webber, Minnie Driver, Ruth Jones, Katie Melua
[9:00AM] MERLIN - Season 2 - Ep 10 - Sweet Dreams
[10:00AM] DOCTOR WHO - Season 6 - Ep 12 - Closing Time
[11:00AM] BATTLESTAR GALACTICA - Season 2 - Ep 6 - Home, Part 1
[12:00PM] RAMSAY'S KITCHEN NIGHTMARES US - Season 2 - Ep 6 - Hannah & Mason's
[1:00PM] RAMSAY'S KITCHEN NIGHTMARES UK - Season 1 - Ep 4 - Moore Place
[2:00PM] RAMSAY'S KITCHEN NIGHTMARES US - Season 2 - Ep 3 - Trobiano's
[3:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - Season 6 - Ep 24 - Second Chances
[4:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - Season 6 - Ep 25 - Timescape
[5:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - Season 6 - Ep 26 - Descent, Part 1
[6:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - Season 7 - Ep 1 - Descent, Part 2
[7:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - Season 7 - Ep 2 - Liaisons
[8:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - Season 7 - Ep 3 - Interface
[9:00PM] CONAN THE BARBARIAN
[11:30PM] CONAN THE BARBARIAN
[2:00AM] DOCTOR WHO: THE CHRISTMAS INVASION
[3:00AM] DOCTOR WHO - Season 2 - Ep 1 - New Earth
[4:00AM] DOCTOR WHO - SEASON 2 - Season 2 - Ep 2 - Tooth and Claw
[5:00AM] DOCTOR WHO - SEASON 2 - Season 2 - Ep 3 - School Reunion (ALL TIMES EDT)
Bravo has the movie 'The Mummy Returns', followed by the movie 'The Scorpion King'.
Comedy Central has last night's 'Colbert Report', last night's 'Jon Stewart', 'Tosh.0', another 'Tosh.0', 'Key & Peele', 'Tosh.0', 'South Park', and 'Brickleberry'.
FX has the movie 'The Karate Kid', followed by a FRESH'The Ultimate Fighter'.
IFC -
[6:00AM] Whitest Kids U'Know
[6:15AM] Paintball
[8:15AM] The Broken
[10:15AM] Dark Mirror
[12:00PM] Paintball
[2:00PM] The Broken
[4:00PM] Dark Mirror
[5:45PM] Exorcismus
[8:00PM] Strangeland
[9:45PM] Teeth
[11:45PM] Strangeland
[1:30AM] Perkins' 14
[3:30AM] Monty Python: Almost the Truth (The Lawyer's Cut)-The Not-So-Interesting Beginnings
[4:45AM] Whitest Kids U'Know
[5:00AM] The Larry Sanders Show-The Flirt Episode
[5:30AM] Comedy Bang! Bang!-Amy Poehler Wears a Black Jacket & Grey Pants (ALL TIMES EDT)
Sundance -
[6:00A] MY SO-CALLED LIFE - Dancing in the Dark (Episode 2, Season 1)
[7:00A] ICONOCLASTS - Seth MacFarlane + Norah Jones (Episode 3, Season 6)
[7:30A] Disengagement
[9:30A] Dopamine
[11:00A] Man in the Chair
[1:00P] Disengagement
[3:00P] Dopamine
[4:30P] Brief Interviews With Hideous Men
[6:00P] ALL ON THE LINE WITH JOE ZEE - Ina Soltani (Episode 7, Season 3)
[7:00P] ALL ON THE LINE WITH JOE ZEE - Nicole Richie (Episode 8, Season 3)
[8:00P] The Darjeeling Limited
[9:30P] The Crucible
[11:45P] INDIE SEX: Censored
[1:15A] Love and Other Catastrophes
[2:45A] The Crucible
[5:00A] THE DAY BEFORE - Proenza Schouler (Season 1, Episode 2) (ALL TIMES EDT)
SyFy has the movie 'Lake Placid: The Final Chapter', followed by a FRESH'WWE Steroid SmackDown!', then a FRESH'Haven'.
Singer Rihanna poses after being symbolically crowned queen of the West Hollywood Halloween Carnaval in West Hollywood, California October 31, 2012.
Photo by Mario Anzuoni
Sandy Telethon Tonight - Bravo, CNBC, E!, G4, MSNBC, Style, Syfy and USA
NBC Universal
New Jersey natives Bruce Springsteen and Jon Bon Jovi will join Sting and other top music stars on Friday for a special television benefit concert on NBC to aid victims of Sandy, the giant storm which killed scores and devastated large sections of the U.S. Northeast, the network announced on Thursday.
The commercial-free one-hour telecast, "Hurricane Sandy: Coming Together," will air on Friday night at 8 p.m. EDT, and will include appearances by Christina Aguilera, Billy Joel, Jimmy Fallon and NBC News anchor Brian Williams.
The telethon, also to be shown on NBC Universal networks Bravo, CNBC, E!, G4, MSNBC, Style, Syfy and USA and live streamed on NBC.com, will benefit the American Red Cross, with proceeds going towards victims of Hurricane Sandy.
"Today" show anchor Matt Lauer, who announced the concert on air on Thursday, will host. Donors can also text the word REDCROSS to 90999 to make a $10 contribution.
George Lucas plans to put a sizable portion of his windfall from the $4 billion sale of his Lucasfilm to Disney into a foundation supporting education, Lucasfilm said in a statement Wednesday.
Lucas is currently the chairman of Edutopia, part of the George Lucas Educational Foundation. Lucas could put money into the foundation or create a new foundation funded from the sale. In 2006, the George Lucas Educational Foundation donated $175 million to the filmmaker's alma mater USC.
In 2010, Lucas signed the Warren Buffet and Bill Gates Giving Pledge, which commits participants "to giving the majority of their wealth to the philanthropic causes and charitable organizations of their choice either during their lifetime or after their death."
"I am dedicating the majority of my wealth to improving education. It is the key to the survival of the human race. We have to plan for our collective future - and the first step begins with the social, emotional and intellectual tools we provide to our children. As humans, our greatest tool for survival is our ability to think and to adapt - as educators, storytellers and communicators our responsibility is to continue to do so."
Legendary comic creator Stan Lee appears at the Savannah College of Art and Design while visiting the college to critique some of the work by graduate and undergraduate students in the sequential art in Savannah, Georgia, on Wednesday, October 31, 2012. Lee, the 89-year old co-creator of Spiderman dropped in on the school after being honored by SCAD Savannah Film Festival.
Photo by Stephen Morton
Aunt Rosemary was not George
Clooney's only famous relative. You can add a certain Civil War
American president to the Oscar-winning actor's family tree.
Politics has apparently run in the activist actor's blood
for centuries, as website Ancestry.com on Thursday revealed that
the "Ocean's 11" star is distantly related to President Abraham
Lincoln.
According to Ancestry.com, Clooney is the half-first cousin
five times removed from Lincoln, the 16th president. The
genealogy website breaks down the connection, explaining the
"half" means that two of their ancestors were half-siblings -
Lincoln's mother Nancy Hanks was the half-sister of Clooney's
4th great-grandmother Mary Ann Sparrow.
Hanks and Sparrow shared the same mother, Lucy Hanks, but
had different fathers. Lucy Hanks was Lincoln's maternal
grandmother as well as the 5th great-grandmother of Clooney.
Clooney's aunt was singer and actress Rosemary Clooney, who
died in 2002.
Jodie Foster is adding a new trophy to her collection - a lifetime-achievement honor at the Golden Globes.
The Hollywood Foreign Press Association announced Thursday that Foster will receive the group's Cecil B. DeMille Award at the 70th annual Globes ceremony on Jan. 13.
Foster, 49, is a two-time Globes and Academy Award winner. She was honored with leading actress trophies at both ceremonies for 1991's "The Silence of the Lambs" and 1988's "The Accused," which she won in a three-way tie at the Globes with Sigourney Weaver for "Gorillas in the Mist" and Shirley MacLaine for "Madame Sousatzka."
DeMille Award winners are chosen by the board of directors for the foreign press group. It includes about 90 reporters who cover Hollywood for overseas outlets.
It's not clear whether Sean Penn knew ahead of his visit to Bolivia of the missions he'd be asked to assume by President Evo Morales.
Cabinet chief Juan Ramon Quintana told reporters after Tuesday's meeting that Morales asked the Oscar-winning actor to defend the chewing of coca leaf before the United Nations, lobby Chile to restore Bolivia's long-lost access to the Pacific Ocean and help persuade the United States to extradite a former Bolivian president.
Penn is already a goodwill ambassador for Haiti, where he has won respect for his post-earthquake charity work.
Penn later showed up for the start of a soccer match with Morales.
People walk past lanterns depicting the Joseon Dynasty period (1392-1910) on the eve of the Seoul Lantern Festival 2012 at Cheonggyecheon in central Seoul November 1, 2012.
Photo by Kim Hong-Ji
A Minnesota casino says legendary country singer George Jones is ill and has canceled a concert scheduled this week.
Jones was scheduled to perform Friday at the Shooting Star Casino, Hotel and Event Center in Mahnomen (muh-NOH'-min). That concert had been rescheduled from April, when Jones needed more time to recover from an upper respiratory infection.
Shooting Star released a statement from Jones' management team, saying the 81-year-old singer has gotten a virus and is being treated by doctors.
Shooting Star says there are no plans to reschedule the performance. Ticket-buyers will receive a refund.
The child abuse scandal consuming the legacy of the late entertainer Jimmy Savile netted its second celebrity arrest Thursday as police swooped in on British comedian Freddie Starr, media reported. Executors of Savile's estate also said they were freezing his assets, clearing the way for a host of potential lawsuits.
Scotland Yard said in a statement released late Thursday that a man in his 60s from the English county of Warwickshire had been taken into custody on suspicion of sexual assault. It didn't name the suspect, but nearly all major British media outlets identified the man as Starr, who is in his 60s and lives in the village of Studley, in Warwickshire.
A phone number for Starr - a 1970s variety show favorite known for his good looks and roguish humor - could not immediately be located. Police refused to answer any questions about the arrest, but the development had been widely anticipated. Starr himself volunteered to speak to detectives after being accused of having groped the woman whose claims are at the center of Savile scandal.
Starr stands accused by Karin Ward, who says she was 14 when the comedian "had a very bad attack of wandering hands" when the pair were backstage at a television show hosted by Savile in the 1970s. Ward's claims have received particular attention because she was the first alleged victim of Savile to speak publicly about her ordeal. Her allegations helped touch off an avalanche of sex abuse claims against the eccentric BBC star, resulting in a massive scandal which has pulverized Savile's reputation, rocked the BBC, and horrified Britons.
A woman stands near the grave of a relative at Santa Maria Atzompa cemetery during the Day of the Dead in the Mexican state of Oaxaca November 1, 2012.
Geraldo Rivera slammed the politicization of the attack in Benghazi, firing off a series of tweets while hunkered down at home in Edgewater, N.J., during Hurricane Sandy. Rivera, the Fox News contributor and "Geraldo at Large" host, criticized the controversy being pushed by some conservatives.
It's "clear no C130 gunships were available," Rivera tweeted. "Criticize coverup [but] saying White House watched [and] did nothing to help is a lie."
Rivera called the "GOP bloodlust" surrounding the Obama administration's handling of Libya "insincere," "desperate" and reminiscent of the political firestorm surrounding the "Fast and Furious" gun-walking scandal that rocked the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in 2011.
To suggest the four U.S. consulate workers killed in Benghazi "could have been saved," Rivera added, is a "cruel myth."
Amy Winehouse's charity says two of the late singer's dresses - including her wedding dress - are missing and believed stolen from her former London home.
The Amy Winehouse Foundation said Thursday the dress Winehouse wore for her 2006 Miami wedding to Blake Fielder-Civil and a newsprint cocktail dress she wore during a British TV appearance are both missing. The presumed theft was discovered during an inventory.
The wedding dress was to have been auctioned off for the charity, established to help young people overcome addiction.
The singer's father, Mitch Winehouse, told the Evening Standard it was "sickening that someone would steal something in the knowledge of its sentimental value."
Children play beneath a giant kite in the Khayelitsha township near Cape Town November 1, 2012. The event is part of the annual Cape Town International Kite Festival which takes place this weekend.
Photo by Mike Hutchings
A controversial Virginia marketing and polling firm appears to have used a legal loophole to bombard scores of Americans with unsolicited text messages berating President Barack Obama less than a week before Election Day.
More than a dozen different messages landed on the screens of phone users late on Tuesday, originating from mysterious websites instead of phone numbers. They attacked Obama and Democrats on a variety of issues such as abortion, foreign policy, same-sex marriage and taxation.
The domain names of those websites had been registered with GoDaddy.com through a firm that masks original owners.
On Wednesday, Reuters compiled a list of at least nine websites gathered from reporters who received the political text messages. A review of websites that track domain name registrations revealed that three of the nine websites that sent the messages were registered by Jason Flanary. Those sites had been suspended for spam and abuse.
An email for Jason Flanary indicated he works for ccAdvertising, a division of FreeEats.com Inc. Neither Flanary or the firm returned requests for comment. Based in Centreville, Virginia, ccAdvertising is a firm that has represented Republican candidates. It has been fined, sued and pursued for aggressive political pushes that state authorities and private parties have argued violate laws against robo-calls and other types of automated phone contact.
In the final days of the campaign in Ohio, the stops have been pulled out in the scramble to eke out a win. And that means one super PAC calling on African Americans to vote against President Obama because Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves.
Cable viewers in several markets across the state are being treated to ads by an obscure self-described "alternative conservative" super PAC called the Empower Citizens Network. One of the group's ads accuses Obama and Democrats of imploding the economy by forcing mortgage companies to lend to "unqualified borrowers" while the Soviet national anthem plays. Another promises welfare recipients that "Republicans can save your money source" by reducing regulations on business.
Details on Empower Citizens Network are sketchy. It was formed in June, according to its FEC filing, but its quarterly filings in July and October showed the group had neither raised nor spent any money. FEC filings made by the group last week show it spending about $98,000 on campaign advertising in Ohio, mostly for newspaper ads.
Documents filed by the group with Time Warner Cable in Ohio identified Akron-area financial planner Bob Warther as the point of contact for Empower Citizens Network. Warther is listed as the group's treasurer in FEC filings (although it is spelled "Walther" in one letter to the FEC that he signed). Warther's office referred questions about the super PAC to Lance Davis at Akron-based Universal Marketing Industries. Davis did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Models present creations by Chinese designer Xu Ming for a haute couture collection at China Fashion Week in Beijing November 1, 2012.
Photo by Jason Lee
A once-prominent Northern California child psychiatrist is set to be retried on charges that he molested patients after a judge sided with prosecutors who argued that he fooled mental health experts into believing he had dementia to avoid prosecution.
San Mateo County Superior Court Judge John Grandsaert set a March 2013 trial date for William Ayres, 80, on Wednesday.
Ayres was tried in 2009 on charges that he molested several young boys under his care, but a jury couldn't reach a verdict. He was accused of using physical exams that included the genitals as a cover for the abuse.
The psychologist, John McIlnay, said Ayres was able to perform tasks that would be difficult for someone with dementia, including spelling "Alzheimer's" for the nurse filling out his admissions form and recognizing and greeting a fellow psychiatrist he hadn't seen in more than a year.
Ayres is the former president of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. His patients were a mix of private clients from wealthy families who were referred by their pediatricians and troubled juvenile delinquents ordered to undergo therapy by the courts.
The Playboy club is coming to India -- but with "bunnies" in non-revealing outfits.
"The costumes of the bunnies, who are integral to the Playboy culture, will be based on Indian sensibilities and morals," Sanjay Gupta, CEO of PB Lifestyle, which is bringing the brand to India through a licensing agreement, told Reuters.
India has strict censorship laws and there is no Indian version of Playboy, the magazine launched by Hugh Hefner that became as known for its pictures of naked women as for the hedonistic lifestyle propagated by its founder.
Playboy bunnies, or waitresses, typically wear black satin bodices, bow ties, cuffs and bunny ears. PB Lifestyle has not yet decided what waitresses will wear in India, a socially conservative country where it is frowned upon for couples to hold hands in public.
"Our clubs will not have any nudity. So there should not be any problem and we are prepared to deal with it if there is any," said Gupta, whose media and real estate company signed a 30-year licensing agreement with U.S.-based Playboy Enterprises Inc.
A nude man carries a sign at Civic Center Plaza in San Francisco, California October 30, 2012. Nudists converged on City Hall to protest city Supervisor Scott Wiener's proposal to restrict public nudity.
Photo by Robert Galbraith
The desk where Bram Stoker
wrote his famed 1897 book "Dracula" is going up for auction next
month after having been restored and turned into a work of art,
auction company Profiles in History said on Wednesday.
The desk, which will be auctioned off by the California
company on December 15 and 16, has had a long history, which,
over the past century, has left it battered, with missing
drawers and legs sawn short.
The Irish-born Stoker, who died in 1912, initially gave the
desk to his friend J.S.R. Phillips. The current owner
commissioned British-based furniture maker and designer Mark
Brazier-Jones to preserve the desk, but also make it a
stand-alone art piece, the auction house said.
Brazier-Jones said in a statement that he wanted to preserve
the desk's scars and textures, but also pay homage to the man
who introduced the vampire Count Dracula to today's pop culture.
His improvements include embroidered imagery "appropriate to
the great man's inspirations and imagining," including bats, a
savage hound and scrolling rose thorns and buds. Brazier-Jones
also lined with leather two secret compartments which will only
be revealed to the new owner of the desk.
The company expects the desk, along with a matching
candelabra designed and crafted by Brazier-Jones, to sell for
somewhere between $60,000 and $80,000.
The Top 20 Concert Tours ranks artists by average box office gross per city and includes the average ticket price for shows in North America. The previous week's ranking is in parentheses. The list is based on data provided to the trade publication Pollstar by concert promoters and venue managers.
1. (1) Madonna; $5,128,536; $165.55.
2. (2) Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band; $4,117,638; $93.78.
3. (4) Justin Bieber; $1,176,505; $76.92.
4. (6) "Gigantes Tour" / Marc Anthony / Marco Antonio Solis / Chayanne; $1,042,502; $106.99.
5. (5) Enrique Iglesias / Jennifer Lopez; $944,501; $79.44.
6. (New) Red Hot Chili Peppers; $803,805; $53.58.
7. (7) Jason Aldean; $721,826; $39.16.
8. (8) "Honda Civic Tour" / Linkin Park; $702,819; $49.66.
9. (9) Zac Brown Band; $679,857; $41.43.
10. (10) Brad Paisley; $611,368; $42.47.
11. (12) Rascal Flatts; $554,491; $37.86.
12. (13) Journey; $519,393; $58.17.
13. (14) Def Leppard / Poison; $496,116; $63.15.
14. (15) Carrie Underwood; $489,821; $59.42.
15. (16) Wiz Khalifa / Mac Miller; $417,999; $28.33.
16. (17) Mumford & Sons; $415,747; $45.39.
17. (18) Florence & The Machine; $400,726; $46.14.
18. (19) "Vans Warped Tour"; $344,045; $27.06.
19. (20) Il Divo; $342,257; $91.45.
20. (21) Sugarland; $326,193; $48.40.
Yanna, an eight-year-old lion-tailed macaque (top), holds her three-week-old baby in their enclosure at the Ramat Gan Safari park, an open-air zoo near Tel Aviv October 31, 2012.
Photo by Nir Elias
You have reached the Home page of BartCop Entertainment.
Make yourself home, take your shoes off...
Go ahead, scratch it if it itches.
The idea is to have fun.
Do you have something to say?
Anything that increased your blood pressure, or, even better, amused or entertained?
Do you have a great album no one's heard?
How about a favorite TV show, movie, book, play, cartoon, or legal amusement?
A popular artist that just plain pisses you off?
A box set the whole world should own?
Vile, filthy rumors about Republican hypocrites?
Just plain vile, filthy rumors?
said:
wrote:
answered:
