Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Suze Orman: Plan to Take Action in 2009 (huffingtonpost.com)
I am sorry to say that it is foolish to think that a stimulus package will be an insta-cure. I think it is wiser to to keep in mind that it is going to take years to make this all right.
TOM PETRUNO: Investing for hard times, not The End (latimes.com)
This is not the way the financial Armageddonites wanted to start the year. A global stock market rally? Don't people know that an economic collapse is coming?
Patricia Zohn: Getting Creative in '09 (huffingtonpost.com)
Artists and arts institutions live from hand to mouth most of the time, alas; they are scrappy and resourceful, generally uncomplaining and used to being valued less than bureaucrats, bankers or engineers.
Behold! The Jewish Jesus (guardian.co.uk)
It's time Christians faced up to the fact that Jesus was Jewish to the core, writes Howard Jacobs.
Mario Batali: "Loyal Blue Issiminger: The Greatest Teacher Of My Life" (huffingtonpost.com)
I sat down in my first class at my new high school in Madrid, Spain. I looked around wondering as the 10th grade watched in fear, perplexed and nervously laughing while Loyal Issiminger led me down the path of hellfire and brimstone into early American literature.
JOEL STEIN: Nut allergies -- a Yuppie invention (latimes.com)
Some kids really do have food allergies. But most just have bad reactions to their parents' mass hysteria.
Geoff Carter: Evaluating Leonard Cohen's 16-Year-Old Prediction (Las Vegas Weekly)
Cohen's "The Future" celebrated its 16th birthday on November 24. And though it's not entirely fair to judge how accurately Cohen predicted the spirit of our age -- for all its prognostications, the song is really about the Cohen's fear of present-day America -- it's almost eerie how much of it he got right.
20 Questions: Girl Talk (popmatters.com)
Q: The best piece of advice you actually followed?
A: When the question arises with Mutt Williams about whether it'll be OK to fix motorcycles for the rest of his life in the movie "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull," Indiana replies "Not if you love it - and don't ever let anyone tell you otherwise."
Chris Ziegl: Home Is Where The Sun Is (lacitybeat.com)
Brian Wilson, survivor.
Greg Kot: "Ron Asheton: The godfather of punk guitar" (Chicago Tribune)
The godfather of punk guitar, Ron Asheton of the Stooges, was found dead Tuesday in his Ann Arbor, Mich., home.
Rick Bentley: Simon Cowell isn't sure that 'American Idol' needs to add another judge (McClatchy Newspapers)
Simon Cowell's philosophy about television production is not to tinker with something that's working.
Robert Kahn: Fast chat with Martha Plimpton, starring in 'Pal Joey' on Broadway (Newsday)
When last we saw Martha Plimpton on Broadway, she was romancing a Russian revolutionary in "The Coast of Utopia." Now, she's making her musical theater debut as sexy chorus girl Gladys Bumps in Rodgers & Hart's "Pal Joey."
The Weekly Poll
Break Time
I'm gonna take a break for a week or two to catch up from the holidays and focus on some personal affairs (mainly relocation closer to my immediate family).
I'll be back soon, I assure you!... Meanwhile, don't let the bastards get ya down!
BadToTheBoneBob ( BCEpoll 'at' aol.com )
Charlie replied:
And, MAM 
responded:
Reader Comment
Alaska
Alaska has become the punch-line to a cosmic joke...
The state I love and call home has deteriorated to an obscene epithet.....I am broken hearted.
This just in....sigh!
Vic in AK
Thanks, Vic!
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Sunny and 70°
The Golden Globes is the only televised show-business-related award show where liquor is freely and readily available for the guests.
Swag And Stuff
Golden Globes
Nothing gets stars in the mood for a big awards show like piles of swag. And despite the slumping economy, the getting was good at gift suites around town.
Stars who visited the DPA gifting lounge at Beverly Hills' Peninsula Hotel - including Golden Globe nominees Blair Underwood and Melissa George - could collect Jil Sander sunglasses, a six-day Tahitian getaway, fine jewelry, handbags and designer dog collars. They could also get pampered with treatments such as eyelash extensions, facials, massages and foot reflexology.
Down the street at Kari Feinstein's Style Suite in West Hollywood, guests perused three floors packed with goodies to eat, drink, wear or apply to skin and hair.
Wendi's Fine English Toffee and Nothing Bundt Cakes provided a sugar kick, and Little Black Dress wines and Glowelle antioxidant beauty drinks offered liquid refreshment while guests including Jessica Alba, Chris "Ludacris" Bridges and Golden Globe nominee Debra Messing stocked up on swag.
Golden Globes
GOP's Top Public Enemy
Al Franken
With only a longshot court appeal standing in the way of Democrat Al Franken's election to the Senate, Republicans are gritting their teeth and bracing for the arrival of a new senator whose every utterance will sound like nails on a chalkboard to them.
While Sen. Norm Coleman (R-Minn.) has filed suit to contest the results of a disputed recount process that turned his narrow lead into a 225-vote deficit, his likely defeat stands to turn Franken, the polarizing former "Saturday Night Live" writer, into the senator who launched a thousand direct mail fundraising appeals.
"I don't know if we've ever had an opponent who is so disliked by Republicans as Al Franken," said Minnesota Republican Party Chair Ron Carey, who cautioned that Coleman's election challenge could still turn the results back his way. "It's one thing to lose to an honorable opponent, but Al Franken is not considered an honorable opponent by Minnesota Republicans."
Republicans outside Minnesota are equally apoplectic when it comes to Franken. Prominent conservative OxyContin and sex-tourism enthusiast Rush Limbaugh, who Franken mocked in the title of one of his books, has already hypocritically jabbed Franken on his Ridex-funded radio show, telling listeners in December that Franken "won't quit [the Senate race] because he doesn't know how to get a real job…He's a pathetic figure."
Al Franken
Coming Around Again
3D
Television makers are scrambling this year to lay the groundwork for 3-D TV, hoping viewers will be able to reach out and touch their movies as soon as 2010, when the global economy may begin to recover.
Now that flat-panel TVs -- once the belles of the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas -- have become de-rigueur in many homes around the globe, the world's top TV manufacturers are searching for the next big idea to spark consumer demand.
At this year's show, several displayed and discussed advances in three-dimensional, high-definition (HD) TV in the home, led by Panasonic, which says it is trying to have the framework of an industry-wide standard completed this year.
Their selling point: bringing the in-your-face, out-of-the-screen immediacy of 3-D pioneering movies such as "Jaws 3D" directly into the living room.
3D
Sales Brisk Despite Economy
Spoleto
The Spoleto Festival USA in Charleston reports brisk initial ticket sales, despite a troubled economy.
Tickets went on sale this week, and in the first five days, $160,000 worth of tickets sold. That's 17 percent more than the same period in 2006 when Spoleto set a box-office record.
Festival General Director Nigel Redden said Friday the festival has a long way to go but the early momentum is reassuring.
Highlights include a new production of the seldom-staged opera "Louise." The festival also features tributes to longtime chamber music director Charles Wadsworth and an operetta inspired by movie actor Peter Lorre.
Spoleto
Judge Rejects Bid
Roman Polanski
A judge on Friday rejected a motion by Roman Polanski's lawyer to disqualify all judges in Los Angeles County from hearing a bid to dismiss the director's rape case because of bias.
Superior Court Judge Peter Espinoza said the county had 600 judges and that only in extremely rare instances could it be possible to find no judge qualified to preside over the matter. He also said he was not biased against or in favor of Polanski, whose lawyers were seeking to dismiss a conviction in the rape of a 13-year-old girl in Los Angeles.
Espinoza also said in the ruling Friday that the court's public information officer had been correct to suggest Polanski had to be present in court for his motion to be heard. The officer, Allan Parachini, was not named in the ruling but had been singled out in a filing by Polanski attorney Chad Hummel.
Espinoza reminded attorneys that his ruling on the question of disqualification cannot be appealed. But he said a mechanism called a writ of mandate allows them to seek a review by a state appeals court within 10 days.
Roman Polanski
Hands Over Culture Title
Liverpool
Liverpool staged a giant fireworks display on Saturday to bring down the curtain on its 12-month reign as European Capital of Culture.
A crowd of around 35,000 gathered to watch the pyrotechnics over the River Mersey in the northwest port city and the ceremony to officially hand over the hand over the Capital of Culture mantle to Linz in Austria.
A total of 7,000 events featuring more than 10,000 artists were staged across Liverpool and the surrounding area, while millions of pounds have been poured into new building projects.
The creative director of the year's events, TV producer and scriptwriter Phil Redmond, said they had "changed perceptions of the city" which was blighted by unemployment and economic decline in the 1980s.
Liverpool
Bikers With Fruit Shell Helmets
Nigeria
Police in Nigeria have arrested scores of motorcycle taxi riders with dried fruit shells, paint pots or pieces of rubber tyre tied to their heads with string to avoid a new law requiring them to wear helmets.
The regulations have caused chaos around Africa's most populous nation, with motorcyclists complaining helmets are too expensive and some passengers refusing to wear them fearing they will catch skin disease or be put under a black magic spell.
The law, which came into force on January 1, pits two factions equally feared by the common motorist against one another: erratic motorcycle taxis known as "Okadas," whose owners are notorious for road-rage, and the bribe-hungry traffic police.
Construction workers have set up a lucrative trade renting out their safety helmets for around 500 naira (2.42 pounds) a day.
Nigeria
Only For Special Events
Eternal Flame
An "eternal" flame at Bullhead City's new veterans memorial park that only lasted until city officials received a $961 gas bill has been re-lit following complaints by veterans groups.
The Medal of Honor Memorial at the Arizona Veterans Memorial Park alongside the Colorado River was lit on Veterans Day in November. When the bill arrived in late December, city officials were stunned.
"It caught us by surprise," City Manager Tim Ernster said Thursday. "What we decided to do for the time being is to turn the flame on ... for special events, for Veterans Day, Fourth of July, Memorial Day - those types of activities."
The flame was extinguished on Monday. The Mohave Valley Daily News published a story Friday quoting city officials and disgruntled veterans who had worked to pay for and build the memorial before turning it over to the city.
Eternal Flame
Authorized Sequel
Winnie-the-Pooh
Publishers in Britain and the United States said Friday they will publish a new book of Winnie-the-Pooh adventures on Oct. 5. "Return to the Hundred Acre Wood" is the first authorized sequel to A. A. Milne's Pooh stories, which were first published in the 1920s.
It will be published in Britain by Egmont Publishing and in the U.S. by Penguin imprint Dutton Children's Books, they said in statements.
The new book is written by novelist and playwright David Benedictus, who has adapted several Pooh stories for audio CD, and illustrated by British artist Mark Burgess.
The publishers would not disclose details of the sequel's plot, but Benedictus said he hoped his book would "both complement and maintain Milne's idea that whatever happens, a little boy and his bear will always be playing."
Winnie-the-Pooh
| CURRENT MOON lunar phases |
