I love this song.

‘The Namedropper’ – a new cartoon from a fabulous omelet maker/DJ/director/slacktivist….

dear Thrillist, jetblue, Las Vegas Tourism Board, Jamaica Tourism Board…

You can give me a free trip anytime. I do not have any media overlords to displease if I take a free trip to somewhere fun or exotic for a weekend.

I love massages and fruity cocktails with paper umbrellas. The smell of rum punch makes me swoon! Crunching sand between my toes is better than sex for me. And staying out all night on the Strip is my idea of heaven. Stop bothering with those freelancers who write for Newsweek and the Times. I’m your woman for a no-holds barred good time on your dime.

New York Times Travel Writer Broke These Travel Writer Rules With Junket [Gawker]

Ethics takes a holiday: Newsweek, New York Times writers in swag orgy [Daily Finance]

I tell myself if the people in this video knew they were going to be asked these questions, they would have read a newspaper or book.

Favorite answer regarding former President George H.W. Bush: ‘He’s from Texas, he’s gotta be right.’

But I bet everyone knows about Jon & Kate Gosselin!

Song of the Day – ‘Brandy’ The O’Jays

When the world becomes too much, why not curl up and listen to The O’Jays?

Song of the Day ‘Tonight is What It Means to Be Young’

Dancing for the desperate and brokenhearted.

Bonnie Lee of the Brooklyn Examiner really knows Brooklyn:

Boerum Hill: Beautiful-beautiful-beautiful. Good subway accessibility. A lively mix. Large African and Middle Eastern populations with their excellent food. Antiques shops. Smith Street’s restaurant row. One day when I have a real paying job, I will live here.

Cobble Hill: Popular and chic yet serene and tranquil. Great little gourmet food shops and clothing boutiques. Discount tickets at Cobble Hill Cinemas. Olives, nuts, and hummus from legendary Sahadi’s store.

Carroll Gardens: Old Italian men shootin’ the breeze outdoors all summer. Charming. Historic brownstones with actual gardens. Handmade pasta at Caputo’s. Bocce. Where I call home.

Red Hook: Though MTV based a Real World season in this neighborhood, I do not know anyone who lives here…yet. IKEA. Those ballpark vendors in the summer. Housing projects. No subways. Possible location of the teamsters’ sandwich shop mentioned in 30 Rock episode.

Williamsburg: Industrial. Hipsters. Artist types. Cash only. Gritty urbanism. Former garter, shoe, and candle factories converted into overpriced lofts. Dirty. According to sis, “where the ‘poor kids’ of Gossip Girl allegedly live with their artist dad.”

Greenpoint: Old Polish neighborhood. Mostly subway inaccessible. McCarren Park Pool and nostalgia for the summer concerts there (soon to open as an actual public pool).

Brooklyn Heights: Basically a Manhattan neighborhood that happens to be on the other side of the river. Brownstone mansions for yuppies who work on Wall Street and want to start a family. Waterfront promenade for fancy dog-walking and jogging in expensive stretchy clothes. $$$$.

DUMBO: Art galleries and workspaces. Yummy foods: Grimaldi’s pizza, River Café, Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory, Jacques Torres Chocolate. Views of bridges and skyline. According to sis, “where the loft of the ‘poor kids’ of Gossip Girl is actually located.” Which makes that show a total farce, told you.

Windsor Terrace and Kensington: No one knows where either is, even native New Yorkers. The few ungentrified (read: affordable, or, in the words of a white friend who lives there, “no white people”) areas left in Brooklyn that are still somewhat downtown Manhattan accessible.

Fort Greene: Brooklyn Flea market. Grand burgundy brownstones and uneven sidewalks. Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM). Home to writers Jhumpa Lahiri, Colson Whitehead, Amitav Ghosh, and Jennifer Egan, among others.

Clinton Hill: G train. Pratt Institute and its artsy students. Historic mansions that were accessible to Manhattan by stagecoach but not so much by subway. Still affordable without being crappy.

Park Slope: The yuppieland of Brooklyn after the internet-startup boom 10 years ago. All-terrain SUV-type strollers, moms in Burberry and Lululemon, and well-groomed purebreds take up the width of sidewalks.

Prospect Heights: A no-man’s land between Park Slope and whatever lays beyond. Connected by the dreaded Franklin Street Shuttle that everyone insists is not that bad.

Crown Heights: Blacks + Hasidic Jews + other = race riots.

Dyker Heights: Houses covered in crazy Christmas lights and decorations you see on TV every December.

Most of these neighborhood descriptions are shallow and lifestyle porny but the Crown Heights and Windsor Terrace descriptions are off the charts krazee.   I mean who would believe there is a neighborhood in New York City without white people?  And she makes Crown Heights sound like a war zone.

Note to Ms. Lee:  Go visit a few places before damning them with your insights gained with your fancy education.

This is who I want to be when I grow up…

UPDATE – An unemployed woman who has six children and then uses her disability…

UPDATE – Nadya Suleman turned down free nanny help because the agency offering it wouldn’t agree to being filmed for a reality show.  No kidding! From LAist:

You would think the single mom from Whittier who was told this week she might not even be able to take her newborn octuplets home without proving she could properly care for them would jump at the chance to have the help. But OctoMom turned them down. Why? It wouldn’t make them famous:

Attorney Gloria Allred, who represents the group, said Suleman spoke with Angels in Waiting founder Linda West-Conforti and seemed to be more interested in “capitalizing on her infants” and doing a reality television show.

The non-profit told Suleman that they couldn’t agree to working in stride with a camera crew because of the risk it posed to the babies’ health and their ability to do their work. Allred has filed a request with the L.A. County Department of Child and Family Services asking them to look into Suleman’s ability to assure all 14 of her children are cared for.

Delusional, selfish nutjob.  I hope the broke state of California gives her nothing.

payment to be impregnated for more children, resulting in eight babies being born and AGAIN SHE’S UNEMPLOYED IS A

FUCKING IDIOT.

I don’t care what race Nadya Suleman  is.  I don’t care about her socioeconomic class.  I don’t care if she had a tough childhood.   I don’t care if  she goes to church or not.  This woman has a very tenuous grasp on reality.  She really believes that she is able to market herself as a ‘baby expert’ now that she’s made this stupendously mindboggling  life decision.

WTF?

There is no kind of excuse for this kind of parental malpractice.     How do you decide to feed 15 mouths on a fixed income?  In the same way, a person who makes $40,000 a year believes that they can afford to purchase a $400,000 house with no money down is a moron.

There should be a backlash against her for being dumb.

And if I lived in California, I would be hella pissed if any of my tax dollars went to help this selfish, myopic example of humanity support her poor lifestyle choices.

I would rather give my money to the other nut of the week Michael Steele, okay?

Race, Religion & Responsibility: About The Backlash Against The Octupulets’ Mom [Jezebel.com]

as I sit here, sifting through receipts from 2008, I am reliving

purchases of crap I ate (confession: McDonald’s fries are my bête noire) and stuff  I put on my body. Looking at the money that flew out of my hands over the past 12 months makes me wonder if I can do a better job as a consumer  for ‘09.

Right now, I’m abstaining from caffeine and alcohol so that’s definitely saving me money.  I am proud to say that I didn’t give in to any ‘I’m so depressed about the economy’ shopping splurges.  My closet isn’t proud but I am.  I definitely don’t go out as much as I would like.  Even if an event is free, I still have to calculate subway costs (which may be shooting up later this year) and a taxi if I stay out past midnight. Great, now I must cop to being  poor AND dull.

I do take comfort that I didn’t have enough money to be Bernie Madoffed. But I also acknowledge that it is not the worst of times or the best of times — it’s just the blah of times.   I (and  guess many others) need some of that hope and change to be sprinkled in our personal lives.