Dishing out the dough

Apparently there is an organization called The Giving Back Fund that releases a list every year of the biggest celebrity givers. Good ol’ Oprah is at the top of their list this year with $50.2 million in givings-awayness. This is a nice big number. I whole-heartedly am a fan of people (including those with uber amounts of money) who donate to deserving charities and organizations. And by deserving this means I probably wouldn’t really have let Mel Gibson creep onto my list just because he gave $9.9 million to the church he is a member of in Malibu, the Holy Family Church. Granted, I could be totally wrong, but I’m guessing the ways in which this money were used wouldn’t all fall under what I believe in as ‘good things’. But I’m actually getting away from the point I wanted to make here. Let’s get to that…

James Todd Smith is the New LL Cool J

Or he’s the old LL Cool J, or LL Cool J has always been James Todd Smith. But whatever the case I am simply writing to express my appreciation for the Cool. As his appearance Wednesday night on Project Runway (sorry Suede, but you needed to go) showed us, the man is a fantastic looking fourty. Seriously. The man was born in 1968, or so the wiki tells me. I was a fan of his ‘Mama Said Knock You Out’ video back in 1991 (special attention to the Unplugged version) and it seems he’s calling a comeback now with strategic appearances on popular shows. Come on, appearing as a hip-hop mogul called Ridikolus on 30 Rock? Superb. The already mentioned Project Runway guest judge appearance. And, the highest achievement of coolness possible, appearing on the new season of Sesame Street. So yeah, props to the Cool. And does anyone else remember the movie Toys? He played the military minded cousin of Robin Williams’ character? He was the son of the bad uncle who took over the toy company? Anyone? Well, I was a huge fan of that movie. I suppose that’s all I’ve got to say. Yay LL. Take it away Elmo…

- suse

Get Out of Here America

So Good Morning America is doing a whistle stop tour where they’re visiting all 50 states and commenting on the state of the nation or whatever. Anyway, they stopped in the upstate NY town where my parents grew up and where I still have family – Rome, NY. Here is part of the video (uh, I guess wordpress doesn’t let you post videos from abcnews. ugh):

http://abcnews.go.com/video/playerIndex?id=5812243

Anyway, even though I think everything they said is true (it is kind of a shithole, in all honesty), residents are understandably kind of pissed because it showed them in such a negative and white-trash-ish light.  My mom emailed me a letter that the Chairman of the Board of the Rome Chamber of Commerce (whom my grandmother taught when he was in kindergarten, fyi!) wrote to the show:

Black holes and vintage wines!

Turns out particle accelerators aren’t just for (potentially) making black holes, you can also figure out the age of wine with them! Leave it to some fantastic French scientists to figure this one out. Turns out you can place a wine bottle in the path of the ion beams a particle accelerator produces and the glass wine bottle will then emit different x-rays dependent on its age. Brilliant! Does this mean that the LHC being the most powerful particle accelerator could give the most accurate readings? So if the people trying to stop the LHC (and these too, awesome) get their way, at least they’ll be something useful to have it do.

The LHC path

+

Old wine bottles

= French scientist’s wet dream

- suse

Full. Stop. Or, Insert Your Fav Euphemism Here.

It all comes back to Lady Problems.  Tina and Amy, telling us to “buy a hat and hold the f’on to it!”  Now that’s fashion advice you can use!

 

 

- Ferrrosha

No, you’re a flirg/flerg/flerge/flurg!!!

Upon rewatching the SNL Clinton+Palin skit I’ve come to the conclusion that the support given to the previous acronyms for FLIRG (see Our wish has come true!!!) doesn’t make grammatical sense.  Poehler says, “And don’t refer to me as A FLIRG/FLERG.”  So unless FLIRG is of the ‘First Lady I’d…..’ ilk, we can’t put it in the sentence.  I do like the urbandictionary definition for flerg of basically being a limp dick, and it would make grammatical sense. But then Poehler’s following line of googling “what it stands for” still makes me lean towards an acronym. Unfortunately, all the ‘First Lady I’d…..’ versions I’ve seen have been acknowledged to have only been invented in the last two days since the skit, so I can’t go with those. So for now I’ll say that the urbandictionary def is plausible. But until Tina Fey or Amy Poehler actually says something definitive, this Mythbuster won’t say confirmed.

And now for some great moments in Fey+Poehler history…

- suse

Our wish has come true!!!

And they mention dinosaurs!

- suse

P.S.  For all of you getting here through the ‘flirg’ tag, the most reliable or plausible things that I’ve seen are ‘First Lady Is Really Gay’ and ‘First Lady Is Really a Guy’.  Though I’ve also seen ‘First Lady I’d Rather Get elected’, but that’s not something Clinton/Poehler would want people to stop calling her.  Plus, where’s the ‘e’?

Liveblogging: Obama, McCain Shutdown Morningside

Hey Friends,

I’m here at Columbia’s historic Morningside campus observing the leadup to the possibly historical discussion between presidential hopefuls and senators (question: who’s watching the senate if everyone’s gone?) Barack Hussein Obama and John Sidney McCain III. Oh, and Bollinger will be there too. There’s a jumbotron set up for all of us peons who didn’t get in by lottery or birth rite. Currently blank, but the masses have begun to assemble and stare at the looming, blank screen. Sooooo many people have gathered, like, an appropriate number for a protest, if Columbia protested. I guess this is more of a power-elite flash mob. Anyways, a few blocks and shut down, many campus entrances, and both GED and ESL testing services have been canceled (you need a Columbia ID to get even close to the wrought-iron fence). So many metaphors for Americana here.

But, I’m hopeful that something magical will happen. I’m hoping that, since this is not meant to be a debate, that reason may co-exist with rhetoric. Especially today, when, collectively there is much to think about and discuss.

Ok, off to class. See you at the after party!

-Ferrrosha

Oh Oprah (sigh)

Living where I do it is quite often that we get articles about good ol’ Oprah Winfrey. This past week we were treated to another oh-Oprah-you-really-aren’t-doing-good-and-you-needed-someone-else-to-point-it-out-to-you story. Oprah has a 42 acre parcel out in Montecito that she christened ‘Promised Land’, no joke. Turns out since she bought the property in 2001 the water consumption of the property has more than doubled. So let’s do a little math! If Oprah is using 10.6 million gallons of water per year and an average family of four uses 146,000 to 511,000 gallons per year (depending on where they live and on which source of info you use) how many families could live at the Promised Land?

I get the west wing!

That’s right! 72 to 20 families could live with Oprah!

So yeah, Oprah is using enough water on her estate out in Montecito for 80 to 284 people to live off of. Keep in mind that using 511,000 gallons of water a year is the Palm Springs estimate, where they are using more water than they really need to be. So even 20 families living in excess could do just fine out at the Promised Land. Now even better (sorry, more math), Oprah has been out there since 2001, so that’s almost seven years of consumption now. Meaning a total usage of about 74 million gallons of water. That’s 37 million gallons that were available for others before she moved in.  Fantastic job Oprah!

But it gets better. Turns out that the area where Oprah’s estate is continuously uses more water than the district can provide. Meaning that in the last two years the district has bought additional state water. The cost this year of the extra water? $816,000! That’s right folks, this area of super and ridiculously wealthy people is not only consuming precious water willy-nilly, they are having the taxpayers of the area pay for their excess water use! Now granted, they are supplied by the Montecito Water District, but this covers Montecito AND Summerland. Median income for a family in Summerland: $64,700. Median income for a family in Montecito: $151,937. So while Summerland peeps aren’t super hurting for cash, they’re not exactly making the level of Montecitans. And it is the Montecitans who are using more water.  Good job well off people!

The Montecito water district has done a number of audits in their area, usually decreasing water consumption by 10-30% at each property. Big surprise, there doesn’t seem to be any damage to the plants! Apparently reps have continuously tried to get a hold of Oprah on this issue. They never got to talk to her or any of her representatives, but they think possibly their message got through, Promised Land’s water usage fell by 40% compared to last July’s usage. Maybe she’ll do a show on saving energy/water/money now that she’s gone through the experience and we can all give her a big pat on the back for being such a great citizen.

- suse

A Response to the GOP Jabs at Community Organizing

I thought I would give a shout out to a blog that has sprung up in response to the jabs Palin, Giuliani and Pataki took at community organizing the other night. I’m guessing some of you saw it or have heard about it by now, but it really just seemed strange. I would think that, in planning a speech, a politician might consider whether or not they are denigrating an entire profession and segment of the population. And on top of that, whether or not that segment of the population might have political influence or work with large numbers of people (like most community organizers do). But I guess this wasn’t considered.

http://organizersfightback.wordpress.com/