Playing with "Lost"

Do you want Kate in your cubicle with you? Jack? Soon you can. Action figures based on characters from TV's "Lost" will be released this fall, though you may place an order now if you want.

The initial batch of six figures consists of Jack, Kate, Hurley, Locke, Charlie and Shannon (even though she was killed off this season). No, no Sawyer or Sayyid yet.

Oh yeah, the show's two-hour season finale is tonight. This Newsweek article takes us behind the scenes of the episode.

Evil Androids retooled

Our friends at Evil Androids have revamped the sci-fi site. The redesign brings in comment areas and other blog-like functions while maintaining some of the permanent fixtures of the site.

LISTS: Cover songs BETTER than the original

• Straight Outta Compton - Nina Gordon. It's easy to dismiss this as just pretty-white-girl-sings-violent-ghetto-rap-song. 'Cause that's what this is. But it's nice to be able to hear the lyrics.


• Take Me to the River - Talking Heads. More of a recontextualization than a cover, really. Intentional or not, you can't help hearing this in the context of Byrne's early repressed-white-preppy-Norman-Bates persona, making you wonder what the singer plans to do once the object of his obsession has, indeed, taken him to the river.


• My Favorite Things - John Coltrane. I'd rather hear metal shards dragged across a chalk board than hear the Julie Andrews version ever again, so it doesn't take much to eke out a victory here. But JC really sewed a silk purse out of a sow's ear with this one.


• Tainted Love - Soft Cell


• I Fought the Law - the Clash


• Time is On My Side - Rolling Stones


• Twist and Shout - los Beatles. The previous four entries are so perfect, I think many people may not be aware that they are covers.


• Nothing Compares 2 U - Sinead O'Connor. She should have fixed the spelling while she was at it, but the distaff Lex Luthor wrenches every ounce of emotion out of this song.


• All Along The Watchtower - Jimi Hendrix. Jimi wasn't a great crooner, but his competition on this one is only old Bobby Z. And Stratocaster es mas macho than harmonica.


• Smells Like Teen Spirit - Ragnar Bjarnason. I'm not fooling around, this version is one of the few songs that always brings me joy, no matter what. The other? The Commodore's Brick House.


• Jump - Aztec Camera. I seem to remember reading that the lead singer of Aztec Camera did their slowed-down tribute of this song because he thought Van Heplin was making some sort of stand against a corrupt industry with the line "Can't you see me standing here, I've got my back against the record machine," not realizing that Diamond Dave was simply referring to a juke box.


• Dear God - Sarah McLaughlin. This one's iffy, only because both versions of this song are so good -- Ms. M. actually gives a more impassioned vocal performance, but maybe has a bit too much polish; and it's hard to compete with the chilling kid singer on the open and close of XTC's version. A push.

LISTS: Five least credible Fox News analysts

A look at some of the frequent guests on "The O'Reilly Factor," "Hannity and Colmes" and other Fox News shows.

5. GERALDO RIVERA
He will say or do anything that promotes himself, and sometimes his head seems as empty as Al Capone's vault. Among his more recent exploits: Geraldo claimed to be reporting from the scene of a "friendly fire" incident in Afghanistan that turned out to be hundreds of miles elsewhere, and he was kicked out of Iraq when he drew a map in the sand on live TV that the U.S. military deemed a security violation.
REDEEMING FACTORS: Geraldo took a chair in the face during a fracas with Nazi punks on his talk show in 1988; more recently, he did some tough reporting after Katrina but again was tempted to steal the spotlight from the storm victims.

4. ANN COULTER
As Al Franken wrote, this woman might actually be insane, and the level of her madness is only matched by Fox host Sean Hannity. What comes out of her mouth is truly incredible, if probably calculated for maximum shock value. Usually, Ann operates in absurd hyerbole and simple vitriol, but on occasion she gets tripped by the facts, as when she swore up and down that Canada had sent troops to Vietnam during the conflict there. And then there are the questions about her voter registration in Florida (where else?).
REDEEMING FACTOR: Ann is so knee-jerk that she's an inspiration for drinking games. For example, if Ted Kennedy's name is mentioned, Ann will respond with something about Chappaquiddick within one minute. If she does, drink. If she doesn't, drink twice!

3. OLIVER NORTH
A former Marine and National Security Council staffer, North would seem appropriate for the part of "talking head" on matters of war and security. But as the central figure in the Iran-Contra scandal, he has no credibility lecturing us on the best course of action in the Middle East, or on anything else. Indeed, he has shown a willingness to bargain, on the sly, with rogue states. With Iran emerging as the new threat, it will be interesting to see how North spins his way out of his activities in the 1980s.
REDEEMING FACTOR: At least he didn't win a seat in the Senate.

2. DICK MORRIS
This political hack has no loyalty to anyone — not to those who hire him, not to those who think like him or even those who marry him. Morris has worked for Republicans such as Jesse Helms and Democrats such as Bill Clinton. Morris was ousted as Clinton's confidante after a prostitution scandal, and ever since, he's been on anti-Hillary jihad. Morris continues to try to cast doom and gloom over anything Hillary does, but his spells do nothing to his intended target. Indeed, Morris usually only succeeds in making himself look more idiotic. Recently, he predicted that the New York senator would face a tough fight from Jeanine Pirro, but Pirro's candidacy sank as soon as it started when a page of her speech went missing on live TV. ("Do you have Page 10?" D'oh!)
REDEEMING FACTOR: Helped Bill Clinton win a second term, although that really wasn't that remarkable considering the opponent was Bob Dole.

1. MARK FUHRMAN
This loathsome detective confirmed everyone's worst fears about law enforcement in Los Angeles: a racist cop who may have tainted evidence. Fuhrman's disastrous testimony in the O.J. Simpson trial was a major factor in Simpson's acquittal (asking O.J. to try on that glove didn't help the prosecution either). On the stand, Fuhrman denied using racial epithets, but O.J.'s "Dream Team" proved him a liar by producing audio tapes of him dropping N-bomb after N-bomb. Nowadays, the creepy Fuhrman churns out sleazy books, like the one about the Terry Schiavo situation, in which the disgraced detective casts blame on husband Michael Schiavo. Not even Jeb Bush would touch that one.
REDEEMING FACTOR: None.

Rosemond-gate!

Parenting columnist John Rosemond has been busted for journalistic malfeasance. Among his offenses:

• recycling old columns when he couldn't meet deadlines;
• taking bits and pieces of real questions from readers and turning them into "composite" questions;
• changing facts and situations in some questions.

DULLARD TAKE: Given Rosemond's hard-line views on discipline and child-rearing, we are tempted to recommend a firm spanking. But since family illnesses played a role in his poor decision-making, we will suggest "time-out" for him — but don't do it again, you hear me?

Top 50 Places to Bend an Elbow

Oddly, Tim's apartment is missing from this list.

7-year-old boy escapes from Alcatraz

A second-grader swims the cool waters from the Rock to freedom. Take that, David Blaine!

All hail Lordi!

Lordi, the mask-wearing, GWAR-like metal band from Finland, has prevailed in the Eurovision Song Contest. The famous competition counts ABBA and Celine Dion among its previous winners.
UPDATE: Here's the view of someone who actually watched it all.

This is Jody. I just wanted to add my own little memorium in photos. I also have a whole set of them on my flickr account for those who feel so inclined to see how much we really are the kind of "cat people" we deny being.

Here is my memorial playlist.

Puddy Pat

Linus and Lucy by Vince Guaraldi Trio
The Love Cats by The Cure
I Say a Little Prayer by Aretha Franklin
Lucy Doesn't Love You by Ivy
Blue for You by Men at Work
Ding Dong by Nellie McKay
Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds by The Beatles
The Siamese Cat Song by Peggy Lee
Stray Cat Strut by The Stray Cats

Friday Cat Blogging

I've avoided this blogger trend until today. Jody and I are cat people, but we're not crazy "cat people." Really.

But yesterday we had to put Lucy to "sleep." It was the hardest thing Jody or I have had to do as a couple, and one of the saddest days I hope to see for a long time.

Lucy was about 14 or so. I got her from my friend Mike shortly after I had moved out from a 3-year relationship, and Mike had re-married to a woman who made him keep the cats in the basement. Mike and the little-sister-I-never-wanted, Jill, got Lucy when they were living in Pasadena next door to a woman who had abandoned her in a locked house for a week or so. She grew up rather suspicious -- and seemingly contemptuous -- of people. She became a claw-first-and-ask-questions-later kind of kitty. Somehow she found a kindred spirit in me, and I was the only one she would allow to pet her at Mike and Jill's. Mike and Jill always sensed that Lucy and I deserved each other, and to my everlasting debt, Mike delivered her to me about a decade ago, shortly after he and Jill had both re-coupled.

We had a quiet co-existence for a number of years together, punctuated by the occasional slashed forearm (usually an unsuspecting visitor) or bisected vermin (what she thought I would do with half-a-baby-possum, I don't know, but it's the thought that counts).

Then she moved in. Jody and Lucy had a rather amusing power struggle over who could take up more room on the bed (Lucy, suprisingly) and who, in general, was going to be low-cat-on-the totem pole in our little household (I'll leave Jody to address the winner there in her own blog entry....) In the end, like an after-school-special, we were all winners, as we grew to be a happy little nuclear family.

Lucy gradually inched closer to normal-cathood, and had mostly stopped clawing friends and acquaintances. She seemed to be a pretty happy cat until Monday this week, when she threw up a few gallons in our bed, and then was dehydrated for a day or so. We took her to her vet, and she got some IV liquids, and seemed ok, but then had a seizure on Wednesday. We took her to the animal hospital, and $2k and a bunch of vague diagnoses later, it looked like she was just in a lot of misery and not likely to get better. She probably had liver cancer which had spread to her stomach and brain.

Lucy was a great cat who is in a better place now. And by "great" I mean "ornery" and by "better place" I mean the cold storage facility at the cat hospital, while Jody and I debate various taxidermy options.

There's an enormous kitty-sized hole inside both Jody and I today, and we will miss Lucy the rest of our days.

Our lives at 45 rpm

Eighth in a series on one Dullard's collection of 45s

Song: "Something to Grab For"
Artist: Ric Ocasek
Year released: 1982
Highest U.S. chart position: 47

A Ric Ocasek solo album seems unnecessary, if not outright absurd. As undisputed leader (perhaps even dictator) of the Cars, Ocasek already had the total control of that band, a level of command that many some "solo" artists lack because of record company pressures or meddling producers. The band still existed, so it wasn't as if Ocasek had no other option than to go on his own. He did anyway, at least in between the Cars' commercially slick albums "Shake It Up" and "Heartbeat City."

"Something to Grab For" is from Ocasek's first solo LP, "Beatitude." The track echoes his work with the Cars, with the requisite themes of isolation and detachment. The song's stalker-protaganist stands distantly from the one he desires, an apparently troubled woman who may be "a lost weekender." Despite the singer's yearnings, he's unable to make a move himself, asking that she give him "something to grab for" but never getting his wish.

With a dense guitar sound and tight arrangement, "Something to Grab For" has a tougher feel than most Cars records, which tended to sound loose and airy. The song is still so close enough to the band's hooky sound, however, that it exposes the quandary facing the Cars throughout their career: They weren't weird enough to be New Wave, but they were too weird to be Album Oriented Rock. Thus, they were loved by no one, even though their best work is worthy of admiration for its cleverness and craft.

The Onion vs. The Sad Reality of the Recording Industry

October 2002:

RIAA Sues Radio Stations For Giving Away Free Music
Onion Article. Pretty funny, huh?

May 2006:

Major Labels Sue XM Satellite Radio
Not an Onion article. Not so funny, huh?

Number 1015 in a series of stupid maneuvers by the RIAA that inhibit innovative ideas for getting music to consumers. I feel for the RIAA like I feel for President Bush: frustrated and amazed at how stupid they are.

They forgot one

The feds overlooked freedom of the press in an abridged version of the First Amendment in "flash card" format.

Once a year I read the entire U.S. Constitution. It's got some interesting stuff beyond the Bill of Rights. Here's an online version, though I read mine in my trusty World Almanac.

How Macca broke up with Heather

"It's not you. It's not me. It's the media."

UPDATE: They apparently have no pre-nup, meaning that Sir Paul's estimated $1.5 billion fortune may be at stake.