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Anybody catch the new reality show Breaking Bonaduce? What about Being Bobby Brown? Perhaps your DVD collection includes one of the ‘Saving’ titles – Silverman, Shiloh, Sister Aimee, Grace, Jessica Lynch or Private Ryan. Maybe you’ve plopped down recently in front of Being John Malkovich, Chasing Amy, Serving Sara, Killing Zoe, Eating Raoul or Stealing Sinatra?

I have a strong feeling that Avoiding Alison, Buggering Billy, Tea-bagging Tony, Slapping Simone, Fisting Fiona, Bludgeoning Barbara, Evading Evan and Shrimping Stewart are right around the corner.

I think it can all be traced back to Searching For Bobby Fisher. Have I forgotten some? Do any pre-date Bobby? And more importantly, when will we run out of these and start in on the past participles instead? I am especially looking forward to Found Forrester and Drowned Mona.

When every act that a culture makes communicates weakness and loss of self-belief, eventually you’ll be taken at your word. – Mark Steyn.

I’d be interested to know what my friends/readership thinks of this article. In England, several children’s cartoon characters and a type of ice cream packaging is being banned and discontinued because a handful – and by handful I mean about 2 – Muslims were offended for varying reasons. For a practical example of why this sort of thing bothers me look at it this way – future generations of children now get to grow up without Charlotte’s Web.

My take is thus: everything is offensive to someone. No matter how flexible and tolerant one may want to be, it has to be a two-way street. I’m offended at the offense taken by others – and that fact will offend someone else all over again. If that last sentence seemed a little ridiculous to you, it’s because it was. And that’s my whole point.

I hope Julia Roberts opted for a paycheck and not back-end points. This is one movie that is now doomed to fail internationally. Pick your battles, people. This is getting truly awful.

Good old Nipsey cashed in his chips Sunday afternoon. And since he’s brought me a lot of joy recentely via the Dean Martin Roast DVDs, I wanted to say a few words. His last public appearance was at the Aviator premiere a year ago, and I think you’ll agree he was looking pretty darn good for 80! But when ya gotta go, you gotta go. Funny bastard or no. I

In addition to being a prominent part of Dino’s crew in the 70’s, playing the Tin Man in The Wiz, starring on Car 54 Where are You? and hosting The Match Game after the legendary Charles Nelson Reilly departed, Nipsey was famous for his ‘poems’ – for lack of a better word.

Of this job, I don’t think so highly, But hey — it beats hangin’ out with Charles Nelson Reilly.

Apparently, the Chinese word for automobile is Qui-che. And here I thought that was some kind of gross pie. I awoke this morning to a fridge full of chicken balls, crab rangoon and fried rice. My house guests, in town for a bachelor party which I also attended, spared no expense upon their return to the apartment last night. I think I snuck home around 10pm or so. The operative word being think. It was a rough one.

My fortune cookie read “To work hard is to be able to play hard without guilt”. And yet I can’t help feeling guilty that while I meant to behave this weekend, I’ve actually ended up sitting here wondering how I got home from Dick’s Last Resort.

For my second weekend in a row of productive sobriety, I’ve opted for a catch-up Marlon Brando movie fest. I ordered every major flick of his that I have been attempting to see for years, and they just arrived courtesy of Amazon. Friday night is One-Eyed Jacks and Streetcar Named Desire, and Saturday is reserved for The Wild One and The Young Lions.

If anyone would like to join me for Brando-Fest 2005, you’re more than welcome to be referred to as one sad fricking individual who should definitely not admit to that fact in mixed company.

It’s actually not as dismal a weekend as it seems. I also have Tonto’s bachelor party to jam in there somewhere, and 2 days of beautiful roofdeck weather to look forward to. So it’s shaping up to be a nice little Saturday. I may hit Home Depot as well. But I dunno… I dunno if I’ll have enough TIME.

Almost a year to the day since I wrote my acclaimed homage de 20,000 Leagues, which still attracts traffic to my site on a daily basis, a Japanese scientist has finally managed to photograph a live Giant Squid in the wild. I think this is absolutely awesome, as I’ve been unhealthily fascinated with the beasts for 30 years. I have no defense or childhood trauma to link it back to. I won’t even eat a fishstick. That’s just the way it’s always been. My childhood was chock full of giant squids, Star Wars and Popeye Candy Cigarettes – and fully devoid of reason.

This photo released by Dr. Tsunemi Kubodera of the National Science Museum, a 26-foot-long Architeuthis attacks a prey hung by a white rope, left, at 900 yards deep off the coast of Japan’s Bonin islands, 1,000 kilometers (670 miles) south of Tokyo.

I don’t want to mislead anyone – so I’m gonna come clean and admit that I wasn’t actually in the original photo. That was just photoshopped in recently. But if I had been there, and was able to breathe 900 meters underwater without the aid of any scuba gear, that is how excited I would have been. It’s practically the equivalent of 100% scientific accuracy if we’re going to split hairs. Again, ladies – please form a line to the left.

So to all you skeptics and nay-sayers be dammned. The truth really is out there if you look hard enough. Next on my agenda – those frigging bastard Minotaurs.

Just kickin’ it at 7am on a Tuesday. You know how we do – Chillin’ with Will the Irish window specialist at the moment. $1,000 to fix my two windows, and he has to break apart the wall in my bedroom to get at the sunken system. So apparently the street level hole in my wall will be replaced by an even bigger hole for a few days. So please – stop in for a chat. I’m sure every other pedestrian in the North End, of which there are scant few (thinly-veiled sarcasm), will be doing the same. I’ll make a bundt cake and we’ll talk.