Tonight I watched House M.D. and I'm still pissed that I can't get a once-a-week fix of Olivia Wilde anymore. Instead, they replace her with Amber Tamblyn, which (A), isn't remotely attractive, and (B), dresses like she came out of the Delorian on November 12, 1955. I just don't get what the producers are trying to do to me. It's like taking Michael Jordan off the Bulls and replacing him with Chris Mullin. Anyone that knows basketball knows Chris Mullin is no Michael Jordan. To pay homage to Olivia Wilde, the only reason I started watching House in the first place, I'll give you these pictures of her doing what she does best...being a rocket. Cheers to you Olivia. I missed you tonight 13. xoxox. ;)
The Oscars is basically a night for an elite group of self-indulgent narcissists to huddle around a microphone and tell each other how great they are. Every once in a blue moon, some fresh face comes along that isn't contaminated with the stench of elitism and offers a little hope to such an insufferable group. This year, that fresh face is Jennifer Lawrence. Not many people saw Winter's Bone, including me, but I can tell you right now, based on this red dress alone, I'll be able to give a review very soon.
According to my extensive dialogue with women, they reveal to me that their bodies are never the same after having children. So, if that's true, if babies are hot body assassins, what kind of voodoo witchery is Penelope Cruz involved in? I've known Penelope Cruz since she ironically starred opposite Javier Bardem in the Spanish foreign language film Jamon Jamon. Essentially, for the last 19 years I've been a connoisseur of a naked Penelope Cruz and she's never looked better than she does right now. Some critics and feminists would say, "Is it only because her breasts are larger." To that insensitive inquiry, I would say, maybe. Probably. Most likely.
Despite it being only March, 17 year old Taylor Momson's parents have sealed up my annual Parent(s) of the year award. Unless a story breaks about parents eating their children, this is a pretty solid lock. She's already done interviews where she spoke of her close relationship with her vibrator...oh by the way, that was when she was 16. If this were my daughter, I'd be funneling Drano and lighting myself on fire right now.
I've tried to abstain from this self absorbed, bi-polar, paranoid schizophrenic, but honestly, it's simply too good to ignore any longer. Just when you think a house full of cocaine and porn stars costing him his job would be enough to scare him into recovery, think again. Instead, Charlie took the other route which consisted of doing more than a tractor trailer full of blow, scheduling an interview on a national television show, while being completely incoherent and bat-shit crazy.
Sheen said that he’s bored now with cocaine. But he said he “exposed people to magic” when they partied with him and that he loved doing drugs. “What’s not to love?” he said on ABC. “Especially when you see how I party. It was epic. The run I was on made Sinatra, Flynn, Jagger, Richards just look like droopy-eyed armless children.” “I am on a drug,” Sheen said. “It’s called Charlie Sheen. It’s not available because if you try it you will die. Your face will melt off and your children will weep over your exploded body.”
Drink that in for a minute. Still conscious? Now, tell me...what in the hell does it mean? This man gave up 1.8 million dollars an episode for Columbian blow and skanks that bang on camera for money. I don't know about you guys, but in this perilous economic time, I'm pretty sure 1.8 million per episode is pretty good for reading lines someone else has written while portraying a character based on your life of excess and poor decisions.
After I heard about this interview thios morning, I was praying that CBS would just tell his dumb ass, "Good Riddance." My prayers were answered because today, thanks Jesus, a rumor is swirling around Hollywood that CBS is talking to John Stamos to possibly replace Charlie Sheen on Two and Half Men as newly introduced character. Instead of a meth toothed narcissist, America gets a supermodel slaying playboy. I don't know if there's ever been a drug habit as public or as bad as this one. If the Vegas over/under for Charlie Sheen living three more months, I'd be blown away...no pun intended.
Rihanna is hotter than Dante's Nine Circles of Hell. Chris Brown is an alleged bi-curious, definite girl beating little b%#$*. The first photos of Rihanna released that night showed some visible marks on her face, but really, for the most part, Tina Turner would have snickered a little. Well today that changed. The photos released today painted a much different story. One that could have easily painted a bleak and life threatening scenario for Rihanna. I've said this before, but let me reiterate. If I could get one hour to kick the shit out of anyone on Earth, besides Bin Laden of course, it would be this little punk. He has stars tattooed behind his ear. WOW...Chris, you're so scary, so masculine. You hit any girl, you're a pathetic excuse for a man, but if you hit this rocket dripping of pure sex appeal, you're begging for me to kick the shit out of you.
John Travolta is a Hollywood enigma. Like cats and Elton John's Tiny Dancer, he's had two lives in Hollywood. You see, Tiny Dancer saw its first success on John's fourth album, Madman Across the Water. Then, when everyone least expected it, Tiny Dancer arose from the ashes in Cameron Crowe's quirky and endearing 2000 film, Almost Famous. That's Travolta in a nutshell. In Grease, he was a gay guy, before gay of sorts, that got chicks. Then after years of grease royalties and a failing career, and a couple of unfortunate Look Who's Talking's, Tarantino saved him in Pulp Fiction. None of this is relavent to this picture, but it's fun to bring flamboyant gay singers like Elton John full circle to flamboyant gay singers like John Travolta.
Every County in the United States has the responsibility to bury their unknown and indigent dead. It is a social obligation that demands to be fulfilled. For a variety of obvious reasons human remains must be tended to by some form of burial or cremation. While every County does their best to identify anonymous remain, it is impossible to also do so. When individuals die indigent and without family, the responsibility for the disposition of their remain falls upon the local counties. In doing research for this essay, I was surprised to learn that an increasingly numbers of families are declining to claim their deceased because they have no financial means for private dispositions, thus leaving the responsibility to the local County.
Unless I either read about it in the newspapers or see some story on the television news, I am have not been very aware about indigent burials until February 17th, 2011.
On that date I learned that the County of Cook in Illinois had recently dug a mass grave at Homewood Memorial Garden Cemetery located in Homewood, Illinois. This cemetery has been contracted by Cook County to provide burial space for indigent burials. From this mass burial, we learned the following facts:
Cheap wooden boxes costing $239.00 were stacked three high per "grave."
This box contains 26 infants mixed with assorted body parts and bones.
In light of these revelations, I wish to pose the obvious question: Is this the ethical and social manner to bury the indigent? From my pastoral view the answer is a resounding NO.
On February 20th, 2011, I, along with others, paid a visit to this mass grave at Homewood Memorial Garden Cemetery to see first hand what had taken place. What we found and discovered was beyond any of our imaginations. Had we not known that we were gathered inside of a cemetery
we could have thought that we were at some landfill site. The concept of "burial with dignity and respect" seems not to apply when it comes to the burials of the indigent. Are burials with dignity and respect afforded only to those families and friends who can purchase them? It is an indictment of our social ethics and morality to permit those who ended their lives indigent to have their remains suffer further indignities. The carcasses of highway road kill are disposed of better that those of the indigent.
Throughout the years, many local community come together to provide unknown children and adults with dignified burials. This is done because
the majority of people within our national family respects the gift of life, not just at the moment of conception but also at its end. At times like this I find the silence of those who campaign for "respecting life" extremely deafening. The gift of life entails a complete circle - marked by its beginning and its end. Why should the end of a life be less respected and less valued than that of a life at its beginning?
Alternatives to Mass Burials of the Indigent
I believe that there are viable alternatives to the practice of mass burials of the indigent, alternatives which would insure that all who indigent a burial which would provide dignity and respect to the gift of live.
My first recommendation would be for cremation of the remains of those indigent or unclaimed. But prior to cremation there must be DNA record made of the individual. Coded urns could be stored in a fitting place until such time as the possibility of claims being made become impossible.
Because of the options provided with cremation, my second recommendation would be for unclaimed cremains to be interred in a simple common collumbarium or reserved in a underground ossuaries.
Given the reality of available land space, the option for cremation and fitting places for permanent internment, would be more cost efficient to the Counties in their obligation to dispose of the remains of the indigent.
The appalling manner in which the indigents from the County of Cook in Illinois were recently buried at Homewood Memorial Garden Cemetery cannot be permitted to occur again in the future.
I propose that we, as a national family, have the obligation to ensure the dignity of life to all persons and I would go one step further to say that we also have the additional obligation of ensuring dignity and respect to the dead. I further propose that we look for inspiration from the example of Saint Joseph of Arimathea, who provide Jesus with a dignified place of burial. Joseph of Arimathea is the patron saint for those in the funeral industry and his Feast is celebrated on March 17th of each year.
I wish to conclude by encouraging all, especially those who devote much time and energy to the causes associated to the Right to Life and for the Dignity of Life to address the issues related to the burial of the indigents and to work to ensure that no person should ever be denied a dignified place to rest in peace. Work to ensure that your county and state has ordinances and laws which will prevent such disrespectful mass graves from being created again in the future.
America is so racist. I'm not sure what message this news cast is sending, but I can bet you if their suspect had been white, they wouldn't have posted two pictures of the same guy. This poor guy...it's bad enough you're wanted for a crime, but worse when you're two guys wanted for a crime.
On Sunday, February 13, 2011, Chicago's Gay Liberation Network, under the leadership of Andy Thayer, held a rally and protest in front of Holy Name Cathedral, seat for the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago. The agenda for this rally was to condemn the "behind the scenes effort" of Francis Cardinal George, OMI, Cardinal Archbishop for the Roman Catholic Community of Chicago, for his efforts to prevent secular to provide gender common couples the rights of civil unions and/or marriages. Andy and his group usually hold a protest in front of Holy Name once or twice a year, earn some quick air time on television and in the print media and then go home. In most cases, I usually don't too much attention to Andy's visits to the Cathedral, but this year I watched the media's coverage of this event and have become motivated to offer comment on it.
I must confess that I am at a loss to understand the true agenda behind this protest, for it came across to me as unseemly and akin to something the Fred Phelps group would engage in.
I have problems with protest in front of houses of worship and I have a problem with GLN's preoccupation with the Roman Catholic Church, for the Roman Catholic Church is NOT the only religious body unfriendly - both within their internal forums and within the secular forum - to the gay and lesbian community. I believe that I am on safe ground when I say that leaders from the various religious bodies have either directly or indirectly lobbied in Springfield and Washington against all of the various legislative attempts to provide civil rights to to the gay and lesbian community. So why single out the Roman Catholics? Could it be that protesting in front of a Roman Catholic Church would increase the odds of media attendance?
Andy and his posse negate themselves when they or anyone else choose to attach theology and doctines. First of all, we do not live in a theocratic society. We live in a society in which membership within any religious body is a voluntary act. Those who protest the teachings or theology of a religious body in which they do not belong to have no business to do so.
If Andy and his organization wishes to make a legitmate contribution to the cause of civil rights, he and they should direct their energies away from the steps of houses of worship. This is a discussion best left within the halls of our houses of government and the courts.
We already have one Fred Phelps group to deal with. We don't need another counterproductive one.
If Jordan Knight started a diet of bacon and Baby Ruth milkshakes and Russell Brand stopped shooting up black tar heroin they could be identical twins. It's uncanny how much these two look alike. In a related story, Katy Perry has huge cans.
Mila Kunis was cast in Black Swan without an audition. Instead, she and the director, Darren Aronofsky, Skyped for ten minutes and that was it. He said he had fallen for Kunis in Forgetting Sarah Marshall and knew instantly she would be a perfect fit. Yeah, no kidding. Mila Kunis is gorgeous. You could cast Mila Kunis and Natalie Portman in a movie where they both read the phone book for two hours while wearing Snuggies and it would be a hit. I'm not sure Darren Aronofsky is as much a genius as he is normal sexually charged heterosexual male with great taste in women. Wait, I think I can direct. Hollyweird, here I come!
Is there anything hotter than a rocket that knows sports? Often times, pretty girls pretend to know sports, but after a few minutes, you figure them out. They're like trannys in Thailand. On the exterior everything looks great, but upon further investigation, well, you know, things just aren't what they seem. With girls talking sports, it's usually when they call Tony Gonzalas a wide receiver, or they say the Steelers beat the Pats 14-28. I guess it's cute you're trying, but Gonzalas is a tight end and when you call out a score, you always say the winning team's score first. It's just how it's done. When you're as hot as Marisa Miller, you can can basically eat your offspring and it's ok. The fact that she's talking wild cards and quarterbacks makes her even hotter...if that's possible. Hey Marisa, I like the football. Call me.
The last two weekends have been devoted to a girl I fell in love with when she played a precocious girl next door wooing Timothy Hutton in 1995's Beautiful Girls, one of my favorite movies of all time. This particular young beautiful actress has graduated into roles that range from strippers to alien queens to objects of Trey Yearwood's wild obsessions. Natalie Portman had asked for a few hours of my life and I gladly gave it to her...not that way perverts...this way, Black Swan and No Strings Attached. Black Swan revealed 3 things to me. One, Mila Kunis will make any man start the process of trying to order a bride from Ukraine. Two, Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis were electric. Three, and most importantly, Darren Aronofsky is a complete genius. Four, I know I promised three, Natalie Portman is carrying my baby. What? I speak Yiddish and I love Jewish Women.
Oh yeah, as for No Strings Attached, Natalie Portman is very good looking. Ashton Kutcher is...well...um...Natalie Portman is very good looking.
