johnnyhongkong says…

Dang. If I were the New Orleans Saints, I would have stayed the hell away from Reggie Bush this past weekend. Why? Because the last time a Bush came to New Orleans, he jacked it up beyond repair.  So, what does the Saints drafting Bush prove?

It proves that the NFL knows the hell out of irony: the Houston Texans staged a shocker by picking North Carolina State defensive end Mario Williams with the first pick in the 2006 NFL Draft, putting the New Orleans Saints in the enviable position of picking the consenus top guy who just happens to be named Bush.

Flashback: Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans, the Government with President Bush (who, lest we forget, is from Texas) at the helm, mangled the response, leaving thousands dead, missing, homeless, and displaced, many of whom are inner city Black families. Kanye West proclaimed on national TV that “George Bush doesn’t care about Black people.”

Fast forward: 2006-2007 NFL season. New Orleans is full of fans sporting Bush jerseys, many of whom suffered great losses as a result of George Bush’s “punt” on disaster response.

I hope Reggie Bush is the all world running back that everybody thinks he is and that he’s able to lift the Saints up from the NFL dustbin, giving the city something to cheer about as it rebuilds. If Bush fails in New Orleans, not only will the Texans front office look like a bunch of geniuses for not drafting him, you can forget irony and start dialing up the Ghostbusters to check on that voodoo Bush curse on the Superdome.

In other draft news:

The 49ers got their man Vernon Davis, the tight end out of Maryland, who is a genetic freak: 6’3″ 254, runs a sub-4.4 40-yard dash, plus he cries so he’s a great fit for San Francisco. Very cool. He’s got tree trunks for legs.

I wished that Matt Leinart got picked by the Lions. I mean is it just me or is it hilarious picturing Hollywood Matt in Motor City? I was talking to Mickey Minnesota at the end of the first round and he said that Leinart staying at USC for his fifth year ballroom dancing class probably cost him about $14 million in guaranteed money. And here I thought my school loans were bad…

I don’t know how much gas is by you, but in West Hollywood the cheap stuff is around $3, which is crazy because…well, you know why paying $3 a gallon is crazy.

My little Honda has an 11 gallon tank. I remeber when I was able to fill it up for $15 and it wasn’t all that long ago. Now it’s $28.

Mayor Sam had a post today about the Congressional plans to “help” you relieve your gas pains (Here’s Mylanta’s plans for gas relief. Tell me which works better.).
For those of you too lazy to click on the link, the long and the short of it is this: Senate republicans want to offset your costs by giving you $100 in tax rebates. Senate Dems are proposing to suspend the .18 cent Federal gas tax. Whichever the case, you gotta write your reps and break them off a little some something because this is nuts. Mayor Sam produced a list of the email addresses for the California Congressional delegation. You’ll find it below. Find your Rep and write them.

• Senators
  • Barbara Boxer
  • Dianne Feinstein
• Representatives
  • Joe Baca
  • Xavier Becerra
  • Howard L. Berman
    Howard.Berman@mail.house.gov
  • Mary Bono
  • Ken Calvert
  • Lois Capps
  • Dennis Cardoza
  • Jim Costa
    congressmanjimcosta@mail.house.gov
  • Christopher Cox
    christopher.cox@mail.house.gov
  • Susan Davis
  • John T. Doolittle
    doolittle@mail.house.gov
  • David Dreier
  • Anna Eshoo
    annagram@mail.house.gov
  • Sam Farr
    samfarr@mail.house.gov
  • Bob Filner
    TalkToBobFilner@mail.house.gov
  • Elton Gallegly
  • Jane Harman
    jane.harman@mail.house.gov
  • Walter W. Herger
  • Michael Honda
    mike.honda@mail.house.gov
  • Duncan L. Hunter
  • Darrell Issa
    congressman.issa@mail.house.gov
  • Tom Lantos
    CA12Lantos@mail.house.gov
  • Barbara Lee
    barbara.lee@mail.house.gov
  • Jerry Lewis
  • Zoe Lofgren
    zoe.lofgren@mail.house.gov
  • Dan Lungren
  • Doris Matsui
  • Howard McKeon
  • Juanita Millender-McDonald
    Millender.McDonald@mail.house.gov
  • Gary Miller
  • George Miller
    George.Miller@mail.house.gov
  • Grace Napolitano
    grace@mail.house.gov
  • Devin Nunes
  • Nancy Pelosi
    sf.nancy@mail.house.gov
  • Richard Pombo
    rpombo@mail.house.gov
  • George Radanovich
  • Dana Rohrabacher
    dana@mail.house.gov
  • Lucille Roybal-Allard
  • Ed Royce
  • Linda Sanchez
  • Loretta Sanchez
    loretta@mail.house.gov
  • Adam Schiff
  • Brad Sherman
    Brad.Sherman@mail.house.gov
  • Hilda Solis
  • Pete Stark
    petemail@stark.house.gov
  • Ellen Tauscher
  • Bill Thomas
  • Mike Thompson
    m.thompson@mail.house.gov
  • Maxine Waters
  • Henry A. Waxman
  • Lynn C. Woolsey
    lynn.woolsey@mail.house.gov

One day after Mary Milan’s dream came true and her first favorite media star Brett Favre decided to come back for one more year as a Packer, Kellie Pickler, her second favorite media star, got canned as a prospective American Idol. It’s a crushing blow after Kellie knocked Reba’s “Fancy,” Mary Milan’s most favorite song of all time, out of the park. To be fair though, while watching Kellie sing “Unchained Melody” on Tuesday, Mary Milan just solemnly shook her head, knowing that bad stuff was on the horizon for the country girl from Ablemarle, North Carolina.

At least Mary Milan is not one of these folks. They’re already spinning conspiracy theories. As “AI Expert” (which I hope means Artifical Intelligence Expert as in the movie because there are some questions I have which I would just love to ask an “A.I.” Expert) writes:

I spent six weeks fighting with the bashers over at IF until they banned me for life yesterday. No doubt I struck a nerve by saying that Chris was the chosen one and they would install him as the next king no matter what. Her fans didn’t let Kellie down, not a chance. She was in the way of their crowing the king is all. They threw her aside the first chance they had. Until this week she had very consistant voting and was always right up there with Taylor. Nothing changed this week except they wanted her gone. American Idol is the same crap as Pro Wrestling, Survivor, etc. It’s pre-determined and nothing we can do about it. I will never watch it again but our family will always be Kellie fans and support her in everything she does. I hope James keeps this forum going so we can continue to support Kellie. We thank him for that, it’s the best fan site anywhere. Don’t believe for a minute that Kellie was not as good as the others. We thought she was the best and she is indeed our American Idol.

 

The entire state of Wisconsin breathed a big sigh of relief last night when news broke that Brett Favre will make out with new coach and former 49er offensive crapordinator Mike McCarthy for what may definitely be perhaps his last season, bringing our collective nationwide drama to a peaceful end.

Okay, not the entire state.  There’s a contingent of the Lambeau faithful groaning right around now.  Can you blame them?  The possibility of another 4-12 season with crazy Brett firing ill-advised passes all over the field, not always able to throw footballs through the defenders or the small windows given to his receivers, en route to another 25+ INT season just isn’t very appetizing (lest we forget he threw so many interceptions last season, even random bitches were stealing the ball from him). 

But what’s Green Bay’s alternative?  Aaron Rodgers?  Please.  That’s like cueing up Alex Smith after Steve Young…dammit..that’s almost exactly what’s happened in San Francisco. 

Favre has made his feelings known that it’s not his job to develop Rodgers as it would help Rodgers take Favre’s job and the feeling is that so long as Favre’s around, he’s actually holding the team back because Rodgers, Mr. Green Bay of the future, will not get a chance to play and develop. 

You know who didn’t get a chance to play immediately?  Carson Palmer.  Who mentored him?  David Klinger?  Akili Smith?  Jon Kitna? 

Blame Favre for dragging this decision out, but don’t blame him for cockblocking Aaron Rodgers and thus condemning the Packers to another horrific season.  Blame that on the offensive line and the piss poor running game. 

Favre gives the Packers a (small) chance to win and Mary Milan someone other than me to swoon after.  (It also gives me another season to wear my Favre jersey around the apartment thereby confusing Mary Milan and, well…you know…).

On Saturday, Mary Milan and I accompanied Mickey Minnesota and Janie Utah to see Al Pacino on stage in “a presentation with music” of Oscar Wilde’s Salome at the Wadsworth Theatre on the Veteran’s Administration grounds in West L.A.

If you thought that just because Pacino was on stage, he wouldn’t “hoo-ah” his way through his performance as King Herod, you’d be dead wrong. If you thought that because of this (and because there’s not actually anything inherently “dramatic” in Wilde’s Salome) that this “presentation with music” was not worth seeing, you’d also be wrong.

While I’m still trying to sort out my thoughts on “Hoo-ah Herod,” it’s clear that either Pacino acted soooo damn hard that something in his brain broke circa Scent of a Woman (see Dustin Hoffman pre-Rain Man and post-Rain Man) or a corporate brand consultant branded him as Hollywood’s go to $10 million man for “hoo-ah.”

OK, Pacino didn’t actually give us any “hoo-ah’s,” but it certainly felt like a couple could have tripped out of his mouth and actually have made sense for the play and the character.

Therein lies the conflicted genius of his performance: though he’s selling Pacino brand acting, it feels bracingly spontaneous and compelling because he believes everything he’s doing and everything that’s going on around him.

Of course it helps him that he’s actually Pacino selling Pacino brand and not Joe Asshole selling “Pacino brand” because if Joe Asshole tried, and even did everything as Pacino did, he’d be admitted (or is it committed?) to the VA hospital for acting that “out-Pacinos Pacino.” The lesson in all of this for Joe Asshole is that he doesn’t actually have to sell Pacino brand acting to fully commit to the moment and to the character he’s created and that’s the secret to good acting.

Pacino aside, the show is tastfully staged and the live music score helps a lot with the non-drama what’s happening. Oscar Wilde’s writing, where words frolick in all forms of excess, is just a delight to listen to.

If you decide to go, get general admission tickets because you’ll be right up at the foot of the stage. Choose the stage right bank of seats, a couple seats in and you’ll have a clear line of sight to Big Al. And unless your tushy is a little cushy, bring a cushion because those chairs are are murder on your butt bones (I don’t know that the theatre will allow it but try to fold up your jacket or something). After the show, he’ll sign autographs so don’t forget to bring your Gigli posters.

Saw one of those MTV True Life “documentaries” about steroids. They followed three 20-year olds who used steroids to achieve physical goals: one, who had perfectionism disorder written all over him, wanted to be a fitness model, another who had a bevy of body image and psychological problems, just wanted to look good and win a strip contest so that he could be “the center of attention” and the third, who wanted used steroids to expedite his training to become a MMA (mixed martial arts) fighter (As an aside, it’s crazy that the most sane one in the group was the one who was willing to get his face bashed in as a vocation).

The slant of the documentary skewed media critical, focusing most of its examination on why these men would want to look better – the media shows us all these pictures of sexy Brad Pitt or some other beefcake and we want to look like them. What’s MTV telling us? F-the gym, don’t fall into this deadly downward spiral, let’s take back the night!

Cut to: five Bally’s commercials where they offer the first month free and the your next 5 months for $68.  I’m not sure that’s actually ironic, but it’s certainly an example of MMM (messed-up mixed messaging).

I know I’m late to the game on this what with baby Jesus coming back to life last Sunday, but since writing is playing the part of the Easter Bunny and kicking my ass today, I’ve decided to further procrastinate and share the joy with you:

Click here to see what the Easter Bunny does on the other 364 days of the year.

Click here to add the Easter Bunny to your myspace.

It reminds me of the late 90′s Crunch commercial series that featured the bunny and penguin beating each other up. It also confirms my long standing belief that a guy in a bunny suit beating people up is comedic genius.