I am screaming and punching myself

Happy (hateful) Halloween

Yeah, I said I was going to stop blogging. But, like dressing the cats, it's a hard habit to quit cold turkey. So here's a little valentine of feline hatred for your Halloween. Many happy, spooky, glucose-laden returns of the day!

I can scarcely think of a better match of costume and wearer.

Here, Mojo is supposed to be Emily's familiar in a spider costume. You can kind of see the extra legs on the side and the googly eyes atop his head. But the best part, to me, is the "why are you doing this?" look of stoic suffering on his little face.

"You too, huh?" "Yup." "They'll pay for this, won't they?" "Oh, yes."

Happy Halloween, y'all.

Slinking off into the ether

Ah, man. I'm so sorry. You guys are going to kill me. I know I just restarted blogging a few weeks ago, but I think I'm going to have to stop for good. I'd been planning to stop blogging at the end of the year, since I'll most likely be entering a part-time MBA program while holding down my full-time job. But then several events occurred in short succession that led me to think that the universe itself wants me to stop blogging right this minute.

I had planned to recap the premiere of I Love New York 2 this weekend (I actually like her this time around; I guess that's what exposure to the perma-sleaze of Bret Michaels will do to you). But then J and I spent most of our time on a massive landscape project, and honestly, after wrestling with 15-year-old monster shrubs, you don't have much creative energy left. Then I decided to blog about it last night. After taking the GMAT that morning, I was pretty sure I had shot my intellectual wad, but I was determined to get the new recap up before the second episode aired.

No such luck. I was 80% of the way through the recap when I opened another tab in my browser and suddenly, everything froze up and I lost my post in the restart. Then I was going to try again gamely this morning, but I received notification from Dailymotion that two of the four videos I uploaded had been taken down for copyright violations, and it finally occurred to me: someone, somewhere is trying to tell me something. And I think that something is "give it up, sister."

So I'd like to thank you all for giving me a second chance, and apologize for squandering it. You've been an awesome audience, and I'm grateful for all the comments and emails. Now go find a blogger who won't let you down!

Love always,
C.

9-4: Hair today, gone to--ow!

Okay, okay, I was asking for it with that line. But unlike previous weave-happy seasons, this year's crop of models lost a lot of hair in the makeover episode. Some were delighted, some not so much, but just about everybody looked better with less hair. And I think that's a vote of confidence in the actual beauty of the contestants this time around. Whether they realize it or not, most of these girls have faces that don't need any special framing to look fantastic.

Oh, and of course there's the requisite "ice-blond" makeover where the resulting hair looks like fried ass. It's almost a tradition on this show.

Reunion: Don't threaten me with a -- oh, you're not

Who could have imagined that a show that began with such a skanktacious bang would go out with -- well, nothing so melodious as a whimper; Rock of Love went out with something like the first cough of the morning from a four-pack-a-day smoker.

Hack, wheeze, horrrrrk.

9-3: Hanging by a thin thread

Sometimes a show drops all pretense of metaphor and makes the subtext the text. So it was in this week's ANTM, when the traditional "learning how to walk" episode went on ahead and put the girls in straitjackets.

See? It's crazy fun! Or... something.

Finale: Open up and say .... "diabeetis"!

The most interesting part of this whole episode, to me, wasn't that Bret picked Jes as the "winner," 'cause we all knew that anyway. It's that he pronounces the name of his medical condition the same way Wilford Brimley does. And that condition -- the diabetes, not the Brimley resemblance -- comes into play and, we are led to believe, even influences Bret's choice of Temporary Ladyfriend Who Doesn't Actually Want to Touch Him.

I know, I know, how could she not have won?!

9-2: Smoke gets all up in your grill

(My apologies for being so late with this recap. On the plus side, though, not only will it be late, it'll be short! Yeaaa!)

The first couple episodes of any season of ANTM are all about thinning out the herd, getting rid of girls who probably shouldn't have made it into the house in the first place. But even as we're weeding out what doesn't belong on the show, we're introducing all kinds of new crap that doesn't belong on this show either. Tyra, God help us all, has apparently put her social conscience on steroids. This is going to be one message-heavy season, folks.

"I know, I know, it's stupid. Just keep telling yourselves that you might get a contract for ads nobody will ever see. And you might want to take this nicotine patch. Huh? Oh... no reason."

Mission accomplished?

Well, it's taken almost a year and more than four easy steps, but Britney Spears has indeed lost custody of her children. And let's reflect on the fact that when we heard K-Fed was getting custody for the indeterminate future, we all breathed a sigh of relief, didn't we?

I know I've been profoundly lax in covering the Britney news, but there's been so much to keep up with! The VMAs, the Chris Crocker, the driving around without a license but with her kids in the car, the hit-and-run charges, the leaving the house without pants, the subpoenas and affidavits, and throughout it all, the horrible outfits, styling and accessories. It's rather impressive, when you think about it; she's managed to violate just about every standard possible: legal, ethical, parental, professional, and aesthetic.