What's Up With Evil Mary Worth?

 

Guest Blogger: The Voice of Reason

                     Immediate Evacuation (my lunch disagreed with me)

There have been an average of 160,000 troops in IRAQ during the last 22
months, which has a firearm death rate of 60 per 100,000.

The rate in Washington D.C., is 80.6 per 100,000.

That means that you are 25% more likely to be shot and killed in our
Nation's Capitol, which has some of the strictest gun control laws in
the nation, than you are in Iraq.

Conclusion: We should immediately pull out of Washington, D.C.

                       

                   Go back to bed, America!  Your government is in control.

 

Guest Feline Bloggers: Norville and Olive

Hello, my name is Norville, and I am 11 years old.  I live with my sister on Capitol Hill, and we are companions to T-Cube and K.   As you can see from my photograph, I feel that during these hot summer days that the coolest place to be is in the bathroom, either on the tiles or where I feel as if I am being properly represented--the throne.

Hi there! I'm Olive. I'm 7 years old.  I am daddy's little girl. Though my brother enjoys staying cool in the bathroom,  I feel that sitting by the open door sunning myself is the place to be. I just LOVE the warmth of the sun on my fur! I suppose it's a female cat's perogative to get as much sun, and quite possibly a tan, as she can!  It feels so good to lie in the sun that I say decorum can go out the window.

                         

                                           King Norville

      

              

                                          Olive Catching Some Z's

                                        Written By Two Cool Cats

                              

(not written by Washington Cube)                                                    

Movie: Land of the Dead--George A. Romero

The undead are making progress.  They are beginning to show some ability in taking direction, they are learning to work together cooperatively and they have some rudimentary deductive reasoning. Zombies have also become tool users on a very basic level. And they said the dead can't evolve. Land of the Dead has some excellent noir cinematography, and the opening sequences are very effective in setting up this nightmarish world.  It seems this post-apocalyptic land has a few enclosed outposts, one of which is Pittsburgh where the film allegedly takes place (Zombie Fun Fact:  Director George Romero wanted to film in his home town of Pittsburgh.  Filming was done in Toronto, however, in order to tax advantage of Canadian tax incentives.) 

At this point in the zombie saga, society has adapted to the circumstances of residing amidst the permanent infestation of the undead, and the living shield themselves within the confines of a protected city, bordered on three sides by a river.  The residents are polarized along the usual lines where the ultra rich live in an exclusive high rise complex called "Fiddler's Green," while the rest of the people are treated as a servant class who are responsible for maintaining and protecting the existence of the privileged.  In other words, a slightly exaggerated version of our own society.(Zombie Fun Fact:  "Fiddler's Green" is a song about the place where calvarymen go when they die.  It is located "Halfway down the trail to hell" and in the end advocates suicide by pistol when death is certain and the "hostiles" are closing in.) The city overlord is a man named Kaufman (played with deft understatement by Dennis Hopper), and he is a greedy, power-possessed C.E.O. controlling his self-visualized fortress.  He shields the rich with heavy policing at the borders, and the servant class is kept distracted with decadent amusements. (Zombie Fun Fact:  In one scene a young woman is thrown into a cage to fight two zombies to the death, a la gladiator style, and she is played by Asia Argento, the daughter of a noted Italian horror filmmaker, Dario Argento who was also co-producer of Dawn of the Dead.)

In several scenes a friend or co-worker is suddenly bitten by a zombie and, therefore, soon to be a member of the zombie hoard. This requires they be murdered on the spot, as it "only takes about an hour to become a zombie."  The viewer must ponder the question:  Are the zombies as inconsequential as the working proles?  In this film, the zombies seem to carry some vague memory of their previous roles in society, and they find a leader among them who takes them to the walled city and through his uber intellectual capacities grunts and gesticulates his orders to charge the barricades.  As in Dawn of the Dead, Romero shows his ongoing contempt for our consumer culture in his destruction of the Grand Concourse of "Fiddler's Green."  Basically, the zombies are out to eat the rich.  (Zombie Fun Fact:  A non-union zombie would make CDN$9 per hour while a union zombie, for a minimum of 8 hours, would make CDN$158.) 

There's more than enough of the usual gratuitous violence for the whole family, but it's all part of the Grand Guignol, and Romero gives you plenty to chew on.

                            Things To Know About Zombies - 2005

Kill the brain, kill the zombie (a classic)

Zombies don't have to know how to swim

Zombies retain a sense of work ethic, even after they are dead

Zombies like fireworks, particularly the chrysanthemum displays, (very much like the Mall on July 4th)

Zombies are tool users

Zombies are beginning to evolve a sense of deductive reasoning

Some zombies have leadership skills

It takes at least one hour to become a zombie

You can only be zombie food for one hour after you are bitten.  Then YOU are a zombie, and you are safe.

       

                              Oh yeah...zombies resent the living

     

 

Cocktail of the Week: The Letter "K"

                                  Kryptonite and Kill Bill Cocktails

Last week it was time to explore the "K" cocktails:  Kryptonite and Kill Bill.  The interesting thing about these two drinks is that they are so obviously colored to match their name.  Kryptonite is a glowing acid green, and Kill Bill is a chrome yellow that matches Uma Thurman's (Bruce Lee's) jump suit.

Kryptonite Cocktail:

3/4 oz Captain Morgan® Original spiced rum
3/4 oz Malibu® coconut rum
3/4 oz Midori® melon liqueur
3/4 oz pineapple juice
1 splash Bacardi® 151 rum

Combine ingredients with ice in a cocktail shaker. Shake and strain into a cocktail glass, and serve.

 Kill Bill Cocktail:  

1 oz Bombay Sapphire® gin
1/2 oz Southern Comfort® peach liqueur
1/3 oz peach liqueur
1/3 oz Lemonel® lemon liqueur
1/3 oz fresh lemon juice
1/3 oz sugar syrup
1/3 oz peach juice

Shake and strain into a cocktail (martini) glass filled with cracked ice. Garnish with lemon and lime peel, and serve.

The only interesting thing of note that happened during this cocktail session was that an extremely wrinkled man sat next to me at the bar wearing those Nantucket Red pants, and the entire time he was twisting his wedding ring on his finger while he winked at the female bartender and blew her kisses.  Le sigh...and yuck.

                The Kryptonite Cocktail

 

                   The Kill Bill Cocktail

Guest Blogger: Wrethwyn A Voice Like Velvet

                                               A Voice Like Velvet

                                       Luther Vandross

                                                Never Too Much

                                 April 20, 1951     -    July 1, 2005

 

                                     

His voice was like velvet and with it he could soften hearts to the possibilities of love so easily.  He was perfection pouring from the radio.  Whether you were in the arms of your lover, or just relaxing with a glass of wine (lights turned down low), he never disappointed to deliver. I was born at the end of the seventies and therefore grew up as a child of the eighties. 

 

It is not something that I knew as a fact until recently, but Luther’s solo career didn’t take off until 1981.  For me he has always simply been there, singing his soulful ballads as the background for romance, while presenting the unshakable image of a performer full of grace and charisma.  Luther’s upbeat tunes always made you want to dance, but it was the ballads that really took your breath away.  It was nice to be able to agree on music no matter what generation was in a room.  The power of his talent crossed generational, racial, cultural, and idelogical barriers.  No one could say that Luther Vandross wasn’t “good music.”

 

It was Roberta Flack who pushed Luther into his solo career, recognizing something extraordinary in her backup singer that she could not allow to  remain in the background.  He was a writer and producer as well.  One of the first features of his music writing prowess was a song Brand New Day in the musical The Wiz.    Every album that Luther released never went any less than Platinum.  A man was moving in the right direction when he pulled out the incomparable Mr. Vandross…if only for one night.

 

We are thankful that Luther rose to the challenge and broke out of his shell to become a man that almost every modern balladeer lists among the inspirations for their interest in the music business.  Luther was matchless until the end, winning Grammys well into 2004, even after being mostly immobilized due to a stroke.  He continued to sing and record music that spoke to the heart. 

 

Having lost my father in 1998, I remember the first time I heard Dance with My Father while driving.  I had to pull the car over to the side of the road.  The words touched my heart deeply, and the voice that carried them stirred emotions as if the sorrow were fresh.  I don’t say this to make anyone sad, but to illustrate that it takes a powerful musician to infuse music with soul that can touch the very heart of a person.  Luther was never just a singer he was an artist and he will be missed but never forgotten.  As long as we have music, Luther’s metaphorical chair will never just be a chair.

 

Just a few of Luther’s hits

 

Can Heaven Wait

Superstar/Until You Come Back To Me (That's What I'm Gonna Do)
Your Secret Love
Any Love
I Really Didn't Mean It
Give Me The Reason
It's Over Now
Here and Now

Dance With My Father
Take You Out

Power of Love
Sometimes It's Only Love
Don't Want To Be A Fool
'Til My Baby Comes Home

Never Too Much

 

             

            A man was moving in the right direction when he pulled out the incomparable Mr. Vandross…if only for one night.

 

 

               Written by Wrethwyn

 

Luther Vandross : Dance With My Father : 'Dance With My Father'

Sartorial Advice To The Next Female Supreme Court Justice

 

 

Sartorial Advice To the Next Female Supreme Court Justice

 

 

White Kimono:  Your homage to O-Ren Ishi.   Pair it with a Samurai Sword, and you’re cooking.  Justice will never have been so swift.  Your docket will be kept empty (so to speak).  Your cleaning bills will jump, but so will you.  You cannot discount the impact of the absence of color in a multi-colored garbed crowd, or against black.  Group photos of the Kourt Kidz, and you will “pop.”   Actress Mae West, when making the film Myra Breckenridge, had it written into her contract that she be the only actor allowed to wear white.  She was worried about her age, and she wanted to deflect attention away from Raquel Welch.  You could also go around quoting Mae West while wearing white, “I was pure as the driven snow, but boy did I drift.”  Nice double entendre going on in homage to the snowy courtyard fight scene in Kill Bill Vol. 1.  If you go with this ensemble, skip the next item and go for the tabi sock and the zori shoe.  A hestitant step will confuse your opponents, and they’ll never see you coming with your verdicts.

 

 

 

             

                                       Docket Number:  05-6258

 

 

 

 

Boots:  High black leather boots with stiletto heels.  Think Condi Rice.  Think power.  Think Dominatrix.  Think of the nice "click, click, click" your heels will make in the marble halls of justice. If you decide to pair these with a kimono, tell them you’re into fusion dressing.

 

The Gavel:  A cat o'nine tails would command more respect, or a riding crop.  Such a nice whooshing, thwapping sound when it strikes.  You'’ll have them cringing at your judgments.  I think you're stuck with the gavel on this one, but if you can pull it off, don’t hang the whip off of your belt.  Stick with the understated.  If you must use a gavel, aim for ebony wood and customize the metal band to have three inch long spikes protruding outward.  Hell on the wood  bench, but what a visual.

 

 

                 

    

 

                 A Nice Homage to Navy Nautical Law...With A Twist

 

 

 

Lingerie:  Sure no one sees it under those robes, but it affects your mind set and body language. Citing astronomical costs, showman Flo Ziegfeld  was once asked why he dressed his showgirls in imported Belgian lace undergarments invisible to the audience.  Ziegfeld replied  "..the girls know they are wearing quality, and it affects how they think about themselves and how they carry their bodies.  They…walk differently."  

 

 

The Lace Jabot Issue:  This has never flown.  I don’t know what Sandy was thinking.  She was constantly sending out conflicting signals.  There was that whole Louis XIV “Le Roi Soleil, L’Etat est Moi” thang  (and you know how that crowd wound up), or it sets to mind male Scottish kilt formalwear, and you don’t want people thinking about your sporran.

 

 

                               

 

                                    

Under the Robe:  Expand your mindset.  The public isn’t going to see.  Go to work one day as a Furry.  Wear boned corsets (constrain your torso, open your mind).  Wear vintage.  Push this one as far as you can.  If you refer to Smoking Gun.com you can read about a judge who shaved and oiled his nether region and had a male enhancement pump working while he sat on the bench.   The courtroom reported hearing a "swooshing" sound coming from the bench, a noise the court reporter said "sounded like a blood pressure cuff being pumped up." The Judge, once discovered, cited that it was a “gag gift.”  What a card. 

                                  

 

 

                                 

 

 

                   http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/0624041pump1.html

 

 

Optional:

 

Cabana Boys:  Easy.   Call them “clerks.”

 

The Lanai:   You should be able to find some officespace for this cheerful bar addition.

 

 

                                       It's 2005, Sistah.  Lighten things up.