More unintentional hilarity from David Vitter’s newsletter (which the technologically challenged senator still can’t manage to post online):

PHOTO SPOTLIGHT

“Last month, Olympic Gold Medalist Misty May Treanor dropped by my office in Washington, DC, to discuss her participation in a program designed to educate children about making healthy life choices and avoiding the dangers of underage drinking. Misty and her teammate Kerri Walsh won gold medals in beach volleyball at the 2004 and 2008 Olympic Games.” (Subtext: “PLEASE NOTE THAT SHE IS COMPLETELY CLOTHED AND THAT MY PENIS IS NOWHERE NEAR HER. IN FACT I HAVE COVERED IT WITH MY TIE TO PREVENT IT FROM SNEAKING OUT.”)

STUDYING THE RECORD OF SONIA SOTOMAYOR
“As the first Hispanic and only the fourth woman nominated for the Supreme Court, Judge Sotomayor is certainly making hopeful and positive history. Now we must study her record and philosophy carefully to ensure that she understands the proper role of the judge as impartial umpire – not pitcher or catcher.” (Subtext: “I HAVE NEVER PLAYED BASEBALL IN MY LIFE. BUT I LOVED THAT MOVIE BASEKETBALL.”)

“We didn’t kill anybody. We didn’t put anybody in a hospital. We’re not selling drugs. We’re not bad kids, you know. We did some porn. Get over it…I didn’t threaten anyone’s life. I’m puttin’ smiles on people’s faces.”

— Kenny Jordan, wrestler dismissed from his college in Nebraska after appearing on an adult website [Outsports via Towleroad]

http://sports.espn.go.com/broadband/player.swf?mediaId=4231209

Belgian artist Jacques Charlier’s original plan was to disperse 100 posters depicting the symbolic “genitals” of 100 artists throughout Venice. The drawings are visual puns, with one written clue, and viewers are invited to guess to whom the genitals belong. For example, a Stanley knife stands for the Italian artist Lucio Fontana, a minimalist fond of slashing his canvases (the drawing comes with the clue “often used”).

For the man who once wrapped Berlin’s Reichstag, Christo’s image resembles a parcel, and the clue is “wraps in very special things”. Damien Hirst’s member is shown sliced and suspended in a tank of formaldehyde.

Charlier’s proposal was rejected by the Biennale authorities (for fear of offending the Venetian populace, and the artists whose genitals are represented). But Charlier has used this rejection as a stimulus for a massive publicity drive — a boat emblazoned with “100 Sexes D’Artistes” has been touring the canals of Venice, docking occasionally to let the public board to view the correspondence between Charlier, Biennale director Daniel Birnbaum and other authorities (while being served free prosecco, of course).

The French Human Rights League has also come out in support of the artist — claiming he has been censored. But this censorship has not prevented Charlier and his supporters from handing out booklets containing all 100 genital drawings, and offering free T-shirts to those who can guess the identity of at least 20 of the artists.

Charlier’s posters will tour several other European cities, including Antwerp and Belgrade.

— The Age

<![CDATA[

Jonno and I went out for dinner last night. Nothing big, but he’s been out of town, and I’ve been busy with Valley of the Dolls, so together, we’ve been like ships in the night. We needed some time alone, away from the house.

As usual, I ate too much. For some reason, I was reminded of a special group of folks in Japan: a long-lived population who have developed a tradition of eating until they’re only 80% full. Apart from being totally random, I find that habit kind of fascinating, but I couldn’t remember where I’d read about it. Then today, as I was running some errands, I stumbled across The Splendid Table (a recent addition to WWNO’s weekend lineup), and host Lynne Rossetto Kasper was interviewing Dan Buettner, whose new book, The Blue Zones, discusses this Japanese community:

/**/

Life is weird and wonderful, y’all.

Somehow, I am always the last to hear these things:

Wayne Doucet, a City Councilor from Evangeline, Louisiana, was asked on a local live radio talk show, just what he thought about the allegations of torture of suspected terrorists. His reply prompted his ejection from the studio, but to thunderous applause from the audience.

“If hooking up one raghead terrorist prisoner’s testicles to a car battery to get the truth out of the lying little camelshagger will save just one Coonass’s life, then I have only three things to say: Red is positive, black is negative, and make sure his nuts are wet.”

— Agweb et al*

Which is creepy and disturbing for many reasons, but also darkly humorous. Because, really, it doesn’t matter if the nuts are wet.

* I should point out that this story is fairly easy to find online, but it is also reported verbatim every time, which is totally suspicious. More eyebrow-raising: it’s also attributed to an Australian politician. Sounds like a new meme.

I would just like to point out: all those people who once said that the internet would turn everyone into little Madagascars–lonely and isolated and incapable of communicating with other people–never counted on Facebook or Twitter or the bejillion other web means we’ve developed to be in constant contact with everyone we’ve ever met.

Sorry. The voices in my head and on my laptop, they are loud today.

My birthday is in a few months. Cough, cough.

In other news: I need your help.

Revised: I need your help if you live in New Orleans and know of an apartment for rent that’ll accept dogs.

Backstory: my dear friend Jack and his invisible boyfriend–whom we call “Snuffy” for reasons obvious to anyone over 30–live in Murderville. This is not to be confused with Greater Murderville (aka New Orleans), but Murderville proper, the pulpy, gooey core of Greater Murderville.

Murderville, you might be surprised to know, is a dangerous place. I have no doubts about Jack or Snuffy or their ability to prevail should an incident come to fisticuffs. However: Jack is also a very talented actor (photo above!) and is playing the role of Lyon Burke in our upcoming production of VALLEY OF THE DOLLS, which I believe I have mentioned before, and if Jack has to go to the hospital for a shiv wound, someone will have to replace him onstage. Yes: me. That cannot happen.

So please: spare me the trouble and Jack the pain and New Orleans theatregoers the exquisite torture and find Jack an apartment so he won’t get stabbed and the show can go on as planned, with no understudies or directors filling in at the very last minute.

Seriously: got a place? Know a place? Email me or leave a note in the comments.

“A Gentleman is one who never inflicts pain.” – Cardinal Newman

“Unintentionally.” – Oscar Wilde

[via Bon Bons of Impertinence]

In Which I Geek Out

I admit it: I’m nerdily excited about Facebook Connect. If it takes off–as it probably will–it’ll help shrink the web. Which would be nice, because girlfriend is getting too big for her britches.

If you haven’t fiddled with Facebook Connect, it’s a lot like OpenID (not that you’d know what that is, because you don’t use it and neither does anyone else). Basically, it’s a third-party system that allows you to log into multiple sites via a single user account. So, for example: think of Gawker, where you have just one identity that you use on every Gawker site, meaning that your comments on Gawker, Jalopnik, etc. are all viewable on your one Gawker profile page. Facebook Connect is a lot like that, but it’s not limited to a particular family of websites; it works on any website where it’s enabled.

On the one hand, that’ll probably save me a lot of time that I’d otherwise spend trying to remember usernames and passwords I haven’t typed in months. It’ll also allow me to stay in closer touch with friends and interact with them outside the relatively small Facebook playground.

On the other hand, it’ll seriously impinge on web anonymity–if such a thing even exists anymore. College-age folks aren’t so concerned about privacy, but I’ve always found that a little mystery is a good thing.

I wish I were as excited about Twitter, but honestly, I think it’s overblown. As a toy, it’s great fun, and it has some nifty applications here and there, but there are idiots out there ready to dump their RSS readers and use Twitter exclusively, and, well, that’s just dumb. RSS is news and full posts and all the info I need in one little ol’ place. Twitter is 140-character updates from friends about lunch and rush hour and hey, do you know of anyone with an apartment for rent that takes dogs. I don’t even subscribe to my Twitter timeline in my RSS reader–that’s how separate I think they are. I’ll be glad when Twitter gets consumed by Google or Facebook or some other entity so I’ll have one less tab open in my browser.