Get your scholarly quirk on:

Journal of Accounting History
The Animation Journal
Journal of Human Lactation
Journal of Pentecostal Theology
Journal of Plastic Film and Sheeting
Journal of Vacation Marketing
The Shock and Vibration Digest

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Statistics for People Who (Think They) Hate Statistics
Data! Dialogue! Decisions!
Understanding Material Culture
Cognitive Dissonance -- 50 Years of a Classic Theory
You Have to Go to School...You're the Teacher!

A sales pitch that left me speechless - featuring bikini-clad models and products like "Looking Good for Jesus Lip Balm"

Etta James is reportedly on the mend, which is good news for those of us who enjoy her music.

While she gained superstar status at the age of 23, Ms. James' life has not exactly been the stuff that dreams are made of. She started making the rounds at age 14 and in her later years, a nasty, decade-long heroin habit took its toll on her talent (or at least her ability to share it).

I'm reminded of all the brouhaha surrounding all these young girls whose personal lives and personal problems are being bandied about on TV, on blogs and on magazine covers:

Today's hit-makers, tomorrow's hit-takers and a bevy of backstage beauties hankering to take their place.

Oh, and let's not forget the members of the audience (myself included) who celebrate their success and feast on their failures.

It's unnecessary and extremely cruel...something's got a hold on us (all), indeed.

Disney is remaking Escape to Witch Mountain leaving this telepathetic practitioner of the dark arts seething with fury.

I will cast every spell at my disposal to right this horrendous wrong.

Speaking of witch which, please see my contribution to A Socialite’s Life.

In addition to claiming that people of other Christian faiths are "defective," (current) Pope Benedict the 16th (as in century?) is expected to allow the return of the old-school Latin Mass, which calls for the conversion of those pesky and transgressive Jews.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

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Link: Pope's Latin Mass push may revive prayer for Jews

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - A prayer for the conversion of the Jews sidelined from Roman Catholic liturgy in the 1960s may stage a surprise comeback on Saturday, when Pope Benedict is expected to allow broader use of the old Latin Mass.

Church reforms in the 1960s replaced Latin with local languages in the liturgy, reached out to other religions and struck texts that Jews found particularly offensive, such as a Good Friday prayer referring to "perfidious Jews".

Benedict's decree is due to revive a 1962 Latin prayer book that removed the word "perfidious" but left standing prayers for their conversion that ask God to "take the veil" off Jewish hearts and show mercy "even for the Jews," Church sources said.

Oh, my.

...are sometimes easily forgotten, or easily taken away.

Erwin Olaf.

May there be a M.A.C. in heaven.

Apple takes a bite out of crime

Heh.

Folks are contending that AT&T's backup strategy for iPhones (link) will allow hackers and your not-so-friendly NSA agent to review your browsing history, e-mails and personal business (link).

Heh.

Poor Janice.

Poor Frances!!!

Not poor plastic surgeon.

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Courtney Love: A Socialite's Life.

Janice "concept" drawing.

Eerie.

The future of fashion is not silver neoprene spacesuits: it's the last six...seven...eight decades all rolled up into one.

• 80's Hawaiian meets 90's Versace meets 21st century gay youngling
• Top Drawer Preppy Heroin Hippies In Target Cargo Pants.
• Kurt Cobain (via Threadless)- wearing $500 jeans
• An Angrier Howard Stern with asymmetrical belting who wears Gaultier-inspired Benetton (without irony) and listens to The Doors
• Alfalfa filtered through the Beatles as worn by Prince Harry who wished he'd been around to see Shaft in the theaters, but instead goes golfing. In flip-flops.

Talk about mash-ups.

Ra-Re - Italian Clothiers (of course). Click on image for larger view.

Well, well...it looks like JJ's, St. Louis' perennial paunch-bellied pleather palace is once again in the news for ejecting customers based upon how they’re dressed. The story, Male identity, female ID: Man in transition barred from club is a cover story in this week's Vital VOICE.

Longtime readers of this blog may remember that I was once mauled by bears at that alternative lifestyle establishment when my costume for AIDS fund-raiser was deemed inappropriate.

While I have rarely ventured back to JJ’s, I have, on occasion, tried to get laid overcome my prejudice and given the place a shot.

Sadly, JJ’s has always disappointed and continues to disappoint by turning away transgender persons for being…well…transgender.

As for me, I doubt I’ll be going back anytime soon.

You see, one of my field operatives overhead the following while a couple of JJ's bartenders were discussing the bar's discriminatory practices and a few choice words I had about the bar in the Vital VOICE article:

"You know, that Rob Thurman....he's nothing but flowers and lube!"

Talk about off-the-mark!

I much prefer strawberries.

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Related: RFT’s archival coverage of the hoo-hah.

Sala Le Fantasy: Cafe, Theater, Disco Show

Located somewhere between rancid and trifling.

The same week that the iPhone debuted, limited production began for a flying car.

No shit.

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Some details from the press release:

June 28, 2007

Moller International has completed tooling and has begun producing parts for its Jetsons-like M200G Volantor, a small airborne two passenger saucer-shaped vehicle that is designed to take-off and land vertically.

Production on the initial six airframes started earlier this week using hard-tooled molds with the capability of producing one fuselage per day.

Depending upon engine production volume the M200G price could start as low as $90,000.

The M200G is the size of a small automobile and is powered by eight of the Company’s Rotapower® rotary engines. This vehicle is intended for operation continuously in “ground effect” up to approximately 10 feet altitude.

Dr. Moller calls the M200G, “the ultimate off-road vehicle” able to travel over any surface. “It’s not a hovercraft, although its operation is just as easy. You can speed over rocks, swampland, fences, or log infested waterways with ease because you’re not limited by the surface. The electronics keep the craft stabilized at no more than 10 feet altitude, which places the craft within ground effect where extra lift is obtained from operating near the ground. This lets you glide over terrain at 50 mph that would stop most other vehicles” he continued.

Let us salute the folks at TMZ who have introduced an exciting new public forum and viewer-created video commentary feature on their notorious website.

They still have a few kinks to work out – most notably, spelling “comments” correctly in their Cue It & Spew It! graphic.

Nevertheless, providing the denizens of the digital domain with an opportunity to be heard loud and clear is a worthy undertaking.

Featured below is a video of Harvey Levin (TMZ’s managing editor) inviting the online community to participate in the aptly named Hater Nation. While he never looks at the camera directly, his animated and energetic facial expressions clearly convey his impassioned plea to bring forth the next wave of citizen journalists.

While I have been loathe to comment on many of TMZ’s shenanigans, I felt Harvey’s voice calling out to me. It was like he was daring me to step forth from this veil of vocabulary and to speak…actually SPEAK…once and for all.

And, so, I have decided to venture into this unfamiliar talkie territory.

Did I mention I have terrible stage fright?

English po-po to be fitted with head cams.

Read the story here: The Evening Standard.

Okay, then....let's all sing along!!!!

I'm in the Moog for Love

Just when one thinks there's nothing to be gleaned from the 435 messages delivered to one's inbox overnight, comes the little gem below.

While all of the content is predictable, please note the subject line.

Rats?

Naturally, one's mind jumps to Plath and Powder Rooms - but according to Orwell Today, the quote is from 1984.

...In the room over Mr. Charrington's shop, when they could get there, Julia and Winston lay side by side on a stripped bed under the open window, naked for the sake of coolness. The rat had never come back, but the bugs had multiplied hideously in the heat. It did not seem to matter. Dirty or clean, the room was paradise. As soon as they arrived they would sprinkle everything with pepper bought on the black market, tear off their clothes, and make love with sweating bodies, then fall asleep and wake to find that the bugs had rallied and were massing for the counter-attack.

To think, all that money spent on pharmaceuticals to satisfy the needful origins, when all it would take is a pepper mill to add some zing to the connubial conjugations.

. . .

On second thought, perhaps one should just stick to pills.

Blessed be the powers of light and love -- The Buffy Musical Sing-Along is heading to St. Louis, October 12-14 at the Tivoli.

For you heathens who have not experienced the nuanced lyrical moments and song-stylings of the most important musical moment on television EVER!!!, I suggest you Google and YouTube yourself silly.

From The Buffy Musical, a song about bunnies.

Buffy, the bunny, R.I.P.

I'd almost forgotten the smell of sweet corn, wild onions and pig shit.

Almost.

I was much more homesick than I realized.

The house my parents built (literally).

The road to my grandmother's house.

Pauline's Phlox

For the birds. Or the skunks. Or the possums. Duhdn't matter.

...so notes a wisecracker at Ads of the World about the awkward moments men share selling their semen, which is featured in an advertising campaign for Lance!.

Too bad the ad (below) is for soccer and not for baseball.

The caption for this post would have been: Baby Batter = Baby Batters

--click on pic for larger view--

It's happened before....a song keeps repeating in the back of your mind.

Hurry boy, she's waiting there for you...Hurry boy, she's waiting there for you...Hurry boy, she's waiting there for you...Hurry asshole, she's mother fucking waiting there for youuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu...

My cure for Brain Itch: YouTube a song and play multiple versions simultaneously - adjust the volume for maximum dissonance -- your brain will clear, quickly.

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Africa -- Toto

...and immediately start this one

Count to three...start this one...

Ms. Lovechild, the art teacher, and I were brewing up some meth trouble at the Missouri Feral Pigs Art Prom.

My camera died, but there was a photo booth.