By Stephanie B Goldberg
1. Thank heavens for Lee Abrams, the Tribune Company’s Innovation-meister, whose incoherent, capriciously punctuated memos are a veritable treasure trove of dumb ideas. The one from July 14 does not disappoint: Hey, fellas, let’s rethink the editorial page – assuming we need one – because it’s so, well, opinionated. And concert reviews are so ovah – we should be helping our readers decide whether to purchase tix – in case they’ve never heard of, say, Madonna or the Rolling Stones.
2. Did you hear about the British woman who wore her bra for four hours before realizing it had a bat inside it? She thought that fluttery feeling was her mobile phone vibrating. Not to be outdone, the Today Show’s Kathy Lee Gifford was positively gleeful about the Wine Rack, a bra that conceals a plastic pouch and straw for sipping brewskis, (and, presumably, comes with a paper bag to slip over your head.)
3. First, the geriatric rockers of Journey used YouTube to find a replacement lead singer. Now, the world’s largest video venue has helped the intrepid police of Leeds, England get their man. Andrew Kellett, 23, was so proud of his assorted misdeeds – including drag racing, drugging and trespassing – that he posted more than 30 videos of them on YouTube under the name MrChimp2007. Kellett’s taking it well – approximately two years’ probation and 280,000 views.
4. I don’t know which is dumber: that the now-infamous New Yorker cover featuring the Obamas in muslim dress and paramilitary garb is that it failed to spark a dialogue about the smear campaign that it tried to lampoon, or the fact that the story it was illustrated for had nothing to do with the smear campaign that it tried to lampoon and everything to do with what a calculating and cynical Chicago pol Obama is.
5. Miley Cyrus told TV Guide that she hopes to make a nice clean, teen version of Sex and The City. I’d say she already has.
Posted on July 18, 2008