The Strange Case of Carlos Estevez

Courtesy of http://www.vchannelnews.com/

I'm gonna hop on the bandwagon for a minute.

Most of us know "Carlos Estevez" as Charlie Sheen, the actor who is currently dominating all of the entertainment/gossip media outlets with Napoleonic zeal.  I was laying in bed last night listening to My Husband snore and I came up with a Charlie Sheen theory.

Don't get agitated, it's just a theory.  It's something to engage my brain when I can't sleep and it's your bad luck I'm capable of typing it up and posting it on the Internet for the world (or my current 12 viewers...10 from the United States, 1 from China and 1 from Singapore, hey guys!) to see.

I think Charlie Sheen is dying.  I think his foray to the hospital for severe abdominal pain a few months ago resulted in some terminal test results.  I think Sheen's long history of abusing recreational drugs and alcohol have caused a number of chronic conditions and culminated in pancreatic cancer.

So he gets this diagnosis and has himself a little reflection time.  He thinks about the survival rate for pancreatic cancer, the effects of chemo and the media coverage of Farrah Fawcett and Patrick Swayze's recent demises and deaths.  And honestly, I think he decided, "Fuck it.  I've got months to live and I'm gonna live them exactly how I want to.  I'm gonna say what I want, do what I want, live with a mini-harem and get my face on camera whenever I have the chance.  I'm not gonna keep going to a job where I hate the people.  I'm gonna suit myself."

I think the guy is James Deaning-it...living fast and dying how he wants to.  Not emaciated or bloated from futile radiation treatment.  Not in a hospital bed where he's too weak to get himself to the bathroom.  Not in rehab ruminating with a counselor about his many addictions and tormented with withdrawal symptoms.  He wants to be in his house: drunk, stoned or having sex with people who know EXACTLY what they're doing. 

He doesn't want to be pitied or fawned over or reminisced with.  Charlie Sheen doesn't want to linger and say anguished goodbyes.  He wants to sear himself into our memories as a shining example of talent and passion that flashes white-hot and burns out quickly. 

Courtesy of http://www.taramtamtam.com/

Maybe it's a still a secret because his doctor can't legally give interviews about his condition (doctor/patient confidentiality).  Maybe that's why he looks so pallid and skinny. Maybe Denise Richards knows and that's why she's been so supportive.  Maybe Brooke Mueller doesn't and that's why she hasn't.  Maybe that's why Martin Sheen referred to his son's addictions as a "cancer."  Maybe Charlie doesn't want to work because he's got a kickass life insurance policy that will provide for his five children the rest of their lives.

Am I projecting a Shakespearean attitude or a tragic Greek eloquence on a guy who may just have Swiss-cheese-crazy-brain from cocaine and booze?  Possibly.  Sheen could also be another Hollywood asshole who's cashing in on his notoriety Spencer Pratt-style.  But I like my Charlie better.  And I think he would, too.

Hypersensitivity

I'm not sure I can adequately describe how I feel after the morning I've had so far.  Feel free to read this and say, "Oh, she is SO hypersensitive I have no idea how anyone can be around her."  Sometimes I don't know myself.

On Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings I volunteer at a no-kill animal shelter about 20 miles from here.  There's a school zone a few blocks from it with one of those flashing 20mph signs.  Today a cop was hanging out on the side of the road.  As I approached him, he stuck his hand out the window and pointed down to the pavement a few times; I assumed it meant he wanted me to slow down.  So I did.

Obviously to some of you this doesn't seem like much, but I have this terrible guilt when I'm corrected by an authority figure.  I mean, he didn't even follow me or anything, but it still tweaked me to the point where I felt bad for having been "that person" who needs to be told to slow down in a school zone.

Anyway, I got to the shelter this morning and tried to put it out of my mind.  I walked some dogs, gave a little extra love to one who can't play for two weeks because he's being treated for heartworm and got in my car to go home.

A good chunk of the 20 miles between the shelter and my home is a two-lane state road with a 70mph speed limit.  I ususally go between 70 and 75mph in the left (what I was taught was the "fast" lane).  I was coming up behind a Lincoln in the left lane that must have been going, like, 60mph...cars were passing it on the right.  Unfortunately, as soon as I decided to be one of those cars, a D.O.T. truck appeared in the distance just over the line of the breakdown lane.

In this state you're supposed to move over a lane if you're passing a stopped vehicle on the side of the highway.  I couldn't pass the slow Lincoln on the right fast enough to get back to the left lane and give the truck its space, so I ended up passing right beside this D.O.T. truck (and its driver, who was standing next to the driver's side door) at about 60mph.  The driver had to move around to the front of the vehicle to avoid me.

So I got about 4 seconds of his enraged face filling my windshield and his mouth twisting into just about every disgusting name one can call a female as I passed.  It was harrowing to see him so angry at me. 

Maybe if either of these occurences had been it for my day I wouldn't have minded so much.  But I'm on the superstitious side, and I think bad things come in threes and the third one is usually the worst.

I continued on my way, now very eager to get home and driving a good deal UNDER the speed limit in the right lane when I pulled up behind a tractor-trailer.  It had open slats all along the trailer and was stacked to bursting with pillows.  Their stuffing peeked out of every slat all along the length of the vehicle.  Except as I got closer I realized they weren't pillows...they were live, white chickens.

I got physically ill.  Not from any kind of smell, but from the sight of hundreds of chickens stuffed haphazardly into their crates.  Wings, beaks, feet and bits of flesh and feathers were protruding from every angle and fluttering wildly in the wind.  I could see their eyes blink against gravel kicked up by the spinning tires; I could see some with a few inches to spare attempt to peck themselves clean.  And I may be overreacting, but all I could think about were those drawings in our history textbooks of African slaves piled into wooden ships and the descriptions of the cattle cars Nazis stuffed their "undesirables" into, where people were packed so tightly one could faint from lack of oxygen and stay upright.

All that suffering just to go somewhere else to die.

I was stuck behind that repulsive vehicle for eight minutes before it pulled off the road and onto another.  I came home and threw up my breakfast.  I'm still trying to soothe my stomach as I write this.

It was...it was just an awful morning for me.  I'm trying to focus on Buoy right now, who is happily chewing her Nylabone® next to me on the sofa.  I wish My Husband was home so I could tell him what happened.  He'd hug me and tell me "It's alright," and that he loves how sensitive and that it's an advantage and not the weakness it feels like at this moment.  But he's at work, and will be for the next ten hours, so I'm telling you.
I tell myself I don't have the "strength of will" to be a vegetarian or vegan.  I know, deep down, that if I subject myself to chickens having their beaks twisted off in hatcheries or pigs being slaughtered with a nailgun to the forehead or cows being rolled with a forklift from one pen to another because they can't stand I will never touch animal flesh again.

So what do I do?  I avoid those visuals, those descriptions at all costs.  I COULD be a vegetarian.  I actively prevent myself from living that life.

But as I sit here I remember those chickens, and I've never felt so spineless. 

The "List"

Have you guys ever played that game where you make a list of the celebrities you’re “allowed” to sleep with no matter what kind of actual relationship you’re in?  You may remember it as a storyline on a second-season episode of Friends (with Ross' laminated list and a guest spot by Isabella Rossellini). 

When I was in college we used to sit at the university-exclusive (no entry without an ID) pub and discuss it with everyone who popped in for a sandwich and a beer.  It made for some interesting conversation and seems to be a great way to figure out what attracts you to the opposite (or same) sex.

My personal list has morphed slightly over the years: Colin Farrell was on the original but got bumped when he grew out that greasy hair…Bear Grylls of Discovery Channel fame was there for a while but I crossed him off after watching him anally rehydrate himself with his own urine.  Even fake relationships can only handle so much.

Still, it’s pretty easy to see I have a type.  Google some photos of these guys...it'll make your day better, I promise:

1.       MARK VALLEY, actor (mostly television): Valley may be best known for his turn on Boston Legal, but I fell in love with him on Fox’s Keen Eddie years ago.  The show didn’t last but the DVDs are worth the Netflix…Keen Eddie was Sienna Miller’s American television debut.  He currently plays the main character on Fox’s Human Target.  The guy is basically the personification of testosterone.  His build, his face and his voice are all completely and deliciously male.  Plus he’s an army veteran.  Catching on to my type yet?

2.       MIKE ROWE, “media personality”: Rowe is another example of my addiction to classic masculinity.  His degree is in Communications and he’s done extensive television work, including developing and hosting Dirty Jobs on the Discovery Channel.  He’s funny, loyal (his crew’s been the same from the get-go) and he loves his mom.  And I’m a sucker for a nice baritone.

3.       NICHOLAS GONZALEZ, actor (TV & movies): I first noticed Gonzalez when he was a visiting detective on a mission on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.  Then he popped up on my Grey’s Anatomy successor Off the Map.  Turns out he’s not only a hottie, but an exceptional student with a degree from Stanford and two terms at Oxford under his belt.  His character on Off the Map grows cocaine, but obviously I’m hoping that won’t result in a police shootout death scene anytime soon.

4.       ANDREW LEE POTTS, actor (British TV & movies): As the anti-hero Hatter on Syfy Channel’s miniseries Alice, Lee Potts was introduced to legions of American fans even though he’s been on British TV for more than a decade.  He’s a main cast member on ITV’s Primeval, about a team of scientists and students who travel around Britain catching creatures from the past and future that slip into our world through slits in time.  If you’re interested, there’s a ton of original music videos celebrating his scenes from Alice (where he’s not only clever and quirky, but sits stoically through a torture session meant to break him) on Youtube.

5.       CHRIS LEAK, football player (University of Florida & CFL): Even though his NFL dreams seem to continue getting waylaid, Leak is a very talented quarterback with a long history of academic achievement and volunteer work.  Parade Magazine featured him as its 2003 High School Football Player of the Year, and I actually cut out his photo and kept it in my locker.  It’s hard to make the Canadian Football League watchable, but Leak does it.

On Deck (I apparently have given this a lot of thought):

·         RYAN LOCHTE, professional swimmer: I’ve always thought dancers have the best “feminine” figures and swimmers have the best “masculine” shapes.  Lochte is an excellent example AND he has a face to match.  He’s often overshadowed by Olympic teammate Michael Phelps, but his record at the University of Florida was stellar and he continues to be a real force in the swimming world.  I also appreciate this upstate New Yorker’s ability to stay out of the spotlight, something Phelps has some trouble with.

Try this with your friends.  You may be surprised at their answers and change some of your own J

Papa Don't Preach



Courtesy of http://www.madisonavenuejournal.com/

 So Mr. Mike Huckabee visited radio host Mike Medved on his show March 3rd and proceeded to have an incredibly offensive conversation about single motherhood, something Huckabee and Medved (based on their mutual possession of a Y chromosome) undoubtedly have no firsthand knowledge of.  You can find the bulk of the conversation here.


Anyway, Mike & Mike spent some time lamenting how Natalie Portman "glamorized" having a baby out-of-wedlock when she thanked her soon-to-be-husband from the stage in her Oscar acceptance speech Sunday for giving her "my greatest role ever."  Huckabee said she sets a bad example, since she's minus a husband and has plenty of money for nannies and other such indulgences to help her care for her child.  Obviously he assumes highly impressionable females (Oh, poor lil' ole me!  I seem to be sufferin' from the vay-pehs.) will equate Portman's decades long career with the fact she's having a baby...with the man she's going to marry...at age 29. 

So I'll fight ranting with ranting.  Thank you for your insight, Mike Huckabee!  Before I heard your opinion, I honestly thought if I got knocked up by a dancer I'll automatically become a rich and famous actress and former child star!

Courtesy of http://www.celebuzz.com/

As if pinning a scarlet letter to Portman's Academy Awards dress is not enough, he said (I'll paraphrase) most single mothers are poor and uneducated and their numerous children are one welfare check away from starvation and typhus and dyslexia and communism.  But does he once mention MTV's extremely lucrative 16 and Pregnant or Teen Mom shows?  As My Husband wisely pointed out to me, these shows are much more likely to induce teens to conceive based on the hefty paychecks MTV shells out to the show's participants.

How about Ms. Bristol Palin?  Former governor Sarah Palin's daughter is one of the most famous American single mothers in recent history, but did her turn on Dancing with the Stars or her interviews with E! News about her new life in Arizona make it onto the radio rant as an inappropriate model of solo parenting?  Not so much.

If you'll allow me, I'll close with a little common sense.  I don't think ANY WOMAN in the history of humanity has ever considered raising a child alone to be a cakewalk.  I am sure there are women (and men, for that matter) who've used and abused their children and their place as parents for their own gain (uhh, Joe Jackson, anyone?). 

And as I've recently said: classy, educated and compassionate people like Natalie Portman (she financed a line of vegan shoes) are the people we want to be parents.  I hope she has ten kids and they all turn out like her.

Bottom line, Huckabee's comments about Portman (and the Oscars, for that matter) were completely judgemental and some of the least Christian words I've ever heard from a minister's mouth.



*As always, all photos in this blog are for illustrative purposes only and I am in NO WAY, SHAPE OR FORM profiting from their publication or claiming them as personal property.  Thank you!

Comfort Food

Our dog Buoy ate my loofah this morning.  Do you think that counts as having her teeth brushed?

As I told you in a previous post, My Husband has been working EXTREMELY long hours...almost 80 hours a week like some stockbroker or ER doc.  I decided to surprise him and make one of his favorite dishes for dinner: chicken pot pie.  I altered a recipe I found on http://www.allrecipes.com/ and it was quite a success (if I do say so myself).  I was actually surprised at the recipe’s simplicity, since chicken pot pie seems complicated to me.  Don’t tell your guests how easy it was, just bask in the glow of being a domestic diva J

LARK'S COMFORT CHICKEN POT PIE

Ingredients:

• 1 pound skinless, boneless chicken breast – cubed
• 1 tsp minced garlic
• Splash of olive oil
• 1 14oz can clear chicken broth
• 1 cup sliced carrots
• 1/2 cup sliced celery
• 1/3 cup butter
• 1/3 cup finely chopped onion
• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 3/4 cups chicken stock
• 2/3 cup milk
• 2 (9 inch) unbaked pie crusts
• 1 egg

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F (220 degrees C.)
2. In a saucepan, combine chicken, carrots, garlic and celery.  Add can of chicken broth and then enough water to cover and boil for 15 minutes. Remove from heat, drain and set aside.
3. In another saucepan over medium heat, cook onions in butter and olive oil until soft and translucent.  Stir in flour, salt and pepper.  Slowly stir in chicken stock and milk.  Simmer over medium-low heat until thick.  Remove from heat and set aside.
4. Grease the bottom and sides of a 9-inch pie pan or other deep glass dish (I used an 8”x4” Corningware dish).  Gently press one pie crust to fill the dish (I’ve never gone wrong with Pillsbury Refrigerated Pie Crusts.  Sometimes it’s the only thing in my pies people compliment J). 
5. Place pie pan or dish in oven for a few minutes until the bottom crust gets slightly golden.  This will prevent the pastry from being soggy.  Remove from oven.
6. Place the chicken mixture in bottom pie crust.  Pour hot liquid mixture over.  Make several small slits in the top crust to allow steam to escape.  Cover with top crust, fold edges in and seal.  Thicker edges will prevent burning.  If you’re using a pie pan, make sure you cover the edges with tin foil or a pie guard (available at most home stores) as soon as they turn golden brown (usually with about 15 minutes left to bake).  Press edges with fork to get those traditional pie grooves.
7. Scramble the egg in a separate dish.  Using a marinating brush, brush the top of the pie with the egg wash.  This will really make the top crust crunchy and awesome.
8. Bake in the preheated oven for about 30-35 minutes, or until pastry is golden brown and filling is bubbly.  Cool for ten minutes before serving.

So My Husband was really pleased to come home to that.  Plus, the recipe serves 4-6 people (depending on portion size) so he doesn’t mind having the leftovers tonight.  Since I caught the cold he had last weekend, I’m enjoying a cooking-free evening.

It Takes a Village...but What Kind?

I take a hard line on a few things…probation violation, molestation, Welfare reform, drunk driving.  I think rape should be punishable by life in prison (I’ll probably blog about that some other time).  But for the most part, I’m socially liberal.

I also appreciate Christian values.  I was raised Christian (my father is Catholic and my mother is Lutheran) and I have a large number of family members who are Conservative Presbyterians.  So I know that someone can believe absolutely that being gay is a sin.  I don’t believe that, but I know some people gain a lot of comfort from seeing the world in a certain way and as long as they don’t hurt people with said view they should probably just be left alone.

However, there are practicalities to life that need to be addressed, no matter what one’s religious views are.  I think gay men and women should, in every corner of the world, be allowed to adopt children.  According to a recent UNICEF report, there are between 143 million and 210 million orphans worldwide.  That doesn’t count foster kids, who are not technically orphaned but cannot live with their biological parents.  In the United States, Florida and Missouri still have laws banning gay men from adopting.

So anti-gay adoption agencies (oh, they’re out there, people) are basically saying they’d rather kids grow up “in the system” than in loving, if slightly "atypical" homes.  And yet, there are gay couples out there who will do ANYTHING to adopt and are barred at every turn, EVEN WHEN THE CHILD SHARES A BIOLOGICAL LINK WITH ONE OF THE APPLICANTS.  Check out this story to see what I mean:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41800437/ns/world_news-wonderful_world/?GT1=43001

This precious little boy spent two years in limbo because of bureaucratic homophobia.  Madonna adopted a little boy WHO HAS A PARENT and it took her mere months.  Samuel is the biological son of a man who happens to be homosexual and all of a sudden it takes two years and tens of thousands of dollars to get him home?  I think THESE ARE THE PEOPLE WE WANT TO BE PARENTS.  These are the people we want raising our next generation.

Not this guy.  Or the stepmother of this little girl.  Or these two monsters who actually PASSED the adoption application process.

Come on humanity.  You’d rather your youth be tortured by “acceptable” parents than raised by people who’d do anything to bring them home?

The Ahskahz, Dahlink!

Courtesy of http://www.gaelick.com/

Now, let me make one thing clear.  I LOVE the Academy Awards.  I love the dresses, the awkward commentators, the speeches, the movie clips.  I love them, I always have.

That being said, I may be a little biased when it comes to properly rehashing/reviewing last night’s show but I can’t believe everyone is harping on it so badly.  Yes, James Franco and Anne Hathaway weren’t your “showman” hosts of Oscars past like Billy Crystal and Steve Martin.  Hathaway is a star-struck brunette Betty from Archie Comics and Franco is a sloe-eyed, slow-talking stoner type.  Both are terrific actors but I don’t understand why everyone expected them to be any different than who they’ve been in Hollywood the past few years.  They were fine…the Academy tried something new and it wasn’t all-pleasing, big whoop.

I’ve also been hearing/reading a lot about the Kirk Douglas thing.  I thought it was great.  Oh, he had a stroke and he’s old and that’s uncomfortable to watch.  Get over it, people.  Stroke victims can gain back most of their brainpower even when they can’t get their speech perfected.  The guy could pick out Hugh Jackman and Colin Firth in a crowd with lights in his eyes.  Tell me the Academy trussed him up and sent him out there like a show dog.  Hell, no.  Kirk Douglas is NOBODY’S poodle.

And I swear, if I hear one more thing about The Social Network I’m gonna scream.  Yes, it’s a fascinating film based on a fascinating book based on a fascinating group of young men.  But it seems the older generations are so desperate to pack us into a box they can label and shelve they’re making a really big deal about a movie that isn’t as groundbreaking as they’re claiming.  The situation was groundbreaking, not the film that repeated it.

And to tell you the truth, the Winklevoss twins, billionaire genius Mark Zuckerberg and their Harvard pals DO NOT represent me or my peers.  I empathize a little more with the unemployed college-educated, the ratio of Americans who love an active duty soldier and the 74% of women whom author Eve Ensler writes are convinced they are under immense pressure to please everyone.  (Her book I am an Emotional Creature: the Secret Life of Girls around the World is totally worth the read.  I may review it here on the blog for fun.)

Moving on to more frivolous Oscar tidbits…Mila Kunis gets more gorgeous every minute.  Divorce does NOT become Scarlett Johansson (she looked like they chopped her hair after she got the fever and wrapped her in grandma’s curtains).  What was with all the wavy, down hair?  This is the Oscars!  You wanna look laid-back; go to the MTV Movie awards.  Get your hair did, ladies.



Courtesy of http://www.wireimage.com/



I want to be Helen Mirren when I grow up.  She’s stunning.  Penelope Cruz is the envy of new mothers everywhere.  Michelle Williams is one of the few naturally beautiful women in the world who can look amazing with all her hair cut off.  I thought all of Anne Hathaway’s looks were elegant, even though she did seem to change as much as the set.  Speaking of the set, even My Husband commented on how understated but dramatic it was.

There is only one other thing I feel the need to comment on.  I think it’s super-cute to bring your mom to the Academy Awards, but you need to make sure she gets the star wardrobe treatment.  That means the proper undergarments to go with her dress.  I’m talking to you, Justin Timberlake.  I guess that’s what happens when you go to the Oscars with your famous son and not your famous daughter.