How great is THAT?!

From the BBC:

Hundreds of Paris Hilton albums have been tampered with in the latest stunt by "guerrilla artist" Banksy.
Banksy has replaced Hilton's CD with his own remixes and given them titles such as Why am I Famous?, What Have I Done? and What Am I For?
He has also changed pictures of her on the CD sleeve to show the US socialite topless and with a dog's head.
A spokeswoman for Banksy said he had doctored 500 copies of her debut album Paris in 48 record shops across the UK.
She told the BBC News website: "He switched the CDs in store, so he took the old ones out and put his version in."
It might be that there will be some people who agree with his views on the Paris Hilton album
HMV spokesmanBut he left the original barcode so people could buy the CD without realising it had been interfered with.
Banksy is notorious for his secretive and subversive stunts such as sneaking doctored versions of classic paintings into major art galleries.
His spokeswoman said he had tampered with the CDs in branches of HMV and Virgin as well as independent record stores.
He visited cities including Bristol, Brighton, Birmingham, Newcastle, Glasgow and London, she added.
A spokesman for HMV said the chain had recovered seven CDs from two Brighton shops but was unaware that other locations were affected.
Artistic leeway
No customers had complained or returned a doctored version, he said.
"It's not the type of behaviour you'd want to see happening very often," he said.
"I guess you can give an individual such as Banksy a little bit of leeway for his own particular brand of artistic engagement.
"Often people might have a view on something but feel they can't always express it, but it's down to the likes of Banksy to say often what people think about things.
"And it might be that there will be some people who agree with his views on the Paris Hilton album."
A spokesman for Virgin Megastores said staff were searching for affected CDs but it was proving hard to find them all.
"I have to take my hat off - it's a very good stunt," he added.

Learn more about our new hero Bansky here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banksy

Biking to Work

Riding my bike to work has been interesting.

I've made the acquaintance of several nice people - other cyclists and a couple of motorists.

I've nearly been hit twice - which resulted in a bit of yelling on my part.

And last week I saw my favorite TV star.

But probably the most interesting thing is what happened today. I was stopped at a red light and a fellow biker pulled up along side of me.

"I just want you to know," he said, "when I get married, I want my wife to look just like you."

What a complement! Even if it did come from a homeless man missing his two front teeth.

So I told my girlfriend T about this great tile I had seen. It said:

I think I'll just skip my medicine today and surprise everyone!

Then T said that one of her favorite saying has always been:

Men are like tiles - lay them right the first time and you can walk all over them.


Got any tile jokes of your own?

I See Buckeyes

Yesterday we flew to Austin to watch #2 ranked Texas take on #1 ranked Ohio State at the Daryl K. Royal Texas Memorial Football Stadium. This is the biggest football event to take place in Austin – ever – as two storied programs with the top rankings meet during the second week of the season. Planes into Austin were packed. Thirty thousand buckeyes have made their way here even though The University gave them only 4,000 seats for the game.

My plane was filled with burnt orange shirts, caps, even luggage, and as I got only the last leg of my flight, it was even filled with a little red. I made my way down the aisle, trading Hook ‘em’s at every step and found my seat – right smack dab next to the enemy.

A big burly black man about 6’5” 250lbs, who looked like he could snap a man’s neck with no more effort than popping his knuckles, stood and let me take the middle seat beside him. I grunted my apprehension/appreciation stored my burnt orange back in the overhead and sat down beside him.

“You have tickets to the game?” I ventured. Texans are never rude.

“Of course,” he sounded surprised by the question.

“I heard a bunch of Buckeyes are coming just to show support. You guys have rented out the entire Erwin Center (basketball arena) for your pep rally.”

“No kidding,” now he was really surprised.

We were quiet for a bit, and then I leaned over to quietly confess, “I’m a little nervous.”

For the first time he really looked at me, then he said in a slow soothing voice, “Ah, it’ll be alright.”

“It will?”

“Yeah,” he let the word linger there to comfort me.

For a moment we were distracted by other passengers, and I got the strange impression that he was so kind to me because he thought I just admitted that I was afraid to fly.

“No, I’m not nervous about flying. I’m nervous -”

“About the game. I know. To tell you the truth,” he whispered, “I’m nervous too. I’m just trying not to show it. Putting up a brave front.”
At that moment a longhorn sat down in front of us. He turned and asked my Buckeye, “Excited about the game?”

He was speechless.

“We’re cool,” I said.

“Yeah. We’re cool,” he echoed. And so I befriended a Buckeye.

When I John about my adventure (he was on a different flight) he was flabbergasted. “Consorting with the enemy! I thought you were a better judge of character than that!”
I just smiled. Maybe I’ll see my Buckeye at the game.

It’s no secret that Texans ain’t too fond of Californians

“They dress funny, talk funny, and sure as hell eat funny. I mean, who the hell ever heard of eating raw fish?” you might hear a Texan ask.

Never mind that the same things could be said of them with their cowboy boots, starched Wranglers, belt buckles and Stetsons and their insistence that a meal isn’t a meal unless you’ve eaten a dead animal.

Though I was born and raised in Texas and still feel an undeniable, intrinsic attraction to its ways, I am unabashedly more at home in California. I blend in seamlessly with the tank-top, flip-flop wearing, sushi-eating, liberal view-espousing crowd.

So it is with a different perspective that I see and enjoy my native state when I return.

After our wedding we spent a few days at a B&B in the hill country. Our private cabin opened out to a field where we watched the deer each evening. In the morning we could hear distant cows bray and quail coo. This little B&B boasted a renowned chef who’s been featured in publications such as Gourmet Magazine. Each morning we were delighted and stunned by what he considered breakfast: three courses, every one with generous portions of devastatingly rich concoctions. That’s when it occurred to me that Texans are trying to kill Californians with butter!

“This morning we’ll start with strawberries and blueberries in heavy cream and your choice of an almond Basque tart or a raspberry lemon scone served with butter, jams and thick cream. Then for breakfast [as if that other stuff were a mere crumb] we have your choice of pancakes with hot maple syrup and our homemade pork sausage or a cheese and mushroom frittata served with mashed potatoes [with butter] and bacon.”

Each morning I plowed through the fruit, the pastry [which I’m sure contained an entire stick of butter per serving] and as much of the actual breakfast as I could manage. And each morning I had to make a mad dash back to the cabin because I was utterly sick to my stomach from the richness of the meal.

Not to worry, though. We rounded out our meals of butter and heavy cream with generous helpings barbeque and beans. When we found one barbeque join that served canned green beans I sat down and ate an entire heaping mound of them all by myself.

Needless to say, I’m glad to be back home in California - where I can finally get a cup of coffee with skim milk instead of cream.

Favorite Wedding Moment #7

This isn’t exactly a favorite moment but it’s a continuation in the wedding cup size saga, so I thought I should include it.

Recap: Bought beautiful sleek wedding dress and had first fitting. Exercised like crazy to look good in sleek dress and went second fitting. The bust of the dress seemed to have ballooned – the only place, apparently, that I had lost any weight.

As fate would have it, the day before we flew to Austin I stopped by the neighborhood boutique to show the owner the amazing necklace her dad (the neighborhood jeweler) had made for me. We chitchatted and I told her about the ironic turn in events of my cup size. She grabbed a little pink box off the counter and handed me the miracle of plastic boobs. “Here, try these. They’re even grope tested!” she said.

So those were packed in the suitcase along with everything else. And as I dressed for the wedding I slipped them in my dress (where my previous larger boobs used to be) and marveled at myself in the mirror. For the first time in my life I had cleavage. I wanted to keep standing in front of the mirror groping my own amazing new boobs, but somebody was saying something about taking pictures and I had to go.

The plastic contraptions served me well all through the pre-wedding photos, the ceremony, the first dance, and the dinner. All until I took a moment to slip outside with John. When we came back inside we were whisked to the stage for toasts and then off to cut the cake and greet the guests. As we walked back toward the dance floor my hand brushed waist where I felt the unmistakable bulge of a very grope-able plastic boob.

I ran to the back of the room grabbing the photographer on my way to act as my shield. I reached inside, readjusted, restored the cleavage and asked, “Was that there while you photographed the cake and toasts?” “I don’t know. I guess we’ll find out,” she said wide-eyed.

The pictures will be available on September 25th.