Please say this isn't a prelude to blackface

Oh, Rod Blagojevich, how can we miss you if you won't go away?

In an interview with Esquire, Blago says he's "blacker than Barack Obama."

Pray tell why, good sir.

"I shined shoes. I grew up in a five-room apartment. My father had a little laundromat in a black community not far from where we lived. I saw it all growing up."

For good measure, he also threw in a "What the [fudgesicle]? Everything he's saying's on the teleprompter."

Speaking later on TV, but presumably not on a teleprompter, Blago said that when it came to blackness, he was "speaking metaphorically" but it was "a very stupid thing to say."

Paul, what happened?

After I wrote that I always thought the actress who played Winnie Cooper on The Wonder Years, Danica McKellar, would marry the kid who played Paul Pfeiffer, loyal reader Coach K sent this update on Paul, whose real name is Josh Saviano.


Yikes.

Fine for Senate!

Yesterday I pleaded for some ideas for this blog, and someone must've been listening. That someone must've been Fran Drescher, who tells New York magazine she wants to be the next U.S. Senator from New York.

That's right, the woman who played the Nanny Fine on TV (145 episodes, 1993-1999) now says, "I was thinking I’d take the next four years to lay some groundwork, but I’m throwing my hat in the ring."

I am coming out in support of the Drescher candidacy because it's the only logical step America can take after the Schwarzenegger governorship.

I don't know if New York Gov. David Paterson reads this blog, but hopefully he does and will heed my call: Please, please please appoint Fran Drescher to the Senate when Hillary Clinton resigns.

Zuma Nesta Rock

Singers Gavin Rossdale and Gwen Stefani have a new son, and as is the law for children born into celebrity in Los Angeles, he has a crazy name.

Please welcome Zuma Nesta Rock, which sounds like "a water park ride or a new energy drink," according to baby name expert Whitney Walker.

That's a little harsh, Whit, especially because that was the name I had hoped to use for my first kid (albeit if my first kid were a girl).

Zuma really reminds me of the chorus from a Wreckx-N-Effect song, which is only kind of safe for work.

Celebrities -- They're just like us

Celebrities are just like us, but only richer and prettier and hounded by the paparazzi. Witness:

They like ice cream. Here's Kim Kardashian showing how she maintains her voluptuous figure.

They forget to brush their hair. Here's Amy Winehouse, just being her wonderful self. I think she might be a zombie.

They downsize for better mileage. What do you be that Shaq weighs more than this Smart Car?

Take a long hard look at yourself

Sometimes I wonder what has happened to me.

I saw a wire story yesterday about Jamie Lynn Spears unveiling her baby daughter in OK Magazine. Apparently, she had her kid three weeks ago, but I didn't find out about it until yesterday.

Have I really fallen that far down the gossip food chain? Celebrities used to be a staple of this blog's diet. If you're a new reader, take a gander at what this link wroughts.

Well, better late than never for me to make fun of the Spears family.

According to OK, the delivery of little Maddie Briann was "perfect," and that the baby has made 17-year-old Jamie Lynn's fiance Casey Aldridge "so happy, and that made me the happiest person alive."

Aldridge is identified by the Associated Press as a pipe-layer. I'll say.

Jamie Lynn says her mom Lynne Spears is a hands-on grandmother. "Just follow your instincts," Lynne told Jamie Lynn. "You're the mother and you know what your baby needs. That's what I've done and it seems to have worked."

Damn straight it worked. One daughter is a mother at 17 and the other is a certifable nutcase. Way to go, Lynne! Parent of the Year!

Fertility, thy name is Spears

Jamie Lynn Spears has gone and spoiled the most-anticipated countdown to 18 since Natalie Portman.

The 16-year-old actress and sister of Britney Spears tells the gossip magazine OK in a WORLD EXCLUSIVE that she's a couple weeks pregnant.

Asked what sort of message she might be sending to her teen fans, she said, "I definitely don't think it's something you should do; it's better to wait. But I can't be judgmental because it's a position I put myself in."

The position she's referring to, of course, is supine.

There are a couple reports that Jamie Lynn's mom, Lynne, let the girl live with the boyfriend. At age 16. And to think this news surfaced only after Time named its Person of the Year. Mamma Spears would've been a shoe-in.

Jamie Lynn plans to raise the baby in her home state of Louisiana -- "so it can have a normal family life."

Another good reason to move there is to avoid statutory rape charges for her 19-year-old boyfriend Casey Aldridge.

I never thought I'd say this, but let's just hope Casey's as good a dad as Kevin Federline.

You can be my Yoko Ono

One-time NaturalBlog crush Jessica Simpson has been going out with the quarterback of America's Team, the Cowboys' Tony Romo. She attended yesterday's game against the Eagles in Dallas, where Romo had three interceptions, two fumbles and hurt his right (caressing) hand.

Tony's got back luck when his girlfriend is in the stands. Last year, he choken when his flame Carrie Underwood came to watch.

See that's why I like Tom Brady. He's always his best when the pressure is on, like when you only have one shot to conceive before breaking up with your girlfriend.

She can be taught

I wrote a week ago about how Britney Spears and I have the same phone. While I mainly use mine for talking and texting, she likes to use hers as a mask.

You can see she's getting smarter, because she's now using its sideways flip feature to keep photographers from seeing her beautiful face, and her bloodshot eyes from seeing the road.

Phoning it in (again)

A lot of the NaturalBlog's friends and colleagues have been showing of iPhones lately. They're pretty much the coolest phone ever, and I was starting to have a little telephone envy, to be honest.

See, a few weeks ago I bought this sweet flip phone, the Samsung u740, which opens both tall and wide for talking and texting, respectively. (Wide at right.) I thought it was pretty nice, until my friends started watching YouTube videos on their touch-screens.

Well, I'm happy to say I'm back among the cool people, because these paparazzi photos show that Britney also has the Samsung u740.

As you can see, our phone isn't a very good face covering, but I bet the iPhone is.

Jan, Jan, Jan

In what might be the most desperate move by a former celebrity since Darva Conger posed in Playboy, Marcia Brady will admit in her upcoming autobiography that she had a lesbian fling with her TV sister Jan. Well, not Marcia, but Maureen McCormick. And not Jan, of course, but actress Eve Plumb.

According to the National Enquirer (how's that for sourcing?):

The most explosive comments will be how the then-blonde, blue-eyed cutie developed a crush on Eve Plumb, which led to some sexual play. This book will certainly come as a shocker. While Maureen is not a lesbian, she reveals there were some sexual hijinks going on behind the scenes.

McCormick said in 1997 that she had a crush on Plumb and admitted the two had kissed.

Who knows what other details her book will reveal, but if McCormick left Plumb broken hearted, it would certainly explain the method behind fine acting like this:

Vegan skin

For a lot of guys, it was 1995 when they first fell in love with Alicia Silverstone, thanks to the great commercial success of Clueless. For me, it was 1993's The Crush. Never before (nor since) have I wanted to be Cary Elwes so much.

I caught part of Clueless on TV on Monday and wondered what Alicia was up to. Absent a cover shoot for Shape Magazine earlier this year (Mrs. N-B subscribes), I didn't really know what she was up to.

The answer came this week, when PETA unveiled Silverstone as a new spokeswoman. In this Internet ad she emerges naked from a pool to tell us she's a vegetarian. She's actually a vegan, but that's too hard a sell, even from a naked girl.

Nice production values there, but there's not a whole lot more skin shown than in 1993. Nudity? As if.

Chris Klein, I like your style

I think it's safe to say that "actor" Chris Klein and I have the same taste in women. He was with Katie Holmes, back before she became insane. And now he's with Big Love star Ginnifer Goodwin, my favorite graduate of Big University (BU). I've liked both of them for a while.


Both have a lot going for them -- cascading dark hair, great cheekbones, successful careers.

Since Klein and I have such similar tastes, I'm a little worried he might come after Mrs. NaturalBlog next. Maybe I should hide her with the remains of Klein's career -- he hasn't been able to figure out where that went for several years.

Marcia Brady: Coke fiend

The periodical of record (that would be People Magazine) says that Maureen McCormick, who played Marcia Brady and thus informed millions of boys what their ideal mate would look and act like, was bulimic after the show ended in 1974. It wasn't long before she found a better way to keep her weight under control, though. That would be a cocaine habit.

What's more unbelievable? The cocaine, or the fact that her husband had never seen an episode of The Brady Bunch before they started dating?

This has all come to light after her appearance on the upcoming edition of Celebrity Fit Club, in which she tried to drop 30 pounds.

I have unfortunately been unable to find you a fat picture of Marcia Brady. So this picture with her cute-but-no-Marcia daughter will have to do.

Celebrities -- They're just like us

Sometimes they have a miscommunication with their stylist.


Sometimes they forget to wear pants.


Sometimes they dress in drag and pose next to slightly smaller-than-life cardboard cut-outs of themselves.

Who be my Brady daddy?

There's some tarnish on the golden boy. Tom Brady has fathered a kid out of wedlock. At least according to his ex-girlfriend Bridget Moynahan.

It's been a rough couple of weeks for Tom Terrific. First he throws an interception to end the AFC championship game, then as soon as he pulls off the rare and vaunted actress-for-Victoria Secret model switch (he's been dating Gisele Bundchen since December), he gets hit with this: a baby momma.

I guess all that talk about Tom's completion percentage being down this season was overblown. He was able to find an open receiver just fine; it was the protection that was the problem.

Thoughts on celebrity photo shoots

You may have heard that celebutant Nicole Richie was arrested for bad driving. She came in at a whopping 85 pounds in her post-arrest weigh-in. Scales at the police department? Must be a California thing. Anyway, I think she looked pretty good in her mug shot, at left. Did she toussle her hair that way on purpose, or are the half-bangs simply good luck? I'd also like to see if she's just wearing a wife-beater, or if there's a clever slogan on her shirt. "Little Miss fill-in-the-blank," perhaps.

Funny, she looks better in her mug shot than she does in tabloid magazines. She is definitely in the upper echelon of mug shots. For comparison, take a look at Yasmine Bleeth, Carmen Electra, and my fave of faves Vince Vaughn, all arrested while allegedly drunk.


As Borat might say, "Not so much." I can actually smell the booze on Vaughn from here.

Of course, none of those three can even hold a candle to the patron saint of mug shots, Nick Nolte. He was arrested in a joint operation between the state police and the fashion police, who charged him with crimes against humanity for his shirt and hair. The booking agent must have been laughing so hard, he just snapped a photo in front of some wall and a door, instead of the usual blue background.

How could anyone hate sunshine

I found myself on the Rachael Ray bandwagon about three months ago, when she was everywhere to promote of her new show on ABC. Usually, all those extra letters in her first name (well, just one extra letter, I guess) would have been enough for me to dismiss her outright, but not so this time.

Good thing, too, as it appears she needs all the fans she can get -- to counteract the pure evil of Rachael Ray Sux. Rule No. 1 in this community of hate: "You must be anti-Rachael!" Also: "Do not flame other members. Save your hate for Rachael!"

To be fair, some of the posts -- uncovered yesterday in the NYT -- make me laugh, like this one from Nov. 25: "OMG she just used her knife to cut open her package of chicken and I swear to god, she threw the knife right back into the drawer. Gross!"

That is gross, but not as gross as her ex-husband's desire to be with spitting lesbian hookers, according to the National Enquirer, anyway.

I can see this post is going down a dark path, so I'm going to wrap it up with this nice picture.

TomKat? More like CopyKat

Some people might be miffed to have major celebrities (like Suri) so blatantly rip off their honeymoon plans, but I feel honored that Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes are in Italy to get married, just a few days after Mrs. NaturalBlog and I got back from Italy on our luna di miele. After all, imitation is a form of flattery.

I even have some tips for the happy couple.

Tom and Katie -- be sure to try and eat at the Ragno D'oro Trattoria (Via Silla 26 in Rome). It's near the Vatican and came on the recommendation of a coworker. I'd call ahead for a prenotazione, though. We were there on a weekday night and it was packed.

You'll probably be spending some time in the countryside. Be sure to seek out Le Vigne de I Selvatici, which is a winery in the hillside Tuscan town of Montevarchi. Have the Vin Santo, which got a 98 in Wine Spectator. If you're lucky you'll even get to try the 1956 vintage. I'm sure you'll get along great with the proprietor who couldn't stop talking about how Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Rothlisberger came by over the summer to taste some wines. Big Ben even bought the '56, a bargain at 500 Euro (~$650) for a 500 ml bottle. Of course, there are only 200 left, so maybe it was worth it.

Finally, you should try to sneak in a visit to the Papal blessing, on Wednesdays in Saint Peter's Square. I know you guys practice a different religion, but it couldn't hurt to snag a blessing for that little baby of yours.

Fake Elizabeth Hurley costs only slightly less than real Elizabeth Hurley

This is something funny I saw on Gawker. The Austin Powers FemBot mock up was on sale on e-bay. I'd link you to it, but it was taken down yesterday. Perhaps because the page contained NSFW jubblies. Before her demise, she was just $3,000 and -- believe it or not -- nobody had bid yet.

I can't pick my favorite part of the description. It's either 1) that she works on a 9-volt battery, or 2) that there are holes for firearms where her nipples would be, but that the gun barrels that pop out of her boobs are sold separately.