Funny Strange is Lori Culwell's blog

Yeah, couldn't see that coming at all

So-- Mel Gibson and his Russian  baby mama have apparently broken up, and now they are getting restraining orders against each other and trying to work out custody arrangements and she's living off of credit cards, blah blah blah.

These two-- just, oh my God.  Do they not seem like a ticking time bomb of crazy, even in pictures where they are supposedly together and happy?

I know this sounds mean and I don't know either of them so who am I to talk, but....does this woman remind anyone else of the housekeeper from The Sopranos (the one with one leg who had an affair with Tony)?   She has that look in her eye like she was already coming unglued before she had crazy Mel Gibson's baby.  And, Mel Gibson, just don't even get me started on how you can see him around Santa Monica all the time, and how much he needs to get over himself, and how if you're in an elevator with him, he will wait for you to acknowledge his Mel Gibson-ness, so I can only imagine what it's like if you live with him and think you're going to be the one to change him, and he's this cipher of neediness who occasionally gets loaded and spews weird and hateful rhetoric about women and the Jews.   These two really fall under the "too weird for real life" category, like-- what do they talk about?  How do they do regular things like go to the grocery store and take out the garbage?   Are either of them capable of paying a bill, or getting a driver's license, or walking a dog?  I know, I know, they have people who do these things for them, but you see my point.  I don't think you'd call either of them "down to earth," so why would it be reasonable to think they could settle down and have a baby and be in a relationship and have that go well?

Also, how is it helpful for her to tell TMZ that she was dating him for two years while he was still married? Does she think that revelation is going to impact his divorce?  Or rather, does she think that her having his baby is even the tip of the iceberg of what must be in those divorce papers?  Ha!  Robin Gibson was with him for more than 20 years and had six kids with him-- I'm guessing the seventy bazillion dollars she's getting in that divorce settlement is holding back a dam of secrets and that it is probably impossible to surprise her at this point, and that she went "oh, crazy Russian girlfriend and love child?  Have fun with that.  I'm done."   I'm.  Just. Saying.

This is a situation for which the phrase "hot mess" was created.

There's Parkour, and then there's STOP DOING THAT! STOP IT!

Someone I know from high school works in production on that show “The Dudesons,” which I guess is this super hard-core version of Parkour. But, let’s be honest, I had to ask Stephan what “Parkour” even was, so it’s not like I’m totally hip in the world of “people flinging themselves off of buildings.” If you’re wondering, here’s Parkour, which I guess is best described as “controlled falling”:

I have the very same reaction to this as I had when I first saw the musical “STOMP,” which was that I’m really glad these people found a place to channel this weird talent, because for their entire lives, their parents were going “STOP DOING THAT! STOP BANGING ON THAT! GET OFF OF THE ROOF! JUST…..STOP IT!”

I’m serious. Can you imagine being the mom of one of those Parkour guys, and having a mini heart attack every single time you see them jump out of a tree? I know, this is exactly the same as when I have a dream, and I’m doing something like going to the ATM, and my meta-narrative voice says “Um, you could be flying,” but I’m too practical to do that, even in the dream.

So—the Dudesons. Are they Swedish or something? I went looking for this promo (below), and I ended up watching a clip of two guys hitting another guy in the balls with a baseball bat. Yikes!  Frankly, this falls into “Jackass” territory for me—a phenomenon that goes in the same place in my mind as “Da Ali G Show” and auditions for reality shows. Still—to each his/ her own. It seems like they are having a pretty good time, although I’m positive that somewhere (maybe in Sweden?), their moms are like “Why would you want to hurt yourself like that? Can’t you find a regular job?”   I will also say, I can't imagine what it's like to work on that show, and I hope my high school friend is alive at the end of the season. 

By the Way....

The notorious SCRAM alcohol ankle bracelet is back, and again I'm wondering how it works.  Do they bolt it into your skin, Terminator-style, so it senses the alcohol in your blood?  I'm assuming that it detects alcohol in your sweat, so I'm going to just go ahead and point out the obvious solution, which would be to only consume alcohol in a very cold room to make sure that you don't sweat out any of the booze, thereby alerting your parole officer, the judge, and TMZ that you have violated the terms of your bail agreement and need to be taken to jail.  Yikes!

Not that I would expect Lindsay Lohan to be smart enough to figure this out, but I did just want to point out that I did a whole post on how weird this was more than two years ago, and now it's back in the news.  She set it off again!  She's out on bail!   Watch out, drivers of Los Angeles!  She's on the loose, with no regard for the law. 

Seriously, someone needs to just take Lindsay Lohan to Montana and make her work on a farm.  It is sad to watch her spiral down like this.

By the Way....

This is rapidly becoming the blog where I say somewhat inappropriate things about the recently deceased, but I can't help myself.  Did you read where Gary Coleman's parents are shocked by his death, and they are demanding some answers?

I mean, Gary Coleman will certainly be missed as a wonderful memory from our collective childhoods as Arnold Jackson from Diff'rent Strokes, but (how to say this respectfully) he was a 42 year old man with an autoimmune disease that left him 4' 8".  He was on daily dialysis, had two kidney transplants, and God only knows what other health problems.  Come on.....aren't we surprised that he lived as long as he did?

I also hate to say this, but these are the parents that hadn't seen Gary Coleman in twenty years, since he successfully sued them for using all of his Diff'rent Strokes money, so I don't think their whole "outrage over his death" schtick is really going to fly.   A completely sad situation, any way you look at it.

Speaking of sad situations, what on earth is going on with Bret Michaels?  Did he just wear out his poor body in the eighties and nineties, playing in a rock and roll band?  Actually, I take it back-- he must be genetically predisposed to all these weird conditions, because I don't think a person could abuse their body worse than, say, Keith Richards, and he seems fine.  Yes, he LOOKS like the Cryptkeeper, but health-wise it's not like you're hearing about him having a hole in his heart and a stroke and a brain hemhorrage all in one week.   Also-- why does he still have his grimy hair extensions?  Wouldn't you think they'd take those out to operate on his brain?  I'm just saying.

I Am a One-Person James Cameron Protest

Remember that day back in 1998 when James Cameron declared himself “King of the World” and has been acting like the World’s Biggest Douchebag ever since?

Yeah, that was the day I decided to never again contribute to the James Cameron empire—I proudly maintain that I have never seen the movie “Titanic,” even when it’s free on tv, and also that I do not even know what "Avatar" is about, and that I will never again put my money toward anything James Cameron creates.  Admittedly, I did very much enjoy the “Terminator” movies, especially “Terminator 2,” but after witnessing that disgusting Cameronian display of ego and total lack of humility after Titanic, I am now actively making an effort to not contribute to that situation, and I want James Cameron to know that I am holding out. 

DO YOU HEAR THAT JAMES CAMERON?  YOUR TALENT IS BEING OVERSHADOWED BY YOUR ENORMOUS EGO.  YOU ARE TRYING TOO HARD.  I AM BOYCOTTING YOU.

I was reminded of my decade-long boycott the other night, when I saw an ad for the release of “Avatar,” with a headline exclaiming that it is the “MOST SUCCESSFUL MOVIE OF ALL TIME.”   See, this just reinforces my point—Avatar might be a perfectly entertaining movie, but the James Cameron Empire can’t even let me decide that for myself—it has to hit me over the head with the “James Cameron is God” media machine, and this makes me adhere even more stringently to my anti-Cameron bias, which, by the way, I honestly believe is the reason that “The Hurt Locker” won all those Academy Awards.  Kathryn Bigelow and James Cameron used to be married, did you know? Actually, James Cameron has been married five times, which I know you'll find very surprising, since clearly his first obligation is to his own precious artistic sensibilities.

I think the Academy does know that, and I think the “Best Picture” and “Best Director” honors were much more about knocking James Cameron down a peg, even though “The Hurt Locker” was a decent movie.    Hollywood politics in motion—not that James Cameron cares about this, SINCE HE’S THE GREATEST DIRECTOR OF ALL TIME, but I like to know that in my own little way, I am keeping him from actually realizing his dream of being KING OF THE WORLD.   

Locked Up Abroad, for Being a Bonehead

Listen, I know I am a website expert and all, but don't bother telling me that my blog has formatting problems, because it's on TYPEPAD and TYPEPAD IS WEIRD and yet I can't fix it because it's five years old and the links are so entrenched in the search engines that I would have to redirect every single one of them by hand if I switched over to the Wordpress backend I would like to switch over to, so that's just not happening.  I barely even have time to transfer the posts from the notebook, ok?   A whole platform switch with a bunch of reformatting?  Not going to happen.  So, get used to the big type/ small type/ entries being repeated problem, because in fact, the cobblers children have no shoes.

So-- the other day I was watching an episode of that show "Locked Up Abroad," even though I swore to myself that I would never do that, because YIKES.  I am always a nervous-type traveler anyway, like I'm going to be at a bazaar in a foreign country, and I'll be buying some beads or a stylish knick-knack, and suddenly I'll be in the slammer with no recourse because the beads actually had cocaine on them or something, or those were the sacred beads of their leader and I bought them without knowing, and then the joke will be on me.  Actually, I kind of always think this is going to happen, whether I'm traveling or not.

Right now, my husband is shaking his head like "Do you see the crazy I have to live with?"  Yes, this is his life.  

Anyhow, Locked Up Abroad-- not at ALL what I thought.  Turns out, it should be called "Locked Up for Being a Bonehead," because the guy they interviewed was caught trying to smuggle 2,400 grams of cocaine out of ECUADOR.  Yes, yes, it involved a nefarious scheme and a hotel room and his having to just take a bag of something to the airport for a local stranger, but COME ON.  If you are in Ecuador, and someone talks to you about a situation involving drugs, seriously-- RUN TO THE EMBASSY, because you are going to end up on Locked Up Abroad.  This is not going to work out for you, ok?  And then what happened to this guy will happen to you-- namely, you will go to prison, IN ECUADOR, for being a bonehead.   And they're interviewing the guy, and I'm thinking "how did you even get to Ecuador?  You are a bonehead."  He's in ECUADORIAN PRISON for three years, and God only knows what kinds of inhumane things happened to him there, and they finally let him out and he's back in the United States being interviewed for this show, and do you know what he's been doing since he got out?

He's been trying to stay sober, that's what.  Because the typical "touch a hot plate and get burned" teaching method didn't work on him (getting burned being the "going to prison in Ecuador" part of the story), he KEPT DOING DRUGS when he got out.     And, I don't even care if he's trying to dull the memories of what happened to him in Ecuadorian prison by taking drugs now, because guess what?  If I got caught with 2,400 grams of coke and then went to prison in Ecuador, YOU COULDN'T PAY ME TO TOUCH ANOTHER DRUG.   Why aren't the drugs giving him prison flashbacks?  WHY?

Because he's a bonehead, that's why.  And now I'm writing about him. 

Heidi Montag: What the what?

 So, oh my God, did you see the People Magazine this week with Heidi Montag and all the plastic surgery?  It is so disturbing, I barely know where to begin.   Of course I had to buy it, just because I was grossly fascinated, even though yes, I know, when we contribute to Spiedi, we all lose.  But-- wow.  For one thing, she ADMITS that she's addicted to plastic surgery, but she's not really admitting it, because she's, like, totally going to get more, you know?  It's part of her career, you know?  Never mind that she looks like a completely different, freaky person.

I have the following questions about this:

1.  What on earth is a doctor thinking, operating that much on a 23 year old?  That does not seem safe, I don't care what they say.   Huge boobs and a brow lift?  Now I think I might just have seen everything.

2.  She told her family she was sick over the Christmas holiday, and nobody went to her house?   What the what?    Would they have come in, like, "oh my God Heidi-- what happened to your boobs?"

3.  Speaking of her boobs, she says that DDD was the biggest they could make her them right then, but she's for sure going back for more.  Seriously, shouldn't there be a law?   This is turning into Michael Jackson all over again, only without the talent.  I'm just scared.  She is just about to have the worst backache in the history of the world, and I am going to laugh.

4.   Why is People Magazine covering this?  I'm not sure I'm really able to correctly understand their angle.  They know that she's doing this for publicity, and that even the mitigating headline "ADDICTED TO PLASTIC SURGERY" doesn't really negate the fact that they have validated this choice by putting her on the cover of their magazine. 

5.  Have we learned nothing from Brittany Murphy?   I'm not even being tongue in cheek about that one.  This just seems like another pretty young girl who was driven to insanity and self destruction by the Hollywood machine.  Yiiiikes!

By the way, on a totally irrelevant note, we are still on the Hoarders-inspired "Operation Throw Everything Out," and we're now up to three carloads of stuff to charity and over ten trashbags full of shredded paper.  Yay! 

This Just In: It’s Raining in Los Angeles. Get Off the Road!

Yesterday the first rain drop descended from the sky (after all, it IS fall), and just like that, a rash of traffic accidents began in Los Angeles.   Oh, did you not know this fun fact?  NO ONE IN L.A. KNOWS HOW TO DRIVE IN THE RAIN.  For some reason, the moment the streets are wet, it’s like a signal for everyone to crash into each other. 

This is no lie—on the news last night (as we were flipping from “The Daily Show” to a DVR’d version of “Bored to Death,” just to emphasize that we don’t actually sit around watching the news), they were reporting that since the rain started, there had been 725 additional traffic accidents around the Los Angeles area.   

So, it’s not racist, or sexist, or city-ist, or whatever you might want to call it.  Drivers in Los Angeles really ARE stupid when it rains.  I’m not exactly why this is, aside from the possibility that your brain just gets lazy from all the nice weather, and when there’s an actual reason to be careful, the brain is all “wait a second, I can’t switch gears that fast, man”—and then you’ve rear-ended someone because the slight change in temperature and weather condition has caused you to lose your head and slam on your brakes for no reason.  Look out!  Water falling from the sky!

I happen to like the rain (I know, Brandi, I am the only one), and I am a conservative driver anyway, so I don’t have this problem, but I will tell you it took me a whole hour to get to Costco last night, during which time I witnessed two rain-related accidents where the people involved in them kind of just sighed and pulled over like “Yeah……what are you gonna do?”

Depeche Mode, the SNIFTER, and....what else have you been up to?

First off, Stephan had a great birthday-- thank you for asking.  He got some awesome gifts like a wonderful bottle of wine and new iPhone, and he has been talking about how awesome the phone every day since then, which I think is the hallmark of a good birthday present, don't you?   Also, we went to see Depeche Mode at the Hollywood Bowl last night, and if there is anything wrong with Dave Gahan (like cancer, or a torn calf muscle, or a strained voice) you would never have known it, because that show was AWESOME!   Here is a blurry picture that I took with my Blackberry, which doesn't even begin to approximate how cool the concert (and accompanying mixed-media/ light presentation) was.  Extra special thanks to Brandi for getting the tickets and bringing the brownies!  Meanwhile, I have been working and working and WORKING, managing several client-related IT implosions, and preparing our place to become a rental property so we can move.  You know, building up the empire, brick by brick.

But that's not what has been on my mind lately, or the usual topic of this blog.  The topic is "weird stuff that I notice that might make you laugh," so I'm going to throw this question out:

Why do people get personalized license plates?  Why?  WHY?

I have wondered this for some time, actually.   Many people in my hometown of Palm Desert have these types of "vanity plates," and the very first time I saw one that said "DRBOB" or something like that, I was like "um..... doesn't that make it easier for the police to catch you breaking the law?"  Because even then, in my mind I pondered the fact that if you were a cop, and you saw two people speeding, and DRBOB was one of them... you're probably going to go with DRBOB, right, because it's easier to remember.   Am I wrong about this?  I remember thinking this for the first time when I was eleven.

Like I said, I don't know why I think this way, or why I have always thought this way.   I did get some concurrence the other day from my new Danish friend Pernille, who said during lunch last week "I don't understand why someone would want PEANUT1 on their car.  Why chooses to be PEANUT1?"  After that lunch I took the dog for his walk and noticed a guy with a giant Jeep who had the license plate SNIFTER, which lead me on a whole different tangent.  Um, there are special forms you have to fill out for the personalization, right?  And fees you have to pay?   And a waiting period, during which your fingers are crossed and you're hoping that you get to be the SNIFTER guy?    Why?  Just....WHY?  The absurdity of this made me laugh.  Mostly it was the forms that got me.  The guy, at the DMV, with the forms, and the SNIFTER.  

Again, I don't get it.  Here's another one.  This guy has a Maserati, which he's parking in the street by my house (just to show that he's so rich, he's so totally over having a Maserati that he doesn't even have to worry about where he parks it, because he's soooooo L.A.), and he's got this stupid license plate on it.    What is this supposed to mean?  If you go to the trouble of acquiring the vanity license plate, doesn't it stand to reason that at least I should KNOW WHAT IT MEANS? SNIFTER even wins over this guy.  Seriously-- what is this supposed to be?

Here's a whole blog post (of someone else's) dedicated to funny photos of vanity license plates, including "IDIOT" and "CARSICK."    To me this is a slam dunk-- if you're a cop and you see the IDIOT guy, just go ahead and arrest him, because you already know he makes a lot of bad decisions, you know what I'm saying?  

The Michael Jackson Murder Conspiracy, or "Michael Jackson is even weird when he's dead"

First of all-- how about that interesting Google Ads experiment?  I was totally surprised to find that Google Ads obviously has some kind of filter on it, because even Rachel's "strong themes" filled guest-post couldn't make it give us an ad for, say, a sexually transmitted diseases clinic or a place to buy a Massengil Disposable Douche.  Final score = Google Ads 1, Humans 0. 

So, now LaToya Jackson is talking about how there was a conspiracy to murder Michael Jackson for his publishing catalog (in case you aren't up on this, in addition to being an eccentric person, Michael Jackson apparently also had enough business acumen to purchase a large portion of the publishing rights to about half of the Beatles' catalog, which is certain to be a producer of a large amount of passive income ad infinitum). 

It does stand to reason that without Michael Jackson's substantial monthly outlay of expenses (for drugs, and nannies, and face bleaching crean, and monkeys, and God knows what else), this income could be amassed into a billion-dollar fortune for whoever holds the keys to the kingdom.  But-- isn't Katherine Jackson (Michael's mother) the trustee, along with the children and some charities?  I don't know why I am attempting to apply regular logic here, but wouldn't the eponymous "they" of conspriacy theory lore only benefit in murdering Michael Jackson if "they" were beneficiares of the trust?  By this logic,  this supposed murder would have to have been engineered by the Jackson family....and they are the ones crying "conspiracy" in the first place.

Don't get me wrong-- I'm not saying Michael Jackson's own family murdered him, not at all.  I'm sure it's an incredibly painful time for them.  I just think it's weird that LaToya is now on the record with a conspiracy theory, when there's no third-party beneficiary, no Da Vinci code, no 2012, no CIA connection, no actual evidence to prove motive, and a ton of supporting reports that Michael Jackson had a terrible drug problem that ended up killing him.   Frankly, I'm also kind of disappointed-- I mean, we knew there was going to be some kind of Michael Jackson Death Weirdness, but this is it?  

I'm going to throw this new conspiracy theory into the mix:  "Blanket" Jackson, the youngest of the three children (who are probably not biologically related to Michael Jackson, which just adds another layer of weirdness to the mix) is a rarely-seen, genius seven year old who noticed that his eccentric father was spending all of his inheritence on weirdness.   In the style of "Stewie" from "Family Guy," "Blanket" plotted with one of the still-unnamed charities that make up the remaining 30% of the Michael Jackson Trust to eliminate Michael Jackson so that his estate's assets could start to build back up.  Eleven years from now, when he's 18, he assumes control not only of his portion of the Michael Jackson Trust, but also takes the reigns of one of the charitable organizations.  He also changes his name to something like "John Smith," so no one ever knows his true identity. 

Thoughts?    I think this one is better than "someone who is not even going to benefit murdered him for no good reason."  Oh, also-- I just read this article where apparently Joe Jackson is trying to get the little kids to tour as "The Jackson Three."  Because that whole "Jackson Five" thing worked out so well and totally didn't mess anyone up forever, right?

Watch, Blanket is going to take out Joe Jackson now too.