reality blurred + Ruben Studdard dropped from J Records

DON'T YOU REMEMBER YOU TOLD ME YOU LOVED ME, BABY? American Idol 2 winner Ruben Studdard has been dropped from J Records. His first album went platinum, his second gold, his third sold "only" 235,000 copies ... which means that up next for Mr. 205 is starring as Fats Waller in the national touring company of "Ain't Misbehavin'". Also joining the cast for this 2008/09 tour? Frenchie Davis.

PERHAPS IT'S BECAUSE RIGGINS WAS BARRED BY "NO PASS, NO PLAY:" The Pflugerville Panthers, which provide sets, uniforms, and football facilities for the fine folks at Friday Night Lights, lost their bid to become state football champions this evening.

FOXNews.com - Spector Rips Tina at Ike Turner's Funeral - Celebrity Gossip | Entertainment News | Arts And Entertainment

AND THE 2007 ALOTT5MA AWARD FOR CLASSIEST EULOGY (NOT) GOES TO ...: Okay, so you're Ike Turner's family. And you need someone to come in and speak at his funeral, someone from the industry who knew him well, someone who can put his musical legacy into proper context and perhaps find a way to -- well, certainly not to excuse his awful history of domestic violence and drug abuse -- but, at least, maybe suggest that he had learned and grown and changed in some meaningful way

The proper person, I'll suggest, was not Phil Spector. If I told you that he started his remarks by referring to "What's Love Got To Do With It" as "a piece-of-trash movie" and said that "Ike made Tina the jewel she was," that'll tell you if you want to keep reading.

I WAS NOT ANGRY SINCE I CAME TO FRANCE, UNTIL THIS INSTANT: I realize I'm noticing this two years after the fact -- having purchased a replacement PC with a good deal on the whole MS Suite -- but who in Hades decided to completely re-engineer the user interface of Microsoft Word?

One of the reasons I've resisted buying a Mac is that I'm used to the core Microsoft products. Not that they're good. Getting consistent formatting on a MS Word document still takes too much work (or the liberal use of the sec'y services pool), but I draft a document without ever needing to find anything.

I've been using this program for seventeen years and well in excess of a million words of product. I knew, reflexively, where all core commands were. Indeed, for my purposes the software had become utterly transparent to the task at hand. Yet Microsoft decided I would be more productive if I had to search for the "new document" or "save" buttons, the former of which just took me three minutes to find.

This product -- in which the task of "creating documents" has finally and completely overwhelmed the task of writing -- is now worse than useless to me.

N.B.: Yes, I am aware that most of the shortcut keys remain the same. Did Microsoft decide that those should be changed? No. Why not? Because, people were used to them.

WHO TOLD TRACY ABOUT ANAGRAMS? The floor is open for nominations for the annual ALOTT5MA Award for Funniest Half-Hour of Television of the Year.

AND TIM GUNN RECOILS IN HORROR: Sure, you've experienced Ugg Boots and Crocs, but how about combining them?

"IT IS SO HARD TO MAKE A GREAT COMEDY AT ALL, AND HARDER STILL TO MAKE ONE THAT IS INTELLIGENT, QUICK, CHARMING, MOVING, AND YES, VERY, VERY FUNNY": And that, apparently, is why the film topping Roger Ebert's list of the ten best of 2007 is "Juno".