Dogs rule.
Something happened in the kitchen
Dogs rule.
Sara Bareilles – “Brave”
“You can be amazing. You can turn a phrase in to a weapon or a drug. You can be the outcast or be the backlash of somebody’s lack of love or you can start speaking up.”
Sara Bareilles latest album, The Blessed Unrest, sees it’s release this coming Tuesday.
The album’s first single was “Brave,” an LGBT anthem about coming out. Co-written with fun.’s Jack Antonoff, the song is a declaration to live for yourself. “I think there’s so much honor and integrity and beauty in being able to be who you are,” Bareilles says of the song.“It’s important to be brave because by doing that you also give others permission to do the same.”
Plus, the fun video features people dancing like no one’s watching. But of course, people are. People watch and listen to us in life all the time. For the folks watching, listening, standing by, nspiration sometimes comes when “you say what you want to say and let the words fall out.”
“I want to see how big your ‘brave’ is.”
The album comes out on Tuesday. Check it out on iTunes.
The hot potato squat
I’ve recently gotten back into working out and watching my nurtrition with my 50th birthday coming up and heading into rehearsals for the Hollywood Bowl production of CHICAGO the Musical. I still have just enough of my tiny, beat-down ego to NOT show up at rehearsals looking out of shape. The past six weeks has really been just for me, and I’ve really appreciated that the stars came together to inspire me to improve myself FOR myself.
I’ve been looking for some new exercises that burn more and more calories plus strengthen my core muscles. Chest, biceps, back – all those are pretty straight forward. But getting my midsection strong isn’t as simple as some situps. So, I found “the hot potato squat.”
BJ Gaddour, owner of StreamFit.com, says”the hot potato squat” trains a lot of muscles, particularly big ones like your quadriceps, hamstrings and glutes. According to Gaddour, it burns more calories per rep than almost any other exercise.
Then, for a tougher challenge and more benefit, Gaddour throws an airborne dumbbell into the mix. “Holding the weight on just one side of your body increases the demand placed on your core to keep your body stable,” he says. “As the weight changes from side to side, your core muscles are worked from every angle.”
Find more workout tips at MensHealth.com
Morning Joe
I want arms like Joe’s!
While I’m at it I’d like to have his chest, his height, his dark hair…
On news stands now
Video: Ian Ziering armed with chainsaw vs shark in SHARKNADO
I’m kind of obsessed with the Sharknado phenomenon 🙂
No, I don’t think it’s “great” movie (hello, the name of the film tells you the creators had a sense of humor…) but I think it’s fun since it’s soooo over the top, and everything the folks responsible meant it to be.
The pop culture response is so fascinating, how could you not have a good time with it?
Ian Ziering deserves “action hero” movie status here, plus points for his sense of humor how he’s handled the response today.
p.s. then there’s the fact that he’s uber-hot at 49. Check the recent pic below from his sold-out run at Chippendales in Las Vegas.
Happy 38th birthday, Cheyenne Jackson
Happy, happy birthday to Cheyenne Jackson!
New year, new CD, new opportunities! As one year ends and another begins, Cheyenne shares where the past year has taken him and what’s ahead with E!News:
“This past year, there has been a lot of change in my life,” Jackson says. “Both grandparents died, a Broadway show [The Performers] that I put my heart and soul into closed after six shows, and some deeply personal things transpired as well.
“But on the flip side, my career took off,” the Broadway favorite continued. “I shot four movies, a pilot, a miniseries, sold out the Kennedy Center with my one-man show and just really grew exponentially as an artist. I craved a song to reflect that and the fact and realization that I’m opening myself up to whatever the universe has to throw at me. I can take it. It’s about being brave, being alive, and being right here, right now.”
And being able to put up with some pain. He shot the video while filming Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks with Gena Rowlands in Budapest.
“My feet were bleeding by the time we walked miles and miles to get those shots,” Jackson says of the video, directed by Hungarian filmmaker Peter Tokay. “But it was absolutely worth it.”
Jackson most recently starred as Tony in West Side Story in Concert with the San Francisco Symphony and Michael Tilson Thomas, a recording of which will be released next year. The openly gay Washington state native also served as grand marshal in San Fran’s annual gay pride parade on June 30.
Check out his new CD, I’m Blue, Skies on iTunes.
Palm Springs – Marilyn and me
Talk about bigger than life…
San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera responds to attempt to reinstate Prop 8
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| San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera |
City Attorney for San Francisco Dennis Herrera responds to Protect Marriage’s sad, last ditch effort to keep loving couples from marrying in the state of California:
“This motion is a desperate obstruction tactic used in the vain hope of pursuing an unconstitutional agenda.
“The opponents of the freedom to marry have chosen to ignore the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution, a U.S. Supreme Court ruling, and the well-settled California marriage case of Lockyer v. San Francisco, which they themselves celebrated at the time. Their motion has essentially no chance to succeed.
“The most basic concepts of American law tell us that a state court cannot and will not overrule the federal judiciary.
“The citizens of California are left wondering when these people will realize that, having lost the moral struggle years and years ago, they have now lost the legal struggle as well.
“Marriage equality is now the law in the State of California, and will remain so from this point onward.Together we will soon see the day when it is the law all across America.”
California: Protect Marriage files petition for continued enforcement of Prop 8
The haters at Protect Marriage have filed a petition to continue enforcement of Prop 8 in California:
Moments ago, we filed a new petition in the California Supreme Court against all of California’s 58 county clerks, and state officials, seeking to restore the enforcement of Proposition 8, the state’s constitutional amendment limiting marriage to a man and a woman. The undeniable fact is, the man-woman definition of marriage, as passed by a majority the voters, is still a valid part of our state constitution.
Yet county clerks statewide are lawlessly defying that law by issuing gender-neutral marriage licenses. We are asking California’s Supreme Court to restore the rule of law and the public’s confidence in the integrity of the initiative process.
The action we filed today contends that at least 56 of the 58 county clerks must continue to follow Proposition 8 because they were not parties to the recent federal lawsuit against Prop 8, and that the state’s governor and attorney general have no legal authority to order local county clerks to disregard the state constitution.
Our petition also reminds the justices that our opponents, the attorneys for the plaintiffs who challenged Prop 8, have repeatedly admitted that the 56 county clerks not involved in their case “are not directly bound by the injunction” issued by a single San Francisco judge against Prop 8. In fact, “super-lawyer” David Boies told the courts that “the scope of the injunction is quite limited”, and at least the 56 county clerks would remain free to “refuse a marriage license to a same-sex couple…without violating the injunction.”
This will result in nothing. The kids at Protect Marriage are just out to cause further misery at this point.
You can read the whole petition from Protect Marriage by clicking here.
U.S. on track for lowest full-year deficit in five years, $117 billion budget surplus in June
From MarketWatch: The federal government posted a budget surplus of $117 billion in June, the Treasury Department said Thursday, reflecting both higher tax receipts and lower spending in the month and keeping the U.S. on track for its lowest full-year deficit in five years.
Including the June surplus, the budget deficit for the first nine months of the 2013 fiscal year totaled $510 billion, down 44% from the same period a year ago.
It was a record-high surplus for June, and the largest monthly surplus since April 2008. In June of last year, the government ran a deficit of $60 billion.
Now since the folks on the right have been saying the poor economy was President Obama’s fault, does this good news mean the President gets the credit for helping to create lowest deficit in five years? Hmm…
More at MarketWatch