Dare-angel

Legendary daredevil Evel Knievel died yesterday at the age of 69.

Amazing how the death of a man who broke almost every bone in his body at least once during his stunts was due to unrelated medical causes. He had been in failing health for years, suffering from diabetes and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, an incurable condition that scarred his lungs. He also nearly died from hepatitis C before undergoing a liver transplant in 1999.

Robert Craig Knievel attempted many motorbike stunts during the 1970s. His 1974 attempt (and failure) to jump Idaho's Snake River Canyon was one of the most notable stunts of all time, and his televised ventures accounted for four of the top 20 most-watched ABC's Wide World of Sports events of all time.

"No king or prince has lived a better life. You're looking at a guy who's really done it all. And there are things I wish I had done better, not only for me but for the ones I loved." --Knievel in an Associated Press interview in 2006.

Knievel is survived by 4 children, 10 grandchildren and a great-grandchild.

Zig-a-zig-aww man.

Being an international symbol of girl power was not enough to trump the millions of people who like watching cars drive around in circles, as Brazilian race car driver Helio Castroneves beat out Spice Girl Melanie Brown for the Dancing With the Stars title.

This is without a doubt an upset, as Mel B and Maksim were the highest scored pair all season, but--still not as big of an upset as Cheetah Girl Sabrina Bryan being voted off entirely too early in the competition. She was by far the best dancer and her departure was the surprise of the season. (Don't feel too sorry for her though, she landed her hot dancing partner as a boyfriend, rarrr.)

I've watched only bits and pieces of the season, mostly because I can't stand the 45 minutes of commercials and 15 minutes of dancing they present each week, but the finale was actually bearable in that respect. What was not bearable was special guest Celine Dion's lack of enthusiasm and stifled smile as she belted out probably the biggest movie hit of all time midway through the show. Could they seriously not find someone who's had a hit in the last three years?

Anyway...Congratulations to Helio, but next to Scary Spice, he's a wannabe.

To catch a bachelor

He's attractive, loaded and likes to rape young women - he's perfect for our new reality show!

A Boston attorney once considered as a candidate for the first season of ABC's "The Bachelor" is, according to authorities, a serial rapist.

He's charged with the rape and attempted rape of two 19-year-old women in 2004 and 2006. He also allegedly drugged and then raped an 18-year-old college student in a Miami Beach club. Posecutors also alleged that he took one of the womento Neiman Marcus and bought her a $700 dress and $250 shoes, took he back to his apartment and slammed her head against a door and knocked a phone from her hand as she tried to dial 911.

Did this guy read "Loves Music, Loves to Dance" by Mary Higgins Clark, or what? That must have been some Neiman Marcus dress...

How terrible would this have looked for ABC had they actually hired this serial rapist to be the bachelor, Mr. Perfect, for the show's first season? Funny, I thought it was NBC that tried to catch the predators...

Sexyyyyy

So not funny, even a caveman could write it

I don't know how many people even knew the premiere of ABC's "Cavemen"--the show spun off of Geico's "so easy, even a caveman could do it" tagline--but I wasted my time tuning in to legitimize my feeling that a show based off an overplayed series of commercials would never last.

And I'm going to go wiiiiith I'm right.

Minus a few funny one liners ("Hey, R Kelley, get out of the closet, we're going out"), I barely laughed at all. In fact, I couldn't wait for the show to be over so I could collect my thoughts and rip on it.

The way the caveman-look was done is definitely different from the way it was in the commercials; if anyone listened to Preston and Steve yesterday morning, Steve was right--they do look like hippies. Hairy, dirty, hippies.

<---original

<---show

To make matters worse, I was having a hard time telling any of them apart when the scenes switched--they all looked alike! And in developing each character's traits, the writers did too much and the cavemen didn't seem very realistic...even if they weren't prehistoric creatures living in the year 2007.

And for a show that wasn't supposed to be about race, the entire thing was a veiled social commentary, which I think was mostly aimed at African Americans. For example, one of the cavemen, Joel, is dating a "sape"--what the cavemen call homosapiens--and doesn't want his friends to know because it's frowned upon. Once his friends find out, they convince him that his girlfriend is trying the "forbidden fruit" and expecting him to give her a sexual experience she can't have with homosapien (or white) man. There's also the incident with the (white), homosapien landlord in the cavemen's building who doesn't know which caveman is which, and urges them to stop their "primal grunting" because she is trying to get people to move across the hall.

No wonder the network didn't preview it to critics. Highly doubtful that this show will be successful. The commercials were funny when they first came out, but will quickly vanish now that this abominable show is on TV.