And I can’t stand the way she points out the error: ” Sorry, I can’t help it, I saw it,” with this little wince, like please forgive me, and I’m really a great girl. No, you’re not, and you’re too anal, so shut up. I do believe the judging results are fixed, especially near the end, but unfortunately, the personalities are real.

Anyway, I think this is the weakest season of DWTS ever, but I’m still watching, because Derek Hough is still there. I’ve come to the conclusion that he is probably a once in a lifetime dancer – in the genius category. He should be winning awards in the Arts, because that’s how we are supposed to honor the best in the field. Sure, it does help that he is very very goodlooking, but I think Tony is very handsome, and Alec might be the most beautiful, yet Derek glows. (Tony is the sexiest dancer, and Alec is sexy with certain partners – not Edyta! – but Derek has chemistry with more partners, and can also solo like nobody’s business.) I hope I get to see him dance in person sometime!

Below are some tasty comments from the fascinating Television Without Pity forums on DWTS.

Derek, for all of his annoying-at-times quirks, is an awesome choreographer. I can’t deny that. Anyone else would have screwed that paso up, but it was easily my favorite dance of the night.

Derek, he likes to do the best he can, so, as is happening this season, he will drag his partner to the end even if she becomes like Goldie Hawn and Meryl Streep at the end of Death Becomes Her.

Hee hee!

Wonder if Joanna will write yet another passive-aggressive blog or tweet about Mya being a professional, especially after that first perfect 30. Looking forward to it. :P

And I’m not a Joanna fan anymore, but I think the producers planned the Mya video thing. And Joanna got through it without screaming “Bitch is a ringer” – well, maybe she did and they just didn’t show it. She’s tweeted it often enough, but at least she’s included Donny in her whining.

Ah, yeah, I do follow Joanna’s tweets, and she does comment that Mya is a ringer. But since she is, that’s okay! :)

So it turns out all Mya & Dmitry needed to connect and spark some chemistry was a hot pink bell bottomed catsuit, a cheesy stache and a Donna Summer groove. Who knew.

This is the first week that I really loved Mya. Her samba was terrific, although Dimtry looked a little too Earl Hickey for my tastes.

Anybody else get a Ron Burgundy vibe from Dimitry during the 70’s samba?

Is that the same as Ron something, the porn actor? Met him at, get ready, a book party. Nice, wrote me a note afterwards. Not sure if he was polite, or flirting! Anyway, yeah, this is the first week for me, too, that Mya had any chemistry with Dimitry. Every single time I start to read, I’m not kidding, she is so boring. But she pulled it off this week.

I feel sorry for Aaron. I’m glad Karina’s been a rock – she seems to really care about him. He’s a mess but I don’t really think he’s a bad person – just a mixed up kid. He’s a better dancer than Kelly and Joanna – and maybe Donny – but yeah, the show’s about likeability just as much as dancing. Still, I’ll be revolted if Kelly wins.

I like Aaron better each week, too. He’s juvenile, but works hard, and is also getting his own chemistry going with Karina. She’s been good for him, and to him, this season.

Loved Donny & Kym’s waltz. Grownups peforming a lovely dance, graceful and (chastely) passionate.

I’m along with the crowd. Hated Marie with a passion and her stupid jokes, but I really do like Donny, and he’s improving and I think he even went a little sexy a couple of times.

Louis needs to push Kelly more. She seems to be almost phoning in some of the Latin dances INCLUDING the Jive. I don’t know any other celeb that would have gotten away with those limp Jive kicks. I always remember Tony telling Melissa that Jive kicks should look like you are trying to get tissue off of your shoe. Kelly couldn’t have moved air off of her shoe with those kicks.

Ah Kelly…what’s shocking to me is that they let Louis of all people slide on the prop and all the messing about (TM Len) before they actually started dancing. I don’t recall the judges ever being particularly kind to him before this season, they must really want Kelly to stick around.

Kelly’s also in danger of going this week or next. While I enjoyed her foxtrot, I cannot believe how spoiled she is, even if she is charming. Louie had to lock up items that distract her? Is she in preschool? This isn’t the only time I’ve seen her flop down on the floor and say she is too tired to continue. Louie must have his work cut out motivating this girl.

Well, of course I pick comments that support my opinions! Kelly Osborne is the worst now, and I don’t find her charming in the least,  just terribly spoiled. And sort of homely. Sorry, but I have to watch her on TV, you know. I do like Louie.

I think Natalie deserves to still be on the show, she could’ve been doing awesome.

So true! I miss a lot of the early dismissals. :(

Photo of Derek and Joanna hanging out at the Grove from Pure Derek Hough. A fine blog about a fine man!

More cartoons:

1. Dancing with the Stars, Season 9 – the men strut their stuff
2. …and then God invented women.

Let me know if any of these stick in your mind…or craw.

Bark
Bark! I hate indie films. Please don’t make me watch them. But this had Lisa Kudrow and didn’t sound too weird, so I took a chance on it. Kind of funny! There were only a few scenes where they “experimented” and got “edgy.” A man’s wife decides she’s a dog. (no animation, no talking dogs, just an actress.) Good actress, and husband was a good actor. People try to figure her out. There’s a romance. I liked it.

Lisa K might think about trying to stretch her acting repertoire. She has the power. And the Amazon reviewers are right – the cover for this really truly sucks.

The Sixth Sense (Collector’s Edition Series)
The Sixth Sense, with good old Bruce Willis. I know, it’s really really old. Sorry! For reasons too long to get into, (these reviews can only be a minute in length) a great friend left a pile of movies and a box of Junior Mints on my doorstep one day, and this was in there, so I thought, well, I’ll TRY it again.

For some reason, I really noticed the quiet cinematography this time. In Philly, yay, with skies and weather you rarely see in movies. The whole movie is really good, and, okay, I cried a little, again.

The Return (Widescreen Edition)

With Sarah Michelle Gellar. Gah, is she a bad actress. And the bf was kind of abusive. Horror? Fantasy? Stupid. Sucks.

Come back later for more one-minute movie reviews!

More cartoons:

1. Milk and Chocolate. A good way to start the morning?
2. …and then God invented women.

Topic for Illustration Friday: skinny.

This is also Wordless Wednesday, but forget that idea right now. I will never be wordless. Back when people designed stationary I designed some for editors that said at the bottom, …because pictures speak louder with words. A cartoon is not an illustration, and vice versa!

In a good cartoon, the words and pic work together, and one without the other isn’t so funny. If the gag doesn’t work, it’s just stupid. But if it’s a good gag, you need to up your drawing to keep pace with it, and make it even better. There’s a background, a time and place and future in a good cartoon. It’s your stage, so use it wisely.

I did this cartoon for my 2nd book, Love Me or Go To Hell: True Love Cartoons. One of my great cartoon contributors, Stephanie Piro, had thought up the first part of the title a few years ago, and offered it for this project. I added the 2nd part, to make sure readers knew it was a book about loving men, not hating them!  

Anyway, my excellent editor Erin, at Andrews McMeel gave me carte blanche on what cartoons to include in the book, and even the focus. I decided to aim this at 20-something women – say, 25 to 35.

I had done this cartoon in a different form I started work on the book, and this was one of the first cartoons where I discovered that to make someone look younger, you must make them skinny! This is easy to prove in cartoons. After all, the face is simplified, hair the same in a cartoon, most of the time, except for glasses, white hair, less hair on an older man, etc.. But a more portly woman always always looks older, and if you just take 30 pounds off her, wowee! Which proves that all you have to do to look younger is lose weight!

Is this the same in real life? I’M AFRAID, YES!! I just saw someone on the news running for governor of Atlanta, Mary Norwood, a tiny little thing, in her late fifties, and she looks terrific.

Of course, I live in LA now, home of Pilates and yoga. And skinny rules.

Cartoon caption: I don’t want to see you anymore, Gary. I just hate it when men try to sell you t-shirts (tee shirts) afterwards.

PS. If you still have a hankering for Halloween cartoons, did a bunch on The Opposite of Wrong!

More cartoons:

1. In which I get syndicated.
2. Sarah Palin is a five-letter word.

Prison Break was an outstanding show from Fox. But I think they underestimated the Bromance and the relationships and the cool sense of place, whether it was in prison or out, and overestimated the weird Company mystery part. Spoiler ahead: I think this Prison Break is running right now in Europe, so I don’t want to give too much away, but in the last season, even more special people die, not listed below. Too many people I loved died:  

• Paul Kellerman, Magnificent Bastard (Paul Adelstein). OMG, the scenes between him and Sarah about pie were SO GOOD!!! Their chemistry was the best on the whole show. He is a total wimp on the 10 minutes I watched him on his new show, Private Practice. He gave up PB for that mealy show? That’s the tragedy, right there.
• Bellick. The show died when he left, the last season. I wrote more about him here. Love that guy, his pig-headedness, humility, vulnerability, and selfishness. All of it.
• Abruzzi. Ah, man, please give me more of that Norwegian hotness. I don’t understand why they killed him. They brought him back from the dead once, since he was so popular – didn’t they learn their lesson then!?
• Tweener. I really only liked him his last season, right before the breakout. I thought he’d make it in the cold cruel world. Loved his little affair with the college girl.
• Sarah. I didn’t love her. She was okay. Apparently she had a tiff with the producers – thought she was a grande dame in Canada, laughable. The sad part was when they brought her back to life – after they cut off her head. Because the fans complained, wah wah wah. Threatened never to watch the show again. “We hate you, Fox!!!” So back she came. Maybe that’s when PB lost its mojo.

In any case, there were so many memorable episodes that I do want the Prison Break DVDs. And the characters were very special. One of my top 5 shows ever.

More cartoons:

1. Prison Break is back! (the girlie version of 24)
2. Prison Break killed Brad Bellick, and jumped the shark.

For Double X I do some cartoons that are current events and political, but also pop culture. Even fem, on occasion!

I think Octomom would fall in the category of pop, or pup culture. Boy, did she wring the public on that one. At first I was angry with how selfish, self-centered, and sick she was – and it still really pisses me off that she is on the dole and leaching off of LA and the state. But now I do understand how mentally ill she really is.

At least her doctor is taking some responsibility for his recklessness, although I feel bad for anyone losing their job now. From PuffPost:

Dr. Michael Kamrava was kicked out of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine last month, group spokesman Sean Tipton said Monday.

Tipton said Kamrava has repeatedly violated the group’s standards. He declined to provide details but said Kamrava was not expelled because of his work with any single patient.

Liar, liar, pants on fire.

But you know what’s worse, Octomom? You’re boring. So take that, and on your way out, go get sterilized.

The cartoon caption: “I was going to go as Octomom, but I didn’t think it was fair to bring that many candy bars into the house…”

I’m not exactly sure what this means, but I assume 14 illegitimate children, each with his or her cute little pumpkin bucket, could score a lot of chocolate.

Gosh, the man looks ticked off, doesn’t he? Methinks he wanted some of that grub.

More cartoons:

1. Halloween cartoon if you like martinis.
2. She needs a good cookie or a good time, take your pick.