Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader’s iPod dished out an REM song he’d not heard in forever, but one he just loves. It is “Photograph.” (Written by REM and Natalie Merchant.)

Sadly, your Maximum Leader can’t find a non-rights protected copy of it anywhere to post.

It is a wonderful song. Take his word for it.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader will probably be doing very little posting between now and after Labor Day. Lots of back-to-school stuff going on which requires his attention. (So Mrs Villain tells him.) Of course, every time your Maximum Leader warns you all that posting will be light, he winds up posting a lot. Then when he posts nothing… Well… He posts nothing…

What to write about now?

Your Maximum Leader had some people over to the house for dinner yesterday night. He anticipated preparing some fancy appetizers. He’d thought of serrano ham and marchengo cheese and proscuitto with melon as two ham-based dishes. (With a mix of olives stuffed with feta, almonds, sun-dried tomatos, and garlic. To be clear, each olive was not stuffed with all of those items. There was a variety of 4 different olives each stuffed with a different item.)

Well… What did the great Muse of Scotland once say about the best laid plans? The ham based appetizers never made it to the table.

Gosh… Your Maximum Leader is so (SO!) torn up inside thinking that he might have Serrano ham and proscuitto just laying about in the icebox. What ever will he do with that wonderful, tasty, succulent cured pork goodness just sitting around? Sadly he is too busy to invite people with whom he’d share the ham.

He’ll just have to eat it himself…

The horror… Oh the horror…

In other news…

Your Maximum Leader is sad to admit that he watches “True Blood” on HBO. He has come very close to giving up on the show on a number of occasions starting last season. This season has a bunch of storylines going on. Most of the storylines don’t do a damn thing for him. While enduring the storylines he doesn’t care for he keeps thinking that he’ll just stop watching. But then the vampire characters just draw him back in. Specifically he is speaking about Denis O’Hare’s performance as Russell Edgington. Damn that man can work magic in that role. If it weren’t for the Russell story-line your Maximum Leader would have just stopped watching earlier this season.

Moving along…

Hey! Is it too early to shill for Christmas (or back to school)? You know that you are looking for a new t-shirt in which to knock about the house or wear on a quick trip to the mall. Have you considered a Naked Villainy T-shirt? If you are particularly stunning woman have you considered a Naked Villainy Tank-top and Thong combo? Your Maximum Leader will keep shilling this particular combination until he gets photos in his mailbox one day of some sultry lass clad only in the tank and thong combo. If that day ever comes your Maximum Leader let you all know. If you want to check out the store the link is here. Your Maximum Leader is probably going to update the store soon with a new t-shirt or two. (Not like lots of people are knocking down the doors to buy the old stuff…)

Anyhoo…

Your Maximum Leader has been re-reading books he’s got on the shelf. He realizes that he’s looking at the books on the shelf and not remembering their contents any more. So he’ll both conserve money and do a little re-education for himself. Like FLG, your Maximum Leader might revisit Hume’s “Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding.”

That is about all from the Villainschloss now…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is pleased to report that he can now see clearly again. As he reported earlier in the week his glasses got screwed up. We think that they got exposed to some heat somehow and got tempered. This tempering caused very small “waves” to form on the lens. When your Maximum Leader put the glasses on, he got the feeling like he was looking constantly through those heat waves you see coming up off asphalt during the summer. It made him sick to his stomach after a few minutes.

So your Maximum Leader tried to trot out his old prescription and get a new set of glasses. Sadly, since the prescription was three years old no one wanted to fill it. So, your Maximum Leader went over to his eye doctor and got a check up. He was clear. No signs of bad deseases of the eye. No deterioration of his vision either. In fact his eyes were unchanged in 3 years. That is a good thing.

Anyhoo…

Your Maximum Leader has new glasses and can see just fine now.

Your Maximum Leader hasn’t blogged much this week because of the glasses issue (which really wasn’t resolved until Wednesday) and a desire to get some of the books off his nightstand. You see your Maximum Leader can read without his glasses. In fact his vision at book-reading distance is quite good. So he read a lot. He is nearly done with two baseball books he recently received as gifts. The books are George Will’s “Men at Work” and Jason Turbow’s “Baseball Codes”. Your Maximum Leader highly recommends Will’s book to any baseball fan. It is certainly one of the best baseball books out there. Turbow’s book is a fun read. Your Maximum Leader can’t say that he learned much from the Turbow book, but it is filled with so many entertaining baseball yarns that it was a quick read.

Now your Maximum Leader is going to try and knock out Lord Norwich’s “Travellers Companion to Venice” and Christopher Moore’s “Lamb” before too long.

Your Maximum Leader is also going to try and get rid of all the old programming on his DVR and free up some space on that hard drive. Last night your Maximum Leader and Villainette #1 finished the last two episodes of Joss Whedon’s ill-fated series “Dollhouse.” The penultimate episode was okay, but would have been better if it had been the last episode. The final episode was disappointing from the perspective of the story. It seemed rushed, badly edited (in fact it felt like it was 3 hrs long when shot and only 1 hr long when it aired), and just thrown together. The best thing about the final episode was the Whedon was able to throw in a few of his favorite actors from previous outings (like Felicia Day from “Dr Horrible” and many members of the “Firefly” series).

For your intellectual curiosity, you should go and read one of the latest installments of FLG’s posts on time-horizons and their connections to politics/economics/world-view. FLG is probably on to something with this line of thinking.

That is all for now.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader must admit a slight interest in gossipy things. He enjoys a quick perusal of two dens of salacious anti-culture on the web and one on TV. (He visits WWTD and The Superficial in addition to watching Chelsea Lately from time to time.)

So… Because he’s been perusing the gossip pages he’s heard that Lindsay Lohan is going to jail for… well… for being eggregious in just about every way possible. Lindsay can serve up to 90 days in jail.

Lindsay Lohan is a sad case. She had (past tense) some real acting talent. Talent aside, she is so self-destructive that she seems to be unemployable in Hollywood. Not completely unemployable, she might still get a gig or two as a token “celebrity” at a party at a sorta-swanky nightclub for which she’ll collect some apperance fee. It is a little sad to see her squander her opportunities.

Just a little sad of course. Lohan’s decline and fall into the abyss of self-destructiveness may have opened the door to some other talented actress who might not have gotten another look. Your Maximum Leader can’t name who that lucky actress might be; but she is likely out there somewhere in some film your Maximum Leader’s not seen.

(NB: At what point does just reading Pajiba actually become as substitute for going to the movies? Your Maximum Leader thinks he’s at that point.)

Frankly, your Maximum Leader is happy that Lindsay is going to spend some time in the poke. Perhaps she’ll learn something and sober up a little bit. Then again she might become some large butch lesbian’s love-toy for her stint in the hosegow. Even if Lindsay doesn’t learn anything perhaps her situation could dissuade some other young star’s bad behaviour.

On second thought, there isn’t much to learn from Lindsay’s situation. She violated the laws of the land. She took every opportunity given her to avoid jail (and there were many) and still wound up in jail. There isn’t anything to learn from this, except to say that judges in Southern California must be pretty lax.

Your Maximum Leader wonders if Lindsay will ever do any serious acting again. He doubts it. He doesn’t think she’ll straighten herself out. The first step down her future path is behind bars. Then she’ll be released in 25-90 days. Upon getting out she’ll revert to her strung-out ways. Then he figures she’ll be in some Cinemax (Skinemax!) after-dark special within a year or two. After a year or two of the soft stuff, she’ll become too strung out and unemployable by soft-core porn she’ll eventually wind up in some inter-racial gang-bang video just to afford more cheap vodka and cigarettes.

Ah well… Arrivederci Lindsay. It was fun. Okay, it really wasn’t, but you just go on thinking that it was.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader sees that there is good news ye olde news wire today.

Apparently His Holiness (and likely most of the College of Cardinals) have a soft spot for a film by John Landis. To wit: The Vatican Endorses “The Blues Brothers.” Here is the release from Reuters in full:

TAORMINA, Sicily (Hollywood Reporter) – When Jake and Elwood Blues, the protagonists in John Landis’ cult classic “The Blues Brothers,” claimed they were on a mission from God, the Catholic Church apparently took them at their word.

On the 30th anniversary of the film’s release, “L’Osservatore Romano,” the Vatican’s official newspaper, called the film a “Catholic classic” and said it should be recommended viewing for Catholics everywhere.

The film is based on a skit from “Saturday Night Live.” In the story, Jake and Elwood — played by John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd, respectively — embark on an unlikely road trip featuring concerts, car chases, clashes with the police and neo-Nazi groups, and attempts at revenge from a spurned lover, all, ostensibly, to raise money for the church-run orphanage where they grew up.

But aside from a brief appearance from Kathleen Freeman as a wrist-slapping nun referred to as “The Penguin” and the brothers’ periodic claim that they were on a mission from God, spirituality does not play a significant role in the film.

In addition to Belushi and Aykroyd, the film featured an all-star cast including musicians James Brown, Cab Calloway, Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, John Lee Hooker, and Chaka Khan, in addition to noted actors John Candy, Carrie Fisher, Charles Napier, and Henry Gibson, and cameo roles for Frank Oz, Steven Spielberg, Landis, Mr. T, and Paul Reubens.

With the recommendation, “The Blues Brothers” joins the list of dozens of films recommended by Catholic authorities that includes Cecil B. DeMille’s “The Ten Commandments,” “Jesus of Nazareth” from Franco Zeffirelli,” Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of The Christ,” Victor Flemming’s “Joan of Arc,” and “It’s a Wonderful Life” from Frank Capra.

Your Maximum Leader should put the movie on the olde Blu Ray player tonight and celebrate…

In a stream of consciousness type of codicil to this post… Another film on the list is “The Passion of The Christ.” In that movie the highly desireable Monica Bellucci plays Mary Magdalene. It has been a while since your Maximum Leader has attempted any sort of RCBfA type post… So here is Monica Bellucci for your viewing pleasure.

Please note the fruit on the banquet tables in the back… Because as we all know, where there is fruit there is art. You know something, and this is a sad confession to make, Monica Bellucci is the only reason your Maximum Leader bothered to watch “Shoot ‘em up.” It was a horrible film, made slightly less horrible by Ms. Bellucci being in it.

BTW, did your Maximum Leader mention that Ms. Bellucci just made the number one spot on Pajiba’s list of the Ten Hottest Celebrity Women over 40 list. You can clicky the link if you like to see the other nine…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is returned from a few days down in beautiful Key West. You want to know something? Your Maximum Leader might be the only normal person to go to Key West for 4 days, experience beautiful sunny 80 degree weather; and return home just as pasty and fish-belly white as he left.

Your Maximum Leader might recount more of his trip in a later post. Let us give a quick summary for you if you are so inclinded…

High points: friends’ wedding, “Little White House” visit, Hemmingway house visit, eating fish caught by friends at Eat it Raw (fish was cooked), drinking so many cuba libres that your Maximum Leader figured he might just go and try to libre the island of Cuba.

(NB to all: Your Maximum Leader takes his cuba libres in his own form. He likes white rum, coke, splash of lime juice, crushed lime wedge, and a float of 151 proof rum. He found that the bartenders at Eat It Raw thought his variation on the popular drink was particularly good.)

Low points: listening to a mediocre piano bar singer at hotel for longer than he wanted, waking up early due to cruise ship horns sounding at dawn, blister on heel from shoes

Regrets: not going deep sea fishing when friends did go with Captain Keith on the Lucky Strike.

There might be a photo of your Maximum Leader and a more detailed post coming… Or not…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has had a shortage of quality blog time for you all. This situation isn’t going to change over the next few days. He admits that he could have blogged some last night, but he got distracted by the Akira Kurosawa film extravaganza on TMC last night. (BTW, Happy Birthday Kurosawa-san. You would have been 100 years old yesterday.) After putting his villainous offspring to bed he spied “Rashomon” on the tv. Next thing you know, the “Seven Samurai” was on. Then your Maximum Leader fell asleep. He’s such a wuss that way.

What to blog? What to blog?

Well… First of he should congratulate the President, but most of all Speaker Pelosi for getting the damned health care bill passed. It was tremendous work on their parts. Your Maximum Leader gives most of the credit to the Speaker who must have used every bit of parliamentary/political/personal knowledge she knew to twist all the arms to make the deal happen. Your Maximum Leader wasn’t sure that she would pull it off. He wasn’t sure that is until she saw Steny Hoyer and the Speaker announce a vote would be held on Sunday. Once they actually gave a day for the vote and were adamant that it would happen your Maximum Leader knew they had the votes. So… Congrats to them. It was a tough slog, but they got the job done.

Is your Maximum Leader happy about the bill? Of course not. It sucks. But you have to give credit where it is due. And it is due in this case.

So what next? Well… One hopes that the Republicans can run an effective campaign this year and take the House or Senate back and work on serious modification of the bill. Your Maximum Leader thinks Fishersville Mike is right on with a slogan of “Change - the right kind this time.” Why does your Maximum Leader say serious modification and not outright repeal? Let’s be honest. Even after a few months there is inertia that sets in on any legislation. There isn’t going to be an outright repeal. Major modifications is the best course. It is the way the system works. Why did you think they were pushing so hard to pass something? Once it gets on the books it is there… Some portions of the law just enacted will remain no matter how hard one tries to remove them.

Ah well… One hopes that Republicans (for lack of a better alternative) can get their acts together and run a tight campaign and put themselves into a position where they actually have some institutional power in Congress…

Did you Wagnerians out there see that Wolfgang Wagner died this week? The grandson of Richard Wagner and longtime Bayreuth Festival director passed away at age 90. His daughter (and teutonic hottie) Katharina Wagner is currently the festival director.

Your Maximum Leader may, or may not, post again this week. He is off to Key West, Florida for a few days of sun, fun, and marriage. A good friend of his is getting married in Key West on Friday night. It should be fun. It has been a long time since your Maximum Leader was last in Key West. If you have any suggestions of things for him to see or do, leave a comment. (No need to comment that he should leer at drunken spring-break co-eds. Please accept that as read…)

This good friend getting married is the owner of Key West Key Lime pies. If you want to get yourself get best key lime pie EVAH (EVAH!!!) feel free to clicky on the linky and buy…

Later gators… Perhaps your Maximum Leader will get some sun…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader tried a few news break posts a few years ago. (2004 to be exact. Including this one that was slightly notorious for the last line.) Do you remember news breaks? The networks would drop one commercial from a prime-time break and give you a 30-45 second review of the top stories nationally. (Remember Jessica Savitch’s famous final news break in 1983?) Your Maximum Leader used to miss the old news breaks… But now with the proliferation of 24 hour news networks they don’t have much of a place in regular broadcasts.

There are of course, local news breaks during prime-time. They exist to entice you to stay up to watch the 11pm news…

So… Here is a news break for you…

Abortion threatens to derail health care legislation, again.

Watch out! Another runaway Toyota.

Biden tells off Israelis in Israel.

Andy Richter is a professor of show business.

La Lohan can’t work, so she sues babies.

The popcorn you are eating has been pissed in. Film at 11.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has been an avid watcher of the Olympics since he was a little kid. He loves watchng the Winter and Summer games almost equally. He has a number of vivid Olympic memories. He actually anticipates watching the games while they are on.

Of course, he hates the absolute morons who run NBC and are doing their best to drive your Maximum Leader away from the Olympics completely.

Allow your Maximum Leader to say a few things about his Olympic viewing. First off, he’s come to the conclusion over the past few years that he isn’t going to actively root for sports where a subjective call by a judge determines the outcome of the event. This conclusion has pretty much eliminated his enjoyment of freestyle ski jumping, figure skating, most snowboarding, and moguls competitions (to name a few). This is not to diminish the athletic accomplishment of the athletes. They are truly world-class phenomina. But your Maximum Leader has grown so weary of judging scandals and the nit-picking that he can’t get himself worked up to view those sports. (He will still watch, except figure skating - he’s had enough of figure skating.)

Your Maximum Leader prefers competitions that are determined by objective measures, like time or distance or a score. He loves hockey, skiing, luge, skeleton, bobsled and the like. He also knows that, with the exception of hockey, he only watches these sports every four years.

So why is NBC doing all it can to completely screw up Olympic coverage? Are they really that friggin stupid? Are they actually retarded?

It was a few Olympics ago when your Maximum Leader really noticed that it was getting bad. Too many human interest stories and interviews that were intermintably long. Too many sports never made it to TV. Too much face time for the anchors. Too much viewing of only Americans.

To paraphrase Ian Fleming, the first time NBC screws up Olympic coverage is bad luck, the second time they screw it up is coincidence, the third time is enemy action. Yes, NBC is the enemy here and they are going their best to piss off your Maximum Leader and diminish his Olympic viewing experience. They have fucked up their late-night lineups, and now they are continuing to do their best to destroy the Olympics. Your Maximum Leader doesn’t need to see one event over and over and over again. There are hours and hours of competitive sport taking place. NBC has at least four (cable) channels on which they can broadcast these events. But we get the same shit hour after hour.

Here is your Maximum Leader’s plea to NBC Sports. Listen. If you insist on having this human interest/light sport Olympic broadcasting on NBC itself, so be it. But at least show other competitions on USA, CNBC and NBC/Universal. You can even show sports where Americans aren’t going to be contenders. These athletes are the best of the best and are worth watching no matter what country they are representing. Show them. Don’t continue to be putzes and limit what we can see to what your sports producers think will draw in the most viewers. Your sports producers aren’t that smart if past history is any indication. NBC Sports coverage generally sucks. The NFL gave you Sunday Night Football to squeeze you for cash (that you were happy to pay since no one was watching NBC Sports). You got the NHL for the game of the week on Sunday because (let’s face it) the NHL did all they could to kill themselves and they desperately needed any big-time teevee outlet to show games. (And as bad as things are at NBC, they are better than the Versus network.) So, your Maximum Leader recommends that you stop relying on your sports producers and start listening to your Maximum Leader. Show more sports and give Bob Costas and Dan Patrick less face time. We’ll all be happier.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader sees that Conan O’Brien will host his last installment of “The Tonight Show” this Friday. It is hard to muster up too much sorrow for a man who is getting a $33 million payout. Your Maximum Leader does think that Conan has been treated really badly. He is sure that Conan will recover and be back on the air somewhere in late 2010. Your Maximum Leader hopes that Andy Richter travels along with Conan wherever the latter ends up.

Fare thee well Conan. Your Maximum Leader will have a beer later in your honor and toast to the complete collapse of NBC.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader sees that actor Patrick Stewart will soon become Sir Patrick Stewart. His name is on the honors list just released, CNN is reporting.

Bully for you Patrick.

Now we can only wait for Bill Shatner to get his. Shatner is Canadian afterall and still eligible…

NB to readers: Speaking of Star Trek stuff… Your Maximum Leader just bought his first Blu Ray today. JJ Abrams reboot of the Star Trek franchise.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader broke out the Christmas song playlist on the old iPod yesterday. 7.5 hours of Christmas music for his listening pleasure.

But there is a problem. On a few different Christmas sampler albums he has on the old iPod the song “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” appears.

Why?

What exactly qualifies “Baby It’s Cold Outside” as a Christmas song? It is just a song about a guy trying his best to make sure he gets lucky on a snowy night. Indeed, as he thinks more about it how is this song played nowadays? Really, the guy is getting the girl to smoke and drink. He’s basically liquoring her up to make sure he can get a little play that night. Why aren’t feminists going on about this horrible mysogynistic song? Perhaps they are and your Maximum Leader just doesn’t know about it.

There is nothing particulary Christmas-y about the song so why is it on Christmas/Holiday samplers?

In case you are wondering… One of your Maximum Leader’s favorite versions of the song is by Sir Tom Jones…

He also likes the Ann Margaret/Al Hirt version.

While “Baby It’s Cold Outside” shouldn’t be thought of as a Christmas song, your Maximum Leader is all for winter makeout songs. So it still has his seal of approval.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is (again) stealing a page from FLG’s book. He’s now listening to:

and

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader was just reading the lastest Badass of the Week entry. It is on the Kraken. Sadly, the Kraken didn’t quite do it for your Maximum Leader. But being in a badass frame of mind he provides you with this eternal question:

Ninjas vs Pirates? Which is more badass?

Well… Ben, the chronicler of all things badass, answers the question here.

Your Maximum Leader has pondered the question and agrees with Ben’s rationale.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has been quite busy this week. This weekend is going to be a rough one.

Tonight he and Mrs Villain are attending a formal ball. Tuxedos and evening gowns. Big band. It should be a good (if long) night.

Tomorrow night your Maximum Leader and Villainette #2 are going to the Washington Capitals game.

Sunday your Maximum Leader is driving back to his alma mater to deliver a speech on leadership to a group of students being recognized for their contributions to the school. (NB to all: If you have some pithy things you believe your Maximum Leader should add to the speech - which is only broadly outlined at this point - please feel free to comment and let him know.)

He figures when you add into the mix sleep, travel time and regular family stuff he doesn’t think there will be much relaxing this weekend.

If all works out he might post a photo of a tuxedo’ed Maximum Leader. Just for kicks…

Carry on.