The Pot and The Kettle

Here we are, with Roland Garros upon us! The 2nd, rowdiest Slam of the year and also the only Slam where some upsets and surprises can actually happen. At least in the past, they have. This year, however, may be pretty by the book. Nadal will win and will beat Federer in the finals, shocking!

As for the ladies (and isn't tennis really all about the ladies), we have a very bottom heavy draw. So let's start with the top. Amelie, at No.1, seems to be sitting pretty for the first week. A likely quarterfinal matchup will be Amelie vs. Patty Schnyder (7). Patty may have to play Venus(11) first, provided old V can get there. I am thinking she will be sloppy and out sooner. Amelie will easily handle Ms. Schnyder. The second quarter of the draw is relatively weak, with non-clay court Sharapovs the highest seed at #4. I can see her making it to the round of 16, but will then fall to Dinara Safina (14), who I am even going to peg to make it through this quarter, beating either Schiavone or Kutzy in the quarters.

The bottom half is full of the favorites, however, with bitchy and Australian Open final whiner and quitter, Justine Henin-Hardenne (5), unfortunately the player to beat this year. Clijsters (2) will do well, but ultimately a non-component. A rejuvenated and surprisingly likable Hingis (12) can go as far as she likes in the tourney, but my heart is with Nadia "one point at a time" Petrova (3) to do well...very well. JHH and Nadia will storm to a quarterfinal bitch of a match, that will probably be the year's de-facto final. The final quarter has Hingis trouncing everyone including Elena "Mc-NoServe" Dementieva (6), and Clijsters scrambling to make it to the quarters, but falling to Hingis.

Quarters:
Mauresmo v. Schnyder
Safina v. Schiavone
JHH v. Petrova
Hingis v. Clijsters

Semis:
Mauresmo v. Safina
Petrova v. Hingis (a good 3 setter!)

Final
Mauresmo v. Petrova
Petrova has a great record against Mauresmo, but Mauresmo will be fighting for everything....EVERYTHING! She has a ton to prove here.

Winner.....?????
Nadia.

The Pot's Update:

Nice arms weren't enough for Nadia Petrova as she was ousted in the first round of the French Open. Don'te feel bad Kettle, America's sweetheart Andy Roddick is also out, although he supposebly withdrew because of an injury. Hopefully these early exits will give each of them time to find their mojo's and give Andy some more time to work on his blog.

If its Memorial Day weekend, its Fleet Week in New York City. That means lots of boats in the harbor, planes in the skies, tourists on the Intrepid and hot men in uniform all over Times Square, Central Park and, for those with a little extra cash, the Meat Packing District.

There might even be a few men in uniform in Chelsea, the Village and/or Hells Kitchen. And I mean real uniforms, not the ones you pick up at the local fetish shops on Christopher Street. In any event men, don't worry -- if you don't ask, we won't tell.

The weather should be beautiful and its always nice to see the Navy boys and the Marine men enjoy the City whil getting a few days rest.

And to one very special maratime man (whose name ryhmes with Will), The Kettle sends a giggly hello and wants to see you again at Paradise!

Oh, Lost. How I love to hate you. I guess there must be something about it, though, if I keep tuning in, but a) I just don't care or b) I only care so much that I want every single character to die. Except for Sun, because she is exquisite. Thoughts on Sun: Last season, I admirably pegged her as a modern Greek tragic hero, because she was. This season, she gets pregnant and, thus, has fallen to a character reserved for shock-value and cliffhangers.

It continues to pain me that critics laud Lost's thrills and finely crafted scripts. Plot-wise I will give it the benefit of the doubt and say it has something going there, even if each plot development/twist is ridiculous. But dialogue-wise, this show sounds like a somewhat clever 7th grader, only attempting to be deep, is writing this drivel:

Locke, being thrown out of the hatch, now that he has decided pushing the button is stupid, yells "We are like puppets! We are puppets on a string. As long as we keep pushing the button we can never be free!"

Seriously, he said that. Thanks, Locke, America wasn't aware. You can force this show to be existential all you want, that doesn't make it so.

Desmond told Libby he will sail around the world and "I will do it for love." That reeks of Titanic idiocy. Obvious Libby sidebar: She and Ana-Lucia, after the actresses were arrested for drinking and driving, were killed off the show. The actress Ana-Lucia, who opted for jailtime over community service, is clearly a horrible person and will never appear on Lost again. Libby will appear in everyone's flashback because she is a nicer drunk driver.

Oh, and yes a pterodactyl actually swooped from the sky onto the annoying, self-righteous band of Jack, Kate, and Sawyer (Hurley was there, too, but until he loses weight, he won't be important). And Hurley thought the bird said his name.

Who uttered the following when asked who would win American Idol tonight?

"Sorry, I don't watch reality shows - I think they're evil and there's nothing real about them. Oh, was that too angry?"

Here are your choices:

A) Mackenzie Astin

B) Maya Rudolph

C) The Kettle

D) Justine Bateman

E) Zach

Make your selection by circling the the correct answer. There is no partial credit.

Here is the answer.

From Towelroad:

Amazon is now selling a special package: Everything You Wanted to Know About the Closet But Were Afraid to Ask.

You can buy former New Jersey Governor James McGreevey's new memoir The Confession, and the Brokeback Mountain DVD in a kind of retail civil partnership.

I didn't expect a full-on glamour shot of McGreevey on the cover!

This just may be the hottest search term to ever lead someone to this blog.

This must be Jim McGreevey day or something. First I hear he'll be on Oprah in September, then I read that his "official portrait" will be unveiled at a private ceremony at the New Jersey Statehouse sometime this summer and finally I see that Jimbo has himself a boyfriend! (That's the happy couple -- Jim McGreevey and Marck O'Donnell -- in the picture).

Yep, Jim is out, loud, proud and off to meet Mark's parents.

Hey Jim, I couldn't stand you as governor and didn't appreciate your attempt to be a gay martyr and some sort of role model in coming out, but mazel tov to you. Its good to see that guy is moving on with his life and being true to who he is.

I'm still waiting to see him at Paradise.

I'm not going to comment on Britney Spears's near tumble yesterday while carrying a glass full of some liquid in one hand and her 9-month old son in the other Sean Preston, except to say that new moms make mistakes, especially with 50 photographers watching your every move (this one forgivable, the no-car-seat one was just plain stupid).

But what I will comment on is her unbelievably poor taste in clothes! Look at this rag she is wearing -- a white doily apron blouse, with her black titty bra and pink thong hanging out. This is a mother and a mother-to-be.

Class-E bitch!

Confucius was right, you can take the white trash out of the trailer park, but you can't take the trailer park out of the white trash.

According to the New York Post's gossip page, former New Jersey Governor James "I am a gay American" McGreevey will be peddling his soon-to-be published book on Oprah in September:

DISGRACED former New Jersey Gov. Jim McGreevey is going to get the star treatment from Oprah Winfrey. The daytime talk queen has booked the pol, who resigned and came out of the closet after admitting he'd given his secret male lover a job, to appear in September for the launch of his tome, "I Am a Gay American." But unfortunately for McGreevey, the tell-all is not being mulled for an Oprah's Book Club selection, her camp told us.

Oprah, girl, what were you thinking? Jimbo's fifteen minutes were up a few hours ago and his book isn't going to change that. Plus, do you really need to be chit chatting about another memoir filled with lies?

LICE! This week will go down in history as the week of the Great IMKA Lice Outbreak 2006. (IMKA is the semi-pseudonym for the semi-illustrious school in which I find a semi-modest employment, FYI)

I am not even sure if there was an actual reported case of lice (there was, but we were asked to be sensitive and discrete about it), but either way, you can learn a lot about a snooty community when something as dirty as the subject of lice surfaces.

So what have I learned about lice this week? I will tell you.
1. Clearly lice is not something you outgrow by the 5th grade.
2. Lice is a great a ice-breaker and will make even the quietest kid in class talk!
3. Lice infection does NOT immediately result in head shaving.
4. Lice is not quite the same as leprosy, so you shouldn't shun, snicker, or run from anyone suspected of hosting the lice. You should also not point and whisper at said host, unless you are a faculty member at the lunch table and another faculty member just doesn't know who the dirty child is.
5. There is an incredibly nasty little bugger out there called a chigger. If it is possible, it is actually worse than it sounds. It is a bug that literally burrows into your skin. Thank god, it is only indigenous to the South, at least according to Mrs. G. and Dr. H.
6. Thinking about lice will automatically make your head itch, and then you will be scared.
7. When talking about lice, you cannot help but glance into the hair of the people involved in the conversation.
8. The special lice shampoo could possibly cause dandruff.
9. Lice are attracted to clean hair. Really.

I was listening to WPLJ while driving to work this morning and was lucky enough to be stuck in traffic just long enough to hear the morning show's interview with Teri Hatcher. Normally I don't pay a bit of attention to ole Ms. Hatcher (although her nipples got my attention) and don't plan on reading her book (which, by the way, is on the New York Times best seller list). But the following exchange (not a precise quote) did get my attention and give me a good laugh, at Ryan Seacrest's expense.

[ommited babble]
Todd Pettengill: I'd like to date you.
Teri Hatcher: Aww that's so sweet
TP: That is if you're still dating morning show DJs
Teri Hatcher: [immediate tone change] I was never dating a morning show DJ.

Poor Ryan.

Some crazy assed lesbian is stalking KTU (NY's 103.5 FM) DJ Diane Prior, leaving numerous sexually explicit voicemails and e-mails for her each day.

Bitch, I know its hard and all, especially since Diane is such a hotty totty, teasing you with that cleavage, but leave the girl be before you get a beat down!

Oh, and this may come as a shock to you people, but KTU is actually located in Jersey City, not New York. And Z100, they broadcast from the swamps in Secaucus, New Jersey. The only thing at the "top of the Empire State Building" is their antennae.

Things are not looking good for our nation's hardest working professionals, the teachers!

WASHINGTON - Not a single state will have a highly qualified teacher in every core class this school year as promised by President Bush's education law. Nine states along with the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico face penalties.

More here. But I am sure the teachers will get around to it next year. Something probably came up. Maybe they had too many papers to grade and couldn't become qualified just yet. Maybe they were too busy drinking away their fears and anxieties; I mean, the kids just keep....coming.....back. Or we just kept daydreaming about the cute, dumb boy in the back of class.

And can someone please define "highly qualified." Are we saying it is bad to show lots of movies? What if you just want to sit around and chit-chat? How bout giving us some highly qualified students??? Has anyone in Washington thought of that???

The Pot's 2 cents

If by "hardest working professionals" you mean those people who have a 6 hour work day (almost half of which is taken up with lunch and "free periods"), work less than half the year and make more money than the average chump working 52 weeks a year, then yeah, teachers are our nation's hardest working professionals.

Of course, referring to teachers as "professionals" is a misnomer. The world's oldest profession aside, there are only two professions -- medicine and law. To be a profession, you must attend a professional school and graduate with a professional degree. Last time I checked, anyone with a college degree could be a teacher.

As for a definition of "highly qualified," all it took was a simple search from Yahoo!

To be deemed highly qualified, teachers must have: 1) a bachelor's degree,
2) full state certification or licensure, and 3) prove that they know each
subject they teach.

These aren't exactly the toughest of criteria. I mean, hello?!?! Shouldn't a teacher know each subject they teach?? And imagine if your kids were being taught by a teacher who didn't have full state certification or licensure! An outrage!

Finally, from looking closely at the picture above, it looks like the teacher is not only hard working, but working while hard. Excellent choice, Kettle.

. . . and thinks Stanley looks fabulous!

"Its so big and shiny," she said. "WHAT is it?!?!"

[Dlisted]

Teri Hatcher loves her nipples:

"They don't age, they don't sag ... Mine point in a perfectly good direction . . . . It doesn't mean they're great or anybody else would like them. It just means I like them."

I like them too, Teri.

Shake that ass, while you're at it girl.

(Dlisted)

It looks like tennis slooper-star Andy Roddick has decided to enter the world of blogging.

So what interesting tidbits have we learned from Andy's "first 'blog' post?"

Absolutely nothing.

Let's hope Andy finds his blogging mojo soon and at some point explains what the hell he is doing in this picture. Raise your hand if you'd like to be the racket!

(ht Towelroad via Cityrags)

In an effort to save the state of New Jersey $1.5 million and put an ever-so-slight dent in the $5 billion budget deficit, Governor Jon Corzine announced that Medicaid coverage for Viagra, Cialis and similar impotence medications would be discontinued beginning in the next fiscal year (to start July 1, 2006).

Sorry men, no more stiffies on the public tit.