It's All About...

Comics covergirls: Lois Lane in go-go boots?

DC Comics Covergirls, a weighty, oversized volume released this week, examines the shift from the photographed pulp fiction covers to the drawn-and-colored comic covers, all featuring women.

The text, by comic book writer Louise Simonson, is a friendlier version of what you'd expect to find in a museum exhibit about superheroines. The real gems are the pages and pages of color reproductions of comic book covers. Some are modern, published within the past few years, but most are pulled deep out of the DC Comics library.

There's Superman, holding Lois Lane high in the air so she can get a scoop in 1949, and then Lois packing her bags and ditching her superman in her mod mini dress and black go-go boots in 1968.  My how things change!

Wonder Woman gets perhaps the most grandiose chapter, although SuperGirl and the Gotham Girls get their fair share of credit. Who doesn't like a cute villain?

On that note, consider checking out Storytelling Through Graphic Novels, a seminar at the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning to be held from 10 a.m.-noon on June 2. Sara Turner and Jerzy Drozd, the minds and talents behind Make Like A Tree comics, will be teaching storytelling and technique. It'll cost you 25 so-worth-it dollars.

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Go: Meet Drew Curtis and drink Joseph Beth out of beer.
The Fark creator will be signing his book, It's Not News, It's Fark: How Mass Media Tries to Pass Off Crap As News starting at 7 p.m. tonight at Joseph Beth at The Mall at Lexington Green.

Mourn: Joey Broughman died on Monday.
The local legend, beloved guitarist and friendly face at Lynagh's music club is being remembered throughout Lexington's music community.

Knocked Up, and the icky miracle of birth.

Knocked Up, just the movie title, is pretty clear in its plot. You know someone is going to wind up pregnant. And because we're talking about a movie made in the United States, it's probably a statuesque, witty beauty and a pudgy, funny guy.

Right-o!

What I wasn't expecting from yesterday's screening, but got anyway...

Top 10 desert island, all-time favorite books.

Since reading Cheryl Truman's story last week about her Top 10 favorite books, I've been stewing about my list, and even the qualifications for such a list.

Would it include books that meant a lot to me at some point, but not anymore? (Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand.) Should it be the books I've read most often? (How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents by Julia Alvarez.) The ones I use most often? (501 Spanish Verbs. Or maybe the AP Stylebook. Both are lifesavers, if a little dry.) The volumes that inspire me? (Seabiscuit by Laura Hillenbrand, and oh, The Partly Cloudy Patriot by Sarah Vowell.) And what if we're just talking about writings, not necessarily books? Because there are plenty of essays and magazine articles and graphic novels that move me to tears and belly laughs, but aren't necessarily in the book category...ugh...

It's like making a mix of all-time favorite songs, but then you  start swapping songs out  to hit the 70 minute mark,  and then you think, well, maybe I'll make two, for pre- and post-college. And then you think, no, no, I'll make several, one for each city I've lived in. And before you know it, 876 songs have made it onto your all-time favorite list. 60 hours of music. Really.

I just don't know.

If you're better at decision-making than I am, and you must be, send your list in and we might put it in the paper. E-mail it to ctruman@ herald-leader.com or mail it to Cheryl Truman, Lexington Herald-Leader, 100 Midland Avenue, Lexington, Ky. 40508. Please include your name, age, where you live, a daytime phone number and a short explanation of why these books are your favorites.

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Ponder: Did you watch Wife Swap last night?
The Pitney family of Nicholasville swapped with a very interesting family from Florida. You can see ABC's interviews with the families and more info about the show at the network's Web site.

Vote: It's the final two weeks of our comics poll.
For the next few weeks,you'll be seeing Get Fuzzy and Over the Hedge in the paper. Vote for two (only two!) among those, Mutts, Agnes, Lio and Pooch Cafe.

Farking Journalism

Fark founder Drew Curtis works out an easy chair in his Versailles home. Photo by Angela Baldridge.

Fark.com creator Drew Curtis has no journalism experience, but his book reads as if he does, like he's one of us  newspaper crazies who spends time tending his copy and his ulcer. He laughs about it and complains about it, but deep down, he sounds like he loves it. He'd fit right in at any newsroom in the United States. (Read about him here, and here.)

Some journalists will have a hard time reading his book, It's Not News, It's Fark: How Mass Media Tries to Pass Off Crap as News. Like band geeks and computer nerds, we love to joke about ourselves, but our hackles rise when someone else does it, especially someone with a new-fangled career on this World Wide Web we keep hearing about. Curtis is openly sympathetic to what journalists are going through, but he still sees right through us.

Take Page 67: "Another common form of Unpaid Placement Masquerading as Actual Article is Oh My God They're Charging How Much for What? You probably can't think of any specific examples off the top of your head, but no doubt you remember seeing them before: $1,000 for a mint julep at the Kentucky Derby; $5,000 a night for a hotel room in NYC; $500 for the world's largest ice cream sundae."

In fact, you can access my story about the $1,000 mint julep from last year's Kentucky Derby right here, but you'd probably be better off to wait until the first Saturday in May of next year, when we'll likely write the story again, when it's a $1,500 julep.

Of course we didn't pick the story because we were bolstering some company's bourbon. Truly, we're not organized enough to have that kind of agenda. But it is wacky, and we thought people would want to read about it, and I'm sure they did. (Because seriously, it's one drink. How can it be worth my car payment times four?) And wacky was enough, even if it is crap news.

So, rather than pretending Curtis is an outsider whose ideas can be tossed away with all the others, what if we started paying attention to those ideas, the kind a guy with no journalism experience can generate just by being a hyper-reader?

Here's a comparison of some of Curtis' points to those you'll get from an actual journalism text book, Writing and Reporting News: A Coaching Method by Carole Rich. This is the book University of Kentucky students use in their basic reporting classes; it's a good text with a lot of ideas about how to gather and present information. Still, maybe we shouldn't be thinking of it as the only book out there for us.

Read on to see how they compare on a few points.

What to do this weekend if you're not a pirate.

Sweet, sweet three-day weekend, you have no idea how much I need you. Whether you're hiding from some seriously scary gas prices or just choosing to have a nice Kentucky Memorial Day weekend, there's plenty to do that doesn't involve three-hours of pirate madness. (Not that I have a problem with it; I just like to root for the underdog.) 

By the way, today is Towel Day, in memory of the brilliant mind of Douglas Adams. (Thanks for the reminder, JTrain!) Do you know where your towel is?

Here's what this weekend is all about.

Movies: All right, there are a lot of great movies opening here this weekend. A LOT. There's really no question which one is going to win, but at least you've got a load of options -- Away From Her, Bug, Home of the Brave, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End and Waitress. Before you go all Depp crazy, consider that Bug stars two Kentuckians and that Waitress is the much-lauded (whoops!) last film of the late director Adrienne Shelly.

Visual arts: Fourth Friday! Check out the Lexington Art League show generatioNext at Loudoun House, 209 Castlewood Drive. 6-9 p.m. tonight. $7, free for Art League members.

Stage: Dancing Henry Five, a truly original adaptation of Shakespeare's Henry V, will take the stage at the Downtown Arts Center tonight and Saturday. Also, Dave Coulier is playing Comedy Off Broadway in The Mall at Lexington Green this weekend. I hardly know what to make of this. When I see the man's list of recent work, I see that there is life after Full House, despite what Jodi Sweetin would lead us to believe. And yet, he'll always be Uncle Joey to me.

TV: I should have warned you yesterday that Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip returned to NBC last night, but I'm glad I didn't. It was a pretty out-there episode missing Matt, Danny and Jordan. Hmph. Next week it looks like it'll be back to business again, so set the TiVo. Moving on, this may be the only time I'll ever say these words: Watch Wife Swap on Monday. The Pitney family of Nicholasville will be on the show, which starts at 8 p.m. on ABC. If you're just not having any of that, check out The History Channel special Star Wars: The Legacy Revealed, which debuts at 9 p.m. Monday.

Music: Walter Tunis emphatically insists that we -- all of us -- need to be at The Dame tonight to see jazz keyboardist Brian Auger play with local funk-and-something band the Sexual Disaster Quartet. As Walter points out, it's a $5 ticket. To see Auger play in Louisville in June is $20. We're thrifty here in Lexington.

• CD Central on South Limestone will have its annual Memorial Day cookout on Monday, with food and music starting at noon. Note that Pops Resale, located out at 1423-B Leestown Road, will celebrate its 11th anniversary Saturday with DJs starting at  1 p.m. and Club Dub and Kynfolk starting in the evening.

Eat: Jaci Carfagno took a hard look at the local institution Joe Bologna's Restaurant & Pizza. She recommends the pizza, but isn't quite as keen on many of the other dishes. In other good foodie news, Stella's Kentucky Deli, one of my favorite downtown spots, is offering its farmers market brunch buffet on Saturdays during the growing season. It goes from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and goes for $9.95.

American Idol's finale.

I hate to admit it, but I got really wrapped up in American Idol this season. I've watched it every year since taking this job because it's such a huge talking point, and while I was impressed by some of the singers, I never felt compelled to vote. This year, my heart was broken by Melinda Doolittle, even though I'm a little in love with Blake Lewis.

So: What do you think?

The judges seemed right last night -- Jordin can sing, Blake can perform. But to be honest, I wouldn't buy Jordin's CD. She has a lovely voice, and I'm sure she'll make the Kat McPhee-Kelly Clarkson power duo into a triangle of song. But Blake's interpretations are so unexpected; I love them. Instead of singing what's on the paper, he really makes it his own. I'd certainly like to hear some original songs from him -- maybe I should be hoping he loses?

Jordin: That was the most uninspired version of Fighter I could've imagined, although the vocal was good, way to go on the Martina McBride song, perfectly fine and surprisingly emotional on the original song, This is My Now.

Blake: Totally fun on the Bon Jovi song, not so great on the Maroon 5 tune, unlucky break on the third song. Does it seem almost unfair? That is so the right kind of song for Jordin, and she did it beautifully. It  is so the wrong kind of song for Blake, and has little room for an interpretation that would've made it right. ::grumblegrumble:: Whatever. I'll buy your CD.

My gut tells me that Jordin is going to win, but then again, my gut thought Melinda Doolittle was  lock for the final. Shut up, gut. Just turn on the TV.

The hard part tonight, of course, will be balancing the most popular show on television with one of the best on television. The first hour of the double-length Lost finale will overlap with the last hour of the double-length AI finale. I can't even pretend to offer a good analysis of Lost -- it's just too crazy -- but I do recommend you check out Lostpedia. Watch out for spoilers.

New Blog: The girl Gawker, Jezebel.

I'm a little in love with the new blog from Gawker Media: Jezebel.

It bills itself as celebrity, sex and fashion "without airbrushing," which made me want to pause and read.

Just a few posts down today, you'll spot the entry about how Sassy changed women's lives, which made me want to stay and order a drink.

And then there's the headline "Return of Shoulder Pads May Be Harbinger of Bad Things to Come," which is a tad wishy-washy about something painfully obvious -- the return of shoulder pads is  unquestionably a harbinger of a terrible future -- but nonetheless makes me want to invite myself over for a sleepover, where we'll watch John Cusack movies, eat gummi bears and prattle off the list of books we keep meaning to read, but haven't.

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Read: KYKurmudgeon and Pol Watchers.
Registered Republicans and Democrats can (and should!) vote in the primary today. These blogs will help you feel informed, or make you angry enough to vote.

Read more: Cheryl Truman examines closet American Idol fans.
The finale starts tonight on Fox. Vote Team Blake!

TV predictions: The Office, Desperate Housewives and Grey's Anatomy.

Now that we're nearing the end of sweeps months, we can start debating what happens next. Because clearly, summer isn't any good for enjoying the sunshine or expanding our minds or any such nonsense. OMG, did you hear Big Love is coming back on June 11?

Behind the cut, you'll find a few swift season finale recaps of the shows I know best, with a few predictions for the future. Feel free to expand on those in the comments section. I'd love to hear some of your ideas about How I Met Your Mother and the injustice against Melinda Doolittle that played out on last week's American Idol.

Season finales still to come are 24 at 8 p.m. tonight, The Bachelor at 9 p.m. tonight, Dancing with the Stars at 8 p.m. Tuesday, NCIS at 8 p.m. Tuesday, Veronica Mars at 8 p.m. Tuesday, Boston Legal at 10 p.m. Tuesday, American Idol at 8 p.m. Wednesday and Lost at 9 p.m. Wednesday.

By the way, for legit scoop and hands-on info instead of late-night speculation, check out Ask Ausiello in TV Guide, Virginia Heffernan's fantastic upfronts blog for the New York Times and sites like SpoilerFix, which make for good gossip.

Biking and Shreking on a slow weekend.

Seems like an awfully slow weekend in Lex Vegas. Students are mostly gone. Coffee shop lines and pizza delivery times seem reduced. Even the entertainment offerings seem slimmer. Here's what's happening:

Film: Only two new ones are opening, Beyond the Gates and the ogre in the corner, Shrek the Third. I'm tempted to see it just because Amys, Sedaris and Poehler, are involved.

Music: Looks like the coolest musical happening around here isn't exactly here. Louisville's WFPK-91.9 FM is hosting its listener appreciation concerts this weekend at the Brown Theatre. One gets started at 7 p.m. tonight, featuring moe., Angelique Kidjo, Keller Williams, Martin Sexton and Tom Morello. Tomorrow's show features Suzanne Vega, Paula Cole, Ryan Adams, Viet Nam and Charlie Louvin. Look here for ticket info.

Food: Clinton H. Comley reviewed the new Woodland Grill, located conveniently across from the Herald-Leader. We're still smarting from the disappearance of Cafe Jennifer in that spot, but apparently Jonathan Lundy is serving it up well in there. The shocker: He serves Spalding's doughnuts, refried and topped with vanilla ice cream. Whoa.

• Also, Sharon Thompson points out that Babs' Big Apple Bagels Deli is now open in Beaumont Centre. I have craved and hunted for better bagels in this area. Will this be the solution? (Maybe I should've quit my whining and just asked you where you find 'em? I'm serious about this. We once skipped cake at my birthday party in favor of bagels. It was brilliant.)

Visual Arts: Heather Castro wrote about a pretty wacky sounding kinetic art show  at Gallerie Soleil, Scott Scarboro: Electro-Fried: Kinetic Sculpture, Paintings and Other Freaky Sh**. Bad news about that is that it's by appointment only, and only here through Sunday.

TV: So many questions after last night's Grey's Anatomy, and last night's Office, for that matter. I need the weekend to continue reacting. So, this isn't really a happening, but you should probably read this commentary that successfully relates the popularity of Dancing with the Stars to Americans' growing frustration with war.

Outside: Everyone is mad about biking. It's Bike to Work Day in National Bike Month. Bike Lexington takes over downtown this weekend. And in kind of neato news, Lexington is diving into a shared bike program; pay $10, get access to one of 80 yellow bikes, and leave it locked at a downtown rack when you're done. 

New fall TV: lawyers, cops and swingers.

I haven't seen any of the new fall series yet, but we're swiftly approaching the season when I lock myself in a room, prop my eyes open and stare at the TV for a week.

But with all the news from the upfronts trickling around the Web, I was able to cull a list of changes that are on the way to your TV. Some networks have short video presentations of their new series, others are going to leave it to your imagination for a while.

So, click the link below to learn which Lexington native will be playing a 1970s swinger, how Oprah is expanding her empire and which insurance company has inspired a legit television series.