... over at Protein Wisdom

"Have you guys heard the news?" Maggie (name changed) unwrapped the scarf from around her neck and patted her flat belly. "Preggers." It was around 30 degrees outside, and her cheeks were splashed pink from the Indiana wind.

She had discovered earlier that week, after missing a period and taking the test. "I kind of knew already. My boobs and my lower back have been killing me for a while." She shrugged.

My girlfriend Ali and I exchanged a surprised look. Our forks, dotted with pasta sauce, dangled identically, flaccidly, in our hands. She was quicker than me to gain her composure, and turned to address her best friend.

"What are you going to do?" Unnecessary question, really -- a conversational life vest, used when you’re sputtering for something to say. We knew the answer. Maggie, a 22-year-old college senior with no intention of bringing a child into the world yet, was going to have an abortion. She told us that she had already made up her mind; she had even determined the time, date and location. A better question might have been, "How are you going to pay for it?"

She answered that one before we had a chance to ask. "We’re having a party Friday to raise money," Maggie said. "You guys are obviously invited."

Before continuing, I should make it clear that I’m no stranger to bizarre, pregnancy-related parties. My junior year of college, I attended a "Welcoming the Baby Kegger" designed to provide love, support and slurred confessions to a friend nearing her delivery date (she drank grape juice). Though I had initially been skeptical, I left this soirée du bébé pleasantly surprised. Everyone had brought gifts, toys, wine and food, which they piled atop a table in her living room. The music was low, and the conversation was great -- an all-around classy affair. I imagined the abortion party might be similar to this: a way to help out a friend who’s made a difficult decision.

All around, a generally creepy tale ... both for Maggie's cavalier attitude towards ridding herself of an inconvenience to this male's refusal to confront and work through his admitted "bizarre" feelings about it.

Today's big circus is happening in Los Angeles at Staples Center

LOS ANGELES – Los Angeles Police Chief William Bratton says Michael Jackson's casket will be taken to the downtown Staples Center for the singer's star-studded memorial service.

The addition of the body adds to the spectacle currently gripping downtown Los Angeles. Police blocked off roads and warned those without tickets to stay away because they would not be able to get close to the Staples Center. [...]

More than 1.6 million people registered for free tickets to Jackson's downtown memorial. A total of 8,750 people were chosen to receive two tickets each.

"I got the golden ticket!" one fan screamed out of his car window in a Willy Wonka moment as he drove out of the parking lot. [...]

Los Angeles Police Chief William Bratton said Tuesday on CBS' "The Early Show" the department would have more officers on the streets of downtown for the memorial service than it had for last month's Lakers victory parade.

Not only send in the clowns, but

Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey starts a run at Staples Center on Wednesday, a booking long planned in advance. In the pre-dawn hours before Jackson's memorial, the elephants started walking from the train station to the arena. They were set to arrive some five hours before the memorial.

In 1981, Thriller made MTV possible.

May grace and peace be granted both Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson.

The RNC uses images and audio from 1964's Goldfinger, where not only Bond but the CIA gets to play, to tweak Liar Pelosi and Hapless Gibbs. For a brief 3 seconds (at .40) SanFranGran is shown side-by-side with Bond villainess, Pussy Galore, and all kerfuffle breaks loose.

The RNC video, which begins with the speaker’s head in the iconic spy-series gun sight, implies that Pelosi has used her feminine wiles to dodge the truth about whether or not she was briefed by the CIA on the use of waterboarding in 2002. While the P-word is never mentioned directly, in one section the speaker appears in a split screen alongside the Bond nemesis – and the video’s tagline is “Democrats Galore.”

The wisdom of equating the first woman speaker of the House with a character whose first name also happens to be among the most vulgar terms for a part of the female anatomy might be debated – if the RNC were willing to do so, which it was not. An RNC spokesperson refused repeated requests by POLITICO to explain the point of the video, or the intended connection between Pelosi and Galore.

But what isn’t open to debate is that the waterboarding conflict has been accompanied by a cascade of attacks on the speaker, not as a leader or a legislator, but as a woman.

Taylor Marsh hyperventilates

That a woman, let alone Speaker of the House, should never be hinted to in any public way through the use of “Pussy” insinuations should be obvious.

Taylor leads off her little hissy fit with this gem

At the end it says “Democrats Galore.” Imposed with a naked woman behind the tag line.

Uh, if Taylor thinks that showing, from the back, a picture of a woman's shoulders, including clothing straps, constitutes teh nekkid I have a lot of questions for her.

But she is refusing comments.

Maybe Taylor and Andie should have coffee (but only if Andie wears a burka so as not to offend Taylor with her nekkidness).