A REAL LIVE DONKEY NAMED "SWIFTY"

1. . . . He's the mascot of the Democratic National Convention and now in Boston at the Franklin Park Zoo. He's a 10-year-old gray, brown and white jackass and he's got experience. He was at the Staples Center in LA in 2000 and his owner rode him down Pennsylvania Avenue for both of Bill Clinton's inaugural parades.
2. . . . Hee Haw. Hee Haw. Hee Haw, Hee Haw, Hee Haw.
3. $38 MILLION. In debt. That's the status of Mike Tyson's finances. How'd that happen? Try owning 110 cars for one thing or two Bengal tigers worth $140,000 for another.
4. Dr. Phil pulls in over $100,000 per speech on the lecture circuit, so says TV Guide. Maybe Mike Tyson should try that.
5. Why does every child Michael Jackson has have to be by a surrogate mother? Doesn't he know that causes problems? I guess he doesn't like to have, uh - face-to-face (?) contact.
6. I'M HATIN' IT. McDonald's slogan. Worst one yet.
7. Somebody sent garlic powder to Sen. Kerry's office in Washington last week. They thought it was something more - maybe anthrax - but it turned out not to be. Maybe they thought he needed some spicing up.
8. ABC has introduced ABC News Now for its coverage of the Democratic Convention. The 24-hour digital video news service is being offered via broadcast TV and cable, computer and cell phone. Available to 55% of the network's affiliates. Sounds innovative.
9. WALK LIKE A . . . There's a monkey walking upright at an Israeli zoo nowadays. The female macaque started walking like a human after a stomach ailment nearly killed her. Maybe she's the missing link.
10. Looks like Michael Okwu (long O) is with NBC News now. Last week he was out in Nevada covering the fires in Carson City. He was with CNN, did a lot of entertainment reporting at first and then got more into hard-news. Good reporter. NBC must've noticed.
11. The New Yorker magazine reports in this week's edition that members of all four branches of the U.S. military can get facelifts, breast enlargement, liposuction and nose jobs for free, done by practicing physicians. Yes, "the surgeons have to have someone to practice on," says an Army spokeswoman. Wonder how it comes out?
12. . . . That magazine has really broken a lot of news lately. They've become a force.
13. THE BOURNE SUPREMACY. Excellent movie thriller with Matt Damon as Jason Bourne, a former CIA assassin on the run, and after him is Joan Allen (Pamela Landy), a gungho CIA deputy. Paul Greengrass directed and that man knows how to put together an edge-of-your-seater. It globe trots and chases through India, Naples, Berlin and Moscow and the movie's so engrossing that you almost feel like you're there. The camera work is terrific and so is the music. The car chases are totally wild.
14. . . . It has shades of CSI-type technology too.
15. I've heard a lot about lettuce bikinis lately. Do women wear them when they're hungry? Ha Ha Ha.
16. So Lance Armstrong won the Tour de France. Thank God it's over. The most dragged-out race of all time. Got sick of all the stages of it.
17. Peter Jennings came out of a news piece on the death toll in Sudan's Darfur conflict and said, "Darfur . . . and not enough of the world is watching. This is true.
18. They found the head of American Paul Johnson in a freezer. How nice. Now where's the rest of him?.
19. While an MSNBC anchor person was talking about the 9/11 commission report one day last week they were showing British Prime Minister Tony Blair commenting about it in parliament. The lower third of the cable channel's screen said, "MSNBC RIGHT NOW" but in the upper left of the screen it said, "EARLIER." So which one was it? I wondered whether I was watching it now or then.
20. Martha Stewart said to Larry King, "I've been working for 62 years." How could that be? She is 62 years old -- Unless she's older or came out of the womb making cookies.
21. First daughter Barbara Bush reminds me of the actress Juliette Lewis. Those gowns the sisters had on (Barbara and Jenna) for a Vogue photo shoot looked like you could make ten tents out of all that material. But the gals did look good.
22. DHL (We Move the World) has an aggressive ad campaign and the commercials are funny. They're trying to take over some of FedEx's turf. I'm seeing trucks and offices spring up in many places and full-page magazine ads.
23. Tucker Carlson did Crossfire from New Hampshire one day last week without any socks on. He was sitting in one of those high director's chairs and you could see his bare ankles.
24. I don't like Halle Berry in long hair. She looks better with it short and less like a Beyonce wannabe.
25. DREAMY BOY. Singer Marc Anthony's nickname for wife Jennifer Lopez is Lola and he thanks Lola on his latest album by saying, "My life has been one of dreams since the second you walked through that door." Aw.
26. What's with Sharon Stone's messed up hair all the time? It's sloppy and not that becoming. But her hair does look a little more kempt in pictures I've seen of her in Catwoman.
27. Actress Minnie Driver has an album coming out in October. Everything I've Got in My Pocket has been described as contemporary folk and she's written all but one song on the CD and that one song is a cover of Springsteen's Hungry Heart. Wonder what she sounds like.
28. Is The Village gonna be good or just another tease like Signs was?
29. I bought a copy of The 9/11 Commission Report. Paperback, $10. Interesting read.
30. THE GLASS MENAGERIE. Sally Field is good as the pushy, talkative mother (Amanda Wingfield) in Tennessee Williams' award-winning play now showing at the Kennedy Center. But it's hard to hear her and her daughter Laura (Jennifer Dundas) from the stage. They must not have been wearing those projection mikes or whatever you call them. Friends of mine had to get headsets from the lobby during intermission to hear what they were saying up there. To me though, the star of the show is Jason Butler Harner who plays her son Tom. Story of a St. Louis family coping with life during the Depression.
31. Mr. Big Stuff and Mr. Highfalutin both have the same gripe and neither one knows each other. They want to buy new cell phones and all they want is a phone to talk on. But when they go to the stores all they're selling are the camera phones and they cost more and they only have one lousy looking regular phone that's not a camera phone. They're not interested in taking pictures or playing games or downloading music. They just want things simple. Is that too much to ask?
32. SONAR KILLS WHALES. Can you imagine how loud it must be? Two dead whales landed on the beach in the Canary Islands and environmentalists are blaming their deaths on sonar used a couple of weeks ago in NATO exercises off the coast of Morocco. Get PETA after ‘em.
33. Is Mark Hacking trying to be another Scott Peterson? They're still looking for Lori Hacking, his pregnant wife, who went out jogging almost two weeks ago. He's a person of interest due to some strange behavior and is currently is a psychiatric hospital. Fishy.
34. Now Hummer's got an HUT. It looks like a double cab truck more than an SUV. And how much do they go for?
35. Is Wolf Blitzer really The Iron Man of TV Journalism? And who gave him that name? Well, he is on two hours a day during the week and he's got another hour every Sunday with Late Edition. It is a lot of face time.
36. FEEDBACK. A reader and old friend of mine has this update on Herb of Peaches and Herb (Reunited, Shake Your Groove Thing) fame: He lives in Washington, D.C. and is a U.S. marshal for the Court of Veterans Appeals. Over the years there have been different Peaches who have recorded and appeared with him, but Herb says, "There have been many Peaches, but there's only one Herb."
37. Hanalie, dog in the neighborhood, got a new housemate: Gidget, a bare-eyed cockatoo. She's a beautiful bird and has that funny crest thing that springs out on her head. Owner Sally wants to teach her to ride on Hanalie's back but that could be dangerous with Buddy and Emma, the new bird's other housemates. They're cats.
38. UH . . . A House Is Not A Home - Dionne Warwick on Scepter and then again by Luther Vandross on Epic, written by Hal David and Burt Bacharach.

rocci@roccifisch.com

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