• Nov. 9, 2006 | 2 p.m. PT

Meet the Seven Dwarves, including Burpy and Chesty

Here's my quick take on a few topics that have been in the news lately.

Burpy? Chesty? Biggo Ego?
Author Neal Gabler has written a new biography of Walt Disney out, and the Amazon.com page about the book shares 10 facts you may not have known about the legendary man. My favorite lists rejected names for the Seven Dwarves, including Deafy, Dirty, Awful, Blabby, Burpy, Gabby, Puffy and Stuffy. Give a little thanks that he came up with Doc, Sneezy, Happy and the rest instead.

I'm a PC! But I'm not a Mac!
We love to   discuss commercials in this Weblog, and one of the most hotly debated ad campaigns this summer was Apple Computers "I'm a Mac! And I'm a PC" ad series. The ads are funny and smart, but many readers wrote in to say they found the Mac actor, Justin Long, to be the embodiment of all the worst stereotypes of Mac devotees — slackery and braggy, or, in the words of Slate's Seth Stevenson, "a smug little twit." The PC actor, uber-talented author John Hodgman, may look like a chubby, chumpy Bill Gates, but he's just hilarious, most of you felt. Anyway, according to Radar Online, Mac portrayer Long no longer will appear in upcoming ads. Mac ads without the Mac guy? What is our world coming to? (  Video here.)

@$#%!
It's going to be interesting to see how newspapers and TV programs around the country print the title of this new movie. Some are using "The F-Word," some the letter "F" followed by asterisks, some are just taking out the "u." This reminds me of when the band the Butthole Surfers were touring and certain newspapers refused to print their name, either. If I'm remembering it correctly, one paper just decided to make up a new name for them, calling them the "Buttonhole Surfers." My favorite way to reproduce a swear word is use the symbols above the number keys, like comic strips do. Drop an anvil on your foot? @#$%! Get lousy advice from Mary Worth? @#$%! And I also like the swear used by innocent little Butters in "South Park"" "Aw, hamburgers!"

‘In Cold Blood’ house
This is really quite chilling to me: The Clutter family home in Holcomb, Kansas, where an entire innocent family was murdered in 1959, inspiring Truman Capote's "In Cold Blood," is up for sale. I don't see mention of the crime in the real-estate listing, but I don't know how anyone could not think of it if they even considered buying the home. It looks just like the normal, comfortable home it was up until Perry Smith and Dick Hickock turned it into hell on earth. I don't believe in ghosts, but that doesn't mean I don't shiver just a little looking at the photos of the rooms where the murders happened. (Zelda gets credit for the link.)

• Nov. 7, 2006 | 8 p.m. PT

Doogie, Britney, ‘Borat,’ Tim Gunn

What a crazy week or so it's been in entertainment: Britney files for divorce, "Borat" makes glorious moviefilm for box-office craziness, Doogie Howser comes out as gay.

Here's a batch of related links from around the Web, on those and other topics:

Doogie Howser goes to White Castle
Personally I'm hardly shocked that Neil Patrick Harris, a.k.a. "Doogie Howser," is gay. But the news did make me go hunt up his classic lines from "Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle," in which Harris, playing himself, unleashes a fairly filthy rant about how Kumar and Roldy need to ditch their burger quest and find him a woman, and soon. (Warning: Language is not for the sensitive.) Harris also inspires Harold to almost, but not quite, quote a similar film's title when he asks "Doog, where's my car?"

Oops, Britney did it again
Here's Britney Spears' Day-Timer for the last few years. January 2004: Get married. January 2004: Get marriage annulled. September 2004: Get married again, to man whose girlfriend is quite pregnant with their second child. September 2005: Give birth to first son with that man. September 2006: Give birth to second son with that man. November 2006: File for divorce. There's been plenty written about Britney and Kevin Federline's split, including Mike Ventre's sly take here on MSNBC.com, but anyone wanting some 20/20 hindsight should read this "Dateline" interview she did with Matt Lauer. Best line, from Spears on Federline: 'He’s very simple.  ... He’s so simple.  His simplicity and just he’s like a boy.  He just, you know, and he cares.  He cares so much and his—his heart is awesome."

And while Federline's new CD, "Playing With Fire," received a decent review from the AP, he's getting trashed almost everywhere else. My favorite reviews of Federline's music come from regular folks posting their reviews at Amazon.com. I feel completely comfortable in saying that people put more work into their creative reviews of the album than K-Fed quite possibly put into making it.

One rhyming review begins: "This former back-up dancer / Now known as Mr. Spears / Has brought us the worst album / To be released in years."

Another review begins "Relative to a pool of vomit, this album is pretty solid. I'd rather have this album thrown at me at high speeds than a chainsaw." (Thanks to Anne for the link!)

Glorious moviefilm for benefit of America
The surprise for me out of this weekend's box-office results wasn't that "Borat" won. It was that all the wire stories reporting on that victory phrased it as a shocker. Apparently, box office analysts had expected Tim Allen's "Santa Clause 3" to win the weekend. Did you know there was a "Santa Clause 3" coming out? Did you even know there was a "Santa Clause 2"? If there is a lesson to come out of this, it should be that Americans are not ready for Christmas decorations or movies when there's not even snow on the ground in most places. And also that Tim Allen is really, really not funny.

Ever wonder how the real people who end up looking like jerks in Borat's bits feel about themselves after their appearance is made public? One friend of a Borat subject wrote to group Weblog Ask Metafilter saying that his pal feels like his life is ruined after he appeared as a drunken, nasty frat boy in "Borat." Note that when the question was first posted back in early October, at least one person responded with "I suspect that this isn't exactly a "#1 at the box office" type of movie." That guy probably saw "Santa Clause 3" this weekend. (Newsweek has more on the real people in "Borat.")

Tim Gunn mania
Don't get me wrong, I love the "Project Runway" mentor as much as the next person -- he's the kind of teacher you rarely find and always remember. But is he getting a bit too much media attention? The New York Times has an article highlighting his hobby of creating miniature buildings. Check it out! He has a liquor dollhouse! Also: The Seattle Times reports on why Tim thinks Michael lost "Project Runway," and am I the last person to know that judge Nina Garcia is pregnant at 41? (Thanks to Andy for the NYT link.)

• Nov. 6, 2006 | 6 a.m. PT

How old are you on Mars?

Some of us are still recovering from the big death on "Lost" last week. Maybe today's random linkage will soothe the pain. Remember, you too can send in link suggestions.

• Sure, you know how old you are on Earth, but how old are you on Saturn or Mercury? Enter your Earth birthdate at this site and you can get that information, plus look ahead and mark your calendar for the exact date you'll turn 20,000 hours old, or figure out how many days left until you'd be 30 on Mars.

• Those fancy Madame Alexander dolls now have two dolls honoring Alfred Hitchcock films. Yes, they depict Janet Leigh in the shower in "Psycho" and Tippi Hedren in "The Birds." I think these would frighten the other dolls on the shelf.

• We've all seen those giant RVs with colorful maps on the back, where the owners mark off states they've been to. Here's a neat way to do that online, either with countries or with states. Hmm, when I do countries, it looks like I've barely been anywhere. I've been to Japan, but it's so small it doesn't really show up.

• Can you name these movies, acted out with office products?

• Reader Elizabeth sends in this fun Word Association game. Just like all those old sitcom sketches where a psychiatrist is asking you to name the first word that comes to your mind, only it's online.