I’m a bit zonked from spending all day in the sun freezing my ass off–in Texas, who knew that was even possible?–and shepherding lots of small children and their families about. The event went rather well, nothing much to say about it, but about an hour before everything wound down all at once the exhaustion just hit me and from then on the time seemed to crawl.

Also, I have a horrible case of hat hair (this being one of the two days out of the year I might actually wear a hat), a sunburned nose (just ‘cuz it’s 55 degrees doesn’t mean you can’t burn), and–I’m so ashamed to admit this–the battery in my camera died early in the day because I didn’t have it fully charged. I am so not worthy of calling myself a photographer. (In my defense: I would have had more motivation to make sure I had a fully charged battery if today’s event didn’t look exactly the same as last year’s or the year’s before. I can totally use some of the photos I took in previous years in our newsletter and no one will be able to tell the difference.)

But there’s nothing like coming home, checking the news and reading some of the more interesting headlines out there. Let’s look at some of them together, shall we?

Ann Coulter Called John Edwards a ‘Faggot’

OK, two things here. She didn’t actually call him a faggot. She said that she couldn’t call him a faggot because she’d have to go to rehab. Subtle difference: the second one is so much bitchier, and we all know that la Ann doesn’t like to do anything halfway. Last year, Ann called Al Gore a total fag.

Now, let’s take stock here. If I were straight and had no taste (this appears to be common), I might find Ann attractive. However, Ann isn’t married. Ann’s getting past the age where marriage is appropriate. Ann calls everyone else gay (or stops short of doing so). She seems to have some weird fixation on homosexuality and making sure that everyone is looking at other people and wondering if they’re gay.

I’m not suggesting anything about Ann. I’m stopping myself just short and letting you complete the paragraph above all by yourself. Yes, that’s right. I went there. She can do it, why can’t I?

Update: Response from various parties includes some of the following tidbits:

Rudi Guilani: “The comments were completely inappropriate and there should be no place for such name-calling in political debate.”

Spokesman for Mitt Romney: “It was an offensive remark. Governor Romney believes all people should be treated with dignity and respect.” [My guess is that this was a rewrite. The original draft probably said something along the lines of, "You go, girl!" before someone on the campaign staff realized that this might make their candidate seem a little too gay and that they had to butch it up.]

The Director of the Christian Defense Coalition responds: ”Frankly, I would have loved to have heard Ann expose and dissect the radical agenda of Senator Edwards instead of resorting to cheap name calling.” Um. Yeah. Someone here has a radical agenda, dude, but are you sure it’s him?

My favorite is from la Ann herself: “C’mon, it was a joke. I would never insult gays by suggesting that they are like John Edwards. That would be mean.”

I just don’t get Ann Coulter, honestly. Liberals hate her. I don’t know a single conservative who likes her, either (‘course, what passes for conservative in Austin is still pretty liburl). Why do people listen to her when she says shit like this?

Oh. Wait. It’s because she says shit like this, isn’t it? Damn.

A Mexican pop star has come out of the closet.

Christian Chavez, of the band RBD (I don’t know them, but I don’t listen to boy bands in English that much, so it rather follows that I also don’t listen to boy bands in Spanish), revealed that he’s gay after a Web site published photos that it claims are of him and his partner getting married in Canada.

Unlike the case with certain other boy band members who’ve recently come out, Christian is part of a band that’s still popular in Mexico and isn’t on hiatus while one of its members–not the one who’s gay (or at least admitting it publicly)–goes on to a bigger and better career but still wants something to fall back on in case his solo career doesn’t go anywhere.

He’s also the first entertainment-world celebrity to come out in Mexico, which is still deeply conservative and Roman Catholic, or so the articles say, which is interesting because I think Mexico is going to have us beat pretty soon in the number of states that allow gay marriage or domestic partnerships. (I mean, come on. If Coahuila can do it, why the hell can’t Texas?)

But most intriguing to me is the following quote in the Associated Press article on the topic from 16-year-old Carla Gonzalez who’s not down with the boys being gay, adding that when it came to Christian, “You couldn’t tell.”

… because the ever-changing fluorescent color of his hair wasn’t a clue?

A Team Hired by the Discovery Channel Claims to have Found the Tomb of Jesus.

… and he was still in it (or was, until they reburied the bones in accordance with Jewish law).

Now, I’m not the most active church-goer–what with the being agnostic and all–but even I have to stop and scratch my head on this one. There is, statistically speaking, a 1-in-600 chance that the tomb that was found was the tomb of The Jesus. 1-in-600. Those are pretty small odds. And consider this: Let’s say that Jesus did marry Mary Magdalene and they had a kid and they all lived to be a ripe old age happily ever after. Don’t you think that maybe they might have noticed Paul and the Apostles running around creating a religion that used their names a bit?

Only in the post Da-Vinci Code world–which is technically also the post Foucault’s Pendulum world–would that not only be considered good science but merit its own freaking television special. (Foucault’s Pendulum being the more intelligent, less stupid tale that instead makes its readers feel stupid because you have to look up every other word even though it’s been translated into English.)

And then there’s the part where James Cameron endorses it. So, having conquered the field of underwater exploration as seen in the spectacularly accurate film Titanic, he’s now an expert on Biblical archaeology? Didn’t Trent Lott pull this crap when he diagnosed Terri Shiavo by watching stock footage of her on CNN? (Back in the days when CNN reported actual news instead of the Anna Nicole Smith funeral, post funeral, post-post funeral, and interviews with the people that prune the lawn in the cemetery where they decided not to bury her?)

Ugh. As Bill Engvall keeps saying: heeere’s your sign.

And that’s Saturday. I hope you’re enjoying yourselves, wherever you are!