"How to Eat Your Watermelon in White Company (and Enjoy It)" *** (out of four): Thoughtful, funny portrait of provocateur Melvin Van Peebles manages to be entertaining while keeping its subject thoroughly at arm’s length.

Early in “How to Eat Your Watermelon in White Company (and Enjoy It)”, director Joe Angio’s documentary of Melvin Van Peebles, one of the interviewees remarks, “In many ways, Melvin was an enigma.” If that was the sentiment on which Mr. Angio based his portrait of the artist then he succeeded with flying colors. “Watermelon” manages to be at once a thorough recounting of the startlingly full life of the man who is credited with fathering the blaxploitation genre, while at the same time shedding no light on who he was behind the scenes.

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Watching the live coverage of Canadian elections, I got almost fainted from the feeling how cool democracy is. I strongly believe that we, Ukrainians, deserve to live in democracy as well. So still so many things are to be done the way ahead. I want to live in free and democractic country and I want so much Ukraine to become so.

Because I love the country so damn much, I can't help but feel dread now that the Canada election is over and they've put conservatives in power. It's too soon to see what will happen, but I'm guessing that Canada will become more like the US in the coming months/years... and the thought of it makes me want to cry.

I have felt sick since last night when they started getting the polling results from the OTHER parts of Canada who have their heads shoved up their asses too far to see Harper's Horns. This man is the Antichrist, I swear, but all the churcheys love him. Don't get me wrong, I'm a churchey, but I can see the devil's horns! Gah.

Recently Wired Magazine ran an article listing The 50 Best Robots Ever. It's quite a list, but fails so miserably on the most important law of robotics that it's not even worth mentioning. I'm referring, of course, to Scaramouch's Third Law of Robotics - All robots should have perky breasts. And so it falls to me to give you a supplement to Wired's list - The Top Ten Sexiest Female Robots.

anyone...anyone?

Link

Remember the late 1990's when all you needed to do was be able to turn on a computer to command $45 and hour as a freelance designer. That was me (although I could do more than that) and I was inspired by the funny cartoons produced at icebox.com.

To my dismay, during the crash of the .com industry the website started charging membership fees, but a recent visit back to them elated me. It turns out that all the cartoons are free once again. I have a lot of old memories to catch up on, but may I recommend Mr. Wong, the touching and heart-warming story of a girl and her eighty-five year-old Chinese houseboy. Love and loss abound. Enjoy!

Thanks to Jarod for sending this one in. I guess it could be argued that this is a milliondollarhomepage ripoff, and an idea long past it's prime. On the other hand, it does have a certain charm. For $1 you can put up the image of a myspace person you love, hate, or want to... well, whatever. You know, there's probably no end to the permutations this franchise could engender.

At one point, I was a student of tarot cards, and supplemented my income during college with tarot readings. One thing that the casual observer might not realize is that there are some very wild and wonderful tarot themes. Dali once designed a very surreal set, DC comics brought out a set based on characters from their Vertigo line, and I've heard that Disney once put out a Mickey Mouse tarot pack (and I'd pay good money for one of those if anyone has one). Now, we have the Lego Tarot. Just the thing for predicting death and despair to your pre-schooler.

A wonderful piece of comics journalism is available to download free from British newspaper, The Guardian. Joe Sacco, the genius behind Palestineand Safe Area Gorazde turns his attention to the abuse of Iraqi prisoners by US forces. This is a prime example of why I love the medium so much.

Canada moves to the right.

"Once a generation, Canadians get exceedingly cross with Liberals' egregiously high sense of entitlement and kick them out of office for their own rehabilitation,'' said Ian Stewart, a political science professor at Acadia University in Wolfville, Nova Scotia.

Does this mean we have to go to Mexico for Xanax?

Right-wing media outlet, Insight Magazine, is reporting that the White House is bracing for impeachment hearings.

Sources said a prelude to the impeachment process could begin with hearings by the Senate Judiciary Committee in February. They said the hearings would focus on the secret electronic surveillance program and whether Mr. Bush violated the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

Administration sources said the charges are expected to include false reports to Congress as well as Mr. Bush's authorization of the National Security Agency to engage in electronic surveillance inside the United States without a court warrant. This included the monitoring of overseas telephone calls and e-mail traffic to and from people living in the United States without requisite permission from a secret court.

alternative title: "And He Didn't Even Get a Blowjob"