Paunch or no paunch?

This was the first line of the article about Sunday night’s VMA’s and Britney Spears’ effort:
Out-of-synch lip-synching, lethargic moves and a paunch doomed Britney Spears' MTV opening.
I didn't watch the show [surprised?] so I can’t vouch for the out-of-synch part or the alleged lethargy, but if this qualifies as a “paunch,” then I think our standards are way out of whack over our bodies. Literally, paunch is defined as “a large, prominent belly.” You want to see a paunch? I can show you some paunches. It’s no wonder that people are so conflicted.

One local radio host called it a "muffin top", and I fully expected to see this rippling lap-over in some disgraceful display of a sloth-like lifestyle.

I'm thinking it's just a bad fashion choice.

Meanwhile, take a stroll around the local shopping plaza and spy the apparently mirror-less and equally clueless people (men and women) who have ample paunches, and picture them in the same outfit Britney wore on Sunday night. Bad fashion choices abound, and your gaze will be turned away and you'll feel like you stared at a solar eclipse.

When your vision is restored, let me know. As for Britney, she's still in the top 5 percent - big time TV shows notwithstanding.

Sunday Stuff

The space shuttle Discovery is shown as it streaks over a marina in Daytona Beach, Florida December 9, 2006 after liftoff from Kennedy Space Center.

NEWS FLASH: VATICAN CITY (AFP) - Religious symbols should be allowed in public places, Pope Benedict XVI told a group of Italian Catholic legal experts.

Sure. And a group of prostitutes in Atlantic City thinks that prostitution should be legalized. How does this even get to the news bureaus? I guess they figure they'll go to Hell if they don't report it. OK, fine. Let's move on to property tax relief. NEWS FLASH: A hundred percent of homeowners think their property taxes are too high. Maybe they should start praying.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - Stargazers will get a rare triple planetary treat this weekend with Jupiter, Mercury and Mars appearing to nestle together in the predawn skies. About 45 minutes before dawn on Sunday those three planets will be so close that the average person's thumb can obscure all three from view. And it won't happen again until 2053.
I swear, isn't it like every six months we hear about some astronomical phenomenon that "won't happen again until [fill in the year]? The biggest problem with this junk is that I have to get up at 3am to see it. Line up during the day, when we're awake, for Chrissakes. If there was a God, he'd let me get some friggin sleep.

A labourer works at a condom production line at the Human-Care Latex Corporation, which is one of China's largest producers of condoms, in Tianjin November 23, 2006. Condoms designed to meet international size specifications are too big for many Indian men as their penises fall short of what manufacturers had anticipated, an Indian study has found.

OK. Public apology to the men of India. If this is the standard for these condoms, then maybe measuring up isn't your biggest problem. Look at the size of that thing. Holy shit, Hannah.

NEW YORK - Forty years after it was made, The Velvet Underground's first recording has become a financial hit - in cyberspace. "The Velvet Underground & Nico," sold on eBay for a closing bid of $155,401. The buyer is a mystery, only identified by the eBay screen name: "jackass2006." Really -- the crap that people spend money on.

Or Won't...

Britney Spears' junior high school homework might have scored her a grade of 88 out of 100 points then, but now it isn"t worth what it used to be. The essay, based on Rex Warner"s translation of Sophocles' Antigone which Britney completed when she was a teenager, were expected to sell for between $500 and $700 when auctioned last Monday at Christie's in New York, but fell flat on the expectation when it fetched just $200.
The 24-year-old singer's paper reportedly had spelling errors, as it carried Spears' teacher comments such as "Nice cover" and "Watch out for spelling mistakes" on its back.

Nice cover and spelling mistakes. Geez ... that sounds like a literary version of Britney. Nice on the outside, but full of junk on the inside. I guess she didn't learn much in school, but it must have been lots of fun watching her get out of the school bus.