kimblr.com

Home interiors are lightening up, but it has less to do with spare spaces than it does with the hues of wood furnishings.
After a long love affair with rich espresso finishes and exotic wenge wood, designers and manufacturers are rediscovering medium and light tones. Wood grains are celebrated, blemishes and knots unmasked.
Sometimes, the grain is scraped or wire-brushed for maximum exposure, then highlighted in the limed finishes that have been so prominent at European furniture shows, such as Maison et Objet in Paris, for the last couple of years.
This whitewashing ranges from blond, to taupe and dove-gray that resembles weathered driftwood, to a medium cafe au lait.
A strong retro vibe has been a catalyst, too. When Baker Studio introduced a collection at the High Point furniture market in North Carolina last fall, some modern pieces paid homage to Scandinavian and Asian design, with tables, stools and armoires crafted from quarter-sawn oak. The company says the grainy texture is reminiscent of coconut wood used in 1930s design.
From the same era are several French finishing techniques, such as light limed oak, which underscores pores and graining in creamy white, or a dark limed counterpart contrasted with sable-colored grain.
The current fascination with wood grain has even spawned translation into faux bois ("false wood") in accessories, ceramic or porcelain tiles, and textiles.
When Martha Stewart launched her expansive home collection at Macy’s, one category featured faux bois bed sheets, towels, and ceramic bath accessories.
"I find stylized wood can punctuate any room with character and wit," Stewart says on Macy’s Web site. "It’s simple to add rustic sophistication to your home with its natural elegance."
Furniture offerings have led to new wood contenders, alternatives to classic choices such as oak, cherry, mahogany, walnut and pine. Bamboo has been growing in popularity, both in flooring and furniture. A striking example in the Acacia catalog is an undulating screen that rolls into a 7-foot coil for storage.

philly.com

Like most of you, I have no idea what the Office spinoff will be about. I do think, however, that no matter what the title turns out to be, many of us will continue referring to it as “The Office Spinoff.” I’m just so used to that title after NBC blaring it at us for months.
But a couple weeks ago, Kristin Veitch at E! reminded us that whatever the spinoff turns out to be, it may not be what it was originally supposed to be:
That’s a popular way of launching a spinoff, though I hadn’t seen it done in a few years; the most recent one I’m aware of was on The Practice, where James Spader’s Alan Shore was added to the cast in the final season, and that final season became basically a year-long backdoor pilot (or as I prefer to call it, “stealth pilot”) for Boston Legal. It’s sort of a bigger, more elaborate variation on the single-episode stealth pilot, when someone we never heard of before is introduced and we’re asked to care about their wacky adventures; instead of doing that for one episode, you do it for a season, or part of a season, and get the audience to like this new character enough that we’ll follow him or her to the spinoff. This way you get all the advantages of a spinoff without the problems of taking an established character off the show.
But that doesn’t seem possible now for The Office, so we’ll have to wait and see who and what the spinoff is about. A previous rumour had Ed Helms’ Andy as the most likely star for a spinoff, which, given that he’s the character who out-Michaels Michael Scott and given that he suddenly became prominent (upstaging Jim and Pam) near the end of the season finale, seems plausible, but who knows?

blog.macleans.ca

Harvey Korman may have been a second banana on "The Carol Burnett Show" for 10 seasons, but he was a star with the Emmy Awards. The gifted comedian, who died Thursday at age 81, won four Emmys for his contributions to this last of the great TV variety shows.
Whether as the dim-witted Ed in the "Family" sketches, faithful butler Max to Carol Burnett’s fading star Norma Desmond in "Sunset Boulevard," or buxom buttinsky Mother Marcus in "As the Stomach Turns," Korman displayed vast comedic range over 137 episodes of Burnett’s series.
Perhaps his greatest laughs came when he least wanted them – as co-star Tim Conway would do everything he could to break Korman up in the middle of a sketch. The two pals took their show on the road in recent years, recalling the glory days of working together.
For the first four seasons of the show, which debuted in 1967, variety performers did not compete head to head like actors do in the comedy and drama series categories. Rather, they were recognized in the area awards, which can have one or multiple winners. Korman won Emmy Awards that way for the second and fourth seasons of "The Carol Burnett Show."
In the fifth season, Korman bested Ruth Buzzi and Lily Tomlin of "Laugh In" in the competitive category of outstanding performer in a variety or music series. The following year he lost the newly titled supporting performer race to fellow Burnett banana Tim Conway (as did Liza Minnelli for "A Royal Gala Variety" and Lily Tomlin for "Laugh In").
Season Seven proved lucky for Korman who came back to beat Conway and Foster Brooks ("The Dean Martin Comedy Hour") in the new supporting actor in comedy-variety or music category. While Korman was not nominated for Season Eight, Conway was although he lost to Jack Albertson for a guest spot on "Cher." That same year, castmate Vicki Lawrence lost the second of her bids to Emmy champ Cloris Leachman for her own guest turn on "Cher."

goldderby.latimes.com

It’s hard to blame New York Giants center Shaun O’Hara for being stunned by his team’s offseason free-fall. Only three-and-a-half months ago in Super Bowl XVII, the Giants knocked off a New England Patriots team that was regarded by some as the greatest of all time.
But in the all-important ESPN.com spring Power Rankings, the Giants are clinging to No. 6, and at least one voter had them at No. 10. This outpouring of apathy toward a world title wasn’t lost on O’Hara, who sits on coach Tom Coughlin’s leadership council.
“I don’t study all the rankings, but I’m aware of what’s going on,” he said. “We were a week or two removed from the Super Bowl and everyone starts predicting the Cowboys to win the NFC East. You almost have to laugh. You just won a Super Bowl, and it’s like, ‘Hey, what do we have to do to get that respect?’ “
After spending a couple of months on the banquet circuit, O’Hara and his teammates officially will reunite at a ring ceremony May 29. Several players skipped the club’s voluntary workouts this offseason and a subsequent trip to the White House, but it’s unlikely they’ll forget to pick up their jewelry.
For the players who’ve been working out, Coughlin already has passed out this season’s first inspirational T-shirt. In 2007, Coughlin began the season with the T-shirt slogan “Talk is Cheap, Play The Game” and then followed it up with a new one every four games. Borrowing from his mentor Bill Parcells’ long list of hokey motivational ploys, Coughlin came up with “Mental Toughness,” “Prove it” and “Together We Are One.” Rumors that he used puff paint on the shirts were later proven false.
Two weeks ago, he handed out a batch of XXLs that read: “It’s a Whole New Season.” Don’t you love it when Coughlin gets crazy like that. He almost seems like a “whole new man,” but I think we wrote that story like 437 times during Super Bowl week.

sports.espn.go.com

If you have an iPod and far fewer songs than the gigabytes of storage space you have available, then you’ve probably asked one of iLounge’s most popular questions: “how can I load my iPod up with free music?”
There are at least two answers to this question, one generally illegal, and one generally legal. You’ve probably already heard about the illegal free music options, but just in case you haven’t, we’ll run through the reasons you’ll want to skip them and use the legal free music sites instead.
Illegal Free Music: Downloads with Consequences
Several years ago, the sheer quantity of open challenges to American copyright law created a popular perception that music - old and new alike - was supposed to be free, and “shared” between friends and strangers alike. Upon release of just about any new album (and sometimes even before), full MP3-format tracks appeared on music-sharing services such as Napster and Kazaa, spreading around the world without restriction. Many recording artists were angered by what they felt was mass theft of their music, while others either ignored or embraced the file-sharing.
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) decided to fight the “music is free” movement, undertaking highly publicized lawsuits on behalf of artists it represented. Services such as Napster were sued for billions of dollars as facilitators of copyright infringement, and either driven out of business or forced into retreat. Subsequently, RIAA lawsuits against individuals shut down large resources of “shared” music, and warned others that swapping smaller quantities of copyrighted content could subject them to similar legal action.
RIAA lawsuits haven’t stopped the trading of copyrighted music online, but they’ve turned file-sharing into a game of Russian Roulette. For obvious reasons, iLounge does not recommend the sharing or downloading of “free” music from file-sharing services unless you know for sure that the artist has specifically given permission for that music to be shared.

ilounge.com

Shia LaBeouf, who in a couple of huge weekends last year transformed from a likably quick-witted teen actor best known for his work on the Disney Channel into a likably quick-witted 21-year-old action hero and franchise star, jumps into the back of his new Ford F-150 and reaches for his rifle. This isn’t a movie set. It has taken us exactly thirty-six minutes to get from first hello to here, a gun-club parking lot thirty miles north of Los Angeles, and that’s a real shotgun he’s hefting. It seems like a good idea, for many reasons, to watch his every move. Which is how I spot the rest of the equipment scattered around his flatbed.
“Dude, why do you have five toilet seats?”
LaBeouf sets down his gun and launches into one of his trademark bursts of high-metabolic enthusiasm: “Me and my friends, as an art project, we decided, you know: What canvas has not been really, like, messed with? So we started this toilet-seat collection.”
Apparently, while other twentysomething Hollywood types busy themselves with checking in to and out of rehab, LaBeouf and his entourage—the same gang of friends he’s had since his boyhood in Echo Park, a largely working-class Latino neighborhood that’s home to Dodger Stadium—spend their weekends whittling toilet seats and spray-painting them with sayings like “pooperazzi” and “high end for your rear end.”
Sport shooting hadn’t been my idea, nor was it some studio scheme to show the tough side of the boy in the blockbuster. LaBeouf insisted on it: He’s taken up the pursuit recently, and as we wait for a ride from the parking lot up to the range, he explains the appeal. “Believe it or not, it’s a good date,” he says. “I bring girls up here sometimes; it’s kind of—it’s very invigorating for them.”

thebosh.com

Just so you know. It’s not “Oo-way.” This is the first thing I learned while gearing up to interview Uwe Boll last August, on the occasion of the uncut version of his film Postal’s world premiere at the 2007 Dead Channels Film Festival. The film played to a small but enthusiastic Castro Theater crowd, many of whom were surely lured more by the Boll’s presence than by the film itself. Boll, who has embraced video games as cinematic source material the way other directors have embraced, say, Shakespeare, is so fond of controversy it’s difficult to read a news story about him that doesn’t include something ridiculous, like a Boll vs. critics boxing match or an anti-Boll petition. The first picture of him furnished by a Google search features a grinning Boll flipping off whoever’s behind the camera.
Postal, as a whole, is kind of an exercise in fuck-you cinema: in addition to making light of 9/11, it pokes fun at everything from new-agers to trailer trash to coffee snobs to midgets to Nazis … and more. (Read my shockingly positive review here.) The long-delayed film is finally getting a theatrical release; it rocks the Roxie starting tomorrow. Such an event affords me the chance to dust off my interview with Boll and cast members Zack Ward (who plays “Postal Dude,” and also appeared in 2007’s Transformers) and Larry Thomas, Seinfeld’s “Soup Nazi” — who plays Osama Bin Laden. Read on for part one, if you dare.
San Francisco Bay Guardian: What did you make of the crowd last night?
Zack Ward: I think the response was pretty good. I wish it was a bigger audience. I wish we could have gotten more people — we were preaching to the choir. That’s where we’re gonna be able to transition the movie from a niche genre piece to crossover into the mainstream. Uwe, like any filmmaker, is constantly making sure that it’s the best product he can do. The same thing happened on Transformers, Michael Bay was sitting there, in the room, watching everybody’s reaction to see what plays a week before the movie goes out. He’s like, fuck it, re-edit this, add 30 more seconds here. Uwe’s doing the same thing. I wanted to get those people there, the people who’d be like, “Who is this Uwe Boll? What is this Postal game?”

sfbg.com

Family Fun Night: Have fun swimming, playing volleyball, dancing and eating at the Unitarian Universalist Family Fun Night at 6 p.m. Saturday at Compton Park, 16101 Compton Drive in Tampa Palms. $10 for adults, $3 for children. Call (813) 988-8188 or visit www.uutampa.org.
Christianity’s family tree: Meet for a weekly sermon to learn about several Christian denominations at the 9:15 and 11 a.m. services Sundays through June 29 at Forest Hills United Methodist Church, 904 W Linebaugh Ave. at N Boulevard. Call (813) 932-8081 or visit foresthillsumc.com.
Vacation Bible school: Enrollment is open at All Saints Lutheran Church, 5315 Van Dyke Road in Lutz. The school is from June 9-13. The church also invites parents to register children for the Lutheran Outdoor Ministries of Florida day camp from July 28-Aug. 1. Call (813) 963-0969.
Power Lab Bible school: Registration is open for children who will turn 4 by Sept. 1 through children who completed fifth grade this year. “Power Lab” will meet from 9 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. June 16-20 at Temple Terrace United Methodist Church, 5030 E Busch Blvd. Call (813) 988-4141 or visit ttumc.net.
Middle school day camp: Enrollment is open for the middle school day camp at Grace Lutheran Church, 3714 W Linebaugh Ave. The camp is July 7-11. Call (813) 961-8747.
Rainforest Bible school: Registration is open for children age 3 through those entering fourth grade for Rainforest Adventure at Grace Lutheran Church, 3714 W Linebaugh Ave. The session is June 23-27. Register online at toolkit.thevbsplace.org/GraceTampaFL or call (813) 961-8747.
Pentecostal prayer: Meet for prayer at 7 p.m. and for Bible study at 7:30 p.m. Wednesdays at Victory Tabernacle, formerly known as Town & Country United Pentecostal Church, 4411 Kelly Road, Town ‘N Country. Call (813) 979-1868.
Study the Bible at home: Victory Tabernacle offers in-home Bible study. Call Pastor Collins at (813) 368-0400.

tampabay.com

Joe Raycraft is joining elite company on Nov. 16.
The longtime Merrimack football coach/athletic director and Manchester AD is one of eight athletes (one), contributors (one), athletic directors (two), officials (three) and coaches (one) that will be inducted into the New Hampshire Interscholastic Athletic Association Hall of Fame.
Since its inception in 2001, 57 people have been honored by the NHIAA for their contributions to high school athletics.
Along with Raycraft, the Class of 2008 includes: E. Robin Beauregard, coach, Hinsdale; Frank Callaghan, contributor, Rochester; George Hamilton, official, Henniker; Dr. Henry LaBranche, administrator, Windham; Hubie McDonough, athlete, Manchester; Alison Risch, official, Madison; and Anthony Urban, official, Berlin.
The induction ceremony will be held at the Courtyard Marriott in Concord. A luncheon will begin at 12:30 p.m. followed by the induction ceremony. Tickets ($35 per person) may be purchased by contacting the NHIAA at 251 Clinton St., Concord, NH 03301, or by sending an e-mail to info@nhiaa.org.
May 21: Tim Schaller had three hits, including a double, and scored a run, but it wasn

Atlanta, GA 5/16/2008 03:01 PM GMT (TransWorldNews)
The 2008 NBA playoffs commence Friday with two second-round playoff games.
The Boston Celtics will travel to play the Cleveland Cavaliers, while the Los Angeles Lakers play the Utah Jazz on the road.
The Celtics, led by NBA Defensive Player of the Year Kevin Garnett, will face the Cavs at 8pm EST on TNT.
is led by NBA All-Star LeBron James.
The Lakers, led by NBA MVP Kobe Bryant, will play the Jazz, who are led by Deron Williams, at 10:30pm EST on TNT.
The Celtics and Cavs are the first and fourth seeds in the Eastern Conference playoff bracket, while the Lakers and Jazz are the first and fourth seeds in the Western Conference.
The Celtics and the Lakers lead their respective series 3-2. Both can advance to their respective conference finals with a win in Game 6.

transworldnews.com