Whatever you're listening to on your headphones at work today is bound to be less interesting than Mari Herreras' audio appearance on the Steve Leal show today, which is airing right about nowish (assuming you're reading this post within the hour of its posting). It's super easy to stream the show online (or even on your phone, if that's your thing), so do it.

Mari previewed this week's show on her Facebook "fan" page:

[I'll be] Joining Steve Leal on his show today, 12 Noon, 1330 AM, All Things Political with Kieran Suckling from the Center for Biological Diversity...There may be a few mystery guests today, but nothing confirmed. Guess you'll have to tune-in.

If Jessica Simpson's naked pregnancy photo where she covers up her lady parts was a problem for a local Safeway, I can only imagine what sort of panic will ensue once the new issue of Time hits newsstands this week. Mostly, I'm curious about the "God of Cricket" article teased on the cover. Is the sport of cricket the new thing? Do I have to try to figure out the rules now so I can pretend to know what I'm talking about? SO MUCH PRESSURE.

Mediaite captured Fox Nation's brilliant headline before the site edited it down to remove the "war on marriage" portion.

Fox Nation seemingly exists just to give people something to angrily type in all-caps about, so I guess someone should get a bonus over there today. Well played, Fox Nation. Well played.

Fresh off being parodied on Saturday Night Live this week, it's almost like the producers at Fox & Friends decided to up the ante and prove that they're capable of being crazier than a satirical version of themselves created for a comedy show. On this morning's show, Gretchen Carlson interviewed astrologist Chris Brennan, allowing him to share his hazy view of the political future. He did, however, predict that Obama will be re-elected, so I suspect Mr. Brennan won't be invited back on Fox News any time soon.

KNST's Garret Lewis wasn't thrilled with Danehy's column this week, so Lewis invited Tom on his show this morning to hash out whether the column "crossed the line."

The sentence that Lewis found most troubling:

Judging by Lewis' absolutely giddy radio demeanor, this Paul Grijalva gaffe meant that SB 1070 was going to be upheld; Congressman Grijalva should be kicked out of office; and all black people are stupid.

Also, Danehy declares that Star Trek is superior to Star Wars.

Double also, a note on Garret Lewis' assertion that Rush Limbaugh was innocent in the "Barack the Magic Negro" controversy...he's right in that the concept didn't originate on his show, but Rush did certainly make the most of it.

So, KVOA has unveiled one of the TV station news ideas that no one really asked for, but seems to be a big deal anyway called News 4 Tucson SKYNET, a series of HD cameras (or "observation network" as their promo video puts it) around town that allows them to show more clear live footage of rainstorms, traffic jams and homeless people urinating or something.

However, while I'm not thrilled with the idea of a private company setting up cameras around town, the first thing that came to my mind regarding this new initiative was that the name sounded so familiar.

Oh, right, they gave their weird camera system the same name as the self-aware artificial intelligence system that takes over the world in the Terminator movies.

This seems like a peculiar mistake, adopting a name with an existing negative connotation, especially considering the very first Google result is an extensive Wikipedia article about the Terminator series and the first YouTube result is a clip from Terminator 2 about the day when Skynet became aware. It seems worth looking up the name you give your fancy project, but maybe that's just me.

However, is it possible that KVOA's new camera system is actually part of a real life take over by our future computer overlords? Maybe the Terminator movies were created to throw humanity off the scent. April 19, 2011 has come and gone without Skynet becoming aware (OR SO WE THINK), so all future references will just seem like poor decision making by a local media outlet and not at all the installation of "eyes" for a self-educating artificial intelligence system.

Either way, the cameras are kind of creepy.

• lev radin / Shutterstock.com

BlackBook's website has a profile of Alison Brie, who seems to be everywhere these days, and the article is fine, but the first paragraph is almost like the intro to one of my nightmares, minus zombies serving the drinks.

“You are immortal,” whispers the barista to Alison Brie as she hands her a steaming mug of antioxidant-rich tea. At Café Gratitude, a vegan restaurant on Melrose, drinks are named after affirmations. It’s an exceedingly Los Angeles conceit—even regulars like Brie admit it’s a bit silly—and while her immortality is still uncertain, Brie is at least having a very good year. The doe-eyed, petite actress already stars in two critically adored television shows, Mad Men and Community, and she's about to hit the big screen, summitting the Mt. Olympus of comedy typography: a Judd Apatow production. This one is called The Five-Year Engagement. It stars Jason Segel and Emily Blunt as a long-suffering engaged couple—like The Breakup in reverse—and features Brie as Blunt’s younger sister, Suzie. As Brie heads to our table to ingest her own immortality, I lean in to the barista and say, “I am gorgeous.” “You are gorgeous,” she answers and hands me green lemonade infused with kale.

Responding to the death of 14-year-old Kenneth Weishuhn, a high school freshman who committed suicide after facing cyber-bullying and death threats following coming out to his classmates, the local paper, the Sioux City Journal, turned over their front page Sunday to an editorial that is a painful, yet poignant read:

Some in our community will say bullying is simply a part of life. If no one is physically hurt, they will say, what's the big deal? It's just boys being boys and girls being girls.

Those people are wrong, and they must be shouted down.

We must make it clear in our actions and our words that bullying will not be tolerated. Those of us in public life must be ever mindful of the words we choose, especially in the contentious political debates that have defined our modern times. More importantly, we must not be afraid to act.

How many times have each of us witnessed an act of bullying and said little or nothing? After all, it wasn't our responsibility. A teacher or an official of some kind should step in. If our kid wasn't involved, we figured, it's none of our business.

Try to imagine explaining that rationale to the mother of Kenneth Weishuhn.

It is the business of all of us. More specifically, it is our responsibility. Our mandate.

[HT: ShortFormBlog]

• Image courtesy of Shutterstock.
• Like this, but lower

Just throwing this out there, but if you're going to get a bikini wax, that's totally fine, but perhaps having these sort of quotes come up in Google searches for your name for the rest of time might not be somewhat regrettable down the road:

Evan Scott, 32, a music producer who lives in Murray Hill, has been getting a more-basic bikini wax for about two years. “I like to represent myself in a certain way, from no clothes to fully buttoned up, and I think that this is an extension of my overall presentation,” he said. Noting the prevalence of bikini waxes among women, Mr. Scott also suggested that what’s good for the goose is good for the gander. “If I have that expectation of someone else, I probably would want to return the favor,” he said.

His comfort might also be explained by the number of visibly depilated men, like David Beckham and the Situation, increasingly evident in mass media. “It’s not emulating something you’ve seen in some X-rated film,” said Jason Chen, an associate style editor at Details. “It’s about maintaining yourself and keeping things clean.”

[NYTimes]

Looks like our favorite Depeche Mode aficianado/talk show host Jon Justice will be undergoing open-heart surgery tomorrow to fix a tiny hole in his aorta. While he manages to make the procedure seem like not a terribly big deal in the above YouTube clip (and of course, he manages to sneak in a quip about Obamacare), it seems like the very nature of open heart surgery is something to be at least somewhat concerned about, so best of luck to you, Jon.