ABERCROMBIE & FITCH
WIN PENNSYLVANIA PRIMARY

Barack Obama lost the Pennsylvania primary tonight. And, if you ask me, Hillary Clinton didn't exactly win it either.

The clear winner tonight is Abercrombie & Fitch!

As Obama addressed his supporters in Evansville, Indiana -- and as I watched that address on CNN -- it was impossible to miss the three stunt supporters in the stands behind Obama's podium. Two rows up, three young white dudes (duds?) stood, all decked out in the A&F tee's for the whole world to see.

Dud(e) #1 on the left wore a black T-shirt with giant white vertical lettering, left of centre, running from shoulder to waist, which read F-I-T-C-H.

Dud(e) #2 in the middle wore a t-shirt with A&F emblazened across the chest.

And, dud(e) #3 on the right hand side your TV screen wore his t-shirt which read A Fitch, also right across his chest.

All three were completely visible, in perfect alignment and easy-to-read formation, for the entire duration of Obama's speech.

Maybe that's where Barack Obama got his $42 million in campaign funds? Maybe A&F actually stands for Alot & Fortune? Maybe the free airtime wasn't such an accident?

KATHY GRIFFIN'S LIFE WITH THE DUH-LIST

(Hilarious and brilliant) Kathy Griffin has appeared in public with (not sure what adjectives should go here) Adnan Ghalib.

The pair was photographed shopping at Victoria’s Secret and then on Rodeo Drive where they attracted a fair amount of attention. Here are some pics from Splash via The Superficial

It’s obvs a ploy, me thinks - a ploy for an episode of Kathy’s hilarious and brilliant My Life on the D-List. After all, we’ve seen something similar before when she staged a drunken exit from a taxi in London to scare up some photos and publicity. And it worked! The events were showcased later on TMZ. And how ‘bout her ‘date’ with Nick Carter? Looks like that sitch has been replaced by time spent with Steve Wozniak.

This is why Kathy Griffin is hilarious and brilliant. She is totally upfront about doing almost anything for publicity. She’ll arrange to be seen in public with anyone if it gets some attention from paps, magazines, whoever. In doing so, she proves that even declaring this intention does not cause others (ie. paps) to re-think what they are doing or why they are doing it. They just go ahead and click their cameras.
Of course the only reason they’re doing it, in this case, is because of some lingering notoriety surrounding Adnan Ghalib and his recent connections to Britney Spears. The paps can’t stop thinking about late night appearances at gas stations and this is all they’ve got to relive those glory days of their occupations.
And Kathy is not only capitalizing on that, but also using a very popular medium to expose the ease with which she, or anyone, can manipulate this machine and get it to do what *she* wants it to do. And that, dear friends, is why Kathy Griffin is hilarious and brilliant.

To be sure, watch this Splash video of Kathy and Adnan on Rodeo Drive and then driving away in a silver convertible. You’ll see at the tail end of the footage that their car is following a green SUV with a camera crew hanging out of the back of it, filming the two of them in the convertible. That ain’t paps, kids – I'm thinking that's her own crew from her own show. Maybe I'm wrong on that, but based on what I've seen so far... I doubt it.

All this Kathy Griffin news/talk is the perfect follow-up to my day trip yesterday with M-dub to Seattle Premium Outlets. On the way to this most-fabulous shopping destination, we stopped for a bite at Applebee's - a first-time experience for both us because we ain't got none of that in the Great White North. The reason I really wanted to go there was because that restaurant is the punchline to a great Kathy Griffin joke:

Says Griffin about the “velvet rope” scene at those trendy LA nightclubs: “I'm a child of the 70s and remember those Studio 54 stories where there's a guy saying ‘you're hot enough to get in and you're not' and I know I'm on the not list. When I go to Applebee's I get a table whenever I want.” [Source]

So we went to Applebee's and it ruled! I had an Ultimate Trio with steak quesadilla towers (yum!), artichoke dip & mini-Chicken ranchers. It was all totally bad for me and totally delicious. M-dub looked at the menu and said it felt like being on a holiday! Love it.

After the food, it was time to shop. Kids, I'm tellin' ya, Seattle Premium Outlets is outdoor outlet shopping at its best. Tons and tons and TONS of stores like Perry Ellis, Banana Republic, Dickie's, Skechers, Quicksilver, Cole Haan, Coach, Liz Claiborne, Guess, J. Crew, Eddie Bauer (which makes me hate my eyes), and best of all... Christian Outlet. That's right, at Christian Outlet you can take home all the discounted Christian's your little heart desires. Nothing like getting God at bargain prices. For me, I opted for a new Perry Ellis jacket for the spring. Fashion Accomplished! Here's a peek at hot boys in the Perry Ellis Spring '08 collection:

(Photo credit: AP)

Back to Applebe's, literally, we decided that one Applebe's experience in one day wasn't enough. So after shopping we went to another location and tried dessert. I had a mango milkshake and M-dub went for the apple pie sans ice cream. More good times were had over these tasty and sinful choices.

Next time, we're planning a cross-border brunch to try out Applebe's breakfast menu. Can.Not.Wait.

btw - Kathy supports the American Heart Assocation. Maybe you'd like to as well? Visit their website to see about giving back. You'll feel good about yourself when you're helping out someone else.

VANCOUVER ODD-IENCES
Beware the gathered masses

Thanks to Vancouver's filing cabinet-grey skies and the wretched current season of Madtv, I've laughed a lot less this weekend than last. That might also have something to do with the fact that last weekend I was part of the two local audiences that welcomed two LMAO comics -- Sarah Silverman and Margaret Cho -- for their first respective visits in years.

Friday night at Queen Elizabeth Theatre, Margaret Cho brought her latest comedy tour "Beautiful" to Vancouver . It took me awhile (ie. years) to appreciate her enough to want to see her perform live. But I did and she was hilarious and the crowd loved her.

I wanted to put up a photo here from that show, but trying to use my cameraphone in the darkness of the Q-E was like trying to get a seat by the fireplace at JJ Bean on Main street. So, thanks to Zooglia's public photos on flickr, you can view a shot of Cho performing in Vancouver.

Cho's opening act was a well-chosen complement to her own shtick, and clearly appealed to the demographics in the packed house. The act was Liam Sullivan, better known as "Kelly" to millions of YouTube users. You might recall Kelly's video "Shoes" won the 2007 People's Choice Award for favourite user-generated video.

The show ended, but the weekend's hilarity sure didn't. The next night, me and the gang hit the 'burbs to see Sarah Silverman at River Rock Casino in Richmond. Unlike Margaret Cho, I fell fast and hard for Sarah Silverman from the first moment I saw her. She's funny like the Canucks are done for the season - there just ain't no way around it.

As much as I dig the Silverman, it was the audience at her show that really threw me. Mostly, she got huge laughs as her crude and blunt monologue slapped everyone in the face. But the problem with seeing shows at River Rock is that a noticeable number of people in this town can't manage a beer (or two or three) while out in public.

Sure, all comedians have hecklers. But hopefully the hecklers are smart enough to challenge the comedian enough for her/him to stay at the top of her/his game and wring some comedy out of the heckle. Or, the heckler isn't smart enough to do that and is effortlessly trounced by the comedians' comeback. But in the case of the audience at River Rock, the hecklers were too drunk to even catch her drifts or realize their own comments were complete nonsense and gave her nothing to work with. It was just embarrassing, really.

It got to the point where Silverman actually imitated one of her hecklers, presumably to illustrate just exactly what she was up against for anyone in the audience who perhaps couldn't clearly hear the heckler. And her imitation was simply that of a sober person mimicking a drunk person trying to speak. Yeah… it went like that. Nice.

Sarah Silverman also commented on how weird it would be if the whole situation "turned ugly". It seems to me that when a performer reaches the point of saying something like that to the audience, things are nearly out of control.

Fortunately, she handled it well and got some extra laughs out of it. But until some folks in this town learn how handle their liquor, River Rock would be remiss not to re-think allowing those dumb-arses into the show. This is the third comedy show in a year where I've witnessed this kind of thing at that venue. It appears, unfortunately, to be not an isolated occurrence.

Getting back to the laughs though, I'd love to put up a vid of Silverman's show, but I don't own this website. So go to YouTube and search "sarah silverman vancouver" for a good chuckle.

Meantime, here's a great short clip of Liam Sullivan arriving in Vancouver.

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