As written by Rob Morse today in the Chronicle, he writes a short paragraph on the plight of Bob Gower, an art director at the San Francisco Examiner. Working from home, Gower had problems accessing his email so he called a techie at the newspaper. Jokingly, Gower asked, "Have I been fired?" The techie responded seriously. "Well, yes." The Examiner fired almost everyone to leave a bare-bones staff to put together a now free newspaper that will use the resources of the company's other two established papers. Prior to the announcement, management cut off phone and computer access to all staffers, explaining Gower's problems with his email.

Saddam Hussein wants a televised debate with President Bush on the issues concerning his country. I still think a duel, an idea mentioned earlier by someone in the Iraqi government, would be better. Plus it's cheaper and quicker. But whatever happens, war or not, we know the French will be there to complain.

News reporters a few months ago were being sent to Qatar, which they pronounced as "Cutter." I'd never heard of Cutter before. For some reason, I'd always heard it as Qua-tar. When did people start changing this pronunciation?

Only in Berkeley: a man wearing pink spandex riding a unicycle.

Kevin Spacey told a really corny joke the other day. What do you call a lady of the night who accepts spaghetti instead of money? A pasta-tute.

I probably won't see Gods and Generals in the theatre, but the critical consensus is, while its sequel, Gettysburg, ran more than 4 hours, audiences were left wanting more because it was so well-done. I also felt that way. But while that movie focused on that one battle, Gods and Generals describes the action with the year leading up to the Battle of Gettysburg. And even though it's less than 4 hours, it feels like it takes a year to watch the thing.

Mike Tyson went through a whirlwind week. After dropping out and re-entering, and his opponent dropping out and re-entering, both fought on Saturday. Tyson sported a new Chakotay-like tattoo on his face. The pictures with his baby was just frightening. The fight was a joke. Etienne was knocked out 49 seconds into the bout. Reminds me of a Sports Night episode where everyone was expecting a big 12-round fight only to have the guy get knocked out just seconds into the fight, leaving the Sports Night crew to fill in two hours of programming with the crazy last-minute boxing analyst The Cut Man.

It's been widely reported that Annika Sorenstam, a successful LPGA golfer, will enter a PGA tournament. Not-so widely reported is that Brian Kontak, a not-so successful male golfer, will try out for the U.S. Women's Open. Well, more power to both players.

Justin Timberlake hasn't been cranking out the great songs ever since N'Sync temporarily broke up to pursue individual projects. You can say he's really embracing rap even though he's not good at doing so. The latest example is this Rock Your Body video, a complete mess. Hey, even Cry Me a River was funny to watch.

My sister let me know of Avril Lavigne performing at the Grammys last night. Since Alias was in commercial, I casually switched over to watch that poor Skater song she sings. Somebody really needed to do a sound check. It sounded horrible. But the funniest part was in the mini-mosh pit they put in front of her. I don't know, but watching people with nerdy glasses on doesn't really set the right tone for Avril.

Speaking of the Grammys, Norah Jones totally deserves the 5 Grammys she won, plus the 3 she had a hand in winning for other people. Congrats also to No Doubt and Foo Fighters, who will be on Letterman tonite. But looking at the categories, even just the sheer number of them, the Simpsons are right: it really is easy to win a Grammy.

I pulled an all-nighter last week for a midterm and while doing so, flipped through the channels to see what could be on. To my surprise, all the 80s shows I watched as a child have been relegated here. Sure, everyone knows of Saved by the Bell on at 4 am. But there's also MacGyver on TV Land at midnight. And Nick at Nite has Perfect Strangers and Head of the Class back-to-back at 3 am. Let PBS bring back Square One TV, and I'll be living in the 80s again.