Internet Psychic!

I predict that in these tough economic times, people will no longer be Rickrolled, or gently tricked into watching Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up", and will start getting Mickrolled, with Simply Red's "Money's Too Tight To Mention", with even more hideous Ginger Mick Hucknall. You heard it here first!

Famously Cheap

My family is very, very, deeply cheap. No, we're not Jewish, we're just trashy, too-many-kids Irish. Growing up, I thought Target was a fancy department store. My mother used to buy our toys pre-broken at yard sales, to save us the trouble of breaking them, and she has never owned a wristwatch worth more than ten dollars. Whenever it was back-to-school time, my dad would peel off a fresh $20 bill and say- knock yourself out. My father's wedding gift to me was a box set of CD's that he had burned for me.
My baby sister Emily is finally making it all pay off on her No Trust Fund blog, and now has an article in USA Today about living on freebies. If only my mother would pony up for high-speed internet, she'd be so proud!

POSTSCRIPT: My mother has announced that she has signed onto highspeed and has resumed her monitoring of badinia.com, and that I should stop making fun of her, and also that I should stop talking so dirty.

Happy Birthday Emily!

Ladies and gentlemen, today is the day we celebrate the birth of the world's cutest rollerderby ref, my sister Emily! In the rollerderby world, her name is Miss Blisters, although Beloved Spouse suggested Belle and Some Bashin'.

My Sisters on Good Morning, America

The camera loves my sisters, and they love to give me the business. I especially like how my mother gets cut off in the middle of her favorite phrase, "Listen to your mother!"

Sha-Zam!

Emily drinks a glass of magician water.

I am proud to announce that my sister, a week after moving to Noo Yawk, has landed a gig as David Blaine's P.A. She is on call 24 hours a day to pick up his magic pants and get his magic coffee. I was then in the position where I had to explain to my mother who David Blaine is. I went with: he's a magician who doesn't so much do tricks as he performs feats of putting up with extreme inconvenience, such as living in a fishbowl or starving above London in a glass box, or indeed living in New York City. And then she asked me a question that I can't answer: "In what way does that make him a magician?"