Neiman-Marcus has released their ridiculous holiday gift catalog just in time for you to buy the staff of AfterElton.com their gifts. In these tough economic times, the catalog selections seem more restrained than in previous years. Why, these very practical cupcake go-carts go for only $25k.

Last week, I mentioned the new photoseries from Jeff Sheng documenting Don't Ask, Don't Tell, and you guys had a very positive response to his work. He's finished a new shoot, and has the fruits of his labor up over at The Bilerico Project.

In one of the more unusual business disputes I've heard of, Costco has stopped selling Coca-Cola products throughout their entire chain. If I didn't live in a tiny town without a Costco, this would upset me, because anything that that interferes with my caffeine intake is not cool.

Yet another reason I'm shopping for a British husband (besides the manners, sexy accent and the healthcare), the BBC has ported its incredibly sexy iPlayer application to the Nintendo Wii.

For those wondering why I used a picture that appears to be from GuysWithiPhones.com, well, I didn't. That's Allan Hyde, who played the sexy gay vampire Godric on True Blood, and he seems to have a thing for t-shirts with wolves on them.  He's been tweeting pictures, which have been collected over at ONTD. Honestly, he's coming across here as adorkable rather than sexy. Still works.

Oxford University Press has chosen their "Word of the Year" for 2009. I find their choice to be somewhat interesting, because my spell check says it's not even a word. The winner? "Unfriend" from Facebook, which is very 2004 of them.

Newsweek gets a few things right when they're not being written by Ramin Seetodeh. They've got a list of "12 Comics Who Aren't Funny" and I tend to agree that these people don't amuse me, from Gallagher smashing watermelons 30 years later to Jay Leno every night.

The 8th Annual Elton John Foundation Event in New York City last night was hosted by the silver fox himself, Anderson Cooper. The event honored Sharon Stone and was evidently dignified enough to get Courtney Love to dress in a nice, conservative dress. Sir Elton was on his husband's arm, looking fully recovered from his hospital stay.

A preliminary report commissioned by Roman Catholic bishops at a cost of $2 million found no data that homosexuality in priests made them more likely to commit abuses, which flies in the face of what the Vatican has been saying lately.

I have to give Andy Towle credit, he's stayed on top of the horrific murder in Puerto Rico of Jorge Mercado better than any traditional media outlet. He keeps up the coverage with the news that the suspect they arrested is going to run with a gay panic defense. I can't believe a gay panic defense still works in 2009 (though it often does), but how that explains the horrible things done in this case is beyond my comprehension. How about we just tell Dick Cheney the guy is a terrorist and leave them in the room alone together? 

In news that must make the citizens of Utah so proud, Rep. Jason Chaffetz has come out and said he thinks Carrie Prejean could run successfully for public office. 

Adam Lambert continues the publicity blitz, and is holding his own against the Twilight machine. He did a piece with USAToday that has a couple great quotes, but the one that's most relevant to this site lately is ""I don't want to be a gay poster child, but I am by default, because there aren't that many. Like it or not, it's projected on me. I'm not saying, 'Do what I do.' I say, 'Do what you do.' "

The mashup is about Washington D.C. this morning. First, the D.C. Elections Board has decided that rights like marriage are not something you put to majority vote, which likely clears the way for marriage equality by year's end. And a selection of religious "leaders" showed up in D.C. in front of the Justice Department trying to get arrested under the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Bill, since they're convinced that's what will happen. Nobody paid them any attention, and they walk free amongst us.

When Felicia Day taught Neil Patrick Harris Twitter, I'm so glad she included pictures.
This one is from the HIMYM set.

Video Meme

We'll start with a tale of the insanely wealthy trying to prove they have a value to society. The heir to the Rothschild fortune, currently estimated at around $6 billion, saw a documentary on cable about the plastic island in the Pacific. So he decided to build a custom boat from plastic bottles and sail it across the ocean blue to draw attention to it. For what he spent, I figure he could have chartered a ship to haul away a lot of trash and recycle, but to each their own.

Last night Stephen Colbert spoke with Rep. Jackie Speier of California's 12th District. Since this covers San Francisco, they discuss President Obama, Don't Ask, Don't Tell, gay marriage, and well, let's just say she's a good sport, because he was in fine form. He finally came right down to the basic element of discussion of gay rights, I wasn't listening, because I don't agree with you.

From South Carolina, we have the story of a cow walking into a backyard, onto a pool cover, and falling in. It has a happy ending, so I don't feel bad about laughing at several points in the report.

For our daily dose of cute, and since evidently people hate puppies, I give you the Puppy Who Can't Roll Over. His mom is in the background and doesn't seem to concerned, and the human is operating the camera without guilt, so I'm guessing this puppy that thinks he's a turtle is well cared for.

And to wrap things up, if you have to work this hard to avoid work, maybe you should consider doing your job. But that won't be nearly as fun. The words are in Russian, but the humor is universal.