It could be worse, I realized. I could live here.

Cold comfort, perhaps, but comfort nonetheless. And so, for providing the enforced monotony that only a dull road trip can provide, and the bleak void to which to compare my own relatively full life, I am grateful to the state of Nebraska. Nebraska has a special place in my heart.

It has no place, however, on a map of the United States.

Let me explain: California is a state. New York is a state. Texas, for the time being at least, is a state. And they deserve to be. They’re big, they’re boisterous — but most crucially, they’re populated. Thirty-seven million people live in California, four million in Los Angeles alone. New York is home to almost 20 million people. If California were a country, it would have the eighth largest economy in the world. If New York City were its own state, it would be the 12th largest — and in my humble New Yorker opinion, the best.

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In case you didn't catch on, the sex strike is tongue-in-cheek. Annette Maxberry-Carrara, founder of Liberal Ladies Who Lunch -- the group that proposed the "Access Denied" protest -- tells me with a laugh, “We're not looking at it as a literal strike." But they are making a serious political statement. The event's tagline reads, "If our reproductive choices are denied, so are yours."

You would have to be profoundly tone deaf to not recognize the satire in recent bills proposed by female lawmakers that proclaim "every sperm is sacred" and restrict access to the blue pill. Last month, Oklahoma state Sen. Constance Johnson offered a bill in response to Senate Bill 1433 -- which seriously and nonsatirically holds that a fetus at “every stage of development” has “all the rights, privileges and immunities available to other persons, citizens and residents of this state.” Her proposal states, “[A]ny action in which a man ejaculates or otherwise deposits semen anywhere but in a woman’s vagina shall be interpreted and construed as an action against an unborn child.”

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Although we -- the collective 1.5 billion Muslims worldwide -- assume Sean Stone is a fine, upstanding man and sincerely wish him spiritual contentment, we earnestly ask Allah why Islam only attracts controversial celebs (in this case, the son of a controversial celeb) who further tarnish our already toxic brand name?

We plead to the heavens for an answer as to why he converted in Iran, of all places, which is currently the most feared and loathed country in America and about as popular as herpes.

We have patiently endured, oh, Allah.

We miraculously survived Mike Tyson, who converted to Islam while incarcerated, and then angrily threatened Lennox Lewis in an infamous interview: “I want your heart. I will eat his children. Praise be to Allah.”

Awesome.

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1. British bands.

2. British bands singing morosely.

3. British bands singing morosely about hungry people in Africa, a place I was familiar with primarily through playing Risk, but which I nevertheless felt a great passion for. We must get these people fed, the world kept telling my 13-year-old self, and therefore I, too, felt this very strongly ... for about two months, anyway, because puberty was making me very interested in a whole host of other things.

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Sources at Mencken General Hospital say that Mr. Gingrich, who has recently been the target of millions of dollars in negative ads, is being treated for a severely damaged ego. He is unconscious and currently in intensive care. One hospital source, who insisted on anonymity, said the Iowa facility is ill-equipped to properly treat the candidate. “Frankly, we’ve never seen an ego this large and fragile,” said the doctor. “We’re doing our best, but they will probably have to airlift him back to D.C.”

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University, as you know, is the only time in one’s life when anything really worthwhile happens. I met Hitch there. The first time I saw him, he had a bird on each arm and a woman by his side. She beamed as he read aloud passages from "Homage to Catalonia." He looked up.

“Who the hell are you?” he said.

“I’m your housemate,” I said.

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Sources interviewed for this article said that Mr. Bush spends at least eight hours of each day at the Preston Hollow Shopping Center, a popular retail destination near his home in suburban Dallas. “Other than that chimichanga lunch he doesn’t really have a set routine,” said one source. “Sometimes he’ll hang around Lenscrafters trying on glasses or head over to Abercrombie & Fitch and watch the girls fold pants. Last week I saw him inside Pottery Barn sleeping in a leather recliner.”

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I wrote all morning while my assigned "Efficiency Expert" stood over me with a clipboard and stopwatch, calculating my return on labor. At 11:30 he clicked the watch to a crisp stop and said, "Bathroom break. Ten minutes," before pointing with a nipple-size cellphone toward a bank of industrial elevators.

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Andrew Jackson, nicknamed “Old Hickory” because he had a wooden leg, was a hero of the War of 1812. Where everyone else had been busy fighting the English and Canadians, Jackson wisely spent the war battling Indians, who had been planning to use the distraction of the war to continue existing on land that rightfully belonged to citizens of the American Republic.

Jackson eventually won so many battles that the Spanish ceded Florida to the United States, which was amazing because the U.S. was not even at war with Spain and had not even particularly wanted Florida that much.

Jackson was wildly popular across the United States, and his supporters urged him to run for president. But the corrupt big-city elites wouldn’t let a regular guy like Jackson, who preferred simple domestic ale to fancy imported ale and enjoyed the occasional stock-carriage race, anywhere near the White House. In 1824, these elites conspired to deny Jackson the presidency through a shady backroom deal in the House of Representatives. But Jackson would not be denied. He spent the next four years organizing grass-roots events across the nation, where true patriots declared their intent to take their country back. At his famous 8/25 rally, he urged Americans to remember how they felt the day after the British burning of Washington, 10 years earlier, and said America should always be as it was on that day.

Jackson’s brilliance lay in his support for Democracy. Jackson appealed to Real Americans -- middle-class and even poor white males, who knew, because Jackson told them, that all their problems were the fault of bankers, rich merchants and other elitists. These freedom lovers also knew that Jackson’s various opponents were all in the pocket of the National Bank, and these bankers wanted to give their jobs to freed slaves and possibly Indians.

Jackson’s opponent was President John Quincy Adams, an effete big city intellectual with a fancy degree, who wanted to spend taxpayer money on frivolous endeavours like “science” and so forth. Jackson, on the other hand, was full of bullets from getting shot all the time, and swore a lot, and had a parrot.

Jackson campaigned on commonsense solutions like cutting the deficit, ending the Bank, and killing more Indians, and voters turned out for him in droves. His inauguration was an awesome ‘80s teen movie-style party that everyone in America was invited to, and the rudeness of the revelers caused high society types to say “my word” shortly before they were thrown, fully clothed, into the swimming pool. Jackson was presented with a giant wheel of cheese, which he invited all Americans to come and eat. He was shot another time but still didn’t die. He killed more Indians and censored anti-slavery materials sent through the U.S. mail.

Jackson followed through on his No. 1 campaign promise, and ended the Second National Bank. It was widely known at the time that the Bank was responsible for the recent Great Panic, and was manipulating currency on behalf of the wealthy and connected. In addition, the bank was plainly unconstitutional. As Jackson wrote:

“But if [Congress] have other power to regulate the currency, it was conferred to be exercised by themselves, and not to be transferred to a corporation. If the bank be established for that purpose, with a charter unalterable without its consent, Congress have parted with their power for a term of years, during which the Constitution is a dead letter. It is neither necessary nor proper to transfer its legislative power to such a bank, and therefore unconstitutional. Swag me the fuck out.”

So Jackson vetoed the bank. Wrong-headed historians blame the following period of easy credit and rampant speculation followed by inflation, panic and lengthy depression on the bank veto and Jackson’s requirement that government land be purchased with gold instead of suddenly worthless currency, but all of that was actually Martin Van Buren’s fault.

After his presidency, Jackson went on to invent outlaw country music.

"A Tea People's History" is available for $2.99 on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and iTunes.

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Philosophy professor Jonathan Lear sets out to answer this question in his new book, “A Case for Irony,” attempting to redefine and flesh out this term from the pat and the vague. In Lear’s view, irony is not just about humor: It's meant to serve as a sobering mirror to our lives and actions, revealing and reaffirming to us our passions and beliefs. It shows how exactly we measure up to our professed ideals, all in an effort to strive for excellence – to become better at whatever it is we devote our lives to. Irony asks us, in a fundamental way, “Am I really who I say I am?”

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“She was in my office one day, and I made a gesture saying — and I was standing close to her — and I made a gesture – you are the same height as my wife.  And brought my hand — didn’t touch her — up to my chin saying, ‘You’re the same height as my wife, because my wife comes up to my chin.’ …  And that was put in [the complaint] as something that made her uncomfortable."
--Herman Cain to Fox News' Greta Van Susteren, Oct. 31

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Beaton, a native of Nova Scotia who recently relocated to Brooklyn, N.Y., began writing comics about historical figures and characters from literature for her college newspaper; her first strip offered tips for surviving a Viking invasion of campus. "The response was way bigger than I ever imagined," she said recently over lunch. "I knew that I had something."

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First the former Utah governor -- just in time for the 20th anniversary of Nirvana's "Nevermind" -- invoked Kurt Cobain in a Republican debate last week.

It was a strained reference -- Huntsman mocked the Social Security plan put forth by Mitt Romney in his memoir "No Apology" by wondering whether it was written by Cobain (who wrote "All Apologies"). But it did get the attention of Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic, who tweeted: "Kurt Cobain Lives in the GOP presidential debate! Kurt supported Jerry Brown for president in 1992."

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Warren Buffett (around left wrist; obscured by watch): I've got the old man's car/ I've got a jazz guitar/ I've got a tab at Zanzibar.

Sean Connery (backward across chest): You're my castle, you're my cabin and my instant pleasure dome.

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Critics carp that by the time reality TV finally finds its way to TV, it’s been scrubbed clean of most of its reality. “Pitch” attempts to reverse all that. It’s a single-camera show that brings viewers inside the pitch meetings for other reality shows. Watch as up-and-coming and/or washed-up celebrities make the case that their lives deserve to be on television. Marvel as executives spin out possible plot scenarios for allegedly unscripted shows. Wince as network veterans who were involved in quality sitcoms (and, in some cases, educational television) look queasy as independent production companies try to convince them of the merits of a half-hour show about Selena Gomez’s driver. If “Pitch” succeeds, there is a spin-off already prepared: “Pitch Pitch,” which examines the process that led to the airing of “Pitch.”

“¬Oprah”

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"Today," a thin, papery voice whispered.

Ryan dropped his shirt suddenly when a P.A. knocked at the door. "Five minutes to show time, Mr. Gosling," called out the pimply teen (Mike? Mitch?) who deferentially escorted Ryan from his limo to this wretched room.

"OK! Yes! Coming!" Ryan shouted, a little too loudly. He stared at his reflection in the mirror one final time. This would have to do ... maybe post-production would take care of the sweat, the bags under the eyes, the constant look of fear he had worn for the past three months.

"No," Ryan said quietly, looking away from the mirror, refusing to look down to the thing that lived beneath his shirt. "Not today."

It was show time.

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We've gone through every season of "Weeds" and boiled each one down to its most important plot points. It's all the fun of playing catch-up, without any of the boring subplots involving Doug and Celia.

Weeds: Season 1

Nancy Botwin: Selling large quantities of marijuana is the only way I can support my family after the tragic death of my husband. I'm a pretty good mom, all things considering.

Celia: You’re my best friend but I hate you.

Nancy: Ditto. Have you seen my kids anywhere?

Drug dealer: No, but would having sex with me help?

Nancy: Sure.

DEA Agent Peter Scottsman: Want to get married?

Nancy: That seems like a good idea.

Weeds: Season 2

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It might not sound that scary, but it really is.

Sometimes you really just have to let videos speak for themselves, even if they are monstrous and horrifying and are going to give you nightmares for like, a week.

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