Shameless plug: If you're in the neighborhood Friday night, be sure to stop by and say whaddup. TUA goes on at 11:15 pm.

Be warned: We also heard they're shooting a segment for "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" at Plaid that same night. So, uh, wear some extra hair gel or something.

Spring is in the air… and so are men with breasts who drink Diet Vanilla Pepsi and fellate underage boys in Central Park trees. Yawn.

Here's what else:

1. The Yankees suggged it bad against the BoSox at the Stadium over the weekend. On Friday, we sat through six unanswered runs, seven innings, pouring rain, a handful of ejections, 20 "assss-hole!" chants and two projectile beer-tossings before finally calling it a night.

2. Chrissy Fessler breaks out another hot list, this time Sperling's "most stressful places to live." In this round, Bakersfield (#34) gets the edge over Fresno (#45).

3. The guys at Low Culture have outdone themselves. Following last week's ridiculous decision by several newspapers to censor Doonesbury because of its "graphic" depiction of war, L.C. decided to remake the comic strip as MTV's "I Want a Famous Face." Nothing like mentally unstable teenagers to keep us numb to war.

4. Naomi Watts loves the corn at Café Habana as much as we do. But we refrained from asking her to sign our plate of black beans.

5. If you're in Boston tomorrow, go see former Westside posse member Smooth-E perform at the Charles Playhouse. His parody of R. Kelly's "Re-ignition" is brilliant. Download it.

6. Reminder: Tomorrow is "Free Cone Day" at Ben & Jerry's. They're also giving away iTunes downloads.

7. The Bronx is beautiful. Go visit Van Cortlandt Park. Not so beautiful, however, is The Bronx.

8. This is a week old, but I'm playing catch-up: Sparta (that other band featuring members of At the Drive-In) played an early club show at CBGB, in advance of their new disc, "Porcelain," due out in July. If Mars Volta is too much Yes-Rush-prog-rock wanking for you -- though who can get too much of that? -- Sparta does a fine job with the straight-ahead stuff.

Luckily, it's not … so I won't. Here's the deal:

I took this picture of Pat Boone in January, when he performed at a black-tie party in West Virginia. (Long story.) My inside sources tell me he's actually a very nice guy -- not to mention a snappy dresser -- but the dude's got some horrible timing. Today, everyone's favorite Moonie paper of record, The Washington Times, has an interview in which Pat says censorship in the U.S. is actually healthy:

"It must be majority approved ... voluntary ... and self-imposed," he said, clad in a yellow blazer, black slacks, a canary yellow tie and white leather shoes. "Censorship is healthy for any society, and that goes for arts, entertainment, anything. Self-imposed means that the majority of people say that is what we want, and it can be changed if people's attitudes change, which is how a democratic society works."

Okay, now fast-forward to three hours later, as the U.S. government was scurrying to censor these images of flag-draped coffins filled with American soldiers coming back from Iraq:



I'm gonna go ahead and say censorship = bad, Pat. Sorry.

While I'm making this public service announcement, go ahead and check out my old stomping grounds: The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press and the Student Press Law Center.

The rest of your day:

1. Fresno Famous is a weekly, and Fresyes is (in theory) a daily blog -- but this past week the upstart publication has been writing circles around yours truly. Check out the latest: An interview with Fresno Bee music critic Mike Osegueda, who exposes the truth behind Esquire magazine's "most rocking cities" list. Turns out Esquire simply interviewed him, and then slapped a No. 6 on our favorite hometown. Hell, we'll take it. Meanwhile, for more proof of Fresno's No. 6-ness, give a read to BadAndy's latest music review.

2. Say you're looking for some great, rare cover songs performed by your favorite bands (say, Arab Strap doing Van Halen's "Why Can't This Be Love"). Well, go ahead and scoot your ass over to copy, right, where they play host (albeit temporarily) to the best of the copycats. Currently in rotation: covers of Cat Stevens songs from "Harold & Maude." (via largeheartedboy)

War is Hell-arious. Nothing but fun and games and dead people. Coming Soon: "Kick Me" signs on the backs of insurgents.

1. Pinback worked up the crowd nicely at Warsaw last night, despite a few complaints that the sound was crappy. (I've actually never been there when the sound has been great.) Their singer gets entirely too happy up there, but we like it.

2. Your very own subservient chicken. Tell it to breakdance or grab its crotch.

3. The bad news: Just when I got y'all riled up with that Fiona Apple MP3, turns out things aren't looking too hot with the new album.

4. The good news: Modest Mouse had a Top 20 debut with its new album. (via Coolfer)

5. Just what we all need: Star Jones Body Butter.

6. When did Lil' Kim morph into Michael Jackson?

We're back, suckas. Just to make up for all our time apart, I'm dropping you a pair of MP3s that I find prescient and enjoyable at this current moment. First comes from Modest Mouse's excellent new disc, "Good News for People Who Love Bad News," and the other is a classic from Fiona Apple. (Note to industry lawyers: If these two lone songs are gonna get me in trouble, just tell me and I'll pull them down. Or maybe you should do something more constructive with your time. But whatever.)

1. "Float On," Modest Mouse (I pulled the MP3, so just go buy the damn thing.)
2. "Get Gone," Fiona Apple

Coming soon: The first official Fresyes Q&A

In case you hadn't noticed, Fresyes is taking a brief Easter holiday. Just enough time to bite a few ears off the chocolate bunnies and resume Monday. Expect some big surprises next week. xoxo, The Guv

We're not gonna start biting too hard on The Black Table's excellent craigslist summaries, but we had to share this new post from the Fresno Craig. It marks the first official "Missed Connection," and I'm assuming (praying?) it's a joke:

you smelled like ranch dressing, and my zucchini stick sizzled - 41

Reply to: anon-28214943@craigslist.org
Date: 2004-04-06, 4:49PM PDT

You were my waitress at Red Robbin...your permed hair was covering your name tag...was it trayci? chrystalle? bryanna? i had the mushroom burger, remeber? are you going to easter at the save mart center?

****

Meantime, I met with a broker for three hours this evening, and suffice it to say this was not one of the available deals. But somebody oughta snap this up:

$825 / 2br - Great large 2 bedroom 2 Bath 1100+ square foot condo

Large 2 bedroom 2 bath condo with fenced patio. Fireplace, utility room, completely refurbished 2 years ago. High wood ceilings, walk-in closets. Walking distance to Starr and Kratt elementary, Tenaya Jr. High, and close to Bullard High. Pool and club house, 2 parking spaces. Quiet neighborhood, near shopping. (Sierra & Maroa)

In other news:

1. It's about time political advertising brought "f**khead" into the presidential campaign lexicon. See the anti-Bush commercial that MoveOn.org really should start airing.

2. For you New Yorkers, the crunchy-haired Carmel lady is dead. Long live the "sultry" Carmel lady. (NYT via Stereogum)

3. A Slate story on Tom Cruise's breakup with PR queen Pat Kingsley. It does a nice job explaining the media's evolution from celebrity worship to celebrity ridicule. In an unrelated note, it never mentions the phrase "into dudes."

4. Holy sweet lord. It's Dodgeball time.

1. One of my all-time favorite Fresno TV pitchmen, Dan Gamel (third only to OttmarThomasofToyotaVisalia, and Al Radka of Oberti Olives), is in the news today for turning the trees on his RV lot into limbless nubby stumps in order to keep them from scratching the motorhomes. Looks kind of like the "Joshua Tree" album, but with more asphalt. (Bee)

2. While I don't find this as egregious as, say, Nickelback ripping off its own material, Nuclear Beef today documents the shocking similarities between The Flaming Lips song "Fight Test" and the Cat Stevens classic, "Father and Son." Give them a listen. (Beef also includes the Johnny Cash/Fiona Apple version, which makes me wonder when she's gonna finally get her album done… but I digress.)

3. For those of you who still haven't discovered that celebrity and fashion magazines are full of shit, check out this lesson in retouching photos. While the first rule of prepping any celeb photo is "whiten the eyes/whiten the teeth" -- pay special attention to the amount of work done on her bellybutton.

4. Wal-Mart world-domination strategy #24,598: Take Over Inglewood. (NYT)

5. Read the blog of Karen Hall, a writer for CBS's "Judging Amy" who, along with the rest of her coworkers, was recently fired from the show. I can't say I watched it (ain't my demo anyway), but I find it bizarre when a long-running show just up and decides to can its entire writing staff. (Hall, by the way, started her career on "M*A*S*H.") Hollywood's a tough joint.

6. Things, however, could be worse. You could be Antonio Sabato Jr. getting his ass kicked. (Gawker)

Belated big ups to the folks at Pollstar, who now join the Fresyes permalink collection. After all, the concert trade magazine has bucked the LA and NY media establishment, turning Fresno into the next great publishing mecca. (While New York has Conde Nast and Hearst, Fresno has His Magazine, Ultimate Athlete and the newly founded Fresno Goth livejournal.) On a side note: can anyone explain how Pollstar ended up in Frez to begin with? We would love a history lesson. Paging quotemeister Gary Bongiovanni...

Another publication: Fresno Famous, which gives us a piece on that "Broadway Row" project -- from the perspective of a downtown business owner whose family has been screwed over by eminent domain for three generations.

Okay, here it goes: We're giving away an official Fresyes Unironic Trucker Hat to the first person who can successfully advise me on how to fix this Web site so it doesn't look weird on Internet Explorer for PC.

If you're over trucker hats, I'll give you a nice coffee mug instead.

Actress-writer-blogger and new Fresyes permalink Audra brings us a brilliant idea courtesy her former boyfriend. (Exes are good for something, apparently.) He participated in a "blind" wine tasting that featured everything from "expensive yuppie stuff" to Fresno State's very own jesus juice. Turns out the ol' Tailgate Red was the biggest crowd pleaser. "Yuppies were aghast!" she writes. "Investment bankers were passing out left and right."

So he came up with a new name for FSU wine to fool the snobs. Behold, Chateau Chien Taureau. Sugggit, Napa Valley.

For more from Audra, check out some "Fresno Noir."

Read it and weep:

1. The Walkmen kicked ass with "The Rat" on Letterman this week. But dammit if Hamilton Leithauser doesn't look just like Ed Vedder ... clenched jaw, psycho-white-guy stare, sensible haircut.

2. Stare at this photo without reading the text. See if you recognize her in the slightest. And no, it's NOT Celine Dion. (lindsayism)

3. Listen to Nickelback's songs simultaneously ... one in the left speaker, one in the right. Laugh very hard.

Sure, there are cynics who claim these Canadian rockers have recorded the SAME song, but I prefer to think they have embarked on a surreal, psychedelic experiment to layer their entire catalogue into one easily digestible piece. When seven albums are complete, fans will be blessed with an orchestral melange of gravelly goatee'd howling.

4. In the latest Entertainment Weekly, oh-so-clever "Shaw Report" writer Jessica Shaw declares bushy beards "IN." This is presumably due to the release of Iron & Wine's new disc, "Our Endless Numbered Days." I don't own this yet, but they're great live.

5. First "Old School," then "Starsky & Hutch." Here's hoping these guys show up in every future Todd Phillips movie.

6. The not-quite-reliable-but-who-cares Popbitch claims that Christina Aguilera is a very disruptive hotel guest, if ya know what I mean. Wink, wink. Nudge, nudge. … Okay, it's sex. Really loud sex. (Luxury Fashion)

7. Johnny Marr replaces Buckethead in Guns N' Roses. Schweeeet!