Category: Games

Young Catherine Zeta-Jones topless (1992)

Scoop, ... 3 comments.

The show was named Resurgence. It was an episode of Love at First Sight, an obscure French/British TV show that IMDb refers to as Coup de Foudre, which is the equivalent French expression for “Love at First Sight.” (Literally: lightning bolt). According to the credits, the series was produced by Erich Segal, the classics professor who loved to slum in pop culture, and became most famous as the author of Love Story.

It’s a jaw-droppingly bad 24 minutes of TV melodrama. The only reason to remember it is that it features a topless scene from a very young Catherine Zeta Jones. (The show aired on August 28, 1992, about a month before her 23rd birthday.)


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Oh, what am I talking about? The series is long forgotten, even with that historically important topless scene. And with good reason!

Here’s a summary of the episode:

A wealthy widower welcomes his university-age daughter and three of her friends to his French country estate during her semester break. Dad and daughter obviously have a great relationship, and dad also establishes a good rapport with his daughter’s friend (Zeta) and the boyfriends of the two girls. They all socialize for a while, then the two young couples head for the Mediterranean in their two separate cars, and dad heads up to sleep.

Dad awakens to the sound of sobbing in his bedroom. It is Zeta-Jones, reporting that the man’s daughter has died in an automobile accident. Since the daughter and her boyfriend have been fried to a crisp, there is nothing dad can do. Since Zeta’s boyfriend is still at the site of the accident, taking care of the details with the police, the dad does what I think any of us would have done on this somber occasion – he fucks the living daylights out of Catherine Zeta-Jones.

Now THAT’S the way to mourn.

The lesson I’ve taken away from this is that there is no bad occasion nor inappropriate time for fucking Catherine Zeta-Jones. Put yourself in the dad’s shoes – there’s nothing you can do to bring your child back, but this would be your one and only chance to fuck Catherine Zeta-Jones, so it’s time to stop mopin’ and start gropin’. When it comes to this ethical dilemma, I don’t think Aristotle could think it through any better.

The next morning he seeks some additional consolation, but Zeta refuses, saying “not this way,” and that from now on she will love him in a different way. That sounded promising for anal, but in this case, she declared “now it’s me who’s your daughter”!

Don’t be shocked. It’s all OK, because their sex scenes were accompanied by sad piano music, not a steamy sax riff, which is the way I would have done it. (Where is Zalman King when you really need him?)

Zeta’s boyfriend returns, and the film ends with a group hug between dad, Zeta, and the boyfriend, who looks mighty uncomfortable about the entire thing.

Here is a clip of the nude scene.

I’ll bet you think I was kidding about the plot, but that is really what happened. Here is the full episode, if you don’t believe me, or if you’re just a connoisseur of bad entertainment.

Betting on the next pope

Scoop, ... 8 comments.

You can bet on individuals, nationalities, number of ballots, and which Papal name he will take upon consecration.

The favorite in “nationalities” is “the field,” which consists of “countries that have never had a pope.” That is considered marginally more likely than “Italy.”

Which countries are in “the field”? For starters, there has never been a pope from North America. The article also states that no Asian or African pope has ever been elected. Is that true?

Yes and no.

Yes, if you consider only the modern election process. There have been several Asian popes and at least three Africans, but they reigned before the modern election process was created. The College of Cardinals wasn’t established until 1059, more than a full millennium after the death of Jesus, while the last non-European Pope (before Francis) died two centuries earlier.

No, if you consider other forms of election. The article does not specify “elected by the College of Cardinals.” It just says “elected.” The early popes were chosen through a different election process. Linus, the first successor to Peter on the traditional list, is sometimes considered the first elected pope. Alternatively, Pope Pius I, around 140 or 150 CE, is considered by other historians to be the first elected pope. Whichever of those you accept, Asian and African Popes have been elected.

There were many in the early church.

  • Besides the famous St. Peter, two others were born in what is now Israel. (Pope Evaristus, and Pope Theodore I).
  • Popes Anicetus, John V, Sisinnius, Constantine and Gregory III (the last non-European before Francis) were Syrians.
  • Popes John VI and Conon came from what is now Turkey.
  • Popes Victor I and Gelasius I were from an area now part of either Libya or Tunisia.
  • Pope Miltiades also came from North Africa, was possibly of Berber descent, and may have had very dark skin.

I’m sure you know that St. Peter, the first Pope, was Judean. His exact birthplace is debated because the town of his birth no longer exists, but scholars agree that it was somewhere on the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee, so he was Asian. Peter, however, is not within the purview of this commentary because there is a universal consensus that he was not chosen by election.

But there are still more nuances. If you want to be persnickety, Peter was the leader of the church, but was not called a pope. Later, among his successors in the early church, all bishops were called “pope.” The official use of the title “Pope” as it is currently understood – the Bishop of Rome in a position of absolute primacy over church doctrine – did not come into effect until the reign of Pope Gregory VII (1073-85). The line of succession was traced back to Peter.

So the answer to “Have there ever been Asian and African Popes?” is “It depends on your definition of ‘Pope.'” If Peter and the others before 1073 are considered Popes, then yes. The Catholic Church considers Peter and a long list of successors to have been Popes, so there have been Asian and African popes by their definition, and almost all of them were elected, albeit not by the modern process. But be aware that Peter’s papacy is retroactive, not contemporaneous. There is no indication that he was ever called Pope Peter in his time. You could make an argument that the Papacy, as we understand it today, representing the undisputed head of the Church, as chosen by the College of Cardinals, started in the 11th century. By that definition, the chair was occupied exclusively by Europeans until Francis came along. Therefore, if we narrow the question to “Has an Asian or African Pope ever been elected by the College of Cardinals?” we can give a definitive answer.

No.

Interesting if you are a gambler …

Scoop, ... 15 comments.

As you can guess, the odds on the 2024 election have become less favorable to Biden since the debate. As of this morning, you could get odds better than 4-to-1 on some of the international markets. He is currently seen as having 17% to 30% chance of winning.

But that’s not the interesting thing, which is that you don’t have to wait until the election to profit (or lose). Some of the international gaming exchanges buy and sell shares based on the current odds, and you can sell at any time. For example, if you bought “shares” in Joe Biden at Polymarket before the debate, they would have cost you 35 cents. If you sold those same shares immediately after the debate, they would have brought you 17 cents, so the debate would have cost you about half of your wager.

The cost of the shares fluctuates based on their odds of winning. Biden is currently considered to have a 20% chance on that market, so the shares currently cost 20 cents to buy, and will get 19 cents if you sell now.

If you could have known the outcome of the debate, you could have made a fortune betting on Gavin Newsome or Michelle Obama. You could have bought shares of either of them for two cents that morning and sold them for seven cents that evening. Of course, Newsome is right back down to 2.5 cents now and Michelle is down to 3.2 cents, so timing is everything. (You can currently buy shares in Hillary Clinton for 3/10 of a cent.)

Biden shares seem like a pretty good bet at the moment. That doesn’t mean you think he would win, but simply that his odds would improve. He’s now seen as having only a 20% chance to win (20 cents per share), and that’s near the very bottom of his range. If you think that things will probably smooth out, and his chance of winning will probably climb back into the 35 cent (35%) range, you could nearly double your money if you buy and sell at the right times. (On the other hand, you could lose every penny. The value of his shares will drop to zero if he resigns or is dumped from the ticket. Needless to say, they will also drop to zero if you hold on to them until election night and he loses, but will pay off at 100 cents if he should win.)

The obligatory warning: These speculations are for entertainment purposes only. Betting on U.S. elections is illegal in the USA.