GIVING NEW MEANING TO "MORNING ZOO"

By BELINDA M. PASCHAL
Radio is going to the dogs.
Well, that’s been obvious for years, particularly since a corporate monster whose name rhymes with "sheer flannel" stomped across the U.S. like King Kong on a steroid bender, devouring more than 1,000 stations along the way.
In this instance, radio has literally capitulated to the canine crowd – in the form of Internet broadcasting. The recently-launched DogRadioThailand.com features barking deejays playing vocal and instrumental music 24/7, reports the Bangkok Post.
Anupan Boonchuen, director of a dog grooming school, started DogRadioThailand because he believes listening to music has an effect on canine behavior. "I've noticed that dogs often respond to music. Some wag their tails. Some lift their heads while lying on the floor."
Not much different from my response when a Michael Bolton song comes on. Of course, I’m only lifting my head to gain momentum as I violently drive it back down against the cold, hard linoleum.
"We found that when we turned on music the dogs' mood improved," Boonchuen said. "They were more obedient and let us trim their hair easily."
Again – not much different from my reaction when I hear James Blunt caterwauling You’re Beautiful. I, too, become obedient. And by "obedient," I mean "brain-dead and drooling."
Ten human students from the school have been hired as deejays. Boonchuen said one of the main qualifications for the job included "must be good at barking." I’m guessing another requirement is "must lose anything even remotely resembling dignity."
The programming on DogRadioThailand.com will be primarily Thai pop music. I’d like to see this expand to include Western pop, which is a hit among the human population of many foreign countries. I envision a multi-genre play list catering to canines from all walks of life. For the old dogs, there’d be classics by The Beagles (featuring Paw McCartney), The Rolling Bones, Barky Manilow and Steppenwoof. Music-loving pups can shake their tails to the likes of Collie Clarkson, Garf Brooks and of course, Snoop Dogg and Bow Wow.
Eventually, the station’s offerings will include segments during which the disc jockey will talk and canine listeners will be encouraged to respond.
"At 9 a.m., we may have a dog greeting show, in which we'll repeat ‘sawasdee’ (‘hello’) over and over," Boonchuen said. "In some houses, the dog may lift both paws in response. In some houses, the dog may lift only one paw. It depends on how the dog was trained."
If DogRadioThailand catches on, it could lead to a whole new industry aimed specifically at man’s best friend. Imagine the first just-for-dogs sportscast:
"Here’s Jim Kibbleson-Bitts with the WWK9 sports news."
"Thank you, Steve. In yesterday’s go-fetch tournament, the Dayton Dobermans took a bite out of the Middletown Mastiffs, and Barkley the basset hound received a special award for being such a good boy."
One question – will the weather reporter be required to avoid offending the audience by saying, "It’s raining cats and humans"?

GO SHORTIES, IT'S YA BOOK CLUB!

By BELINDA M. PASCHAL
Madonna did it. So did Jamie Lee Curtis. And Bill Cosby and John Travolta and Jay Leno, among others.
No, the answer isn't "starred in some incredibly lousy movies." Well, yeah … they did, but that's beside the point, which is: They've all written children's books. For some reason, celebrities feel uniquely qualified to write books for an audience that largely has no idea who they are. With a few exceptions, these literary forays are as horrible as, say, Leonard Part 6. Or Battlefield Earth. Or Shanghai Surprise. Take your pick; they all suck like a Hoover.
Madonna jumped on the bandwagon a couple years ago with the explanation, "I'm starting to read to my son, but I couldn't believe how vapid and vacant and empty all the stories were. There's, like, no lessons. There's, like, no books about anything." (That’s, like, profound.)
Other scribes for the sandbox set include Sting, Jerry Seinfeld, John Lithgow, Talking Head David Byrne, Katie Couric, footballing brothers Tiki and Ronde Barber, ex-president Jimmy Carter, Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York, Prince Charles and Whoopi Goldberg. Ally Sheedy was 12 when she penned She Was Nice to Mice, which, incidentally, is much better than most of the claptrap scrawled by grown-up celebs.
Eighties songstress Kylie Minogue (Remember Locomotion? I’m still trying to forget it.) is among the latest stars to publish a kids’ book, The Showgirl Princess, due out in September by Puffin Publishing. According to a press release company, the picture book is geared toward "little girls who dream of dressing up and going onstage" as – what else? – showgirl princesses.
Right. Just the sort of aspirations we want to encourage in the women of tomorrow.
Even rogue rapper 50 Cent has taken his "get rich or die tryin’" credo to the publishing world with a book in which he draws on his past experiences to teach children lessons about life. ("See Jack run. See Jack run from the 5-0. Run, Jack, run!")
I can only imagine the lessons to be learned from the eloquent Mr. Half-Dollar. I can see it now -- stacked somewhere between Beverly Cleary and J.K. Rowling, will be such classics as:
* The Little Boy Who Cried Wolf and Got Smacked Down for Bein’ a Snitch
* Malice in Wonderland
* The Lord of the Bling
* The Crackhouse at Pooh Corner
* Goldilocks and the Three Pimps
* Little Red, Ridin' in Tha Hood
* The Chronic of Narnia
* Hush, Little Baby, or So Help Me, I’ll Give You Somethin’ to Cry About
* Harry Potter and the Chamber of Bullets
* The Gingerbread Man: Original Gangsta
* The Adventures of Sherlock Homeboy
* Little Bo Peep THIS
* Georgie Porgie: Playa of the Year
* Car-Jack and Jill
* Curious George Learns to Mind his Own *$&% Business
Thanks, but no, Fiddy. I'll stick to Dr. Seuss. On second thought, I MIGHT pay 50 cents for your books. But you're gonna owe me change.

SMELLS LIKE SCREEN SPIRIT

By BELINDA M. PASCHAL
Colin Farrell’s The New World stinks and it has nothing to do with overacting or Greeks with inexplicable Irish accents.
Really, the 2005 drama about the Brits settling the Jamestown colony and the love story of John Smith and Pocahontas isn’t so bad. It’s breathtakingly shot, if a bit ponderous, and boasts one of the most compelling under-18 actresses in recent filmdom, Q’Orianka Kilcher, cousin of singer Jewel and a multiple award nominee for her breakthrough performance in the Terence Malick-scripted film.
That’s nothing to sniff at … unless you live in Tokyo, where The New World opens later this month. Whereas U.S. viewers had to settle for the standard popcorn, Milk Duds and keg o’ cola, Japanese audiences will get a different treat to enhance their cinematic experience – Smellovision.
During the film, a bouquet of aromas will waft through the theaters to coincide with the emotional tone of various scenes. Love scenes smell like flowers, anger carries a hint of eucalyptus and tea tree, and joy is a citrus-y blend of orange and grapefruit. The peppermint-y aura coming from the back of the theatre? That’s not the guy in the last row chomping on a wad of Wrigley’s … that’s eau de sadness emanating from special scented oil machines under the back-row seats in two Tokyo theaters.
Actually, Smellovision isn’t new. Considered one of the more curious gimmicks of the time, it was introduced in 1960 in the movie Scent of a Mystery, which was something of a stink bomb. Twenty years later, John Waters paid tribute to Smellovision with scratch-and-sniff "Odorama" cards distributed at showings of his 1980 film, Polyester.
Imagine if all movies came with Smellovision! OK, so Thank You for Smoking and The Stink of Flesh probably wouldn’t pull in the crowds, but Charlie and the Chocolate Factory would drive concessions sales up 200% as moviegoers begin drooling like Pavlov’s dog at the first whiff of an Everlasting Gobstopper.
After painstaking research (translation: stream-of-consciousness daydreaming), I came up with a plethora of movies that suitable for Smellovision adaptation. Here are some I can actually print, along with their accompanying scents:
* The Ten Commandments – Verily, verily, I smelleth a burning bush.
* The Exorcist – Green pea soup. Mmmm, heavenly!
* Forrest Gump – A box of chawk-lits, of course.
* Popeye – Spinach and olive oil.
* Citizen Kane – Rosebuds.
* The Elephant Man – Peanuts.
* Last Tango in Paris – Butter. ‘nuff said.
* Soylent Green – What’s that smell? It’s PEOPLE!
* Cheech & Chong's Up in Smoke – As if you couldn’t guess.
* The Godfather – Fishes, as in, "sleepin’ wit da."
* The Silence of the Lambs – Some fava beans and a nice Chianti.
* Apocalypse Now – What else? The smell of napalm in the morning.
* Fatal Attraction – Boiled rabbit.
* Rain Man – Pepperoni pizza on Monday, yeah … ‘course, Wednesday is fish sticks.
* The Sixth Sense – I smell dead people.
* Evita – I’m not sure what the fragrance would be, but with any Madonna movie, you can be sure of one thing: It reeks.

HOUSE OF WACK

By BELINDA M. PASCHAL
Oh, Paris.
Sweetie, come here. Sit down. We need to talk.
You’ve done television and that’s working out pretty well. I’ll admit I’ve laughed – guffawed, even -- on numerous occasions at your high jinks with Nicole Richie on The Simple Life. You’ve done movies and that’s working out … well, you’ve done movies. Yes, House of Wax counts.
Can’t you just stop there? Are you on a campaign for total entertainment world domination? It’s not like you need the exposure – a certain videotape from a couple years back gave you more than enough. Seriously. Stop.
Do you have to ruin music, too?
No, that’s not a typo. Music. Ms. Hilton is continuing to milk her long-expired 15 minutes of fame by recording an album. Just what kind of fare might one expect from the vacant-eyed, party-hardy heiress? Bubbly, synth-laden dance pop, right? Wrong. Word has it that La Hilton is gettin’ her gangsta on by teaming up with rap crew Three 6 Mafia. Really.
I can think of nothing more frightening … well, maybe Paris pairing with Kevin Federline for a duets album.
See, this is what happens when people become famous for nothing other than being famous. With no real talent to peddle, they stumble into the spotlight like drunken hogs on ice skittering around an all-you-can-eat buffet trough. A little bit of this … a little bit of that … And why? Because they can.
For those not in the know, Three 6 Mafia scored an Oscar for their song It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp from the movie Hustle & Flow. They’re not exactly the Limp Bizkit kinda band that chicks like Paree consider "hardcore." Without censorship, most of their songs would be a series of bleeps with intermittent noise words, e.g., Get kicked out of this (expletive) like, (expletive) that (expletive) – an actual censored line from an actual Mafia song.
Can Paris prove her street cred on her new album? Show that she’s down with the homeys? We’re talking about a girl for whom "the hood" is found on the back of an Abercrombie & Fitch pullover and "peeps" are sugary little Easter chickies.
I can just imagine what Hiltonized hip-hop would sound like:
"Check one, check two, check – EW! Like, who writes checks anymore? I totally use MasterCard Platinum … and Visa Platinum ... and American Express Platinum … and … what? Oh, we’re rolling? That’s hot.
‘Kay, so, like … I’m a fresh, fly honey from the big, bad city
My folks call me Paris – you can call me P. Hitty
I grew up on the mean streets of Beverly Hills
I go slumming in Bel Aire when I need some cheap thrills
Everyday I pull drive-bys – that’s a cold, hard fact
Like, I drive by Wal-Mart on the way to Saks
Think I’m a dumb blonde? Well, I’ve got you conned
See, I’m not really dumb – and I’m not really blonde!
Like, WORD … or whatever."