Digital City

If you think the destruction of the planet will in fact happen in 2012 or you just need to do some general planning for your average, everyday apocalyptic situation, Costco is here to help and save you money even.

Through Oct. 18, Costco.com is offering a one-year supply of THRIVE Self Reliance dehydrated and freeze-dried food for $799 - a savings of $200.

The 4723 servings in the package are actually a one-year supply for one person. If you think you won't need to be hunkered down in a bunker for that long, the food will last two people for six months or a family of four for three months.

The 2009-2010 season premiere of the Supreme Court of the United States opens today with about as much fanfare as the season premiere of Saturday Night Live. Both SNL and SCOTUS have new cast members with Jenny "F-Bomb" Slate making a name for herself on SNL and Justice Sonia Sotomayor becoming the first Hispanic cast member on SCOTUS. At 55, Justice Sotomayer is the second youngest umpire in the current line-up joining the cast of mainly seventysomethings.

In the first episode of SCOTUS today, the judges will be hearing arguments on how long a shosuspect's request for an attornuld last in Maryland vs. Shatzer. It's pretty sick and twisted case involving a guy and his 3 year old son, if you want the background, click here.

Other key episodes this season involve the usual plot lines: gun control, life sentences and public displays of religion. With the fall of the economy, there are a several business cases this season. The episode of Needle vs. the NFL will be watched closely as American Needle goes after the NFL and Reebok for what they believe violates the Sherman Antitrust Act.

For a full list of SCOTUS episodes this season, check out SCOTUS Wiki. The justices will be hearing cases until through April and start passing out judgement through the season finale in June.

Still way too early to tell if this season will be a comedy or tragedy, but where Slate and SNL have to worry about the FCC and ratings, Sotomayor and SCOTUS never have to fear the wrath of Nielsen as they got their show until death do they part.

It's important to note that I like children and believe they are the future. You just need to teach them well and let them lead the way. However (to continue with Whitney), I decided long ago to never walk in anyone's shadow, especially the shadow of a massive doublewide baby stroller being leisurely pushed down a crowded Manhattan sidewalk clogging foot traffic.

Like pollution and crime, I thought doublewide strollers were a big city issue. I was wrong. There's a doublewide stroller battle raging in Westfrield, N.J. and it's getting ugly.

Venezuela repeats Miss Universe as Miss Venezuela Stefania Fernandez upset Miss Dominican Republic Ada Aimee De la Cruz at the Miss Universe 2009 Pageant at Atlantis Resort in the Bahamas. After the field was narrowed down from the 84 original ladies to 15, Miss Domincan Republic outscored Miss Venezuela in the swimsuit and nightgown rounds cutting from 15 to 10 and 10 to five respectively.

Even though her scores were lower in the rounds, Miss Venezuela had more of a timeless beauty looking modern and retro at the same time while Miss Dominican Republic looked more poppish - which isn't a bad thing.

There weren't as many fireworks at the Miss Universe Pageant as there were at the Miss USA competition - both are managed by Donald Trump's Miss Universe Organization. Just because there were no opposite marriage designations, doesn't mean there weren't any awkward moments. The show itself seemed choppy and dragged, except for the parts they had to rush so the pageant would come in under time budget.

It's supposed to be a Day Without Megan Fox, but it was hard not to celebrate this talented actress on a day when other sites have Joan of Arc'd her in their own Megan Fox Boycott. The same sites that rake in ad dollars from page views when they publish a sexy new shot of her are saying she's over exposed. While it the sexy, yet talented, actress exudes sex appeal and it seems daily there is a sexy new shot of her, I'm wondering how she can be overexposed. She's only been in a handful of movies and a few TV performances.

What really then has Megan done to deserve the ban?

Maybe it's her on and off again relationship with Brian Austin Green. Except for teenage girls in the '90s, it seems he's not that likable, although his work in the Sarah Connor Chronicles is above par. The question for the guys is 'how the hell did he pull that?' Maybe for the ladies Brian Austin Green doesn't have the rock star cred worthy to help elevate the ladies he's dating to 'ho nutha level.'

Today is National Tequila Day, a day to celebrate the high-octane agave juice. While almost any drinker worth their weight in salted rims has tequila horror stories, tequila doesn't have to be scary. It's easy to over indulge because tequila, like Jagermeister, is one of those shots that unequivocally tells the entire bar, you are ready to party. Walking up and ordering four shots of Patron or a gallon of Cuervo sends the message that the night has begun and that the time to rock is now.

Excessive tequila consumption is also aided by the great enablers: salt, lime and in the case of body shots, naked flesh. The pomps and circumstances of downing tequila shots adds engagement value to the process and is as much a part of the tequila as the 100% agave inside the bottle.

Any really good tequila however doesn't need the enablers. Any good tequila doesn't even need a shot glass - just needs a mouth in which to land. I learned the hard way early on in my drinking career drinking cheap tequilas that smell like a gas station. When I didn't have lime, or a little too drunk to safely use a knife to cut a lime, I found the joy in chasing cheap tequila with straight pickle juice. Believe me, pickle juice serves the purpose. You replace that nasty petrol taste with a mouth-puckering pickle preserver preventing projectile vomiting. If you're fresh out of pickle juice, regular mustard works, but when you wake up the next day happy in the haze of a hangover hour, friends and store clerks may question why your hands are stained yellow.

Once I learned words like Patron, Herradura, 1800 and Tres Generations, I learned that a shot of tequila doesn't mean a big production number. Shoot the shot and say "ahhhhhhh" - no lime, no salt, no dry pickles sitting in the fridge and no stained yellow hands. It was also at the time I learned the simplistic beauty of an up margarita which remains one of my favorite drinks if a bar has fresh lime juice.

To celebrate National Tequila Day, you can do whatever you like. Try some tequila tasting tips and hit a City's Best bar or margarita or find a dance party and consume tequila while a DJ spins T.I. rapping about Patron in, uh, "Whatever You Like." Or, if you want to keep it home schooled, grab some tequila at a liquor store, head home and imitate Pee Wee Herman's dance to the song 'Tequila.' If you want to be TMZ-obvious about it, you can grab some celebrity tequila like Justin Timberlake's 901 tequila or Sammy Haggar's Cabo Wabo and watch reruns of Tia Tequila.

Happy National Tequila Day.

It's Bastille Day 2009, or as they call Bastille Day in French, Fete Nationale or the more literal le quatorze juillet. It's the day that marked the storming of the oppressant Bastille prison and the beginning of the French Revolution. Unlike July 4th in the U.S. where Americans tell each other Happy July 4th, people don't typically walk around Paris saying Happy Bastille Day. They do have a morning parade and nighttime fireworks. However, Americans love any reason to party so there are some Bastille Day events and ways for you to be French for a day and celebrate.

With Bastille Day 2009 falling on a school night, most of the big festivals and parties happened over the weekend, but if you look hard enough, you can find some smaller events. Click here to find out if there are any Bastille Day events in your neighborhood.

If the search comes up empty, you can always find a French restaurant or pick up some French wine or if you are lactose tolerant, some French cheese. If all else fails, hit a grocery store, pick up some French bread and rent a couple of Jerry Lewis movies or hit Paris in Vegas.

Personally, I'm going to rock some Kyo, have an Audrey Tautou film fest and butcher what's left of my high school French vocabulary.

One of the most anticipated, or at least talked about, movies of the year hits theaters today but may have some competition from the teen set. Sacha Baron Cohen's racy Rated R Bruno, think Borat's gay cousin, is up against the other wide-release this weekend, the PG-13 I Love You Beth Cooper starring Hayden Panettiere with her first nude scene.

It seems like a no-brainer that Bruno will beat Beth Cooper. Bruno is as close to a Borat sequel as possible. According to Box Office Mojo, Bruno is in about 900 more theaters, but it is Rated R which is rare for a summer blockbuster so given the limited audience and subject matter, there could be some empty seats. Both films have midnight showings that will start the cash registers rolling early.

If controversy does sell tickets, then Bruno wins hands down. Ever since reports surfaced highlighting the 31 fake companies that Bruno movie producers used to mask the production from unsuspecting movie participants, the movie has been a trail of controversy from crashing Milan fashion week to golden Chanel rocket launchers to the hastily cut LaToya Jackson scene taken out before the U.S. premiere following Michael Jackson's death. Bruno already premiered internationally with the scene still in it that involved Latino gardners serving as chairs and hairy sushi tables.

Both films also have the dominating Transformers 2 and Ice Age 3 to content with, both taking in more than $40 million last week. But as Sacha Baron Cohen said as Bruno in a special David Letterman Top 10 on why you should see Bruno, "it's like Transformers, but not as gay."

Between the Michael Jackson Memorial, the anniversary of the 7/7 terrorist attacks and Jim Gaffigan's birthday, there's a lot of activity in the media world today. Probably a bad day to launch a re-branding campaign, but nonetheless, that's what Sci Fi Channel is doing.

Today the Sci Fi Channel becomes SyFy - pronounced /sie fie/ like in my pie and not /sih fee/ like sippy as I've heard on the subway and in the office. Our local mobile guru Farhan Memon was kind enough to snap an iPhone pic of the shindig this morning at Rockefeller Center where he reported that there were pastries, energy drinks and free "WyFy" in a park setting.

The stars of the new show premiering tonight Warehouse 13 were on hand, but as we've seen this morning in the NYC papers and even online right now, SyFy is using the old Sci Fi logos to promote the show so I'm confused. Sci Fi/SyFy is even using the old logo and scifi.com Website today to promote new episodes of their fun and quirky show Eureka.

Company after company seems to screw up branding, one of the easiest disciplines in marketing. However, that won't stop me from watching Warehouse 13 - it seems to be the right mix of the pop TV I like along the lines of X Files and Fringe. And it's not lost on me that Sci Fi/SyFy launched their rebranding on the anniversary of the day the aliens crashed their ride at Roswell.

If anyone wants to borrow my copies of Why Johnny Can't Brand or Your Marketing Sucks, hit me up on Twitter.

Today is the day of the public memorial for Michael Jackson and you can watch it live in the Ustream below.

The coverage has to be unprecedented citing some people to say Michael Jackson in death, is bigger than most historical figures like Gandhi, not Congressman Peter King of course.

It's estimated 250,000 people attended Gandhi's funeral and while technically only 17K or so mourners will be inside the Staples Center for the King of Pop's actual memorial service, millions joined the lottery for tickets and with live television coverage on CBS, NBC, ABC, FOX, CNN, E! Fox News, MSNBC and MTV and Ustream broadcasting the memorial online via their partnership with CBS and movie theaters giving away free tickets to watch the broadcast with popcorn and with Times Square and other public places broadcasting Michael Jackson's Memorial, Michael Jackson probably is bigger than Gandhi. And that's just in the U.S.

Free TV Show from UstreamLive coverage begins at noon, ET, 9AM Staples Center time. It is reported that Michael Jackson's body will be at the Memorial and oddly enough, the animals from Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus will be at the Stpales Center. Coincidentally, the animals had to do the traditional Animal Walk from the train last night to the Staples Center where they are performing for the next month - kind of ads a Neverland quality to the memorial.