Weekend Assignment: #296: The press and the public always seem to be obsessed with one scandal or another, from Tiger Woods to Balloon Boy. Do you eagerly follow such stories, try to avoid them, or something in between? Does the identity of the celebrity (or would-be celebrity) affect how interested you are?Put me down for "something in between." I'm a major news junkie so it's virtually impossible for me to avoid the media's scandal of the day, but I'm certainly not obsessed with them either. When a scandal or any other big celebrity news story comes along, I usually pick up on the major points and ignore the rest, switching the channel or turning the page as the story drags on through Day Three, Day Four and beyond. I'm certainly not interested in knowing every teeny, tiny detail of Tiger's life.
You can usually catch me on my soapbox, railing about how the media is wasting so much time on such nonsense while there are much more important stories going on. For example, in the past few days, while the media has devoted major resources in tracking down every single one of Tiger's mistresses, the escalation of the Afghanistan War, the health care battle in the Senate, the upcoming climate conference in Copenhagen, and other major stories haven't received the attention they deserve.
Extra Credit: Have you ever purchased a supermarket tabloid?Not for myself. My wife goes through phases where she likes to read them, and I've occasionally picked one up for her and even occasionally flipped through one. One of them (the National Enquirer, I think) has a pretty good crossword puzzle, and almost all of them have some sort of puzzle page. That's about the most that I get out of them.
My wife is partial to supermarket tabloids like the Enquirer, Star Magazine and US Weekly, but my favorite one to flip through while I'm waiting in line is the Weekly World News, which bills itself as "the world's only reliable news." They're great at covering all the major stories that the mainstream media somehow misses, like how Obama met with aliens at the White House to avert a Fourth of July invasion, or how Michael Jackson faked his own death, or that Megan Fox is a man, or that the Earth's rotation has suddenly increased to 66,666 mph -- "the Speed of Satan!"
An aside: When I was younger, I used to know who all the people were in the celebrity tabloids. Now, I don't have a clue who a lot of these people are. They must be reality show stars or something.
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