Diamonds, Engagement Rings & Diamond Jewelry in popular culture

Oh, the roller coaster year it has been for Serena Williams.  Things were moving along smoothly for her until her massive meltdown at the US Open.  Then her ranking—after losing the matching to Kim Clijsters—went down, along with her stock in general.  Tennis is one of those games that are played in relative silence, with only the ‘oomphs’ and ‘ahhhs’ from the players heard, along with the sound of racquet strings hitting ball, back and forth, back and forth, back and forth.  But after a questionable line call by a diminutive judge, our Serena went completely berserk and threatened to jam the ball down the judge’s throat. 

You Don't Want to Get On Her Bad Side, And They're Almost ALL Visible Now.

That’s a big no-no in a game during which you can hear the sound of a players feet shuffling on grass, or the sneeze of an allergic fan.  And when a muscle-bound Serena Williams is bearing down on you with fury in her eyes, you don’t have to be a small person to want to get well out of her path.  In retrospect, she told Good Morning America, she would like to apologize and give the judge “a big ol’ hug”.  It doesn’t take a sports expert or a Rhodes Scholar to know that the judge will pass on that, thanks.  She probably wants to keep as much distance as she can between herself and Serena’s considerable cakes.

Then, just yesterday, Serena regained her #1 ranking in the world by winning the Australian Open, Wimbledon, and then defeating Ekaterina Makarova at the China Open.  The tennis world—and the sports world in general—were more than ready to put her outburst behind them.  The normally-composed tennis star and fashion ground-breaker was sorry, she knew she lost control.  Okay, let’s move on, right?

And then she decided to pose for ESPN Magazine.  That’s what sports stars do.  But in this particular issue, athletes from a variety of sports have posed either naked or nearly-naked.  Serena, who posed for one of four covers that have already circulated the globe via the internet, is entirely in the buff, save for a barely-visible ring encrusted with diamonds.  All of her goodies are covered and there is not even a hint of naughty bits, but the International Tennis Federation is seizing this opportunity to bring up the US Open tirade again.  They say she might be banned from competing in the Australian Open in 2010 and could have more than $500,000 in prize money taken back.

Would they have brought up her outburst again if she posed in her trademark revealing tennis outfits?  What if she was wearing long underwear and body armor?  Where does the ITF draw its line?

So far, there has been no word from any other sports about penalizing athletes for showing their goods for ESPN Magazine.  It is the magazine’s first-ever ‘body issue”, in which athletic bodies are shown as beautiful and not odd or unattractive.  It’s the possibility of another ground-breaking moment for Serena Williams, who is as far from the ‘visible-sternum-and-hipbone’ beauty ideal as a woman can get.  She is muscular.  Like really, really muscular, and has a tush that follows a few feet behind her. 

Major League Baseball is being represented by Nelson Cruz, Joba Chamberlain, and Ivan Rodriguez.  Seriously.  Pudge Rodriguez’s giant rear is posing nearly-naked and we’re obsessing about Serena.  The NBA’s Dwight Howard, Mixed Martial Artist Gina Carano, and surfing’s Laird Hamilton will be among the 40 or so athletes to bare almost-all.  Some ladies from the LPGA are also posing, but there’s no word yet on whether or not anyone will look.  They’ll be in the same “Who Really Cares?” section as poker players. 

Come ON, ESPN.  SPORTS.  Not ‘guys in a smoky room not talking to each other for hours on end’.  Besides, it’s gambling.  I thought those two things were supposed to be kept separate.

But hey, let’s make a really big deal out of a muscular, fit, strong woman posing in her birthday suit instead.  It makes for much better press.

As for the huge diamond engagement ring Kim Zolciak and her wig started sporting at her 75^th birthday party, it turns out that it may or may not have been an engagement ring that may or may not have come from “Big Poppa” Lee Najjir.  Since Poppa is already married to someone else, it seems illogical—although not improbable in Real-Housewives-Land—that he would have proposed.  It is more likely that he bought her a big rock to keep her on ice even as he was filming an episode of MTV Teen Cribs. 

Which One Is The Drag Queen?

There was an hysterical episode in which Kim laments her lack of fortune without Poppa in her life, wondering how she would afford to keep herself and her kids in Prada without financial support.  So she thought about getting a job.  When the reality of her skill set hit her and she just couldn’t imagine herself asking NeNe if she’d like fries with that, she reconciled with Big Poppa.  Or not.  She is as vague on the answer as she is on the truth in general. 

In her defense, she did work on getting her singing career off the ground.  She met with mega-producer Dallas Austin, who recommended that she get some voice lessons under her belt before they began recording the song ‘Tightrope’.   Austin also nearly wet his pants laughing when he heard her attempts at singing, which ranged from ‘Cow in Pain’ to “Noises Only Dogs Can Hear’. 

Other Housewife Kandi Burruss, who actually has connections in the music industry, recommended that Kim change from country to pop, and, with lyrics written by Burruss—and an enormous amount of assistance from Auto-Tune—the duo squeaked out a single.  “Tardy to the Party” is the deformed love-child that was born of the unholy union that is Kim Zolciak and Music in General.  Her voice is barely heard on the track, because Burruss—a veteran of the music game—knew enough to distort it beyond recognition. 

The song, regardless of its level of suckitude, is one of the top 10 downloaded tracks on iTunes.  This is probably more a result of the curiosity of Real Housewives fans than of actual interest in the track.  Besides, who of us does not rubberneck when passing a gruesome accident?

So whether Kim is engaged to her married boyfriend or not, she still has that big diamond ring on her finger.  And, with the success of the ear-splitting, dry-heave-inducing “Tardy to the Party”, Kim will be able to keep herself in acrylic nails and blonde wigs for years.

In case you feel like cutting, listen to this instead.  The psychological damage is far worse than any razor scar.  Please note that while Dallas Austin is pictured in the video, Kim said he was “over” working with him long before that.  She cut out his uncontrollable laughter at her vocal stylings.  Enjoy.  I dare you.  

“Tardy for the Party”, in all its glory.

Cambridge, Massachusetts – Harvard University handed out this year’s Ig Nobel Prizes on Thursday night, and actual Nobel Laureates turned out for the event.  Not to be confused with the actual Nobel Prizes—scheduled to be awarded next week in Stockholm—these are awards for inventions that are supposed to make us laugh first and think later.  They are “dubious achievement” awards, but the researchers who work tirelessly for their prizes take them very seriously.  Or as seriously as they can.

Almost as Dignified as The Nobel Prize, But Not Quite.

This year’s Ig Nobel Prize for Chemistry went to Javier Morales, Miguel Apatiga, and Victor M. Castano from the Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, for generating diamonds from tequila.  Mexico, as we all know, is a major supplier of tequila, creating hundreds of millions of gallons each year, and supplying the US with about $500 million worth.  Team leader Apatiga evidently thought there might be a better use for it than getting frat boys drunk and causing innumerable unplanned pregnancies.  By applying heat to the tequila, the liquid turns to a gas.  Those gas molecules are broken into tiny pieces, then heated even further, to about 800 degrees Celsius.  This creates carbon atoms.

And what does carbon turn into when tremendous heat and pressure are applied?  Diamonds.

The best part is that even the cheapest, most vile-tasting, dry-heave-inducing brands of tequila can be made into the world’s most coveted gem.  Well, it can be made into little bits of the world’s most coveted gem, and has applications in computer chips and medical instruments.

Dubious achievement, but an achievement indeed.

The Ig Nobel Public Health Prize went to Dr. (that’s right: DOCTOR) Elena Bodnar, who designed a bra that can be converted into 2 gas masks: one for you, and one for your date. 

The Physics Award went to Katherine Whitcome, Daniel Lieberman, and Liza Shapiro for using science to determine why pregnant women don’t tip over.

The Ig Nobel Prize for Medicine went to Donald Unger, who spent 60 years cracking the knuckles on his left hand to see if, as our mothers warned us, doing so contributes to arthritis.

For Veterinary Medicine, the prize was given to Catherine Douglas and Peter Rowlinson, who proved that cows with names produce more milk than their anonymous counterparts.

And the Ig Nobel Prize for Peace was awarded to meticulous researchers Stephan A. Bolliger MD, Senior Forensic Pathologist; Steffen Ross MD, Radiologist; Lars Oesterhelweg MD, Forensic Pathologist; Michael J. Thali MD, Professor, Director, Forensic Pathologist; and Beat P. Kneubuehl PhD, Physicist.  Through careful calculation, they determined whether it is safer to be struck on the head with a full beer bottle or an empty beer bottle.  Their 14-page report, chock full of mathematical equations and empirical experience, can be found in the Journal of Forensic and Legal Medicine.  For real.

According to the organizers of the Ig Nobel Awards, “Our goal is to make people laugh, then make them think. We also hope to spur people’s curiosity, and to raise the question: How do you decide what’s important and what’s not, and what’s real and what’s not — in science and everywhere else?”

These are not idiots with tons of free time on their hands.  These are scientists and doctors and freak geniuses who know how to convince universities to give out grant money.  These are the people we should be looking to for answers.    After all, is it not important to know exactly how much panda excrement is required to create the bacteria that can reduce our kitchen waste by up to 90%?

I have seen the future, and it is full of $100 trillion Zimbabwe bank notes and glass from shattered Budweiser bottles.

Ted Williams, baseball Hall-of-Famer, Boston Red Sox legend,  and one of the greatest hitters ever to touch a bat, must be paying off some kind of major karmic debt.  Called the “Splendid Splinter” because of his tall but slight build, he was known for being, well, not particularly friendly.  He didn’t acknowledge the fans when they cheered for him, he was hostile to the press, and he was a little too fond of himself for most people’s liking.  Because of his status as a professional athlete, he was able to find not one—but three—women to marry him, offering engagement rings over the years to the daughter of his hunting guide, a socialite model, and a former pageant queen/model–all between 1944 and 1968.  He finally settled down with Louise Kaufman for 20 years until she died in 1993.  Immediately after, the vultures that were Ted’s sons got a lawyer involved to get their half-interest in the condo that they claimed he gave her.

When Ted died in 2002, his will stipulated that he wanted to be cremated and have his ashes sprinkled at sea, ‘where the water is deep’.  He had always been an avid fisherman, so this made sense.  What did not make sense was the actions of his son, John-Henry, who had, over the years, taken over more and more of his father’s affairs—whether his father knew or not.  Citing a legal agreement between his father, his sister Claudia, and himself, John-Henry insisted that Ted’s body be put in cryostasis, so that they might be together again someday.

One Should Not Have to Say: "Please Don't Decapitate Me After I Die".

This ‘legally binding agreement’ was written on an ink-stained napkin and signed by all three parties.  The only thing that didn’t quite add up was that Ted always signed legal documents with his full name: Theodore.  This was on a napkin, the scrawled “Ted Williams”  looking more like an autograph a kid might get after wiping the mustard off of his face with the other side.  And then, of course, there was the issue of the will, which specifically said nothing about cryostasis.  Ted wanted fire, not ice.

But John-Henry was adamant, and somehow got his wish.  Alcor Life Extension Foundation in Scottsdale, Arizona, was the chosen cryostatic preservation site.  In a book written by whistle-blower Larry Johnson, it is revealed that Alcor did not offer the promised dignity that anyplace suspending bodies in liquid nitrogen should.  Johnson, who was the Chief Operating Officer of Alcor until 2003, stole internal records and took photographs he describes as “gruesome” before going into hiding to write his book. 

Evidently, a visit to Alcor wasn’t like the charming Cryo Prison in the 1993 movie “Demolition Man”, where Wesley Snipes and Sylvester Stallone were suspended and frozen in transparent pods organized in a sterile environment.  In 2003, Buzz Hamon, a longtime friend of Williams’, snuck into Alcor with the help of a mortician friend, where he saw the 50-or-so steel tanks in which the bodies were frozen.  Strewn around the room were cardboard boxes and trash. 

And one more thing: Ted Williams’ head, despite the instructions of John-Henry, was removed from his body.  In an effort to keep it from sticking to the base on which it was held, it was balanced on a tuna can leftover from feeding a cat that lived nearby.  When it got stuck, a macabre batting practice took place, in which one Alcor employee allegedly swung a monkey wrench at the can, hoping to break it free.  When he missed, the head—frozen at -321 degrees Fahrenheit—sent off several not-so-splendid splinters.  Things frozen at that temperature do have a tendency to crack.  According to Johnson, it took a second swing to get the Bumblebee tuna can free. 

John-Henry died of Leukemia in 2004 after a long court battle with half-sister Bobby-Jo, who had wanted to follow her father’s will all along. 

Now this book is coming out five years later, and one has to wonder where the slugger’s body is, and in how many pieces.  Has Bobby-Jo already liberated her father’s body from its cryo-prison and cremated him as his will indicated, or does he hang, suspended still, separated from his now-damaged head? 

Alcor, naturally, plans to take action against their former COO and his book. 

The man whose only wish was to be called “The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived” may or may not still be frozen in a place that may or may not be totally unsuitable, even for cryogenics.  What began as a crackpot scheme between John-Henry and his sister Claudia has turned into a Stephen King novel. 

Even the notoriously mean-as-a-snake Ted Williams deserves better.  Hopefully, Bobby Jo has already seen that her father got a decent burial at sea, as requested. 

I, for one, will never eat a frozen dinner again.