Paris Hilton just got engaged to Paris. That would be the (man) Paris, for all of you keeping score at home.

TVGuide’s Michael Ausiello said it best:

PARIS SQUARED: This won’t get confusing at all: Paris Hilton is engaged to her boyfriend of five months, Greek shipping heir Paris Latsis. According to reports, Paris popped the question last Wednesday when, um, Paris returned from a three-week House of Wax publicity tour in Europe (among the stops: Paris). Paris and Paris marked the engagement over the weekend by hosting a barbecue for 75 of their friends and families at Paris’ Hollywood Hills home. See, this is gonna be a breeze!

No word on possible future kids names yet. Ooh, I know — how about Paris?

I’m just wondering when the UPN will announce the Paris/Paris reality show chronicling the couple’s relationship. Now that’s chaotic.

Happy Memorial Day to everyone grilling, tanning, frisbee-playing, shopping, and enjoying the beautiful weather this holiday weekend. I have to work, but I did have fun on Saturday.

Please take the time today to take a moment to reflect on the lives of the soldiers that have fought for our country… and ARE fighting for our country as you read this. No matter who sent them there to fight and under what circumstances, they are serving our country and sacrificing for us.

As of today, 1657 American soldiers have died fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. 1838 “coalition” soldiers have died in total. Although the sheer number of soldiers doesn’t seem to get covered much in the media, soldiers are dying at a rate of over two soldiers a day.

There will be plenty of time to debate national and world politics, exit strategies, and even the massive undertaking of caring for the soldiers as they return home from war. But today, let’s reflect on those we have lost fighting for our country in all wars and those putting their lives on the line today.

UPDATE: Make that 1663 American soldiers (6 more were killed today).

Today I accomplished a bunch of small things:

1. Enjoyed a delicious new entree at Applebee’s. (The Teriyaki bowl)
2. Brought out all the lawn furniture for the start of summer 2005.
3. Set up two water features for the backyard.
4. Spliced together wires to extend the stereo speakers in the den.
5. Skipped dessert in my effort to eat healthy.
6. Tried cottage cheese for the first time to mixed results.

Each of these things may sound pretty mundane when taken by themselves, but lumped all together, they made me feel a sense of accomplishment. Just having the time today to do things I wanted to do among many days of working and thinking of things I had to do made me happy.

What did you accomplish today?

In true Star Wars tradition, Episode III: Revenge of the Sith is chock full of “Easter eggs” for the true Star Wars fans among us.

While the group of people that noticed all of these special extras in the film may be limited to only those people that waited for hours/days/weeks on lines to see the 12:01 AM first showing, all are pretty cool for all Star Wars fans.

Now for those who don’t know, Easter eggs are those plastic, colored things with candy on them that kids hunt for and “Easter eggs” are special surprises worked into video games or films that pay reference to past plot lines or that work as special features. Get it?

The Star Wars site has three pages of “Easter eggs” for your perusal. Just make sure you see the movie first!

Don’t leave it to me to try and figure out what Arianna Huffington’s blog-of-a-million-celebrity-voices represents or what respect it is supposed to garner or even why it exists.

However, it is a good way to get a bunch of people blogging that would otherwise have not chosen to share their mishapen, convulted, and sometimes thought-provoking entertaining thoughts. Welcome to blogging all you HuffPost blogging celebrities!

Okay, some of the posts have been interesting — some for their content, others just as a show of some of what’s going on in certain people’s minds.

I used to think groupblog Metafilter (the blog of a million voices) was fascinating in terms of a group blogging dynamic. But maybe HuffPost will relegate Metafilter to being known as “the blog of a million nobodies’ voices.” Not true, but that doesn’t matter, does it? Or maybe Metafilter will continue on as it has for the past years and HuffPost won’t draw anymore attention and quietly fade.

Who knows? For now, let’s just use the always non-reliable, always entertaining Alexa ranking as litmus test for HuffPost: 30,191. I’ll be comparing its ranking over time to see how popular it really does become.

P.S. Check out Bill Maher’s reaction to crazy Congressman Spencer Bachus’ call for his show to be cancelled over Maher’s “low-lying fruit” comment.

UPDATE (5/30): Now it’s up to 27,537.
UPDATE (6/5): A week later and it’s up to 25,242.
UPDATE (6/7): Now its jumping 1,000 spots a day to 23,407.
UPDATE (6/27/2006): What a difference a year makes: 1,276.

Today I went with my dad to visit relatives in Long Beach. It was a long time coming.

And even though we only made it to two relatives’ houses, it was quite an experience.

Running up the stairs on the dune at the end of my old street and seeing the beach and ocean like I used to (relatively speaking) when I was 5 was both interesting and nostalgic. (I took some photos, which I’ll try to post.)

Seeing my aunt in her house (I had only visited once since moving away 18 years ago) was really great. She didn’t even see us sitting on her couch until we yelled “Hello!” to her, which was funny.

Tracking down my 89-year-old grandpa (affectionately known as “The Mayor”) as he transversed the city as part of his daily routine turned out to be a bit tricky. My dad and I were going to follow up on my aunt’s tip about him hanging out with some Pakistani guy at the neighborhood smoke shop where he plays the lottery, but before we could he came strolling down the street.

He seemed surprised to see us sitting in our car outside his house (although his neighbor didn’t). Since he didn’t want to go out to eat, we left and went to the local Hibachi Japanese restaurant (delicious AND entertaining!).

When we got back to my grandpa’s house, it was nice to see he was getting along well (all considering), since my grandma passed away. He’s still exercising and dancing like he always used to and is very organized (financial notebook, calendar, and all!).

He seemed excited about that new celebrity dance reality show coming up on ABC. He even had it marked down on his calendar as a reminder. After hanging out with him for the longest amount of time in a really long time, we left.

(I’ll try to post some photos from the day if I get a chance.)

Some people say I can be a little sarcastic at times. But rest assured, I only use my sarcastic powers for good.

And now, thanks to an Israeli study on the subject, we know that being sarcastic is a sign of a healthy brain:

Scientists say they have located the parts of the brain that comprehend sarcasm - honestly.

By comparing healthy people and those with damage to different parts of the brain, they found the front of the brain was key to understanding sarcasm.

Damage to any of three different areas could render individuals unable to understand sarcastic comments.

That explains why a couple of people I know just don’t understand my sarcasm. They are obviously suffering brain damage! It all makes sense now, doesn’t it?

Someone sarcastic obviously made this cartoony infographic — I mean, using a poorly illustrated cartoon to illustrate sarcasm and brain damage has to be made sarcastically, right?

CBS 2 TV reporter Arthur Chi’en was fired by WCBS Thursday after directing the f-word towards two “Opie & Anthony” hecklers during a live shot.

F-word costs TV guy a job:

For a few moments, as the knuckleheads heckled him and gave the finger to the camera, Chi’en kept his cool and continued talking.

But as soon as he finished his report, he spun around and shouted at the intruders: “What the f— is your problem, man?”

If he thought the WCBS control room had already cut to tape, he was wrong. The expletive went out over the air.

“Sorry about that distraction before,” Chi’en said when he returned.

The apology apparently wasn’t enough for WCBS, especially when the Federal Communications Commission is cracking down on obscenity.

“He’s been terminated,” station spokeswoman Audrey Pass said.

Now that’s seriously f—ed up! Its too bad Chi’en couldn’t keep his cool for a couple more seconds to give them time to cut to tape. Its hard to blame him for reacting, though. Those hecklers were really being obnoxious and were standing right behind him while the guy’s trying to do his job.

And despite the FCC crusade going on these days, was this one mistake really severe enough to cost him his job?

Today I saw Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith and I have to say I was impressed.

Revenge of the Sith was the best of all six Star Wars movies. I think the main reason is that it operated at a faster tempo than any of the other films. Or maybe just because it was rated PG-13. Or maybe it was Anakin getting burned by hot lava.

Anyway, besides a couple of cheesy stunts thrown into the movie to make sure it flowed exactly into the original Star Wars (aka Episode IV), the action, effects, and pacing of the movie was much better than any other Star Wars movie. And it held true to the imagination factor that is the main core of the Star Wars saga.

Not everyone was impressed by Revenge of the Sith, however. Take my blogger friend Chris Diclerico, for example. He spent hours writing a critique of every single thing wrong with the movie.

Revenge of the Sith, a scathing review:

I hated Star Wars Episode 3, Revenge of the Sith with a passion. But I feel like I am the only one. It’s me against most of the world with the exception of a small minority. People keep asking me why I hated it so much, and I am tired of saying the same thing over and over again. So I decided to take a few hours and write it down.

It probably took longer for Chris to write all that than it took for George Lucas to come up with R2D2’s stupid two-way radio.

Could you imagine working eight days in a row?

Scary, right?

Well, after today, I will have done just that. And let me tell you, it is not only physically and mentally draining, but it isn’t a lot of fun either.

All the people and problems encountered on any normal workday start to repeat and build up and you have no means of escape, but the light at the end of the tunnel. (No, not heaven, silly. I mean getting to the ninth day.)

Basically, eight days blend into one hell of a long workday. You’re never really sure what happened on what day, or even what day it is sometimes.

My only recompense is that I get two days off in a row. And then when I go back I only have to work three days before another day off. Now that’s a vacation!