Jason Toney

Apparently Adelphia cable wants us to love ourselves. Intimately. Starting Friday, Adelphia of Southern California (and most of its cable providers around the nation) will make triple X pay-per-view channel Spice Platinum available to its subscribers. This makes them the first major cable operator in the US to offer hardcore action. If you don't live in porn valley like we do maybe you don't know what "triple x hardcore action" is. Well, friends and...

While Hustle & Flow got most of the buzz coming out of Sundance and Love & War were the themes of the two big jury prize winners, we're most excited about Dave LaChappelle's short (now a full length documentary), Krumped. After being featured in videos by Missy Elliott and the Black Eyed Peas last year, we wondered if the local dance movement was going to quickly lose its lustre but, thankfully, that doesn't seem...

Well, morning internet issues and a hangover kept us from taking a gander at the morning papers but can you blame us? It's Hollywood's 118th birthday today and we thought we'd get our celebrating in a little early. Now that we're coming out of the fog, we can check out the few interesting nuggets in the papers today like The Daily News's report on the nine county sheriff's employees that were fired last year...

The Gotham-centric Paper magazine runs a feature in the February 2005 issue that gives their guide of the "hottest restaurants, bars, clubs and shops in the city of angels" and it's actually not half bad. While they seem to be searching for all the things they love in New York in Los Angeles -- they have more than a little obsession with gangsters (of the mob kind not the neighborhood ones with which we're...

Every year, we say we're not going to battle the heat and the crowds and the traffic on the 10 to spend a weekend at the Empire Polo Fields in Indio; and, every year, Coachella puts together a list of acts that we'd kick ourselves if we missed. This year, we'd made a deal with ourselves. We'll only go for one day. We'll drive up and arrive around three or four, catch the cool...

We're having a debate with ourselves this morning. Do we lede with the most important global story or the King of Pop? Since local news seems obsessed with celebrity justice, we'll pretend like we have loftier standards and run with the first Iraqi Democratic Election. Both The Daily News and The Daily Bruin run stories of local expatriate Iraqi voters. The Bruin covers a poli sci student who has never been to his home...

We wish we'd brought our camera. Gili Rashal, owner and tipster of thetipjar.com, held the launch party for the new advice site at trendy Hollywood clothing store, Brunette, last night and we were lucky enough to attend. Mixed among the very pretty folks enjoying deli trays, doughnut sculptures, and free vodka were Sugar Ray's "Extra TV's" Mark McGrath, a very tanned hair salon mogul (and "Blowout" star) Jonathan Antin, and the adorable Marla Sokoloff....

Our own personal top story this morning is that it is raining and it's Friday and we don't want to go to work. But we digress. Instead of starting with continued coverage of the Rail Tragedy, let's look at what the alt-weeklies have for us. The LA Weekly has articles on two of our current faves: Senator Barbara Boxer and HBO's "Unscripted". Los Angeles CityBeat (featuring a newly redesigned website) launches a new column...

LA City Council Member Eric Garcetti is providing a way to give support to the victims of the Metrolink tragedy. He explains: We have had a lot of people in the blogosphere who have asked how to help--we have set up a donation account at PayPal and are working with relief services and the Red Cross to determine the greatest needs. We will have this on the City of Los Angeles web site, but...

LAist is really, well, just flummoxed with yesterday's senseless metrolink tragedy so although there are a few other interesting local stories in the papers today, we're going to focus solely on what The Los Angeles Times is calling the Tragedy on the Rails. Times Coverage: Chain Reaction Kills 11 Survival a Matter of Chance A Troubled Past, A Startling Action Concern Grows Over Rail Suicides Rescuers Work Among Carnage For Victims, A Deadly Last...