A couple end-of-the-week thoughts

I see dollar signs
So, gas prices are at an all-time high (at least until next week, when they hit yet another "all-time high")...at the station down the road regular unleaded is $2.89. That's highway robbery, in my opinion. How is the average family supposed to be able to fill up weekly and still afford things such as groceries, electric bills, etc.?

What really irks me though is an item I saw on "Good Morning America" today - the CEO of Exxon is going to receive a retirement package worth close to $300 million. The report was part of a regular GMA series called "Are you kidding me?" I'd say it's more like: Are you fucking kidding me? What the hell has this guy done, other than continually raise gas prices, to earn such an obnoxious retirement package?

We pay more for gas every week and where does the money go? Right into his pockets, apparently.

And he's not the only one. There was an article in the USA Today this week about the highest-paid CEO's and executives. The amounts were, in a word, ludicrous. Salaries capping out at the $20 million mark. Add in the benefit packages and stock options and these guys (and yes, they were ALL men) were bringing home between $10 million and $200 million last year.

I ask - what have they done to deserve it? They can't be that smart or that talented or that valuable to be able to justify money like that.

I don't know...maybe I'm just bitter. I have two college degrees and I make $2000 a semester teaching. That's a far cry from $20 million a year.

But really, I think it's the greed of it all. Greed is not good, and yet with salaries like those you just have to know that greed is a factor. One guy actually had a severance package worth $65 million. Again, are you f***ing kidding me?

Celebrity Religion?
One any given day, I am not prone to jump to the defense of celebrities. I think most movie and TV stars are spoiled, petulant children who make too much money for doing too little. And for the most part, I consider everyone's favorite couch-jumping celeb (the Tom half of TomKat) to be, well, a bit bonkers. [Although I'm sure some of us have jumped up and down on a couch declaring our love for someone -- we just didn't do it on Oprah].

But I have to put in my two cents worth on the whole TomKat-TomKitten-Scientology thing. [After all, the future Mrs. Cruise is a hometown girl].

Here's the thing - yes, Katie Holmes was raised Catholic and attended an all-girl's Catholic high school. And yes, now she's apparently a practicing Scientologist. My question is this: WHO CARES AND IS IT REALLY THAT IMPORTANT TO REPORT ABOUT ON A DAILY BASIS?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but we DO have religious freedom in this country and if someone (even a former Catholic schoolgirl) wants to ditch one religion and start practicing another, is it really anyone's business? Yeah, OK...so no one really knows if Scientology is really a religion, but she is still free to choose. And if she and her couch-jumping fiance want to participate in a so-called "silent birth", who cares?

I have grown tired of the constant media speculation about what is really going to happen at the Holmes/Cruise birth. Having a baby is a very personal, private thing between the mother and father of the baby (yes, even if the parents are celebrities). Having said that, if they want to do it silently or loudly or at home or at the Scientology center -- it really is no one's business.

[As I type this, I cannot believe I am defending the weirdness that is celebrity].

I guess what really irks me about the whole thing is this - no matter how famous someone is, they still deserve some privacy when it comes to private matters (such as having a baby). Just because someone projects a public image, there are some things - certain aspects of their PRIVATE lives - that should remain PRIVATE. I don't care if they announce their relationship at a press conference or get engaged at the top of the Eiffel Tower and then announce that a press conference. Celebrities still deserve some privacy. So let's give it to them. And give the rest of us a break from the constant and never-ending media circus that is TomKat.