Maybe I wear too much black. Maybe I sketch too many skulls or obsess over E.A. Poe and Morrissey. Or maybe I'm just in a spiritual cul-de-sac right now, looking for double chocolate relevance in a vanilla circumstance.

One of the most Magical encounters a Cast Member can have is with a child from the Make A Wish Foundation. Disney does a lot of work with the Foundation to provide final wishes for kids with terminal diseases. Not surprisingly, these wishes often include meeting a favorite Disney character, and Disney goes all out to accommodate them, rushing them to the front of the lines, giving them full VIP status. Mickey and Minnie are favorites, as are Pooh and Tigger, but all the characters give extra time and energy to the "Wish kids."

After being kicked out of Indonesia, Lou Perelman is back in the States to face bank fraud charges. You remember him, don't you, the guy who created Backstreet Boys and N'Sync?

I would have happily died never knowing that name, if it weren't for my roommate, who wants to be Lou Perelman.

Click on the photo of Brooke Nipar to see some of Chenman's Hidden Mickey pics...

A friend of a friend figured out a way to detach from his harness in the middle of the ride. This photo was shot right before the big drop. Big surprise: even though Disney budget cuts have eliminated most of the photo screener positions, this one still ot caught. For full story, go to http://gostbrand.com/blog/?p=2100

I've been feeling really sick the last couple of days - congestion, nausea, burning fevers at night. It's rare that I get sick, so I'm always a little bit in denial when it happens. "It's probably just allergies," is my stock blow-off response. After a sleepless night of the sweats, however, I finally decided I had to do something.

I found this site today where anonymous posters comment on how much they hate their boss, coworkers, etc. Some of the posts are pop-interesting from a voyeuristic point of view ("I'm sleeping with the manager.....and he's engaged...") but most of them don't make any sense to me. Conference calls, corporate branding, office frustration . . . What is this world?