Tomfoolery in the Garden State

Last week, the FBI stormed New Jersey (including my own block) to arrest 44 in an elaborate cross-state corruption scheme. Among the detained were five rabbis, three assemblymen, two mayors, and a partridge in the pear tree. In fact, there were so many people arrested that they had to use an old school bus -- the only vehicle large enough to hold them all.

The details are a little sketchy -- something about money-laundering rabbis and a black-market kidney -- but the pattern is familiar enough. The feds nabbed some smooth-talking alleged swindler, in this case a failed real-estate mogul named Solomon Dwek, who then curried favor with prosecutors by agreeing to wear a wire and fish around with cash-stuffed envelopes. Before long, he had hooked a whole school of greedy politicians.

One of these fish is the mayor of my very own town -- Peter Cammarano. The 32-year-old leader who’s held office for 23 days (seriously) has already been caught on a federal wire tap telling a cooperating witness, who was about to hand him $5,000 in cash, he would be “treated like a friend” when his projects came up for approval. This morally-flexible, Tony-Soprano-wannabe risked his reputation, career, and freedom for $5,000!

The list of lowlifes included Italians, Jews and Irish; Hispanics, blacks and whites. Democrats and (one) Republicans. Men and women. People aged 33 to 87. The ironic part? None of those charged has been fingered by the feds as being a member of the Mafia. That’s progress, right?

I laugh along with my fellow Hoboken-residents, in the same way we laugh about our landfills, our pollution and the New Jersey Nets. But it’s only funny until you realize that, as a taxpayer, I’m the rube footing the enormous bill. God bless America and words like tomfoolery.

For Mad P

Dear Madison,

Here are the zoo pictures I promised! I wish you lived closer because you would have loved it there.



Thank you for the Cheerios video you made me. I think about you everyday! I miss you.

Love,

Aunt Leslie

The Bold and the Diapered

This past week, we shot two new Cheerios commercials. It was my first experience with kids on set and it was every bit the adventure I anticipated:

- For one ad, we cast a real family (mom + 2 kids) so they would look authentic and have what the casting director called “chemistry.” In the spot, all three are supposed to be on the living room floor playing with blocks. The baby was being a bit unruly though. So, in front of a production crew (that numbered at least 50) and a rolling camera, she swooped the baby up, pulled up her shirt and began breastfeeding. Yikes.

- These babies have serious entourages. There was the nanny, the nurse, and the state-appointed baby handler. Somebody was slacking on the job however, because they didn’t keep one kid from face-planting in the driveway, one from being fed soda in his bottle, and another from hitting his baby brother for an hour with a balloon.

- All day, we watched the 4-year-old (Jack) shovel handful after handful of Cheerios into his mouth. Take after take you could see him getting greener and greener. I was certain that we were going to have a Cheerios fountain at any second. He was a trooper though and kept the cereal down and the set clean. I bet that kid doesn’t eat Cheerios for weeks.

- In addition to having an iron stomach, Jack was quite the star. He had two lines to deliver and he was determined to give editorial plenty of range to work with. He screamed his lines. He squealed his lines. He even went a straight 15 minutes singing his lines. Afterward, he walked off set, slipped on his robe and over-sized sunglasses and went to his trailer to watch Go Diego Go.

A Beardy, Weirdy Time in Coney Island

July 4th came and went. Here's how I spent mine:

Nathan’s Famous July Fourth Hot Dog Eating Contest. Kobayashi vs. Chestnut. There were jugglers and trampoline champions and this guy who raps about competitive eating. I was in freak show heaven.


The swearing in of the judges. This is serious competition.


Chestnut won the Mustard Yellow Belt and set an all-time record with 68 hot dogs! The Daily News estimated that 40,000 people turned out to watch this craziness.


Afterward, we rode the Cyclone, drank some beer, and of course ate a hotdog (or two).






We skipped the headless woman, but Pete fell for the world's largest rat. He could have saved 50 cents and just hung out in my kitchen for a couple of hours.




Sufficiently sunburned and back in Hoboken, we watched the NYC fireworks in the park across from my apartment.




To wrap up the long weekend, Pete took me shark fishing.


Can't it be summer all year long?