A Twofer

• Bobby Cutts Jr: I'll be damned, I'm shocked. If you don't know, this guy is the former cop in Ohio who was recently convicted of murdering his lover/girlfriend and their unborn child, which she had been set to deliver within days of her death. Cutts appeared to act out some crying-like histrionics on the witness stand during his defense. Definitely not an Oscar-worthy performance. More like Razzies-worthy. He repeated that performance with a smidgen more sincerity during the sentencing phase of the trial earlier this week, begging the jury to spare his life. And they did it. He'll be eligible for parole when he's 80-something. If I was a gambling man, I'd have sworn they were gonna juice him up or send him to the deep fryer. The man killed a late-term-pregnant woman and her viable baby, and they didn't even give him life without parole? Hmmmm. I know some of you don't like it when I talk death penalty, but if ever there was a textbook case for it, this is it. While I don't like capital punishment 'cause of how it is applied in this country - often to innocent people, as proven most recently in Illinois in the 1990s, and often with uneven standards for criminals of different ethnic backgrounds - I am all for the concept. Some crimes are just that bad. Still, this is our system. So Cutts was done justice. I just hope they give him a 7-foot tall 400-pound cellmate whose nickname is Sausage Grinder, or something like that.
• Everybody's down with the swirl: As some of you may also know, I live the Neapolitan life. I am ebony. Mrs. B is ivory. We just don't sing together. Anyway, I went to get a coffee before I really got into my work this morning, and an elderly woman complimented me on just how pretty I am. Those weren't her words. I'm enhancing. I think she said she liked my hat and sweater (which I'm wearing 'cause it was cold in Miami this morning). Anyway, we chatted briefly, and she told me I was a nice young man. She concluded her portion of the conversation by saying she should hook me up with her granddaughter and that she'd be proud to welcome a man of color into the family. Um, OK. Of course I told her I was flattered, but I was married. But this was the third time in like a week this has happened. It happened to Mrs. B and me at Costco. We were looking for a bottle of wine, and the wine lady came over and recommended a bottle. Mrs. B managed to escape to the next aisle. But before I could walk away, the wine lady and I were discussing menopause, and how it used to keep her up at night, and how the meds she took awakened her and helped her realize that she needed to be single again, 'cause miserable marriage is for the birds, and how I'm a reporter, and how I love my job and my bosses are the best ever. What? They're not reading this. And then she asked about Mrs B. "Your girlfriend?" "No, my wife." "Well, I'm going to tell my brother-in-law about you. He's a tall, handsome (or pretty; you can use pretty if you want to) man of color too! I'd marry him, but he's unavailable!" Then there was the woman bagging our groceries the other day. She insisted on walking out to the car with us. She asked Mr. B "your boyfriend?" Mrs. B answered "No, my husband." Grocery lady: "Well, that's perfectly alright. I don't see what the big deal is about black, white....." OK, so what is going on? Who's making a big deal about it? Not us. And why are all these folk feeling the need to tell us it's OK? I know it's OK. We're living in perfect harmony...side by side on my piano keyboard.