MIDWEEK MADNESS

We missed Tuesday night's bloggers meeting, and thank God. John Stone @ Curbstone Critic apparently alerted the group to Tom Cruise and his placenta-loving ways -- this during the dining portion of the bloggers confab:

Cruise told GQ magazine: "I'm gonna eat the placenta. I thought that would be good. Very nutritious. I'm gonna eat the cord and the placenta right there."

Sounds like complete and utter crap -- or perhaps it's just Cruise having a flashback to the late 1970s, when John Belushi was still alive and the kids at "Saturday Night Live" thought they could slip this skit past the censors:

Laraine: By the way, are you planning to eat the placenta?

Gilda: You're kidding! You mean the afterbirth?

Laraine: That's right. Many mammals eat their own placenta. It's nutritious, it's 100 percent natural, and now that you're going to have a family, you've got to watch your food budget more than ever. And there's no cheaper meat than placenta.

Gilda: But is there enough placenta to make a complete meal for my husband and myself?

Laraine: Not if your husband has a hearty appetite like mine. And that's why you need Placenta Helper.

Gilda: Placenta Helper?

Laraine: That's right. Placenta Helper lets you stretch your placenta into a tasty casserole. [Holds up a box of Placenta Helper.] Like Placenta Romanoff--a zesty blend of cheeses makes for the zingy sauce that Russian czars commanded at palace feasts. Or Placenta Oriental. An exotic mixture of oriental vegetables and exotic herbs and spices creates an exotic meal. Look, you can have placenta only once every nine months. Why not make a rare occasion, a rare occasion?

[CUT TO: Gilda's kitchen. John Belushi, as her husband, has just finished his placenta casserole.]

John: Ummm. That was great. Let's have Placenta Helper every night.

Gilda: Oh, honey!

Better bet for this day: A little light reading, courtesy of Vanity Fair. Carl Bernstein uncorks a winner with his call for Senate hearings on the illegalities within the Bush Administration.

And don't forget Dominick Dunne, the delicious name dropper.