I am so sick and tired of hearing about Jesse James trying to apologize and make up excuses for why he decided to cheat on Sandra Bullock, America’s favorite sweetheart. It’s bad enough that he cheated on Sandy with multiple women, but the fact that he’s going to the media (i.e People Magazine, Nightline) and explaining what prompted him to cheat (apparently his Dad was abusive to him as a child) just proves that he needs to grow a pair and be held solely responsible for his actions.

During his Nightline interview, James explained that one of the main reasons he cheated on Sandy was because as a child, his father was emotionally and physically abusive to him, going as far as breaking his arm and beating him. Although I do think abuse is an extremely touchy subject and it would be stupid to make up stories about abuse, I don’t even know what to believe anymore. Here, the fault lies in not only James but also Nightline. By granting him an interview and allowing him to share his side of the story, the public is encouraged to sympathize with him and maybe even give him a free pass for his infidelities. It’s a win-win situation for both sides: Nightline gets the viewership and publicity of the interview and James gets more coverage and money in return.

Abuse or not, what people need to understand is that Jesse James initially made a vow to Sandra Bullock during their marriage and he was the one who chose to sleep with Bombshell McGee (the tattooed up adultress who, in desire for her 15 minutes of fame, blabbed her big mouth to the world). At the end of the day, by excusing his “transgressions” (ha!) to his father’s abuse, James is the coward copping out and not stepping up to his own responsibilities.

The same can be said for Lindsay Lohan, the actress we all love to hate. Lohan, who once used to be one of Hollywood’s most sought out actresses, is now a hot tranny mess who is shamefully wearing her SCRAM ankle bracelet. Many people blame her parents for her derailment, but honestly, she’s the one snorting all the coke and downing Vodka like it’s water. Lohan should really be taking advice from Drew Barrymore, who, after her stints in rehab and failed marriages, is now Hollywood’s Golden Girl.

Sucky parents or not, celebrities in the likes of James and Lohan need to realize that for all that they’re given in the world – a life of fame, luxury and money – they need to step up and seriously take some personal responsbilities to their action. I absolutely do not feel sorry for James and hope that he locks him and his junk away from the rest of the world and becomes eternally miserable for cheating on Miss Congeniality.

Suck it Jesse.

When evaluating the main driving forces of our decisions, the power of guilt seems to be a leader in the race. On a day-to-day basis, we are forced to do things out of guilt.  If our actions could hurt someone else, we opt out of doing things we may personally want just to avoid the guilt.  And of course, we are often left to feel guilty for an infinite amount of time over our regrettable actions.

In this theory, however, it is hard to determine if this “we” means “we as people” or “we as women.”  A recent study by psychological researchers in Spain indicates that women in fact, do feel more guilt than men.  Beyond the conclusion that men are from Mars and that women are from Venus, the study has proven that we are actually genetically different when it comes to this emotion.  Neuroscientist Simon Baron-Cohen writes: “The female brain is predominately hard-wired for empathy. The male brain is predominately hard-wired for understanding and building systems.”  (And yes, before you go Googling, he is related to Borat, they are cousins.  So much for credibility…)

A report of the study by MSNBC describes how this proof can be used to support claims that “men should be more like women.”  When it comes to love, life, emotion, and now guilt, it is easy to blame men for all of the downfalls.  Perhaps, convincing ourselves that men are emotionless is the only tactic that lets us keep our sanity.  If only they were in touch with their feelings, if only we could “fix” them, if only.  Then all of our problems would be solved.

Finally: science to validate our coffee talk.

As rewarding as it may be, I have to stop and wonder, doesn’t the study prove the exact opposite? If men do feel less guilt than women, instead of “fixing” them, shouldn’t we be more like them? Wouldn’t we all be happier if guilt wasn’t the flavor of the infamous chip on our shoulder?

Undoubtedly, there are times when we should feel guilt.  If you sleep with your sister’s boyfriend, yes, you should feel guilty.  When mistakes are made, it is such guilt that prevents us from making them again.  The MSNBC article proposes that if men were to feel more guilt, there would be fewer instances of “Tiger Woods” and “John Edwards” situations.  I would have to disagree because of the simple fact that this study, along with any human behavior study, is a generalization.  There will always be exceptions.  Women as a whole succumb to guilt, yes, but there are many women whose sinful actions reflect no guilt.  There are still sociopathic women who feel no remorse for murder, to note an extreme example.  Even if we were able to “fix” men so that they generally felt as much guilt as women, the Tigers of the world would still exist.

On a completely separate tangent, if men were to reflect, analyze, and regret their actions to the extent that we do, could you imagine how much more coffee talk we’d all have to take part in??

So before you bask in the glory that someone has proven that we need to “fix” men, pour another cup, consider how much happier you’d be if you were to take on the carefree lifestyle of your male counterpart, and sip on that ladies.

(P.S. if the caffeine overdose causes you to spill on the couch…try not to feel too guilty.  Unless it is your Jewish mother’s couch, you stand no chance.)

The iPad is out!

And so are the jokes.

Gold medal beauty tips from an Olympian.

So that’s why K-Fed got fat.

Taylor Momsen’s heading to Lohan-ville, fast.

Do men understand guilt?

"I swear, I wasn't cheating on you."

Need some advice? Ask nicely and I’ll hook you up. Email me at tuffyluv@collegecandy.com and I’ll get back to you on the fly.

Dear Tuffy Luv,

Please respond! I’m in a rough spot.

Also, this is a very long story.

My boyfriend and I have been dating for 2 1/2 years. We love each other very much and he is my best friend, but we have had a lot of trust issues. It all started close to a year into our relationship. I went over to his apartment one evening to hang out and he was watching football so I sat down at his computer to entertain myself with the internet. I wasn’t snooping but something in an open AIM window caught my eye. The last line of the conversation read “Wait don’t you have a girlfriend?” So being curious I read the rest of the convo. To sum the whole thing up, this chick (who he had been trying to set his good friend up with) was flirting with him and he said ” If I were to go there, or you were to come here, we would hook up. Don’t pretend like it wouldn’t happen.” And she pretty much agreed.

So after reading this I confronted him. He said that in the process of trying to hook his friend up with her, the girl developed feelings for my boyfriend and he just didn’t want to hurt her feelings. I told him  that he needed to be honest with her and tell her that he has a girlfriend and nothing was going to happen between them. I made him show me the AIM conversation in which he said this to her.

Understandably, after this incident I became intensely paranoid. So, I stole his Myspace password. Not only his Myspace password but Facebook, Yahoo, and Gmail. I know that that’s really horrible but I didn’t know what else to do because I really didn’t want to break up with him but I didn’t feel I could trust him. Everything had been fine until twice in the past month or two the girl that originally set this whole thing into motion has sent naked pictures to his Gmail.

I’m pretty much fed up with this stuff but I don’t know where to go from here. I don’t know how to confront him about all of this. I feel just as guilty as him because of my dishonesty with stealing his PWs. Even though I know it might be the right thing to do, I don’t want to break up with him. I have invested so much in this relationship. He really is my best friend.  But trust is a key component in a relationship and I think ours has been so badly damaged it can’t ever be repaired. How do I admit to my dishonesty and is there any way to repair this? Please help.

Thanks,
Lost

Dear Lost,

Dump his lying a** and get yourself someone who doesn’t completely suck.

Look, there’s no way to fix this. He’s being completely dishonest with you, and, as you know, you’re being dishonest with him. I really doubt there’s any way back from this.

And why would you want to stay in a relationship with someone like this guy? You say you guys are best friends, but this is not a friend, honey. This is a man who flirts with other women online and accepts nude photos. If he’s doing it online, he’s doing it in person. If he hasn’t cheated on you yet (which, to be honest, I’m pretty sure he has), he’ll be doing as soon as he gets up the nerve.

You were definitely wrong to get his passwords and to look at his private information. This is not the way to have a relationship and I recommend you don’t do it in your next one.

But he was DEFINITELY wrong to carry on online relationships with these women. And he’s made no effort to stop, either! That’s the part that really grinds Tuffy’s gears. He makes up really lame excuses and then keeps right on.

Dump him, girl. He is not worth your time. This is not an investment. This is a dud.

Hearts & Skulls,
Tuffy Luv

Love in the Novel

Nabokov

Intro to Buddhist Thought

These are the kind of classes my parents put up with throughout my college career, with nary an Econ class to be found among the lot.

Many students feel a lot of pressure, however, to take classes that will turn around into the best profit. They know their parents are dropping some major Benjamins to keep them in a good school, and they want to return the favor by, at the very least, not making their parents go gray worrying that their children will be living in a box on the street. So they take Econ and finance classes. They try to become good little doctors and lawyers and I-bankers.

But most of the people I know taking that path aren’t particularly happy doing it.

Sometimes I begin to feel that creeping Slacker Guilt. You know, the worry that I’m only taking lightweight courses that won’t lead to a career. That I’m squandering my parents’ money, happily off dancing through English and artsy-fartsy classes. I begin to feel like maybe I should just put my head down and grind through a few teeth-gritting courses like Decision-Making in Finance, just so I won’t feel like I’ve got my head in the clouds all the time. I see other english majors being struck with Slacker guilt, too. Creative writers taking on extra-burdensome course loads and classes that have bad professors and uninspired reading lists, just because they think they should.

It just doesn’t….fit.

I know that it makes sense to take these “practical” courses, but that doesn’t mean it’s right. College is about exploring new things and learning the things you want to learn. Sure, it is also about working towards a career, but if you don’t like what you are studing in Econ 101, you are not going to like working for a large finance firm for the next 60 years (or until it goes under). Especially if you only did it to appease the parentals.

I’m proposing a bold new interpretation of the keep-the-parents-happy rule. Above all, your parents want you to be happy. Honestly, it seems to me that life’s too short to waste twenty or more years of it on a career path that makes you groan inside. There is a better life out there, doing something you feel passionate and excited about. Even if it means making a few less bucks, I say go for it.

At the very least, spend your college years being excited by your classes. You can do the more practical stuff later. Med schools like admitting English majors, honestly, because they’re well-versed in the world and they know how to write, which is an invaluable skill in just about any profession. So take a little joy in your education, and worry about paying the bills just a little bit later.

You’ll need:

a large skillet

10 oz. Turkey sausage

1 whole Green or Yellow Pepper

1 can STEWED tomatoes (make sure they’re stewed ladies!)

2 cups uncooked instant brown rice (instant is a must, any other kind will result in al dente Jambalaya. Yuck.)

8 chicken tenders, uncooked.

1 bunch fresh green onions.Chop up your pepper(s, if you love the spice). I only use one–because I’m still trying to teach myself to eat all my veggies– and prefer yellow because of the color it adds to the dish.

Slice the roots and tops off of your onions, then cut (the smaller the better). *Tip after slicing your green onions, wash your knife & hands, then rub your fingertips on the flat side of the knife (obv.) Tada! your digits won’t smell like onion all night.

Now slice about 8 oz. of sausage to the thickness of your liking. Teehee! Optional: dice another 2 oz. for more even distribution. Don’t be grossed out or worried if some of it squeezes out of the lining, it’s all good once it hits the skillet.

Speaking of the skillet, now would be a good time to start heating it up on medium.

Cut up your chicken strips into bite sized pieces.

Toss your sausage and pepper into the skillet, stirring for about 5 minutes, until sausage is evenly browned.

Crank that bad boy up to high, add a cup and a half of rice, 3/4 cup of water, a pinch of salt, and stir until it boils.

At this point, your skillet should look like a gross, gunky mess, but trust me you have done nothing wrong and this will only result in deliciousness

Once it’s boiling, cover and turn the heat to low and let the soupy mixture simmer for 10 – 15 minutes until the rice is cooked.Remove from heat. Mix in your green onions and serve! Goes best with a SoCo & Lime to maintain that Southern Hospitality.

Without fail, no matter who my last partner was, how perfect I have been about taking my birth control or how sure I am that I used a backup method too, until I get my next period I am quite convinced that I am probably both pregnant and dying of full-blown AIDS. There are no symptoms that prompt my overreaction, it just comes to me in sharp pangs of anxiety.

Once I’m satisfied that I’m not actually pregnant, however, the panic truly sets in. Sure, you’ve been tested in previous gynecological exams, but have you actually been tested for HIV? And isn’t there a lot of discussion about HIV these days? There was that program in the park, and Philadelphia has been on TV lately, and…

Ohmygod I can’t remember exactly… he definitely is a charmer, who knows how many girls he’s slept with… I know I’m not a slut but what about the other girls? What if he gave me something? What if I give someone else something? How do I tell my parents? Oh, God… the parents. They’re going to be so disappointed in me… what if he doesn’t know he has HIV and I got it because the condom wasn’t enough and what if and what if…?

You can see that the what-iffing does no good, it just causes anxiety attacks and fits of hysteria. After putting myself through this, since I’ve been sexually active for a few years now, I figured it was time to be an adult and realize that ignorance isn’t bliss when it comes to my health. I’d been focusing so much on not getting pregnant, but had I been worried enough about not getting anything else? The potential for disaster was huge; not only was I risking my own health, but maybe I had been in danger of hurting those I had been with. Yikes. I talked to friends of mine who had recently decided to get tested, and realized that as terrified as I was, I was driving myself crazy without knowing anything.

I had to go.

And so for my annual exam, I scheduled an appointment with my new OB-GYN and laid it out for her in our pre-exam meeting.

“Test me for everything,” I said. She nodded, reminding me that tests for HIV and HPV required bloodwork and waiting a week for the results, and only then did I shudder. Needles I could handle, but waiting a week to hear if I had unwittingly become another statistic?

So after the joy which is an annual exam, the nurse came in and drew a couple vials of blood, something I had trouble stomaching between nerves and my general disgust for seeing my own veins in action. Overall, this was as painless as getting tested for mono or anything else, and much easier than actually donating blood.

As I walked out of the doctor’s office, I had a knot in my stomach the size of a softball. Over the next week, knowing that whatever would be, would be, it only seemed to grow. I longed for a distraction, and another guy wasn’t the answer when I still didn’t know anything. Even stress eating wasn’t helping. I was restless at work, I wasn’t sleeping well, and I couldn’t help but think of ways to explain to my parents what had happened… all while trying to accept that at this point, there was nothing I could do.

My friends reassured me that I was fine, and my inner monologue laughed, because of course they weren’t worried. It couldn’t happen to one of us, right? Not so much. There was no reason that something horrible shouldn’t happen to me. I wasn’t special. I didn’t deserve to be “saved” just because my charmed life had brought me this far.

After I got “the call” from my doctor, reassuring me that everything was fine, I had a crazy new appreciation for my life and my body. Which is a little weird, maybe, but it felt so good to know that everything was okay, and that it was up to me to keep it that way.

If HIV or other STDs are something you’re stressed about but you’d “rather not know,” seriously, you might want to reconsider. There are a lot of consequences out there that you may have to deal with. You’d be amazed how much better you feel after getting tested. Your health shouldn’t be beyond your control, and once you bite the bullet and get to your doctor, it won’t be.

The guilt set in and now this weekend is all about shopping for my family and friends.

Then I found hautelook.com. Sh*t.

Avert your eyes! This site is amazing but a total drain on your wallet (due to selection–not prices!). Just in case you’re willing to spend some cash on some discounted designer duds here’s the lowdown:

Hautelook.com is a member-only site where the user can sign up to receive discounts on major designer apparel–up to 75% off!

You gain access to sample sales days before everyone else. And if you know anything about real-life sample sales…this is a Godsend. No more elbows to the face, disgruntled bitches, and long lines! It’s a Christmas miracle!

Designers like Miguelina, Robert Rodriguez, and starting next week, Development by Erica Davies are available, so get your clicking finger ready.

And refer a friend…you both get $10 credit! Hey, it’s one present off the list, right?

Oh, and we proceed to eat every fatty, salty, chocolaty, everything that is in our path no matter how hard we were working out the week before.

So, when searching for this week’s recipes- I thought, “IDEA! Why not give our faithful CC readers some easy recipes that will satisfy your PMS cravings and not pack on the pounds?“

So sit back with some Midol, a heating pad, a good ‘ol sappy movie and a big, huge fork and indulge — sans guilt!

Oven Baked French Fries

(with ketchup, and a little salt they will taste like the real deal- try sweet potatoes if your feeling crazy!)

What you need:

6 lg. russet or other baking potatoes, scrubbed

Vegetable spray

Directions:

Preheat oven to 475 degrees. Cut potatoes into 1/2 inch strips or leave thicker if you prefer more of a potato wedge. Lightly spray baking pan with vegetable spray. Lay potatoes in a single layer on baking sheet.

Spray strips with vegetable spray before placing pan in oven. Bake 15-20 minutes, turn them and continue baking until crisp and browned, approximately 15-20 minutes more.

Chocolate Mousse-Cream Cones

(from my favorite guilt-free food site: Hungry-girl.com

Ingredients:

2 Keebler Ice Cream Cups

1 JELL-O Sugar Free Pudding Snack, Vanilla (or any flavor!)

2 tbsp. HERSHEY’S Syrup, Sugar Free; refrigerated

1/2 cup Cool Whip Free

(1 cone: 83 calories, 0.5g fat, 150mg sodium, 19g carbs, 0.25 fiber, 2g sugars, 0.5g protein)

Directions:

Begin by pouring 1 tbsp. of chocolate syrup into each cone. Swirl around until inside of cone is well coated; place in freezer immediately. In a small dish, combine Cool Whip and pudding; stir until blended. Place dish in freezer for 45 minutes to 1 hour. Remove cones and mousse mixture. Spoon mousse evenly into and on top of cones.

Optional: Top each cone with a drizzle of the sugar-free syrup! Serves 2.

Weight Watcher S’mores

What you need:

1 Chocolate Graham Cracker

1 lg. Marshmallow

Split the Graham cracker in half.

put one half of the cracker in the microwave and cook until the marshmallow is puffy. Top with remaining half of cracker.

*Add a little Organic Peanut Butter to make this super yummy!

WW Points: 1.5 pt.