He’s back! Tim Tebow showed up on stage at recent Brad Paisley concert. Unfortunately, all those years of singing in church did nothing to help his voice.
According to Jacksonville.com, presidential candidate Newt Gingrich is opening his Jacksonville headquarters Wednesday at 4:30 p.m. Bill McCollum, former Florida attorney general and co-chairman of Gingrich’s Florida campaign, will speak on his behalf at 5 p.m.
The headquarters is located at 1046 Riverside Ave. (pictured here … in all its glory) just across the street from fellow Republican U.S Congressman Ander Crenshaw.
In honor of Gingrich’s arrival, I’d like to share a few non-political tidbits that I learned during the three minutes of research I did for this post.
1. He is a “dinosaur enthusiast.”
2. If MTV had been around in 1943, Gingrich’s mom could have appeared on Teen Mom and/or 16 and Pregnant.
3. His first wife was his high school geometry teacher who he married one year after graduation. Ew.
4. He has a ”Bacon Number” of 2.
5. At a public appearance in 1995 with TV host and zoologist Jack Hanna, Gingrich was bitten on the chin by a baby cougar.
6. He was recently endorsed by Chuck Norris.
And if you think that campaign sign on the front lawn of the new headquarters is bad, you should see the other side of it.
The 15-year-old Orange Park resident auditioned in for season 11 in Savannah, which aired last night. And what do you know, she made it through to Hollywood. Renae has been singing for years including such prestigious venues as Rockin Rods in the OP, the Suwannee River Jam and Hernando County Fair and, apparently, impressed the judges enough to get the golden ticket.
Sharon Wilbur, Face of Fox 30/season 8 American Idol contestant/friend of The Specktator, has the scoop from today’s Morning Dish.
While this is great news for Medina and Renae—and Northeast Florida in general—it’s terrible news for me because as the city’s premier D-list celebrity stalker, now I have to watch.
* Note to American Idol, jacksonville.com and any other media outlet that thinks her name is spelled “Stephanie”: It’s not. It’s “SteFFanie” with two F‘s, as in “Face of Fox 30.”
Speaking of the lovely and talented Face of Fox 30, thanks, Sharon, for your help today. And save me some of that Randy caramel popcorn seasoning!
In an attempt to feed people’s insatiable appetite for celebrity gossip, The Specktator and my trusted panel of reporters, the Eye-Team, report sightings of local luminaries (aka J-listers) and “real” stars about town, in a segment we affectionately refer to as “Invasion of Privacy.”
If you’re looking to have J-lister restaurant encounter, I can think of no place better than Taco Lu in Jacksonville Beach since Jags tight end Zach Miller stopped, The Morning Show crew and Jags quarterback Blaine Gabbert all stopped by the Baja Mexicana restaurant in Jacksonville Beach just last week.
I wonder if that has anything to do with the Lu being named Best Cheap Date Location (and Best Family-Friendly Restaurant) in Jacksonville Magazine‘s January issue. Either way, I hope they paid homage to my deceased mother, Peg Speckman, and my college Spanish professor, the late Gustavor Godoy, on the Dia de Los Muertos altar.
It was a good news/bad news kind of day at Phoenix Lanes on Blanding Boulevard. The bad news is that I thought I had a big celebrity sighting when I spied who I thought was Dennis Franz (aka NYPD Blue‘s Andy Sipowicz) but turned out to be just some a random mustachioed, bespectacled, chubby guy on the Westside.
The good news is after I posted the photo on Twitter, TheDailySipowicz started following me.
Speaking of which, are you following TheSpecktator on Twitter? I mean, how else are you going to get my STALKER ALERTS?
Since TT’s “miracle season” has officially ended, I’ll be curtailing my obsessive coverage and will be leaving you with some of my favorite recent stories.
1. One word: Tebowie. P.S. I love you even more now, Jimmy Fallon.
2. ESPN breaks its own Tebow record. (Apparently, I’m not the only blogger with Tebow-related OCD counting issues.)
4. Bleacher Report names Tebow one of the hottest singles in sports. I suggest he check out UFC Octagon Girl Arianny Celeste. They have at least one thing in common.
Sun-Ray Cinema hasn’t been open two months yet, but genius owners Tim Massett and Shana David Massett are already attracting award-winning actor/directors to the 5 Points Theater as part of Tim’s über-popular film series brainchild, The Talkies (did I just use the word “über”?)
First up is John Cameron Mitchell. To those of you who only know JCM as director of 2010′s Rabbit Hole starring Nicole Kidman and Aaron Eckhart and/or Hedwig and the Angry Inch, the off-Broadway hit brought to the silver screen in 2000, buckle up because he and two cast members will be appearing on March 2 at 7:30 PM to discuss Shortbus (or as the New York Times called it “an ode to the joy and sweet release of sex”).
At 10 p.m., Sun-Ray will screen Hedwig sans JCM, which is just as well because I’m such a fan (despite hating musicals) I don’t want him flapping his yap while I’m trying to enjoy the film.
On March 3 at 7 PM, JCM returns to present two of this favorite films, Badlands and Real Life.
Tickets are $20 for Shortbus, $10 for Hedwig, $20 for the JCM double feature or $40 for all four films—and they’re going fast. So head on over to Sun-Ray’s website and get yours now before you’re left with nothing but an angry itch to have a unique theatrical experience. In Jacksonville.
For the record, it’s been two whole days since I mentioned Tim Tebow (one if you count yesterday’s implied reference). Here’s what you’ve been missing:
1. So desperate are they for new Tebow news, NFL.com created a slideshow depicting what his children might look like if he married certain celebrities. How respectful of them to assume he would not procreate without being married.
2. Singer-songwriter John Parr rewrote and re-recorded his No. 1 song “St. Elmo’s Fire” as “Tim Tebow’s Fire. (In a related question, could you have even named the dude who sang “St. Elmo’s Fire” for a million dollars prior to reading the previous sentence?)
3. Instead of a two-second shot of T.T. slipping into a Jockey Staycool t-shirt, the undie company is giving fans something to linger over in their a print ad (even his back has abs!). But they’ve also chosen a very disturbing subhead for another one—unless, of course, football fans literally crap their pants while watching a game. (I’m quite sure they’ll want to vomit, however, after listening to that song.)
Jaxson de Ville, who is the “self-proclaimed best mascot in sports,” has the chance to prove that he actually is. The 403-pound 12th man coordinator is a finalist for the title of Cartoon Network’s Hall of Game Most Awesome Sports Mascot.
I might agree if he hadn’t done this…
In other Jags-related news, Maurice Jones-Drew isn’t the only member of the Jaguars family off to the Pro Bowl.
Heather, a member of The ROAR, is headed to Honolulu to shake her pom-poms for the AFC.
A member of The ROAR for four seasons and one of the season’s captains, Heather was voted by her teammates to represent the Jags in Hawaii.
Unfortunately, I did not have the energy to count the number of times he said “um” or “great,” but feel free to do so and report back to me.