New England 49 New York 10

Last night in Phoenix 50 Cent made Paris Hilton cry, and it had nothing to do with the mutual exchange of sexually transmitted disease. Apparently Paris wanted to get up on the stage and dance as Fiddy performed, but the multi-platinum recording artist humiliated the not-so heiress by yelling her off the stage, and that is when the water works began.

There is a big game in Phoenix Sunday and, unlike Paris, I suspect the surprising New York Giants are just happy to be in the desert. And even happier to be there without Tiki Barber and Jeremy Shockey, irritating black holes of attention they both would be.

The Patriots have to be happy too -- they are now one game away from making real history, and avoiding the dreaded footnote. But recent history shows that, for the Pats, that kind of pleasant relief lends itself to the kind of a focus that results in victory.

The Patriots haven't been blowing teams out like they did at the beginning of the season, and barely beat the Giants about a month ago. This sounds like a challenge. And, if you were the collective psyche of a football team, would you want to play Bill Belichick and Tom Brady a month after almost beating them, and when they've had a bye week to work with?

Also, the Patriots are a whole lot better than the Giants. When I was kid Super Bowls regularly had ridiculous final scores like 55-10 and 46-10 and 45-10. The Patriots of 2007 will turn back the clock on their way to history. They shake their habit of winning Super Bowls by a field goal in a big way: Patriots 49 Giants 10.

Update: This didn't happen.

Rule of three strikes Farmington's foremost citizen

Early yesterday morning, burger-loving Paris Hilton was picked up for DUI.

Then, later in the afternoon, an already shaken world got news a tearful Lindsay Lohan had been the victim of a major robbery at Heathrow Airport. Lindsay claimed the thieves made off with a Hermes handbag containing jewels and "medication" worth upwards of one million dollars.

Lohan's stolen bag was recovered soon after the news of the theft hit the wires -- although some of the bag's contents remain missing. Meaning the perpetrators and their noses are going to be hitting London like they own it tonight.

These two tragedies automatically triggered the notorious rule of three. Most famous for its spooky domain over celebrity deaths, but applicable in all situations involving bad luck and the rich and fabulous.

Throughout the morning the jsb offices were rife in anticipation of who would be the next celebutante to fall, probably around 2 PM today. The smart money was on Britney Spears and "baby dangling" or Jessica Simpson and "some sort of horrifying body part incident."

Imagine our surprise when, about an hour ago, bullet-scarred self-proclaimed "gansta" 50 Cent revealed himself as girl three.

In front a crowd of Hell's Kitchen on-lookers 50 was pulled from his silver Lamborghini by six of New York's finest in plain-clothes and taken to the pokey. Early web speculation centers around drug possession.

50's cosmically approved association with Paris and Lindsay shouldn't come as that much of a shock. The man clearly spends as much time preening as the two tabloid queens, and has been residing on the mild streets of suburban Connecticut ever since most of us met him.

And, although hip-hop is not my expertise, I do detect 50 comes from the style-over-substance school.

So there you have it: Paris, Lindsay and 50, forever linked.

Somewhere -- wherever disgraced rappers go after they hock their gold chains and do a duet with Christina Aguilera -- Ja Rule is laughing.

Snap judgment: 2006 MTV Music Video Award

Ever watch the Oscars or the Grammys and think to yourself "this really sucks"? If you have, you need to check out the annual MTV Music Video Awards. It will completely change your perspective on awards shows and sucking.

It was with that attitude I took in about 45 minutes of the 2006 MTV Music Video Awards. I was particularly looking forward to being the who-the-hell-are-these-people curmudgeon as MTV inevitably unleashed one flash-in-the-pan no-talent performer after another.

So, I was quite thrown when I turned on the TV and there was Lou Reed singing a song from his Velvet Underground days. Reed looked good for that rock and roll milestone of 64, although his presence had thrown the audience too, and they seemed quite worried.

The show was hosted by Jack Black, a fairly talented, mostly physical comedian who never blinks his eyes. Ever. He also didn't seem to mind that he was performing on a stage that looked, to the television viewer, like two-and-a-half giant penises.

Soon, Black introduced Lil' Kim, who had just been released from prison. The audience cheered her return to freedom. The crowd cheered even louder when Lil' Kim thanked her "peeps" for sticking with her through her incarceration ordeal because, you know, the whole having friends sticking with you when are in prison is something Ivy league music executives and their plus ones can really relate to.

They started giving out awards. I can't remember who won. But I can remember who didn't win. That would be Kanye West. The camera caught each of his smiles-through-gritted-teeth. It would have been nice if Jack Black cracked an "I guess MTV doesn't care about black people joke," but he didn't. No matter, everyone was thinking it.

The lowlight of the evening for me was when 50 cent and LL Cool J were called on to present an award. It started innocently enough. One of them would say "yeah" and then the other one would say "make some noise." This went on for a while, but when they actually started speaking real sentences 50 unleashed a verbal gaffe that will forever change the way I look at the hip-hop-artist.

Describing some sort of musical journey, 50 said "From Texas to Michigan to Detroit to Canada."

Now I have always admired rappers for their flawless senses of geography. And, as a fan of geography myself, it has always pleased me that the typical rapper is so ready and willing to display his geographical skills lyrically. Yet 50's Michigan to Detroit blunder leads me to believe this geographical mastery is nothing more than studio wizardry. A sad day.

In conclusion, I can't say the 2006 MTV Music Video Awards didn't provide me with 45 minutes of commercially punctuated distraction. But I also can't say it was any good.