Essay Eighty-Nine

Feminine hijinks and more with MultiCultClassics Minutes…

• TLC members T-Boz and Chilli debuted their singer-search reality TV show, R U the Girl With T-Boz and Chilli. R U sick of American Idol rip-offs 2?

• Some Asian-American women want to be like Mike — Michael Jackson, that is. These women strive to preserve or enhance their pale complexions, using creams, gloves, scrubs, medical treatments and more. A popular saying goes, “If you have white skin, you can cover 1,000 uglinesses.” Or find work as a street mime.

• Super-thin supermodel Kate Moss won her libel suit against a newspaper that ran a story claiming she had collapsed into a “cocaine coma.” Moss will receive a substantial-albeit-undisclosed amount of loot from the Sunday Mirror in London, which she’ll no doubt use to buy a ton of coke. Just kidding. Please don’t sue, Kate.

• The Oprah Winfrey Show: 20th Anniversary DVD Collection is scheduled to release in November. Proceeds from the inevitable sales will benefit Oprah’s Angels Network, one of the TV queen’s charities. Look for the commemorative DVD at any fine Hermes boutique. Just kidding.

• Who let the robot dogs out? A team of students from Spelman College recently participated at RoboCup 2005 in Osaka, Japan — an international competition involving programming Sony AIBO robot dogs. The SpelBots’ accomplishment was nothing short of phenomenal, given that this was their maiden entry in the annual event. Of the 24 teams from around the planet to be deemed worthy, the SpelBots represented the first and only HBCU, the only all-women institution and the only U.S. undergraduate institution in the (dog)house. Team members Aryen Moore-Alston, Brandy Kinlaw, Ebony Smith, Karina Liles, Ebony O'Neal and Shinese Noble — along with faculty adviser Andrew Williams, Ph.D — deserve a round of applause for their breakthrough feat.