Jenny McCarthy (“Dumb Like a Fox,” Aug. 24) is mature for her age? Please! Give me a break! This is coming from a girl who right now makes a living running around in a pink tutu and generally making an idiot out of herself. It is ludicrous for her to claim that she is more mature than guys her age (of which I am one). I know 12-year-olds with more maturity in their little fingers than she has in her whole body. Her show will go down as the biggest mistake that NBC has ever made.
Michael Kerwin, Chicago
I like Jenny McCarthy. However, I am sick, sick, sick of seeing that picture of her on the toilet! Everybody over diaper age uses the toilet; it’s not unique to Jenny. It’s private; let’s keep it that way.
Marilyn Bozeman, Chicago
Jenny McCarthy was washed up and humiliated living with her lower-middle-class family and working in a Polish deli? This is just a reminder to her that a lot of people still live with their lower-middle-class families and are proud of their one-bathroom homes. There are a lot of beautiful women who have gone to her school and are struggling to pay their way through college. They have chosen to work in the Polish delis to pay for their education while preserving their dignity with their clothes on.
Jenny McCarthy should respect her roots and her upbringing. To denounce her childhood home and work is an insult to her community. I know some people who won’t be watching Jenny’s show.
Mary Stanek, Chicago
Nar-cis-sism.
1. Egoism, egocentrism.
2. Love of one’s own body
see: Jenny McCarthy
Terry Henebry, Glen Ellyn
TALK ABOUT EXPENSIVE
Your recent article on Charlie Trotter’s restaurant (“Have It His Way,” Aug. 17) should have been titled “My Stove Costs More Than Your House.” Two-hundred thousand dollars for a stove! Oh, excuse me, it’s “a fire-hearted beast of gleaming steel and bronze on which hot dishes are prepared.”
Am I crazy, or do people have way too much access to unwanted cash today?
Instead of spending anywhere from $70 to $150 per person at Charlie Trotter’s on a special occasion, take my advice. Without your wife knowing it, enroll in a gourmet cooking class, and on the day that you serve your beloved that meal prepared and cooked with a lifetime of love, look her in the eyes and say, “Honey, I wouldn’t trade you for all of the wealth in the universe!”
Daniel E. Volz, Palatine
The “transcendent dining experience” which Charlie seeks has so far translated into tiny dabs of overpriced food, served up with large portions of ego. The service is spiritless and grim, reminiscent of the welcome committee at a cheesy funeral home.
The plastic surgeon/Charlie-wannabe who described Trotter’s kitchen as “a great operating room” confuses dining out with brain surgery. Whatever happened to the idea that dinner could be fun?
MaryAnne Spinner, Chicago
GAYS IN THE MILITARY
I read with interest the Aug. 10 article “Death of a Sailor.” It proves one thing: that President Clinton’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is not working. Evidently, Allen Schindler’s shipmates did not ask, but they could tell.
The few gay men aboard the ship were aware of the hostility of their straight shipmates. I agree this is not right. If gays or lesbians want to fight for their country, that is commendable. I believe that during combat, they will not be thinking of sex, but rather survival. But they should have their own units. They are what they are, but, by the same token, so are their straight shipmates.
I applaud Dorothy Hajdys for her mission, as no mother should lose her child the way she did. But did her son really belong in this frightening situation?
Dorothy Farnsworth, Chicago
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