Poppaea Sabina, the second wife of Nero, insisted that her husband maintain a herd of Asses at all times. Like all terminally bored and s-xually famished Empresses, she deemed it necessary to bathe in their milk.

She said it kept her skin baby-soft. Personally, I think she was just a jaded harridan looking to cause trouble. As I am. As such, I bid you join me in a Hot Tub of homogenised Ass Milk.

AKA, the low week in the life of the popular culture.

If, like me, you have outsourced the management of your libido to Rupert Murdoch, you will currently suffer unclean thoughts re Delta Goodrem. Our bravest popstrel explains How I Got S-xy. This subtle and ingenious plan devised by either Satan or Sony may be viewed here. A visual roadmap that charts Delta’s route to S-xy begins with pictures of her as a five-year-old.

Nice.

Inscrutably, Channel Seven feasted on its own young. Bec Hewitt copped it from a putative current affairs show. Dunno why. Sad, as it seems the former foxtrotter had thrown small change in the direction of Asian orphans. Some might consider this a good thing. Not so the good men and women of Today Tonight.

News today reveals the demise of the bloke with the haircut from the first season of Big Brother. This tragic event possibly serves as a reminder that smack is an utter nonsense and must be shunned by all sane persons. Gordon Sloan’s passing is also just a bit eerily poignant. In death, he is known as the bloke with the haircut from the first season of Big Brother. I find this unspeakably sad.

If I were a little less like Poppaea, I might also find Britney unspeakably sad. Instead, she is deeply comic.

As if the finish of our own poison dwarf, John Howard, was not hilarious enough, Britney helped the rest of the world yuk it up big time following her performance at the MTV VMAs.

On a real and human level, it is sad to watch the undoing of a young glazed female doughnut. On another, it is pleasingly symbolic. This daughter of Bush is now as bloated and obsolete as the US currency.

Meaning has always ricocheted prettily off Britney. In fact, she rides the zeitgeist like a pony.

And now, she emerges as proof positive that, eventually, even the best antidepressant drugs don’t work.