popular thinking

WORKING HARD, HARDLY WORKING: Just got back home from a "long" weekend up near Cape Ann with the fam. Good times. Need to work on my golf game, but don't need to work on my tan. Not for a few days, anyhow. But plenty of my stories have appeared in print these past few days, and if you're not already reading the Boston Herald every day (and really, why aren't you?), then you need to catch up. So here is the recap...

SATURDAY
Boston hosts more than a few so-called goodbye tours and finales, but in many cases, entertainers often have a hard time saying goodbye.
When Greta Garbo and J.D. Salinger said goodbye to public life, they meant it.
But so, so many other celebrities fail in their attempts to bid farewell to fame. Some because they crave it. Others because we won't let them go.
The rest of the story: Is that your final answer?

SUNDAY
Some prefer blondes.
Some prefer brunettes.
Still others prefer whips, spanking benches or women made up like horses - saddles included.
To each his or her own yesterday at the 25th installment of the Fetish Fair Fleamarket, a production of the New England Leather Alliance at the Boston Center for the Arts/Cyclorama.
Leather abounded, of course, but plenty of other kinks were on display: latex, saddles, corsets, paddles, whips, adult diapers, S&M videos and several women and men dressed as women being led around the market in chains.
The rest of the story: Hurts so good: Annual fetish fair kicks up Hub heels

MONDAY
Of all the people selling cars on Boston TV stations this summer, two stand out.
One is retired Chrysler chairman Lee Iaccoca, brought back into the automaker's ad campaign in recent weeks, who spoofs his famous pitch line from a generation ago (``If you can find a better car, buy it'') while paired up with the likes of Snoop Dogg and Jason Alexander.
The other is Ernie Boch Jr., the ubiquitous pitchman for his various Boch Enterprise dealerships on the Automile in Norwood.
Both men exemplify a classic advertising gimmick - the CEO spokesman.
"Ninety-nine percent of the time, it's the chief's decision to do the ad,'' Boch said. "If you have a company, you really want to do the ads. It's the best way to communicate your ideas.''
The rest of the story: It takes a tough man to tender a TV pitch