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I was flipping through a magazine and saw a photo of Madonna at the Venice Film Festival, and stared in horror at her face. She looks dreadful, barely recognizable. She has what cosmetologists call “pillow face” from overuse of injectibles like Botox, Juvederm, collagen. The swelling also comes from laser treatments and other “work” done.

While I’m no purist about beauty treatments, not by a long shot, there was something about these pictures that made me sad. I came of age in the early ‘80s when Madonna ruled. For a repressed Mormon girl new to the big city, the singer’s confidence and individuality were an inspiration.

Around 1983, nude photographs of Madonna were rumored to exist and were going to be sold to Playboy and Penthouse. Turns out she had posed nude at an art school and someone had taken pictures. They obviously decided to cash in on the snaps when she became famous. This was before the Internet, before you could easily see nudity, and during a time when images of stars — especially in compromising positions — were tightly controlled.

Then she did something amazing: she shrugged it off. “Posing nude was something I did when I was young. I needed the money. So what?” They were published, people bought the magazines, but because of her super-confident handling of the event, there was no scandal.

So you would think Madonna is the kind of person who would just kick expectations about aging right in the groin. “I’m 53, I have wrinkles that are evidence of a life lived at full-tilt, so what?” So much better than pillow face.

Raised weird, wanted to be normal

Raised normal, wanted to be weird

Arguably the best album of last year was The Suburbs by Arcade Fire. For those of us born in the 60s and 70s it perfectly captured the details of living on a cul-de-sac and riding your bike to school. The classic American experience from a French-Canadian band. It’s interesting the way our childhood environment shapes us. Just saw the Tim Burton exhibit at LACMA where his bio explained that part of his subversive art was in rebellion to his repressive upbringing in surburban Burbank.

On the other hand, J.J. Abrams of Lost and a zillion other projects fame, was recently interviewed on Jon Stewart and he had the opposite experience. He had an artsy bohemian family and envied the kids who lived in those tidy houses in the suburbs because he imagined their lives were orderly as well. We’re all shaped by our family of origin, for better or worse. As a character from the movie Magnolia said, you might be done with the past but the past isn’t done with you.

For a super cool experience, click here and type in the address of your childhood home. It’s a brilliant interactive video from Arcade Fire. A little creepy, but amazing.

You can't imagine a scandal with these two pros

I read in the paper yesterday that the British monarchy is going to do away with male primogeniture for heirs to the throne, meaning Will & Kate’s daughter could be crowned ahead of a younger brother. Now historians are playing games of “what if?” so I thought I’d jump into the fray. If this equal opportunity monarch rule were in effect during the time of Henry III, he would have ceded his position to his sister Margaret, who was born two years earlier. So there would be no infamous divorces and beheadings of six wives, no break with the Vatican, no Elizabeth I.

If the rule had changed for Henry’s children, the outcome would be the same as above. He would have stayed married to Katharine of Aragon and Mary Tudor would have ruled England, at least until she succumbed to her stomach tumor, after which time the crown would have been up for grabs because there were no other surviving children. At least she wouldn’t have burned Protestants at the stake. No reason.

I had the strange fortune to meet Queen Catherine on her Los Angeles visit. It was a Sunday morning and I was on my jogging route along Sixth to La Brea when I noticed the road was barricaded at June Street where news vans were parked along with three black SUVs with dark-tinted windows. There were about 20 people lined up holding bouquets. Helicopters circled overhead. Ever-curious, I ran up to see what was going on, and just at that moment, William and Catherine exited from one of the houses and came our way! I then remembered that they were staying in Hancock Park at the British Embassy, but I didn’t know where it was.

They made their way down the line smiling and shaking hands, ever the professionals and seeming to not resent their command performance. Truthfully, they could have waved at the crowd and that would have been enough. Instead they chose to put in the extra effort and came over to shake hands, including my sweaty, sunscreened one thrust through the well-dressed line of people. “My name is Catherine too!” I blurted like an idiot. She looked and me, and in that plummy accent said, “How lovely” and moved along.

Anyway, I’m glad their daughter will be queen, and I’m counting the striking of the primogeniture rule as a score for feminism. I, for one, think the monarchy is a delightful and useful tradition, because the royal family manages the ceremonial tasks so the real heads of state don’t have to. Poor Barack is expected to be David Cameron and Duchess Catherine rolled into one. Too exhausting, and a poor use of resources.

It’s hard to imagine a person who has had such a direct impact on everyday living. Sure these Nobel Prize winners move the frontiers of knowledge in the field of particle matter, but that doesn’t trickle down to the person on the street, at least not in an obvious way.

As someone who has never worked on a PC, whose first computer was a Mac IICX, which took up the whole desk and cost over $7,000 in 1989 — for me, the impact of Apple is personal. The Mac, the iphone, ipod and now the tablet, represent not gadgets but a seismic cultural shift in the way we both communicate and create. Add in Pixar, and the millions of people who have enjoyed those brilliant movies, and there are probably few people on the planet who have not been touched by Apple.

My reaction to Steve Jobs is also visceral. This is how I remember him: Young, shaggy, wicked smart and smokin’ hot.

Lived with intensity, died young