2005 News Archives
Cassie Newman
 

Dead Newman Kid had Favorite Tree Ornament Too!

December 20, 2005

It was learned this week that in addition to her many favorite holidays, and horses and sports and condoms, the dearly departed Cassie Newman had a favorite Christmas tree ornament!

Similar to the one that went missing from the Abbott Hotel tree last year, the one with the words 'Ashley's first Christmas' on it, Newman's half-brother, Noah said Tuesday he can vividly recall the time last year when Cassie personally put the ornament on the tree with her very own hand.

"She was a good sister," Noah sniveled during a tree-lighting ceremony at the Newman Ponderosa Outhouse with his sex-starved mother Sharon and adulterous father Nick.

"That memory of Cassie is so special," Mrs. Newman confirmed as Mr. Newman continually referred to Noah as "Bud".

The Fugitive (Trial)
Newman Kid Back From the Dead?

August 16, 2005
by Brent Kellogg

When the word went far and wide on Tuesday that District Attorney Glenn Richards has rested his case there was much shock and awe. What damming evidence had Richards shown to the court that would in any way prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Daniel Romalotti was not driving the vehicle said to have contributed to the death of Cassie Newman? Where were the blood tests and autopsies and expert witnesses who could point their crooked fingers at Daniel and say, yeah baby, he did it! There was none because Richards never had any. The best he could do was summon the victim's mother to the witness stand.

Sharon Newman testified that outside a few bumps in the road - and please don't mention when Cassie didn't want anything to do with me that time I abandoned her to go have sex with a strange man - she had a "good relationship" with her daughter. Sharon said she and Cassie made dinner, folded laundry, went for bikes rides, lived under the same roof and shared "everything" together, except of course, Sharon's many men.

"I knew her well," Sharon added, noting too that Cassie was a very smart kid who would never operate the Newman ranch tractor or ATVs without permission. As to whether Cassie might disobey the no driving rule whenever her mother wasn't home - which was often - Sharon said, "No."

At this point in the nonspecific and nearly irrelevant questioning defense attorney Christine 'Bug' Blair did not object. She did not ask that the question and Sharon's answer be struck from the record as hearsay as Sharon couldn't have possibly known what Cassie did or didn't know if she wasn't there to see it with her own eyes.

Pressing for another voluntary opinion from the witness Richards asked Sharon how she feels when people say Cassie was driving on the night of the accident. But before Sharon could say Nick Newman made another outburst. Disrupting the court, Nick said there was no way Cassie would have driven without a license and he couldn't understand why people weren't getting that through their thick heads. Making her third major outburst the defendant's mother screamed at Nick, "Nobody asked you!" and both Nick and Phyllis Summers had to be admonished by the sleepy judge who, following their last outburst had said he'd throw them out of court, took no action other than to remind Nick he wasn't on the witness stand and to pretty please refrain from answering questions.

As if to prove he's a boob Richards said he fully understood Nick's reason for causing another scene and then rested his case when the Bug declined to cross examine! That the Bug didn't examine the one witness that might have made her case was nothing short of insanity. That the Bug would later whimper what a poor excuse she is for a lawyer didn't mitigate the damage. Dumb as she is, even Phyllis knew better. Phyllis demanded an explanation only to be told by the Bug not to tell her how to do her job.

That somebody needs to tell the Bug she's making a mockery out of the justice system, and to please turn in her Sears law degree, would have been pointless as the Bug, despite having said she knows how to do her job, confessed to feeling like an idiot.

"I'm scared. Daniel has so much faith in me. He's looking at Aunt Christine to save him. I'm so afraid I won't win," the Bug sniveled, only to be told by private detective Paul 'Clueless' Williams, "Isn't that what aunts and lawyers do? Daniel is getting the best defense he could ask for."

At that moment, when Clueless said he'll "keep digging" until he finds something to help the Bug win right after he'd said there's no such thing as waving a magic wand and making evidence appear," it become apparent as to why Richards rested his case.

Doing so is the only possible way the Bug can win and everyone knew going in the Bug would win. For all her bawling, for all her ineptness, for the lack of questioning prime witnesses, for being so afraid she won't win, the Bug actually said, "We're planting reasonable doubt".

Maybe then this scandal, this lamest and worst of all trials ever held in Genoa City, is something completely different, less obvious, more excruciating than we want to imagine. Maybe this kangaroo court is, in fact, part of a larger plot to elevate the Bug to the point of bizarre saint, a patriotic hero, in a fantastical but not unthinkable effort get Daniel off, maybe even immunized from all future law suits. Brace yourself, because this could actually happen. There is no law against it. And yes, the Bug is capable of just such sainthood, for she does, you know, know the law, is invincible and may even get Abby Carlton to help when Abby becomes an angel capable of performing miracles such as bringing Cassie Newman back from the dead.

A Celebration of Life
More Tales from the Crypt

June 1, 2005

It's not like being a fan of Six Feet Under where you flip on HBO each week to see if any new episodes are available via Comcast's ONDEMAND feature. It's not like if you've seen all the episodes and must wait for the new season to begin you'll go through the withdrawal of being without a creative writing fix because SFU is so damn well written and interesting. Genoa City's Tales from the Crypt aren't like that. Nothing about Cassie Newman's death was believable from the outset and it's only gone downhill from there. There are lots of laughs, however.

And so it was fitting that following Cassie's funeral the much hated guests tagged along behind the Newman family for cookies and milk at the Ponderosa. The Abbotts, along with Christine 'Bug' Blair and Paul 'Clueless' Williams, were joined by the likes of Mr. and Mrs. Neil Winters, Ether Valentine, Katherine Sterling and BoreUs Collins. All took turns dispensing buttery mishmash. How sad it was to have lost a "beautiful child" and how they will so "miss" that precious child for about 24-hours. Ether presented the gloomy grandmother with tea roses said to have special meaning and when placed just right behind a photo of the dearly departed would undoubtedly bloom - as they did.

A pouting and threatening to hold his breath until he turned blue Nick Newman was still angry over Phyllis Summers having crashed the funeral. It was perfectly okay for Jack Abbott to be there. It was okay that other members of the Abbott family who have in the past made him look like a fool to be there but not Phyllis.

"If it weren't for her son my little girl would still be alive," Nick grumbled before leaving to take his frustrations out on a punching bag.

Meantime Sharon Newman was worried about her living son, Noah. The 9-year-old hadn't eaten a thing all day and even now, when offered some of the sugar-laden goodies cooked up by the slave and Gina Roma, was refusing to eat. BoreUs waylaid Sharon's concern by announcing she'd had the forethought to bring Noah's baseball cards up from the outhouse and wondered if the boy might show her some of his favorite players. Sharon nixed the idea. She didn't want the frail Noah leaving her sight despite his being in the next room with her boring mother. On second thought Sharon gave the go ahead so long as someone stayed with Noah at all times.

Looking around the room Nikki Newman couldn't see her goofy son. Where could he be, she asked daughter Victoria who said she didn't know but when she saw him last he had "a strange look in his eyes." This look, this indescribable burning of Hell in the mirrors of Nick's beady eyes, had Victoria so worried she said, "It scared me a little."

Still listening to guests offer up their condolences Victor Newman thanked Katherine for saying what a moving speech he'd given at the funeral, and agreed with Ether it was so "unfair" Cassie had been taken away at such a young age with so much life ahead of her. His ego pumped, Victor make another stunning prophecy.

"[It] reminds us to live each day to it's fullest. We never know when the end comes."

"That's so true!" a dazzled Ether agreed as Katherine made the great man promise right then and there that he'll always take good care of Nikki because "she needs you more than ever."

Checking his watch John 'Yawn' Abbott must have known he was pushing it. At any moment Victor might remember when Yawn knocked him on his ass right in his own home and called him a bastard. At any second Victor might remember when his son almost left him for dead and kicked him as he lay motionless. Yawn's noticing the time was interrupted when Jack ambled up to ask if Nick had calmed down. Yawn had no clue. Hell, he hadn't seen Nick. He had, however, told Victor how sorry he is about Cassie and that if Victor ever needed him he'd be there. After all, "What are friends for?"

The gushing of pity was lost when Ashley Carlton told Nikki what a wonderful funeral it had been and that she felt the Newman's pain. "Only you could," Nikki hissed, before all but ordering Ashley to grant Victor some quality time with his long forgotten daughter, Abby.

Ashley was taken aback. What the...? "A tragedy makes you see what's important in your life," Nikki explained, leaving Ashley to scratch her head and maybe want to say, "Jesus. You people and your what's important in life crap. Tomorrow we'll all be sniping at each other like normal so let's not kid ourselves."

Elsewhere, Neil was asking his wife if she'd seen his brother and her former lover. Dru said she had. Before the funeral Malfunction Winters was at their wooden box speaking with their freakish daughter. Dru knew too that Daniel Romalotti is missing and... Neil interrupted. Does this mean Lily knows where Daniel is? Is sweet and innocent Lily harboring a criminal? Not just any criminal mind you. The punk who killed the beloved Cassie?

Hells, bells! Neil freaked. By golly he was going to nip this little problem in the bud. Just you wait and see. While he didn't have any idea moments earlier where his brother was, Neil knew he'd find Malfunction in the steam room at the Athletic Supporter Club. As he burst through the door Neil said in no uncertain terms that he had urgent business to discuss. Malfunction flicked him off. Whatever Neil wanted to talk about would have to wait. Besides, he'd just started steaming and Neil was letting the hot air out.

In a flash Neil returned with a towel wrapped around his loins. Very impressed, Malfunction quipped, "You were serious about wanting to talk." Well, Duh... After Neil said his daughter is aiding and abetting a criminal Malfunction flicked him off again. Interfere in Lily's life too much and he could lose her which would be entirely different than should Lily go to prison for hindering prosecution. Like a dog kicked in the groin Neil went off with his tail tucked between his legs.

Back at the party Sharon was drifting around the room when she realized Noah was nowhere in sight. BoreUs told her the kid was in the study. Did she forget? "I don't want him alone," Sharon spat, as BoreUs said Noah wasn't alone. The slave was with him so there was no reason to fret. It's not like Miguel Rodriguez is a Catholic priest alone at night in the boy's dormitory - or something.

Her mind struggling to keep it together Sharon flashed on Nick. Where is he? BoreUs didn't know. Sharon asked Victoria who couldn't wait to say she had seen Nick and what she saw "worried" her. Had they the good sense God gave a toad the girls might have got off their fat asses and gone looking. They would have found the boob pounding on an old bag much like Sharon. And because they were all unwittingly playing the home version of Who's Line is It? Brad Carlton moseyed over to ask Sharon, "Where's Nick?"

Her mind so jumbled Sharon knew only that Nick had left the building at a time when she needed him the most. Too damn bad Katherine hadn't made Nick promise - like she had Victor - to always take care of Sharon because, "She needs you more than ever."

Seeing Sharon was distraught Brad tried to sooth her nerves by comparing Cassie to Colleen Carlton! Yeah, Baby. That Colleen was quite the role model what with her rebellious attitude and dope smoking. Sharon didn't see the similarity. It wasn't like Colleen up and died just when she and Brad were "just getting back on track".

With all the clichés being bantered about Brad must have felt another wouldn't hurt. "You will smile again," he told Sharon, not causing a band of angels to descend upon the joint singing in harmony, "I can't Smile Without You" words and music by Barry Manilow.

Also playing Who's Line Is It? Nick and Victor were vying to see who could say "He's going to spend the rest of his life in prison" most convincingly when they both know damn well only three people in this city (MariJo Mason, Izzy Brana and Tricia McNeil) has ever gone to prison for their rest of their lives. Still, as if to prove he's manly, Nick said again Daniel Romalotti is responsible for killing Cassie, then, contradicting himself, repeated, "I feel like I want to kill somebody."

Victor did not point out to his nitwit son the absurdity of condemning murder while having a lust for it but did give Nick a boxing pointer. When lashing out at an old bag keep your chin down. When down in the dumps about something completely out of your control keep your chin up.

The philosophy nearly as thick as the mystical Gitta Hendrickson, Nick returned to tell the Bug he knows her client is not to blame for what happened to Cassie because before dying Cassie whispered in his ear. Lawbug she is, the critter didn't get it. Had Nick gone insane? Why would Nick say Daniel was using Cassie so he wouldn't be charged with a crime? It made no sense to the Bug.

"Something is wrong. We need to find out what it is," the Bug actually said, as Nick went on damning Daniel for causing Cassie's death.

After looking around at all the solemn faces Victor thanked his guests for helping him and the family "celebrate Cassie's life."

'Cindy' Steals Show at Newman Funeral

May 31, 2005

Prior to reporting on yet another episode of Tales from the Crypt I could only shake my head. Not because Sharon Newman said that her head is "jumbled", or that Nick Newman can't contain his anger and wants to "kill someone" or that Daniel Romalotti fears suddenly that his mother will notice the calls from Lily Winters on his cell phone bill which Phyllis Summers or Paul Williams have yet to think of checking, but because for all the times they have said how they will personally find Daniel neither Jack Abbott or Phyllis have done anything of the sort.

In fact, Jack went to Cassie Newman's funeral after telling Phyllis again, "I promise you we'll find him" and following another rant from Phyllis that her son is going to prison and that she wanted to attend the funeral too and told by Jack not to go anywhere near the Newman family much less a funeral for their dead, Phyllis did exactly that.

Although it doesn't do any good you gotta wonder about these people. Why are they so stupid? It's a rhetorical question.

As for the funeral itself what a comedy it was.

While a total of eight guests had been projected the actual total exceeded that amount not counting Cindy the doll. That's right. Cindy was hauled out of mothballs for the weepy-eyed spectacle. More on Cindy in a moment.

First, let's review the guest list.

Michael Baldwin. He knew Cassie so well.

Ether Valentine and Jill Abbott. "Cassie who?" the two women might have asked considering Ether hasn't seen her own daughter, Kate, for years and Jill has to pretend she ever hears from her son, Billy.

Gina Roma's presence was more out of anger. With Cassie dead there's one less kid she can inject with sugar-laden cookies and ice cream.

Bobby Marsino, his pregnant wife unable to accompany him because of morning sickness, showed up only because it gave him a reason to suck around Nikki Newman.

Apparently having read the news of Cassie's death in the paper Katherine Sterling was on the scene and wonder or wonders, the Newmans had actually allowed their slave to put in an appearance probably because Miguel Rodriguez was the only person who really knew Cassie all these years.

Lastly, Christine 'Bug' Blair and Paul 'Clueless' Williams, two freaks working to absolve Cassie's suspected killer, were welcomed to the funeral with open arms.

Also as expected a said to be out of town Larry Warton was absent as was Cassie's grandmother Millie Johnson, and the woman who adopted Cassie, Alice Johnson.

Now for the lower lights of this wackiest of all funerals in Genoa City history.

As it was for the very much alive now Malcolm Winters funeral, a collage of photographs complimented the white casket. From young girl to hot pants teen the photos of Cassie gave a jolt for anyone who might not recall what she looked like.

After greeting the Newmans like he never hated them nor they he, Jack Abbott checked on his - doing quite well after hip replacement without his walker thank you - father and then listened as Ashley Carlton said she couldn't imagine how Sharon was getting through a funeral which hadn't even begun.

When the pipe organ began to groan and the preacher man had taken center stage Victor Newman took control. The next best thing to God Himself, Victor thanked everyone for saying bye-bye to Cassie. Yes, Cassie was wise beyond her years. Yes, she had endured so many Newman tragedies during her short life and lived to tell about them except, of course, for this, the latest crisis, with a smile.

Never in Victor's 60+ years had he ever seen anyone deal with a Newman dilemma like Cassie. It was such an inspiration Victor said he hoped there would be many flights of angels singing Cassie to her final resting place. Then, after asking God to bless Cassie, and maybe thinking he'd been talking to himself, Victor placed a wet kiss on Cassie's closed coffin.

Next on the pity parade Nikki Newman spoke of Cassie's infamous pie in the sky. That starry night when a headless horseman placed a special star in the heavens just for Cassie's family and friends who, if they try real hard on a clear night, will think of Cassie if they don't confuse the star with Venus or Jupiter. And despite that Cassie is deader than a doornail, Nikki said, "She will always be with us."

Following this astronomical giddiness one of the real stars of the show took the stage. Sharon, in all her radiant glory, confessed to those gathered what a worthless human being she is. Yes, she gave Cassie up at birth because she didn't then, and doesn't now, have the good sense God gave a toad to keep her legs closed.

Sharon so wanted Cassie to have the good life but Frank Barrett was a lowly mechanic. When Millie Johnson allowed two total strangers to snatch Cassie away in later years how happy Sharon was. Having trapped another dumb Newman into getting her pregnant Sharon was riding the gravy train. With Newman riches at her disposal Sharon gave Cassie the finest things in life, but alas, like she often does, Sharon blew Diego Guittierez or Cameron Kirsten or who knows how many men this disgusting woman has slept with. Bottom line: She "failed" Cassie.

Sharon's message to other parents facing a similar circumstance? "Look out for your children. Help them with things they can't do by themselves and protect them."

And then, to make her point, to grandstand and in an attempt to steal the show, flung her body across Cassie's coffin while at the same time asking forgiveness.

Not to be upstaged Noah Newman (not in school this day as other kids were supposed to be) sauntered up to the coffin and whipping out Cindy placed the doll atop it! Quickly shooed away by his father Noah didn't get to make a speech much like Nate Hastings. Try as he might to grab the spotlight Nick couldn't hold a candle to Sharon or Noah's stunning performance. Perhaps because Cassie has taken control of all candles, Nick's blathering that he wasn't sure he'd ever love Cassie because pure Newman blood didn't run in her veins was overshadowed by his moronic statement that Cassie was his daughter "in every way".

Then, because no tale from the crypt is complete without hate, Nick began spewing how Cassie had her detractors. People wanted to "hurt" Cassie. They took Cassie before her time and given the chance will eat small babies.

Always the horse's ass, Nick's rant was another irritating little side effect of your typical hypocritical bastard preaching love and democracy while systematically killing those they don't like. Please believe it's not happening. Please ignore the actual data, the brutality, focus instead on the patriotism and the soothing sound of the war drum. Black-eyed and foaming at the mouth Nick screamed repeatedly at Phyllis, "Get out!" when he saw she'd foolishly come to the last place on earth she should have been at that moment in time.

And later, after the funeral, as we already know, Nick will say again how he so feels like killing someone.

Beautiful is the logic of the great man of peace and love on the day of his daughter's funeral. All hail.

Inappropriate Attire

May 31, 2005
by Michael Kelly

Forget the tearful, moving speeches recited by grieving yet somehow completely composed and articulate family members. Forget the glaring absences of the deceased 14 year old's adoptive mother, adoptive grandmother and one-time surrogate mother. Even forget the dramatic moment in which the hysterical mother of the young man accused of causing the girl's untimely death by driving drunk was ordered by the girl's irate father to "get out" of the Church of the Good Shepherd, which is where the service was held.

The most unforgettable aspect of Cassie Newman's funeral this week was the not so basic black short skirt and shoulder baring ensemble worn by Cassie's grandmother Nikki Newman, who looked like she should be on her way to a nightclub where she could down endless shots of tequila and rub up against her girlfriends on the dance floor rather than a funeral in her sexy and completely unsuitable ensemble.

It's also interesting to note that both Nikki and Cassie's mother Sharon Newman sported similar tousled bun hairstyles. What a shame both ladies seemed to forget proper grooming is so important at such a somber occasion.

Nikki dear, your granddaughter's funeral is neither the time nor the place to prove to those present how hot a grandmother can look. If you've got it, flaunt it should not have been your motto the day dear Cassie was buried. Shame on you. Alas, the point your provocative appearance on such a sad day seemed vividly determined to illustrate is that you can take the girl out of the Bayou but you can't take the Bayou out of the girl.

The Bottomless Pit

May 30, 2005
By Brent Kellogg

Entering into the 5th of week of the Cassie Newman affair who knew there would be so many Tales From the Crypt or that they would have been so bizarre? Not me. Last week when Nikki Newman said she wondered if Cassie's horse misses her I thought we'd hit bottom.

I was wrong. It would appear the Newmans have fallen into a bottomless pit. Observe, won't you?

At the Newman Ponderosa bright and early Monday morning the family, sans Nikki who had taken the slave to the Chapel of the Good Shepherd to put finishing touches on Cassie's funeral service, was gathered around the breakfast table.

It was a charming scene until one wondered: who prepared the food? It couldn't have been Sharon Newman still reeling so from Cassie's death she couldn't be bothered to lift a finger to help with the funeral. It couldn't have been Victor Newman who always expects someone wait on him hand and foot. It couldn't have been Nick Newman for the only eggs he can scramble are those thought to make up what Sharon calls a brain. It couldn't have been Noah Newman regressing rapidly from age 9 to 3 or Victoria Newman so like other members of the family. It must be presumed therefore that manservant Miguel Rodriguez was ordered to prepare the meal before attending to his other chores. Either that, or the Newmans have heard what a great cook Mac Browning has become and called her over to whip up a 5-star breakfast.

As Victoria was about to sit down Noah let out a yelp. No sitting in Cassie's chair! As Sharon held her head Nick and Victor told Noah it was okay for Victoria to sit wherever she pleased. Cassie is dead and where she's gone won't be needing a chair.

"I know she's in heaven!" Noah snarled, making the point that Cassie's chair is Cassie's chair and damn it nobody was going to desecrate Cassie's good name by sitting in it.

Dropping down to Noah's new age level Nick asked if he thought Cassie would mind if Victoria "borrowed" the chair. Noah thought for a moment before caving in. Okay, if Victoria must, then fine. With Cassie still on his mind Noah asked if it was possible to speak with her through prayer.

Reaffirming the belief that they can communicate with the dead, and with Victor snorting what a wonderful idea it was, they all linked hands and prayed.

Dear God, please make it end.

Oops - that's the Genoa City News prayer. The Newman prayer went like this:

"Dear Lord,

Cassie is in heaven with the angels now. She's a very special girl so please take care of her."

Adding his two cents Noah said he loves and misses Cassie to which Victor said, "Amen."

His plate empty, Noah said he wasn't hungry. Right away Nick took this to mean that Noah wasn't quite himself. Was the kid holding back? Did he need to cry another bucket of tears but feared doing so because it wouldn't make him look manly?

That Noah hadn't eaten concerned Sharon too. A growing boy needs food especially before going to his sister's wake. "Let it go," Nick farted of only the most important meal of the day.

Victor did nothing to encourage the boy to eat either and instead asked if there might be something Noah would like to do before they all became grief stricken again.

Do cows make cow pies? Do bears... never mind. Noah said you bet. He wanted to tell Cassie's horse she won't be riding him anymore!

Sharon was so zoned out by this infatuation with talking to horses that think and miss their twice a year riders she personally took Noah to the stables.

The only possible event that could have made this talking horse craze credible would have been had the horse actually been able to talk.

"Cassie who? I don't recall any kid riding me. Where the hell are my oats? Is Devon Hamilton eating my Oaties? Are you humans aware I'm not getting fed on time since Diego left? Is anyone ever going to brush my mane? And please, do something about these flies. It ain't fun switching my tail back and forth all day," the horse might have said.

That Cassie may have ridden a horse more than once during her short lifetime was affirmed later when Nick said he wanted to call the wake off. "Why do we have to put on a big show?" he asked, noting that Cassie spent "half her life on the phone."

But when Victor said the wake was all about honoring the dead and that all Cassie's pals deserve a chance to say good-bye, Nick capitulated. Yeah, "She had a lot friends," he added, counting them all on one hand. Let's see. There was Ali and... and... let's see. There was Cindy the doll. Hey! Is anyone going to bring Cindy to the wake?

As Nick so declared the day Honor Cassie Day, Noah returned. So how had the chat with Cassie's horse gone?

"He's sad," Noah said of the horse. Nick agreed. If there's one thing Nick knows it's how to spot a lonely horse. Then Nick let another fart rip through the bottom of his diaper. What if Noah starts riding the horse so it doesn't get lonely? It was, didn't Noah know, "Cassie's favorite sport."

And in the event Noah wasn't aware, Nick reminded the kid, "Yours is baseball."

By now the smell coming from Nick's rear must have been ripe. Would Noah like to hit some balls? Like your daddy's for asking such a stupid question on such a solemn day? Noah declined. Nick still didn't get it. Was it because Noah was sad? Wait, isn't the horse sad? To snap Nick out of his confusion Sharon chimed in to say, "It's okay to be sad and have fun at the same time."

God have mercy. If anyone knows about being happy and sad at the same time and talking with dead people it's Sharon.

Despite the fact they must have yards the size of professional baseball diamonds on the ponderosa, Nick wanted to take Noah to a park! Not to worry. Nick said they'd be back in plenty of time to catch the wake so long as the guests didn't mind a sweaty, grass-stained boy and his Pa wearing backward baseball caps.

Over Sharon's objection the boys were gone which was as it should be because Cassie's death has been reduced to nothing more than a reason to drive another wedge between Nick and Sharon's marriage. This much we know.

For all the crying, the bad nightmares, the concern about a sad horse, whether Cassie can speak from beyond the grave, her chair at the table considered a shrine and that all the whimpering is just so much fodder became evident when Victor, after leading the family in prayer, turned right around and told Nick, "Daniel Romalotti will be prosecuted to full extent of the law if it's the last thing I do."

The great man may as well have added, "Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition" as he added his name to the long list of Bible-groping warmongers out to persecute someone for whom there is no evidence had anything to do with Cassie's death.

Hypocrisy so inflames the Newmans it's impossible to have empathy for them. The pain they feel can only be laughed at. Collectively they are despised for their purported closeness to God. Oh please kind sir or madam. Take good care of our Cassie. Lift us out of this bottomless pit. Be on our side as we march off to kill us another Abbott, or Romalotti, or Fisher, or whomever is on the hate list today.

Who's in Cassie Newman's Coffin?

May 30, 2005

About that memorial service. That wake. That funeral for Cassie Newman. We know Nikki Newman and her man servant were making the arrangements and that the Chapel of the Good Shepherd was just about ready to accept mourners, but where in the hell did the Newmans find time to send out invitations? Was it all done by telephone and email and if so who had the time to do this? Who, exactly, will be at the service?

Millie Johnson? Grace Turner? BoreUs Collins? Larry Warton? The odds that just one of these four show up are about the same as winning the lottery.

Those who will be attending are the least likely band of vultures you're ever likely to see. Neil and Dru Winters for starters. Who invited them? Was Victor Newman's call letting Neil know of Cassie's death an automatic invite? Who told them where or when the funeral was being held? Yet there they were on Monday on their way to the chapel. Funny too it will be if the Winters' adopted puppy attends the service as Devon Hamilton was reportedly working on another "project" for "special credit" at his school. Their daughter, Lily, said flat out she had no intention of going which prompted Neil to blast the kid thought responsible for Cassie's death.

"He deserves to go to jail for what he did," Neil spewed of Daniel Romalotti, proving again how ignorant Neil is.

Completely unaware of Cassie's death until they'd read about it in the paper, the entire Abbott family is now grieving almost as much as the Newmans are. When John 'Yawn' Abbott heard his sperm-stealing "daughter' say what an impact the death is having on the Newmans he said, "That's why it's important for all of us to attend the memorial service."

Yawn's contention that having Abbotts present at the funeral will be a sign of solidarity and send a message to Nick and Sharon Newman that death is no stranger boggles the mind because the Newmans and the Abbotts are much like the Hatfield's and the McCoy's.

Because somewhere along the way she stopped being one of Yawn's outcasts, Gloria Abbott was told she's expected to bid Cassie a bon voyage too. Like one of those bawling bozos who say it just ain't right when a child dies before the parent, Gloria said, "No mother should ever have to bury her child". And since she "hardly knew that child" Gloria didn't think the Newmans would want strangers at the funeral and therefore wasn't going.

While they spoke of the funeral as if they planned on going, whether Brad and Ashley Carlton would attend wasn't clear given Brad's hated for Victor. Not that she ever gave a rip about Cassie, Ashley indicated she might go as an excuse to exercise the lust she still carries for Victor so long as she could stop saying how daughter Abby is "Growing up too fast". Ashley had apparently just noticed that born November 13, 2000, Abby was three on March 29, 2004, the same day Abby herself announced she'd turned six. To say she's growing up fast was something Abby found silly.

"I'm growing at same speed as everybody," she said, as Ashley laughed the point flying high over her head lost on Brad's muttering that Abby can't stay at the Abbott Hotel because "it's like a zoo." This truism gave Ashley pause. Maybe it's time she buy a home of her own! As a homeowner Brad wouldn't have a reason to deny her the right to see Abby like he does now based only on estrangement.

By day's end the question remained: how many people will be at Cassie's funeral? Eight at last count. Five of those Newmans.

Is eight enough? Will this be a sufficient dose of sticky tackiness for anyone to endure? Will Noah make a speech? Will he make a collage from past photos of his big sister and speak directly with Cassie as onlookers, heads bowed, detached and otherworldly, wonder: who's in the coffin?

See Also: Funeral for a Photographer

Horse Manure!

May 27, 2005

As Tales from the Crypt continue there's the one about the surly, flames coming out his nose, Nick Newman preaching love and hate all at the same time. Such are these hypocritical times in Genoa City.

Nick so wants revenge. He wants someone to pay for what his adopted daughter did to herself. He blames Daniel Romalotti for killing Cassie Newman and damn-it to hell Lily Winters better tell that punk-ass boyfriend of hers that Nick Newman is going to see to it he spends the rest of his life in jail.

Bible-groping pro-family Genoa City zealot who apparently still thinks good sex means a bottle of Jim Beam and 30 seconds with Sharon Newman, Nick finally goes home to spend time with the little woman. Sharon wants to know why he wasn't with her immediately following Cassie's passing when she was just starting the grieving process. Sharon wants to know too if Nick is aware his son is having nightmares.

Nick isn't surprised. All kids in this godforsaken city have nightmares. As for where he was, Nick had to go to the gym to workout his frustration and anger after paying respects to Cassie's death bed. Not that it did any good. Nick still feels angry. He wants to "kill" someone. His little girl is dead. Somebody must pay, big time.

As for being there for his very much alive son Noah, Nick says he's too much of a "dead man" right now to be much use to anyone. This would, perhaps, explain why he nor anyone connected with Cassie's death has put in so much as an hour at their respective places of employment Bobby Marsino's working at the gym bar for about five minutes notwithstanding.

Sharon was shocked. Nick feels dead? Oh my! How will she explain this to 9-year-old Noah? Boys this age must know what their parents are feeling deep inside. Not to worry. After lashing out at the entire world Nick says, "I'll be there for Noah".

As Nick hacked on that "Nothing in this world is good" a rock fell to one side of Sharon's head. She ran off to awaken sleepy Noah then paraded him before the tearful Nick. Had Daddy been crying? Nick said he had but it's okay for boys and men to cry. Noah knew this as he and Mommy had already shed their daily tear allocation.

For Noah it was all good. Cassie said she'd always be there for the family and regardless that he knew too that Cassie is in Heaven said, "Wherever she is maybe we'll go there one day too."

Given his hatred Nick wasn't so sure he'd make it past the pearly gates. Considering he stuck a knife in his father's back and on numerous occasions said he was ashamed to be a Newman he'll probably go straight to Hell. Still, going to Heaven is "something to think about".

Up at the main house Nikki Newman was blaming herself for Cassie's demise. If only she hadn't been such a lousy Granny. If only she can save what's left of her soul by making the funeral arrangements. God knows she couldn't be bothered with such trivia when her husband, Dr. Josh Landers died. So as to further rid her guilty conscience of the shame Nikki made a donation over the phone to MADD or some such organization against drunk driving. And because their adult diaper-wearing kids are so distraught Victor Newman said he'd do his part to be strong for them by making sure the Chapel of the Good Shepherd is fully prepared to handle the onslaught of well wishers.

After a stop at the chapel Victor went straight to Jabot Cosmetics where he's been told a million times to stay out. Easily slipping by Jabot security Victor made his way deep into the bowels of the toxic chemical company where he found Ashley Carlton, the woman who stole his sperm and opposed his bonding with the resulting child - who Victor has since forgotten about - inhaling noxious fumes.

Told that Cassie is deader than a doornail Ashley seemed surprised. Wasn't Cassie getting the best medical care money could buy? Yeah, she was. But God had different plans for Cassie. And this made Victor so sad. Ashley said she knows how it is. Great man that he is, as much as he's holding it together and being strong for the family, she doesn't want Victor showing the family how he really feels.

But he can show her!

This, of course, was Victor's cue to fall into Ashley's arms and your cue to reach for a barf-bag. What a bitch Ashley is. How whipped can Victor get? What audacity of these freaks to share their emotions with the wrong people at the wrong time because it was just wrong. It was an abomination against God and Cassie and Nikki and Brad Carlton and whatever, big scary threat to marriage and family values and the sanctity of "Touched By an Angel" reruns. Or something.

But wait! There's more.

Lest Ashley's cancerous breasts and Victor's shriveled testicles have never more deserved to be nailed to a board and then pushed over Genoa City's biggest water fall, the doorbell was ringing back at the Ponderosa.

Bobby Marsino at Nikki's service. Hearing the bad news had reminded Bobby of a time not so long ago when he was down in the dumps about a certain 5-year-old Nikki had shot dead in the head. Only one thing helped Bobby through that tragedy.

A horseback ride!

"It made me feel so much better," Bobby actually said, suggesting Nikki go riding with him right then right there.

Thinking it was a wonderful idea Nikki went with Bobby to the stables and along the way had an epiphany.

Was Cassie's horse wondering where Cassie is?

We are not making this us.

Yes, Nikki. "Blue" or "Paint' or whatever the hell the name of Cassie's horse is had been up all night thinking. When was the last time Cassie had ridden him? When had Cassie last fed him a carrot or a pail of oats? Why, oh why, hadn't Cassie come around to brush his mane?

Things like this are important to understand. They make the irony even more, well, ironic. The truism remains: Those who fear and tremble and fret and make donations after the face and clutch their Bibles and their ideologies the most when death is at their door are the very ones who could most benefit from it.

Anyone who thinks a horse is wondering where Cassie is deserves to die.

A Travel Guide to Heaven
by Sharon Newman

May 26, 2005

There was never any doubt an end to what the GCN is calling Tales From the Crypt would not be coming anytime soon although as the one documenting the events surrounding Cassie Newman's death I had hoped to have wrapped it up by now.

Unfortunately the stupidity dragged on late into the week as Thursday a distraught Nick Newman worried about what is to become of him. What if he becomes "a complete wreck"? What if he's not at his wife's side during Sharon Newman's most desperate time of need? But most of all, who will save the little children?

Who will be there for nine-year-old Noah Newman who is now, suddenly, having nightmares? Why is it that the kids in this town suffer so long and so often from bad memories eating away at them like generically altered food-fed rats? Who is going to make Noah feel "safe" now that his big sister is dead? Who will turn Noah upright from his upside-down world and how would Nick know anything about Noah given he hasn't seen the kid in something like 24 hours? What will Noah do at a time like this if he sees his Pa has come unglued?

These were but a few of Nick's concerns as he spent yet another day away from his family.

And what a premonition it was. For at that very moment Noah was at the Newman Ponderosa outhouse telling his mother of a bad dream and Sharon shared with Noah that she had a bad dream too. And lo, both dreams had been about Cassie.

Noah pondered the situation. Was it true what Auntie Victoria said? Was Cassie in Heaven?

Sharon tilted her off-balance, rock-filled head to one side. Yes, Cassie is in Heaven. Noah's eye's lit up. "What's Heaven like?" he asked. Sharon's empty brain began cranking. Let's see. Heaven. What's it like? Well, she didn't know. In fact, Sharon said, "No one knows."

But then she took it back. Well, yes. She does know. "It's a really nice place," she said.

This land of milk and honey intrigued Noah all the more. What do people do in Heaven?

Again, Sharon said, "I'm not sure", but went on to say whatever Cassie is doing there, "She's having fun."

Fun? Like when she and Noah rode horses? Noah needed to know.

Sharon said no. What people do in Heaven is "even more fun than that". More fun than a barrel of monkeys. More fun than talking to a rag doll named Cindy. Did Noah remember Cassie's doll, Cindy?

Oh yes! Noah remembers the time Cassie told him Cindy was her only friend. That was, of course, before she became a Newman at which point lucky kids so named can go around ordering people they don't like to leave town and others they routinely call "punk" and "killer".

All the talk about Heaven infatuated Noah. Would he be able to talk with Cassie? Do they have cellphones in Heaven? Sharon said, sure. Noah can talk with Cassie all he wants. Why, who knows? Cassie might be sent back to Earth so that she can get her wings. It happened that way in It's a Wonderful Life so it must be true. Moreover, Sharon said when people die they "never really leave us".

This insane remark did not cause Noah to ask, "So why are you freaking out and bawling so much if Cassie is still with us and having more fun than she ever did in this godforsaken city? Why are we both having bad dreams and why is my Pa so worried about what is to become of me and asking grease balls like Bobby Marsino what he should do about that punk who killed my sister? And why is Pa fussing so much about Cassie's death when both you, Mommy, and he, flicked off the dead baby you guys had like so much belly button lint?"

It's a good thing too Noah didn't remind Sharon of those times when she fell on the ice and tripped on the carpet while wearing high heels as it would have only provided another excuse for Sharon to blame herself for Cassie's death. Instead, she regurgitated the bile that Cassie has become a Guardian Angel and will always be there for Noah, unless that is, she gets too busy fighting crime on the streets of New York City when she's supposed to be in Heaven because, you know, Heaven is such a nice place.

Tales From the Crypt, the Sequel

May 25, 2005

Now that Cassie Newman is dead strike up the band. Roll the opening credits. Let the sequel to Tales From the Crypt begin. Because that's what it will be for the next several days in Genoa City. It'll be like some bizarrely darkened coffin. A massive chaotic attack on the senses and that's well before Sharon Newman starts with the endless bawling jags.

With Cassie's body still warm the entire Newman entourage couldn't get out of the God Have Mercy Medical Center fast enough. Can't blame them, really, given all the infection floating freely in the air and the butchering doctors telling patients with 105 degree fevers to page them if they need anything like maybe a nice resuscitation.

At the sprawling Newman Ponderosa this week Sharon was blowing snot out her nose and flicking her tongue at tears pouring from her sunken eyes. Nearby a dazed Nick Newman, gazing at a photograph of the dearly departed, announced he had to get away. Unlike the death of their other baby, his biological child, anywhere Nick went would be better than at his wife's side during the second most tragic point of Sharon's life. That Nick would leave her so soon after the grieving process had just begun caused Sharon to bawl all the more.

In a flash Nick found he'd made the one hour trip into the city in record time. Returning to the hospital he walked into Cassie's empty room where an orderly was disposing of the germ-infested sheets. Letting it be known that the last person to occupy the bed had died the night before Nick watched the orderly scurry away then putting his hand on the pillow as if to communicate with the dead was interrupted by his self-centered sister, Victoria.

Victoria couldn't keep her mouth shut. She had no respect for the dead. She babbled on and on about her inability to sleep and might have said how a nice porking from Jack Abbott or Brad Carlton would have cured her insomnia had Nick not told her to shut the hell up. Nick didn't want to hear Victoria tell him where he should or shouldn't have gone. He wanted to be alone. Why or why couldn't Victoria get that through her thick head?

Because, of course. Victoria needed to be with Nick. Because this fleeting pang of sibling love caused them both to cry a bucket a tears thus washing away the fact that just the other day they were at each others throat.

How strange too that about an hour earlier Victoria had to be the one to tell Nick's sleepy son that the Grim Reaper had come to take his sister. How odd that Noah Newman spent the night with his aunt when he should have been with the family at such a tragic time in their lives. How freaky that a nine-year-boy had to be treated like a four-year-old when Victoria told Noah that Cassie's death wasn't a dream (or was it) and that Cassie had gone to be with God in Heaven?

And how very weird was it that this same kid, old enough to be playing Little League, had to be taken to the ponderosa stables by the Newman slave to watch the horses eat? Is slopping the equine on Miguel Rodriguez's honey-do list?

How colon-clenching is that Nikki Newman's method of dealing with grief is to tinkle the piano keys? Did Cassie's death bring back any bad nightmares of a certain 5-year-old boy she shot dead in the head? All Nikki could do was lament. She can't believe Cassie is dead. It's not real because she doesn't want it to be real. "Oh where is Bobby Marsino when I truly need him?" she did not ask.

"How can this be happening?" she did wonder, and as Victor Newman, thinking of who the last people in Genoa City with a need to know of the family's personal crisis hadn't he informed so he better alert the Winters clan, repeatedly asked herself how Cassie can be gone before declaring she won't accept the reality. Nor could she bring herself to comfort Nick and Sharon. Whatever would she say to them? I'm sorry? I feel your pain? Would you like some soup?

Fact of the matter was Nikki said she'd never, in all one thousand of her most personal disasters, felt so helpless. Then, as if more proof was needed that this woman is one of Genoa City's biggest hypocrites, told Victor "don't torture yourself" after he'd said again how there must have been more he could have done to save Cassie.

As they so often do, as they can't stop saying enough, Nikki proclaimed they've got to stay "strong" for their diaper-wearing adult children.

And then, because apparently they'd forgotten having slapped Daniel Romalotti with the blame for what happened to Cassie, Victor and Nikki went down to the outhouse to find a still bawling Sharon blaming herself. Oh, woe, is she. If only she'd been a better mother. If only she hadn't given Cassie up at birth. If only she hadn't abandoned her children and run off to spread her legs for about twenty different strange men.

Stella! Stella!

Oh, wait. Wrong movie.

"My daughter is dead!" Sharon bellowed, throwing in a few "Why? Why?" for good measure when she knows damn well why.

Had she a brain of her own to wrap around it Sharon would have heard when Dr. Olivia Winters said Cassie's brain was "raging" with infection. Crap happens. People die. Get over it!

The Big Mistake

May 24, 2005
by Michael Kelly

The Biggest Mistake Y&R Has Ever Made? All right, perhaps the sperm stealing saga was Y&R's biggest all-time blunder but killing off 15-year-old Cassie Newman is unquestionably a close second. Ms. Newman was not only the show's most kind hearted character who was refreshingly untainted by hypocrisy or hatred but she also had limitless future story line possibilities. What made Cassie even more of a rarity - not only on Y&R but in all of daytime television - is the fact she was one of the soap medium's few non-SORAS-ed (Soap Opera Rapid Aging Syndrome) children. She grew from an adorable 7 year old in 1997 to a realistic, unsophisticated and refreshingly awkward 15 in the present.

Compounding the storytelling crime that is Cassie's cruel, untimely demise is the fact that head writer and executive producer John F. "Jack" Smith has made it known the reason he killed the character off was merely to test the marriage of the teen's eternally dysfunctional, dimwitted parents Nick and Sharon - who, throughout the course of their disastrous 9 year marriage have accumulated nearly a half-dozen extramarital affairs between them - in a manner free for once of infidelity.

Heaven forbid Smith should have strained his meager imagination to concoct a source of non-cheating conflict for the Newman couple that didn't necessitate claiming the life of their innocent daughter. Heaven forbid it would have dawned on Smith that millions of us are tired of Nick and Sharon's marriage and that Cassie's presence was the sole saving grace of this otherwise empty union.

Last but far from least, heaven forbid Smith and his team of sorry scribes wouldn't have subjected viewers to an amateurish, preposterous exit for Cassie that was too inept and pitiful to even qualify as a campy comedy of errors.

Let us count the ways in which the events leading up to Cassie biting the dust did nothing but provoke eye-rolling from an intelligence insulted audience.

We had authorities who charged an innocent young man (Daniel Romalotti) of a crime he didn't commit because they supposedly don't know what the letters CSI stand for. We had Nick and Sharon, whose sympathy quotient was greatly diminished because they barraged the doctors with annoying, asinine questions, demanded the docs guarantee Cassie's complete recovery and verbally as well as physically assaulted both the young man they believed caused Cassie's predicament as well as his mother. We had a negligent, flighty quack factory in which a weak, delirious, severe head trauma patient in the ICU who shouldn't have been able to even lift her head somehow managed to disconnect her IV and successfully wobble out of the building. Saving the best for last, we had Cassie wandering around the city streets looking like an immigrant, middle-aged zombie woman wearing a babushka, trench coat and cheap hospital slippers moaning, "Got to... find... Daniel" like a moron ad nauseum.

Since we're unable to erase all of this madness from our minds, perhaps we should console ourselves with the fact that a once again hospitalized Cassie's final moments were quite moving. Only a soulless bastard wouldn't have found a lump in their throat when Cassie attempted to comfort little brother Noah by proclaiming herself his "guardian angel."

From a performance standpoint, everyone was right on the money but no one more so than Joshua Morrow (Nick), who made you feel his helplessness, his struggle to keep from breaking down as the life drained out of the girl he loved as his very own and his complete devastation when Cassie finally died. If Morrow continues to give performances like these, an Emmy nomination next year would be richly deserved.

We were also treated to yet another montage of Cassie interacting with the important people in her life (including adoptive grandmother Millie Johnson) and the inspired use of Y&R's theme music only heightened the emotional resonance of Cassie's fate. The final overhead shot of a lifeless Cassie being held by her heartbroken parents followed by the slow fadeout was a fitting and powerful conclusion to a gut wrenching episode.

However, the short term dramatic benefits of Cassie's death don't outweigh the fact that a cherished character with broad future promise has been destroyed and won't make the unfathomable flaws of the story leading up to her demise anymore forgivable. We'll have to find solace in our memories of Cassie and be grateful we got to know someone so unlike the other jaded, sin-infested residents of Genoa City in the first place.

Dearly Departed

May 24, 2005

Leave it to the Newman family to make a mockery out of death. Their vigil for Cassie Newman still going strong the clan gathered Tuesday at the God Have Mercy Medical Center as it had for several days.

In a fruitless attempt to reduce her sky-high 104 temperature Nick and Sharon Newman applied wet towels to Cassie's forehead until she woke up long enough to tell her brother not to be afraid of death. Guardian Angels were awaiting her arrival at the pearly gates and as Noah Newman's big sister Cassie was sure she'd be given her wings so that when Noah faces his first battle with death she'll be there for him.

As the hospital room welled up with tears and BoreUs Collins sat by fondling her rosary beads Victor Newman demanded to know what was taking those specialists he'd summoned so long to appear. Dr. Olivia Winters, still munching on Valium, reported the World's best doctors were at that moment locked in a traffic jam above Genoa City's International airport.

Dr. Winters knew this because the pilot - we are not making this up - sent a message personally to Victor which had been left at the nurse's station. Due to "fog" the plane was running late.

Having been told repeatedly that there is nothing to be done about Cassie's ever increasing fever did not stop Victor from asking again:

"Is there anything else you can do?" the great man grunted. Right on cue Olivia began rambling off a bunch of nonsense about "extreme cooling measures".

Back in her room Cassie was making a few final requests. Would Victoria Newman be sure to take care of her Pa? Sure, that's her mother's job, but when it comes to Sharon's propensity for running off with strange men it would make Cassie feel better knowing Nick's sister would change his diapers if needed.

Sensing her time was near Cassie and her grandparents reminisced about going on her first horseback ride in the moonlight. It was such a "gift." Why, Nikki Newman had given Cassie a star of her very own that night. A glimmer of light that Cassie could look up to and always know she's a Newman. As if to prove that it's better to give then receive Cassie gave gramps and granny a star too.

The talk of better days was interrupted when Olivia, butcher she is, came in to say that should Cassie need anything she was to tell her parents and they could page her. Not a single person in the room said, "Jesus! This girl could die and you want us to page you?"

Perhaps because she didn't know any better, or she knew something she wasn't saying, Olivia noted that because Cassie's temperature was approaching the 105 mark it meant "infection is raging through her brain."

Still, should Cassie need anything Olivia was to be paged. And again, his aging brain stuck on stupid, Victor asked, "Isn't there something you can do?"

"Look, fool. How many times do I have to tell you? There's nothing more I can do. Cassie's going to die. You got that?" Olivia did not say.

Beamed in directly from the airport Victor's medical experts arrived, looked at Cassie's chart, and decided what Cassie needed was sleep!

With Cassie's one-way departure from Genoa City close at hand members of the family left Nick and Sharon alone with their precious child. Right on cue Cassie began breathing hard. And then. And then?

Nick began singing Cassie a lullaby!

And then?

Fear knocked. Fate opened the door. The Grim Reaper walked in and in the blink of an eye Cassie joined the dearly departed.

Love is all Around

May 23, 2005

If you'd had enough of the Cassie Newman saga you probably had no interest in following along on Monday for fear the already sad and ridiculous would cause you to rip out your hair and scream obscenities at the wall.

Or maybe you were distracted as you waited with baited breath to see if Miguel Rodriguez, the Newman slave, would actually show up at the God Have Mercy Medical Center with homemade soup for the nutrient deprived Sharon Newman.

Whatever the reason let me herein go over the lowlights with you. The utterly insane remarks and backward progression of such magnitude there remain many references on the subject in the GCN archives.

Again making the statement that she considers Daniel Romalotti her "son", Christine 'Bug' Blair squealed how the odds of keeping her client out of prison keep going down. Moreover, with Daniel in the process of moving into the Abbott Hotel and the hotel being such a magnet for the press, what with its easy street access, the Bug decreed Daniel shall move into the love bunker with her. Doing so will further prevent Daniel from going on the run which is one the the Bug's greatest fears now that it would appear his days of freedom are numbered.

With all the running around, the gathering of depositions, the legal stuff a lawyer like the Bug must do to prepare a defense to vehicular homicide, a task the Bug is in no way qualified as she is not a criminal defense lawyer, Daniel would be easier to keep an eye on. "He needs to have someone with him 24/7," the critter actually said, adding that Daniel's mother would be able to visit him.

Meanwhile, a confused as ever Daniel said he didn't know how he's "holding up" given that he's made such a mess. The question was posed by Lily Winters who continued her insistence that Daniel hide in plain sight despite Lily's awareness that going on the run will only make matters worse.

Tales from the Crypt
At the GHM Sharon Newman's words last week, "What kind of place is this" were echoing up and down the hallways. Sharon's freakish what will become of us if Cassie dies mantra had been ratcheted up to such degree BoreUs Collins tried calming her daughter down while Nikki Newman belched that with Cassie back in the hospital where she belongs she'll get the "best medical care" money can buy. Better yet, GHM doctors are known for their ability to "work miracles" and do so every day.

Pulled from a drug-induced sleep, a new and improved Noah Newman arrived with his aunt Victoria Newman and after a round of hugs was shuttled off to the cafeteria for a bowl of ice cream. Moments later the great Victor Newman blew in to announce he'd ordered the police to call off the search for Cassie, and vowed to Sharon there isn't anything he won't do for her except maybe have sex.

Fleeting about like a flying monkey Dr. Olivia Winters stopped sucking on a Valium vial long enough to say she would be getting Cassie "stabilized" which should have raised a red flag in Victor's thick head. For all his chest thumping about having only the best doctors working on Cassie why in God's name would he allow a general practitioner anywhere near the child?

At a lost for words, Victor had to ask "how are you holding up" when Nick Newman returned before going off to read the now high on sugar Noah a book as if a 9-year-old playing in the Little League is not fully capable of reading on his own.

Having complied the entire situation in her head BoreUs piped up again. Love will make Cassie better! And looking around all BoreUs saw was love.

Words of love and modern medicine's miracle drugs sparked a burnt out brain cell in Nick's head. He recalled the first time Cassie had called him Pa, how she had said she'd always wanted a Pa and how lucky she was to be part of a real family. Not just any family. A Newman.

Nikki agreed. Cassie is one "special" girl. That she's so lucky to have him as her Pa caused Nick to have some reservation. He's not Cassie's biological Pa, but he's a Pa in every way that matters. As for his own Pa, Nick thanked Victor again for being there for him when he needed him most and acknowledged again what they say about the Newmans. Regardless of how much they hate each other, for all the times Nick had said he didn't want to be a Newman and stabbed Victor in the back, at the end of the day they are - don't you know - Newmans!

Comedy of Errors

May 20, 2005

I'm sorry. No, take that back. I'm not sorry. I know how serious Cassie Newman's life-threatening situation is but I can't help laugh. I can't stop rolling on the floor after what happened late this week at the Newman Ponderosa and elsewhere.

Told to stay at her gated ranch - with its super security and ever alert guards - Nikki Newman asked her husband, "In case Cassie shows up?"

"No, you fool. In case Cameron Kirsten decides to drop into the living room again, or Brad Carlton comes looking to punch me out for trying to bond with my daughter," Victor Newman did not say, but you know, should have given the stupidity level the why can't we find Cassie saga had reached.

Asked how the search was going a giddy Victor said everything was under control especially since Genoa City's most inept private detective "and his men" were looking everywhere.

At her mother's side Victoria Newman seemed to be taking the situation with a grain of salt. Dragging out her My Trip to Italy photo album she and Nikki thumbed through it. Florence is a wonderful place especially in the Summer when they'll be taking a safe at home Cassie there. How ever did Nikki have the forethought to take all the Newman women along? Truly, a trip would do the family good they buzzed like humming birds until Nick Newman blew in to say how it seemed as if Cassie had disappeared off the face of the earth.

Pondering this, Nikki wondered if Nick had checked the Newman Jitter Joint as if to say the one, of two most popular places where kids and adults alike can be found at all hours of the day and night, would not have been the first place they would have looked. Asked too if he'd checked the shopping center for Cassie Nick said, why, yes. He had. In fact, he'd checked "all of her favorite stores." It was quite a task what with Cassie being a rich kid with credit cards from Victoria's Secret, Nordstrom's and Chuck E. Cheese.

Distraught and frustrated Nick asked how hard can it be finding one little girl and hearing his sister's reassurance that Cassie will be found snapped it wasn't good enough. He had to blame someone. How could he have let this happen? And if, as his mother said, it wasn't his fault. Who's fault was it?

Meanwhile Victor was pulling out all the stops and admonishing police detective Hank 'KGB' Weber. Had the copper put every available cop on Cassie's case? Had Weber not said to be in such disarray he had to call in Paul Williams? Did Weber know that should he find Cassie she should be rushed to the hospital? That her life depended on it?

That the blind were leading the blind could not be over emphasized when Sharon Newman was seen clutching an old photo of Cassie and, as usual, sniveling. How could her cell phone had gone dead during one of the most important conversations of her meaningless life? Had she a fully functioning brain she'd have a good mind to sue Cingular or whoever serves Genoa City's cellular customers. And, damn it. Why had Cassie called? Was she in need of a mother who couldn't be there for her? Why had Cassie left the hospital? Was she fearful Dr. Olivia Winters would put a pillow over her face? So many moronic questions, so little time.

Checking in with his wife again Victor reported Sharon's condition. Nikki thought for a moment. Maybe what Sharon needed was some of the slave's homemade soup! God knows Miguel Rodriguez has nothing better than to bake cookies and boil soup during these crazy times. It would be too much to expect Sharon should eat at the hospital cafeteria with the peasants. No, order the slave around. Better yet, have the slave take the soup personally to Sharon. Maybe even spoon feed the slut. That is, if they could drag Miguel away from the sleeping through it all Noah Newman who had, apparently, been doped up like during those times when he was a baby.

Victor had more good news. Nick and Paul were "teaming up". Didn't that put Nikki at ease? Still, to be on the safe side, Victor suggested they "pray" God show Paul the way to Cassie as Lord knows he can't find his way out of a wet paper bag alone.

As an after-fart Victor recalled he's never needed Nikki more than now and then casually tossed that sentiment aside when it entered his head that like always they need to be "strong" for their troubled kids.

Feeling somewhat guilty Victoria chimed in to say from now on she'll always be there for Cassie and Noah. Only one thing could have made this already wacky comedy of errors more hilarious.

Right on cue BoreUs Collins rolled into the hospital. Victor thanked her for coming so quickly. Quickly? Hasn't Cassie been in the hospital for a week? Hasn't the entire town been caught in the horrific grip? Why was BoreUs the last to know? And where the hell has she been for something like the past three years?

Sharon, the rocks rolling around in her head making a racket, gave BoreUs the bad news. Not only is Cassie very sick, she's missing too!

Before BoreUs could say much a nurse interrupted to report that Paul Williams called. Cassie had been found. Not one member of the Newman family thought it odd. With all their cellphones Williams called some stinking nurse? Oh well, whatever.

Following a group hug Sharon couldn't help but recall the day Cassie was born and how she'd given the baby away. Damn right, BoreUs snapped. She should have made that girl raise her baby like millions of other unwed teenage girls. "You and Cassie belong together," BoreUs actually said, adding, "but what's done is done."

Standing on the sideline munching on a vial of Valium, Dr. Winters woke up for a moment. Paul Williams called? "What did he say," she asked. The question was rhetorical. It was Victor's cue to throw his weight around again. Whatever Cassie needs, be it the best damn doctors in the universe, they are standing by waiting for Victor's summons. Better still, they can be in Genoa City "in less than an hour."

Only the Good Die Young

May 19, 2005
by Brent Kellogg

As a rule I don't much care or think about who in Genoa City lives or dies. If asked, I can produce a long list of those I'd like to see kick the bucket in a violent way, however. At the top of that list is Ashley Carlton, followed by Dru and Lily Winters, J.T. Hellstrom and Mac Browning. Others, like Dr. Olivia Winters, Hank Weber, Paul Williams and Jack Abbott, deserving to die as they may be, are at the bottom of the list.

The creepy Christine 'Bug' Blair, the sluts Sharon Newman and Lauren Fenmore elude my list entirely. Like Jill Abbott, despite her so wanting to find her birth parents, to become a family, only to chuck all desire when doing so no longer fit her agenda, they don't deserve to die. But if something was to happen, if Jill or the Bug meet an untimely death, I will not shed a tear. I will not miss them.

Cassie Newman I'll miss.

And like millions of us across the city, I was jarred and horrified and utterly stunned to learn of her impending death. I snarled at fate's random predisposition. Of all the people so deserving a painful death why Cassie? Why the brightest with the most potential and whatever other terms you want to use to address the tragedy and believe me, people are trying everything they can think of to understand this, because this is what we do. We try to figure it out. Find a reason. Understand the roots. Blame something. Someone. Somehow.

Life is fleeting and it can all be literally washed away in the time it takes to feed the cat. What's worse, there's not a damn thing we can do about it, except get hammered, again, with the probability that Ashley Carlton may never die.

And yet here we are, the most massive and horrific death in decades. There is no available perspective, little by way of opposing opinion except of course for the turbulent eulogy yet to come. The buckets of tears Sharon Newman will bawl in the daze ahead as that's two - click - two dead babies on her rap sheet. The final farewell to make the memorial service for Malfunction Winters an embarrassing whimper by comparison.

Not counting when she developed an out of the blue lust for Daniel Romalotti, Cassie was the smartest kid to ever set foot in Genoa City. Light years ahead of her diaper-wearing adult parents, Cassie was able to outsmart Nick and grandpa Victor Newman and the best doctors when she pretended to be in a coma after falling into a frozen pond. She constantly had rocks in her head Sharon wrapped around her little finger. Cassie's working knowledge of building design and drafting dwarfed architect Diane Jenkins. She drew up the blueprints for a room addition on the Newman outhouse. She cooked and cleaned and took care of her little brother when her mother was off looking for sex with strange men.

There wasn't much Cassie couldn't do. She never asked dumb questions like, "what are you doing here", "how long have you been standing there" or "are you saying she/he might die" when told someone could die. Cassie never uttered pointless clichés. She never ordered people she didn't like to get out of town. She never went around calling people names. Cassie never killed her 5-year-old playmate or her own father. She was never arrested for arranging toxic cosmetics be placed at eye-level on store shelves.

In the end Cassie's death will, like so many children before her, like Ricky Carl Williams and Scotty Grainger and Nate Hastings, be quickly forgotten so that the survivors can milk this experience for all it's worth and haul their boatloads of hate to the next level, the next life, the next disaster.

Cassie did do one other thing. She did make me recall that old Billy Joel song.

Only the Good Die Young.

Misery Loves Company

May 17, 2005

As much as you'd like to step away from the bobble-head alarmism, the overall unrest, the wagging fingers of hissing Newman family members and the very dumb Lily Winters because you don't have enough painkillers, you obviously weren't able to control yourself if you are right now reading this report.

At the God Have Mercy Medical Center, and elsewhere on Tuesday, the madness was frightening. Nick and Sharon Newman were being more sinister and savage than usual hacking up an endless stream of what-if probability. What-if their precious daughter dies? What if Cassie Newman's temperature goes up another tenth of a degree? What is it now? 103.1? 103.2? What are the doctors doing about it? The diaper-wearing adults know, they have said it repeatedly, the doctors are doing all they can. But it's not good enough. They want new, unproven, medical methods employed. Experimenting with different antibiotics isn't working. Hell, test animals know it doesn't take long for the body to build up an immunity to antibiotics.

Nick Newman wants it straight. Time is running out. On the other hand, Sharon Newman doesn't want to hear that her baby could explode at any moment. Living in fantasyland is her choice of reality. She just wants Cassie to get well.

The doctor in charge feels their pain. Dr. Jun quips that with "luck" Cassie will survive. They must not give up hope. If it's been five minutes since this vicious cycle was last rehashed it must be time to check on the patient. Only this time Cassie has gone missing. Where can she be? She was there just a moment ago. Surely if the Newmans and the hospital staff scour the building they'll find her. Oh wait! Where is Sharon's coat? She left it on the chair next to Cassie's bed and now it's not there. Wait! Wasn't Cassie hooked up to an IV?

"What does that mean?" Sharon wonders.

Nick pops a stinky brain fart. "She couldn't have gotten out of bed and walked away. Could she?" he asks Dr. Jun who says, hell, he doesn't know, as Sharon, dumber than dirt, hurls a chunk of hate in the doctor's direction. "You don't know? What kind of place is this?"

The place is a freaking, crawling with diseased, brain dead, patients, visitors and hospital staff alike. Anyone who has to ask if someone could have gotten out of bed and walked away when it's obvious the person is gone needs to have their heads examined. Anyone who asks "where is my daughter" like Sharon did should be injected with a lethal dose of morphine. Put all of these freaks out of their misery.

Yet Nick is not worried. He's sure Cassie is "close by." He'll ask Dr. Jun about the coat.

"Say, Doc. My daughter is missing and so is my wife's coat. Do you think?," Nick blubbers in so many words. Dr. Jun says not to worry. He's alerted hospital security. Nick gives praise. He'll call the cops, too. The cops will drop what they're not doing to find whoever was really driving that car Cassie was riding in the night she was injured. The police detective will immediately place its best detective on the case.

Nick farts again. "We think Cassie may have left the building," he proclaims. Nobody wonders. You think? Nick farts again. "What kind of danger could she be in if she left hospital?"

Gosh, Nick. Cassie was hooked up to an IV pumping life sustaining antibiotics into her bloodstream and now she's not. What do you think the danger is?

Dr. Jun confirms this. Cassie could be "delirious and not thinking clearly."

Sharon perks up. Could this mean Cassie is "putting herself in danger"?

Dr. Jun confirms this too as Nick says for the umpteenth time, "We're going to find her."

A security guard appears. He, perhaps with a desire to work for Newman Ponderosa security, reports he checked with a receptionist who "caught a glimpse of someone leaving" but didn't think anything suspicious about a little girl wearing an oversized coat weaving down the hallway.

Nick farts again. Better call the Newman slave. Better have Miguel Rodriguez alert Ponderosa security because actually making the call himself would require that he have to, you know, think. Yeah, if anyone can catch Cassie it's those Newman guards so long as they aren't sleeping on their Krispy Kreme inflated bellies as if the guards have ever been concerned about who comes and goes except for the one time they detained Brad Carlton.

After Nick had instructed Miguel to tell the guards "Cassie may be coming home" Sharon rattled her rock-infested head. Shouldn't they alert Victor Newman? Nick didn't hesitate. Yes, as often as he'd spewed for more than a year how he doesn't want or need daddy's help, damn but what "if we ever needed my dad's help it's now."

See how much fun hypocrisy can be?

See how many more times Sharon can break down bawling? See how detective Hank 'KGB' Weber can appear to tell the Newmans there is nothing to worry about? That his agents will find Cassie? That his brown shirts know of Cassie's condition and if located will have the wherewithal to call an ambulance? See how Cassie's new friend, Ali, arrives just in time to get hammered? See how the Newmans pounce on Ali like the Winters clan once did to Sierra NoLastName? If Ali knows where Cassie is, if she knows what's good for her, Ali better damn well start talking because it's a "matter of life and death".

Then watch in amazement as Ali is the only one bright enough to figure out Cassie may have gone to find Daniel Romalotti.

See why the GCN persistently says that if these people had a brain between them they'd be dangerous? See why we say there is nothing "compelling" about this alleged "drama" and that we long ago gave up caring whether Cassie lives or dies and in fact wish she would die? Not so much as to put her out of her misery but because Cassie's death will put us out of ours.

How much longer must we go on like this? How many times can we ask what in hell is wrong with these people before we say the hell with it? In this case it's not true. Misery does not love company.

These Tragic Times

May 5, 2005

Except for a few of the names and a few of the places the story was the same one this week in Genoa City. Guilt by association is the name of the game.

At the God Have Mercy Medical Center a grumpy Victor Newman was braying. He hoped that with every beat of his cold, cold heart police detective Hank 'KGB' Weber will soon tell the family that Daniel Romalotti has been thrown into jail and the key tossed away. The teenage Romalotti was driving drunk and fully responsible for his granddaughter's renewed cling to life. Evidence? Who needs it? That someone said Romalotti was behind the wheel was good enough for Victor.

Also on scene was the now totally flip-flopped Victoria Newman. Just yesterday she hadn't been able to stand her family, didn't want anything to do with them, couldn't get out of town fast enough but the moment her niece got into a car wreck all that changed. It'll take a team of mules to drag Victoria away from her family especially now that she's determined the devils went through so much the year she was away.

More than for Cassie's sake, Victoria wants to stay for her brother. The same brother she could barely stand to be in the same room with 24-hours ago. The same brother she accused of stealing her birthright. Why the change in attitude? "I know he loves Cassie more than anything," she said of Nick, who at one time had not wanted anything to do with Cassie because she wasn't created with his hot, manly, spunky sperm.

Seizing on Victoria's change of heart Victor also took the opportunity to play his We Are Family tape.

"Nothing is worse than to know your child is in pain and to be powerless to do anything about it," the great man mumbled, as subsequently Victoria reversed her earlier claim that Victor is a self-righteous bastard.

"You were a good father too," she patronized, as Victor turned eighteen shades of fire engine red. Gosh, my darling, "I never thought I'd hear you say that."

While these nitwits were buttering themselves up with godly oil Mrs. Nikki Newman was plotting revenge. Because that creep, Phyllis Summers' son, is responsible for her granddaughter's latest dilemma and didn't suffer anywhere near the way Cassie is suffering, Phyllis and Daniel must move off the Newman Ponderosa. They've got about 72-hours to find a new place.

As if Phyllis didn't already have enough problems she returned to the Ponderosa and immediately began blaming herself for being a terrible mother. She should have seen this latest tragedy coming a mile away. A quick check of the calendar would have told her it's been about six months since she or her son have tangled with a crisis.

Being evicted was the least of Phyllis' newest problems as Jack Abbott, without seeking his father's permission, and with little concern that the just out of the hospital John 'Yawn' Abbott had been told to avoid stress, insisted Phyllis and Daniel move into the already crowded Abbott Hotel.

Meanwhile, back at the hospital Cassie's diaper-wearing parents were happy to see that she was "awake" as if being unconscious means a person has only taken a nap. Assuring the in need of brain surgery patient she'll be fine, Sharon and Nick Newman informed Cassie a nice doctor had cut his vacation short to perform the operation.

Claiming not to remember much of what had happened to her Cassie did recall she'd lied about her whereabouts the night before, assumed this latest fabrication would get her grounded for life and said she'd take her punishment like a trooper before Weber walked in to conduct another interrogation.

With her parents permission Cassie told Weber she couldn't remember anything about an accident. She did know she was at a party in the park, who she was with, that she saw Daniel there, that Daniel had drunk "a couple" of beers and that she hadn't.

Then it hit her. Did somebody say Daniel might be in trouble? Suddenly Cassie's mind went blank. "I know nothing. Nothing," she may as well have said in her best Sergeant Schultz accent had she ever watched Hogan's Heroes.

Off telling the family that Cassie was "awake" a sleepy Nick got it into his head that it wasn't good enough that Genoa City's top doctor had interrupted a vacation just to be at his beck and call. Nick wanted the world's best. Given that his sister had just told him that all hatred had been put aside, that bygones are bygones, Nick decided to put his two-year-long hated of Victor in the closet too as it could be broken out at some later date when things aren't going his way.

To that end Nick said told his father that while the doctor rushing to operate on Cassie was good it wasn't best. Best is better and the only thing a Newman should have access to as they always do during times of crisis. Nick said jump. Victor asked how high. He'd go to the ends of the earth to please his ungrateful son. Nick's wish was Victor's command.

The one thing Victor couldn't get for his son was a pair of balls when Nick started whining again how hard it was trying to be strong for his weak family. Sharon was bawling every five minutes and poor Cassie was again drowning in a pond of hurt. Worse yet, the doctors refused to give him a written guarantee. If anything went wrong with the surgery Nick wouldn't be able to take Cassie back to the dealer.

As they have done so many times in the past family members mingled together around the please-don't-die-victim-of-the-month. This time it was Cassie who said how lucky she is to have a family like the Newmans standing by her side even if her brother, Noah, couldn't be there to celebrate these tragic times.

Teen Faces Vehicular Homicide Charge Following Fender Bender

May 3, 2005

Accidents in Genoa City are such fun and so predictable. She must have been going all of 25MPH when inexperienced, fifteen-year-old Cassie Newman crashed into a utility poll with such impact both she and her passenger, Daniel Romalotti were ejected from the vehicle she was allegedly operating and rushed to the God Have Mercy Medical Center where her condition was not immediately known.

Summoned by always on-duty GHM general practitioner Dr. Olivia Winters, Mr. and Mrs. Nick Newman blew into the hospital within minutes of their daughter's arrival and began asking a seemingly dumb as dirt nurse for an update on Cassie's condition. At first the nurse couldn't say much but after learning the patients name rattled off an array of details including the fact that Cassie had been admitted with a young man.

The Newmans were stunned. A man? Dr. Winters appeared soon thereafter to say Cassie was unconscious, had severe head trauma, possible broken bones and other internal injuries to be verified by an expensive CT scan. Unlike the TV show ER, where family members can just barge into the emergency room, the Newmans were told they'd have to wait until doctors had finished doing that voodoo they do so well before seeing Cassie.

Par for the course Sharon Newman began bawling and placing blame. How could they have been so stupid to let Cassie go out that night? For all anyone knew Cassie was dying as they spoke. Right on cue Mrs. Nikki Newman swirled in for an update on her granddaughter but Sharon was so distraught she couldn't speak. Jumping on a pay phone Nikki learned her husband was on his way to the airport to fetch daughter Victoria Newman hopefully before Ms. Newman could board the Newman jet scheduled to leave for Italy.

"If there were ever a time Cassie needed her whole family around it's now," Nikki declared, thus assuring Victoria's permanent residency in Genoa City.

In the mere moments this all took Dr. Winters returned to say Cassie was one lucky kid for someone who wasn't wearing a seatbelt. Likewise for the passenger. As for the best advice she could give Winters said "hope" was all they could do for the time being.

Dumb beyond recognition, Nick asked what would happen if Cassie didn't snap back to a conscious state and had to be told not to dwell on the negative. After all, the worst that could happen was Cassie's imminent death or that she'd live out her remaining days in a wheelchair. The thought, apparently a bad one, of having to wait on Cassie hand and foot for the rest of her life caused Sharon to have another bawling jag.

Strange as that all was it wasn't as strange as Nikki having taken the time to stop by the hospital's billing department where she just happened to find former spit-swapping buddy Bobby Marsino paying his bill. After asking how Bobby's little wife and yet to be born baby were Nikki told of Cassie's accident, got a warm hug and a pledge from Marsino to light a candle in Cassie's name at the hospital chapel of miracles.

Back in the waiting room it wasn't long before Phyllis Summers arrived. She was immediately attacked by a raging Sharon who accused her son of causing Cassie's injury. Without knowing the facts Sharon just assumed and blamed Phyllis for letting it happen.

Having no problem finding her son Phyllis was relieved to see Daniel was none the worse for wear except for a convenient memory lapse. He did know he wouldn't have given Cassie a ride anywhere because he hardly knows the kid, however.

So far as this latest tragedy was pretty much run of the mill and to be expected it just wouldn't have been crazy Genoa City if it hadn't spun out into the world of unbelievably. That's when police detective Hank 'KGB' Weber showed up to say he had lots of questions. Undoubtedly he probably just happened to be in the neighborhood at the time and took it upon himself to launch an investigation where none was justified.

Weber demanded Nick and Sharon explain their daughter's relationship with the Romalotti kid. From there it was onto Phyllis who Weber threatened. She better damn well hope Cassie pulls through or Daniel will be facing "jail time" for "driving under the influence". The charge? Vehicular homicide.

Like every case Weber has investigated this one is no different. Without having the facts, unaware that Daniel wasn't driving, without a blood test to prove Daniel's intoxication, Weber was nevertheless hurling accusations and generally being an ass. Quite an achievement considering how asinine the overall situation was.

Leave the Driving to Cassie Newman?

May 2, 2005

Didn't Cassie Newman hear? Didn't word spread among the pitchfork-welding teens of this city that inexperienced driver Lily Winters got behind the wheel of her parent's SUV and ran her, um, father down? Should Cassie of heard this news? It wasn't so long ago. Surely, since injecting herself as a member of these little weasels, Cassie would have heard. And since Cassie is so much older and wiser than even her diaper-wearing parents how could she presume to drive Daniel Romalotti home?

But let's forget about all that for a moment. There are more important questions.

Who's convertible was that Daniel was sitting in? Why was he so distraught over not being able to be with Lily he had to numb his mind with booze? What city park anywhere allows open burning?

It's not like Daniel and Lily are the new Colleen Carlton and J.T. Hellstrom. Both J.T. and Colleen were seeing each other long before they were told to break it off and refused. They kept seeing each other on the side until their respective guardians gave in. Yet here we have a sobbing Daniel. Oh boo freaking hoo. I can't date Lily. If someone finds out I was behind Lily's attempted Wreck Center rape they'll put me in jail. There are no other girls in this city. Why do I look like Sharon Newman?

Except for the open fire it's nighttime at the park. A party is going on. Music is blaring. Park Police who were so quick to nail J.T. Hellstrom when he pursued Colleen in the park are nowhere to be seen. Daniel is three sheets to the wind when Lily walks up to say she knows he doesn't want anything to do with her so they should keep their distance.

The younger Cassie is watching. She's lied to her parents about where she is just to be here. She's got a bad case of the hots for Daniel probably because he looks like her mother. "Poor Daniel," she laments as her heretofore unknown pal with no last name Ali explains Lily is being "mean" to him. All Cassie knows is that Daniel needs a friend and she's it. She hits but Daniel flicks her off as a lowly high school freshman.

Later, Lily gives in. She'll speak with Daniel and is about to drive off with him when her adopted brother, Devon and best pal, Sierra NoLastName caution her about getting into a car with someone who's been drinking. When Lily stomps off Daniel pops another beer. His stash running low, Daniel looks for Stan the "hookup" man.

As pitchfork-wielders look on, one remarks, "I hope he doesn't try driving home" which is always a clue that the one in question may do exactly that. Cassie assures her pals she'll keep an eye on Daniel since they both live at the Newman Ponderosa she'll be sure he gets home okay.

Later, Cassie finds Daniel passed out in a convertible. But who's convertible is it? His mother's? Wasn't Phyllis Summers working at the Newman Jitter Joint? Was a drunken Daniel planning on picking her up after the party or was Phyllis intent on catching one of those $50 taxi rides home? Doesn't Phyllis drive a gas-guzzling SUV? Do they make convertible SUVs? How did Phyllis later get herself over to the Abbott home?

What made Cassie think she could drive the car? All that driving she's done at the Ponderosa? There isn't much traffic at night? A city where offices and stores are open at all hours, a city where people are showing up unannounced at the strangest hours, a city large enough to have two major cosmetics companies and Cassie doesn't think there's much traffic?

What planet is this kid on? How could any accident Cassie might get in be "bad" as Dr. Olivia Winters would soon announce? Did oncoming drivers not see a car put-putting along? Would a kid not sure of herself floor it? Was Cassie going the wrong way on a one-way street? Was a looking down from on-high Victor Newman see what was going on and maybe say, "Hey! That's the answer to my prayer?"

There's only one thing that can keep Victoria Newman from leaving town and Cassie is it.

Now the questions are: Will Cassie die? Will Daniel be blamed and if so will he and his mother be kicked off the Ponderosa? God knows Victoria won't be able to live under the same roof with the slime responsible for her Niece's accident.

Cassie and the Magic Wand

April 28, 2005

Kneel down. Put your hands together. Offer thanks right this very moment to whatever deity you desire that you are not a teenager in Genoa City. This gratitude is so much of a given you might not even need to hear why. You just say to yourself, oh my freaking God, I can only imagine.

As if being a teen isn't bad enough add another party being thrown this week for the pitchfork-welding kids who want Kevin Fisher dead just 'cuz and kids named Sam, Ali and Max never heard of before who wonder if Daniel Romalotti is bringing Lily Winters to the party when heretofore only Lily and Daniel knew they might possibly have something in common which could have led to their dating had Lily's parents not issued a fatwa against any such mixing of the races. Not that it was a black/white thing. Daniel's one and only friend is, or was, or might again be, Kevin and they'd like nothing more than Kevin locked up if not dead.

Hey, it's Genoa City. This is what they do. And these are the hatreds and fears and astounding atrocities of its culture and why you should be grateful. You should be thankful you aren't Daniel who, after not much more than sorting Hallmark cards and slurping on a few $4 lattes with Lily, was slammed this week by the Oreo-eating Sierra NoLastName for "treating Lily so badly".

This bad treatment apparently came about because Daniel never made a commitment to the again asking herself "what's wrong with me" Lily and obeyed his mother's order to stay away from deranged girls eager to spread their legs for Internet predators.

And what if Lily goes to the party? What if she's escorted to the event by the lusting for his adopted sister Devon Hamilton and sees Daniel there maybe sucking around Cassie Newman? This is what Sierra demanded Daniel explain. This is why Daniel could only say: "I can't tell her [Lily] what to do, but why don't you tell her to stay away from me."

Yadda yadda gargle spit angry teens ptooey. It's enough to make you gag. Or maybe not. Maybe what it takes for you to hurl green chunks of bile is that the now caught up to Daniel's age Cassie is hotter then a four-alarm fire for Daniel. That Daniel noticed her makeup and was really "nice" to her caused a feeling deep in her groin never felt before. Not so strange, really. The aging part given Cassie was born years before Daniel who chronologically should be eleven or the sex part considering teenage legacy going way back to Cricket Blair and Phillip Chancellor.

What? Not barfing yet? Okay, then. Check the calendar. Do you see any legal holidays this week? Do you see any for next week? Nope. Oh wait. Boy's Day is May 5. Is this why schools in Genoa City are closed? Is it just a coincidence that classes were cancelled because principles had heard of another teen party on a school night? Did the School Board degree that kids should have another day off so as to perfect their twitching and hate spewing? Could it be teachers need more time to grade exams?

Or is it merely a prelude, a warning that a pack of uptight colon-clenched teens are gathering so as to make us cringe, crack ourselves in the head with a brick and say, damn, please bring back the Glow Worms?

Yes, even before school lets out for Summer a party is needed on what should be a school night for young gullible minds in need of more short-circuit self-expression and demeaning vaginal investigations for which Cassie carries a condom. More things to make Lily's and Sierra's demonic stranglehold on the world of teendom seem like a boring day at the mall, with lots of makeup and tube tops.

Because apparently these kids don't already have a mountain of sexual mixed messages, and not a single one tuned into themselves, there must be a party. On a school night. Thongs and sexy bras and low-slung jeans. Yep, that should clear things right up. That should have Lily seeing Kevin's shrink soon asking for the umpteenth time, "What's wrong with me?" That should have Daniel developing a case of "blue balls" and the more of Cassie he sees the more he likes.

Oh yes. You read correctly. Cassie has a bad case of the hots. You can almost hear her pelvic heaviness and aching. Her parents are too busy changing their diapers to notice. They do know about Cassie's condom. They gasped, wagged their fingers and hinted how naughty but didn't take the rubber away. They made Cassie promise not to have sex until she's something like forty and admonished her with threats of guilt, sin and the fear that if wayward slackers must have sex they'll suffer the consequences of a baby or a very unpleasant STD, not to mention the scowling disapproval of a deeply hypocritical adult population, all of whom would love nothing more than to be 17 and carefree and hormonally gluttonous again, if just for a day.

Nick and Sharon Newman didn't grasp the fact that when kids start carrying condoms and talking about sex it can mean only one thing. For all her bellyaching Sharon turned right around and helped Cassie with the fine art of applying makeup without a concern that in young girls toxic facial goop acts like an aphrodisiac.

Even though she doesn't know how, Cassie wants to have sex. She wants to know why Sharon kept her up all those nights with screams coming from the bedroom and abandoned her for a year to go in search of a man better than one-minute Nick.

While Nick is too stupid to see the warning sighs, Sharon should. Sharon should tell Cassie what the Magic Hitachi in the bathroom drawer is really for. She should explain to Cassie that the best way to prevent teen pregnancy is with healthy masturbation habits. Masturbation creates kinder, more benevolent teens. It keeps them off the streets, out of trouble and away from parties on a school night. A little rub-a-dub-dub in the right place will keep Cassie's hormones in check and out of the maternity ward. That is, unless she should happen to catch a ride home from the party with a drunken Daniel, get into a wreck and hover near death for a few days at the God Have Mercy Medical Center then taken home to the Newman Ponderosa as a test to see if Noah Newman has learned not to light a match when oxygen is present.

What's that you say? Sounds like the Cassie falls into the pond saga? Why, yes. It does. Are you shocked? Do you remember?

The Great Condom Conundrum

April 7, 2005

You know they're out there. The embarrassing diaper-wearing adults Nick and Sharon Newman so passionate and deeply concerned in their beliefs that having sex at a young age is so wrong and dangerous.

After frothing at the mouth, screeching into the megaphone of righteousness, yanking their daughter's chain and pounding their Bibles as they hid their own warped sexual fetishes, the young Newmans weren't sure this week if Cassie Newman had heard their hypocritical message.

The rocks in her head rolling around like an avalanche Sharon Newman couldn't fathom how Cassie could be so stupid as to have sex at the tender age of fifteen if indeed Cassie is having sex. Despite how abhorrent and wrong and, well, anti-Christian, sex can be, Sharon said that even if Cassie is having sex "there's probably nothing we can do about it".

See? This is how freaking stupid Sharon is. Nick is just as dense. Were it not true, that these nitwits are not the worse kind of believe-in-Jesus-or-burn-in-hell hypocrites, Nick would not have said "we can sure as hell try" to prevent Cassie from having sex.

So what, exactly, is their plan? How can they stop Cassie from doing what she wants when she wants which has always been the case with this little girl from the day she was whisked away from Mildred Johnson by two total strangers?

They can't, like Terrible Tom Fisher did to Kevin Fisher, lock Cassie in the closet until she's of legal age. They can't watch Cassie's every move as the kid is so much smarter than both her parents combined. Cassie calls them dummies to their face and the best Nick and Sharon can do is go, yeah, we knew that. They can't ground Cassie. They can't do anything.

But they sure can spew that paganistic Newman cow manure. As Cassie told them over and over again she's not having sex and knows better than to spread her legs whenever the hired help expose their manly chests or Grace Turner drops by to seduce her Pa, Nick and Sharon whined how disappointed they are in Cassie. They called Cassie a liar and whipped her with meaningless dialog about the dangers of STDs which is hardly what a girl like Cassie wants to hear when she's been told she isn't being truthful.

Dumb as dirt, Nick and Sharon oozed their concern that Cassie is carrying around a condom, but the thought of taking it away from her didn't enter their thick heads. It didn't dawn on them to take Cassie to the doctor for an examination which is pretty much what Dru Winters did when she found out what her daughter had done with Kevin Fisher.

Even when Cassie spat at her parents that they were "overreacting", that she doesn't live in a cave and is more enlightened at age 15 than her parents will ever be, the bozos conjured up something they must have heard on FAUX NEWS. There's a new strain of HIV that turns into AIDS more quickly and there's no cure and oh my, how terrible it all is. Sexual education is not allowed at Cassie's school and therefore it is up to the parents to teach