The Entertation Index: August 2

Colosseum — Italy announced on Tuesday that the famed Roman Colosseum will begin an extensive remodeling costing $31 million dollars in December and will include metal enclosures in ground level arches, underground galleries and a large services center. It’s about time someone fixed up that cruddy old building, am I right? What an eyesore. It’s been falling apart for years like an abandoned mall. It’s about time, I say.

Link: Colosseum Won’t Be Restored in a Day, But Work is Finally Scheduled to Start (NY Times)

Cook, Dane — Comedian Dane Cook stunned audiences at Los Angeles’ Laugh Factory over the weekend by making several off-color jokes about the recent Aurora, Colorado theater showings at the blockbuster The Dark Knight Rises. But I think we’re all missing the bigger story here: people are still buying tickets to see Dane Cook?

Link: Dane Cook Jokes about Colorado Theater Shooting in Standup Act (FOX)

Like Twilight? What are you waiting for? Your stupid fan fiction could be worth millions.

Fan Fiction, Twilight — Been working on that Great American Novel? Struggling to turn out something deep and meaningful that will contribute to literature as a whole? Good luck, stupid — because the real money is in simply ripping off an existing property by writing your own bizarre sex fantasies about Twilight. The normally-fairly-high-class publisher Penguin has made a deal with the internet author of Twilight fan fiction offshoots Gabriel’s Inferno and Gabriel’s Rapture for seven-figures and a print run of 500,000 books. The novels will revolve around a mysterious professor of…you know what? Don’t worry about it. Just wait for the non-stop press and inevitable movies after you’ve rewarded this schlock, America. Have fun at the beach, dummies!

Link: Penguin Imprint Picks up Twilight Fanfic for “Substantial” Seven Figures, Ordes 500k Copies (Gawker)

Oberst, Conor — Bright Eyes’ singer and Pitchfork darling Conor Oberst has reunited with members of his former band Desaparecidos to record several music attacking controversial Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio and the state’s anti-immigrant groups. Critics are calling it the most  “moody and sensitive” protest against Arizona yet. Arizona officials have yet to respond and, as no one on staff has ever listened to Conor Oberst’s music, likely will never even know this exists.

Link: Conor Oberst Explains New Desaparecidos Track, Which Takes Aim at Sheriff Joe Arpaio (HuffPo)

Octomom – Notorious baby-haver Nadya Suleman, who you may recall for having eight babies in order to make some money, then stripping and making a porn film to keep food on the table, is now asking for public donations to save her from foreclosure on her La Habra, California home by setting up a website for contributions. The American public as a whole has responded with a staunch refusal to give Octomom herself any more money, but is more than willing to contribute to her children’s inevitable therapy bills.

Link: Octomom Begging Fans for $150,000 (TMZ)

Olympics — If you’re like us here at TBTS, you have Olympic Fever (among other grim and unfortunate maladies). Here, then, finally for today is a clip from the famed comic institution Upright Citizens Brigade detailing NBC’s latest coverage of the titanic sporting competition. Enjoy.

Link: NBC’s Sad Olympics (Milk and Cookies)