The obligatory bash Britney post

Okay, so I'm officially too old to be watching the MTV Video Music Awards -- so old that I practically did a fist-pump when Justin Timberlake kept asking the channel to start playing videos again (as in, I still remember when they played videos) -- but as a pop culture observer, I felt I had to see Britney make a fool of herself yet again. Thankfully, she obliged me.

That may have been the most embarrassing live TV musical performance since Ahslee Simpson did her little hoedown on "SNL," and Ashlee hadn't been spiraling out of control in public for several years leading up to that point. Britney looked bored, could barely bother to lip sync convincingly, was afraid of walking in those boots, let alone dance in them, and was of course immediately followed by Sarah Silverman. The only plus was that I thought she looked to be in pretty good shape, but I appear to be in the minority on that, judging from a brief skim of the blogosphere.

Compare her to, say, Chris Brown, who was also lip-syncing and not putting much effort into hiding that, but who at least danced up a storm for our troubles. It almost made me forgive Josh Schwartz for casting him as the band geek on "The O.C." last season.

So, Britney Spears: done? It's not like anyone's paid any attention to her music in a long time anyway, and this couldn't have helped.