In your maverick Monday media column: A word is preposterously declared to be The Top, Jim Lehrer takes it slow and steady, the Mike Penner vs. Christine Daniels question, and you are invited to a Hooker Pub.

Mike Penner, LA Times sports columnist, was found dead in her apartment yesterday; it appears to be a suicide. Penner famously came out as a transsexual, becoming Christine Daniels, and one of America's few transgender sports writers. [LAist]

Ever since LAT sportswriter Mike Penner announced his transformation into lady LAT sportswriter Christine Daniels, we've had one burning question on our minds: How's she look? Now we know!

Yesterday's article by Mike Penner—the Los Angeles Times sportswriter who is undergoing gender reassignment—was a bonanza. By last night, it had got half a million page views, becoming one of the most requested pages on LATimes.com over the last year (can you hear the NYT snickering?), and 1000+ comments on the site's message boards. Today, LAT editor Jim O'Shea announced that his columnist Joel Stein would undergo a series of operations that would helpfully turn him funny. "For many years," said O'Shea, "Joel has secretly felt that his brain has been wired for humor. Hopefully, these surgical procedures will at last allow that part of his persona to emerge." O'Shea additionally called for twenty-five newsroom staffers to similarly change gender—and chronicle their passage in both the paper and on the web—or face "voluntary separation" from their jobs.

• LA Times sportswriter Mike Penner to become LAT lady sportswriter Christine Daniels. Expect plenty of stupid headlines like the one above. [LAT]