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DOE Thief's "Housewife Next Door" Loves All The Attention
By
Ben Yakas
Published Apr 30, 2011
Modified Apr 30, 2011
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By
Ben Yakas
Published Apr 30, 2011
Modified Apr 30, 2011
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This week, Department of Education computer consultant Willard "Ross" Lanham was accused of stealing $3.6 million in kickbacks. But the story took a turn for the Bravo when Lanham's weird relationship with his live-in estranged wife, Laura Lanham, took center stage. And Lanham is perfectly alright with her cougarlife hogging the spotlight: "My life is already a reality show...You can't make this s--- up. My reality is surreal. It's crazy," she told the News.
Lanham, who has a 14-year-old daughter and two 20-something stepsons, is extremely proud and forthcoming about her desires: she blogged extensively about her dating life at Cougar Life Diaries, and in 2008, she and her friends created their own mid-life crisis website, The Housewives Next Door. "I'm a very attention-hungry girl, and I stopped everything at 22 when I got married...I'm doing what I want to do now," she told the Post.
She and her husband still live together in their home on Laura Lane, a street he built (with stolen money) and named after her; but they have separate bedrooms, and she doesn't let their arrangement stand in the way of her social life, including sending nude photos to Playboy and (implicitly) banging 'cubs' in white stretch limos. "I'm proud of myself. I'm 42 and I'm in great shape. I'm one of those people--strut your stuff if you have it," she said.
Of course, there's that small matter of her children, particularly her daughter who is justifiably mortified of her frisky mom: "[My daughter] has a problem with it. She loves that her mom has cool shoes and loves to dance, but she doesn't like the other side—where her friends are looking at me and think that I'm hot," she said. And here's our favorite part: the Post's "sources" said one of her sons had to endure his friends' bets over which one of them would bed her first. Watch out kids: who knows if the Post has sources among YOUR friends!
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Ben Yakas
Ben Yakas is a former Gothamist reporter.
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