It's been a while....

but I haven't forgotten about you. little blog of mine! Of course, there's no time to devote to a lengthy explanation as to what I've been up to, BUT! I will not leave you with a simple "I'm sorry". That would be lame.





There. Hopefully that's enough for now.

Fun with Felines

I don't remember where I found this, but it makes me giggle.

He's a doll. He's a dreamboat. He's a delinquent.

I’ll be the first to admit that my knowledge of John Water’s films is limited. I’m not exactly sure why. Every interview I’ve seen of him on TV or in documentaries has always engaged me, the episode of ‘The Simpsons’ he guest-starred on is brilliant, and the fact that he still takes the subway around New York earns him extra points in my book. Plus his demented and kitschy sense of humor is right up my ally. So it’s a bit strange that the only work of his that I’ve seen to date is ‘Cry-Baby’ and his interviews in ‘This Film is Not Yet Rated’, plus the musical ‘Hairspray’ (which I’m sure, compared to the original movie, is a bastardization cleaned up for audiences comprised of the overweight soccer moms and their spawn that plague the streets of my fair city. And my grandma). Of these selected films, ‘Cry Baby’ is my favorite. In fact, I would go so far as to include it on my list of ‘Favorite Musicals (Stage and Screen)’ alongside ‘South Park: The Movie’, ‘Moulin Rouge’, ‘West Side Story’, and ‘The Nightmare Before Christmas’. I know it’s a short list. Sue me.
If you haven’t seen the movie already, (and I highly recommend you do) here are some reasons why it’s awesome:
1. It’s set in the 50’s. (My favorite!) Cheesy poodle skirts and leather jackets abound. Plus, I’m pretty sure several characters walk around wearing coonskin caps. When I was little, my sister and I were each given a coonskin cap by some relative for some holiday. I thought it was badass then and still do.
2. Not only does the cast include porn star Tracy Lords, Iggy Pop, Ricki Lake AND Troy Donahue, it stars Johnny Depp as the title character. I would argue that, while Mr. Depp is certainly attractive as a pirate or a gypsy or getting eaten by a demonic bed or just standing around, ‘Cry Baby’ is a little visual time capsule to when he was the most striking. I mean, look at him:


Or maybe I just have a thing for emo boys in leather jackets. Who knows?

3. It’s funny. With lines like:
“Wanda's Father: Hi, Wanda honey.
Wanda's mother: You were on the radio.
Wanda: Would you just get me the fuck out of here?
Wanda's mother: What's "fuck" mean, Hector?
Wanda's Father: Oh, Maggie, it's just a teen nonsense word Wanda uses to make herself feel all grown-up.
Wanda's mother: Your Honor, could we take Wanda the fuck home?"
there’s no denying it.
4. It’s making fun of “Grease”, which yeah I know it’s a classic and blah blah blah but whenever that movie comes on I can’t help but get really offended by the ending. I mean, does Sandy REALLY have to become a slut for the relationship with Mr. Scientology to work? She’s kind of a horrible person already, and some skanky leather pants and a smoking habit aren’t going to change that. Danny would be much better off with Kenickie, who he’s clearly gay for the entire movie anyway. EMBRACE WHO YOU ARE, PEOPLE!! Don’t let some hot guy with a cleft in his chin change you just so you can get laid once or twice in the backseat of his car.
5. The white trash house where Cry Baby and his extended family live is all shades of awesome.
6. I own the soundtrack on vinyl. That alone should clue you in to how great (or awesomely bad, you choose) the music is.
If those reasons don’t convince you to add this to your Netflix cue, I’m not sure what will. And speaking of Netflix, I’m off to add more John Waters movies to my ever-lengthening list of movies I should watch but never have time for.

Attention Future Suitors:

This is the only form of marriage proposal I will consider/accept:



Please plan accordingly.

Hodgman

As a continuation of yesterday's post, I offer this video which features John Hodgman's White House Correspondent's Dinner speech:


I'm not one of those who think that Obama is Jesus and is going to solve all our problems, but damn....I sure as hell am proud that he's a nerd.

Awesome

Famous

Celebrities I have seen while I have been living in New York:


Woody Allen


Claire Danes


The emo tool behind Dashboard Confessional


James Cromwell


Joan Allen


Dylan Baker


Scary Spice


Joey Fatone
(Scary Spice and Joey Fatone were on the same day within 15 minutes of each other. I felt like I had slipped into some weird 90's pop vortex)


Tony Soprano


Ferris Bueller


Nick Jonas (not really. This is for Sarah. I'M SOOOOOOO FUNNY!!)

This post was prompted by the fact that this man:

Gerard Butler

lives near where I work, and so I've seen him a total of three times. In New York, seeing someone three times, famous or not, is kind of a big deal. I took the same subway every day at around the same time all summer and never saw anyone more than once. When I lived in my old apartment, I never saw 2/3 of the people that lived there, and it was only a 5 story building. So, like a friend suggested, perhaps if I see Mr. Butler 10 times a genie will pop out of the sidewalk and grant me a wish. Or maybe under some obscure law he'll be obligated to marry me. You never know.

Catch Up

So I'm finally back home after visiting my family in Colorado and America's dairy-land, aka Wisconsin. I goofed around with my sister, learned some interesting tidbits about my mother's past, went to Sonic, watched a lot of TV, slept, and appreciated the absence of humidity. Obviously I did not have a single second to devote to this blog. But now I'm back. Back on the East Coast, back in my new apartment/house, back in the humidity, and back to being a real person. (Ha!) Since I a) have yet to hear if I'm going to become employed in the near future and b) I don't feel like organizing all of my crap that's currently sitting in boxes piled around my new room, it's list time again!


-I saw (500) Days of Summer and loved it. Loved the clothes, loved the music, and only had slight issues with the plot. Seeing as how this movie could categorized as a romantic comedy, a genre of movies that I typically despise, the fact that I really, really liked it speaks volumes. My thoughts about the title character can be summed up in this little comic that has been floating around the web recently:

Brilliant.

-Because of said movie, I have also been forced to add this man

to my "Celebrities that I would willingly get naked with 5 seconds after meeting them" list. Ahem. Moving on!

-This rumor (oh god oh god oh god I hope it's just a rumor) makes me absurdly angry.

-I've become obsessed with 'No Reservations', Anthony Bourdain's travel/food show, and with cake decorating shows. The first because the host is funny, I'm a travel nerd and I love food...the second I have no idea why. Because they're pretty?

-I tried to watch this movie with my friend Maggie

(aka Kirk Cameron's ode to boats, porn, firefighters and Jesus) but it was so awful we only got through half and had to turn it off.

-Did I mention I went to SONIC????

I swear, Sonic cherry limeaid is like the elixir of the gods. If someone took me on a date (cough I'm looking at you JGL cough cough) to Sonic and bought me a cherry limeaid and an order of tater tots, I would marry them on the spot. (Or at least give them a really good bj)

-I just finished this book after seeing the movie

and was fascinated with just how much the FBI sucked when it first was organized.

-I have an absurdly long list of TV shows that I want to add to my Netflix, including but not limited to: The Wire, Sons of Anarchy, Mad Men, Twin Peaks, Weeds, and Deadwood.

And now a quick story to sum up the post: Anyone who has spent more than a week's worth of time with me will inevitably be made aware of my not-so-secret obsession with Lord of the Rings. I love the books, love the movies, love the awful cartoon, loved the memorabilia you could buy in the SkyMall magazine found in the pockets of airplane seats. I would buy the movie soundtracks and listen to them over and over and over, until I had the themes to each movie pretty much memorised. Two days ago, I was sitting on a plane back to New York, watching the buildings and lights below from my tiny porthole window, and fiddling with the crappy music stations on my armrest. Just as the Manhattan skyline came into view, I paused on the classical music station and was surprised to hear the opening notes of one of the songs from "Return of the King". It was the song played at the very end, when Aragorn is crowned king and sucks Liv Tyler's face off and everyone bows to the hobbits. So I listened to the flutes and horns and strings as Manhattan glistened below me, and just as my plane touched down, the song ended. I think that was a good sign.

So I know...

...that Hollywood might possibly totally bastardize the story and make it have explosions and possible robots BUT



is it so wrong that I'm a little excited about this?

Mad Woman

A show that I desperately need to catch up with is 'Mad Men'. It would always be on right when I had to study for finals, or when I actually had some semblance of a social life, so I would only catch snippets of it and be all, "Damn, Don Draper is sexy. I wish I could wear every dress featured on this show. I also wish I could smoke and drink with such abandon. I wish actual things like hamburgers still cost a nickle. Damn, Don Draper is SEXY"......and so on. From what I have seen, the art direction, makeup and costume design are stunning, plus it's set in an era I'm extremely interested in, PLUS did I mention Don Draper is sexy? Hopefully this fall I'll have more time to sit around and watch my ever-growing Netflix cue, which now includes all the disks of 'Mad Men' I can get my hands on (as well as Fargo, Donnie Darko, The Dangerous Lives of Alter Boys, The Queen, and The Girl Next Door. Ha!) Until then, I'll have to satisfy my Mad Men cravings with this very neat promotion/game thing that the people at AMC's website came up with called Mad Men Yourself, which enables you to create an awesome looking 'Mad Men' alter ego. Here's mine:



Why can't I look like this ALL THE TIME??? Look at my cute little watch and glasses and cigarette and dead animal around my neck!!!!!! I've said it once and I'll say it a billion more times: I love 1950's clothing. I covet it. If I could have one wish, well... it would be for world peace. But, if I had TWO wishes, I would ask for world peace and then for '50's style to become all the rage so I could walk down the street in gloves and a pillbox hat and not get deranged looks from passersby. (Then I would fly to all the places in the world that are now conflict-free in my pillbox hat and perhaps have a Mai-Tai on my way there) And in this beautiful universe where everyone holds hands and wears red lipstick and pearls, I would of course need a traveling "companion":



What?