Eye candy

If I blogged about my more personal life, then I would blog about this, which really did happen, and really did happen because - in a nutshell - I'm an alcoholic and INSANELY STUPID.

What I really want to share with the world is my newfound fascination with this chick, Marilyn Minter, whose work graces the cover of the latest edition of Time Out New York. She also has a featurette as part of their "Success" profile, and TONY was decidedly NOT shy about showing some of her more... exotic pieces. Regardless, I've looked this lady up and can say that I absolutely floves her eye for pure, unadulterated glamour trash. I also admire her embrace of the pornographic, and her emphasis of its truly bizarre aesthetic. As TONY points out, homegirl really does deliver in the same mode of a man. You know, like, a man with a raging, unforgiving hard-on.

Also, during my interwebz cruise for Minter, I came across CoolHunting.com and this other photographer who is totally awesometown. And makes me want to nom.

Dance across the Rio Grande

Last night, as I was drunkenly responding to one of those soul-searching surveys people propagate across the ethers of the interwebz, I was caught up in a storm of cheesy 80s music videos while I cruised YouTube.  I must say that the most arresting and captivating piece of work was the video for Duran Duran's "Rio":

Yes, this video is truly bizarre, and full of that essential, let's-pour-some-mysterious-fluid-on-a-hot-chick, unashamed sexual innuendo.  But at the end of the day, you really have to appreciate this 1982 number as a grandfather to the neon bubble pop avant-gardeness of the 80's.  Plus, doesn't it just make you want to slam back Miami Vices while you get a killer tan in Belize?

What would life be without prepubescent surveys circulating on Facebook?

To whom did you last give the finger to?
A priest.


If you had one thousand dollars, what would you buy?
150 12-packs of either Diet Coke or Bud Light.


What was the last beverage you spilled on yourself?
Rum and diet. Or Christian Bale. I can't remember.


Where were you last night around 9:30?
Your mother's Hyundai Elantra.


How was the last egg you prepared?
Fertilized. ZING. (actually - that's gross)


Last song you listened to?
"Lovestoned"


Are you a forgiving person?
Yes. Provided there's a monetary supplement involved.


Last thing you drank?
The sweet nectar of the fountain of youth.


What is your current mood?
Drunky Malunkies.


What do you hear right now?
"Summer Love" (an ode to the only acquaintance of mine for whom I'd switch teams: AMYTANG)


Are you sarcastic?
....


Do you think relationships are ever really worth it?
Hellz yeah. How else would we learn? I mean get laid?


What do you do when you have a bad day?
A case, all by myself.


Pick a word that begins with the first letter of your first name?
Kangaroo bop.


How many states have you lived in?
Two. Unless you count the state of misunderstanding


Have you ever caught anything on fire?

My house maybe?
(I think this question means to ask have you ever SET anything else on fire, to which my answer would be "half the panties in Manhattan")


How long is your hair when it's wet?
That's what she said.


How many bathrooms are in your house?
Porto potties all the way, m'friend.


What was the last thing you took a bite of?
How wrong would it be to make two "your mom" jokes in one survey?


Do you drink soda?
Only if it's chased by a hearty glass of Bacardi.


What are you thinking about right now?
Dollas.


Have you ever been on an airplane?
A what?


Marriage in your future?
Who's askin?


Do you like your life?
Considering I was just violently ejected from from Slackoffwhileyourparentspay University. No, not at the moment.


Do you know anyone whose name starts with a Z?
Only this Mayor of Fox City.


Have you kissed in the rain?
Yeah, but I was compensated handsomely for it.


What are you doing tomorrow?
Tons of hot women. And maybe some Text Twist.


When is your birthday?
TODAY. Plz 2 hav caek?


Whats your favorite drink?
I could no sooner choose a favorite star in the heavens.


Do you have a job?
I don't want no scrubs. But seriously, only until I find a nice manz to pay for my addictions.


Do you like to read?
I read women like I read books.


Are you a nerd at heart?
Maybe in bed because I can never seem to stop giggling nervously.


What music do you listen to?
Same shit as the stuff to which I was conceived, I'm sure.

EI! EI! Oh.

I'd like to congratulate my roommate for starting a blog today. It looks great, particularly for something that was just started. You know how I know? Because she embedded a YouTube video and threw in a lot of hyperlinks!

Also she's a smart cookie and has meaningful things to say.

Holy Singing Old Ladies, Batman!

This weekend I had the immense pleasure of being one of the many Americans that bolstered BOTH of the top two movies at the box office above their competition. Friday night, my friends and I got straight up hammered and saw that film about a crazy psychopath with a painted face who runs around cackling maniacally and torturing people. Obviously I'm talking about Christine Baranski in Mamma Mia!.Not much to note about Mamma Mia! beyond what's expected (guilty pleasure plus Pierce Brosnan's GOD AWFUL singing voice), but I must say I'm a little disappointed with the audience at the 19th Street Regal Cinemas. Granted we were like two giant margaritas and two Bud Lights ahead of everyone else, but we were also the ONLY bitches singin in that theater! Seriously, we brought it on home. I know it's not the Broadway production or anything, but I sort of expected all the memaws to get up and shake it like there's no tomorrow. I dunno - just sayin. And to the two gay guys I sat in front of, I'm sorry for ruining the movie for you. I mean like, ruining whatever Pierce Brosnan didn't. And if anyone's interested, coming home to a drunken screening of Grease 2 makes the perfect double feature experience.

Saturday I had the cosmic luck of catching what seemed to be the only showing left in Manhattan to The Dark Knight. I was so in awe of what Christopher Nolan did to the Batman franchise. I remember when I was in, like, third grade, and my babysitter brought over a VHS of Batman Forever - the one where Val Kilmer was oversexed Batman. It was like, my first "adult" movie and I cannot tell you how differently people approached a superhero flick back then. In 1995 Batman was smothered in color, comedy, and sounds, and no one thought twice about what he really stood for (although there ain't NOTHIN wrong with watching Chris O'Donnell run around in a wife beater... mmm). The Dark Knight was so politically fueled and sociologically charged that it actually incited a conversation about religion between my friends on the N train.

It's such a cartoony question but really - who is Batman? Someone insisted that Batman was Jesus, which I totally disagree with but I can see where she was coming from. Really, why do we need superheros? Is the Christian reverence for Jesus the same admiration we feel for Superman? In this conversation, I mentioned that when comic books became popular (1930s and 40s), DC Comic books in particular, Americans thrived on that morally upright, wholly capitalist, polarized theater of good versus evil. That's the formula for the perfect superhero breeding ground. Unlike in the Marvel Comic books (and before you think I'm turning into the Comic Book Guy here bear with me), DC Comic superheros lived in allegorical fantasy worlds (consider the fact that these men live in places like Gotham and Metropolis, unlike Spiderman's actual New York). Their adventures did sort of emulate the Bible: they were escapist reflections of an ideal society.

Right? Can I get a "hey ya?"

But seriously, Batman ≠ Jesus.

Also, inspired by how hard Heath Ledger rocked our world in that powerhouse of a movie (as Kevin Smith puts it, he "disappeared completely into that role") and rolling along the same history-of-comics train, here's a time line that the LA Times put together documenting the evolution of the Joker - a character that Ledger proved is much more complex than what we've come to envision.

Austin Scarlett is in the mothereffin house, bitches.

The demise of Project Runway is such a sorry loss to good television. The fifth season aired on Wednesday and, thanks to numerous and correct theories that it is being quietly put out of its misery by Bravo (to spite that bitch network Lifetime for stealing PR from them - ugh! dumb whores), I didn't even feel buzzed enough to catch the first airing of the premiere. With nothing better to do, I tuned into a repeat to gauge whether or not I would be paying this program any attention this season. Good news is, I think I will (either through repeats or online or some shiiiit). Bad news is it does NOT look like this season will hold a fucking CANDLE to the previous four. And I mean like one of those shitty birthday cake candles that are an inch and a half long and half a centimeter in girth. But I digress.

Although watching these designs unfold, and seeing people in really challenging situations that force them to be innovative is always fun, the cast of this season is just so blaaaaaaaaa. They are either COMPLETELY vanilla (or "silent fashion assassins," as one boring ass Pollyanna defined herself) or totally cliché. Wow, you're a twinky gay guy with crazy hair and a cutesy lexicon? I don't know if you'll stand out next to that girl who ironically dresses up like a 40's pinup and wears red lipstick everywhere. Just to prove that they weren't above keeping contestants around for the pure sake of color and conflict, the folks of PR decided to keep Stella (a 40-something woman who dresses like a hell's angel and seems to have missed the fact that 1988 has come and gone - she was wearing wool long johns with a leather bikini bottom on top), even though she sent something that wasn't even a definable outfit down the runway:


Thank god this adorable number took the cake.

The challenge, by the way, was "taking it all back to where it began," which I think is a whopping harbinger from the PR producers themselves. They're sayin: "This is it yall, because once this mofo moseys on over to the Uterine Broadcasting System you can kiss our popularity wave goodbye." Just as in the first challenge on the first season of Project Runway, the designers were made to pick out materials from Gristedes, a New York grocery store, and make some sort of wearable, innovative costume out of it. AKA yall race in there and whoever buys the most table cloths and shower curtains wins. Yawn. BUT - ZOMG - look who came out to say hello!!!!

AUSTIN MOTHERFUCKING SCARLETT. The REAL winner of season one. Seriously, where has this bitch BEEN? Homegirl also got to be the guest judge for the challenge. Needless to say, Austin was the saving grace for this episode. If only this season's roster were as magically gay as he, maybe Project Runway would have a fighting chance. Sigh. Anyway, here's most of the rest of the designs (and more shots of Austin looking sheerly divine and kick all our asses with his fabulosity):

Apocalypto

I think one of my greatest fascinations in this lifetime has been... the end. What will it be? Where will it happen? Will I be there - or worse yet - will my kids be there?  Hopefully le fin is very, very far off in the distant future, because even with things standing as shittily as they do, I think the world's alright.

My aim in this post is not to divulge into an entire existential inquiry.  'Tis to note that (Babylink) Gawker has compiled a collection of fifteen cinematic demises to our fair city New York.  That's right - New York gets her fucking ass whooped, baby.  It's funny - why is it that in most sci-fi or horror movies, when some natural or extraterrestrial disaster (be it global warming, epidemic, or creature) ALWAYS strikes New York the hardest?  I'll tell you why.  Because, as Gawker puts it, "it looks awesome!"  Or, more specifically, it's New York: it's the epicenter of American awareness, and, in a sense, our cultural diplomat.  When the yeomen of the future look back upon the great states of the third millennium, they will look to the super powers (America and Russia and the diametric battle between tradition and progression, I think), and the metropoles that have the best sampling of mass opinion.  Where else would you look?  Kalamazoo, Michigan?  I don't think so, sister.

Curiosity is such a powerful thing.  Everyone wants to know how it's all going to flicker out.  And if anything can stand up to the forces, it's New York.  If New York can't rough it in the face of a threat, who can?  It's strange how fun it is to watch something be defeated, and it's even stranger that we all want to watch our own existence be defeated.  Nothing is more awe-inspiring than witnessing the very nerve center of our world be crushed by an imaginary monster.

In the case of I Am Legend and Planet of the Apes, it's watching the post ass-kicking that's so eerie.  In the case of Gangs of New York , it's actually watching Manhattan kick Brooklyn's ass (we all know that New York and Brooklyn were the original twin cities), and realizing what was buried forever to make way for the life we live now that's so enlightening.  We see buildings engulfed by 50 stories of element, or the Statue of Liberty raped by Michael Bay.  But anyway you watch New York falter, it's still a little captivating.

And here's my most burning question of all: why is it so?  Especially after only seven years ago, we saw the most prominent piece of Manhattan's skyline crumble in a matter of minutes and realized how vulnerable we REALLY are?

PS: Not so burning question: In I Am Legend, if Will Smith is the only bro left on that island, where did he get the gas to power that sports car?  Oooooooh - think about that!

PPS: This has also encouraged me to recommend the few minutes of apocalyptic movies

 that all should watch: def recommend Deep Impact and The Day After Tomorrow.  You can totes skip I Am Legend and 28 Days Later (coincidentally, both apocalyptic zombie movies!), but ONLY AFTER the first fifteen minutes of each - which will blow your mind, son.

The Toast(ed) of New York

I was a little insulted when my friend Caroline (for whose blog I'd make a hyperlink except she abandoned it five months ago) sent me a link to this article that ran in the New York Times regarding New Yorkers being total boozehounds in the summer. My immediate response was, "well, as for me, I liquor it up pretty much all 13 months out of the year." And then it was, "how dare you imply that I'm an alocoholic." Caroline noted that she was only concerned that I was drinking just as much as the rest of 'em.

Yet it all rings true... the article notes how, in the summer, NYC heavily resembles a carefree college campus: girls walk around without bras, casual flings seem to be so in vogue, there is never an inch of available grass on which to sit or play in the parks, weekends are typically three days long, and the alcohol flows in bachae-ic abundance. BYOB events are EVERYWHERE, particularly (and funnily enough) in open, public spaces where liquor isn't really allowed. When I think about my own alcoholic track record for this past season, I consider the fact that each week I have been drunk about three nights out of the seven, and have imbibed at least some sort of alcoholic unit on SIX of those nights. Isn't that, like, excessive? Shouldn't my liver be turning in a resignation notice? I just recently "won" my first open bar party of the season (thank you Porky's for adopting Snitch's tired but gracious old tradition), which I'm having serious misgivings about. Mainly because these past few weeks I have also been spending a collective 3 days a week in my own apartment. By that I mean spending 4 nights a week OUTSIDE of it. Seriously kids, I have a duffel bag in my office. This past Monday I went to see the Philharmonic and fireworks in Central Park, and after I polished off (more than) a whole bottle of wine, I actually let my friend drunk dial my parents. I've never had so many hangovers in one month.

.... and now this post is no longer about New Yorkers' seasonal alcohol consumption and more about my growing addiction. Aces, Katelyn, you keep livin the dream.

PS: Regardless of my shameless indulgence, I will never be as big of a tool as this douche who monopolizes the middle of the lawn and runs a friggin daquiri stand for his friends at the Bryant Park film festival:

Arthur Golden served up his signature frozen strawberry daiquiris in the center of the lawn, where 20-odd blankets were spread out for his friends.

“I always bring 12 bags of frozen mix, because that’s the capacity of my freezer,” said Mr. Golden, who is 41 and works in real estate development.

There was an array of rums to choose from, too: light, dark and coconut. Mr. Golden mixed the daiquiris using a potato masher, churning the strawberry slush with rum in a plastic container, and offered the end product to all takers.

Mr. Golden and his friends have been going to movie nights in Bryant Park since he was in his late 20s and have the sequencing of the night’s cocktails down to a science.

“Elisha brings sangria, Ian brings margaritas and David brings prosecco,” he said.

...? Whatever dude. Just get hammered on your fruity drinks and watch another episode of Frasier.

Finally this blog has some effin relevance in the world.

Holy shet!

My favorite VH1 commentator - or maybe the best talking head in the history of anything in the universe - Michael Ian Black, has challenged Tucker Max to a deathmatch. And in true (drunken) alpha male form, Tucker has heartily risen to the bait. Hurrah. My money's on Tucker, because he is like five times the size of Black with ten times the wired adrenaline, but Michael Ian Black does have that advantage of, you know, fully functional nerve endings and is like, a whole immune system ahead.

Michael Ian Black, by the by, is some hot ass shit right now. Not only because he's the only one worth watching on VH1's new nostalgia fest I Love the New Millennium, but also because he's June's Hot Slut of the Month on Dlisted. I'd post a video of him being filarious on VH1, but that's tired. Here he is in the greatest cinematic tour de force that God ever had the mercy to bestow upon mankind, Wet Hot American Summer:



UPDATE: Michael Ian Black roars with excitement! Tucker responds, "I assume that he is kidding about this. I am not at all. Once he realizes I am completely serious and that this means he is going to get punched in the face, I doubt he'll be as eager as he is now."

Dick Lit

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New Favorites! Or, longest post ever.

1. NOT eating avocado roll every day. For srsly. I love buying my groceries, making dinners and packing lunches (even if it's just sandwiches since we never called the gas company) and saving myself that $10/day. The economy is wack, yall. Your girl can't be wastin G's on anything other than hooch.

2. Summer film festival in Bryant Park. There's nothing like getting off work, heading straight to (probably) my favorite place in Manhattan - Bryant Park, eating cheese, getting wasted on the lawn, and waiting to watch a dumb old-timey movie. The past few times I've gone the films have been boring as H-E-double hockey sticks, but being able to lie back and stare at the tips of sky scrapers under a totally open sky, hearing the far-off sounds of cosmopolitanism, and listening to the crackly mid-century voices of Turner Classic movie stars is really surreal. I tend to get a little TOO drunkies, and once all the wine's done I decide to sing theme songs or mock people on neighboring blankets loudly, and that spending 45 minutes on a train rather than finishing a story I haven't paid attention to is more important, but regardless, the two hours prior are golden summer moments. (Also, props to NYC Parks Commission for making the bathrooms there literally look like bathrooms at the fucking Rainbow Room. Yes. I've tried them. Two toilet paper rolls up!)

3. Going home. I used to come down on myself for being too much of a baby to not stay in the city for more than a month or two at a time, but fuck that. My family rocks hardcore, my mom's a hot ass bitch, and we threw a fucking kick-ass party at our joint this weekend. I come from one hot brood, yall.

4. Being employed. Duh.

5. VH1's new dark horse I Love Money. I know I said I was so disappointed in VH1 in my last post, and to be truthful, I am. The way they pinch off no-fuss reality shit shows, recycling tired old characters who we can all clock in at 15:01, really bastardizes the great channel I grew up with. And the title? "I Love Money"? Holy shit, VH1, you never cease to astound us with the things you come up with. Especially because 75% of your programming now starts with "I Love ___" or is book-ended as "Best ___ Ever."

But I digress. The title of this post is "New Favorites," and I must admit that since I try everything once (thatswhatshesaid) I HAVE lent VH1's new craptacular experiment the privilege of my attention. And - oh shit - I'm hooked. Natch. It's like MTV's Real World/ Road Rules Challenge, except everyone comes in already being hilarious - ain't no semblance of dignity here. What's more, it actually looks like (despite their ruthless efforts to become real actors) people actually seem to get along! Here's a video of the first contestant to get the boot talkin some sexist STD smack. Oh, Midget Mac you will (not) be missed, you bite-size little nugget of douche.

VH1 TV Shows

Music Videos

Celebrity Photos

News & Gossip

6. My neighborhood. For the longest time I thought that I had rushed into settling into anapartment in which I'd never be fully content, mainly because it was like eons from the L (or the G) train and way too close to the BQE. I thought the only thing that surrounded me was a Staples, a McDonalds, and really really shitty fall-out shelter type delis that were only good for selling candy bars and mediocre Boar's Head. But tis not so. Recent excursions have brought me around greater Greenpoint (which really is only in the opposite direction of the L - shame on my nonadventurous self!), and I've discovered it's actually SO lovely. And I actually CAN access a grocery store and laundry place. I've been running (yeah you heard me!) around McGolrick Park, which is flanked by two very pretty churches, a 19th-century public school, and tons of trees. Inside the park are really gorgeous paths littered with benches, some gorgeous statues, a neoclassical pavillion, a dog run, and billions of kids riding bikes and catching fireflies. Sound fruity? It totally is. But it's so much better than the situation I thought I was in. Brooklyn, I actually DO heart you. And if you need any more evidence that Greenpoint does not equal shithole, then check out this dude's little vignettes on the hood in Lost City, which include two McGolrick park inhabitants: the "Luncheonette/Fountain" corpse and the Palace Cafe. Which I have yet to try.

7. Speaking of - Lost City! Loves how this guy unearths the past of some facades of what we'd typically refer to as tack city - or look past all together. I'm puttin this bitch in Babylinks.

8. Boys you can find state side. Take it from Estelle, Kanye, and my new favorite jam: