Isn't it the worst????!!!!

... when you "discovered" some magical, wonderful, insatiable artist like, eight years ago, and then suddenly they're famous. No, seriously, Lady GaGa, I'm happy for you. But A) release your fucking soon to be fawesome album already, and B) play the shit you played at the club and stop letting the record bitches over process it. You know what, I'm not even like a "music aficionado" or anything --- I HEARD YOUR SONG ON MYSPACE --- but I'm mad that the economy chooses to favor you in a well-deserved limelight that's two minutes too late. And when I can barely afford to buy shit from the breakfast cart on 47th and Lex in the morning.

You know what, whatever. Here's the source of my wrath: the recent, toned-down-yet-still-pleasant sounds of the Virgins, and their "latest"....

PS: I still love you, Virgins...

PPS: Love the Robyn Bird shout-out for the "Private Affair" video. (Yes, I know who Robin Byrd is. Don't pretend like you don't.)

When men was men and dames was dames

I haven't paid any heed to this blog in so long - I'm a terrible parent. And then I choose to steal away to it during work. Shame on me!

But. Speaking of mixing leisure with work, I have a new obsession. And it doesn't come from a bar well or the Gawker media network! No, lately I have been fully ensconced in AMC's beautiful confection Mad Men, an ode to the sexist, elitist, Kennedy-era executive kingdom of skirt chasers and four-martini lunches. (As per usual, I am once again slow on the latest brilliant pop culture uptake, as Mad Men has already been lauded by publications like Vanity Fair and graced the cover of Entertainment Weekly.) It's funny, because as misogynistic and philosophically concrete as the time was, there's something still so appealing and captivating about the gloss of it all: the economic optimism, the epicurian habbits of wining(scotching) and dining(smoking), and the impeccable approach to sex and how to sell it. I remember stories of my grandfather (though not in advertising, a thirsty member of Washington's lawyer crowd after he was swiftly ushered out of Kennedy's State Department) spending more time guzzling down lunch than inquiring about his wife and four children. Sure, it sounds a little irresponsible, but as the alpha female of Mad Men, Joan Holloway, says of the behavior, "isn't it the best?"

To sum up the mantra in one scene, here's SterlingCooper's resident slimeball, Pete Campbell, musing for the non-con, ambitious secretary Peggy Olson his idyllic vision for existence:



Fucking hurrah for chauvenism.

I'll have what she's having.

Here's hoping that my substance abuse impediments never find this sort of affect on my social skills.

After catching up on the last few episodes of Project Runway on YouTube, one of the thumbnails under the "project runway" search list really caught my eye. Here it is for your viewing pleasure - I hope you start to feel as uncomfortable as I was watching it. Luckily Tim Gunn shatters the icy wall of "WTF"ness by declaring a most decidedly out-of-character exclamation that puts his "holla atcha boy" moment with "that little gay grommet" Blayne to shame. Never have I loved the man more. Enjoy:

SUCKS FOR YOU!

(... that's what they should've called it.)

Tonight marked a few firsts for me:

1. The first time I ate at least a quarter pound of bucheron all on my lonesome (thanks, FRIENDS, for being ladies and not helping me polish it off).


2. The first time I came home to find my roommate there before me AND asleep.


3. The first time I threw away not only a food stuff, but an alcoholic stuff! I cannot believe I tossed at least a quarter bottle of my $13.95 bottle of Placido pino grigio. Perish the thought!


4. The first time I sat up straight and paid legitimate attention to an old, black-and-white, mid-century-accented Bryant Park lawn movie. You know, until I got back from a trip to the bathroom and fell asleep.


5. And tying in with such rapt curiosity, the first time I had ever consumed a full Alfred Hitchcock feature. Considering my twisted, dark, and absolutely unforgiving penchant for the "what-if?", I find this simply appalling and unacceptable.
   

Such were my musings after my viewing of the movie Lifeboat. 'Twas a propagandist(?) WWII cross of and Survivor, Titanic, and Lord of the Flies wherein the folks left to their own devices in the middle of Fucked Avenue and Screwed Boulevard must decide what truly matters in this world we call HUMAN life. Do we work in the interest of MEMEMEMEMEMEME or do we put in (or out) for the greater of the common good? Do we sacrifice our most prized possessions, our own body parts, our loyalty, our kin, or (horror of horrors) our own selves for the pure understanding that the survival of just six living bodies is better than that of just our own?

As Hitchcock virgin, I felt that this little project he pinched out for Twentieth Century Fox c/o John Steinbeck (in 1944 - before the landlord of the Twilight Zone became a mainstream icon in pop culture - but wholly private - mental terrorism) was an apt introduction. It has enough psychological mindfuckery to make you wonder why the bosses of HBO's Bryant Park Summer Film Festival would sick it on a group of after-5 drunken 20-somethings looking for a summer Monday release, but not enough evil perversion to trump other, more perverted films. Because really, can you get any saner with this man? My roommate, a true old-timey movie afficianado (her dad can name ever Oscar winner since like 1325) insists that Lifeboat isn't as an appropriate first film as Rear Window, but I aint complainin. Lo, my Hitchcock naïvété welcomes the enlightened insight of those better versed in the man's portfolio.