Chaps anyone?

No one should have to work this week. But here I am, at work, most definitely not working. Quick run down on events occurring around me in slow motion. 1) Steady dwindling of chocolate covered pretzel supply. We got a ridiculous (last week's Times discussed "the year in words" and ridonkulous, in about 20 spellings, including ridinkulous, which uh, not quite, made the list, along with backdoor draft (which, contextless is a very, very funny phrase) and spim (It's over. I'm already my parents. The paper of record had to explain slang to me). Seeing ridonkulous on paper made me hate it. Look how Ugly it is.) amount of food from cable networks and there was a smorgasbord of cookies, nuts, fruits, crappy chocolates all week. And Danish sugar cookies which I have inexplicable love for. If you spend eight hours next to cookies, you can say no three out of four times and you'll still end up eating about 20 before the day is done. So the supply of choco-pretzels (all that remains of the bounty) is moving from the table to my belly in a timely fashion. I expect to finish on my way out the door. 2) The girl in a cubicle the next aisle over is singing. She obviously wants to be heard because it's very loud and sound carries here. It's like she wants us to "know" she has a good voice, and maybe stop by her cubicle and tell her so. Instead we sit here and snicker and throw pretzels. 3) My neighbor cubicle just told me a story about the subway, which is the craziest subway story I've ever heard. That's quite a thing in and of itself, but when you hear the story it's even crazier because it shouldn't be crazy at all. Ok, so rainy day on the F train, post rush hour boom, but still full. Woman walks in wearing a business suit and sneakers, string of pearls, and big leather tote. Very Ann Taylor, Yuppie outfit. Clearly employed as like an accountant or ad sales exec at respectable firm. She looks around and there are no seats, so she SITS DOWN ON THE FLOOR OF THE CAR, takes out some M & Ms, eats them, and waits for her stop. What's crazy about this story is that I have never, ever seen anyone sit on the floor of the subway. And given what I have seen people do on the subway, why not that? People sit on the sidewalk, they sit on the floor in Barnes and Noble, people sit everywhere, dirty or clean. But not a one of the totally insane people, the punk-rock teens, the giggly 14-year olds, or any one else ever sits on the floor of a subway car. 4) I saw 54 movies this year. Coincidentally, I also read 54 books.

My 9 Best of 2004 List

9) The F train. Is like your first car. It doesn’t matter how beat up it gets (very), you still have irrational love. You name it (Kermit) and you call it dependable even when it breaks down every other day. This is the F train. The F train is also like a (my) freshman dorm. It’s totally acceptable, lots of fun even, and you don’t think you’re getting a bum deal on a day to day basis. Until you go to another dorm and see kids are living in enormous rooms with lake views and private bathrooms while you share a 10 by 10 concrete cell and the bathroom with 24 barbarians. This is the F train. It breaks down a lot. It never comes at night. It only comes every 10 minutes during rush hour, which is fine, until you see that the 6 comes every 2. But I’m attached to it. Even when the B and D trains made themselves available to me, I still felt partial to the F. Grand Street is no Delancey. The F helped me read dozens of books this year by giving me quality time in the station with the Mexican windpipe player. And the Chinese harmonica guy, who plays Edelweiss over and over and over. This year the F train got me everywhere I needed to go.

8) TV. I didn’t have one for most of the year. I did not have a television for an entire year. Holy Shit. I, me, soap-opera watching, trash TV-sometimes-champion, sometimes-apologist, went cold turkey and it was like the best decision ever. Somehow I managed to stay current on all TV goings on without having to waste any time watching it (except for One Tree Hill, since abandoned, and The O.C.). That’s quite a reflection on the explosive state of media commentary (if you can call it that) and my unflagging interest in television shows I have never seen. Pretty people captivate me. Not having a TV directly correlates with me not being a lazy ass, me reading a lot, me getting out of my house, and me not being really depressed. Thank God I have one now.

7) Optimism. For which, as it turned out, there was no cause. It all ended really shitty, and really painfully, but for those months there, when everyone was energized and positive and hopeful, it felt good. The comedown was a bitch, but the feeling I had looking at the first exit polls was, really, one of the happiest moments of my year.

6) The O.C. I think I’ve talked about The O.C more this year than I have ever talked about any TV show ever. And I talk about TV a lot. This season hasn’t been up to par, mostly because they’ve let Adam Brody take over the show (good things come in small packages people), but last season’s second half was also in the ’04. I got the DVD for Chanukah and became sleep deprived for the next week. Lately I’ve been thinking about how the show would be so much better if Mischa Barton wasn’t the worst actress ever, and its been blowing my mind because that shit is already so good.

5) Coffee. When we started this year together I was still trying to change you. I just couldn’t accept your bitterness. I did everything in my power to lessen it. Lots of milk, lots of sugar. But as our year together went on, I realized your bitterness is what makes you special, and trying to alter you, to cover up for your weaknesses, has less to do with you than it does my own unsophisticated palate. Your bitterness is what makes you you, and I couldn’t have done without you this year. When we started I made the mistake of favoring sweetness over complexity. I was wrong and for that I apologize. Coffee, it will never happen again: I love you just the way you are. Plus a little milk.

4) The Notebook. Was my favorite movie of the year. Suck it tastemakers. I saw a lot of movies and not one came close to making me as shamelessly giddy as this one. I can’t stand the old people. I checked my cell phone for messages when they came on. I left before the film was over, because it was just 10 more minutes of them dying. I hated half this movie and it was still best. If I was 13 there would be pictures of Ryan Gosling on my binder. He and Rachel McAdams have chemistry; something I thought didn’t count for much until this movie reminded me that it can. This movie should be bad, but the two of them won’t let it, delivering lines like “Tell me I’m a bird” so you don’t notice how stupid they are until the bus ride home.

3) Joan Didion.

2) Freeness. I talk about free food often, and this was a good year for free food, thanks in large part to the restaurant, Zach, my mother, movie premieres, and leftovers. But this was not just the year of free food. This was the year of free stuff. I scored a dozen books at Time Out this summer. I’ve snagged like 7 DVD sets and seen a dozen free films because of Variety. Moments ago I got a free bottle of Kiehl’s grapefruit lotion. And then there’s the library (see below) that provided me with films and books the whole year long. This entry could also be titled, mooching, scamming, poverty, but then the emphasis would have been on me, and not the objects I consume. I avoid the spotlight at all costs.

1) New York Public Library. So like there’s this organization that has a great new distribution scheme. They have every book and most movies you’d ever want and you go online and order them. Then they email you when your requests have arrived at the store near your house. You can keep a book for 3 weeks and the movie for 1, but if you decide you want either for longer, you just go online and request them for longer. And it’s all free.
If I was a rich lady, one day- on both counts, it’d be my charity of choice. It works. People use it. People love it. The library is an encapsulation of all that’s good about New York City: lots of different kinds of people excited and interested and learning in a cozy place with free internet. The best.

Durand Durand

Last night I watched Barbarella. I don't think I fully understood the meaning of camp before then. Jane Fonda's so straightforward, grounded even when rolling around naked in fur rugs and space suits and shtooping angels. She can't quite manage to be dumb, even when uttering the dumbest lines. She's always in on the joke.
But I was thinking about a remake. Mind you, there is absolutely no reason to do a remake. The only thing the film has to recommend it is its silliness, and it nails silliness. That being the only good component of the flick isn't the fault of the execution; it's not like the premise or the script are great. And the acting is exactly what it's supposed to be, camp central. You could probably make a "better" version of Barbarella, but that would be missing the point of Barbarella.
But, it's a fun thought exercise to ponder the cast. Because I can't image an actress who'd be willing to lounge around naked as gratuitously as Fonda, and also comes across as vaguely intelligent and innocent at the same time. Especially now, when we know so much about actor's sex lives, the big joke of the film would be the actress playing on her off-screen persona. In the original, Barbarella gets laughs by playing on ideas about sex, not on the audience's knowledge that, in real life, Fonda is a ho.
Take Pamela Anderson: totally expect her to run around naked, totally believe she's a whore, she's not quite smart, but weirdly nice (those kids and all). On paper, she'd be perfect, and so horrible. There's no fun in her as Barbarella, she's typecast. Consider, Jennifer Lopez, Cameron Diaz, Kate Winslet.

Holiday cheer

I don’t know why I get surprised about other people’s lack of manners. I have no manners. But sometimes, I’m surprised. Went to see Life Aquatic at the Sony on 68th Street, which is the craziest theater in all the land (I heard somewhere it was the busiest/ highest grossing Cineplex in America.) 2:00 on a Sunday, the show was sold out, and my sister and I got there at like 1:55. We’re looking for seats in the side section and ask these two middle aged ladies if the seats next to them are taken, as the coats on them would imply. No. The coats belong to the people sitting behind the empty seats. I’m sorry, it’s a sold out show, someone is going to sit in front of you. In fact, for trying to have an entirely unobstructed view, you deserve a 7 footer to plop himself smack in your sight path.
That’s only the more egregious manifestation of the coat-save: at a crowded screening you should only put your coat on an extra seat if you’re saving that seat. That way, people won’t have to wander up and down the aisles asking everyone, “is that seat taken?” because they’ll know the coat is not just resting on a seat for its owners comfort.
After the people behind us moved their coats, I scootch past the two ladies. There are 3 seats between the ladies and the wall, but the woman leaves her coat on the seat right next to her, indicating that we should sit in the 2 next to the wall. Because I, apparently, have cooties and she doesn’t want to sit next to anyone. “You only need two, right?” she asks me, even though the seat against the wall is obviously shittier than the one next to her- because of the angle. Plus, it’s a sold out show, so the third seats gets filled within a matter of minutes (by a woman who would not stop laughing really loudly, at everything).

Booyakasha

I've been thinking about The Gilmore Girls. Time Out and TV Guide both ran brownnosing articles this past week, a month or so after all the press related to the Norman Mailer appearance, foremost of which was the Slate article that called GG the most 'bookish,' in a good way, show on TV.
The Time Out article posited that it's not super gay to like GG if you're a boy, so don't be embarrassed to 'fess up to the Lorelai love to your buddies and girlfriend. Mistake. Loving GG is super gay.
Then the TV Guide article claimed that this, the show's 5th season, is the series best. Wuhuh? Are any of these people actually watching the show?
The ratings are up because they got Luke and Lorelai together and all the dupes out there (myself included) figured now was the time to start watching again, as Luke and Lorelai are so best. But they dropped the hell out of that: Luke and Lorelai are hardly ever the focus, and when they are, they’re flip the channel boring. It's all just been Lorelai talking, talking, talking and Rory whining, whining, whining (because that's the tone of her voice all the damn time). Entire episodes revolve around irrelevant minutia, like the one about town politics, which was way, way, way more boring than it sounds and featured more screen time with Taylor than any of the main characters.
This season of GG is fascinating because it's an object lesson in what happens when you abandon narrative as the driving force of your television show: your show starts to suck. Amy Sherman Palladino seems to have decided the show should reflect regular life, if everyone talked too much and too quirky and lived in a faux-town. In life outside the TV you meet lots of irrelevant people and do lots of irrelevant things, neither of which have any bearing on your state of mind or relationships. Stuff happens that doesn’t further the plot or character development. And that’s what GG has spent the season doing, staging interactions that don’t further plot of character development. Or, in other words, making crap ass TV.

Allison looks divine

There's an ad on subway for The Children's Place that's a close-up of a blonde tyke in a blue, white-flecked sweater making a scrunchy face. The small type above the ad reads, "Jimmy looks hot in his 100% wool, shetland snowboarding sweater..."
Jimmy doesn't look hot. Because Jimmy looks 9 years old. Maybe there are people out there who think hot is an appropriate, or cute, adjective to apply to kids, but I think they're both named Paris Hilton and Michael Jackson.
Related, there are no new thoughts under the sun.