Sophia: Rose, I found my lucky handkerchief. Rose: Where was it? Sophia: It was in my bra. Rose: What was it doing in your bra? Sophia: I was blowing my breast, Rose.
Goodbye, Estelle-- you were always my favorite girl.
Looks like another one of my favorite celebrities, Ms. Martha Stewart (Cat Stevens is the other one), has some nasty travel restrictions put upon her. Turns out my Martha has been denied a UK Visa for her previous "criminal" activities. Are they still mad we stole Trading Spaces? It's All in the Family, isn't it.
But seriously, what kind of threat do these two pose anyways? Tastefully decorate someone to death? Torture via sensitive ballads?
How about travel restrictions on loud, obnoxious crying toddlers or overly friendly passengers who insist on talking to you during the entire flight when all you really want to do is secretly watch The Hills marathon?
My freshly-updated website is up and running! What does that mean for you? Probably nothing but I did work très hard on it and would appreciate some feedback. (And by "feedback" I exclusively mean the positive kind.)
1. Oi to the World by The Vandals - So horribly 90s! I always thought No Doubt sang this and just found out they didn't two minutes ago when I Googled the title. That doesn't change my opinion that it's the worst Christmas song... ever.
2. Santa Baby by Madonna - Trashy girls who own at least one "naughty" Santa or Elf outfit love this one. This song wouldn't bother me so much if it didn't sound like Betty Boop rather than Madonna.
3. 8 Days of Christmas by Destiny's Child - Let's just say that her beau's fashion sense is very pre-9/11. Cropped jacket? Dirty denim jeans? You can do better Jay-Z.
4. Happy Christmas (War is Over) by John Lennon and Yoko Ono - I loathe this song-- there I said it.
5. Do They Know It's Christmas? by Band Aid - No, because they don't necessarily celebrate Christmas in Ethiopia.
What's your least favorite song? I know there are more out there!
Even though I was a very spoiled brat, this video always managed to make me cry during the holidays amidst my sea of rainbow-haired She-Ra dolls-- thanks Max Fleischer!
Stay tuned for more tear-inducing holiday favorites from your childhood!
I just finished Carlos Eire's Waiting for Snow in Havana and it was easily one of the greatest books I've ever read! I take book recommendations about as seriously as I take Mo'Nique's credibility as a charm school headmistress but if you're the child of a Cuban exile then this should be required reading. Not to sound all book critic-y but Eire brings to life everything wonderful and glorious about pre-Castro Cuba that has been verbally passed down to my generation and beyond since 1959. Everyone generally has fond memories of their childhood but nothing I've ever heard can compare to the endless buffet of fun that a Baby Boomer Cuban exile remembers--they seemingly had everything short of cotton candy trees! At least that is the outlook that Eire adopted once the deception stylishly known as the "Revolucion" banished everything from independent businesses to Coca Cola to Santiclo.
But I digress... if you grew up listening to stories about how much bluer the water was in Havana or what a grand house your grandparents had in the 50s, then this is the ideal book. In turn, if you're someone who's asked me "Have you been to Cuba?" or own a graphic Che Guevara t-shirt from Canal Street then you should put down the pretentious philosophy book you're pretending to read and pick this one up.
In honor of the new school year (that I am no longer a part of), I thought I'd reminisce about one of my favorite back-to-school accessories, the JanSport bookbag.
Did anyone else use those?
EVERYONE at W.R. Thomas Middle School did but while the brand name might've been the same, each and every bookbag was a precise indicator of one's social and economic status.You had the plain, all-cloth backpacks and then you had the fancier kind with the tan suede bottom; suede bottoms usually meant mom and dad had the bucks to shell out fashionable school gear… or that they simply loved you more.You also had the kids who would fill their bags to their utmost capacity, the nerds if you will, and the "cooler" kids who preferred to store their goods in their locker (or leave at home because they were so cool, fuck-- they didn't need homework!).My mom made sure my sister and I had the suede JanSport but her hopes of me ever been cool were shattered when I refused to use a locker because it was too "teenagery."
Aside from the material and weight of the bag, JanSports also exhibited other crucial factors that differentiated one bag from another.I was in middle school in the mid-90s which meant that you were either a "rocker," "rapper" or had very little knowledge of either musical genre—like me!Rockers preferred decorating their bags with the ever-ironic anarchy symbol, band logos and safety pins while the rapper kids excelled in detailed Sharpie and Wite-Out representations of graffiti tags and verbal memorials to dead friends—Mike Nesmith's mom would be proud.As for me, my bag was solely decorated with the string my grandmother used to sew the seams once my daily 500 lb load would cause some expected wear and tear.
How about you?What was your JanSport like?Did you even carry one or was that a Miami thing like Jon Secada, La Carreta and buying shrimp off the back of a truck?
No matter how nicely designed, stylishly branded or seemingly tasteful those "vintage" pin-up and Playboy coffee table books you see in the Bargain section at Barnes and Nobles are, it's safe to say that they're probably filled with naked and semi-naked photos of someone's grandmother.
Photos that, if taken today, would probably look like this:
