Filed under: where the sidewalk ends | Tags: celebs, disney, i found it on the internets, in the ANGRY DOME
SERIOUSLY. Of all the things I’d ever thought I’d blag about here, I didn’t think it’d be Miley “My Dad Wrote That Song That You Were Singing Ironically Even in the Second Grade” Cyrus.
Let me preface this by stating: I object to Miley Cyrus being famous. I’ve never seen her show and I totally buy into the ‘tweener culture! So again, this is me objecting to the fact that anyone cares that she posed for partially nudie pics in Vanity Fair. Plus, it’s ridiculous that she’s apologizing to all her fans and whoever else—she was participating in a time-honored tradition of teen pop stars trying to hop the fence. You, your parents, and your handlers made a gamble and you lost: don’t whine that you were exploited now.
ANYWAY. I find that I kind of care about this whole kerfuffle. Not because she’s a role model and little girls look up to her blah blah blah responsibility-cakes. No, I’m truly creeped out by this because…well, have you seen this picture? Oh, silly me, of course you have, but I’m going to post it anyway:
The Internet is flipping out over the fact that any God awful number of people are sexualizing this 15-year-old girl, but no one seems to be stating the obvious: girl looks wrecked. And I’m not talking Alyson Hannigan wrecked, either.
Is it just me or does she look kind of…victimized? Seriously. The first thing that struck me when I saw this picture was how scary it was—as though this poor child has been assaulted and is waiting for the po-po to get the details. Yes, the picture is sexualizing a teenager, but isn’t there also a sort of celebration of how…well, corpse-like she looks?
For those of you who might not be in a position to keep up with such things, this past weekend was Reunion Weekend (and Spring Frolics!) here at Davidson. Alumni celebrating their 10, 20, 25, 35, and 50 year reunions descended upon campus to mingle and outclass each other in an event-crammed nostalgia spectacular.
Why do I bring this up? Well, being on staff in College Relations, the division that hosts these events, naturally meant that I had to pitch in and help out at the Class of 1988 Reunion Dinner. Let me tell you, if the atmosphere at the Brickhouse afterward was any indication, those ‘88ers are a rockin’ group of forty-somethings.
In related thoughts (I assure you), last Monday, How I Met Your Mother opened a discussion on a very important affliction from which so many of us suffer: Revertigo. Revertigo occurs when you reunite with someone from your past and revert back to the younger, most likely lamer, version of yourself that you were when last you were with this person.
I was thinking about Revertigo as I staffed the ‘88 Reunion dinner and wondered how many of the class of ‘88 were suffering from it as I took their names at registration. I was struck by how young they all seemed—or was it just that I was looking for the college student in them, who first wandered onto Davidson’s campus one year before I was even born?
One woman came up to my table with a couple friends and excitedly asked if a woman named Lisa had arrived yet. When I confirmed from my list that Lisa was, in fact, somewhere in the crowd, the women all squealed in unison and raced off to find their friend. How great is that?
What I’m trying to communicate here is the bizarre sense of Reverse Nostalgia I was having for all of our future selves who, with some luck, will descend upon campus in a very similar way in 2027. Will our graduating class still fit together in the same way? Will we be embarrassed while we Revertigo our way back to who we were almost a year ago now?
Anyway, friends, I am here to calm your fears—the Class of ‘88 looked like they were having an awesome time. I have seen our future, and don’t worry: there’s an open bar.
Image used under a Creative Commons license courtesy of the Flickr user silkylemur.
Tech-savvy though we all most certainly are, being the iGeneration and all, I think I speak for most of you when I say that we heart books. For me, books—the reading of and attempts at writing of—make up the bulk of my most elaborate inner wants.
Which is why The Telegraph’s list of the 110 best books that create the “perfect” library gets on my nerves. Flawed, isn’t it? Kind of reads like a Humanities 151W syllabus, doesn’t it?
Crafted of ridiculousness though it is, it got me thinking: what books do you just have to own for the integrity of your personal collection? How many books are in The Perfect Library?
I’m calling bull on their entire poetry section—not that Shakespeare isn’t essential to any good library, but seriously, could The Telegraph GET any more white, male, and British? Where’s Anne Sexton? Elizabeth Bishop? Seriously?
So I ask you: what’s missing from their list? What shouldn’t be on there in the first place? What essentials are in your personal library?
After a somewhat unfortunate and unexpected hiatus, I am back! And I come with a movie rec!
So, at first, I was going to write up a really eloquent review of the latest movie produced by Judd Apatow’s crew, Forgetting Sarah Marshall. And I realized that me talking about what a great movie it is really couldn’t do it justice, so I decided to follow a recurring instinct I’ve been having lately and just blather on a bit about how much I love Jason Segel, who wrote and starred in Forgetting Sarah Marshall, and why you should, too.
My love affair with Jason Segel began in 1999 with a little show called Freaks and Geeks. I had an inkling of what our relationship would be in the beginning, but these feelings bloomed, as they so often do, to the gentle, yet rocking, melodies of Queen:
The above clip is only eclipsed by the unbelievable scene in which Segel’s character writes a song for Lindsay in the style of…Harry Chapin? God, I don’t know, but you should check it out.
Fun fact (and by “fact,” I might mean “rumor”): Forgetting Sarah Marshall may or may not have been loosely based on Segel’s relationship with Linda Cardellini, who played Lindsay on Freaks and Geeks. Apparently, she broke up with him because he’d gained weight. I bet she’s regretting THAT as she prepares for her 43rd season of ER this fall! Her shiny, shiny career peaked with the Scooby Doo movies!
I had a male friend say to me once, “I’m heteroflexible, but in a really specific way. Like…if Orlando Bloom showed up at my front door wearing nothing but a rain slicker, I’m not sure that I could be held responsible for my straight.”
The reason I bring this up is because Megan recently sent me a picture of one of my biggest girl crushes looking simply smashing, even though I sort of suspect that Vanity Fair might have done something Photoshoppy with her legs, cause we ALL know K-Bell is tiny…
ANYWAY. Among my group of straight girlfriends, there’s often talk of who our biggest girl crushes are. Everyone does that, right? I KNOW boys do it, too, because there’s a CERTAIN FELLA (you know who you are) who is kind of head over heals for Clive Owen.
So who are my biggest girl crushes? Here’s a short list:
By the way, kids, let me tell you: doing a Google Images search of Charisma Carpenter is dangerous biddness.
So I want your thoughts—girl crushes, man crushes, let ‘em loose here. Bonus points if you’re crushing on actors I adore.
