Wednesday, June 30, 2010
'Twilight: Eclipse': But Can We Talk About the Wigs???
Obviously I was taken to see Eclipse because my friend knows me well enough to know that, not only have I read the series, and seen the other movies, but I also have thoughts about both. Mostly these thoughts are about Mormon sexuality and anti-abortion propaganda, but also about how I give Robert Pattinson credit for wanting to be a good actor, and how I have nothing but empathy for how bonkers his life must be. Anyway, that's not what I want to talk about. What I want to talk about is wigs. READ MORE
Letters From The Gulf, Parts 8 and 9: "BP Dropped Off Crates of Bottled Water"
Dan Horton, a friend and former colleague, works on tugboats out of the New York Harbor for a living. Two weeks ago, he flew down to Louisiana to take a job on a barge unloading crude oil from the skimmer boats that clean the surface of the Gulf of Mexico. Crew are only allowed to send and receive one email a day; his girlfriend, Lori, passes along his daily email to friends and family. With their permission, we're passing them along to you. -Dave Bry READ MORE
Archipelago Books is having a big old sale on books from countries in the World Cup. Why, you could be reading great books from The Netherlands or Argentina! Instead of watching soccer! | June 30, 2010
Grown Women Unafraid To Act Like They Are Back In Fourth Grade
Silly Bandz — the non-circle-shaped variants on the old rubber-bracelet theme that clog up the checkout counters at your local drugstore and get serially banned by concerned elementary-school principals — are now a hit among adults, according to Thursday Styles! Hats off to this trendlet piece's author, Kayleen Schaefer, who is so devoted to her Styles-reporting craft that she found someone who wears the brightly colored, 20.6-cent scraps (shaped like "a palm tree, the number 3 and a monkey") on the same wrist as her Rolex. [Pic via]
Amazing Long-Lost Bongwater Video for "The Power of Pussy" Lives!
The video for "The Power of Pussy," the classic Bongwater song (with B-52s frontman Fred Schneider singing backup!), had a budget of "$1000 and $600 of that went to Ann [Magnuson]'s hair and make-up, with the remainder going to pizza and videotape stock." And: "Ann threw a big party to premiere the video and it was the first time I was ever in Los Angeles. There were tons of TV and movie stars there (Albert Brooks, Richard Lewis), rockstars (members of Red Hot Chili Peppers and Fishbone) Russ Meyer actress Kitten Natividad and even Simpson's creator Matt Groening, who asked me for a copy for his personal collection, which was a thrill." DREAMY. It's after the jump, because the video's still is a drawing of a bunch of penises and a few of you have jobs! READ MORE
Come one, come... well, I can't think of a good pun there? Anyway! Tonight in Washington D.C.! People are coming together! At the Looking Glass Lounge! 3634 Georgia Avenue NW! After 5:30 p.m. and onwards! There will be bourbon balls. | June 30, 2010
KFC Makes A Dumb Bet On Why People Liked The Double Down
Will July 5 be another banner day for the fried-food slingers at KFC? The chain is launching a new sandwich that's sort of a spinoff of its napkin-requiring, fat-upon-fat, America-encapsulating Double Down. It will be called the Doublicious — you know, like Bubblicious, but with chicken and less fruity! Here is what this new mutation, which arrives in KFC outlets just one day after our country celebrates its awesomeness, will consist of: READ MORE
What The Girls Really Say About 'The Twilight Saga: Eclipse'
What do young women really talk about when they talk about The Twilight Saga: Eclipse? We asked experts Mary HK Choi and Natasha Vargas-Cooper to fill us in. Warning: contains spoilers, multiple pop culture references and graphic sexual language! Their analysis may also cause sudden-onset epilepsy in people under 18 or over 33.
Natasha Vargas-Cooper: What are your loins telling you about Twilight Part 3. Sparklequest?
Mary HK Choi: WELLZ. I LOVED it!
Natasha: It was exactly what I desired.
Mary: EXACTLY.
Mary: Plus? The dialogue was better this time.
Mary: Last time, I had to re-up my understandingness and suspension of disbelief every 6 seconds because of the dialogue. This time? DID NOT HAVE TO. READ MORE
The Curse of the Lottery Takes Another
How come everyone who wins the lottery just doesn't know the rules? Basically, it's just like the Final Destination franchise. You are on death's radar. When you win the lottery, you must immediately stop smoking, stop drinking, stop eating meat, you go to the doctor like once a week (or you get your OWN doctor! Live-in!) and you basically put yourself inside the bubble. No jaywalking. No skydiving. No futzing around. And you know why? Because when you win the second biggest lottery in Britain's history you will inevitably drop dead, at the age of 59, just five years later. (If no one stabs you first, of course.)
The very funny Party Down, which just aired its season-two finale, has been canceled by Starz. "After careful consideration," "grateful to everyone involved," "proud," said the corporate blah blah announcing the axing. | June 30, 2010
T-Pain's New Chain Not Very Off the Chain
Rap Radar's B.Dot says T-Pain's new chain looks like "a bedazzled dildo." He's right. It does. Meanwhile, that massive medallion swinging from Kanye's neck during his performance at Sunday's BET awards? It was in the shape of the falcon-headed Egyptian deity Horus, and it cost $300,000. So there you go.
Elena Kagan Confirmation Hearings Finally Talk About Serious Business
During Elena Kagan's Supreme Court confirmation hearings this morning, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), decided to open her remarks with a question about The Most Pressing Issue Of Our Time (This Week): Team Edward or Team Jacob? One wonders if Klobuchar lost a particularly grueling game of Truth Or Dare that ensued during the Eclipse-premiere-occasioned sleepover she talked about hosting at at her house last night, and thus felt forced to ask that question for the benefit of the C-Span-watching hordes (and her daughters). Kagan demurred, instead uttering a sorta-strident "I wish you wouldn't" that sounded like her pledge of allegiance to Team I Am So Embarrassed For You As A Fellow Woman In Politics. [Via]
Until Cop Cars Can Fly, The Ground-to-Air 'Transition' is the Perfect Getaway Car
Soon reckless drunken drivers will have a new way of evading pursuant police. Massachusetts company Terrafugia has obtained a special weight exemption from the FAA that clears the way to bring to market the 1,420-pound Transition-a car that can drive on the street, fuel-up at gas stations, and then fold out electrical hinged wings and take to the sky. So with the mere 20 hours of flight experience needed to obtain a light sport aircraft pilot's license, and the $194,000 that the Terrafugia costs (70 have already been ordered), an attention-deficient booze-hound can speed his or her new ride through stop-signs and around school buses until finding a 1,700-foot-stretch of open pavement, from where to make an air-born getaway. The Transition can fly 460 miles at 115 miles-per-hour before crashing into a deep-water oil rig or a nuclear power plant.
Maureen Dowd of Arabia's Flickr is 'Vanity Fair'
Maureen Dowd went to Saudi Arabia and all she got was this hilarious slideshow of photos of herself in different outfits. (Oh and a big piece in the August Vanity Fair.) I LOVE IT. It's just like Sex and the City 2 except 1. no galpals and 2. at least MoDo pulls out a notebook sometimes. I clicked through every picture two times! Actual caption of the photo seen here: "Dowd and friend on the outskirts of Riyadh. 'It's funny,' she writes, 'to see how many people have named their camels Barack."
"This song is called 'Fuck the New York Observer!'"
-I love that song! Play it again, Wavves! In any event, Wavves played a show last night with The-Dream-and there isn't a single clip on YouTube yet. | June 30, 2010
