beret

In my first job after college, I wasn’t above taking things from Lost and Found. (Who am I kidding, I still totally do it.) Anyway, at the first job, there was this beautiful black-yarn, Donna Karan, expensive beret in my office Lost and Found, and since it went unclaimed for weeks, I decided to add it to my wardrobe. I wore it every day for two weeks — loved every minute of it. Felt like a million bucks and it was the most stylish piece of clothing I ever owned. Everyone in the office, and I mean everyone, saw me in it and passed on compliments. At the end of those two weeks, I found out the hat was owned by the CEO’s wife. I still remember coming in one morning to my cubicle where she was waiting for me one morning. She said (very nicely I have to say) “I believe you have my hat.”

Dude, did I want to melt into the floor or what? That was SO embarrassing.

private practice question

Yes, I know, I watch too much TV, but question — there’s a character on this show who’s a SWAT guy and every time you see him, he always wears a black t-shirt with “SWAT” on the front. Is this normal, or just a TV version of real life? It just seems insecure that SWAT guys would need everyone to know that they’re SWAT all the time.

Rob Pantene

This is the picture of the kid who is playing the romantic lead in the mammoth “Twilight,” the teen vampire love story that makes 13-year-old girls and me weep with joy. I googled the guy’s previous big role, as Cedric in the “Harry Potter” story, and I am just floored by how you look changes during adolescence. Can you believe how much this kid’s face literally shifted? I guess he lucked out, huh. He looks like a Gossip Girl kind of guy now. I don’t remember his last name — it’s French sounding and awfully close to Pantene.

Noah Wyle

You ever think about Noah Wyle? I know, me neither. He’s an odd type — like he’s really good-looking but also incredibly nerdy. Like Steve Jobs was a great role for him. I saw previews for his made-for-TV movie “The Librarian,” which looks a little bit of an adventure flick for … a librarian. The librarian part is perfect, the adventure part — a little harder to believe. Like he should play an IT guy or a graphic designer who really likes to talk about fonts.

And another random celebrity thought, you know who’s making it through this economy a.o.k.? Norah Jones. Remember that picture they showed of her dumpy Williamsburg apartment before that Come Away record came out? Now she’s got four-floor apartment in the East Village with a floor devoted exclusively to music. Nice.

Joan Miro at MOMA

Is it me? I don’t think I can see this dude’s paintings any more. Can any one else? (Jen?) I feel like the MOMA just recycles five painters over and over again: Miro, Van Gogh, Picasso, Braque and maybe that’s the point of “modern” art, maybe those are the dudes who are part of this movement, and I’m missing the point, but don’t people like to see something new? That’s why I like contemporary art, even if it’s as random as a blank yellow canvas entitled “Happiness #148.”

In the Heights

Just saw this show last night and it’s AMAZING. Takes place in Washington Heights, has songs but also a lot of amazing rapping and hip hop dancing. In general, I’m not a fan of musical theater because of the steadfast refusal to act, but in this show, the actors are actually acting on stage, even while singing — that, on top of the decent story line sucked me in. When I hear someone who can REALLY sing wail in a song, it gives me goose bumps. Man, if I could sing like that, I would NEVER shut up. I’d sing doing the dishes, getting ready for work, doing laundry, presenting a power point on cost savings, all of it.

The guy who wrote it as one of the leads and raps/spoken words his way through the show and he’s amazing and performs with heart. And the whole show is really different from Broadway, like it was good at capturing something about real life without Disneyfying it, so that there’s still something recognizeable of Washington Heights, Latin, urban/hip-hop culture on stage without being cheesy. Usually, when a show gets to Broadway, the soul gets completely steamrolled out of it (You know, like the version of “New York” on “Friends”), so I have no idea how they managed to pull this off.

P.S. And I know this is bad, but some of the show reminded me of a really good episode of “So You Think You Can Dance.”

P.P.S. The only “musical” moment I could see was when the grandmother character tells a girl that she sent her recipes so that she could remember “the flavor of life.” That made me throw up a little.

Celebrity Jealousy

Have you ever experienced Celebrity Jealousy? It’s absolutely ridiculous to be jealous of a celebrity, because they are leading completely different lives than the common man and woman, and yet, I can’t help it.

The first one was Jennifer Connelly in “Labryinthe.” At age thirteen or so (I could be off), I was so obsessed with David Bowie. I would have dreams about him where we would just talk and he’d respect me because I wasn’t affected by his fame. In “Labryinthe,” Connelly plays a babysitter who has to save the kids she’s watching by traveling to some magical land where David Bowie rules, dressed up like a Henson Muppet. And when they dance at this ball, I think that was the pinnacle of my jealousy. I was like, Why can’t it be me at that ball, dress up in a “Dark Crystal”/”Secrets of the Rats of Nimh”-era ballgown. Oh yeah, I’m winner.

And the other big celebrity jealousy? Winona Ryder, when she was Johnny Depp, and you know what? At that point, she was totally celebrity-jealousy-worthy. Today, it’s hard to find one be jealous of in my opinion — partially because our access to celebs has gotten 24 hour-ish and a lot of these mondo-successful-gorgeous people are clearly BONKERS.

And I don’t know how to make picture of that yellow-suited Johnny Depp smaller!

W.

I watched this movie, and it was AWFUL. I had heard Oliver Stone shied away from showing a strong point of view, burnt by criticism that his work was too slanted but the result is bland material with NO point of view and is deadly dull. in fact, I fell asleep twice. It’s a literal recreation of the Bush Administration, which begs the question…why make this movie? Why now when we already know the story and you’re not bringing anything new to it? Which begs a larger question, why are you giving money to Oliver Stone to make movies when he doesn’t really show a knack for it? (i think people should stop funding Kevin Smith too — it’s not that he’s not on occasion clever, but he’s just not a filmmaker.) On the other hand, please fund the work of directors Danny Boyle and Spike Lee, both of whom are over-the-top-talented.

toys!

As an only child, I had boatloads of toys, particularly dolls, even when we were broke. But really, aren’t toys a waste of money on some kids? The littlest ones I’ve seen seem just as happy with Scotch tape as they are with the latest technology, but that’s before they get to the age of the WII. Here’s the breakdown of toys from a 1970s childhood:

* Baby Magic. An enormous, blond, ugly doll in a pink tuxedo, that could do tricks. Each hand had a hole, so whenever you stuck a trick in its hands and squeeze the belly, air would flow through and you got…and exploded wand or whatever. Conclusion: I didn’t really stay interested in it too long. I stored the tricks in the box it came in, and Dad, in his ever-eager cleaning mode, tossed the whole thing. We were all bummed after that because the cash wasn’t flowing at the time.

* Baby Alive. Yet another kind of fugly, weird-looking doll, whose selling point was that you could feed it actually food provided in the packaging….and had the questionable benefit of pooping it out. I think they made it ugly because they were trying to be realistic. Conclusion: Since the food actually tasted good (it was 100% sugar), I fed all of it to my cousin Aimee, and never played with the actual doll.

* A menagerie of stuffed animals. In particular, I had a handful of teddy bears. Conclusion: Didn’t play with them, because the glass eyes creeped me out. Eye contact gave me the willies.

* Barbie & Company. That Mattel conglomerate was a huge part of my childhood and then some. No brunette dolls here! Conclusion: I played with these for hours, um, for more years probably than I should have. (What can I say, my maturity rate may be as slow as my metabolism.) It is totally a materialistic toy — there is so much to buy, the dream house, the dream car, the dream little sister, the dream boyfriend. Not sure if that culture was the healthiest to grow up with, but oh, how I loved them.

* Board games. Monopoly, Trivial Pursuit, etc. Conclusion: Probably not the best gift for an only child. If I were really bored, I’d play Monopoly by myself, which didn’t help my ability to share. Yeah!

Did anyone play with Legos?

doctor who

oh dear god, no, i’m hooked on yet another tv show. it’s a british remake of the old “doctor who,” time-traveling time lord who goes to new galaxies as well as time periods. i’m so screwed.