my day

images-2.jpg Do you ever have days where youare so stressed you feel like Han Solo at the end of “Empire Strikes Back”? I’m having one of those days.

It started by being punched on the insanely packed rush hour subway this a.m. For me, the cut-off point on a subway ride is when you can’t fit your limbs in. When your legs and arms don’t fit in, that’s a sign there’s no more room. On this train ride, some dude with no where to go just started to rise in the air and with no place to put his feet, he started to fall, and as part of that effort, punched me. Some days are like a cartoon, and from that point, it only got more and more frantic.

If you don’t know the end of that movie in particular, he gets crypto-something–genetically frozen. Somebody knows the exact term out there.

To see what Bart Simpson looks like frozen, see below.

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Gilligan’s Island

gilligans-c.jpg Is “Lost” today’s answer to “Gilligan’s Island”? I don’t know — it’s about a motley crew of characters stranded on an island with no way to get home, who have no choice but to cope with their differences to get along. Instead of “the Others,” Gilligan’s Island had the natives (vaguely Polynesian). And instead of desperate drive to get off, the cast of Gilligan’s Island kind of made the best of things, creating homes with a strong Tikki aesthetic. I don’t know if it’s as strongly correlated as “Sex and the City” and the “Golden Girls,” but it was something I was thinking. (And yeah, the whole native thing being quasi Asian would probably give me the willies today. I’m not as innocent as my friend’s two girls, with whom I watched “Peter Pan” recently, as they blissfully watched Peter’s adventures with the “how”-speaking, red Indians.)

I just remembered this a.m. the episode where Ginger and Mary-Ann try to make over a native, heavy set woman with makeup, and the native ends up eating the lipstick. It was such a striking, odd thing to do, I think about it years later. See, TV writers? You can make a difference!

uh….”tropic thunder”

tropic-thunder_l.jpg Have you heard about the new comedy called “Tropic Thunder” about a group of actors playing soldiers who are actually left in the jungle to deal with real combat? Robert Downey, Jr. is playing a black man…I kinda think that’s not a good idea. Not being it’s definitely offensive, but when there’re more parts of white actors, can you leave the parts for folks of color for the non-whites so they can earn some cash? It’s kinda like when Owen Wilson bragged that his part of “Oscar Choi” in “Armageddon” was cool b/c they didn’t change the last name when they cast him. Uh, no Owen, actually, you’ll get parts all of your life and Daniel Dae Kim will only get parts as long as “Lost” is hot, so you can throw the peeps a bone? Thank you.

On another note, why do actors want to portray characters they are not to such an extreme degree? It’s kind of like when actors play mentally retarded people. It’s like some major gateway to get to this moment where you wear your pants over your waist and wear a backpack and talk funny. Even Sean Penn succumbed to it in that movie with Dakota Fanning and Michelle Pfeiffer (what’s it called), where Pfeiffer was like “I’m learning more from you than you’re learning from me!” Why do actors do this? You’re never going to be retarded! If you’re right next to a retarded person, you think we’re not going to see the difference? ARGH!

p.s.

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This is like the most unflattering picture of Spitzer alive, right? Doesn’t he look like an angry Muppet? Like he has no lips. The poor wife has to stand behind him in a moment where she probably wants to drive her car over him.

And why do these politicians always sound so fake in their apologies? I guess when you say stuff like “I’ve let myself down in the high standard I’ve set for myself” doesn’t really sound like “I’m sorry.” I think if he were sincere and shed a tear or two, people would be softer on him. As it is though, he merely sounds like he’s sorry he got caught.

sex, politicians and major, major hubris

images3.jpg By now, you’ve all heard the news — Spitzer caught with a prostitute. Yikes! Busted! I don’t know about you, but I was still shocked. I mean, sure it does seem normal for politicians to have some big, dirty secret that comes back to haunt them these days, but Spitzer? He made his career on how he relentlessly pursued corruption in others with evangelical zeal, a proselytizer of a hard-edged, squeaky clean morals.

Part of me thought he could bounce back — if he were caught with a child or a man, there was no chance, but a hooker? That seems like a 1950s since these days. And hey, as a public, we’re kinda forgiving for personal sex foibles, we have short memories, no? (Even my mom thought Spitzer’s affair was “no big deal.”) I mean, didn’t Eddie Murphy make “Haunted Mansion,” a family-friendly pic after his transsexual transgression?

Now I know Spitzer is not an entertainer — he’s paid by the public, etc., etc. Now I don’t have an issue with government folks who cheat on their spouses per se and have not really thought about prostitutions as an issue. Booty calls alone do not mean to me that they can’t do their jobs, however, I do think if you’re a government figure and you know you have enemies gunning for your head, you are being self-destructive when you give them any excuse to bring you down, i.e., Bill’s affair with Monica seemed really DUMB when everyone knew Ken Star was voraciously on his trail. That choice makes me question your judgment.

Monogamy, following laws — that’s hard for everybody, but we still do it! Is there something about folks who go into politics where they’re 90% ego and think they can be above what they preach?

becca’s fantasy

image001.jpg hey there, it’s almost easter and those peep candies are now on sale at duane reade. if you ever want to get on my friend becca’s good side, get her a package. she loves those totally nuclear-bright, teeth-rotting treats, which is why I think this is “Becca’s Fantasy.”

Nice. If it were Eliot Spitzer’s fantasy, he’d be in less hot water. Hoo-wah! Wouldn’t want to be in the Spitzer household tonight, boy.

natalie portman

images2.jpg As you know, when I am frustrated with work, I have a few options at my disposal: a) I pretend I’m a camp counselor at a Special Olympics camp b) I pretend I’m a Buddhist monk and the people around me are a zen challenge 3) I read people.com to make myself feel better about the world.

If you go to Elle magazine this month, or elle.com, they post an interview with Natalie Portman. The interviewer was like “so ‘Boleyn Girl’ is about a tale about female ambition being punished” and Natalie was like “oh really? I thought it was a cautionary tale about capitalism and capitalist values.”

This girl is definitely more intelligent than the average Hollywood star. No wonder Julia Roberts and Jude Law were like “she’s so smart! Sometimes, when she talks, I don’t have any idea what she’s saying!” (Because why, they’re dumb as posts?)

Anyway, her acting does seem to be getting better (though whenever she cries, it makes me want to hurl, because it looks like fifth grade acting and it singularly ruined “Garden State” for me — and for the people in the theater around me, because I started yelling at the screen) and I just appreciate that she is bright, educated, and liberal (plus she sticks up for Hillary in her interview, which is very persuasive for me to become a fan). Kudos, young Natalie Portman.

S.O.S. to Cousin Ed

Ed! My “cartwheels” entry got hijacked by some crazy amount of porn/real estate spam! Any advice? My tender eyes are so traumatized by this invasion…seriously, it’s kinda gross.

yo cartwheels

images.jpg I’ve never been able to do a cartwheel. If I kept living in the boroughs of NY, this would’ve been okay, but as soon as we moved to suburban NJ, I was toast, man, b/c there’s actually room in the suburbs for kids to fly wildly across the room all topsy-turvy like that. It was very embarrassing in junior high school, when they did gymnastics for gym and we did somersaults (I was all over that) progressing to cartwheels, and the more I was expected to do it, the more I sucked. It was like the only gym unit girls were supposed to be better than boys at. Flag football was also not a strength.

They have instructions on how to do a cartwheel in this weeks TimeOut New York and it looks simple enough — just throw your whole body forward (yikes), so the next time I have an open space with no one looking, I’ll do it. Then I’ll have to call one of you afterwards to take me to the hospital.