Tuesday, November 30, 2004
Procrastinating
First off, I have a new layout! Which I'm sure you all noticed, not being blind and all that. I was searching for something, anything, to get me out of doing homework, so I decided to do this, and I'm oddly entranced with the color scheme. It really doesn't take much, I'm sort of like a kitten that way, I could easily spend hours looking at a ball of tinfoil.
In other news, it's that part of the semester known as "Crunch Time" or "Hell". You know, that time where you have assignments due in every class? On top of reading every night? Yeah, that's fun.
Yesterday, for example, in my Brit Lit class, my professor asked me how my research paper was progressing. I did an excellent job of pretending to be on the up and up and said, in my very best teacher's pet voice, "Oh, really well, I'm making loads of progress", when the truth is that I've barely researched it and have only a very vague notion about my thesis. Vague as in, "I know it's something about the poetry of World War I...you know...poets and poems...and their meanings?"
And she said, "Oh, good, because you need to have your rough draft in class on Wednesday with a list of all of your sources".
Hmmm.
And that's just one class! I also have papers and projects and presentations (oh my!) and it's just shaping up to be a span of time where I will need to either walk around with an IV of coffee or turn to heroin.
Just kidding! Walking around with a coffee IV is so impractical.
So I have this metric ton of work to do and, as you can see, I'm ignoring it in order to discuss Julia Roberts and her twins.
Now. I know it's not cool to like Julia Roberts. I know she has an annoying laugh and that she plays the same role in all of her movies, but I like her anyway. It really has a lot to do with good fashion sense and residual Mystic Pizza love.
Anyhoo...Hazel Patricia and Phinnaeus Walter Moder. Hmm.
The old lady names are coming back into vogue, yes? Nora, Opal, Ingrid, Harriet and the like are all being used again after being rejected in favor of Britney, Ashlee, and Emily as being too dated. And now Hazel. It's not so bad, but the last name Moder uglies it up quite a bit.
As far as Phinneaus goes, I am in no place to judge as, for years, I harbored a love for Phineas of A Separate Peace. (Don't judge! He was dreamy!) I'm not overly fond of the spelling of it, but Finn's a neat little nickname and they're actual names not random words (Hi, Audio Science!) or appliances or anything.
There's been a lot of "The poor kids will get made fun of on the playground!" but, really, they will be in school with kids named Lemon, ObiWan and L'Oreal. The little Moder twins will be just fine. Plus, they can say, "Do you know who I am?! I'm Hazel Moder! I can buy you and sell you!" or something similar if provoked. Not that I advocate threatening to buy and sell one's classmates, of course. It's just a route they can take if worse comes to worse.
Mallory at 11/30/2004 12:36:00 PM
Saturday, November 27, 2004
Oh, Aaron!
Proving that celebrities and my caffeine addiction are always first and foremost in my mind, I had a dream that Aaron Carter worked at the local Starbucks.
(I know, I just called Aaron Carter a celebrity, which he's totally not. But I don't know quite how else to explain him)
Aaron Carter is, quite possibly, the most repulsive thing in show business and if not the most repulsive, than at least in the top five.
I feel almost bad hating him so much, as being the second banana to Nick Carter has to sting. That's a sad life for anyone. Not to mention that Nick and Aaron support Mama Carter, who I believe uses their earnings to finance the meth lab in the basement. Apparently, the entire Carter family lives on a compound. Yes. The compound's interior design theme revolves a lot around wicker, pastels and Jack Daniels. Nothing against those of you who live on compounds, of course, but ew. The Carter family give off a distinctly...icky vibe, a level of which is usually found in trailer park toilets. Nick Carter is the least trashiest of them all, and that's saying something. Like, his sister got arrested for shoplifting jewelry from a drugstore. That's trashy trashy.
But hate him I do, which is why the fact that he showed up in my dream makes me want to shower so badly.
He may think that my hatred is irrational, but all I have to say to that is-Aaron, please.
Aaron, please. A song with lyrics like
It's like boom (boom)/I put it in the hoop/Like slam (slam)/I heard the crowd screaming/out jam (jam)/I swear that I'm telling you the facts/Cuz that's how I beat Shaq
should really earn a person some jail time.
Yes. Two of the brightest stars in young Hollywood were fighting over that. No matter your opinion on Lindsay and Hilary, you must admit that they are, like, lightyears out of his league. Lightyears.
Aaron, please. Clearasil isn't so expensive.
And with...shiny pants? And...cornrows? You don't see anything quite so hideous when you're not on a week long bender. And even then, in drug fueled hazes, the night terrors aren't quite so frightening.
Aaron, please. To call that a fashion faux pas is the understatement of the decade. The muppet duster, the shiny pants, the cornrows...they all add up to a level of fug not fit for this planet.
I think I speak for us all when I say, ew, turqoise?! And also-WACKO JACKO?!?!
Aaron, please. Embarking on a friendship with Michael Jackson is forty shades of creepy and the dumb, deaf and blind all know better.
From People:
I've been seeing a couple of people. There was a Hawaiian Tropic model I was seeing named Monique....we're just friends now. I'm not going to tell you, "Oh, looks don't matter." If you don't look good, get away from me!
I think I speak for us all when I say, "Honey, you really can't afford to be so picky".
My sound is definitely changing. It is going to have more of an R&B vibe with some rock. It's influenced by Craig David, Usher and Justin Timberlake.
Yes, Craig David, Usher and Justin Timberlake are the godfathers of R&B. And let's not forget the Tupac shirt that he wore on his episode of Cribs. Aaron keeps it real, yo! Marvin Who? Usher's where it's at, y'all! "My Boo" is so genius, it makes me want to weep.
Aaron, please. Craig David paints his damn mustache on every morning, Usher looks like a penis, and Justin Timberlake has been girlier than all of his girlfriends and I include Britney on that list.
I know.
Oh, don't believe me? Don't say I didn't warn you...
I know, just send me your therapy bills.
Aaron, please. Incest, despite evidence to the contrary (like Passions, for example), is not cool. You may have skanked your way around tween Hollywood, but that's no reason to dip in your own gene pool!
Mallory at 11/27/2004 07:14:00 PM
Tuesday, November 23, 2004
In the Last 24 Hours...
(Twice, if we're being honest)
All the money in the world can't buy you literacy, proper grammar or fashion sense.
Mallory at 11/23/2004 02:37:00 PM
Saturday, November 20, 2004
Gah!
Somebody on my floor has insisted upon playing the Rent soundtrack all afternoon.
It's driving me absolutely mad.
For a brief moment in 1996, Rent captured the hearts of people all over. And then, in 1997, people started to realize that it was rather dated and terribly schmaltzy. All of the people, of course, except Rentheads.
Rentheads are those people who went to see Rent ten times a week and quoted lyrics in their yearbooks. These people are scary and not to be trusted. I think what's most annoying, besides their irritating habit of thinking that they are friends with the cast members, is that they truly think they are part of some elite group of wonderful musical fans who are privy to Jonathan Larson's special vision and that it makes them, somehow, better than the rest of the world.
Um, hi. Seasons of Love is the soundtrack to every elevator ride on the Eastern Seaboard and Chris Columbus is directing the film version. I truly think you lose all street cred when your play is being adapted by the man who brought us such indie films as Bicentennial Man and Jingle All The Way.
This isn't even taking into account how incredibly sappy the lyrics are, for an allegedly edgy musical-measuring a year in LOVE? Yeah, okay. And did you know that love prevents junkies from dying of AIDS? Because it does. And there's no day but today. NO DAY BUT TODAY!
I seriously want to stab somebody right now.
I should take a moment to do something that I haven't done in a while, which is publicly declare my love for Tom Brady:
People are always surprised that I like watching sports and even more surprised when they realize that I actually know what I'm talking about. I'm not totally sure why that is.
Anyhoo, the Patriots play this Monday and I'll be able to watch the game from the comfort of my own room while home for Thanksgiving break. It will be quite exciting. Especially if I can coerce someone into buying pumpkin ice cream for me. Pumpkin ice cream + Tom Brady = A good Monday night. Better if he were here in person, sure, but let's not get bogged down in the details.
George H.W. Bush's speech at the dedication of the Clinton library was seriously awesome.
Apropos of nothing, I hate watching Sex and the City on TBS, because it's horribly obvious where they edit it. Samantha Jones has no place on TBS, seriously.
Mallory at 11/20/2004 07:15:00 PM
Thursday, November 18, 2004
Me Against The Animal Kingdom
I had a nightmare last night that my school, in all of its avaricious glory, had sold the rights to the campus lawn to a farm meaning that when one went to class, they had to walk by a menagerie of horses, cows, goats, sheep and chickens.
You mightn't think this is what nightmares are made of but I have, since childhood, had a profound dislike/bizarre fear of farms and the animals found there. Not all of the animals, I do quite like ducks and had hoped to get a pet duck named Gatsby but, much in the fate of many of my dreams, the idea was shot down by the parental units. And pigs are rather cute from a distance. Specifically the kind of distance where they are painted on a mug.
But horses? Cows? Goats? Donkeys? All leave me with a monumentally icky feeling and the very sight of them unsettles me.
I think that, like many of my various neuroses, this comes from lingering psychological trauma from childhood, specifically the town "farm".
I grew up in a suburban area that is known for shops and cul-de-sacs and a rather big lake that people are obsessed with. The area isn't rural at all but, for reasons unbeknownst to me, the powers that be created a farm for a tourist attraction of sorts, or a place to have birthday parties. No, it wasn't a good idea at all, but the community leaders aren't terribly bright.
The farm boasted random barns scattered across the land, big weeping willows and a heinously ugly general store that, due to wind and weather, looked purple. There was the usual assortment of animals--horses, cows, ducks, chickens, goats, sheep, pigs, and a seemingly unending plethora of donkeys, I'm assuming there was a discount of some sort on donkeys that year--and all in all, it was lame. Lame than lame even.
Epic levels of lameness aside, parents attempted to instill a love for animals in their children by having myriad birthday parties at the farm, where you got to walk around, ride on a horse, feed chickens (read: throw food on the ground and run away before the vicious chickens attacked you) and have lunch. At one such birthday party, a cow moseyed over to me and "Moo"-ed loudly in my ear. I have not been the same since.
After that, the farm seemed even more creepy than it had before and I got a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach whenever I drove by.
Next to the entrance to the farm was a 7-11 and, when traveling with my father, we often stopped there to get gas and, if my tantrums were effective, a Slurpy and a Hostess Snoball. One morning on the way to work, my father was getting gas and I was sitting in the car listening to talk radio (really, is it any wonder that I am the way I am?), and I looked out the window and was greeted with two donkeys looking in the window at me.
To say that I "screamed" doesn't do justice to the sound I made, a shriek of terror found so rarely in nature.
My father, thinking I had been stabbed by someone sitting with me in the back seat (or not, you know, he was old enough not to believe in urban legends) looked in the car, saw the surce of my fear and shooed the donkeys away, where they moseyed up to the 7-11 entrance and waited to terrify the people who walked out.
Once we pulled out of the parking lot, we had one of those serious talks where my father attempts to bring himself down to the level of a child which, when the child is prone to flights of fancy and easily distracted, is never easy. He told me that donkeys are as afraid of me as I was of them--which is why, I pointed out, they were so quick to run when I screamed. Oh, except how they weren't--and that he hadn't heard many stories about little girls being mauled by donkeys--the qualifying "many" implied to me that he had heard some stories about girls being attacked by crazy donkeys--and, finally, that I was in the car and no donkey was strong enough to break down the door to come get me. He had a point there.
My dislike of farms continued unabated for years. It's weird, because I do enjoy the zoo. But something about farm animals just gives me the willies. There was also the highly unfortunate class trip to the Catskill Game Farm where I was majorly squicked by the abundance of chickens roaming freely and the llamas that looked highly evil. They claim that their unique array of animal attractions would be interesting, but all it did was give me new animals to be disturbed by.
I suppose I'll save my distaste for the rodent population for another time, lest PETA get all up in my grill.
And that concludes the story of my fear of farms. I know, I'm a headcase.
Is he doing a Jedi mind-melding trick? Or maybe he thinks he can talk to the animals, like Dr. Doolittle. At any rate, weird.*
*It would be far too easy to make a joke about befriending someone on his mental level, so I decided to show some restraint.
Oh, Karl. We all feel that way about the obese heathens who dare wear clothes above a size zero, but we don't say it out loud!
And besides, dude, you're responsible for Kimora Lee Simmons. Let he among us who has not created a tacky shopaholic monster cast the first stone.
Mallory at 11/18/2004 12:42:00 PM
Tuesday, November 16, 2004
Today Is Weird
This is what they mean when they say too much schoolwork is bad for the brain. And by "they", of course, I mean...me.
Man: You suck and swallow anything that come out that mothafucka!
Babymama: What did you just say? Get your ass back here! You don't know what you're saying!
Man: I am SICK of this! SICK of this!
The man then stormed away, crossing the street without them. Babymama then left the baby on the other side of the street, ran after him, kicked him in the stomach, and then stopped traffic to run and get her baby.
I think I speak for us all when I say that people scare me.
A simple "I'm on another call" would have done just fine, really.
Mallory at 11/16/2004 03:47:00 PM
Saturday, November 13, 2004
Hey, Dirty, baby I got your money...
This summer, I made a pronouncement and said, when discussing the song "Got Your Money", that it is my greatest dream to live in a nation whose anthem includes the phrase "None of you nmph better look at me funny, nmph you know my name now give me my money!"
I once hoped against hope for a Diddy/Dirty presidential ticket. Diddy would bring the sexy back to the Oval Office and the scandals would be coming left and right, and Dirt wouldn't go into cardiac arrest every time something went down. Farnsworth Bentley for Secretary of the Interior, Pharrell for Press Secretary, Suge Knight for Head of the CIA, etc. I'm not sure we're quite ready for that, but making "Got Your Money" the national anthem is a step in the right direction.
And today? ODB died and my dream will never be realized.
That's really quite sad, and I need to go play "Brooklyn Zoo" in his honor. ODB was a whole new brand of crazy-claiming that he had three favorite children, riding a limo to pick up his welfare check, "Wu Tang is for the children!", etc.-but damn if he wasn't entertaining.
And Star Jones got married! I can hardly wait for the next issue of InStyle to see the pictures but, really, if it's anywhere near as wonderful as the Ebony cover, it will be fabulous.
I went to CVS and they were out of Diet Coke. Surely that violates one of the amendments, yes?
Dick Cheney's health acting up again?. We're all used to that, no? I'm really more disturbed by his jacket, which badly clashes with his pale blue shirt.
Mallory at 11/13/2004 09:23:00 PM
Thursday, November 11, 2004
Thank you, Tyra, Thank you.
If one more person asks me if I watch Lost, I may become violent.
I understand that I am one of the five (not counting the Amish) people in the nation who don't watch Lost, and you know what? I'm fine with that. I'm sure it's a very good show but, as I am allergic to anything and everything that is related to the hobbits, am perfectly all right with not watching it. This doesn't mean that I am some sort of depraved heathen--well, no, I am, but not because of that--and, besides, Lost is up against the greatest of all great shows, America's Next Top Model.
Go ahead, laugh, drink your grape-flavored haterade, whatever. The point is, ANTM rules and we all know it.
On paper, it may look like something you'd see in some sort of a cracky haze ("Tyra Banks? Is attempting to judge up and coming supermodels? And this isn't a comedy, you're saying? But the girls are all prepubescent Eastern Bloc girls, right? No! What is this?! ON UPN?! I feel like I'm taking crazy pills!!") but, when executed, it's nearly perfect.
The first "cycle", as TyTy Baby so cleverly named it, started it all. She brought us a group of girls from the modelly (Elyse) to the bizzoring (Shannon) to the out and out bizarre (Robin). Adrienne, the tomboyish winner who went on to do, well, er, nothing. But whatever, everybody knows that the show isn't about integrity, it's about drama, which we got in spades. Eating disorder drama! Elyse's rant!
Adrianne, stop interrupting me. Stop quoting Jay and Silent Bob right in my ear. Robin, how [bleeped word, probably "god-love"]-ing dare you show me the 'foolish is the atheist' Bible verse this morning. Giselle, you [bleep]-ing, worthless [bleep]. You are so wasteful, bitchy, stupid...you're worthless. Your parents must be ashamed of you.J...You offended me today.Dammit. Let me [bleep]-ing die. You bitches.
Is that not the greatest thing ever? It is, isn't it? And then there was the religious drama! Janice telling Shannon she should have teeth removed! Psycho Robin bringing a Bible on a date! "He was lustin'!"
Then came the second cycle, and it was awesome. Anna was all "It's not Christlike for me to pose naked with a man who's not my husband" and everybody was confused, because Jesus doesn't mind stuff like that. Simon Doonan called Catie a ho and made her cry. Camille was psychotic, delusional and quite possibly schizophrenic. Tyra rapped ("Pack your bags, y'all, you're going to Milan!"). Janice was awesome ("That was really offensive to me. I'm a member of the PTA). Sara was hot, but had dead eyes. April was over analytical. Mercedes had Lupus. And Shandi cheated on her boyfriend, marking a high point of television for confessing this transgression over the phone to her boyfriend, causing him to positively wail, "WHAT?! YOU HAD SEX?!" I didn't stop laughing for days. Oh, and Yoanna won or whatever.
And now, the third cycle continues its foremodel's great expertise in the area of awesome. I mean, the very first episode had "Bitch poured beer on my weave!", quite possibly the most glorious sentence in the English language. There was nearly a catfight in the house. Cassie was a stripper, Jennipher...well, she spelled her name Jennipher. Kelle said, in all seriousness
I'm just saying...I was in denial about my snout. And now I know. And so it's just hard to work, you're very limited.
What? That's the best thing ever. It makes no sense, but it's hilarious. "In denial about my snout". Brilliant.
Ann became all Single White Female after, like, two minutes
I don't want to change the way I feel about anyone, like, I don't want to try and control that, like, I love you, like, I will be friends with you forever...you will be in my wedding, like, I swear to God, like, I love you, and like, it kills me to walk around this house knowing that I can't, like, talk to you.
To someone she knew for two days, no lie. Be careful not to let the crazy suffocate you.
And Amanda is blind. Blind, you guys. And they put her on rollerskates. Perhaps it's just me, but that's the funniest damn thing I've ever heard. Ever.
So with the elimination of Toccara last night, we're down to six, and I am calling Eva as the winner, as she's been most consistent. Norelle has the model body, but she can't walk to save her soul. Yaya is too pretentious, Ann is too psychotic/unphotogenic, Nicole is too "Who?" and Amanda is too blind.
Plus! Tyra Banks brought back into the limelight (and rightfully so) Ms. Janice Dickinson. Sure, Janice may be some sort of plastic creature stitched together in a surgeon's office, but whatever dope she's smoking is laced with the best sarcasm known to man. She's brilliant and hilarious and I just adore her, though she scares me at the same time. If you get a chance, please do read her books No Lifeguard on Duty, which is my second favorite celeb autobiography of all time, second only to Victoria Beckham's Learning to Fly, and Everything About Me Is Fake...And I'm Perfect and, really, the title just says it all.
So the next time you guys are planning on making fun of Tyra Banks--and I know how often that is, what with the forehead and the red Cowardly Lion weave--please just remember that she brought us the most brilliant show in the history of ever.
In other news, Britney Spears may be having a baby. I'm sorry, I can't think of words to adequately express just how terrifying that is.
In a move shocking only those who are blind and deaf, Nicky Hilton's marriage is officially over, freeing up her schedule and allowing her to go back to the life of table dancing and puking all over Bungalow 8. You go, Nicky, do us proud.
For those of you who didn't know, I have a sick obsession with the New York Times Wedding Announcements which are horribly sweet and pretentious and ridiculous and just amazing. So it should come as no surprise that this is the best blog ever. Really.
My caffeine intake has spiked severely in the last couple of days and, if you know me well enough, you'd know that my caffeine consumption on average is, uh, terrifying, so for it to be worse is just...uh, not good. I'm very jittery. But such is life, I suppose.
Mallory at 11/11/2004 09:13:00 PM
Tuesday, November 09, 2004
Free Your Mind
John Ashcroft resigns. What they don't tell you in the article is that he's going to commit himself fully to his music. Expect his album to drop sometime in February, featuring appearances by Usher (who will use it as an opportunity to rerelease his album yet again, Lil' Jon and Nelly. The first single will likely be a Jessica Simpson collabo.
Let us all take a moment to picture Mr. Ashcroft in an Atlanta Falcons jersey, doing the rockaway. Okaaaaaaay.
Today seemed to be "National Skeevy Men Hit On Unsuspecting Girls" day and people got rather creative with their approaches.
Exhibit A
Random Man in the Dining Hall: Do you want some cereal, baby?
Me: Uh, no.
Random Man In The Dining Hall: You sure, baby? How about some grapes?
Me: Uh, no.
Random Man In The Dining Hall: I'll wash 'em off and feed them to you, just like they did with Cleopatra.
Enticing, no? I can hardly believe I was dumb enough to decline. And the fact that he had to stress that he would watch the grapes makes me somewhat wary of ever eating in the dining hall again.
Exhibit B
Random Man In Dunkin Donuts: Are you an angel?
Me: No.
Random Man In Dunkin Donuts: You sure look it. All you need is a harp.
Me: (Turns around)
Random Man In Dunkin Donuts: You can play the harp and sing and solve all of my problems.
Charming. And, oddly, the second time a man waiting for a caffeinated beverage called me an angel. I'm sure there's some complex point to be made about the effects of caffeine on the psyche, but I'm in Diet Coke withdrawl and in no mood to make it.
While watching BET today (What? Sometimes I get bored when I have no classes, don't judge), I made the following observations:
For reasons unbeknownst to me, I am suddenly on a huge En Vogue kick and have found myself dancing around my room to "Free your mind" multiple times in the past few days. It's really quite embarrassing though, apparently, not embarrassing enough to keep me from sharing that with you.
Mallory at 11/09/2004 08:21:00 PM
Friday, November 05, 2004
The Passion of Ben Affleck
The most obvious upside to the end of the election is that we will no longer have Ben Affleck telling us what to do.
Affleck's self-appointed political leadership was rather unsettling, no matter what your party affiliation. Yay for civic duty and all that, but really, if there's one human being whose lectures you should not listen to, it's Ben Affleck. Say what you want about P. Diddy, but his level head and quick thinking have gotten him out of many a tight situation. All Ben Affleck's got going for him is the fastest success/career implosion ratio in recent memory.
It all started back with Mallrats a quirky, juvenile Kevin Smith comedy where Affleck played a cocky jerk and did quite well. How much he was acting is debatable, but whatever.
He and his Best Friend Forevah Matt Damon then decided to write a screenplay and, with help from someone at Miramax...I mean, with no help at all, Good Will Hunting was born. Not being foolish, Ben and Matt cast themselves in the film and were launched into superstardom. They even won Oscars!
"Wow, Ben Affleck," you said. "Your life is good. You're 25, starred in one of the top grossing movies of the year and you won an Oscar! Granted, a writing Oscar which we all know doesn't count, but still! And you're dating Gwyneth Paltrow, a fashion icon in the making! Vogue says she is, and Anna Wintour don't play no games. Plus, your vaguely homoerotic relationship with Matt Damon has inspired millions to write bad fanfic. Your life is good, Ben."
But things weren't good for long. Ben signed on to Armageddon, an apocalyptic romance starring Bruce Willis that required Ben to cry tears that were obviously plastic and have a love scene with Liv Tyler that included animal crackers. He also made Phantoms where he was outacted by Rose McGowan. You know, the girl who wore dental floss to the VMAs and dated Marilyn Manson? Yeah, her. And it became apparent that Gwyneth Paltrow didn't really like him. Look at her recoiling from his kiss! How embarrassing.
"Wow, Ben Affleck," you said. "Bruce Willis? Really? Huh. I mean, I'm sure it's nice to be in the lockers of teenage girls across the country but, dude...and your girlfriend hates you! That's so sad. Poor you."
But Ben bounced back. He took a role in Boiler Room and, while blatantly cribbing from the ouevre of Alec Baldwin, managed to not suck. Even my father agreed and my father doesn't like anybody except Christopher Walken. He and BFF Damon appeared together in Dogma and were really quite funny. And then he went on SNL and appeared in a downright hilarious sketch. The love was back.
"Wow, Ben Affleck," you said. "The love! She is back!"
Ben, however, was determined to self destruct at all costs. He went to rehab and, while I am mean, I'd never make fun of someone for going to rehab, though I do reserve the right to laugh at the general "What the hell?"ness of Charlie Sheen driving him to Promises. Charlie Sheen. Please, take a moment to reflect upon the absurdity of that.
Around this time, Trot Nixon earned my eternal love and devotion, taking issue with Ben dissing various Red Sox players saying
"Matt Damon made you what you are, slick"
Cruel, perhaps, but definitely true. And the "slick" kills me every time. Ah.
Ben came through with the one-two punch of Changing Lanes which didn't wholly suck, and The Sum of All Fears, which did. Around this time, while doing the press rounds, he kept mentioning the idea of marrying and having children, neglecting to note that he could barely take care of himself.
And, true to his word, he promptly became engaged to the next woman he dated. Who he met while she was married. Who happened to be Jennifer Lopez.
"Wow, Ben Affleck," you said. "Do you really think this is a good idea?!"
A national nightmare was born and given a cutesy nickname (Bennifer) to torment the public with. Their exploits were legendary-pink diamonds! Baiting the paparazzi! Ben appearing in the Jenny From The Block video and kissing her ass! No, literally, kissing her ass on video for the whole world to see!
Ben tried the whole turning orange and wearing velour jumpsuits thing. Around this time, he made Gigli, Jersey Girl and Paycheck which combined to gross $18.75 and Daredevil which just sucked.
"Wow, Ben Affleck," you said. "It totally sucks to be you, bro."
It did, and he knew it. He often looked as though he wanted to die and was coming close to it, what with the suffocating combination of his fiance and his terrible, horrible career.
He tried everything he could do get the wedding called off, short of doing the whole murder/suicide thing. This included nailing strippers in Vancouver, but Jenny Lopez was stubborn. Eventually, though, whatever power she had over Ben had totally disappeared, and Bennifer was no more.
"Wow, Ben Affleck," you said. "You must be so happy! Now you can go back to being a normal human being and maybe make a good movie! Oh, yay, Ben Affleck, yay for you!"
But Ben Affleck was all, "Fuck that".
He got a new girlfriend who had a fetish for Burberry tube tops and a criminal record and friends who wasted no time running to tell the paparazzi that Benny had a hair back.
"Wow, Ben Affleck," you said. "You sure know how to pick them."
He also got a double chin and a rack some girls could kill for. He lost sight of the need to shower and took his fashion cues from the dude in Trailer #163 and infected brother Casey with that same skeeze ("Kids, don't go up to those guys in the white van, okay?")
"Wow, Ben Affleck," you said. "What the fuck? No, really, what the fuck? I know Matt Damon's career success must make you feel like shit, but really, bro...soap isn't that expensive, youknowwhatimean?"
Eventually, he regained the ability to shower and lost the paunch, but his sanity still seemed sort of fragile. He began to campaign for John Kerry at the Democratic National Convention, which posed a couple of problems. I mean, he was everywhere getting interviewed. Everywhere. I saw more of him than I did of John Kerry. Oh, and, yeah he had never voted before.
Damn, Ben. Damn.
And now, Ben has another Jen, another box office bomb and rumors that he will be appearing with the New Jen on Alias
"Wow, Ben Affleck," you say. "Will you ever learn? Sometimes enough is enough, man. Why don't you take a nice break and maybe just sleep for a while and think about what you've done. Your Red Sox won the World Series, just be happy about that and go to a spa or something, yo."
To which Ben Affleck responds, "Der?"
Sigh.
It's no wonder young folk stayed away from the polls in droves, with Ben telling them they should vote. Would you take his advice? I think not. I hope that the Democratic party learns from this escapade and prevents all freakish actors from getting the vote out.
Mallory at 11/05/2004 01:05:00 PM
Thursday, November 04, 2004
America The Beautiful
Our nation is not, nor has it ever been, perfect. Plenty of bumps, glitches, politicians and laws that pepper the history of the United States are depressing, perplexing and absurd. Slavery, segregation, oppression, Prohibition, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Ann Coulter, Charles Manson, OJ Simpson, Stephen King, Carrot Top.
At the same time, our nation is wonderful, strong and resilient. Our nation has given us Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Eleanor Roosevelet, Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Gloria Steinem, Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks, Gregory Peck, Jackie Robinson, Joe Dimaggio, Katharine Hepburn.
The country elected George W. Bush for a second term this week. He won with a popular mandate and a clear margin of victory, however slim.
It's disheartening to hear people all over the country and all over the world say that America made the wrong choice. Because we didn't. Nearly half of the country disagrees with this choice and is disappointed with this choice. But it was not the wrong choice. Because it was the choice of the majority of the people in the U.S., and in a democracy, the people rule.
That's the beauty of our government. The people rule. Right now, many are disappointed and disaffected. But they have the power to spend the next two or four years until the next election fighting. We can change things about our government that we don't like, as long as we are passionate about making the change.
That's what I love about this country. It's maddening and multilayered and marvelous and we're a direct part of it.
Everybody in the nation has the right to do whatever he or she can to force change. So what are you waiting for?
Write your representative
Contact your Senator
NOW
Childrens Defense
NAACP
Amnesty International
Special Olympics
Big Brothers Big Sisters
amFAR
American Cancer Society
Planned Parenthood
Donors Choose
Mallory at 11/04/2004 11:15:00 AM
The State of the Union
So, really, despite pronouncements that the world has ended, things haven't changed. Deep breaths, y'all.
Mallory at 11/04/2004 01:30:00 AM
Monday, November 01, 2004
Stressy Stressiness
Tomorrow, as you all know, is election day. And it makes me want to puke.
I'm a terribly high strung person and prone to being jittery and panicky about the slightest of things. When something is so major and I can't do anything about it, it makes me feel impotent and out of control, which I really hate. So you can imagine how pleasant I've been lately.
I've been trying not to think about it too much, because it will only cause my carefully maintained sanity (which, let's face it, is pretty tenuous at best) to shatter, but really, I can't help it. Like, it's just so close and it's making me really, really anxious and I'm well on my way to having a total nervy breakdown and just, like, spazzing out. Even more than usual, I mean.
And, seriously, if this is another long, drawn out thing a la 2000, I will lose my mind. I just won't be able to handle it. I'm not strong enough for that.
In a related story: Hush yo' mouth, Curt Schilling. They might have sewed you up well enough to pitch, but they didn't give you any sense.
And then? On top of all of the election drama? We got our course registration booklets and I was all excited because, yay, my last registration ever, and I was flipping through it and saw that nothing was offered. Seriously. All of the fun classes that they claim to be offering? So not being taught next semester. Which means that for my writing requirement, I am stuck taking The Writing of Poetry.
Um, no.
I don't write poetry. I only read poetry when forced to. The very thought of reading poems about trees and leaves makes me twitchy. I'm not very fond of nature, see (and I'm well aware of how awful that statement is, but it's the truth, the whole plant and animal thing is just vastly overrated), and reading about it in cute little couplets or, worse, bizarre free verse is enough to make me want to scream, as I informed a class last semester and my professor said it was refreshing, but in most cases, I sort of get that look, like, "Dear lord, she's a heathen!" and it's not good at all.
And writing poetry? My experiences are even worse. I just can't do it. I like to think I'm bright enough, but my mind just doesn't work that way. And my inspiration comes from bizarre things like, I don't know, rubies or, uh, Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck. And when you need to workshop these poems with a bunch of emo type people with thick black glasses and Che Guevara shirts? It just doesn't turn out well. Trust me, I know from experience, it just doesnt.
Poutpoutpout.
I will, of course, be doing the best Cher Horowitz impression I can and doing whatever needs to be done to get out of taking this class, whether it's setting two professors up or spearheading a donation thingy of some sort. As God is my witness, I will never write poetry again.
Aaaand, I need to take Early World Literature. Now, I'm a bit of a nerd really, maybe even more than a bit. But anything with the word "early" in the course title makes me all, "Danger, danger, Will Robinson". Early British Lit? Shudder. Early American Lit? Ugh. And Early World Lit, where it's all about the Greeks and the Bible? Le sigh. I just have a bad feeling about it. I've never been one for the Greeks and their fucking epicosity, so a whole semester of that is just, like, blargh.
So, yeah, like, no.
See how eloquent stress makes me? I certainly do have a way with words.
Mallory at 11/01/2004 08:55:00 PM