Happy Birfday To Moi

Today marks the fifth anniversary of my partying with Jessica Biel. Whatever that it's my birthday, no, the highlight of the last five years of my life was without a doubt the night that I rode a bull with La Biel. Anyone who knows me personally has already heard this story ad nauseum, so you guys can just stop reading right now. For the rest of you, enjoy:



Like many a deranged Angeleno, I was under the impression that spending my twenty-first birthday at the giant clusterfuck that is the Saddleranch Chop House was a good idea. It was all pretty dismal considering that it was a Sunday and NO ONE was out. I mean, there's always someone out on the Sunset Strip, but comparatively speaking, it was a ghost town. No worries though, because I had a great group of friends with me who could and still do turn any bar they enter into a baccanale. Oh, and I should mention that I was not yet out, as in I was heavily closeted, as in two of my best friends were gay, as in I was that really open minded straight guy who had hour-long convos with his buddies.

I know... and yes, please, spare me.

Well, the evening was fun and involved my friends having me pose for pictures with sorority girls who were got all kissey face with me for the cameras, which I'm sure everyone thought was tewtally hilarious (I won't be posting those by the way). But the real festivities started when an already ineabriated Jessica Biel showed up posse in tow. I should mention that Jess and I not only share the same birthday but also the same birth-year. I like to think of us as kindred spirits of a sort and our meeting at Saddleranch was only further evidence of this fact.

Jessica & co. wasted no time in making complete and total asses of themselves. Wilmer Valderama was there and he's just sort of an ass in and of himself, but my favorite moment of the night (even better than Biel repeatedly falling off an already slowed down mechanical bull) was when Beverly Mitchell of Seventh Heaven fame came barreling out of the ladies room and hit my former roommate Corinne with her purse. Corinne's reaction, That BITCH Beverly Mitchell just hit me with her Gucci bag, became an instant classic and to this day remains one of my favorites.

I could explain how drunk La Biel was and how hammered I ended up getting off of Long Islands, but I think I'll just let the pictures speak for me:







I don't know what could possibly top that birthday, but there was the year (my 23rd?) I celebrated by drunkenly fawning over PJ Harvey at the Cat and Fiddle. She was very polite and obviously wasn't too offended by my gin breath since she let me talk to her for a good two minutes or so. Lesson learned? If you're drinking with a celebrity, make sure you're the more sober of the two; it makes for better stories and doesn't forever get you banned from PJ Harvey's clique.

Beast Cancer Is A Doozy

Katie came home yesterday to inform me that her co-worker fucked up an ad that's been running in the Tribune for the last month. The ad was a quarter page dealie that ran once a week. The copy was supposed to address breast cancer, but thanks to her co-worker's inattention to detail, ended up addressing the scourage that is beast cancer.

It's a touchy topic, no doubt, and one that is severely under-funded. Let this post be a sound alarm to all those readers out there who don't think the beast that haunts your dreams won't one day be afflicted with this dubious, dubious disease.

Word to the wise, protect your near and dear by doing a beast exam stat.

The Internet Will Destroy Us All

Sometimes you discover something on the internet that makes you rethink the greatness of all this inter-connectivity. It's happened to me before when I've been written about by a friend or an ex and sure, I could link to those instances right here and now, but that would further whatever agenda the person writing had, so I won't, because I'd like to preserve at least a modicum of dignity while I still can - *cue laughter.

I'm thinking about personal space on the internet for two reasons: Yesterday my roommate had something posted about her that wasn't too earth-shatteringly awful, but it was something that she, nonetheless, didn't want spread allover your T1 line. Ultimately, the person who put the offending material up had the good sense to take it down, but not until after a day full of Katie wracking her brain over who'd seen said offending material and how she was going to do damage control.

And then there was this weekend when I discovered an online memorial to my mother. Mom died back in 2000 but it's taken me this long to find an eerie little slice of world wide web dedicated to the woman who bore me. God only knows when this baby was put up, but I do know that my father's sister created the "online grave site"... no joke about the name, BTDubs.

I suppose I'm not really offended that this thing exists - it's the thought that counts and at least people care enough to think about her - but I do have a problem with the fact that this thing is so fundamentally tacky. Tell me, can an online memorial ever be tasteful? I tend to think not. I don't know what it is, but it seems that when it comes to the dead, people's lose all control and their emotions get funnelled into the most god-awful displays of excess known to man. Pair that with a shoe-string budget on the internet, and you've got a deadly* combination.

Case in point: I've more than once had to reign in family members who wanted to deck out my mom's real-life grave site with all sorts of hot mess. Garland for Christmas, shamrocks for St. Pat's, plastic hearts for Valentine's... what have you. Not to mention it's like the most precarious of situations to be in because you don't want to upset your loved ones who are already having a tough time of it with the whole dead thing, but you also don't want your mother's grave looking like something that came out of the Lillian Vernon catalog.

I realize that I'm complicit in all this since I write about people I know here, but I can at least be proud of the fact that I've yet to post a single online memorial to anyone.

Wait... does writing about Heath Ledger count? Okay, so I say no because I'm not submitting that post to an electronic graveyard. Ooof. And sucks for families of celebrities like Heath Ledger. If I have one word of advice to Michelle Williams or her daughter, it's that you shouldn't go trolling the internet for traces of deceased family members because you'll more than likely not like what you find. Unless of course your sensibility is of the Harriet Carter variety, and then in that case, go forth brave soldiers into that dark, dark night.


*No pun intended, I promise.

She's Very Commercial, AND THAT'S FINE.

Nina Garcia is a cunt and that's also why I love her. I've often said that Nina's dictum that a designer is "commercial" or "going in a commercial direction" or "palatable" is secretly code for "your ass is out the door in a matter of a commercial break". It sucks, but after having had to put up with four seasons worth of hot mess designers, Nina knows of what she speaks. Commercial is generally boring and has no place on Project Runway.



Which is why Sweet Pea had to go. I love her, yes, but this look is just unacceptable. If Sweet Pea hadn't trademarked irrepressible exuberance somewhere around episode two, sister would've been gone long ago. I can only hope that I'm exuding that much spunk when I'm 46, but should I ever learn to sew a garment, may it NEVER look like this.

So adieu Sweet Pea! We knew you well, er... didn't know you at all. So what if your construction was always a little slipshod and your insecurity was through the roof? You've got a fiance or a husband or boyfriend or something waiting for you back at home who doesn't care what your designs look like AND you got to show at fashion week. Quoth Donna Summer: "No more tears."

The Audacity of the Grammys

Reasons why the Grammys are irrelevant:

Album of the Year: "River: The Joni Letters," Herbie Hancock.


New Artist: Amy Winehouse.


Alternative Music Album: "Icky Thump," The White Stripes.


Rock Album: "Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace," Foo Fighters.


Electronic/Dance Album: "We Are the Night," The Chemical Brothers.


Spoken Word: "The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream," Barack Obama.


For reals... the White Stripes, Chemical Brothers, and Foo Fighters? It's like straight up 2001 in here. However...

Reasons why there may still be hope:

Comedy Album: "The Distant Future," Flight of the Conchords.


Short Form Music Video: "God's Gonna Cut You Down," Johnny Cash.


Long Form Music Video: "The Confessions Tour," Madonna.


Record of the Year: "Rehab," Amy Winehouse.


Musical Album for Children: "A Green and Red Christmas," The Muppets.

The Evil of the Thriller

If there's ever been a dance that's appropriate for all occasions then it's the Thriller dance. I've attempted to do my own variation of the infamous curled-claw crossover formation at many a house party much to the, um - delight? - of friends and fellow party-goers, but I've most certainly never done it justice like London choreographer Anthony King has taught these tube riders to:



Thriller has held a special place in my heart ever since an seven year-old me convinced my mother to buy me the making of video that was on sale in a bargain bin at Ralph's. As soon as we got home I watched it pretty much on a loop for the following week, and anyone who knows me knows that that was both the best and most horrifying semaine of my life. I had intensely vivid nightmares every night that I was trapped in the video although I'm not sure if I was playing Ola Ray's part or Michael's (is there really that much of a difference?). To this day those are still some of the most terrifying dreams I can recall which isn't all that bad considering that my sister remembers dreams from her childhood wherein Batman and Robin are being eaten by a giant ice-cream cone.

I wish things like the Thriller-Tube happened in Chicago. The closest I've experienced is one morning when I was taking the Red Line to the post office in Uptown. That morning I got a private dance from this young African-American girl who was getting her jam on to The Pussycat Dolls' Buttons. Sister had, natch, a discman and was all sorts of serene until her tune popped up, at which point she got up from her seat, grabbed both poles by the exit, and started gyrating/slinking like my very own CTA Doll.



The only way I knew the song she was listening to was because she was singing... nay, bellowing, but choo keep frontin' over and over. I got on at Addison and she got off at Wilson, so I'm pretty confident I'd gotten my money's worth. It was almost as good as the time when I saw a drug addict threaten to fight a toddler, or the time the man sitting across from me shat himself - both on the Halsted bus.

At any rate, it's refreshing to see that Londoners can appreciate a solid performance like the one above instead of complaining about the music being too loud or that they're being bumped into. This is what I've always loved about London: your city and subway can smell like a giant shitstorm, but as long as you've got some free entertainment with your morning commute, no one's complaining.

Best. Awards. Ceremony. Ever.

If I was Julian Schnabel I'd be livid that my supreme moment of self-actualization was ruined by the lush in the white fur coat, but thanks be to Sean Young for taking a piss out of Hollywood and reminding all of us how ridiculous these ceremonies really are. Oh yeah and, uh, get well soon.

Surely You Jest

Proving that idiocy knows no bounds... or country for that matter, Warner Brothers has put up a site to promote their forthcoming Batman movie where legions of fans are encouraged to gather their nearest and dearest, dress up like the joker (or at the very least paint their faces), and pose in front of their town's greatest landmark.

I'm sorry, Heath Ledger, if this proves to be your greatest legacy:


This dude is posing on a sign for what I believe is Warner Brothers Music's offices on Hollywood Way. What the caption on Warner Bros' site doesn't tell you about this guy is that right after the picture was taken he was promptly arrested by lot security and held in an interrogation room for three hours until Burbank PD could finally get their act together and take him to a real jail.

The submission guidelines on WB's site specifically tell you not to get arrested, so it's pretty awesome that this kid is none too subtlety testing their directive. Talk about taking down the man with his own tools.


Riddle me this: Is the look on this guy's face a result of the fact that he just realized that he's never going to win a WARNER BROS internet contest by posing in front of the COMPETITION'S landmark, or is he just having a really horrendous reaction to the toxic goo he just slathered all over his face?


These hooligans are pretty dorky and all, but I like them if for no other reason than they remind me of the Upright Citizens Brigade. This is so something Amy Pohler would've been talked into doing by those guys.


This, without a doubt, is my least favorite submission. No surprise then that it's also the front-runner to win right now (I'm not even sure what you win... your dignity back?)

These two are gross for so many reasons. If I actually listed all of them I think I might break the server.


Buddy looks sad in this pic (maybe he just lost on the ponies?) and much too old to be wearing clown makes-up. Especially if he's not going to even enjoy it.


I pity these kids because, while this is all fun and games right now, at some point in their mid-teens brother and sister are going to be cursing their parents for having made them do this. I hope they win just for the children's sake.


Here's another contender for first place who looks like a complete loon. The only anecdote I can equate this to is when my dad's girlfriend went to Europe without him and took along a paper facsimile of him to take pictures with at the leaning tower of Pisa.

And I'm sure all those tourists trying to get a snapshot of Sugar Loaf really appreciate this nutcase that they just had to ride the tour bus up the mountain with. Word to the wise, this is the kind of traveller who gets killed in Turistas.


Dude here gets a special shout-out for being so GD pretty. He reminds me of this guy I used to work at the Gap with who was super tall, super skinny, and dressed up one Halloween as Trannysaurus Rex.


There really is more to North Dakota than just wood chippers and Frances McDormand.



Mormon Jokers. Priceless.

The two guys at the bottom get bonus points for being Mormon Joker missionaries complete with Batman comics in tow. If they showed up at my door, not only would I let them in, I'd totally convert.


How much do you think this girl's boyfriend had to pay her to let him take this picture? If she's doing that shit for free then she's been seriously ill-advised.

More important still, did she do the makeup or did he?



This girl - I love. For her, painting your face up and running around town posing in front of pseudo-landmarks isn't horribly embarrassing just 'cause it's pretty a propos of her whole aesthetic. That, and she's what fifteen?

She reminds me of all those Hispanic goth girls I used to go to high school with - the one's who knew every lyric to every Morrissey song ever written. Those are the girls you knew would have your back if you ever got into a fight... and probably would do more damage than anyone else. Although, Latina Joker kind of loses points for me in the second photo since she seems, I don't know, a little too eager. And her eyes are open really wide.


I thought this building was a firehouse or something until I read the caption that said it was a actually these girl's fav Mexican joint in Ft. Worth. How many times must I remind you ladies? I love south of the border cuisine as much as the next guy, but a Mexican restaurant does not a landmark make.


Words escape me. This guy is probably doing improv as we speak.

Never Take Advice From a Stoner

Slutmachine from One D at a Time and Rich from Four Four are starring in Jezebel's latest in the series Pot Psychology. This is usually an advice column over at Jezebel wherein Slutmachine gets stoned and answers questions sent in by readers. This one, however, is about a thousand times better since we get to see these two giggle their little hearts out (link below).



I'm usually not an advocate of pot smoking because I can't stand being around people when they're high, but that's just me. These two are kind of adorable though and I love her even more because she looks and acts eerily like my ex-roommate. I haven't talked to the my former roomie in over two years and after watching this I totes miss her. sigh.

2008: The Year of the Get it Together

Usually I curse night owl-ism because it contributes to my intermittent bouts of depression inability to get up before noon on the weekend, however, tonight's different because I just saw THIS!!!*

God I hope this story pans out cuz a full-scale Britney breakdown is just what we need kick start celebrity excess in 2008. Not that I don't have the best of wishes for Ms. Spears, but as a friend informed me the other day, "2008 is the year of get it together!"

Incidentally, I'm officially changing Britney's Chinese zodiac sign to a rat because I really think this is her year to shine be it for better or worse. Sure, she was born in the year of the rooster, but after some totally reliable wikipedia research, I've found that a rooster she is not:"It is almost impossible to find someone born in [the year of the rooster] looking dowdy or untidy."

OBVS, Britney's a rat; "Rats in general should guard themselves against hedonism, as it may lead to self-destruction. Gambling, alcohol and drugs tend to be great temptations to Rat natives."

Best of luck, Brit-Brit!


*I know I should be writing about the Iowa caucuses and how Hillary got her ass mowed down by Obama but the wound is, frankly, still too fresh.

And Then a Guitar Hero Comes Along...

New Year's Eve was fun for a lot of reasons. Chief among them:

1. Austere Party-goers


2. Guitar Hero


3. Or was that Clit-ar Hero?


4. Assholes on cell phones


5. Kisses


6. Mimi