In Lena Dunham's Corner

Lena Dunham is a pretty polarizing figure. Anyone familiar with her seems to have a pretty strong opinion - love her, hate her, love Girls, hate Girls, too much nudity, love the nudity, she's gorgeous, she's a troll.

Usually the Lena internet chatter is pretty minimal when there isn't a current Girls season airing, but the other day I came across this NY Post article about why Lena shouldn't follow through on her talks with Anna Wintour about posing for Vogue. The argument is that Vogue only puts heavier women on the cover as a way of occasionally showing, "oh hey, look at us, we're edgy and revolutionary because we put an ugly chick in our magazine," and not as a way of showing that those women - who, by the way, include Oprah, Adele, and Serena Williams, to name a few - are smart or talented or sexy or otherwise worthy of being on the cover of a famous fashion magazine.

I think this logic is totally flawed, and let me explain why (did I just ask for permission to write something on my own blog? I guess I did).

Lena Dunham is the shit. I don't know her personally, of course, so my opinions of her consist largely of what I can glean from a) Girls b) her Twitter account and c) Miranda July's We Think Alone project, where every Monday for 20 weeks you received an email digest consisting of personal emails from the archives of 9 celebrities, including Lena, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, and Kirsten Dunst, among others.

From what I can tell, Lena is smart, funny, hard-working, humble, and passionate. She's a feminist role model, a confident woman, and does not appear to give a fuck what you think. I love all of these things about her. And sure, though it may not resonate with me 100% of the time, I think Girls is one of the best representations of life in New York that I've ever seen on TV. Though she may not have gotten the opportunity to write, produce, and star in her own show at age 26 without well-connected parents, I fully believe that she deserves it.

Though people have a ton of negative things to say about her, most of the controversy around Lena Dunham stems from the fact that she dares to walk around in her underwear on television despite, *gasp*, not having a perfect body. Ignoring the fact that the internet seems to think she wears a size 8, which is several sizes smaller than what the average American woman wears, I have to say - so what? Unless you live in Clockwork Orange, no one is forcing anyone to watch anything. If you don't want to see a size 8 woman play topless ping pong, you don't have to! It's a beautiful place we live in, isn't it? America the beautiful! Land of the free!

Frankly, I would give a lot of things to be a fraction as confident in my own skin as Lena is. I love the fact that she writes sex scenes for her Girls character much the same as she writes sex scenes for the other, super skinny characters. Maybe this shouldn't be necessary in order to demonstrate to some ignorant folks out there that you can be a "larger" woman and still be seen as sexually desirable, but I guess it is.

You know what else apparently needs to be very clearly explained to people? The fact that "fat" girls (I keep using quotation marks here because again, despite never having seen her in person I'm pretty sure Lena Dunham doesn't fully qualify) can take themselves seriously. I laughed just as much as the next person when Melissa McCarthy's character in Bridesmaids shamelessly hits on the air marshal. The only reason this bit landed with audiences is because we're not supposed to find her attractive. While I adore that movie and I really adore Melissa McCarthy, I appreciate that Lena doesn't feel the need to constantly poke fun at herself. She and her character Hannah are full and complete individuals who have lives - and relationships and problems and other real concerns - outside of their weight. But some people seem to think that if you're heavy, that's the be all and end all of who you are. As someone who is also in the not-even-close-to-size-zero range, I can always tell the difference between someone who views me as a normal human being and someone who views me strictly as a "fat chick." While I love the moments when I'm able to make my friends laugh (and I swear there was a time when I used to be funny on my blog), I resent the occasional pressure I feel to always be funny, partially because I'm not always funny, and partially because my weight doesn't preclude me from experiencing other emotions or eliciting those emotions from others.

But back to Vogue!

I think Lena should absolutely pose for the cover of Vogue. I'm not concerned that Vogue typically only puts the ultra svelte elite on their cover, even though this is true. If they truly only wanted Lena on the cover to prove that they don't feature thin girls 100% of the time, they wouldn't need to put her (or Oprah, or Adele, or Serena) on the cover - they could feature any overweight Jo Shmo. Or Jane Shmo, I guess I should say. But they choose women who are powerful and remarkable for exactly that reason - these women are powerful and remarkable and thus, worthy of recognition. They may not look like the typical Vogue cover model, but they're still worth highlighting.

Think about it this way: let's say Lena Dunham really wanted to be on the cover of Vogue, and they initially said no because she has curves and thighs that rub together when she walks. Then Vogue reverses its decision and says yes. Should Lena then refuse on principle because they didn't initially want her? Or should she seize the opportunity to do her small part in setting, or at least continuing, the precedent that you can grace the cover of Vogue by virtue of your accomplishments and not your tiny waistline? (Even if Vogue does a kind of annoying thing and photoshops you to the point of making it look like you have a tiny waistline. Baby steps, small victories, etc etc). Is there anyone out there who truly believes that the only reason anyone would ever put Oprah in a magazine is to prove that they don't have an anti-fat stance? I mean, Oprah is kind of the unofficial queen of the world.

I'm pretty low on the spectrum of people who follow celebrity news, but even I am tired of the anti-Lena rhetoric. I'm weary of reading comments about how fat she is, how she looks like a "sea cow," or how Girls is so unrealistic because no one who looks like her could ever have as much sex as Hannah does. Why can't we applaud someone for being bold and for kicking ass despite not conforming to conventional (and bullshit) standards of beauty?

Lena, I hope I do see you on the cover of Vogue one day. I probably won't buy it, because a Target-clad lady such as myself has no interest in high fashion, but it would certainly be the first issue of Vogue that I ever flip through while standing in the aisles of CVS.

Get it, girl.

Famous lookalikes and my love of JGL

One of the best parts of summer, right up there with street fairs, sundresses & flip flops, and trips to the Frying Pan, are outdoor concerts.

In the last week alone I have been to 3 summer concerts: Cake, Blues Traveler/Barenaked Ladies, and Incubus/Linkin Park. It was a week of high school throwback shows and I never thought I would say this but I'm a little concert-ed out right now.

But this post isn't about that. This post is about a revelation I had during the Linkin Park show.

This is Mike Shinoda, Linkin Park's primary songwriter, guitarist, keyboardist, and rapper (as opposed to Chester Bennington, the guy who does all the screaming. I wrote about him in my post about how rock stars are too skinny).

This is Josh Radnor, AKA the guy who plays Ted Mosby on How I Met Your Mother.

Let's look at them together.

These guys are TWINSIES.

If you like Linkin Park and you like How I Met Your Mother, you can probably understand how distracting it is to go through the entire concert feeling like Ted Mosby is rapping at you. But still - GOOD CONCERT.

Also, I think Mike Shinoda is adorable (Josh Radnor too, obviously). He's half Japanese, and I was going to say something about how maybe I have a thing for half-Asian men because of how much I absolutely adore Joseph Gordon-Levitt, but then I googled it and apparently JGL is very much white and not at all Asian.

Was I the only person who thought this? Anyway, JGL is Jewish, which I probably should have guessed with a last name like Levitt. The only thing this can possibly mean is that SOMEONE PLEASE GIVE HIM MY PHONE NUMBER IMMEDIATELY.

JGL, my mom and grandma will love you! Let's get married.

See? We'd be a totally cute couple.

Mindy Kaling can read my mind

You know how sometimes you encounter a line from a song or book or whathaveyou and you just think to yourself, "OMG THIS IS SOOO MY LIFE IT'S LIKE THIS SONG WAS WRITTEN FOR ME OMG OMG FOREVER."??? Well, that happened to me.

If this was 2002, I would put the line as my AIM away message, or if it was REALLY deep, I might even give it more semi-permanent recognition in my actual AIM profile.

But it's not 2002, so I'm putting it in my blog instead. Deal with it.

Back story - just yesterday I returned from a lovely 5 day trip to Florida, where I helped my grandma run errands, sort through paperwork, and talk about how upsetting it is that none of her grandchildren or great-nieces/nephews are getting married anytime soon. I also spent an obscene amount of time by the pool, soaking up the 80 degree weather and reading lots of books.

One of the books I read was Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns) by Mindy Kaling. I wanted to read this book not because I'm a fan of The Office (I've seen all of maybe 3 episodes), but because I'm a fan of intelligent, confident women who aren't afraid to assert their intelligence while also kind of making fun of themselves (see also: Bossypants, by Tina Fey).

In the beginning of the book, Mindy (we're on the first name basis, obvs) lists a few alternate titles she considered for the book. Among them:

When Your Boyfriend Fits Into Your Jeans and Other Atrocities

Harry Potter Secret Book #8

So You've Finished Chelsea Handler's Book, Now What?

And my personal favorite, the one that speaks to me like some awesomely emo song lyrics did when I was in college...

There Has Ceased To Be A Difference Between My Awake Clothes and My Asleep Clothes

STOP BEING INSIDE MY HEAD, MINDY.

Also, maybe I shouldn't be such a slob. But when the siren song of luxurious fleecey sweatpants beckons, I am powerless. Oh well.

Dave Grohl is a beast

The other day, I was finally able to cross another band off my "must see in concert" list. And as you probably realize, this band was the Foo Fighters.

I expected this concert to be amazing. And it was. But while I've been to a lot of amazing concerts, it's pretty rare that I see a frontman as completely ridiculous as Dave Grohl. The man is a BEAST.

First of all, this was one of the longest concerts I've ever been to. Their set was about 3 hours, including a 40 minute encore. At no point in this 3 hours did Dave Grohl exude any level of energy below that of a puppy. On red bull. If you were to give red bull to a dog, which you probably shouldn't.

At one point, my concert buddy Brian said, "I have no idea how he can walk, play guitar, and headbang all at the same time." It was pretty incredible, the headbanging. I've never seen so much of it. And it didn't seem to get in the way of anything. He had amazing hairography, as they say on Glee.

I think there's some rule against talking about the Foo Fighters and Glee in the same blog post. Apologies.

Halfway through the show, Dave Grohl's shirt was completely, 100% soaked in sweat. His hair was stringy. And yet he still rocked on like a fucking badass.

Another thing? THE MAN DOES NOT AGE. At one point, Krist Novoselic (let's not pretend I had any clue how to spell that before Googling it) came out to join the Foo Fighters for a song. For those who don't recognize the name (full disclosure: I didn't), he was the other guy in Nirvana. The one who wasn't Dave Grohl or Kurt Cobain. And he looked OLD. He was balding and wearing some dorky outfit and I told Brian that he looked like an aging scientist.

And then you have this guy:

Bad picture, but you can see how he does NOT look super old.

I am totally impressed. And while rock stars don't typically do it for me (remember this post about how skinny they all seem to be?), nor have I ever thought this about Dave Grohl before, I would definitely tap that if given the opportunity (call me!). Rawr.

Please feed the rock stars

First of all, I want to say that the overwhelming response to my last post was that I should put this profile up on OK Cupid. I am not sure about this. Decision forthcoming. But moving on.

Recently, I've noticed a trend among the male frontmen for various bands.

They are some skinny fuckers.

Bear in mind that it is surprisingly hard to find a good picture of these dudes in a wifebeater and skinny jeans, the state in which I've seen most of them recently and which, in my opinion, makes them look the most malnourished. So use your imagination a bit.

Maroon 5's Adam Levine....eat a sandwich.

Green Day's Billie Joe Armstrong...eat a sandwich.
Linkin Park's Chester Bennington...eat a sandwich.
Brandon Boyd of Incubus...eat a sandwich.

I know that they all have to have insanely high energy levels as a profession, but seriously, don't you just want them to go eat a bowl of pasta or something? I'm not saying they aren't sexy because let's be real here, everyone loves a rock star (amiright ladies?). But you know...there's no data to suggest that we wouldn't love a well-fed rock star.

Anyway, not that Lil Wayne is my type AT ALL, but let's just take a moment to feast upon Weezy's abs.

Hello.

Temporary fangirldom

In the immediate wake of a really good concert, movie or show, I tend to turn into an obsessive fangirl for a period of anywhere between 2 and 7 days. If I really love a particular actor in a movie, I will probably spend a few days reading as much as I can about him/her. With concerts, I go home, download whatever of their music I didn't already have and listen to nothing else for days.

After seeing American Idiot on Broadway, I spent a lot of time rocking out to Green Day and debating whether or not Billie Joe Armstrong is cool in real life and if there’s any chance he might want to have a beer or a shot of Jameson with me some day.

Because I had the wonderful privilege of seeing Daniel Radcliffe in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying this weekend (“privilege” meaning “waiting in the cold for 2 hours to get rush tickets”), I was in full fledged fangirl mode for several days and am finally coming down. My friend Anny said that he always has a good rapport with talk show interviewers, so of course I youtubed as many interviews as I could. I also youtubed his appearance on Extras, googled reviews of How to Succeed, read as much about his life as humanly possible, and discussed contrasting experiences with my friend Rebekah who saw him in Equus (verdict: I’m happy I went with Daniel Radcliffe singing and dancing over Daniel Radcliffe showing the world his…magical wand).

I also, of course, debated whether he would like to become my adopted younger brother because if there’s one thing missing from my life, it’s a British younger brother who sings and dances and who happens to also be Harry Potter. If not my younger brother, maybe he would like to join my book club since he likes to read (I know a bunch of you book clubbers are reading this – at the next meeting, let’s make a plan for getting him to join okay? OKAY!), or MAYBE he can come over for the Passover seder since he is apparently one of the Chosen People.

Dan, my mom makes awesome brisket. Come to my seder! You can bring your parents.

Yes, I have learned that his parents are living with him in New York.

Anyway, Daniel Radcliffe obsession time is on its way out, as I mentioned. I’m just going to sit around and wait for the next thing to kick in.

Last weekend...

Started out with a little Martha...


And then included some last minute ticket purchasing to Boyz II Men (last minute meaning 10 minutes before the concert started).


Good times.

A little Emmy's snark for you

As you know, last night we had the joy of watching Glee get robbed of most of the Emmys for which it was nominated. Though I wasn't even planning on watching because the vast majority of the TV I watch is by no means Emmy-worthy (Real World/Road Rules challenges what WHAT), I got a last minute call to liveblog from Dan who, as you may remember, was my partner in liveblogging the Oscars earlier this year. We were joined this time by the fabulous Jess, and even though the Emmys weren't all that exciting after the first 10 minutes (I even abandoned the last hour to watch Mad Men), we still managed to squeeze in a few gems. Here are my favorites:


Jess: God I hate Seacrest. It's like watching a man's soul leaving his body on live TV.


Jess: Is it my TV or is Guiliana orange?


Arielle: ...not that i follow any of the glee cast on twitter or anything
Jess: I've @ replied Corey Montieth like three times


Arielle: the top of her dress looks like spray-painted seashells
Arielle: like an art project i would have done at sleepaway camp



Arielle: oh no
Arielle: naya rivera has a pineapple on her head

(Ed note: HELLLOOOOOO Mark Salling)

Jess: Oh my god Billy Bush and the chick on NBC doing the fashion stuff is awful
Jess: and she's a raging bitch
Dan: love it when you get mad jess
Dan: you go big


On Lost:
Jess: Yeah there was stuff unanswered
Jess: But the finale was so emotional
Jess: Bawled off all my make up


Jess: if you don't cry in Up, dead inside
Jess: fact
Dan: well I didn't cry
Dan: but I DID feel bad
Dan: (I felt bad because I spilled my Mr Pibb)


Arielle: this chick needs a bra
Arielle: or some chicken cutlets
Jess: for real
Jess: no free boobing it


Arielle: can i just put Hugh Laurie, Jon Hamm, Joel McHale and Cory Monteith in a room together?
Jess: Can I put Kyle Chandler, John Krasinski, Cory, Mark Salling and Matthew Morrison in mine?
Dan: my room would just be scarlett j
Dan: mila kunis would be in line to get in the room
Dan: then diane lane
Arielle: betty white
Jess: Good call
Jess: betty white, I'm sure she knows her way around a....
Arielle: nursing home?


On the Oscars winning an Emmy:
Arielle: an awards show winning an award at an awards show?
Arielle: how meta

That's it for now. See you all at the...whatever the next good awards show is.

Margaritas and Kendra, 2 of my favorite things

This email to my peeps yesterday pretty much sums up my life perfectly right now:

Hello wonderful friends!

As all of you know, my summer of leisure, AKA daytime drinking, buying new dresses and hunting down every free food deal in Manhattan, is every so often interspersed with this thing called "job hunting."

I am proud to announce what a few of you already know, which is that I will soon reach a major milestone in my job search. No, not a job offer. Not even the interview of a lifetime. Tomorrow, I expect to reach 100 job applications.

While most people might find this milestone to represent a failure of epic proportions, I think it represents a time to ask a number of questions. Why doesn't anyone want to hire me? What exactly did I get myself into my desired salary's worth of student loan debt for? How many different versions of the same resume can one person possibly create? And most importantly - how many happy hour margaritas can I drink in 3 hours?

Which is why tomorrow I will be downing margaritas like it's my job (because there certainly isn't anything else that's my job right now) in CANCUN BABYYYYYY. That's Cancun, on 8th Ave. between 55th and 56th. Kind of like the real Cancun, only...not.

Happy hour is from 4 to 7. If you would like to join me, please do. And if you would like to bring anyone, please do. Because even if you don't have a reason to celebrate, however fake that reason is, everyone likes margaritas. At least everyone important does.

First 10 people to show up get a free stack of copies of my resume.

With love and tequila,
AJ

Happy hour was fab. I am margarita-ed out. And OMG I forgot to mention how Lacey sent me an email from Berlin or Amsterdam or wherever she was at the time on her whole "honeymoon" thing being like, "Kendra Wilkinson is going to be at Borders signing books." And of course I wrote her back saying "YOU ARE MY FAVORITE" because Lacey knows how much I love Kendra. And Hank Baskett. And Baby Hank Baskett. And then I went with Crapface, a fellow lover of all things Wilkinson/Baskett, and people weren't allowed to take pictures with her but it was all good because I got to see her and Hank (sadly, no mini Hank) and if you think I paid $25 for that book just so I could get her to sign it...you're wrong. I'm not that crazy.

Then over dinner I told Crapface the story of how I ended up being written about (not by name) in one of Jen Lancaster's books all because Lacey was making fun of me because I had never seen Footloose. Maybe one day I'll repost that story from ye olde blog.

How did this post get so rambly? Oy.

The best and worst dream

I freaking hate really good dreams. Some people wake up from an awesome dream and think, "Man, that dream kicked ass. I'm going to be in the BEST MOOD EVER all day!" I wake up from a good dream and think, "Motherf'er, my life is never going to be like that. Sad face."

2 nights ago, I had a dream where I was dating Cory Monteith. It wasn't even a makeout dream (PS, who else loved when Kristin Chenoweth was all, "Will Schuester? I just had a sex dream about you!"). In fact, I don't remember anything that happened. We might have been on some kind of It's A Small World-esque amusement park ride where you sit in a little boat and see cool stuff, but even that detail is sort of fuzzy. The point is, DO YOU KNOW WHAT IT'S LIKE WAKING UP FROM A DREAM WHERE YOU'RE DATING CORY MONTEITH? It sucks.

If you don't know who Cory Monteith is, I mean, why are you even here and are we even really friends? Go away. But to fill you in, he plays Finn on Glee, hence why I already referenced Glee in this post. But my dream wasn't about the character Finn (hi, 16 is a little young for me and probably illegal in many states), it was about the actor Cory, who, according to IMDB, is 28.

And whatever, I don't care if I think about Glee too much or tweet about Glee too much. I love it.

For real, though. Cory, if you're reading this, call me. I don't even care that you're Canadian.

And for the future, I would much rather stick to weird dreams over good ones. That way I don't walk around all day in a "Boo hoo I'm not actually dating a totally adorable TV star" funk.

Niecy Nash

Okay, this is yet another post about Dancing With the Stars. Shut up, I like it.

Even though she got kicked off last week, Niecy Nash is still one of my favorite contestants. She was completely hilarious, which is sort of expected seeing as she's a comedian (or, comedienne, whatever). And while it's amusing when she talks about how much she likes her "jiggly parts," and says things like, "Before the show, what I did to keep in shape was...nothing," the show totally takes it to a whole other level. I mean, the judges make fun of her for eating a lot and hardly an episode goes by without comments, sometimes in voice over, about how much she loves food.

Most women would find this offensive. Niecy, however, totally owns her weight and clearly doesn't care that others comment about it even when a lot of people would see this as one of those situations that's like, "I can make fun of myself but don't you dare make fun of me."

The thing that bothers me about this whole thing is that Niecy Nash is NOT THAT FAT. Sure, she rocks the T&A like nobody's business but she has a defined waistline! Her stomach is mostly flat! She's just a curvy woman and yes, if she wanted to lose weight I'm sure she could (as opposed to other female celebrities who probably don't have a full pound of fat on their entire bodies), but she by no means needs to. If she didn't have so much natural junk in the trunk she would probably wear a size 6. Maybe she even DOES wear a size 6.

I realize that the judges and hosts probably wouldn't say things if she didn't say them herself, but I really wish the whole thing would just be put to rest. It's like the producers were embarrassed to have a non-size zero in the top 5 so they felt the need to compensate by acknowledging Niecy's size over and over. And over.

I won't even get into how it's likely that the only reason Niecy lasted so long is because she's so awesomely hysterical. Because you know that no one likes large female celebrities unless they're funny. Or Oprah.

Pretty but stupid

Chad Ochocinco is a sexy, sexy man.

The thing is, his last name is OCHOCINCO. ON PURPOSE.

I'm sorry, but among the many good reasons that exist for changing your last name, mainly if you get married or your last name just happens to suck, the desire to reflect the numbers on the back of your jersey is not one of them.

Changing your last name to your football number is about as stupid as getting a tattoo. Yes, I realize many of you have tattoos. And yes, I think you're a fool for getting one. And no, I don't care how much those song lyrics or some cryptic symbol that most people don't understand reflects who you are or who you used to be or reminds you of someone who passed away. But it's okay, I'll still be your friend. But only the kind of friends who don't get matching tattoos.

Chad, even though you also did a sort of foolish thing by making a kinda-sorta-permanent life change in order to reflect something that's really only temporary, I will still be your friend. Mostly because you're hot. If you and Cheryl Burke break up (are they even together? Does anyone know? Why is she wearing his "thank you" diamond ring on her ring finger?), call me.

Nicole Scherzinger, you can call me too. You are also hot and I would like to be in the Pussycat Dolls. Let's discuss.

Now that Buzz Aldrin is gone, there are some seriously sexy people left on Dancing With the Stars.

I love television.

Live from the 82nd Academy Awards...

...are your ever-inebriated and awesome correspondents, myself and Dan. And by this I mean we had been scheming for weeks to liveblog (AKA gchat during) the Oscars. It was everything I expected and more - snarky comments, booze (Jack and DCs for me), and me discovering my magical ability to accurately predict winners at the very last second. You can read Dan's excellent recap, full of 100% new gchat quotes, here.

Oscar night proved to me a number of different things. First, that great minds really do think alike.

Dan: oh look at morgan freeman
Dan: he has a glove on his left hand
And then at the same time:
Dan: does this asshole think he's MJ?!
Arielle: tribute to MJ?

Second, that Dan is far more quick-witted than I am.
Arielle: is this the music from jurassic park?
Dan: haha its ET
Dan: who just happens to be hiding under her dress
(I really wish I remember who was on screen at the time)

Arielle: tom ford sort of looks like keanu reeves
Dan: he like, totally knows kung fu

Dan: and Precious wins one
Arielle: did this guy just run a marathon?
Arielle: why is he wheezing
Dan: he was probably on the can when they were announcing the nominees

I also learned, or rather reinforced, that I am heinously immature.

Arielle: did jlo just say butt sanders?
Arielle: as in that's someone's name?
Arielle: i guess ill never know

Talking about Gabourey Sidibe from Precious:
Arielle: it would suck if your name rhymed with "cabaret"
Arielle: come to the gabareeeeeey

Sometimes, alcohol causes you to be hilarious and/or ridiculous.

Arielle: helen mirren looks like an uppity bitch
Dan: damn helen mirren
Dan: I mean, dame
Dan: lolololol

Arielle: omg is that baby baldwin?

Dan: is that courtney love?!
Arielle: are you talking about michelle pfeiffer?
Dan: yeah at first her hair looked weird

The awesomeness abounded. But obviously I already knew we were awesome.

When James Taylor was about to perform:
Arielle: you've got a friend!
Dan: how sweet is to be loved byyyy youuu
Arielle: or you know, he can sing a beatles song, i guess
Arielle: on a scale of 1 to 10, how pissed would you be if you were james taylor and the producers were like "you're going to sing someone else's song"
Dan: 2 words: Hulk Smash

Dan: nice jacket streisand
Arielle: is she wearing a curtain around her neck?
Dan: ahaha
Dan: she wants to be a pirate
(a few minutes later)
Arielle: pirate is exiting stage right
Dan: shiver me timbers

In addition to my constant obsessing over how much I loved Inglourious Basterds was my constant obsessing over Ryan Reynolds.

Arielle: bradley cooper: the poor man's ryan reynolds
Dan: oh you'd still hook it up
Arielle: duh

The end. See you at the MTV Movie Awards, mayhaps?

Not a regular day at the office

This is my last post before leaving for Mardi Gras! But have no fear, I have a series of guest posts set up to keep you entertained. And by guest posts I mean posts written by me. But you can consider that a guest. The Ghost of Arielle Past. Right.

It's a little after 1 AM and I just got back from work. I was working at a wedding which we knew to be pretty high-end, and that maybe it was the daughter of someone who used to be a pro football player or something like this and maybe there would be other athlete type people there. Whatever. So we're waiting for the wedding to get started and I'm the only girl in a group of 6 working at the ceremony part. And we're waiting for ish to start and the conversation is sort of like this:

5 Guys: Holy crap look at that ~insert name of really expensive car/limousine~!!!
5 Guys: DUDE THAT'S JOE NAMATH!
Arielle: I sort of know who Joe Namath is! Wait, is the bride wearing black shoes!?! Hey, Joe Namath doesn't look like a football player.
5 Guys: Duh, he was a quarterback. He's like Peyton Manning, all skinny.
Arielle: Anyone who thinks I knew that Joe Namath was a quarterback or that I have the faintest idea what Peyton Manning looks like is giving me too much credit. Let's just be happy I've heard of Peyton Manning at all.

And then somehow later on Joe Namath is asking me a question and as I'm talking to him I think to myself, "There are so many people in the world who would appreciate this so much more than I do."

Later on, we have moved to the reception. I should mention that we are dressed in full tuxedo attire, which is rare. While everyone in catering owns a vest and bowtie, we almost never wear jackets and thus aren't required to own them. The caterer provides them for us if needed. Somehow I get stuck wearing an XL, which is decidedly NOT my jacket size. We're in the back doing our thing, and a staff person I've never spoken to says...

Random Dude: You win the prize.
Arielle: What prize?
RD: The "Dad wants his jacket back prize."

If you think this was the first or the last person to laugh at me for swimming in my tuxedo jacket, you are far too optimistic.

Another highlight of the evening was when we found out that Natalie Portman was also in attendance. The guys were excited because she's hot, and I was excited because she's a famous Jew. So everyone won. And while none of us spoke to her, we did see her a few times.

Perhaps my favorite part of the night, though, was when we were cleaning up the cocktail hour. There was this huge display of flowers, and we had been told earlier by some of the workers that everything was going to get thrown out when they took it down. I look over and the 2 workers are pulling flowers out of the display and making bouquets. I asked, "Trying to save money on Valentine's Day?" and they said yes, at which point all the other guys started making bouquets as well, talking about how lucky they were to have a huge array of free roses to choose from the day before V-Day when, conveniently, none of them had already arranged flowers for their significant others. I couldn't help but try to capture the moment.


In short, it was a lovely evening. I got to make some money, see some famous people, and be thoroughly entertained from start to finish. Enjoy the fabulous posts I have set up for you, and at some point I will be back to hopefully recap the next week of sheer awesomeness. =)

Birthday weekend extravaganza!

Well, it's official. I have been 26 for exactly 2 days. The transition has been a little weird, as I think 26 sounds WAY older than 25. Yuck. But anyhoo.

I went to New York to celebrate because celebrating in Boston just doesn't cut it (even though I will be having the Boston version of my birthday on November 7th).

On Friday, Lacey and I went to Shecky's Girls Night Out (for free! Booyah!), where we enjoyed free drinks, free cupcakes, and some awesome goody bags. We then had a delicious dinner and drinks with our friend Anna at Mary Ann's.

On Saturday, my actual birthday (woohoo!) I had an A. MA. ZING. lunch with my friend Crapface at Bobby Flay's Bar Americain. Holy Jesus, it was good. Go there. Eat the burgers. Pay no mind to the overdressed tourists. Make room for dessert. DO IT.

After lunch, I got a mani/pedi with my wifer and birthday partner in crime Julie (HAPPY BIRTHDAY WIFER, I LOVE YOU!!!). Then I headed to ANOTHER BOROUGH (I know, what?!?) to visit my friend Rebekah in Brooklyn. She's a fabulous bartender and I've been promising forever that I'd go visit her while she was working at The Brazen Head. Since my bartending resume has this bar on it, I figured it's about time I stepped inside (don't hate on me for lying, every bartender I've met, including my bartending school teachers, said you can't get a job unless you flat out lie the first few times).

I returned from Brooklyn and got ready for my TRIPLE BIRTHDAY PARTY EXTRAVAGANZA, as I was celebrating with Julie and my high school friend Devika. I got sexified, pregamed with some lovely ladies, and headed to Mason Dixon. I enjoyed some Jager shots, too many sweet tea vodkas, and of course, some good old fashioned mechanical bull riding. For pictures and video of Lacey (and thankfully not me) riding the bull, go here. I know someone out there has pictures of me, but I have yet to see them. Maybe that's a good thing.

We left the bar when it closed at 4 AM, and on our way to catch a cab Anna spotted Maks from Dancing With the Stars. She flipped out. He waved. I was, as usual, amazed at Anna's ability to find celebrities I wouldn't otherwise have noticed.

On Sunday morning I somehow miraculously managed to drag my hungover ass to the bus back to Boston, on which I accomplished an astonishing amount of homework and received text messages from Nicole about what a champ I was for getting on the bus (WIN).

I went straight from the bus to volleyball, then dinner with vball peeps at Boston Beer Works, and finally back home.

Fabulous motherf'ing weekend. Good food, good drinks, and most importantly, surrounding myself with good people. I heart my birthday.

Miss Universe? I think not

I've been thinking about something amidst all this hullabaloo (Fact: I have never before used that word) around the Miss Universe pageant. And by "hullabaloo," I mean, "I didn't even know the Miss Universe pageant was going on until Lacey started tweeting about Heidi Montag's performance, at which point I immediately Youtubed it and GOOD GOD will someone off that girl already?" Jeez.

Anyway, to preface this story, I will tell another story.

A few weeks ago, some lovely friends and I were driving to the Hamptons. During our ride there, I started wondering aloud about some things I think about probably way too frequently, such as what kinds of life forms exist in other galaxies, and if we ever met them how on Earth (pun intended) we would communicate with them seeing as they're probably not human and don't do things like nod or smile and they might not even have hands to gesture with in the first place. My friends indulged me in the way that you indulge people with whom you're stuck in a car for a long time because you either have to talk WITH them or listen to them talk aloud to no one in particular. That is to say, they joined in my conversation somewhat unwillingly because they, like my sophomore year roommate who listened to me pontificate on multiple occasions about the possible existence of giants, are normal and I am not (and if you think I didn't also bring up giants in this car ride, you are wrong).

The point is, I think there is crazy life millions of light years away and we will never know about it.

And now, back to Miss Universe (did you forget that, for once, there was a point to all this rambling?).

I think it's rather shortsighted to crown a Miss Universe seeing as we have no idea who or what else is out there. I understand that "Miss Planet Earth" doesn't have a great ring to it, but I hate for these bimbos scholarship pageant contestants to think that they're reigning over something they really aren't. Our solar system, let alone this lovely planet we inhabit, is but a miniscule portion of the overall universe and somewhere, quite far away, is a being that is quite possibly being denied his/her/its true title.

One day, many years in the future, assuming the world doesn't end in 2012 or whenever those crazy Mayans said it would, when we have mastered the art of somehow traveling across the universe without it taking thousands of years, we will have the opportunity to crown the REAL Miss Universe. The contestant pool will probably be a crazy mix of human/alien/other being that possibly has tentacles or 600 eyes, but we will have developed some standard by which we can judge all of them (bye bye, swimsuit competition). I wish I were going to be around to see that crazy day.

And also, hopefully there won't be crap like Heidi "my whole body is fake and I can't sing or dance" Montag performing. Vom.

No Doubt concert

On Saturday night, Lacey, 2 others and I went to a No Doubt concert at Jones Beach. And let me tell you something:

IT WAS FUCKING AMAZING.

For realz. Lacey and I went to our first No Doubt concert 13 years ago, and it was pretty exciting back then because it was the first concert I ever went to that was of MY choosing (as opposed to being dragged to my parents' concerts). Plus, Tragic Kingdom was the first CD I ever owned.

I'm pretty sure that in the last 13 years, Gwen Stefani has aged..not at all. Apparently getting married and having 2 children is the way to get some hot ass abs. Maybe the key is having your hubby be a sexy British grungey sexy sexy rocker man (hi, Gavin, call me!).

Anyhoo, so Lacey has a fuller review of the concert on her blog, but seriously, it was the kind of concert where even if your feet hurt from standing and you're nauseous afterwards from beer + jumping up and down for 1.5 hours and your throat hurts from screaming and you're SO TIRED but you don't get home until 4 hours after the concert is over, you still want to do it ALL OVER AGAIN BECAUSE IT WAS THAT DAMN GOOD.

The No Doubt show got me thinking about some of the better concerts that I've been to in my life. I made a list of all the concerts I can remember going to, and I have 43. I'm going to assume that I'm forgetting some, so we'll make it a nice even 50. Out of those 50, I'm going to try to rank the top 5. This should be interesting.

1. Linkin Park, February 2008. I wrote a review of this concert on my old blog. I waited 7 f'in years to see them live and it was SO WORTH IT.

2. Weezer, Summer 2003. I was at the peak of my Weezer obsession at this time. We tailgated in the pouring rain and had crappy ass seats and I still wanted to jump on stage and molest Rivers Cuomo.

3. No Doubt, June 2009. LOVE LOVE LOVE.

4. Guster/Ben Folds/Rufus Wainwright, Summer 2004. I actually didn't remember much about this concert but in going through my old OLD blog I had a post about this show and I was totally gushing and said it was one of the best concerts I had ever been to. So, that's that. Guster and Ben always put on fab shows.

5. H2O, sometime in early 2002. This one is sort of random because I had never even heard of H2O and I don't usually enjoy concerts as much if I don't know the music. I pretty much got conned into going because my friend told me that a guy I had a crush on was going. However, we pushed our way to the front and totally rocked out and I LOVED IT even though the only song I knew was their Like A Prayer cover. I can't even say that I liked it because that guy was there, because right after the concert he told me he wanted me to hook him up with another one of my friends that had been there.

I have to give an honorable mention to Barenaked Ladies, because even though they didn't make the top 5, their shows are always awesome. Totally one of those bands that's just meant to perform live. I've seen them twice and had a blast both times.

Shawn vs. Nastia

Look, people. I heart Shawn Johnson as much as the next EVERY PERSON IN AMERICA. She's cute and awesome and I was rooting for her in the Olympics and on Dancing With the Stars like you wouldn't believe.

The other day, as I was walking up 7th Avenue, I saw an advertisement featuring none other than Shawn's Olympic teammate, Nastia Liukin.

You're like, "Who?" And I'm all, "Remember her? She was the gymnast who has sort of a creepily close relationship with her dad but, oh yeah, she pretty much dominated the Olympics (and our beloved Shawn) and won the individual all-around gold medal (Shawn came in second, if I recall correctly). And now that you remember who she is, you're like, "Cool. Well, good for her and her ad."

People, her ad was for a brand of jeans. A brand of jeans I had never heard of. A brand of jeans whose website is a MYSPACE PAGE.

A MySpace page, for those of you not in the know, does not constitute a legitimate corporate website. This leads me to believe that whatever brand of jeans Nastia's hawking these days is, sadly, not longed for this world.

I feel badly for her. I know that if I were Nastia, I'd have been throwing things at the damn TV every Monday and Tuesday night screaming "GOD DAMNIT BITCH I BEAT YOU IN THE FREAKING OLYMPICS WHY DOES NOBODY CARE ABOUT MEEEEEE!" I'm also prone to jealous rages, if you couldn't tell.

But seriously. Nastia has totally gotten the shaft. Shawn gets the fame, the glory, and the reality TV show. Nastia gets a MySpace page.

Sorry Nastia, maybe next time.

And if you see Shawn around, tell her to be my friend. I love her.