I’m a Jinius

i wanna see that new anne hathaway movie “rachel getting married”. it seems to be in the same vein as the noah baumbach film “margot at the wedding.” i can see the next wayans movie now “i can’t believe my fat, ugly sister got married before me.”

hey, lets do an online book club! my goal has been to read a book a month (i’m a moderate achiever). i skipped september but kavalier and clay was like 700 pages so that should count as two books. heh.

so this month’s book is american pastoral by philip roth. The last Roth book I read was Portnoy’s Complaint (which was more like Portnoy’s Rant). I thought it was hilarious at first but then fifty pages into it I was like okay, I get it, you wanna get laid and you hate your mother. But American Pastoral is supposed to be the standout of his oeuvre (insert exaggerated French accent here) so it should be good.

if you have any other book recs please let me know! especially books by female writers. it’s a little disconcerting that my bookshelf is dominated by white, male, jewish writers. kinda like my love life. or not.

aaaaaaand scene.

-Yesterday I met up with Emi at the beer garden in Williamsburg. I have never seen so many toddlers running amok in my life. Is a bar really a safe place for a youngster? We all know how painful it can be when a wine bottle falls on an adult’s foot, (or just mine), imagine the pain it can bring to a two year old!!! Well, I suppose it is not so strange for toddlers to be at a bar. When they walk they kinda look like drunk people.

-So over La choufes and bratwurst, I learned about the the astrological phenomena known as Saturn Returns. I guess it takes 29 years for Saturn to complete its cycle in your birth chart. It’s supposed to be a major transition time that involves endings and new beginnings and commences your period of adulthood. This can explain why so many of my friends are applying to grad school, moving, changing jobs, and becoming republicans.

-My apps are due at the end of this week and I can finally stop agonizing over them. If I don’t get into grad school, I’m going to kill myself. Hahahahahaha…ha.

-I know, I know, no one likes suicide jokes on a Monday morning. They’re more of a Friday evening/happy hour thing.

-I stayed home on Saturday and rented the Sex and the City movie. I thought it was moving…my bowels.*

-I go to this hair stylist that I really like but I think she talks too much. So when she’s cutting my hair, I close my eyes and pretend I’m sleeping so I don’t have to engage in a conversation. She must think I’m either narcoleptic or just meditating.

-Did you know that women in their late twenties go through a second puberty? Yes, it coincides with the return of saturn! This explains why I developed hips over the past year. I have birthing hips! My body is literally telling me that I’m ready to produce children!

*like everything else i totally stole that from Tina Fey

While watching the VP debates last night, I came up with a very easy drinking game involving Ms.  Palin.

1. Every time she says “nucular”, drink

2. Every time she says “maverick”, drink

3. She says maverick and John McCain in the same sentence, two shots

4. Mentions Alaska and energy, drink

5. She says “worldview”, Irish car bomb

6. Ends a sentence with “withcha” “heckofalot” or “darn right”, drink

7. She says all three in the same sentence, drink.

8. Pass out.

I don’t understand why she keeps bringing up the fact that she’s a soccer mom and that she’s just like the rest of middle America. I don’t know about you but I don’t want a soccer mom in the executive branch. I want someone who’s a lot smarter than the average person. Geesh, is that too much to ask???

I’ve always been intrigued by the word “radical”.

In pop culture, it’s the parlance of surfer dudes or teenage mutant ninja turtles.

In math, it’s the root or fundamental part of a number.

In politics, it denotes change or extremism.

And it wasn’t until college that I realized radical politics was all about the fundamental components of an ideology. Like radical feminism or radical islamism. It is both tradition and change. Extreme and fundamental. And that’s what makes politics so freaking confusing.

Take for instance last night.

I went to a screening of a documentary that was not exactly aligned with my political beliefs. And I’m not even a blood thirsty liberal. As someone who’s not a citizen, I think I have a Toquevillean advantage of seeing both sides of politics which means that I’m conservative on some stances and liberal on others.

For instance:

I advocate universal health care but I also believe the morbidly obese should not eat up all US tax dollars. I believe everyone has the right to a great education but I also believe in charter schools. I strongly believe that every woman has the right to choose but I also believe not every woman should have the right to be a parent. (For example, I saw a woman walking down the street with her newborn in one arm and a cigarette in the other. It’s not that I’m advocating eugenics, I’m just saying stupid people should not be allowed to raise children.) I believe in social welfare but I’m also a fan of capitalism. I oppose capital punishment but I also believe that child predators should have their dicks chopped off.

Anyway, that was just a long, drawn out way of saying that I tried to watch this movie with an open albeit still biased mind. Heh.

After the movie, there was a reception with open bar and lots of meat and cheese and one older woman said to me, “I’m so happy to see such young conservatives here!”

I nearly choked on my soppressata.

People kept asking what I thought of the movie and I was reminded of that 30 Rock episode when Tina Fey has to pretend that she liked her friend’s movie so she tries to think of one random compliment. So when people asked what I thought of the movie I’d smile and say, “Oh, I am really digging this open bar.”

Talking about drinking is safe. It’s non partisan.

Actually, as much as I hate to admit it, the movie was actually pretty good. Entertaining even. And while I didn’t believe in what the movie had to say, I think there were parts of it that were pretty–insert Psycho theme song here–insightful.

Anyway, it was interesting to be able to infiltrate the other side. It was kinda like that US Weekly feature “Celebrities: they’re just like us!” Except it was more like “Conservatives: they’re just like us!”

(Well, except that whole I don’t believe in gay marriage or birth control thing)

And that’s the interesting thing about politics in this country. If we just set aside the caricatures we have of both ideologies, stop thinking in extremes and looking at issues as just black and white, and remember what the common causes are, maybe we could really carve out a path to mobilize change.

Wouldn’t that be radical?

“I am very fun after one glass of vodka. I am more beautiful, too.”
-Carine Roitfeld

Photo of the Paris Vogue Dream Team via The Sartorialist

Much to my delight (and my inevitable social demise), I discovered that the Sci-fi channel is now airing re-runs of LOST. So now I can get my fill of Michael screaming WAAAAAAALT!!!! WAAAAAAAALT!!!!

So they run four hours of LOST on Monday nights. And do you know what I did last night? I WATCHED FOUR HOURS OF LOST. And even though I’ve already seen season one, I cried at the end of the episode when Sayid talks about Nadia and how he still clings on to the hope that he will be reunited with her again. “If not in this life, then in another world.”

Of course I cried. Am I not human???

But at least I had human interaction beforehand. I met up with Emi at Crocodile lounge and had some pumpkin ale and free pizza. Yes, they give you a free pie with every beer. And the place was busy for a Monday night. Must be all the impoverished NYU students and Wall Street bankers.

And I did other things this weekend besides watch tv. Well, unless you count Saturday when I spent the entire day prostrated on my couch, watching season one of 30 Rock and old episodes of LOST. Oh, I did get up once because I ordered Korean food.

Side note: I wanted to order Mexican food but Mexican food in New York City has become increasingly costly!!! Tacos at San Loco are like seven bucks now. I remember reading this piece in The Economist about the end of cheap food and that because countries like India and China actually have more money now, more people actually have money to EAT, and the greater demand for food is raising prices, and coupled with the fact that the high demand for ethanol also drives up the price of CORN, you can see why I can’t afford to eat chicken guaco locos!!!

So the reason I stayed inside all day Saturday is because on Friday I went out to Barramundi for Vidya’s birthday. They have $3 drinks until nine. Fabulous! So I ordered a guinness. But the bartender neglected to mention that guinness is not included in the happy hour. Faux fabulous!

Some photos from the evening.

(more…)

Oh my jesus I started watching this at work and literally burst out laughing. I don’t know why. I think it’s because fart jokes are just perennially funny. Click here.

1. Soooo I went to a going away dinner for Sabs last night at Chez Elissa.

2. And maybe it’s the stress from dealing with work and my grad school applications or maybe it’s because I’m dealing with the sadness of Sabbie’s departure or maybe it’s just the plain fact that I like to drink whiskey on Wednesday nights but I drank a little too much last night. And by ‘little” I mean I passed out at Elissa’s house and woke up this morning feeling completely displaced and confused.

3. First of all, why WHY do I drink whiskey on a school night????

4. Second of all, I was so disoriented that I couldn’t figure out where I was. Imagine the Bourne Identity. But with a massive hangover. And you have to pee really bad but you can’t figure out where the bathroom is because you can’t figure out where you are! I finally figured out where I was when Chris’s alarm off and he told me to wake up. How sweet are my friends? He set his alaram at 630 IN THE MORNING so I could get to work on time.

5. Then I saw a pink post it note next to my bag. Elissa had left a pencil skirt and a top for me to wear to work.

6. And then there was another post-it note next to a clean towel for me to shower with.

7. I continued to follow the pink post-it notes like they were a sherpa leading me to back to reality. There was a post it on the front door reminding me to take my lunch that Elissa had packed for me (like a mom!). There was even a plastic bag with a muffin, emergen-c and meds to help alleviate my HANGOVER. Yes, it was the kind of hangover that requires ALL CAPS.

8. So I learned two very valuable lessons.

9. Don’t drink whiskey on a Wednesday.

10. Always be grateful for such amazing friends. Especially the ones who have to carry you up a flight of stairs and put you in bed and set their alarms and give you clean clothes and packed lunches so your ass doesn’t get fired during this recession!!!!

11. Oh and I lost my phone. So if you’ve called/texted in the last 48 hours, it’s not because I’m avoiding you. This time!

when i finish my grad school apps i’m gonna party like it’s 1989. collapse of communism style yo.

and i think that for halloween i will dress as a russian hipster. i will wear a shirt with a sickle and carry a roll of toilet paper.

i havent had social interaction since sunday. ugh.