Snowball Effect

Thursday, May 15th, 2008

Once I don’t post for a few days, it creates this horrible snowball effect where I feel I either have too much or too little to talk about. I just can’t bring myself to post anything when I feel like way too much has happened to discuss in one coherent post, SO in order to rid myself of this feeling, I will not be writing a coherent post. Here goes:

In the past week I have traveled to:

Ohio: to visit my high school friends and to help my mom pick up a foot board. 

Syracuse: to watch my sister receive her Master’s degree from Newhouse. 

Back to Delaware: for three days, where I have become a bum, watching “Jon and Kate Plus 8″ marathons on TLC. 

In the past week I have seen:

My best high school friends: Liz and Kaitlin, both of whom are probably moving to New York after graduation, making the moving to New York myself thing look much more appealing. 

My grandparents: whom  I haven’t seen all semester. 

My sister: who is now home and yelling at me for sleeping in so late. 

Jillian: who came to stay with me for a day, but then had to endure shopping for kitchen supplies with me. I did take her to see Baby Mama though!

In the past week, I have watched:

Whitney win ANTM!: I cannot BELIEVE she won! This has caused me to have to rethink everything about Tyra and ANTM. I guess they had to let a plus size girl win sometime…

Calvin do a spot on Tyra impression on Greek: “I have two beautiful ladies standing before me. One is a beautiful girl, but has no personality. The other takes gorgeous photos, but is plus sized.” I couldn’t love this show more. 

The showdown of the David’s come to fruition on AI: Thank god for David Cook or I would resent being forced to watch American Idol week after week. 

In the next week I will: be moving back to Boston for the summer. I originally thought I was just going to be living with my little from the sorority, Lynn, but now it looks like Lynn and I get an unknown roommate. I’m sure she’s nice and fine, but I feel that I’m at that point in my college career where I don’t want to live with people I don’t know anymore. I somehow lucked out completely, getting an amazing freshman year roommate, but my sophomore year was effectively killed by the random roommates my friends and I had to deal with. Now, I’ve been living with my friends for a year, and it makes SUCH a difference in how comfortable I feel with my living situation. Even if we don’t get along, at least I know that going in, and I feel like I can talk to them. This is the main reason I didn’t sign up to live in BU housing this summer. That and the lack of microwaves in the apartments. I just have to keep chanting to myself: I won’t prejudge. I won’t prejudge.

I’m also having minor meltdowns about not going back to camp this summer, but that is a whole other post. 

Anyone else have any exciting summer plans? 

A Small Rant About The Hills

Monday, May 5th, 2008

Something about The Hills has been bothering me for some time now. I’d talked about it with Jillian and Grace (read: ranted it about it until they yelled at me to shut up because Lo was talking), and then I read the Rolling Stone cover article about them, which articulated my problem with The Hills beautifully. 

Basically, I hate how they never acknowledge The Hills on The Hills. They actively hide who these girls really are and who they have become. Yes, when it started, Lauren was a “small town girl” moving to the big city. She didn’t have any connections, and she wasn’t a huge celebrity. That is no longer the case. The show completely omits aspects of their lives that would be so much more interesting to follow than Lauren’s non date with Steven. I mean, they acted like the biggest thing Lauren did during LA Fashion Week was helping out at a show with People’s Revolution when in actuality, SHE PREMIERED HER OWN LINE! That is a huge deal! But no, The Hills can’t mention that because it was mean Lauren was special, that being the star of her own reality show gave her opportunities no one else would get, and that isn’t what this show is about. This show is about real young people trying to make it in LA. It’s about their ever exciting social lives and entry-level jobs. Please…

I just hate feeling insulted by television. I mean, we can figure out she is getting special treatment when she buys a million dollar home in Hollywood to live in with her friends. I don’t think even her parents would be able to buy her a house that nice. It has a guest house, for Pete’s sake. So why can’t they show why she can afford that home? Why can’t they show Lauren working on her own line, or Heidi (god help us) working on her “music career.” That would be great television! I feel insulted both as a viewer and as a student of the medium of television. (Also insulting, Spencer’s idea of good children’s names: see The Soup for evidence.)

Now, I know this is a stupid subject to rant about. “Just stop watching it!” you’re screaming at your computer. “No one is forcing you to watch the Lauren and Heidi show.” I will concede that this is true, but that brings me to the real thing I hate most about The Hills. I can’t stop watching! I’ve tried. I really have. But it’s just so pretty and weirdly addicting. And all my friends watch it. And now I’ve been to half the places they go to, so it builds my feelings of coolness while it slowly eats away at my soul. Plus, if I didn’t watch it, what would I rant about? 

Things I’m Loving Right Now

Tuesday, April 22nd, 2008

1. The Paper : This show about high school is actually like real high school! Novel idea! I totally knew these kids in high school, and now I’m totally hooked. Plus, the narrator’s name is Amanda. Automatic love.

2. This purse: 

It’s big. It’s purple, and it’s got two different sized straps. What more could I ask for?

3. Michael Ian Black and Ken Marino on Reaper: Two of my favorite random guest starts from old shows (Ed and Veronica Mars respectively) playing a gay demon couple: sold. *

4. Twitter: Seriously. It’s like internet crack. 

5. All of my television shows coming back: The Office, 30 Rock, Gossip Girl, Greek, How I Met Your Mother, Grey’s Anatomy, Scrubs…I’m drowning in new episodes of fabulous television. 

6. Cooking my mom’s recipes: I’ve made many friends this week making brisket, cheesy potatoes, and chocolate covered matzo. So delicious. 

7. John Oliver’s rant about the oreo pizza: During his special, John Oliver: Terrifying Times, around the 16 minute mark, he discusses the patriotic nature of the oreo pizza. I laughed to tears. Really, the whole thing is gold. 

*Ah! During the writing of this post, the devil killed my favorite gay demons. Sadness. Stupid devil. Wait! One came back, but is now evil. Still…sadness.

 

A Glimpse of What’s to Come

Friday, April 18th, 2008

I feel I’ve neglected you, dear blog! This week has been crazy ridiculous. I didn’t even twitter today. *GASP* A giant amazing post is forthcoming, but to give you a taste, it includes not only me going to a taping of “The Soup” (Joel McHale totally talked to me out of ALL the kids in my class. OMGZ FANGIRL SQUEEE….and I loathe myself….) but also Jeremy Piven coming to my friend’s 21st birthday party. For real. Oh, LA…

Oh, and while it’s on my mind, Jim and Pam make me drip loneliness. I literally threw a pillow across the room when he pulled out the ring, both out of a ridiculous amount of excitement for them (Yes, I am that invested in fictional characters), and out of my own self pity. Damn the lack of real Jim’s in the world. Damn. 

A Good Start

Friday, April 11th, 2008

This weekend has started surprisingly well, and it hasn’t even technically started yet. At work yesterday, my boss informed me that they again didn’t need me on Friday. Obviously, I took this as an excuse to go out last night, as all of my friends routinely go out on Thursday, while I stay in, watch Lost, and go to bed early in order to get up early for work. Anyway, we ended up, after some wandering around Hollywood Blvd, at CineSpace. At night it’s a club, obviously, but I want to go back earlier in the day slash night, because it’s actually a movie theater where they serve you dinner! Fabulous combination of things, in my opinion. Sadly, though, I found out that the cast of the Office (!!!!) was at a bar a ton of our friends went to, but we decided against. Unbelievable opportunity missed. Me drunk around the cast of The Office may have been a life highlight. 

This morning, sadly, was not fantastic, as I definitely felt every drink I had last night. I stumbled downstairs to do laundry, had enough money on my laundry card to do the wash, and then discovered I had no cash to refill the card with for the dryer. Sadly, I only had a dollar and the stupid laundry machine only takes fives, tens, and twenties. Boo. I then set off on an adventure to find cash that lasted hours, while my clothes sat wet downstairs. Classy. 

Luckily, the journey to find cash took me to Coffee Bean and to the nail salon to get a pedicure. Two activities that are always winners in my life. I finally got change at Urban Outfitters and was able to start my laundry again. Hopefully, it won’t be all gross when I go get it. Maybe my day didn’t go so well after all…but my toe’s look super pretty, so I’m happy. 

OH! And joy of joys that NBC Thursday night comedies are back. I may have teared up from laughing at 30 Rock, and The Office obviously never disappoints. I was surprised at Jim almost abandoning Pam at the party, but I guess that just drives the point home of how terrible this get together was: Jim was willing to abandon the woman he pined away for for years just to get out of there. Tough stuff. 

My Life on the Big Screen

Tuesday, April 1st, 2008

Sadly, I started writing this entry last night, got too tired, then figured I could just write it at work. It is now 1:30, and the only reason I have time to finish it now is because everyone is at lunch watching the How I Met Your Mother  episode with Britney Spears, and I had to escape, having already suffered through Britney acting four times. Of course, they had to watch the newest episode that I haven’t seen while I was making my lunch only to turn on last week’s when I got in the room. Life is truly unfair.

Anyway, to the topic of the post: Last night while watching The Hills, I was excited to see that the girls had returned to LA so I could now obsess over every locale the girls go to, figuring out if I have been there or not. Last night, I did pretty well. Heidi and her nameless co-worker dined at Food Court LA, where we ate for my roommate’s birthday. Audrina, Lauren, and Lo discussed something super important (as everything on that show is) at Lola’s, a bar we went to on our first weekend in LA, and Heidi and the same co-worker walked to Bolthouse, which is a block away from one of my offices! I looked for my car parked on the street in the background, but alas, it wasn’t there. To make up for it, they showed an establishing shot of my apartment complex. I feel like a true Los Angelean (Los Angelesian? Los Angelen? Whatever…), except for that whole never wanting to actually move here thing.

When I thought about my excitement over The Hills, I remembered that only last Friday, I had the same feeling but with good old Boston U. We had a special screening of “21″ for our program, since they filmed the movie on our campus last winter. (No, MIT wouldn’t let them film on their campus. Yes, my best friend saw Kate Bosworth at our gym.) In the movie, I saw Kate Bosworth make eyes at Jim Sturgess beneath the track where I run. I saw Jim Sturgess run into the dorm a block away from my old dorm where I ate lunch almost every day last year. I saw the entire cast strut down the hallway of the College of Arts and Sciences where I myself have strut to class a good number of times. It was kind of odd, because they kept saying it was MIT, when clearly to me it was nothing like MIT. It almost took me out of the story. I got over it, however, because my school was in a movie…and that’s pretty cool.

Alright, well, this post really had no point except to point out that I am closely connected to various sets of both film and television. It also served as a nice break from the constant stream of reading I’ve been doing for the past two days at work. My eyes are blurry from going back and forth between scripts and my computer. Thankfully, my professor is out of town this week, so I’m free after work to do whatever I please, which sadly is probably read, BUT I will read whatever I please! Take that world!

“You Know You Love Me”

Monday, March 24th, 2008

Aaannnd, I’m back. Back to LA. Back to Work. Back to tiredness.

Our journey to San Diego was fabulous. We stayed in my uncle’s beach house, which looks more like an Italian Villa, relaxed on the beach, ate some amazing food, and watched Everyday Italian about 7 times, prompting us to eat our fair share of gelato and Italian food. On Friday, I met up with my parents, who are in town for my cousin’s bar mitzvah, and spent Friday and Saturday with the family. My parents drove me up to LA Saturday, and I showed them all the highlights of my area, even the CVS and Trader Joe’s. Exciting stuff. They were impressed by the sandwiches at Joan’s on Third, though, but really, who isn’t?

Now that I’ve breezed through those four days, I can spend a little time reminiscing about the amazingness that was Saturday night. Jillian and I scored tickets to the Gossip Girl Panel at PaleyFest ’08 back in January. We (or I) decided on the GG event back when few people were confirmed for the Friday Night Lights event and the Pushing Daisies event was already sold out, so GG seemed a good choice. I thought it would be quality, but let me just say that my expectations for the night were exceeded. The panel was hilarious, interesting, and entertaining. The only downside was having to get there early (which did help us score some sweet seats), and the annoying 14-year old girls beside me (who sadly reminded me of myself at all those *Nsync concerts).

The night started with the reveal that the moderator was Tim Stack from Entertainment Weekly – only my favorite magazine of all time. (It made up for missing Michael Ausiello of TV Guide, my favorite television writer, moderating the FNL panel.) Then Josh Schwartz, the inspiration for Seth Cohen and the youngest person to ever create an hour-long drama for network television (only a little something called The O.C. – now the producer behind both Gossip Girl and Chuck) came out to introduce a nice clip reel wrapping up the season thus far. After the clip package, the entire cast and creative team came up on stage. The girls looked beautiful, the boys adorable, and the panel began. Some of the boys seemed to think they were a little too cool for school at the start, but after a while, everyone opened up and had a discussion that was truly entertaining and informative. My favorite parts were probably Blake Lively discussing her mad guitar hero skills, Tim Stack asking about Josh Schwartz’s aversion to parties, and the constant references to a future appearance by a gay, jewish monkey on the show. To read a professional recap, you can go check out The Futon Critic.

After the panel ended with Tim Stack giving the smack down to some obnoxious girls in the audience who asked about the cast’s personal lives (really?), the crowd swarmed the stage for pictures and autographs. I didn’t for a second pretend to be above this practice and ran up as well. Jillian and I were quickly fearful for our lives as we were surrounded with young girls and creepy old paparazzi men with really bad BO. We kept getting close to the actors only to have them walk to another part of the stage. We also realized we didn’t have pens. Our lone goal then became getting a photo. We got the closest to Blake Lively, but the publicists and body guards started rounding everyone up. We saw our chance slipping away so we pushed our way over to the stairs where the cast was heading out. We got Blake Lively’s attention and asked her for a picture. She couldn’t have been nicer! She said absolutely, even as they were pulling her away. I went to take the picture of her and Jillian, when she goes “Do you want to be in the picture too?” I half answered something incoherent as she happily handed my camera to a girl next to us and asked her to take the picture for us. Success! My goal of getting a photo with a celebrity is fulfilled. I’ve also now seen one half of the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, as I spotted Alexis Bledel at the doctor’s office.

So that was my first foray into PaleyFest. It only hit me a while later that I was that close to the cast of Gossip Girl. Oh, and Leighton Meester and Blake Lively are completely that beautiful in person. Flawless. Seriously. It’s unfair. I really do love that show more than I should. It’s just so saucy. Tonight is the night of other shows I shouldn’t love so much. It starts out with a little How I Met Your Mother (very acceptable – excellent show), moves into some Greek, (quality but underrated. Seriously. You should watch it), and ends with The Hills (so terrible, but SO addicting. I can’t help myself.) I’m off to prepare!

(To see the rest of my sweet panel pics, go here. Enjoy!)

A Lot of Relaxing and A Little Sleep

Monday, March 17th, 2008

Still reeling from my sickness induced tiredness, I decided to take this weekend easy. I mean, if you can’t relax on Spring Break, when can you? Friday Night, I stayed in and caught up on the latest season of Degrassi – a bit jarring since the last time I watched Degrassi they were in 10th grade and are now apparently in college – while my friends headed out to Winston’s, and of course, saw Sienna Miller at the table next to them. I do not regret relaxing though. How else could I have discovered that Paige and I are suffering form the same intern-hazing-induced stress?

Saturday, Jillian and I headed out to a relaxing lunch with our friends Jordan and Pauline at a cute place a block away called Eat Well. We each devoured our weight in sweet potatoes fries, aka orange crack. We then decided it would be a great idea to wander around Melrose. We started and ended at Fred Segal, as we quickly realized that nothing is really within walking distance in LA, plus we were tired. We ended up hitting up Hollywood Video and spent the night watching movies (The TV Set and Ratatouille) and eating pizza. Fabulous night in my humble opinion.

Sunday Jillian and I went on a number of outings. First, we headed out to Pasadena. I had been out there twice to help at casting sessions for the Pasadena Playhouse, and I had decided it was adorable and needed to be revisited. We had another delicious lunch (crab cake sandwich…mmmm), walked around a little art festival, and hit up some stores. (Is it just me, or has J. Crew got even more unreasonably priced?) When we got back, we decided it was too nice to sit inside, so we went and read by the Park La Brea pool. After a dinner of leftovers and things I found at the back of the refrigerator (I refuse to go grocery shopping within a week of going on vacation…), Jillian and I headed out to Milk on Beverly, which Pauline and Jordan recommended. I got schooled on what a Caramel Macchiato actually is when I complained that my drink was all foam – which is apparently all a macchiato is supposed to be – and bought some delicious coffee cake. Unfortunately, I was so caught up in this macchiato confusion that I forgot to ask for decaf and was up until four in the morning last night. I was already having trouble falling asleep. A shot of espresso certainly didn’t help the situation. Neither did the helicopter that flew over my building about 10 times at 3AM. Luckily, my pre-sleepless part of the night was happy, as I finally saw Once, which was beautiful and fabulous. I highly recommend it.

Today has just been showering, laundry, and soon, packing for San Diego tomorrow. This week will hopefully be more relaxing with some beaches and family thrown in, as my parents are coming out for my cousin’s Bar Mitzvah. If I’m MIA for a while, it just means I couldn’t bring my computer, but I’ll give the full Spring Break update when I get back.

The TV Set

Saturday, March 15th, 2008

I just watched The TV Set, and while it was an extremely good movie, it was like seeing all my worst fears about working in the television business come to life on screen. The executives were unfeeling and uncreative. Their families were falling apart. The writer comprised and comprised until he didn’t even recognize his extremely personal show anymore, and his manager, while being his friend, encouraged him at every turn to give in just to get the show on the air. Perhaps that wasn’t the best of rental choices.

In other news, my sickness has turned into debilitating tiredness. I almost fell alseep at my desk yesterday. When I got home, I fell onto my bed and had to roll myself off to get up and make dinner – and by make dinner I mean microwave leftovers from my free work lunches. My life right now is amazing, isn’t it?

Tuesday I head down to San Diego for some beach and family time. As long as at least 50% of my time is devoted to lying down, I’m sure it’ll be a wonderful vacation.

I can’t hear you over the blowdryer

Wednesday, March 12th, 2008

I feel bad for the people who have to cut my hair. Not because of the quirky way my ridiculously thick hair is crazy curly on top, limp on the bottom. I feel for them, because I am the world’s most awkward stylee. I never hear them when they ask if I want something to drink. I never quite know where they want me to go. I always move my head to the exact place it needs not to be while there are scissors very close to my eyes, and I have no idea what kinds of conversations I’m supposed to get into with hairstylists.

In middle school, I went with my mom and sister to a stylist we all loved for years, thus we all could have one big, unending conversation together. In high school, I had a stylist who I barely spoke to despite how often I saw her, which to me was a very special kind of balance between awkward and silent understanding. Lately, however, with all the moving, I’ve been going to someone new each time I get my hair done. Thus, after I initially explain what I want done to my hair, I become socially inept. Usually, I can waste a few minutes explaining why I came to their salon, where my family is from, what I’m in school for, but then I lose it. Do I need to ask the stylist questions about their life? Is it prying to ask about their family? Am I supposed to keep talking even when the blow dryer is going, despite it cutting my hearing ability in half? Usually, I go for silence. This may be awkward, but at least I’m not over sharing.

Today, however, I am not shouldering the blame for the awkwardness. Today, I went on my first foray into the LA hair styling world. It started off better than expected. I began thinking, perhaps I’d finally figured this thing out. I had a great conversation with the colorist about San Diego, the merits of going to Disneyland on weekdays, and learning to surf. It was impersonal, but interesting. I felt fabulously cool and calm.

Then I moved over to the hairstylist, who came very highly recommended. I’d had a few awkward talks with her on the phone, mainly awkward because she was so friendly, and I had no clue what to say when she told me she had to go out of town because her father was very sick. I should have known where this was headed. As my hair cut began, we discussed my styling techniques before taking a sharp left turn into discussing religion, selling her father’s mobile home, and her acting career. I could barely comprehend where this conversation was going. Couldn’t we just discuss a movie you just saw or maybe my bangs? The problem was, she was so nice that I felt I had to actively participate in these conversations I knew nothing about, adding vague positive comments here, nudging the conversation along there, but in my mind I just kept thinking, this is not appropriate client stylist conversation, unless you have been going to the same corner salon for the past 15 years and attended this stylist’s wedding or kid’s graduation. I was reassuring her about taking control of her father’s medical care, for pete’s sake. I don’t know anything about retirement communities. I just wanted to know if you thought I should take off one inch or two.

Luckily, my hair turned out fabulously – seriously, amazing cut, perfect color, just fabulous – and all for the low low cost of $200……Sorry, had to take a moment to stop the gagging reflex. Transitioning from Ohio salon prices to LA salon prices pains me a bit at times. Plus, the entire encounter ended with her hugging me good-bye. That seemed apropriate for the amount of information I had just learned about her life.

Sadly, I had to run by work in the BULA office after my beauty tryst, and when I got home I felt like I had run a marathon. I guess that’s what comes after leaving the house for the first time in three days. Now I’m just counting down the minutes until my double header of Top Model and Top Chef – Welcome back, Tom Calicio! How I’ve missed you, Padma! – and contemplating whether this haircutting experience should count as a pro or con in the LA tally.