The Lost Boys are for Girls

Keifer Sutherland has spiked bleach blond hair in The Lost Boys. Both of the Coreys are in it. The vampires look like a young hair band and ride motorcycles. There is one main female character, and she is mixed up in a bloodsucker/human love triangle. Hottt.

This movie came out when I was 8 years old, and I begged my parents to let me see it. They wouldn't allow it! My older brother and sister got to go see it, and when it came out on video, I remember being exiled from the family room so they could watch it a hundred times during the three-day rental period. I sat at the kitchen table, from where I could hear the movie:

Michael: "I can't beat your bike." David: "You don't have to beat me Michael, you just have to try and keep up." Cue 80's music.

I kept peeking into the room, and my older sister kept telling on me. Humph. Soon after, my brother hung a Lost Boys poster in his bedroom. I used to sneak in there, just to look at the picture (growing up without the internet was hard!). It was one of those posters where all of the people are staring directly into the camera lens so if I looked at it and moved across the room, it seemed like they were all following me with their dreamy vampire gazes.

I used to hang upside down from the monkey bars on the swingset in my backyard, wrapped in a sparkly shawl my Grandmother had given me for dress up, pretending to be Star.

Dances with Birds Nests

Well me oh my. Farnie Farn Farnsworth--who always smells good and looks ravishing--is engaged! Not to me, unfortunately.



A toast to Sarah and Cliff! White Russians for everybody!

My Cobrasnake Muse (is better than yours)

As you may or may not know, I am kind of a geek about the internet. Not a nerd, mind you. Internet nerds actually know about some stuff, and maybe even have a lot of internet friends, message boards where they pretend a cutting edge persona, etc. But I am not one of those people. See, look at my myspace page. Not a lot of friends! Whoops, oh well.

I am an internet geek, because I have my little sites I like to drop in on from time to time (kind of like an old lady's version of "watching my progrums"), and the even worse thing is that a large part of my "progrums" include photo blogs. I mean. Could it BE any worse? I'm not even reading about current events, or like, feminism! I'm mostly just checking in to see what the girls at Go Fug Yourself have to say about Sienna's latest disaster, or if Perez Hilton's hair is still pink. (It is.) Luke once did a guilty pleasure about thecobrasnake, and I got all huffy because that is my website that he makes fun of me for reading!

Point is, if I had a guilty pleasure to speak of, it would probably be knowing a leeeeeettle too much about internet it girl cory kennedy. Well, that, and italics, of course. So there, I said it. Check out this article about the most famous un-famous person ever. And it doesn't even mention Edie Sedgwick. There was a Warhol reference, though. Phew, close one.

Quickie Mart

Soooooo oh oh

haven't been posting because I'm very busy (said in diva fashion). But this week I've been on vacation, and haven't been up to much. So maybe I'm just very lazy (said less diva-like)

Apparently during my hiatus, I've become quite popular with the spam crowd. Thanks, spammers! Without all of your weird sex video ads and penis enlargement promises, I don't think I could find the strength to keep going.

Last weekend I went to this theme dinner party in Brooklyn. It was fun, but doesn't it always seem like New York people can't just have a dinner party, they have to have a THEME dinner party? The theme was "Teeth Optional," and to my surprise people took it seriously (I shouldn't have been surprised, that is so New York of them to not half-ass it). There was twice baked cheesy butternut squash, peasant stew, and creamy polenta. I made watermelon martinis, and they were totally teeth optional.

I was thinking about the dinner party yesterday and I realized that if I was a true "blogger" then I would have taken a bunch of pictures to post. Duh. I had my camera and everything, but I was just too lazy (or maybe too drunk). I guess I am only a fake blogger then. Actually, I think I'm OK with that.

Blue boy got smashed. That's for another day though.

I'd Rather Not

The CBS post-football game line-up on Sunday night:

Amazing Race
Cold Case
Without a Trace

Uhm.
Whatever happened to Will and Grace?
And Please Punch Me In the Face? So I don't have to watch the Amazing Race?

Why Can't I be Coy Like Regina?

Friday night was the Regina Spektor show, and for once I actually got to go to a show I wanted to see. I had been waiting for it for sooOOOooOO long and it was well worth it! Abs and I went to Eastern Standard before & after and got French fries both times--whoopsie. At the show Regina wore a sparkly shrug (I was wondering if those were still cool) and there were fake sparkly stars behind her and her voice was like a million little fairy wings flapping in the night. Whatever that means. It sounds good, no? When she spoke between sets it was so cute it almost killed me dead.

I was thinking today about how I usually start to talk with the same voice as whoever I am hanging out with. It's something that annoys me about myself, but I can't really change it. It kind of make makes me worry I am too impressionable and maybe have low self-esteem. But even if I'm around someone I don't like very much, chances are I will start talking like them. Maybe if I went to enough Regina shows I could start talking in her garbly little Russian-Brooklyn (rusch-ook-lyn?) gurgle voice.

Anywho, she didn't sing the song that I wanted to hear SO BAD, Chemo Limo. But this girl does a neat-o live rendition of it. Thanks, youtube.

After the show, the champagne was flowing at East Stands and methinks I had a tad too much to drink. But French fries and bubbly never tasted so sweet.

Apples are People Too

Apples picked off their trees this morning, from Honeypot Orchard in Concord.

The best I have ever eaten.

Shades Oft Rue

When I look at my url, I see the phrase "shades oft rue." Then I think: Shades oft rue the day I made the title of this blog "Shades of True."


Then I look at this picture of the world famous sox lobster and all my petty grievances melt away.

Bowling for Spinach

Well hello there! As you can see, I haven't been posting lately. I've been a little bit busy molding young minds in the morning and treating grown up diners like kindergarteners in the evenings. So.

First off, I would like to say that I will hopefully sustain from any pre-9 am posting, since last time I actually wrote the phrase "bushy what-have-you." Goodness. I didn't mean it that way. Get your head out of the gutter!

Is it out? Of the gutter? Good. Now let's do some housekeeping.

1. I recently received an email from a certain journalism listserv. Even though I dropped out of the program in December, and even though they threatened to sever my life line to all of the secret journo activity that goes on behind closed doors, I still get emails. And it's a good thing they didn't keep good on their promise, because I heard about the most amazing job opportunity through it. Was it perhaps an editorial position at Conde Nast? Uh-uh. A reporting gig for the NYTimes? Nope. What then? Maybe a shit paying freelance position for some trendy website? Again, no. It was this:

"I frequently hear about childcare jobs, generally paying $10/hour. If you're interested in being contacted about such jobs,
please send me--not the entire list!--an email at professorwithkid@expensiveuniversity.edu."

WOW! I'm so glad that these exclusive openings are being well-guarded by the educated elite. Who knows what regular citizens would do with this sort of access?

Come to think of it, $10 an hour isn't bad for someone with a journalism degree.

2. Remember the good old days, when spinach was free of killer foodborne bacteria? Me neither. So last weekend at work we 86'd our house greens, which are spinach. Fresh, bagged spinach, delivered to our back door. Most people understood when I told them why we didn't have it (Why did they even want it? Don't they watch the news?). But others, the special "foodie" customers, were like, "OH. So you don't use FRESH spinach?"

And I was like, "HMMM. We use fresh, bagged spinach."

As in, the spinach has not been frozen or canned and we don't get it pre-cooked. But yes, shame of all shames, put a scarlet "S" on us, we use spinach that has come in bags. Fresh. Is it wilted, you might ask? No. It is fresh, green, leafy, delicious spinach. By Sunday, the conversation was going like this:

Foodie: "Ah-HAH! So you don't use FRESH spinach?"
Me: "Well, we don't have a spinach farm in the back of the restaurant. The chef doesn't just walk into the FRESH spinach farm in the back and pick out FRESH bushels of spinach for the night. We get it delivered it here, in bags. Inside those bags is fresh spinach."

Aaaaarghh! Why, people?

3. Last, I would like to propose that local radio DJs, specifically the ones at WFNX, the local "alternative" radio station, stop playing any and every crappy Beastie Boys song every day on every show at any time. The Beastie Boys are just really really really really bad. Even if I liked the BBs, the amount of play they get on WFNX is unprecedented. It seems that if Julie Kramer isn't trying to sell me a mattres (leave off the last "S" for savings!), then she's blazing through her show with a sweet Beastie tune. It's almost as bad as the Red Hot Chili Peppers on WBCN. If I never hear the term "funky monkey," again, it will be too soon.

AM/PM

It is 6:58 pm as I write this (ok, I don't know how to make the time right on my blog). Why am I awake at such a crazy hour, you ask? Because today I start my new job at an elementary school, I answer. This morning it was easy getting up, I popped right up a 6:45, no zonkiness, no zombie walk, all bright-eyes and bushy what-have-you. But, since I'm not going to be able to scale back my hours from the restaurant, it's going to be a big adjustment of not-sleeping-'til-noon, or as my Umass professor kept putting it Tuesday night, "transformative." Oh well.

In related news, I kind of hate the Charlie card. It's not that I hate it, but I hate how it's taking a dog's year for the switch to happen, resulting in some stations being Charlied up, and other being Charlie-less. On my way to UMB the other day, I bought two tokens one to get there, and one to get back at the Harvard Square station. Only to find upon my return that my grubby little token wasn't going to help me at JFK/Umass at all. Long story short, I ended up running smack into the doors of the train in an attempt to not miss it, even though I should have been able to if only I had known beforehand about Charlie. I actually kicked the door shouting "No! Wait!" as if I had a real emergency. At least the building didn't collapse on me though.

Full Bloom/Everything but the Kitchen Sink

I kind of have lot of balls in the air right now, or however that saying goes about juggling.

To list:
-Working like a dog at the restaurant, about to take on more responsibility for awhile
-Starting my sociocultural perspectives on ed. class in about two hours, meeting one night a week (one of my precious nights off) until December
-Just got back from an interview for a library assistant at an elementary school. This job would be great, but I am secretly hoping I don't get it. It would involve teaching 19 different classes, average size of 22. That's...418 students!! Can I make them wear nametags? Can I just let them use computers while I cat nap amongst the encyclopedias? Probably I won't get it because I am horribly unqualified for it. Pretty much my best qualification is that I wear glasses.

To make up for my stupid schedule, I just went to Formaggio's Kitchen and bought obscenely overpriced gourmet food. Some fancy granola, french bread, and of course, cheese. Fancy, expensive cheese. As the one perk of shopping at fancy, outrageously priced, don't-these-people-know-there-are-children-who-live-off-of-25 cents-a-day Foramaggio's, I got to eat a lot of samples while I was shopping around, trying to avoid the cheese boy's steely glare. The thing is, I could buy a jar of Newman's Own Basil & Tomato Sauce and a box of Bucatini pasta (my new favorite kind) at Shaw's and be just as satisfied. But where's the perk in doing that?

MY, that's a Lovely Shade of Musk You're Wearing

Last week, Sarah and I were going to meet her boyfriend & co. at a bar in Central Square. For whatever reasons, this made us very giggly and girly as were getting ready at Sarah's apartment. We had given ourselves a time constraint of ten minutes, I think. Sarah is many things, and one of those things is a master mixologist. She is always wearing the right amount of perfume and it smells perfect and very come-hither. So I asked her if I could wear one of her many perfume flavors, and she said that she had a musk perfume and a lily of the valley and both of them were her favorites so she would wear whichever one I didn't choose.

Musk is kind of my favorite word, for all of its primal mysteriousness. I didn't even know what musk would smell like, but I knew I wanted to wear it. I thought it would be like the smell of a sweater you somehow managed to steal from your crush before you never saw him again, and then every night for three months you cuddled up with it in bed, practically choking on the nostalgia. After a while, your tears mixed with the boy-sweater-smell and that scent was musk. One can imagine. Ahem.

So S. wore lily of the valley and I went musky and all night long I could smell myself (in a good way).

Apparently, this perfume that I am now obsessed with is called Ultima II Sheer Scent, and it is discontinued from JC Penney (!), and Sarah buys it on eBay.

The Somerville People

When I lived in New York for about ten days, I really got to missing my old Somerville neighborhood a whole lot. I tried to share the nostalgia with new friends, but they would constantly berate me for my inability to "heart" New York.

"But you don't understand!" I would tell them. "Boston and New York are so completely different! There is no Harvard Square in New York!" But they would only gesture around to wherever we were and talk about how much said place had to offer. And I think they were right, there IS so much more in New York, and that's why I didn't like it, because I was so used to Boston's underachievements as a city.

What I really couldn't get used to was the size of the city. I naively thought that living in Brooklyn would be like living in Somerville, the desirable areas of Boston and Cambridge only a hop skip away. But no. In Greenpoint, Brooklyn, it seemed as if there was a secret plot to keep me from getting to Manhattan on weekends and late nights. The G train was the worst. Aside from smelling like radioactive poo half the time, it would run on the wrong side of the tracks, and only come about every three hours. So, I would sit and sit and wait for the train, usually spotting at least one heart-stoppingly humongous monkey-rat in the meantime, and when the train finally came it would be going in the wrong direction. Someone wrote on one of the poles at my stop, "The G creates nothing but misery," and sometimes that line still runs through my mind. Like if I am waiting in line to use the bathroom at a bar, and my bladder is so full it is bringing tears to my eyes, I will think, "The G creates nothing but misery."

If you could even get into Manhattan, once you were there you had to be wearing orthopedic shoes to even survive a single day of "fun." I walked a lot in Boston, but for some reason in New York my feet always hurt. And wherever I was things just usually didn't look nice. Soho shops were crawling with tourists no matter the time, day, or weather. Sometimes I think that the one place that I loved in New York was Washington Square Park (original, I know). It felt how I thought New York should feel, like movie New York and book New York and poetry New York felt (you know fake, unrealistic, and idealized).

I also want to point out that although everyone in New York was always talking about how unfriendly people in Boston are, and how every one in Boston has a "chip on the shoulder," I have never had so many strangers be mean to me until I lived in New York. Like the shop guy who chased me into the street after he sexually harassed me in his store, which in turn made me flip him off (lesson learned: don't flip off people in New York, even if they are doing something as awful as harassing you while you are innocently shopping. They might be crazy, real crazy).

Anyway.

When I used to come back to Somerville to stay with Luke during my hiatus, I would be so stupidly, moronishly happy to be in Somerville. I mean it's only Somerville, but it felt like MY Somerville. I used to pretend that the people in Union Square were marchers in a parade, and Luke and I would sing this song (pretending that they were singing it to us): "WE ARE THE Somerville people and we're marching along! YES WE ARE! We're marching right along." And so on. It made me happy every time.


not the Somerville people parade

Weekly Watch

I totally heart Boston's Weekly Dig. The editor's letter is always wonderful, and it's right at the beginning, so me and the Dig get off on the right foot every time. Love the Media Farm, love the exit polls, love love love. There is one little problem, though. The Dig is in love with the term "douchebag."

I had this idea a while ago that I wanted to do a Weekly Dig "douchebag" watch, because it seemed as if every time I flipped through the free weekly's inky pages, I found gratuitous offerings of the word to describe almost anything. A quick search at weeklydig.com comes up with 38 hits for the word, and honestly I bet there are more, because the website doesn't always have all the captions that the print version does, and you know what word can really sum things up in a caption? Yup. Douchebag.

A sampling of doucheiness:
Late at night, you are roused from an uneasy sleep. You have seen The Void. 'Holy shit,' you exclaim, 'John Kerry is a douchebag!' Alan Blevins feels your pain. He too has grappled with Kerry's doucheitude, and he is here to hold your nose as you pull the lever for Kerry in November...
this paragraph actually uses the word and variations of the word a total of 5 times, even though "doucheier" is incredibly vowel-y awkward.

and

Now that summer’s here, we’re in for several weeks of unbearable heat and flaring tempers, forcing us to smile politely at every douchebag who cuts us off in traffic, just in case he’s packing.
just a minor douche offense here, but you get the point.

Apparently at Dig HQ, it has been decided that in the spirit of our times, douchebag=hilarity. So of course after getting the idea to call them out for it every week, I've been scouring the pages for the word, and come up douche-free every time. But that doesn't mean that there isn't anything else to report.

The Dig's [words] section is harmless, really. Just a listing of events on half the page and ads on the other, actually. But there is something odd in this week's paper (though not available online). They have a reading by hot author Marisha Pessl listed at the top with a pink "dig this" sign, so we know it's Dig-approved. Ok, I've read about her in the NYTimes, and Luke bought her book last week and is now probably harboring a secret literary crush on Pessl. Whatever. Pessl is actress-pretty, and when smart people who do things are cute, it makes other people want to print pictures of them to spread the cuteness. Good for her, I say. But why does the Dig have two pictures of her, actually just the same picture, one panning out and one close up of the hotness? I don't know why, but it's weird. No reference to any "douchebags" though. Darn.

Coupla Things

Every time I listen to WFNX lately, I hear Miss Julie Kramer shilling for Dial-a-Mattress. The idea of a Dial-a company just sounds unsavory, like the Dial-a-Pizza that I used to live down the street from in Somerville. If it had just been a "Pizza Place," I would have thought it was fine, but it wasn't. It was a Dial-a-Pizza. Now, who in the world would want to dial a mattress? The last time I checked, mattresses were expensive, like in the low thousands. Why would a person want to just phone one in, rather than test it out, and buy it from a respectable storefront, rather than dial one up to a shady warehouse?

Every time Julie Kramer starts in on her mattress pitch, she says something along the lines of, "All you students out there are getting ready for school. Now, there's a lot to figure out, but you shouldn't have to figure out where to get your mattress from..."

What I want to know is, where are these campuses that you have to bring your own mattress?! If I had shown up for freshman year with my own bed, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have made it very far before some RA told me to get it out of there. But 1-800-mattress.com even has a back to school special. So. What. Is. The. Deal.

also, the Shins are playing in the McCarren Park pool tonight in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Makes me miss Greenpoint a tiny bit. Not the summer stench though. I'm living just fine without that.

Roof-eee-OOHHHH

Sunday night, Entourage:
Luke: That's the artist who made the shoes.
Me: The real artist? Is it a real artist?
Luke: I don't know.
Me: That's no artist, it's Rufio!

(and by popular opinion, I'm right about the Ruf-ster, that lewd, crude, rude, bag of pre-chewed food, Dude.)

Missed Connections: Animal Kingdom Edition

Sometimes, one finds a missed connection so perfectly surprising that one wants to share it with the world. Take, for example, a highlight from this MC posted today on Boston's Craigslist:

MC with my dog's shit - 25

I placed my hand inside a baggy to use as a glove in an attempt to pick up her poop. The thing is, you can't "pick up" liquid, especially when you have tiny 8-year-old-esque girl hands. I did the best I could...squatting over the sidewalk while everyone watched me smear crap around like fingerpaint.

yucks.

I think this poor girl was secretly just looking for an excuse to post pictures of her incredibly cute, albeit pooping, puppy.

The Spanish Caller

Has this ever happened to you?

Luke and I occasionally get a phone call from an unknown area code. We don't answer it, then we get a message left on our voicemail in Spanish. We both have our own cell phone, and it has happened on both of our phones. Luke even went so far as to save the message and play it for some of his Spanish speaking co-workers. They couldn't understand what it said. He played it for a bunch of different people at work, and some people thought it was a calling card message.

I haven't heard from the Spanish voicemail in a while, but last week a number called my cell every day listed as "unknown." I would have answered it, but I kept missing the call, and when I tried to call it back, my phone said "no number." Then today, I get a phone call from 773.703.7421. I was sitting with Luke, and I didn't answer it because I get weird about talking to someone on the phone when someone else is in the room. Like if it was a long lost high school friend, then I would have to have my polite phone voice on, and I hate it when someone I know really well hears my polite phone voice masking surprise and probably regret (at deciding to answer the phone). I just really hate talking on the phone.

So, I try to call it back after I see there's no message. My call cannot be completed. Phone sleuth that I am (and slightly nervous that it's a creditor calling to tell me I owe someone somewhere money), I plug the number into google. 773 area code is in Illinois, apparently. Then I find this website, www.whocalled.us and plug in the number and there are all of these comments about the number calling people's cell phones. Some comments say that they get a message left in Spanish.

One extremely awesome person, "Bill," went so far as to comment:
we are in AMERICA, and we should NOT be receiving calls in another language that is not the language of this country! this is 1,000 times worse than a regular telemarketing call

Wow.

What is the key to the mystery of the Spanish caller?

Quick Question

Q. Why is Gawker fake promoting Fake Writer James Frey?

A. Because their sporty brethren Deadspin is featuring a piece by Frey on Monday. Is it just me or does this whole post reek of cross-promotion irony? Fake irony, that is.

How can Gawker even gawk itself in the mirror? For shame.

Parking Parade

Yesterday, I drove to that beacon of jail-house chic architecture, Umass Boston. It had been a long time for the UMB and me. Maybe too long?

I was happy to see that they had put in a light at the 93 north Umass exit offramp, where years ago I would just close my eyes and hope for the best, flinging the car into a lefthand turn. I was unhappy to see that all of the garage parking was closed. Having no other choice, I began to circle around the campus. Then I saw a sign for parking. $6.00 FLAT RATE, it screamed at me, and I screamed back.

"Where can I park that's cheaper?" I asked the attendant, outraged at the price. After all, this is just a shitty campus in South Boston, not Newbury Street. Dude just shook his head. Fine.

So I registered for a graduate education class. There was this woman being advised by two administrative type people, and so much to-do was being made over what classes she had to take. She had a paper in her hands that listed everything she had to take. "What's the big mystery?" I wondered. Then a princely little admin signed me up in two shakes, sent me to the bursar's and I had nearly forgotten about the whole flat rate thing by the time I was ready to leave.

I got a handsome note from the chancellor on my way out of the lot. Apparently, Chancellor Collins is looking forward to welcoming me back on campus for what he knows will be an exciting year. Only one little snag, though. Umass, everyone's favorite campus built above sea-level, may cave in on itself at any moment. See, senior colleagues have inspected the parking facilities, and they have found them unfit for cars. To fix the substructure would cost 160 million dollars, which wouldn't be "fiscally prudent." Chancellor Collins does his best to assure us that the foundation is structurally sound.

I'm doing my best to understand all of this jargon, but my heart of hearts is telling me that the foundation is in fact the parking garage. So how will I know that those depressing asbestos-laden walls of Wheatley Hall won't be the last thing I ever see when I start school this fall? Well, I guess I won't.