Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Category Archives: Stardust
Research
One of the advantages of writing science fiction which is, in truth, a satire on pop culture: I can buy OK! magazine and write it off on my taxes. Or, rather, I could write it off on my taxes if I could ever manage to make any money at this writing biz.
I have to ask myself: which celebrities do I pick on? Madonna and Cher are so yesterday. Paris and Britney have become too pathetic, too self-satirized. People still idolize Brangelina and they still think of Jen as one of their friends and oh, isn’t it so sad how heartbroken she is? There’s emotional investment all around with the Jenbrangelina story, whereas with Partney, who cares? Leave Partney alone, I say. Besides, after you’ve seen some drugged out rich girl’s much-abused stubbly va-jay-jay* in a high rez jpeg, there’s not much else to say.
Inevitably, I’m getting caught up in the Brangelaniston story, too. I’m a sucker for broken hearts and unrequited love, and (even if she is blonde) my heart goes out to a girl who looks like the girl next door, even if my girl next door, growing up, was a sixty-something-year-old nurse. Jen, if I weren’t married, I’d be there for ya, babe.
From OK! . . .
Though she did celebrate her birthday earlier this week with some of the cast and crew of the film, a friend of the actress tells OK!, “Almost every night when she finishes work, Jen goes back to her hotel and eats and drinks by herself. Just as often, her evening is a drink and a book. It’s pretty much what she does most nights in L.A.”
And when she is in L.A., friends say Jen spends most of her time with her white German Shephard Dolly, who she adopted in 2006.
Whom she adopted. But can I use the Jen and Dolly story? You betcha.
Sorry to take advantage of your angst, Jen, but if it’s any consolation, you’re going to be one of the good guys.
D.
*Va-jay-jay: my new word. Stay tuned for the Thursday Cosmo Thirteen: the Va-jay-jay Edition. I wish I were making that up.
Thirteen Valentines to Audrey Hepburn
Only number three on American Film Institute’s top 25 actresses? How dare they!
1. My Fair Lady. See, this is what I love about homeschooling. My explanation of iambic pentameter led to “The rain in Spain stays mainly in the plain,” which led to a discussion of the myth of Pygmalion, George Bernard’s play based on Pygmalion, and finally, this video. Jake seemed to find it hilarious. And, truly, there is something very funny about an old-fashioned Hollywood musical. If you’re not used to seeing actors and actresses break out into song, the effect is electric. As in, What the hell . . . ?
2. Sabrina. Here’s Audrey singing “La Vie en Rose” to Humphrey Bogart. (Karen says she lip-synched the singing for My Fair Lady. I don’t know if this is really Audrey singing, or not.) One enduring testimony to Bogart’s greatness is the fact he looks so much older, so much more tired, so much more used than Audrey Hepburn here, and yet he still works as a romantic lead. That’s because Bogart is Bogart. People sometimes forget that about stars: they’ve become far more than their physical selves. Part of the star’s soul is up there on the screen for all to behold, for all to share.
It’s true of Bogart, and it’s true of Audrey Hepburn.
3. Funny Face. Fred Astaire, he’s another one. If you had never seen him dance, what would he be? Some goofy-looking guy, that’s what. None of Astaire’s dancing in this clip, but Audrey’s really singing here (“How Long Has This Been Going On.”)
4. Breakfast at Tiffany’s — the ending. I’ll ruin it for you. In what has to be one of cinema history’s crassest uses of symbolism, Holly Golightly sets her pussy free, then decides her pussy would be happier as a kept item.
And could George Peppard look any more GQ?
Stephen Colbert pwns Phil Zimbardo
Phil Zimbardo, the Stanford University psychologist who has been coasting on the notoriety of the infamous Stanford prison experiment for 36 years, has written a book on evil. Too bad he can’t even go one round with not-too-shabby-theologian Colbert.
Watch the video and tell me what you think*. Seems to me, Colbert knows his catechism.
D.
*I’m not sure I buy the premise that evil is a societal or situational effect. These supposedly “good” people who behave in evil ways, given the right situational prompts: are they truly good? Or do they have some latent moral laxity which gets magnified by the appropriate prompts?
I think it’s all locked in fairly early, certainly by age five, and that many among us are plenty evil, yet lack the opportunity to exercise these talents. That nice little old lady next door, the one who brings you oatmeal cookies on the weekends, would in an instant, given the right movitation, hook up the jumper cables without a second thought.
Once Upon a Time on TCM
Walnut sez: Balls never goes halfway with things. Why buy 100% Kona coffee from Hawaii when you can buy it green and roast it yourself? And why grab pastries at the supermarket when you can make your own puff pastry?
Well. She doesn’t do that too often, but you get the idea. Lately, she’s been watching movies. The same movie. Over and over again.
Thank God it’s not Titanic.
Below the fold: Thirteen Things about Once Upon a Time in the West, by my beloved Balls.
(more…)
GallimauFriday III: the Gonadal Special
Hat tip to Indecision 2008 for tonight’s NEWSFLASH: Hillary Clinton Denies Desire For Sweet Caress of a Woman’s Tongue.
Regulars here know I’m not a big Hillary fan. But asking her to comment on rumors that she’s a lesbian? Why, that’s as irrelevant as asking the Republican Presidential candidates if they troll airport bathrooms for long-shlonged dudes, or tryst with mommified dominatrices who let them poop their Pampers. Ask them if they’ve ever appeared in drag while you’re at it.
***
For those of you who missed yesterday’s story: it’s true. We do think with our nuts. Or at least, the potential is there:
Men have a source of potentially life-saving stem cells between their legs.
A team of American researchers has found a way to easily identify stem cells in the testicles of adult mice that can be coaxed to turn into brain cells, muscle cells, heart cells, blood cells and even blood vessels.
One day, they say, male patients may be able to turn to their own testicles as a source of stem cells to repair an ailing heart or kidney or to fix the brain damage caused by Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s disease.
Thus explaining the commonplace mid-21st Century catch phrase, “Saved by the balls!”
***
It’s Yom Kippur. Have you asked Stephen Colbert for forgiveness yet? I would, except I haven’t wronged the guy.
I’d call and make shit up, but I suspect that wouldn’t be in keeping with the Yom Kippur spirit.
***
Speaking of balls. From the Department of Testicular Atrophy: Vicente Fox writes that George Bush, “windshield cowboy,” is afraid of horses.
***
And here’s someone that should stimulate a fair share of gonads out there . . .
Zappa vs. Zappa
| Released Weasels Ripped My Flesh in 1970 | This weasel’s claws ripped my flesh in 2007 |
| Only in it for the money. | Only in it for the ferret chow. |
| Once appeared on Dance Fever | Every night’s a weasel war dance! |
| Never ate his excrement on stage* | Never ate his excrement. Not intentionally, anyway. |
| Son named Dweezil | Son of a weasel |
That’s it for tonight, folks. As usual, I thought, “Gaaaah, I’m so tired, I need to do something easy. Hey, THIS idea would be easy!”
An hour later . . .
D.
*From Wikipedia:
An old rumor states that at some point in the 1960s, Zappa once won a gross-out contest against Alice Cooper, by eating his own excrement on stage. Zappa denied the claim, stating, “For the record, folks; I never took a shit on stage and the closest I ever came to eating shit anywhere was at a Holiday Inn buffet in Fayetteville, North Carolina, in 1973.”
Shamelessly thieving from Donahue
This Donahue.
I have a new Major League Crush (sorry, Cintra — but check Nina out. You’ll love her, too):
Nina Conti, ventriloquist and BRILLIANT stand-up comic. Here’s a YouTube sample from her website.
Maybe some of you are familiar with her work, but she was news to me. In Jim’s post, he emphasizes her naturalness, the way she responds to Monk as if he were an independent entity. I agree; she does this better than any ventriloquist I’ve seen. But I’m impressed with her ability to turn ventriloquism on its head, reversing conventions left and right. While ventriloquism is traditionally family entertainment (think Shari Lewis), Nina Conti can be filthy; and while most ventriloquists do their best to sustain the illusion of the dummy’s reality, Nina Conti revels in trashing that illusion.
Yes, she’s a sort of meta-ventriloquist. That YouTube clip demonstrates this well: she toggles between convincing actress and renegade deconstructionist. Wow. You try walking a tightrope like that.
That’s it for tonight . . . I’d like to get started on my Thirteen, and it ain’t writing itself!
D.
Speaking of noses
Live-blogging tonight: 7:30 PM PST, or thereabouts.
We were watching the end of Dirty Dancing this afternoon, and I said, “Whatever happened to Jennifer Grey?” She was adorable in that movie. Can’t say I ever thought much of Patrick Swayze, but Jennifer? Yum. Guess how old she was in that movie. Don’t cheat, guess. I’ll tell you later.
“I think her career tanked after she got her nose job,” Karen said, which sparked my interest, given our discussion of noses in yesterday’s post. So I decided to see what I could learn on IMDB and Wikipedia. Now remember what I said — don’t cheat. Think back to Jennifer’s role in Dirty Dancing and guess, damn it, guess!
Paris Hilton’s Prison Diary
The minute, the second I learned that Paris Hilton would keep a prison diary, I said to Karen, “Now, THAT would make a GREAT blog!”
Right away, the comic gears began to turn, and my mind became a kaleidoscope of all the Hilton canards. The pettiness. The vanity. The jealousy. The idiocy. All the Deadly Sins wrapped up in one petite blonde brazilianed package.
And then, fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck I discover someone has beaten me to it:
The Inner Thoughts of Paris Hilton
Each post concludes with the ass-bandage,
Disclaimer: This site is intended for parody only and was not created by Paris Hilton nor intended for any purpose other than entertainment.
Coward.
Well, at least now there’s nothing to distract me from finishing my romance and participating in Samhain’s Best First Line contest (see Kate for the full dish). (And don’t forget Kate’s contest where you can, like, win stuff!)
Let’s do us some live-blogging tomorrow night, okay? See ya when I see ya.
D.
Thirteen Presents for Father’s Day
Some creative ideas for the perv man of the household. I’m warning you now, don’t let the wee ones follow you below the fold.
Sorry for the quickie thirteen, but Walnut gots a cold and canna think too clearly.