Live From The Pen Fifteen Club

A few nights ago, this les-faux (from the Greek, meaning "fake lesbian") that I know texted me at two in the morning to tell me President Spears's "If You Seek Amy" so totally omg reminded her of me. I'm still not sure if this is a reference to the fact that everyone secretly wants to have sex with me (possibly), or that I'm just really elusive (not so much), or that the bar she was at should stop running $4 Jager shots on Tuesdays (b-i-n-g-o!).

So, um, in any event, Britney's latest and most controversial single (meh) now has a companion video. I could address the "controversy," but I'd really rather not. I like the song. It's silly and flirty and damn catchy, continuing this wonderful "kiss my ass" theme running through Brit's last few singles. And the video is in large part: fun-Britney dancing around and looking hot with a bunch of horny, strung out dancers in a large house (perhaps invoking a little Fiona for the dance pop set?). Towards the end, things shift a bit, and I suppose the whole point of it is to showcase, yet again, her duality as an American Sweetheart and a hardcore sex symbol (although the two have bled together after so long--there's really no duality anymore), generously sprinkled with bitterness over one or the other (you just can't tell which is which with her).

At the end of the day there's nothing wrong with any of it. Just keep doing what you do, babe. We support it. Although, why did you have to raid the Paramount Archives and steal the wig Stockard Channing wore in the "Sandra Dee" number from Grease?

Weekend at Bernie's (Jail Cell)

Madoff's last unincarcerated moments were spent in the midst of a media frenzy that reads like a red carpet premiere in photographs. He plead guilty. He expressed remorse. He was sent directly to the chokey.

Video Store

And I ought to have this French Art Deco headboard.

It must be so lovely in the afternoon.

We should probably buy this opium bed.

The weight of it! You have to take a closer look.

Quote of the Day

I know her from the club! She's my gay sister!

—Courtesy of Cops, Atlanta

Signs

Yesterday, to kill some time after work and before drinks, I bought a sandwich and went to the movies. This trailer for Sin Nombre, specifically, the images of gang tattoos, remained with me all evening.

Proactiv Solution?

We hate Diddy. We have for quite some time. And it's hard, because sometimes I'm hearing him recite the 23rd Psalm in the intro of "You're Nobody (Til Somebody Kills You)" or I'm talking to Pillow about Dylan or Babs or any of the other beautiful cast members of Making The Band 2: Da Band and I'm thinking...maybe he's not all bad? But then he goes and clears things up for me, like here, in an appearance on yesterday's Ellen. Diddy, when asked about the nuts-ness and irresponsibility of lending his Miami home to Chris Brown and Rihanna in order for them to "work it out," claims that none of us know what really happened between them and we should just be praying for both and not throwing stones blah blah—bitch is crazy. WE ALL READ THE POLICE REPORT. CHRIS BROWN CHOKED RIHANNA, PUMMELED HER FACE, TRIED TO THROW HER OUT OF A MOVING VEHICLE. Some things are exactly as they appear. Under no circumstances should a person be encouraged to return to such an abusive, criminally dangerous partnership.

Happy Birthday, Nina Hagen!

Verses

"Untitled"

Rumi

I died from minerality and became vegetable;

And from vegetativeness I died and became animal.

I died from animality and became a man.

Then why fear disappearance through death?

Next time I shall die

Bringing forth wings and feathers like angels;

After that, soaring higher than angels -

What you cannot imagine,

I shall be that.

Alpha: "Which one of you *%$#&'s took the last donut?" / Able:"...What?...Really?"

The Best Thing Going (For Tuesday)

Mercedes Matter, above (center) photographed by (boooo) Jack Kerouac at Cedar Tavern (called Cedar Bar in his handwritten notes) in the late forties/early fifties, seems to have been a pretty tremendous dame with a clever, clever name. Here is an ongoing research project documenting her life and paintings.

I Still Dream

Publishing a book, marrying a beautiful, foreign, Jewish billionaire, making a pop record--these were my childhood dreams. At 23(almost4), these sunny slips of not-yet-reality only serve to stress me out, because, no longer a kid, I'm mired in making strides to achieve these old goals. So I need to come up with one or several new imagined achievements that seem as golden and distant as those once did. Thus far, I've decided that I want to be a King Magazine cover girl (mostly because I just saw Lauren London's issue and I want to do/wear whatever she does), not FHM or Maxim (ewww!), just King. Maybe this will be related to that pop record, the debut of mine and Pillow's steel drum and celly ringtone band, Rock Dove, set to be recorded this summer. Pillow--if you're down, I am...no other covers (No Paper or Nylon music issue or Rolling Stone), just King. It sounds like something Taryn Manning would do!

Whitney Say--"Hell to the Yes!"

Whitney Say--"Hell to the No!"

I'll admit that when I was in high school I thought that Absolut Vanilla hung the moon. But "those were different times." And since cutting my teeth on many a barstool, I've come to be a purist. In most arenas, purists make me nervous and unhappy--they disapprove of animal fat rendered meals or join cults. But with booze, it's best to set real limits. I only order from a self-determined, small range of drinks and at some establishments this narrow list narrows further. At our favorite pub I only drink Smithwick's (sometimes, maybe a bourbon and ginger). I don't drink tonic (I used to...but). I love margaritas and bloody mary's, but those are majorly site-specific. I love to have champagne when available. I drink a few bottled beers--Shiner, Yuengling, Bud (heavy, never light), Stella, Red Stripe. I dig a tallboy or a 40 (when the occasion calls for it). I love white russians (made at home or by beloved Barkeep R). I love a bourbon or rye en rocas, or in an expert Manhattan (also site-specific). I don't take free shots. I try not to take any shots; if I do, it's strictly Jameson. I love a historically sanctioned event-specific cocktail, like a mint julep in a silver cup at a Derby party (or box). I love wine of all colors and varying sweetness with meals, most digestifs after meals. And so on and so on.

As long as I've hung out in bars, I've been 'regusted' by what folks drink--Memphis' ever-popular Walk Me Down (which we call 'blue drank') or any godforsaken candy-colored thing presented in a martini glass or meant to taste like cake or Miller Light or business mixed with Red Bull. The ever-growing family of flavored vodkas (beyond my teenage love, vanilla) turns my stomach--peach, pear, apple, raspberry, VOMS. And now I hear that brown liquor is being threatened! Jim Beam intends to release a Black Cherry version of their seventh generation Kentucky brew, and I am appalled and deeply, deeply saddened. I imagine that we'll begin to see a sickening row of brightly colored bottles of whiskey-jacked-up-every-which-way beside the already long, yuckstons vodka outfit behind the bar. Weep.

Happy Purim?

I wonder how it feels to murder something beautiful. Let's ask these ladies.

big pictures

This morning's Hollywood gossip channels remark two very different actresses and their polar feelings about photographers and being photographed--

On the one hand, that little, underaged, gymnastics-stunted television star, Hayden Panettiere.

On the other, that little, wise and beautiful, divine fur coat-sporting, eating disorder-stunted movie star, Christina Ricci.

Obviously, it's unfair for me to compare these two. Ricci is a founding father, A&P is down with most anything she has to say (we don't even impeach her for Black Snake Moan--that shit was Craig's fault). Panettiere, on the other hand, is one of those of the younger generation that we spit on for fear of being prematurely aged by the Culture Industry and because dudes think she's hot and we disagree. However, with or without an oppositional quote from steady(ish), grown Ricci, Panettiere sounds over-dramatic and foolish. What kind of an upstart young actress doesn't want attention from reporters on a red-carpet? Long before these internets, when Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks took their 1920 honeymoon press tour of Europe (yes, publicists were around before sound), a whistle stop appearance in Lenin's Moscow brought a crowd of over a million fans, a number of whom were trampled to death--so powerful and far-reaching was the celebrity created by our first cinema. I mean, talk about ruination! In later autobiography-authoring years, Pickford would recall that Soviet photo-op as the most miserable and frightening experience of her life.

I have a lot to say about tabloids, the imaging of celebrity, the desire to appear as a photograph; a large portion of my book on B. Spears is dedicated to popular imagery--paparazzi pictures, music videos, and television commercials. And, of course, I view much of this stuff as dangerous and violent, but working actors do press. It's simply part of their job, and don't tell me anyone who becomes an actor isn't categorically attention-seeking, particularly child-actors like these two. Methinks Miss Panettiere has delusions of grandeur, a notion that she is the sort of Hollywood star who has passed into the heady death valley of people-turned-visual-icons. She is not. She is a girl on a primetime drama who dates her costar and has some generationally ordained name recognition and maybe a few magazine covers (Self, Seventeen...?). Lady needs the Entertainment Tonight correspondents of the world to affirm her employee status and keep her afloat (working past the age of 25). Lawd.

Whistle While You Twerk

A love, inexplicably presented in two parts—

Love In This Club: Adrian Veidt and Edward Morgan Blake

Whether Watchmen is actually unfilmable (Zac "so-not-gay" Snyder being the proof of that) is irrelevant. Billy Crudup's crazy glowing blue wang, Patrick Wilson's enjoyable (but understated) wang (god, there was so much wang) are also a bit irrelevant—to Alpha at least.

Let's get back to the book. To why Alan Moore (as scared of him as I am) is really a fucking genius. Let's get back to the actual characters. And let's get back to what A&P does best. Let's get back to the love in this club:

Contestant #1. Adrian Veidt (aka Ozymandias). The smartest (and often implied to be the prettiest) man on earth, forever cursed with that burden. Say what you will about his actions, but the man's motives are understandable and direct; he believes the world is worth fighting for, and does so with ruthless efficiency. While obviously purported to be the "villain" of Watchmen, once you really listen to the sick mind behind it all, you can't help but believe in him. Just steer clear of Manhattan and enjoy the calamari...

Contestant #2: Edward Morgan Blake (aka The Comedian). Another one of the (quite possibly the) greatest morally ambiguous characters in fiction ever. They call him the Comedian because he gets the ultimate fucking joke: life. It's silly. It's self-defeating. It's not worth saving. It's simply worth maintaining. And gaining bloody satisfaction in doing so. Is it any wonder contestant #1 (SPOILER ALERT) had to kill him? Not at all, and the fact that Blake took it with the dignity and professionalism one would expect?... make love to me...

I'm OK. You're OK.

Just a little fun-times to raise team morale... Unfortunately, no one wants us to have a good time (especially the devil's new favorite website, YouTube) so I have to link it... Great muppety Odin, how I wish it was displayed prominently on the site... cuz this is my favorite song, I sing along when the DJ throws it on...

Verses

At fifteen, this was my most favorite poem—

"The Young Housewife"
William Carlos Williams
1916

At ten AM the young housewife
moves about in negligee behind
the wooden walls of her husband's house.
I pass solitary in my car.

Then again she comes to the curb
to call the ice-man, fish-man, and stands
shy, uncorseted, tucking in
stray ends of hair, and I compare her
to a fallen leaf.

The noiseless wheels of my car
rush with a crackling sound over
dried leaves as I bow and pass smiling.

—And here are some lovely Mainers formalizing it.

View of a Room

Wilton House
Wiltshire
Double Cube Room

I Demand Satisfaction

I realize that A&P has been man-negative recently. It could have something to do with a few unsavory March anniversaries or how it seems pretty clear that Chris Brown intended to kill Rihanna. But in an attempt to free my system of man-negativity by wallowing in it, I've elected to post a "baby oil and belt" beatdown (lord—how that sounds!) from 2007's This Christmas, a film which incidentally starred Chris Brown, and a game of abusive hubby bruising "Grit Ball" from my most favorite film of the past decade, Madea's Family Reunion—

Expansion (and Deflation)

I need to expand my comment on Pillow's "...Broad" post below into a proper post of my own. Because I just got sucked into reviewing several years worth of Vice Magazine (which I haven't read since 2005) "Do's and Don'ts," first looking at our old friend and then on and on and on. And though there are a few quirky old drunks and bums featured, like our Founding Father smelly aunt down there, most of the mugs are young girls and guys. A girl is a "Do" if she makes Vice's "pants tighter" or causes them to "whack off" or "think of getting married," a "Don't" if she dresses poorly or looks "diseased." A guy is a "Do" if the Vice fellas admire his estilo or otherwise find him relatable, a "Don't" if he dresses poorly or generally seems "normal" and "douchey."

The prose is pithy and fun-as-ever, and their opinions not always so predictable as one might imagine, and I don't really mind using sartorial choices as a major criteria for hotness, because clothes tell you a lot about a brother/sister. But I have new information since 2005—I've dated a couple of these Vice employee types, these blue-collar, over-the-hill skater, record collector, mannered, dinge-aesthetes (one of them was a featured "Do" back in '04). And it didn't go so well.

These hyper-specific, but all too common boyfriend-characters were (as the "Do and Don'ts" authors self-proclaim constantly) nerds in high school (but the kind that took a lot of acid in Jr. High...?). I know that there are sweet dudes who avoid this particular noose, but most high school nerds turn out to be whopping misogynists. Obviously, those who were jocks can also wear that mantle, but often, they do so openly. Nerd-turned-'hipster'-misogynists tend to hide their woman-hatred, born of painful memories of rejection and humiliation at the hands of pretty girls (I recall a drunken fight with an ex that began with him saying that he "would have hated me in high school."), beneath a frosting of liberality and "alternativeness."

These guys are obsessed with beautiful women in the shallowest way, as possible fixes for their public validation addiction, their crippling insecurity. The most dangerous of the species seek to belittle and punish these much-desired femmes once they've drawn them in with adoration and half-serious marriage proposals and mixed CD's. When you've actually loved and co-habitated with a textbook case, a deep suspicion of all men (especially the ones who ride bikes and wear beards and horn-rimmed glasses) sets in.

Today, in 2009, I still found Vice "Do's and Don'ts" amusing and absorbing, but my absorption was inflected with dreary recollections of waking up next to a guy who was jealous of me (inevitably these unions are rife with class issues), a guy who would essentially never stop hating the part of me that he imagined hated him.

Founding Fathers: This Broad

I heard that a chick I used to know was a recent "do" on Vice's grating "Do's & Don'ts" list, so I took a gander at the website. I'm really glad that I did because I found this little slice of elegance, in the "do's" section no less.

The Best Thing Going (For Monday)

This map was originally published in Morse's American Gazetteer in 1797. Can you believe this presaging of neon highlighters?!

More Sinistration

Daylight Saving Tiempo is just sickness, further, extreme, March-styles sickness. I wasn't so phased yesterday, being that it was Sunday and I had nothing to do but sleep in and watch One Tree Hill on SOAPnet. But this morning has been a serious test of my will-to-live mettle. I feel like I've gotten less sleep and less sun at the bitter end of a season that generally makes me feel tired and dim. Fuck you, Ben Franklin (srsly).

OK Stupid

Verses

"Zero"
Yeah Yeah Yeahs

Shake it like a ladder to the sun
Makes me feel like a madman on the run
Find me, never, never far gone
So get your leather, leather, leather on on on on

Your zero
What's your name?
No one's gonna ask you
Better find out where they want you to go

Try and hit the spot
Get to know it in the dark
Get to know it whether you're
Crying, crying, crying, oh oh
Can you climb, climb, climb higher

Shake it like a ladder to the sun
Makes me feel like a madman on the run
No you're never, never far gone
So get your leather, leather, leather on on on on

Your zero
What's your name?
No one's gonna ask you
Better find out where they want you to go

Try and hit the spot
Get to know it in the dark
Get to know it whether you're
Crying, crying, crying, oh oh
Can you climb, climb, climb higher

Was it the cure?
Shellshock!
Was it the cure?
Hope not!
Was it the cure?
Shellshock!
Was it the cure?
What's your name?

Your zero
What's your name?
No one's gonna ask you
Better find out where they want you to go

Try and hit the spot
Get to know it in the dark
Get to know it whether you're
Crying, crying, crying, oh oh
Can you climb, climb, climb higher

Was it the cure?
Shellshock!
Was it the cure?
Hope not!
Was it the cure?
Shellshock!
Was it the cure?
Hope not!

What's your name? (x7)

I've Hated Everyone I've Met Who Works in Advertising

Sinister Minister

I know I've mentioned it before, but at A&P we're old friends (family really) with more than a few traits in common. We have comic-tragic taste in men. We drink (preferably the brown stuff). We get maudlin. We dwell on/in the past, revisit all the old bastards and losses and triumphs and television shows. These are year-round pursuits, sometimes blissful, but in winter, the grave sorts of reminiscences seem denser, joy and its memory scarce on the ground.

This past week, the first of March, it snowed in both of our homes, Memphis and New York. And as various weathermen clucked the phrase, "in like a lion, out like a lamb" over and over again, I began to feel anxious. At root, or after much repeating, it's a pretty sinister, strange saying, which is appropriate, because March is a pretty sinister, strange month with its inconsistent weather and Caesarcide. So, without getting into the sordid details of my March (with the damn Ides still to come!)...I'll say: friends—lay low, self-care, set your clocks forward, feel free to be a mess. In a matter of weeks, this spell will lift and we can start wearing shirtsleeves and eating at outdoor tables again. Blame March. Stay up.