November 03, 2010
This Week's Line
This Week's Bizarro Vegas Moment
Okay, i kid, this was from a few weeks ago, but i had that thing below us to finish first. Like i've never taken poetic license. Fuck, like i've never taken journalistic license. Anyway, i'm driving to work one morning, through my usual, odd, surface-street path. As i make the turn from Charleston to Maryland, i see something tawny and fluffy in the middle of the street. I slow down, very slow, and roll past, trying to see if it's a dog or a cat or a... wig. It's a curly red wig, complete with shiny barrette still stuck in cheap corkscrew curls. That tranny sure must've been in a hurry.
Then, the very next morning, same time, i'm cruising through a school zone about a hundred yards further down the road. Guy on a BMX bike starts riding alongside me: Crew cut, stonewash baggy shorts, button-up shirt unbuttoned in the breeze, occasionally shouting something about "senorita." He bikes up ahead of me (remember: school zone) then turns around and rides down the middle of the street, straight towards me. Still shouting, but also now blowing kisses. He swerves before i can run him down with the Chrysler. See, you gotta be careful with me. I am often in a bad mood and have little to no love for humanity. Don't tempt me.
This Week's Taste Sensation
The Absolut collection of city-flavored liquors is of wildly varying quality. The opener, Absolut New Orleans, donated some of the proceeds to Katrina relief, but was worth drinking for the mango-black pepper flavor, which combines spicy and fruity. Absolut Los Angeles followed, with a blueberry-acai-pomegranate flavor that was just too sweet and synthetic (in that way, i suppose, very L.A.) and recently Absolut Brooklyn has come out, a mix of ginger and apple endorsed by Spike Lee. But in between there was Absolut Boston, definitely the best since the one that started it all. The infusion is black tea and elderflower and it is indeed delicious. Sure, the two flavors are trendy, yet both are subtle and complex--the elderflower adds a slightly fruity, floral taste, but the black tea keeps an edge on it. It's great in a gimlet (be sure you're making that gimlet correctly with fresh lime juice combined with either simple syrup or Rose's lime) or with tonic or sparkling limeade.
This Week's Important Fashion News
Hail, hail motherfuckers, for we finally have an opening date for the H&M in Caesars Palace, the largest H&M in North Goddamn America! November 20, probably at 9 or 10 am. No longer will we have two be content with that shitty, MacLaren-crowded H&M at Town Square or that abysmally miniscule one at Planet Hollywood where they don't carry anything over a size 4. No longer will i have to choose between buying booze (and the very occasional $12 pack of Lucky Strikes) and clothes when i am in New York City because they have the three-story H&M and i need pyramid-studded silver bangles and 50's bad girl sweaters and trumpet-flared tweed skirts. We're even getting the new Lanvin collection early!
This Week's Dollar-Store Movie
Actually, this movie was a gift, but ii'm pretty sure it's dollar store, or at least Big Lots. Anyway, Lisa and the Devil. Obvious why it was given to me. Anyway, Italian spooky-house horror flick, written and directed by Mario Bava, starring Telly Savalas as the Devil. Sounds good, doesn't it? Well, it's not. Sure, Telly is loads of fun, alternately imperious and obsequious, though the lollipop is confusing in this context. And the decaying baroque palazzo setting is fantastic with cinematography that does it full justice. But not a whole lot happens and what does happen is totally incoherent. Heroine Britt Ekland seems to be brain-dead, even by horror-movie Euro-bimbo standards. Even softcore necrophilia can't save Lisa and the Devil. However, this does provide me with the opportunity to share this most awesome screencap with you...
This Week's Thrift Shop Find
Oh, i was tempted by the mid-century fancy gold metal end table/album rack and the American Apparel dress that almost fit, i passed them up. How, however, could i say no to The Intimate Sex Lives of Famous People? Written by three people named Wallace and one named Wallechinsky, this purple-and-pink tome delivers just what it promises: The dirty details of two hundred-odd figures of renown. Nothing but naughty bits. James Joyce was such a panty freak he carried a pair of doll's underwear around in his pocket. Andre Gide was turned on by deformed children and the sound of breaking glass. T.E. Lawrence dug flogging. Van Gogh and Gauguin had the clap, Toulouse-Lautrec and Diego Rivera had huge cocks. Hitler was a total perv scat freak with one ball, but everyone knows that. They don't even bother to dignify that bullshit about Catherine the Great and the horse with a response. (She fucked everything on two legs.) but unfortunately, they do repeat those untrue things Irving Shulman said about Jean Harlow. Maybe that's been changed in the revised version, with flashy cover art and additional celebrities, such as Tupac Shakur and Kurt Cobain. But i'm happy to have to older one. the cover goes better with my bathroom decor. Also, i'm sure the new one cuts out Ninon de Lenclos and King Farouk. And any discussion of Kurt Cobain's personal fetishes will necessitate a discussion of Courtney Love's snatch. And none of us are brave enough for that. Even with a toilet nearby.