Happy Friday, all. There are wild raspberries growing in Central Park , the special cream puff filling of the day
at the Beard Papa’s at 76th and Broadway is hazelnut, and life is
good.
I saw Magic Mike XXL
last weekend (not many people did—it underperformed at the box office, and
there were only about four people in the theater with us. Then again, we caught
the 10:30 AM showing, which is maaaaaybe not the optimal time to watch a high-spirited
romp about male strippers). It’s thoroughly charming. No real plot to get in
the way, just two hours of watching a bunch of attractive, amiable strippers as
they bump and grind their way from Tampa to Myrtle Beach . On my
spectrum of movies I’ve seen thus far this summer, I put it squarely in the middle
with Dope, while Mad Max: Fury Road is unchallenged at the top and Avengers: Age of Ultron is bringing up
the rear.
No free book giveaways this week. After that mad flurry of recent giveaways, I figure it was time to take a breather. However, I still have a couple Lonely Satellite paperbacks looking to get adopted into good homes, so if you want a free copy, let me know. Lonely Satellite is currently holding at #90 on Amazon's listing of best-selling LGBT-themed science fiction books on Kindle.
Ernest Cline’s new novel Armada comes out on July 14th. Ernie’s debut novel, Ready Player One, was a New
York Times bestseller; Steven Spielberg has signed on to direct the movie.
Ernie is a good friend of my sister’s (fun fact: she’s thanked in the
acknowledgements of Ready Player One);
I’ve hung out with him before, and in addition to being a fantastic writer, he’s
one of the friendliest, coolest guys you could meet. Relevant to my interests,
and to the interests of a hefty percentage of visitors to this site, he has a
deep, passionate love of eighties geek culture, which is one of the dominant
themes in his writing. Here’s a great new interview with him in Mother Jones, in which he talks about his
love of The Last Starfighter and Iron Eagle and, ahem, loaning his
DeLorean to George R. R. Martin, which is one of the most amazing phrases I’ve ever
typed.
More of my Glitter Princes concept art!
Last week I introduced you to the lovely Marcel; this week, it’s all about Etienne.
Etienne is a fashion photographer/secret agent with a taste for the good life. He’s a
little fussy and high-maintenance, but he’s got a good heart.
Nostalgia corner: Here's a 1986 commercial for Nestle's Alpine White chocolate bar. I'd forgotten all about this one until my sister showed it to me yesterday:
It's nice! Very pretty. I like the way it recreates famous Maxfield Parrish paintings:
And because I’m a little short on news this week, I’m going to
pad this out with some Fun With Keywords. Courtesy of Google Analytics, these
are some of the search terms people have recently entered into Google to find this site:
"paul
gleason" nude
Thus reinforcing my theory that if, if you’re a public
figure, no matter who you are or what you’re famous for, someone out there is scouring
the web for nude photos of you. Even if you’re the mean principal from The Breakfast Club.
akira kanedaaaaaa
I believe the appropriate response is “Tetsuooooo!”
arrow shoots roy
Magical. While I loved Roy and couldn’t stand Oliver, aka
the Arrow himself, that whole sequence where Oliver shoots an arrow into Roy’s
leg, then has to call Diggle to help take it out (“Roy’s been shot. With an arrow.” Awkward
pause. “It’s a long story.”) ended up being the most bizarrely funny thing to
ever happen on that glum, sloppy show.
ioan gruffudd why did
he wear shorts in 102 dalmatians
Oh, god. I have so many questions about Ioan Gruffudd’s
decisions in 102 Dalmatians,
beginning with his decision to, y’know, appear in that damn movie. His baffling
shorts-with-heavy-parka-and-scarf ensemble is the least of my concerns.
is ioan gruffudd in an
olive garden commercial
Seems very
unlikely.
movie about a young
woman kidnaping a woman and disguises her self as her and
seduced her boyfriend
in the morning while he was sleeping pretending to be the woman she locked up
at her house at his hotel and he notices her and threatens but she kills him by
throwing a high heel shoe on his eyes and he dies soon after she gets killed by
the girl she locked
Haven’t seen it in years, and the details of this don’t
quite seem right, but the “kills him by throwing a high heel shoe on his eyes”
makes me think of Single White Female.
nick rhodes
gundam wing
I’m a big fan of both Nick Rhodes and Gundam Wing, but I’ll be damned if I can come up with any
connections between them. However, this reminds me of a hard-hitting intellectual discussion I had
with my sister a couple years back (which I may have actually shared here
before, because, like a cocktail party bore, I tend to repeat myself): The
members of Duran Duran match up perfectly with the Gundam Wing pilots. Nick is Quatre (tiny, blonde, keen strategic
brain, rich beyond imagination), John is Heero (dark-haired, hot, high-strung),
Simon is Duo (reckless, fun-loving, weird fashion sense), Roger is Trowa
(troubled, quiet), and Andy is Wu Fei (doesn’t get along with anyone). I mean,
obviously.
nick rhodes
pretentious
Hells, yeah. Pretty sure Nick would enthusiastically agree
with this assessment.
sacajawea junior high spokane
Oh, I know this one. The totem pole is the only thing I
remember fondly about my years at Sacajawea. From the official Spokane Public Schools website (you know, I don’t like being needlessly pedantic about
spelling and grammar, but this is the official website of an entire public
school system—a very good public school system, in fact, unless things have
changed significantly since my time. Maybe cleaning up the typos would be a
good idea?):“1973 brought a new ear [sic] of excitement as the totem pole carving
began. It took seventh graders two years
of designing, carving, and painting to complete the pole under the direction of
Mrs. O.J. Cotes, the art teacher. The
excitement mounted as the 23-foot cedar pole was dedicated at a special
ceremony on Potlatch Day May 23, 1975.
During that week, $10 per homeroom was raised to purchase a gift for the
Museum of Native American Clture
seems nice
You, too.
It’s complicated. I can’t really give you a firm yes or no
on this. Parts of Spokane
are awesome, parts are problematic. Same goes for any city.
teen wolf jackson
Worthy of a gif.
the car that adam
rodriguez used in psych
Dunno. Thank you for this, though, because I spent much of Magic Mike XXL trying to remember what
I’d seen Adam Rodriguez in, and thanks to your search query, I now recall it
was that Psych episode where he drove
some kind of fancy car.
tv series about the
american revolution that starred ioan gruffudd many years ago.
Ah. You’re thinking about the ITV series Hornblower (which aired in the US on
A&E), which is set in the early
nineteen century during the Napoleonic Wars, which puts it about a
quarter century or so after the end of the American Revolution.
who played the thugs
in max headroom
william s burroughs
arcadia video
Yep. William Burroughs was in Arcadia ’s “Election Day” video. Weird, right?
That’s all I’ve got. Stay cool and dry—it’s muggy out there.
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