American Idol = Fun + Sexy x Crazy Ass Crazy

Hi, Friends!

As some of you may know, I've written about the yearly televised Godzilla American Idol for a few years now over at PhillyBurbs.com. As it seems that neither the current cloud of these economic times nor Rod Blagojevich's giant taint have yet to touch the niche blogging industry, I will be blogging over there once again. After a few years of Sanjayas and crazy Paulas and Randy's sparkle cowboy shirts, I'm feeling TIRED. So, my question for you is -- What do you want out of your Idol blog reading experience?

I'm looking for new ideas and challenges. Basically, I want you to do the hard part of my job for me. What kinds of posts do you want to see? What do you definitely not want to see? If you had been a reader of my posts previously, what worked and what didn't? I write to serve you.

Love.

Fun! Sexy! Truthy!

Ahhhh ... The Holiday Season is over. Officially. I say again, "Ahhhhh!"

Ask anyone who knows me and they'll tell you that there is no one who loves Christmas -- the whole holiday season, actually -- more than I. I love the lights. I love the tradition. I love the 75% OFF, EVERYTHING MUST GO, GO, GO! sales at every turn. But even I have my limits. And I, for one, am delighted to turn the page and see what January will bring.

The Golden Globes!
American Idol!
The Oscars!
Other stuff I don't really care about!

There are two things, however, about which I am most excited in this new year: the returns of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert to the airwaves. I depend on these two stalwarts of journalism to keep me abreast of the latest goings-on on this big blue marble we call home. Their extended holiday vacations left me woefully (or is it blissfully) uninformed and forced me to turn to hacks like John King and David Gregory to get my "facts".

For the remainder of this week, Jon Stewart's guests will be the brilliant, fun, possibly sexy, definitely awesome Rachel Maddow (who looks curiously like Elvis Costello) and White House Press Secretary Dana Perino (which will doubtless be nothing short of glorious). On Colbert, you'll see Benicio "Mushmouth" Del Toro and author Lawrence Lessig.

I'm glad you're back, gentlemen. A sense of peace, harmony and factose intolerance has returned to my life.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Crisis in the Senate - Deliberative Disorder

Barack Obama Interview
John McCain Interview

Sarah Palin Video
Funny Election Video

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Better Know a District - Utah's 3rd - Jason Chaffetz

Colbert at Christmas
Colbert Christmas DVD

Green Screen
Bill O'Reilly Interview

Talk To The Fun, Sexy Hand!

I've made no secret of the fact that I find The View to be vapid and patently unwatchable (sorry, Augie ... I know how you feel about Joy Behar's smooth n' velvety voice). I actually think its existence is one of the signs of the End of Days, sort of like Jimmy Dean Pancakes & Sausage On A Stick (there just aren't enough meats on sticks) or the presence of Sarah Palin on a Presidential election ticket.

Where was I? Oh, right. Daytime talk show drivel.

Yesterday, the show where seemingly-intelligent women go to fester and rot dealt me a moment of pure, unadulterated, laugh-out-loud glee. It would seem that Sherri Shepherd (the current, and probably just as disposable, Star Jones, who apparently thinks the world is flat) and her son did their best to annoy the crap out of Jeremy "Let's Hug It Out, Bitch" Piven on a recent flight from somewhere to somewhere (I feel for you, Mr. Piven).

While it was no real revelation that this woman is vehemently vexatious, I DID discover one tiny thing: I might actually have a glimmer of respect for Baba Wawa. Her flat-out, audaciously derisive reaction to Ms. Shepherd's little anecdote is glorious. You GO, you bitter ol' thing, you!

Fun, Sexy New Year

Hi, all!

I've been spending a lot of time with my new bestie, the Amazon Kindle, so I feel like I've been neglecting the Internets. Good thing for my intellect, bad for the blog. I did want to write a post to wish you all a healthy, happy New Year. You can start by detoxing with Gwyneth. But remember:

If your bowel movements get sluggish, you can accelerate things by drinking half a cup of castor oil or using a mild herbal laxative. Bowel elimination is paramount for correct detoxification.

That's more information than I need to have about a former Oscar winner.

I also wanted to tell you about the amazing thing that happened to me on New Year's Eve. I. Had. Fun.

I am a big Scrooge McDuck about any holiday whose sole purpose is to give amateurs the excuse to drink copiously or hit unsuspecting victims with shaving cream and eggs or to nearly set my garage on fire with their illegal fireworks. My top 5 most despised holidays are New Year's Eve, Halloween, St. Patrick's Day, 4th of July, and frakkin' Pulaski Day. If I lived anywhere else, I'd probably include Fat Tuesday in the list, but here in Chicago we care more about consuming lethal doses of paczkis than lethal does of alcohol on that particular day. And who doesn't like doughnuts?

This New Year's Eve, I had the best excuse to stay in -- the infant. The husband and I decided we were going to stay in and order a Lobstergram. We were not going to actively pursue merriment outside the confines of our home. Word got out about this, and a few of our friends thought it sounded like fun and we invited them over. We decided instead of ordering Lobsters, we'd go to that great seafood haven, Costco, and see what we could find.

I stayed at home while the shopping occurred. If they came home with nothing, at least I'd have asparagus and molton chocolate cake for them to eat. If the cake didn't turn out, I'd have ice cream. At around five o'clock, my sister-in-law showed up at my door with boxes of food -- frozen seafood appetizers, shrimp, scallops, crab legs, and beef tenderloin. Thus we started our Iron Chef kamakaze cooking. Everyone helped out with the food. I was most impressed with my brother's garlic shrimp. The whole cooking process took us to about 7:00. We ate, then played Celebrities (lots of Chicago politicians included in the mix). After that, it was about 11:00. We watched two local news personalities flirt their way, inappropriately, into the New Year. Then we had some champagne, sent some gratuitous text messages, and settled in for some Karaoke Revolution.

The evening was fun, exciting (the secret ingredient is -- surf and turf!), and spent with good friends (and the cake was delicious, if I do say so myself).

Here's to an equally fun and exciting New Year for all y'all!

The Leastest Fun, Leastest Sexiest Dance Show Ever

You remember Michael Flatley? The self-proclaimed "Lord of the Dance" should, perhaps, consider a new title after last night's premiere of Superstars of Dance, the brainchild of American Idol and So You Think You Can Dance? producer Nygel Lythgoe. Somehing like "Jester of Dance". As an aside, Mr. Lythgoe didn't NEED another dance show, as SYTYCD is already the bomb diggity, yo. It is fun, it is sexy -- nay SMOLDERING -- and it doesn't have Michael Flatley, which I consider a rather good thing.

The new show, which will air starting tonight, at its "regular" time (I put "regular" in quotes, because if it lasts another week, I'll eat my Ugg boots. Which, from a fashion perspective might be a good thing, as it's been pointed out that they are heinously ugly in spite of their delicious comfortableness. But I digress ...) on NBC at 8EST/7CEN, is billed as "an intoxicating mix of cultures", but it's pretty much just a celebration of cheese. And not even good cheese.

The one thing that this 2-hour cavalcade of dreck DID have was Robert Muraine. For those of you who're fans of So You Think You Can Dance?, you'll remember him as "Mr. Fantastic", or the guy who was able to do all of those insanely freakish, wonderfully awesome, defy-the-laws-of-physics-and-anatomy things to his body. Sadly, this show even managed to steal some of HIS thunder, which is really hard, as you'll see in the video -- a clip from his audition for SYTYCD last year.

Save yourself the agony. SKIP the show. Watch the video. You'll be up in the game by 113 minutes.

You can thank me later.

The 2008 Least Funny and Sexy Movies of the Year

Though I managed to avoid a lot of the crap, I couldn't sidestep it all. 2008 was rife with movie dung. Pretty much the first nine months of the year was a veritable wasteland of doody with a few golden nuggets thrown in for good measure. End the poop imagery.

In no real order, here are the worst of the worst:

Harold and Kumar Escape from Gitmo. I really liked the White Castle version of this movie. I LUUUURVE me some NPH. Alas, I knew I was in trouble when the first two minutes of the movie included both fecal and wang cider humor. Didn't that stop being funny around Van Wilder time?

The Love Guru. Mike Meyers has not come up with a new joke since 2001. It's almost a little bit sad to see what he's become, but it's really more about the Shadenfreude.

Tropic Thunder. I realize I may be in the minority on this one, but I thought this movie was an incredibly stale caricature of the film industry. I had very high hopes for this movie, but I thought almost every "insight" revealed about Hollywood could've been made by any casual observer of popular culture or watcher of Entourage. Even Robert Downey, Jr. was a tad disappointing. Tom Cruise's performance has been way overrated. A fat suit and bald cap do not equal funny. The only funny parts? The faux film previews and the full retard conversation. Otherwise? Blah.

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. George Lucas, you are wearing no clothes. This movie was one of the most disappointing of the year. Horrible title? Check. A crystal skull constructed from last year's Christmas and Halloween decorations from Michaels? Check. Bored, over-the-hill Harrison Ford? Check. A bizarre performance by one of the most talented actresses in the world? Check. ALIENS!?!? Check.

Australia. Nicole Kidman should just enjoy her time in Tennessee and stop making movies. Hugh Jackman had nothing to work with. And my sweet Baz, what happened to you? This movie almost makes Pearl Harbor look like Gone With the Wind.

Other films that sucked, but really had no hope of not sucking: What Happens in Vegas, Fool's Gold

Decent Ideas that Fell Very, Very Short: Vantage Point and The Bucket List

Movies That Should've Sucked, But Didn't: Don't Mess With the Zohan; 27 Dresses; Welcome Home, Roscoe Jenkins

Worst Movie Going Experience: Run, Fat Boy, Run where someone behind me kept coughing up a lung every five minutes.

Best Actor of a Mediocre to Bad Film: James Marsden, 27 Dresses, who solidified his status as under-the radar super-stud

Casting that Pretty Much Ruined the Movie for Me: Angelina Jolie in Wanted, who could not possibly have lifted any of those guns in real life. And she takes herself way too seriously. I just don't like her. Anyway.

10 Funnest, Sexiest Movies of the Year

Since I spent all of 2008 either pregnant or with an infant, I missed a few movies here and there and I mostly avoided a lot of the crap. However, I did see enough movies to compile a Top Ten list. Here it is:

10. Forgetting Sarah Marshall.* I was really starting to tire of everyone who ever met Judd Apatow before this movie was released, but I should have known that my Marshall Erickson would be able to make a really sweet and funny movie.

9. Burn After Reading. I'm not sure why this movie didn't get more love. It's very classic Coen Brothers. Brad Pitt is amazingly insane.

8. Role Models. The best straight up comedy of the year. Tropic Thunder is undeservedly overpraised (see my worst of list tomorrow), and Pineapple Express is fantastic for the first 3/4 of the movie, but loses it in the end. Plus, the dorkiest character in the whole film is named, what else, Augie.

7. Son of Rambow. Can I say, Chuck Bass? Yes, the Bass-hole is in this movie, but it's the little kids who sell it. Look for Will Poulter, who plays Lee Carter, to make something of himself someday.

6. The Visitor. So. Freaking. Good. You must rent this movie immediately. Richard Jenkins deserves a best actor nomination for sure.

5. In Bruges. I love, love, love this movie. The screenplay is fantastic. The acting is superb. It's just a bizarre, smallish, bloody film.

4. Iron Man. This certainly was the year of really good superhero movies. Robert Downey, Jr. is officially back, though he'd been back in my heart since his stint on Ally McBeal.

3. Frost/Nixon. The most recent movie I saw with my husband has a slash in the title, just like the very first movie we ever saw together: Face/Off. Just a little bit of trivia. Frost/Nixon is waaaaay better. The acting is superb. Both Frank Langella and Michael Sheen are great as the title characters. Plus, Oliver Platt. Love him.

2. Slumdog Millionaire. This is the movie that will probably win Best Picture at the Academy Awards, and it probably should. It should also receive an adapted screenplay nomination as well. This is one of the most interestingly constructed movies in a long time and it's just a joy to watch.

1. The Dark Knight. I've seen it thrice. I don't care how popular it is or how cool it is to be bashing TDK right about now, this movie is fantastic. The acting is very good to great. The score is fantastic. The cinematography is unbelievable. I still can't help but marvel at the non-CGI shot of Christian Bale at the top of the Sears Tower. Chicago never looked better. And, most of all, shouldn't we all be encouraging Hollywood to make big budget popcorn movies that are actually good? Let's throw a few Oscars over by there.

*I realize the movie Wall-E is missing from this list. I saw it. I liked it. I'm not as deeply in love with this movie as many people are. I think it's good, and technically brilliant, and I may grow to love the movie in time, but as of December 30, 2008, I am just not there yet.