Prancers Investigates

Clean Nose Clean Heart Can't Lose

2007-12-05T10:07:00.000-08:00

This post is like getting an email where the content is in the subject line and reading the body can only be a let down, and for that I apologize. Also, Bones has aired all of their pre-strike episodes, so rest assured that my recent Bonesmania will soon end. But from the bowels of my Tivo I just had to bring you this one gem.
Brief background: Bones' dad reappeared after lots of years on the lam, having undergone plastic surgery to make him resemble his old self less and Ryan O'Neal more, only to be promptly arrested by Booth, throwing Bones and Booth's relationship into turmoil and necessitating the drafting of John Francis Daley as tweener psychologist Dr. Lance Sweets to help them work through the emotional detritus. (Sidebar: Daley plays the same role that Stephen Fry played last season, which leads me to believe he might turn out to be the apprentice Gormagon people eater, who Fry is clearly too old to play. Eek!) Also recently arrested was Russ, Bones' brother. Touchingly, Booth was able to get Russ's sentence reduced to 30 days by doing absolutely nothing, but Bones was very grateful. After doing nothing though, Booth felt the need to impart some wisdom to his future Bones-in-law. So he said:

"Keep your nose clean, kid. Clean nose clean heart."

Now, this is obviously some kind of misguided attempt at a Friday Night Lights homage, whose "clear eyes full hearts can't lose" pre-game chant is so cheesy I have to eat it with crackers, risking 4th quarter cramps, but it works for the show. I need not tell you "clean nose clean heart" does not work, for this or any show. While the former conjures images of hopeful, misty-eyed teens with hearts bursting; the latter makes me want to wipe SNOT off of my HEART.
I fear that Bones' viewership is not large enough for the level of widespread mocking this phrase deserves, so I charge you, loyal readers. Go forth and bring the Word to the People! Who's got Stossel's email?

Bones Follow Up Potpourri Style

2007-11-30T12:31:00.000-08:00

I know, I am SERIOUSLY shamefully late with this post. You know the story. We all lost our jobs, blah blah blah, I only had dial-up at home, turning my light-hoofed prancing into the glacial clodding of a narcoleptic Clydesdale. But I have remedied the situation and returned to bring you the long-awaited, admittedly worse for the wear version of Bones Halloween Extravaganza.
Due to lapse in memory and my inability to find a theme to my ramblings, this post will be presented potpourri style. Did you know that potpourri means "rotten pot"? I always thought it's translation would be more poetic, like say "bountiful satchel" or "jubilant miscellany" (I just wanted to use that word. LOVE it.) But no. Rotten pot. I wonder if Alex Trebek knows. I'm emailing Jane for one of her boyfriend's Trebekistan appendices. (Potpourri is a Jeopardy category, no? Or am I thinking of Potent Potables?) Anywho, on to rotten scrap #1:
1. Bones' boobs. It's not like I didn't go into this episode fully aware that it would showcase Bones' goods. But sweet lord. I haven't seen so much - spatially AND temporally - of a character's boobs on network TV... ever. The only comparison I can think of is when Bennie goes to the ball in Circle of Friends and looks unintentionally brazen in her made-for-the-average-booblessly-chaste-Celtic-Woman gown. It was like Bones' costume just squashed her boobs against her like two giant, colorful tongue depressors. I could see her underboob, people. And it was like the ONE character trait they thought they'd stick to in the whole episode was to have her flounce along like a nerd who doesn't walk like a lady. You can imagine the comic boobal vectors that result from the combination of unstable boobs + flouncing. Accidental sluttiness only works on fat Irishwomen, FOX. Not on SCIENTISTS. Scientists are able to calculate VARIABLES.
2. Everyone else's boobs. Bones is dressed as Wonder Woman. So maybe Angela and Cam have more workplace-appropriate costumes to even things out. Plus then your lead character gets to be the hottest, and you get the irony that the most sciency nerd is the hottest, which is about as complex and subtle as TV irony gets. No. Angela is Bob Mackey-era Cher WITH headdress and Cam is Catwoman. It was like watching the Vegas stage production of Dr. G: Medical Examiner.
3. Bones' sudden pop culture awareness. Again, absolutely no irony regarding the famously pop culture retarded Bones' choice of a pop culture icon as a Halloween costume. In fact, the other squints refer to it as "the same costume she wears every year." From the previews it seems like Bones repels a bullet with her Wonder Woman bracelet whilst adorably oblivious to the significance of such. Oh no. She mentions that the bracelets aren't made of AMAZONIUM, then later spins like Wonder Woman trying to teleport! In a later episode she confesses an embarrassing high school prank in which the SMURFETTE figurine she wanted was replaced with BRAINY SMURF! HelLO, am I the only one who respects the sanctity of Bones' character?! Clearly SOMEONE (I'm looking at you, Josh Berman) has tired of Bones, the empirical scientist who lacks human and cultural identifiers. So lets fast track her into someone completely generic using the cheapest, most one-dimensional means: TELEVISION REFERENCES. SACRILEGE!!!! NOT TO MENTION THAT BONES WOULD NEVER WANT SMURFETTE.
4. Incessant couple-fying. Clearly the constant carrot-dangling of romance is the reason I got into this show; got into ANY show really. So it is a sad day when even I have had too much. This episode ends with Bones and Booth sitting in the Jeffersonian after thwarting the killer EMT guy who kills kids with FEAR. Booth has been SHOT, but they're just hangin'. Can't end the show without some completely manufactured sexual tension! So Bones practically works up a sweat comparing their crime shenanigans to a date. Really guys? Then there's a clunky mention of how Booth looks like Clark Kent in his squint costume, don't even get me started on how Bones would know who the FUCK Clark Kent is, and the episode becomes Spaceballs. Oh you're a superhero and I'm a superhero. We should fuck. Now I can marry that hotshot bad boy instead of Prince Valium.
Lame. Friend of blog Sean (Happy Birthday!) investigated a fire on the set of Bones during the filming of this episode, and I submit it was caused by the spontaneous combustion of scripts due to INFLAMMATORY SUCKINESS. Potpourri indeed.

Bones is a Hero and Booth is a Nerd?! WHAT?!!!

2007-10-30T17:51:00.000-07:00

I know, I know. Bones did an episode on pony play, and despite the equine connection, Prancers failed to investigate. Then, John Francis Daley guest starred as Doogie-like psychologist (BUT BRRRRAH BONES HATES PSYCHOLOGY BAHHHHH) Dr. Lance Sweets. (Yes, gone are the days of over-descriptive, blatantly phallic names on Bones. End of an era, very sad.) But it was in a conscious Bones-out to make this week's post just that more dramatic. Tune in tomorrow (Or Thursday, whatevs. I can't conjure the Prance on demand.) for ULTRA HALLOWEEN FIRE ON THE SET FLAMING OVERUSE OF PARENTHESES WONDER WOMAN ROLE REVERSAL EXTRAVAGANZA POST!!!! If you read one post all year, it should be THIS ONE.

Checking in with Norm and Cherry

2007-10-15T17:38:00.000-07:00

I think this could become a regular post, as my parents are regularly hilarious and lord knows I need to break up the Bones monotony (Bonotony, teehee). You know that Norm was recently diagnosed as diabetic, and it turns out, much to his chagrin, to be the variety wherein you must eat LESS sugar, not more. Accordingly Norm's sausage and egg McMuffin intake has been cut in half, and double cheeseburgers are now being consumed sans bun. The most encouraging sign of reform is the purchase of a bicycle "specifically designed for seniors." I am told it has 2 wheels and is not stationary, so I'm having trouble picturing these design adjustments. My further interrogation of Cherry revealled only that the seat makes Norm's privates numb, so I have abandoned that line of inquiry. (A special split seat has been ordered.)
While Norm is well on his way to normal blood glucose levels, Cherry's health has taken an alarming and abrupt turn. My first hint to this situation was a text I received: "Recovering well from surgery. Love you." Now Cherry, that fiendish devil, was fully aware of the manipulative nature of her wording. Oh yes, do not ye doubt that. When I called she answered, "Well I think you've set a new family record. I must be getting good at guilt trips in my old age." Harrumph. Alas, the surgery was real. Cherry had to have the toenail of her right big toe removed while she watched eagerly (Cherry has quite a penchant for the morbid, as discussed previously, see "Is Bones my Mom?") Trauma to the nail caused it to grow at an unnatural angle, i.e. down. Norm likes to joke that Cherry needs steel toed house slippers, so as you might guess, the specific trauma throughout the years of stubbing is hard to pinpoint. Ironically, Cherry's side of the family has been plagued by toe difficulties. Her father lost 4 toes in Korea. He would afterwards be known to us as Grandpa Six Toes. I kid you not.
Cherry's podiatric problems have kept her from her most ardent pastime, watering things with the hose. She loves buying plants, watering them, letting storms knock them over, then watching them die still in their pots in the driveway. Norm and I find endless joy in this, but the neighbors are less than pleased. Our neighbors are Paul and Peggy, and their 2 grown daughters, Paula and Penny. Yes. I really have so much to say about Paul and Peggy, or "Terrible Peggy" as Cherry calls her. In the interest of brevity however, I'll just say that Paul once fired a shotgun at/near my brother Eric who, drunk and in his underwear, was attempting to woo young Paula. Paul collects trucker hats in absolute earnestness. He was a truck driver, mainly for Pillsbury (Sidebar: when googling Pillsbury for spelling, it was discovered that the website tagline is: Everything you wanted to know about the Doughboy but were afraid to ask!) before campaigning for school board. Peggy, to use Cherry's description, is "one of those women who's just dying to tell you about her hysterectomy." Last I saw Terrible Peggy she was out in her yard 2 days after goiter surgery (Yes. YES.) CLEANING HER ROCKS. I was in the pool with Norm, and as if keeping his huge mass afloat wasn't strain enough, her rock cleaning shenanigans nearly sent him under. (Peggy recommends darker colored rocks for your gardens, people. They show dirt less.) Paul and Peggy, aghast at Cherry's watering techniques and their effects, called the health department on my woebegone parents for fostering the West Nile virus. Since then, relations that survived gunplay have been severely strained.
Now a new torment threatens the neighborhood: moles. Paul and Peggy, in a twist of Judeo-Christian irony, are the worst afflicted. Their strategy, admittedly, is to drive their moles onto Norm and Cherry's property. The nerve! Cherry is unfazed. She looks at the fearsome steel moletrap Paul and Peggy are using, and sees its true potential. She will call PETA and report this inhumane trap and have a measure of revenge for her West Nile shame! She will regain her neighborhood cred! This from the woman who purchased a "frog gig," which for the unacquainted is a trident for spearing frogs, and sent her husband out with such and a flashlight for stunning them, in order to slaughter the frogs brought about by her own rampant watering and West Nile-infested mosquito rearing! Updates to follow.

Meet the Women's Murder Club

2007-10-02T11:59:00.001-07:00

Due to conflicts on set, there have been some recent casting changes.

Babies taste like Fish: the new were there Statues at the Nightclub?

2007-09-28T14:28:00.000-07:00

I was so excited to find that my last post was NOT about Bones, so I can post about the season premiere without worry that I'll have to post a spin off blog entitled Prancers Investigates Bones (inevitable). (I just noticed, while re-reading my posts and musing about my brilliance, that I made this same joke in the last Bones-related post. Anyone else who noticed gets a cookie in appreciation of your careful attentiveness.)
Let me just say first that Bones + Vanished is weird as shit. Already. Don't worry, I'm not going to get into it. Suffice it to say that there is now a tech who's been to Iraq and dismissed for reasons unknown, a mysterious ship's captain husband from a tribal marriage that must be anulled, an abandoned bank vault containing the silver-plated bone edition of Wheel of Fortune, an Illuminati conspiracy involving a virtuoso violinist and the head of the Secret Service, and a crazy baby eater. That's one episode folks.
An ex of mine always wanted to write a movie called The Crazy Baby Eater. He thought it was funny to state that a person who eats babies is also crazy - independent of the baby-eating. He also wrote a short called The Planet of the Robots and of the Zombies. Clearly redundancy is a theme for him. Anyway, this crazy baby eater was brought in because some suspicious scrapes on the bones (the bones) indicated to Bones (the person) that the killer/eater must have a diamond stud in his tooth. Of course since this is Fox, the crazy cannibal who has a diamond stud in his tooth is played by an attractive 19-year-old white dude. They give him what looks like a toilet paper dowel made of pink wax for him to bite into, explaining to him that his stud gave him away and this will allow them to compare his bite to the bones (the bones). At this point CBE gets to explain his motives to us, to make us understand why oh why he would do such a thing. And it would be great if said explanation included some clue to the massive Bermanian conspiracy ahead of us, since so far the episode has been like fast forwarding through an Is It Real? marathon on the History Channel, and since this character will later die naked via antique knife in his holding cell. Instead:

"It doesn't taste like chicken or pork like people say. It's more like beef. The faces are sweeter. The younger the better. Except babies. Babies taste like fish."

Then CBE takes this giant bite out of the wax while glaring intensely into the camera in extreme close-up. I mean, I can see how a writer-producer could get seduced by the poignancy of a statement like that. How it could LURE him away from banal alternatives like character or plot development. That's like a poem. I'm going to go write it up on the Elliot Smith wall as soon as I post this. PS, the kid is 19! How many babies has he really eaten? And does anyone believe that babies taste like fish? FISH? They aren't even mammals! And they're all muscle. How much muscle tone do you think the average baby has? Bones should KNOW this! We all know soft tissue is not her specialty, but COME ON. She knows all about dolphins, so you'd think she'd have an opinion. Nope. Even Bones is mesmerized by this youthful, bestudded cannibal and his meaty hubris. And we know when Bones abandons science it's time to go back to the nightclub and look for statues, because the WORLD has gone to HELL.

Pantyhose, BBQ Chips, and Other Ways of Living in the Past

2007-08-27T15:16:00.000-07:00

I'm reading this book (recommended by Reb Velvet) about the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary. I know, I am SOOOO smart! So what if I learned of the OED's existence when Christopher gave it to Rory as a present on Gilmore Girls. It uses this device where a word is defined OED-style at the beginning of each chapter. So sad that books need devices now too. You don't find that noise in The Golden Bowl. Anyway, now I really want to look up "pantyhose" in the OED. It's deal is thoroughly representing the history of a word from its first usage on. I just want to know what psychopath (and such is possible, see book) came up with "pantyhose." It sounds like panties with some sort of drainage system for what one can only imagine. If you think about it, "hose" is an entirely inappropriate word to describe both the form and use of pantyhose. It's like when my Temporary Building Manager Specializing in Move-In, Z. Mason Frisby, spent an afternoon of my life describing the device for securing DirecTV cables to the wall to myself and a bewildered DirecTV tech as "condoms." Now Cherry loves using something for purposes other than those intended, such as Crisco as a nighttime leg moisturizer, but I think even she would balk at the use of a condom as a cable tie. A condom is a fitting (heehee) description of the article we know as hose, however. Hmm...
I don't like pantyhose. They're for adults. I will wear them when the varicose veins overtake my legs as they are now beginning to do. (Actually, they aren't varicose veins but what Cherry calls "spider veins." They don't have dimension. I wanted to look up the actual name but I'm scared to death of pictures of varicose veins and don't dare Wikipedia them. This fear stems from a terrifying description in Mi Vida Loca, one of the insane gang memoirs Glen made me read.) I don't understand how one wears them with open toe shoes. I mean, nearly all shoes are open toe. Don't we have the technology to dispense with the toe seam? If those R&D ninnies at Victoria's Secret (I'm picturing the cast of Veronica's Closet) can make a bra without a seam PATENT PENDING, then the pantyhose people can do it too.
My brother has been waiting years for similar technology. As a kid (now) he hated the seams in his socks touching his toes. He would only wear tube socks, then he would pull the toe of the sock up over the top of his foot to his ankle. Then he would quickly slip on his Air Jordans to hold the sock device in place, thus insuring nary a pinky toe touched a seam. I know, it is a miracle I don't walk on all fours.
When Cherry saw me dressed for my high school reunion, she was mesmerized by the shade of my pantyhose - WHICH I WASN'T WEARING. I took this as a compliment, even though I'm sure it just means that my legs are so pale that my own mother doesn't recognize them as a color existing in nature. BUT that also means I don't have to wear pantyhose, right? It feels like a lie. A really bad lie that no one believes because skin doesn't have a weave to it. And then there are the colors that aren't even pretending to be skin, and what's the point of that?
I refused to eat BBQ potato chips for years because I feel chip flavors should recreate baked potato toppings. If you don't put it on a baked potato, why in the world would you want to eat it on a chip? I was soooo wrong. BBQ chips, please accept my humblest apologies, you are DELICIOUS. BUT my hypothesis was flawed from the beginning - reason cannot be applied to snacking. Decorum, I believe, DEMANDS that we apply it to hosiery.
So if anyone asks, I'm not wearing hose because they are a LIE. Or, LIE and say I am wearing hose. They are called LEG CONDOMS, and they are in a new shade called INTEGRITY.

Crossover Bonesnanza!

2007-07-27T16:20:00.000-07:00

OMG. I promise this blog won't become Prancers Investigates Bones (although I would wager that Stossel is a fan), but this is an emergency. Wait for it...
Bones/ Vanished crossover extravaganza! Josh Berman, you have reached near-Stossel status. You are hovering around Chris Hansen status, both in awesomeness and in dramaturgical prowess.
For the few who don't follow day-to-day Bones developments with salivating anticipation, Something has Happened. Vanished creator Josh Berman will play out quashed Vanished plotline on next season's BONES, on which he is now a consulting producer. How this will work, I do not know. Will now-unemployed Vanished actors join the cast as guest actors? Will Bones become the victim of a Sara Collins-like masonic kidnapping? Will Booth clash with intrepid reporter Judy Nash (Rebecca Gayheart), then fall into a grief-motivated sexual romp with same? Will Gayheart's husband Eric Dane do a guest stint as well, giving rise to a new, Rhimesian McClash? Will it be with Agt. Seeley Booth (McSteamy vs. McSeeley?) or with Marcy Collins' illegitimate mason baby (McSteamy vs. McPreemie?) or with A BONE ITSELF (McSteamy vs. McSternumy??!!!!) We cannot know.
I know what you are thinking - was Thomas Jefferson a freemason? Because then Bones - as an employee of the Jeffersonian - would necessarily be dragged into the shameful and debaucherous underground of freemason conspiracy and TREASURE depicted in Vanished. Sure, Bones doesn't SEEM susceptible to the lure of shiny doubloons, but what if, what IF they were from ancient Atlantis? Then they might... HAVE DOLPHINS ON THEM!!!! Dolphins are like kryptonite to Bones because of their connection to her mother. BONES' MOTHER COULD BE FROM ATLANTIS. I dare not think of the implications... that I might, because of the aforeposted Bones/ Cherry connection, be... an Atlantian princess?!
But fear not readers, Thomas Jefferson, though a famous builder who employed masonry; though a visitor of Paris (see: Jefferson in Paris), the site of Lourve reno and Holy Grail resting place; though a polymath like DA VINCI; was NOT a mason. Whew. I am, for now, a humble blogger. Although that might be disputed in next season's...
BONES.

If A Bear Pees on A Raft...

2007-07-23T12:09:00.000-07:00

I've gotten into Man vs. Wild lately, for the same reason I get into many shows, because the lead reminds me of a boy I like. Except for Bones, I got into that because of its extreme quality. Or I guess because I like my mom (see previous post). I got into Harry Potter because Harry reminds me of a person I used to like (a grown person), and I watched the Raiders for a whole season because their coach Jon Gruden looked like a boy who touched my boobies once. Now, I'm into Man vs. Wild because cutie Bear Grylls reminds me of certain headbutter with whom I am recently enamored. This boy is frenetic and Bear-like and bear-like, and this is 1 of 3 shows he watches. Plus you know Bear is a headbutter.
Bear is forced to take off his clothes in the name of survival quite often. To avoid hypothermia, to demonstrate the proper way to exit a peat bog, and for fording glacial rivers, for example. He always leaves his boxers on, but they're usually soaked or otherwise made clingy with peat or death mud or something, and are visually permeable. But, I must emphasize, this is in the name of SURVIVAL. There is no place for a namby-pamby in the WILD, which is what he's VERSUS, people.
Recently, though, I was forced to question Bear's trouser-dropping criteria. He was in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, on a raft he built out of bamboo and hibiscus bark, and was taking periodic swims to lower his core body temperature. On one of these dips he was stung by a jellyfish and - you guessed it - he had to pee on himself. The wound was on his shoulder, so he actually had to pee into a coconut shell and pour it on himself. Now, I get it, it hurts. And these are somewhat dire circumstances. But Bear is ALWAYS in dire circumstances, and he ALWAYS has time to face camera and deliver a lesson about how to get out of them. So it's hard for me to excuse what he did next as a forgivable lapse. Also, although Bear sometimes pretends to be alone and setting up the camera himself, there is clearly a cameraman there at most times. At the very least he knows a squadron of editorial staff are viewing.
So he peed in the coconut, his member blurred out, natch. Then, while describing to the camera how the acid in the pee neutralizes the jellyfish toxins, he pored in on his shoulder. HIS DICK IS STILL OUT. It is out the whole time! No one is learning about toxins, their eyes are instinctively glued to the fleshy blur in his pants. Or OUT of his pants. It's out for a good minute (REAL good, mm hmm), with both the peeing and the explaining.
I'm going to give Bear the benefit of the doubt that he just forgot it was out. Because, it would be startling to me to think that Bear has slowly abandoned decency while versusing the Wild. Isn't the instinct to cover ones parts just as basic as that to survive? One could even argue that to modern man it is MORE important. Otherwise we wouldn't need to reacquaint ourselves with survival instincts via Discovery Channel, and there would be a show called Man vs. Nakedness.
I guess no one is as scandalized as me, because I couldn't find a clip of this on YouTube, but I did find this clip of Bear drinking his own pee. I think you'll see that he's much daintier about exposing his manparts here than the incident I described. Maybe it was shot earlier in the re-savage-ifying of Bear Grylls. Perhaps in the battle of Man vs. Wild, Wild is WINNING after all.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=vIjQHXOJklU

Is Bones My Mom?

2007-07-12T12:12:00.000-07:00

Please take a moment to picture La Stossel contemplating the title of this post. Ahhhhh. I know all 3 of you have heard me make this comparison already, but I've thought for about 30 seconds more about it, and I think that time has increased its efficacy tenfold. Those of you playing along at home can now calculate the velocity of the Bones-Mom Comparison's efficacy with your Picture Pages pen. (Upon further research I've learned this pen was called "Mortimer Ichabod." I hearted the shit out of that pen.)
1. The formal name/ absurdly plebian nickname irony. Bones' actual name is Temperance. Yowsers, can you get a grimmer, more dour name? Why not just go all Bleak House and name her Honoria Dedlock. Or Eeyore. But before you change the channel folks, she's got a pleasing coloquial nickname! Bones! Oh, Bones, now we understand you. You're COMICALLY erudite. Good one.
My mom's name is Carol. Also mildly Dickensian, but fun Dickens not bleak Dickens. And her middle name is Cherry. Wildly inappropriate. It is basically what that jerk David Boreanaz would've dubbed my mother if they had 5th grade science class together.
2. Cold scientific assessment of surroundings. Bones is a scientist and can only approach things using logic. It makes her so mad when Booth tries to use his intuition to solve cases! Cherry has a masters degree in chemistry. She likes to say "bacchanalian revelry" instead of "drinking." Dad likes to make up theories (lies) and try to pass them off as actual knowledge. Boy, does that make mom mad! Bones works at the "Jeffersonian," a greeking of the Smithsonian. Cherry got her masters from the University of Virginia, Richmond. Also known as... Mr. Jefferson's University! Eerie.
3. Clunky thematic and somewhat morbid jewelry. The geniuses at Bones like to convey Bones' eccentricity by constantly loading her up with consistently hideous large jewelry. We are left to imagine she dug these pieces up herself, one of the lesser known perks of being an anthropologist (sign up today, ladies!) or acquired them on some exotic grave dig trip to Swaziland or some shit. Bones also likes to wear jewelry that reminds her of her long murdered, thieving but just kinda misunderstood mother. Her mother looooved dolphins. Seriously, dolphins. Have writers learned nothing more about women since Will Smith gave his stripper fiancee a dolphin engagement ring against Harry Connick's advice in Independence Day?! Come on guys. OWLS are the fad animal of today! Bones was able to recover a dolphin BELT BUCKLE from her mother's body, which she cherishes. I have a theory that Larry McMurtry has dumped that baggage Diana Ossana and has secretly teamed with Donna Marie (dresses like a mermaid who shops at Forever 21) to write Bones. Think about it.
Cherry likes to wear sea-themed jewelry as well. I get it, she's from North Carolina, but she hits the Of The Sea theme a little hard. Some crafty seaman fell on hard times and went to work for the Chico's jewelry design department, and he's been feeding my mom's insatiable appetite for abalone and gold-tipped seashell necklaces for years. No dolphins, thank the lord. Her other jewelry mainstay is a quaint heartshaped pendant. Inside... human remains!! That's right, in an oddly Billy Boblike character twist, my mother likes to keep her sister's ashes inches away from her face at all times.
4. Inability to understand people except on anthropological grounds. Both Cherry and Bones have managed to make it to (or well into) their adult lives without interacting with people on any kind of functioning level. Cherry likes to say she taught herself how to perform small talk, and still clings to the one pop culture catchphrase she gleaned from her children, "duh." Bones says "I don't know what that means" in response to cultural references FOUR times in the pilot. Bones has to ID victims using ethnic stereotypes, while Cherry does it just for fun. She is always ready to point out that Italians are very emotional and African Americans weren't raised to value grammar, that Indians are always late and men love lesbians. Sigh. Oh, Bones.
5. Squinting. Booth calls Bones a "squint" because she looks closely at things all scientist-like. Cherry squints too! She can't see at all. She reads everything lying on her stomach so she can get her face as close as possible to the print. The remote control has a yellow fluff of yarn taped to it so she can see it.
6. Cherry watches Bones! She bought season one on DVD despite the fact that she's never owned a TV show on DVD and can't work the DVD player! She's suspicious that the episodes might be out of order, and can't adjust to the lack of commercials for retrieving Diet Cokes, but so far it's worth it! I may have to get her a new yarn fluff for the DVD remote.
I think the Bones-Mom evidence is irrefutable, but Stossel says you be the judge. Is fact, indeed, exactly as strange as fiction?

Hong Kong Bong, or, Who's the Racist?

2007-06-06T15:50:00.000-07:00

My high school friend Stephany was in town a few weeks ago to interview at Kaiser Permanente as Pediatric Genetics Counselor (yes, this does mean I'm old enough to be in charge of important stuff yet am an assistant), a job that she got and is now moving here. I call Stephany Ster and she calls me Jenndee because well, it was high school and we were drinking a lot of Mountain Dew (then). Ster and I did an exhausting one day tour of LA, which mostly involved taking pictures of shit: Ster at the Hollywood sign, Ster with the donkey from Shrek, me getting molested by Beetlejuice, etc. It culminated in an abortive attempt at a typical Hollywood night on the town, i.e. Good Luck Bar 2 blocks from my apartment.
Good Luck is what I called "fortune cookie Asian," which to Ster might've meant totally authentic. They have drinks named things like "Hong Kong Bong" and "Orange Bang." We met her stepbrother Brett and his friend Jeff there. I was hoping Jeff might be cute until I was told that we would hit it off because although he's engineer, he WANTS to be a director. Umm... yeah. He was large and not cute. A few minutes in, a group of Asians sits down next to us. At this point I start to get really scared that Brett or Jeff or Ster is going to say something totally offensive, unknowingly sanctioned by me and my baffling choice of this racist bar for a night out with the yokels. A bit of background on Brett and Ster and Jeff:
Ster's dad is the star attorney in our hometown, and also a cock. He married this total bitch Jody when we were in middle school and had a bitch kid with one of those veiny gross tumors so we had to be nice to her. A few years ago, Richard left Jody (yay!) for his secretary of 32 years, Agatha (a-GAY-tha). Agatha is Brett's mother. So Ster and Brett have known each other for years and are now weirdly step-siblings. Brett moved to LA when his friend Jeff had a job for him at a company called Neutrogena. Am I painting a picture here? I am out with 3 people who accidently moved to LA without managing to fit in at all or absorb any non-hick culture.
So these Asians sit down. Two of them we never meet and eventually go off to canoodle. The other two are Janet and Channing. Janet works for LATimes.com and Channing works for FoxSports.com - they have a precious dot-com rivalry. We start talking about Heroes, I've blocked out why because I suspect it's because it has an Asian in it. Jeff brags that he predicted Hayden Panettiere's fame and advised Neutrogena to retain her as a spokesmodel. "Save the cheerleader, save the brand," he told them. I swear, he said those words. Meanwhile, he's calling Janet "Ryan" and I have no idea why. Brett asks Channing where he's from, to which Channing replies, "Canada." Brett is baffled and quietly turns back to his Stohli Raspberry and soda, this one a DOUBLE.
Miraculously, Janet ends up winning the race to be a racist by referring to basketball as "a bunch of monkeys playing with a ball," to which we reacted with equal parts horror and relief. She had given Jeff a business card of a guy named Ryan instead of her business card, which Channing was none too pleased by. Then Janet felt sick and ran off to puke up her Orange Bang and was forgiven by all. We threw Brett and Jeff in a cab back to Playa del Rey and I drove us home. It was the most exhausting night of my life. I drank two Hong Kong Bongs, an Orange Bang, and an Amstel, and was still sober from the mental effort of averting certain disaster.

Planet Earth (the show) Wins

2007-05-14T14:18:00.000-07:00

I've decided to concede defeat while still clinging to my rage re: the overwhelmingly large and maddeningly self-congratulatory viewership of Planet Earth. This has come after 2 recent developments:
1. Oprah's Green Episode featured a woman who has begun living more eco-friendly because of Planet Earth. *Trite.* Apparently a polar bear resigned himself to death after being unable to swim the vast miles between the few icebergs that haven't melted due to global warming. Okay, that's sad. It makes me glad I don't watch that shit. I still have beef with nature shows for not letting their cameramen intervene when cute animals are dying. That's just unAmerican.
Said woman (who described herself as going "mint green," gag me) had no other reason for being a guest on the show. She wasn't a grocery bag craft expert or anything. She just came on a TV SHOW to relay a story she saw on ANOTHER TV SHOW. This is the power that Planet Earth wields. I'm surprised Gilmore Girls hasn't referenced it yet. Maybe they realize that Rory's intellectualism would suggest she's seen more than 1 nature program and would therefore be beyond the talons of the Planet Earth mania. I so respect that show more now.
2. Bush is actually introducing legislation to call greenhouse gases "pollutants" and limit their emissions. This unlikely embrace of *science* and reality is tantamount to his creation-addled brain suddenly accepting evolution as one of those fact thingees. It can't be the result of research and study and THINKING, therefore I can only attribute this shift to Planet Earth. You KNOW Bush watches that shit
As the 4th Law of the Infinite dictates, anything that Oprah and Bush agree on must be so, and consequently I will relent. Besides, an unexpected byproduct of both developments is that Planet Earth (the planet) may actually benefit.

Were there Statues at the Night Club?

2007-05-02T17:13:00.000-07:00

This weekend, in an attempt to rally from a boy crisis, I abused some substances and sat down to watch the film version of Twelfth Night. Can anyone (of the 3 that are reading) believe that "twelfth" has only vowel? It basically sounds like phlegmy noise, which I picture having a lot of vowels. Although, look how many consonants "phlegmy" has. And "pbbbbt," the recognized spelling of a phlegmy noise (sometimes referred to as a "raspberry, though not by me) has no vowels. Huh, I must be wrong.
Anyway, Twelfth Night (the film) is terrible. I had forgotten this. I wanted so much for it to be good. Shakespeare set in Croatia (?!) and reimagined in the Victorian era, with not one but TWO romances, and Ben Kingsley singing a cool song about wind and rain! Win, win, win... win! Well, I forgot that in one romance the guy is played by a woman, pretty much sucking the sexual tension out of it for me. Then in the OTHER she's dressed as a man and doesn't look pretty until the end credits, where she doesn't look pretty either but is at least dressed as a woman.
I'm not stupid, I know this is the plot of Twelfth (Pbbbt) Night, but I had forgotten that its purported function as a romantic comedy is rendered useless by it's mustachey woman kissing for anyone but John Stossel. So when, dejected, I turned it off, I was delighted to be met with the philosophically and metaphysically pregnant query, "Were there statues at the night club?"
Now, as I said, there were substances involved. But that phrase just tickled me so. You KNOW what kind of show you must be watching. (It was the Lifetime series "Blood Ties.") You KNOW it's a vampire detective show. Why else would anyone care about the STATUES? Or ANYTHING in a NIGHT CLUB? You know some nefarious demon is afoot turning inappropriately-clad ravers into stone! THAT, my friends, is no giddy Croat romp in romcom's clothing! And isn't "or What You Will" kind of like saying "or whatever"? Twelfth Night or Whatever? Hey, Lifetime isn't fucking around with any "Blood Ties or Whatever." (I know my quotations are totally random at this point.) They want to KNOW were there motherfucking STATUES in the motherfucking NIGHT CLUB. BAM. I'm not going to watch that show, because it sounds like crap. And it IS in fact crap. As sure as there are statues in the night club. Or What You Will.

Pinkberry: TCBY or GHB?

2007-04-26T15:53:00.000-07:00

I had my first Pinkberry last night, and it was indeed delicious. Not a very appropriate title, though. It's not pink, or sweet, or what you imagine Hello Kitty would eat like I thought, although she would certainly approve of the decor. It's basically a foodstuff like cupcakes or lattes that gives people who normally avoid each other like the plague an excuse to congregate. I swear if Matt Damon hadn't preternaturally pointed out that caramels were as logical an excuse to meet as coffee was in Good Will Hunting, there'd be a super popular caramel store called Brownbutter or something at The Grove. And of course Pinkberry already had its requisite writer on a laptop precariously balanced in one of the tiny pastel chairs.
I'm not against convening to consume, oh no. I just think it's funny that it tends to happen in the nastiest places where people hate each other the most. And since that naturally pits New York against LA, I'm glad LA is gaining ammunition. Now maybe I won't have to hear about Tasty Delight and Magnolia Bakery and H&H bagels and whoever's superbest peanut butter. Oh yeah, you have PLACES in NY? Whoa. It must've been so cool to live there. Eat shit.
I'm just bitter because Indiana has no places. Even the crack research team at The View had trouble coming up with a Hoosier menu for their SuperBowl party episode. They pulled out this "Popcorn, Indiana" that I have NEVER heard of. I mean sure, we have corn, ergo we have popcorn. And EVERYONE knows Orville Redenbacher was from Valparaiso, Indiana, but no one I know has ever heard of this mythical Popcorn, Indiana that Rosie showed us how to make at home. It's now the agreed upon gift I will send my boss periodically after I leave him in order to ingratiate myself to him, though: "Just checking in. Hope you enjoy my homestate's most famous treat, Popcorn, Indiana! I made it from a RECIPE, because I can do PROCEDURAL! Hahahaha! Let's get Pinkberry soon. Miss our talks, Jenny."

Headbands: Do they make you Smarter or just Look Smarter?

2007-04-25T14:27:00.000-07:00

Last night I had to return some shoes to Nordstrom. The Nordstrom shoe department makes me very happy but very nervous. This is because all the salesmen are black and I have white guilt about being served by a black man. Is that terrible to say? Is my fledging blog going to get hate mail from its vast readership of one? Liz, are you mad?
Okay, there are two white salesmen, but you can tell they suck. One I always hear playing this aw shucks country mouse / backpacking adventurer Lonely Planet guy. You know he watches Planet Earth, probably just because he thinks Planet is a brand name and he likes their books, afterall. The other is just sad sad sad. He's like short middle-aged player guy who goes for all the 6ft Amazon women with patterned leggings. I bet he was a top seller at the Foot Locker when he decided to go for the gold and leave that sneaker security for the higher eschelon salon shoe.
Actually, Nordstrom has a separate "salon shoe" department. I don't go there. It is not for me. I don't even know what a salon shoe is. I have an image of shoes without soles that one wears daintily on the carpet of a salon. Honestly, I don't even know what a salon is. I've gleaned from the existence of salon.com that you go there and talk. Possibly in dainty soleless shoes?
Anyway, my salesman is DeWitt. He sold me the shoes I returned, so I really wanted to buy a new pair through him so he'd still get the commission. Also he doesn't suck in any immediately perceptible way, which is probably why he was super busy. So I did what any guilty white girl would do: I go buy a headband while I wait.
I've been DYING for a headband. They cost like a million dollars though, and I'm not yet grown up enough to willingly spend money on accessories. I like to let them come into my life accidentally. But I really need a haircut, and Rudy's is suddenly too cool to even answer their phone lately, so I need some sort of hair controlling device STAT. I also have anxiety about acquiring any trend item. I have to buy things before they're annoyingly omnipresent, but well into mid-craze. I am clearly not cool enough to pull off anything pre-craze. Mental Headband Hurdle #3: those stores. The stores that sell the headbands scare the shit out of me. Claire's? ICING? Yikes. Any mall store that can perform a medical procedure on you is unnatural. So I went up to Nordstrom's "Brass Plum" section (Genius title. Again, I have no idea what it means, but it suggests affluence and a pull-a-plum-out-of-a-pie-with-your-thumb kind of irreverence to me). Voila, headband acquisition.
Today I have the distinct feeling that said headband is crushing vital lobes of my brain, even after I cleverly put it around my bathroom wastebasket all night to stretch it out. It was all worth it though when my officemate and until now sole wielder of the headband, Melissa, saw my new "icing." The look of cunning malevolence on her face said, "Soooo, there's a new headband in town." And the look of pained excitement on mine said, "Owwww," and, "Thanks for making these cookies!"

Celebrity Deathmatch: Planet Earth the Show vs. Planet Earth the Planet

2007-04-24T16:47:00.000-07:00

I am really annoyed at the seemingly universal fawning over that Discovery Channel bitch, Planet Earth. It's as if it were the first nature show ever. It's not! It's not nearly the best. It's not nearly the best on right now. It's merely the first to "capture the public's imagination." Read: be talked about so people know it's herd-approved and therefore cool to watch. Not that I have anything against my hooved herd counterparts. And when I *quoted* that passage, I was really just recalling an imaginary annoying announcer who provoked the argument in my head, not an actual news or information source outside my body. But still. I am provoked, albeit internally!
Does Planet Earth (the show) have giant iguanas diving into trecherous surf, swimming to the bottom to graze on sea greens, then being harassed by sea lions before leaping back to the cliffs before their sun-dependent internal temperature plummets and they die cold and alone? Noooooo. That's National Geographic's Galapagos series, also in HD. Does Planet Earth (the show) tell you how each of Yosemite's giant sequoias (everything's giant on NGC) sucks a TON of water up 300 feet EVERY DAY for 3000 years or more? Nooooo, that's National Geographic's Secret Yosemite. And there's no clever-clever voiceover from Dana Barrett: "There's nothing sadder than when your best isn't good enough." Really? There's nothing about, I don't know, SCIENCE you want to say here? Like how things are going on Planet Earth (the planet)? But no, the saddest thing in nature is this six-plumed bird of paradise not getting laid. He's got six appendages that have no earthly (the planet) use except to attract attention! If he were as hot as TJ Thyne from TV's Bones he still wouldn't get laid! Let him die, Sigourney. Show us something giant already.

Dots: Are they the next thing in News?

2007-04-23T15:33:00.000-07:00

I meant to make this blog's appearance coincide with it's theme, i.e. hard-hitting investigative news / hoofy woodland prancy things, but in the end I went with green and pretty instead. Although I think that with some imaginings, the dots suggest the blee-bleep-bleep of the news ticker as important Facts make their way to John Stossel for conversion into pointless meandering folkisms. I can almost see Woodward and Bernstein clackity-clacking away in the background. Barely discernible on their ties are... DOTS.
Why am I now singing "Tuppence" from Mary Poppins? Perhaps because its staccato rhythm reminds me of the dots. Or perhaps like Mr. Dawes my creepy enthusiasm is scaring the children. You see the dots. You can put them in the bank OR feed them to the birds. It's none of my affair.