Stuff That Keeps Me Busy

Seeing: There Will Be Blood. There was. I went into this movie preemptively taking 2 Advil. I heard that it was bleak and unforgiving, and P.T. Anderson and I have an interesting history. Or not. I loved 9/10 of Boogie Nights, thought Magnolia was pretentious and over the top (saved by the gorgeous Aimee Mann music) and Punch Drunk Love made me homicidally angry. This movie was an original auteur vision, but I really don't think it's the new Citizen Kane or modern masterpiece like many critics are rapturously claiming. Daniel Day Lewis acts with a capital A, and every once in a while the whole movie veered into Saturday Night Live skit territory. After I saw the film, I didn't really feel like talking; I just wanted to wrap myself up in a blanket, shower and listen to upbeat music. But overall, it's a gorgeously scored, often powerful, perfectly fine movie that I never, ever want to see again. Oh, I can't believe I am saying this, but the scene in the bowling alley when people scream about milkshakes still leaves me profoundly confused.

Reading: Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman by Haruki Murakami. This is a collection of Murakami's best short stories from throughout the past couple decades. I thought that this would be a book that I would pick up once in a while and be able to read other things after a couple of selections, but it's become completely addictive. His ability to transform quotidian detail into the extraordinary and really make you think has gotten me hooked. It's the most relaxing book I have read in quite a while. Each selection is a character study that centers on a momentary revelation, and while I normally prefer more plot-driven fiction, these stories fly by with ease. In the introduction, the author perfectly sums up how the book feels: "If writing novels is like planting a forest, then writing short stories is more like planting a garden."

Eating: Fork, 306 market Street, Philadelphia, PA. I know I am not Craig Laban, but I had a lovely dining experience there this weekend. I have a hilarious story about dining there forthcoming in which my friends and I meet the owner of the establishment, but until then I will tell you that the Hanger Steak with Chimmichurri with the Yucca Frites was delicious, if slightly overdone. I loved EJ's Porkchop with some sort of sweet sauce and honey-glazed sweet potatoes even better (and so did he). The tastes I managed to steal from JB of his 1/2 Duck Two Ways and CC's Roasted Free Range Chicken were great, as well. The drinks? Not so much. I would stick with wine over mixed drinks. The best thing I had all night there was a mix of the chef's nightly tapas: baby mozzarella with roasted peppers, Spanish meatballs and the best thing, braised pork belly with hoisin sauce. Extra bonus points are awarded for the cute waitress/Rashida Jones lookalike who sang Dan Fogleberg songs with us.

Hating: The Anti-Fois Gras protesters in Philadelphia. Please let me walk past Susannah Foo's without having to see your pictures of goose fetus or whatever it is that's supposed to make me support your cause. It's gross; it makes me look away. It makes me want to go eat more meat to perpetuate balance in the world. Also, your self-righteous grandstanding would gain probably gain a little more legitimacy in my eyes if you weren't wearing leather jackets while protesting. Even annoying people should strive for consistency.

Have Your Cake And Eat Me, Too.

I may actually be a professional wedding guest at this point. Every couple weeks, it seems, I am invited to participate in or attend a ceremony in which I am legally banned from participating. No matter how sane, cool or calm the bride is on the day of the wedding, she no doubt has experienced a couple moments of megalomania and psychosis that make them so special to be around weeks before the big day. Did you know that their wedding is the most important day of your life, too? You will.

Don't get me wrong. I love my married friends, and I respect the institution of marriage for the most part. But I would respect everyone and everything that had anything to do with marriage if they all were like this woman.

How awesome/horrifying is this? Let's count the ways together:

1. She's honest. Other women try to conceal just how insane they are on their own wedding days. But this cake is the perfect metaphor for the crazy bitch bridezilla. Just how much is this day all about her? Ask her and she'll tell you to eat her. Literally.

2. This cake has been a dream of hers for years. Yes, she has had a lifelong dream to have a lifesize wedding cake. CNN says that she sadly never had her other dream come true--receiving a life-size doll in her likeness. That shit is straight up porny.) Some girls dream of horse-drawn carriages and silk canopies. This woman just wanted dessert that looked like her that she could eat for a week. Dream big, y'all!

3. Is there a part of the wedding that guests care about less than the cake? Her guests would have been better served if she hired an ice sculptor to fashion a frozen likeness of her wherein the bartender would pour martini ingredients in her mouth, and out of her special place would flow delicious potent potables. I need to get this idea trademarked a.s.a.p.

4. Her husband gets to hack into her cake likeness with a knife now, acting out all of his frustrations from the days leading up to the nuptuals. This may possibly save her from an O.J.-like tragedy years down the road.

5. Her dress looks like Vera Bradley threw up all over her in the receiving line.

6. Guarantee: this cake idea or my ice flume idea (see #3) will most definitely be used in a future episode of My Super Sweet 16.

7. The cake looks a bit like VH1's New York, if New York ever wore that much fabric at one time.

8. No matter what flavor cake is inside (please let it be red velvet!), it's just downright creepy.

I only wish that more women would take a moment to think about themselves in the months leading up to their weddings, like Chidi Ogbuta. Self-obsession has never been so delicious.