Friday Five: Fashion Edition

I went to the mall last week and my visit inspired this week's Friday Five post. I'm also cranky. Be forewarned...


OK, retailers are suffering. This is apparent. Everyone blames the recession for keeping inventory low and people away, but maybe the hideous trends being shoved down our throats can shoulder some of the blame, no? I like fashion as much as the next gal, but really designers, if you want to start selling again, you really need to stop making...

1. Skinny jeans. No one looks good in them unless they wear a tunic or abbreviated muu-muu to cover up that puffy little muffin top/belly roll/spare tire. This ensemble makes most people look like an apple on a stick. Not flattering. (The only thing that's even possibly worse is a pair of acid washed jeans that have been pre-shredded. If someone had to chemically wear out your jeans in some factory in China then you are indeed a loo-whooo-ser.)

2. Empire waist shirts/dresses with waaaay too much fabric. I don't need to be reminded of what I looked like when nine months along. Thank you, but no.

3. Open-toe boots. Whaaa???

4. See through anything that isn't underwear. Because no matter how beautiful you are, you'll still end up looking like this.

5. Neon if you are above the age of thirteen. Even for the young, headbands made of colors not found in nature are kind of a bad idea. Hopefully this trend will disappear as quickly as it did in the 80s, or everyone is going to look like they just stepped off a Wham! video.

Alright I'm done complaining, but you are free to bitch all you want in your comment box!

Over and Over

I know a lot of English major-y people who reread Hamlet every few years, or Dante's Inferno, or something equally as high-falutin'. They generally do this while sitting in a very public section of Borders, or in Starbucks, as, let's face it, if you're going to work your way through Dante, you want other people to acknowledge it, right?

The stuff I reread is not so highbrow. Some books just call to me, year after year, and I never tire of them. Is it the story? The voice? Do I recognize a little piece of myself in those pages? I don't know. What I do know is these books have become part of how I define myself. Here's a partial list:

On the Road by Jack Kerouac
Shining Through by Susan Isaacs
The World According to Garp by John Irving
Boys and Girls Together by William Goldman
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

And in YA: Forever by Judy Blume, Sloppy Firsts by Meg McCafferty, Just Listen by Sarah Dessen, and I've already read Perfect Chemistry by Simone Elkeles twice, so I think it makes the list!

What about you guys? Have any go-to books?

Oscar Night!!!

Every year I compete in some super cool Oscar pools (yep-for CASH!) and I usually rock at predicting the winners. I'm also a total braggart about it so my husband gave me a super hard time last year when I went down in flames. I think I got nearly everything wrong. This happens when I don't see the movies and vote based on instinct and what I read in Entertainment Weekly.

Well, this year I haven't seen any of the Best Pic noms except for UP or any of the performances except Meryl Streep's in Julie/Julia. So, these are my picks and my crappy reasons for choosing them. If they happen to coincide with what everyone else is predicting, well, that's just happenstance. Here goes:

Best Picture (Who came up with listing ten? Does this mean we have to suffer through ten stupid montages this year?)

--Avatar (The blue people freak me out and I HATE James Cameron, so no.)

--The Blind Side (I like Sandy--everybody calls her that, right?--but this movie just doesn't feel big enough for a Best Pic nod.)

--District 9 (What is this? Seriously, I never heard of it.)

--An Education (I love Britain in the sixties, but again, this seems like a small film.)

--The Hurt Locker (Kathryn Bigelow has the best arms and the sense to divorce James Cameron. And that guy Jeremy Whatshisname is hot. This one gets my vote!)

--Inglorious Basterds (Tarantino/Pitt, etc. are so full of themselves. Turns me off. Ugh.)

--Precious: based on the...oh, forget it. (This was my second choice, pretty much because the trailer made me cry.)

--A Serious Man (This is the Coen brothers, right? They hate the Oscars--why give them one?)

--UP (Bawled during the first ten minutes, but I have a thing against giving an animated film the Oscar for this category. There already is a Best Animated Film so it can win that one.)

--Up in the Air (Clooney looks too smug for his own good. Jason Reitman will probably win for his screenplay. That's enough.)


Best Actor:

--Jeff Bridges (YES! He is winning for everything he's ever done. My favorite? The Fabulous Baker Boys)

--George Clooney (Nope. It's the smug factor.)

--Colin Firth (Ooh, la-la, how I love Colin. But I still think it belongs to Jeff.)

--Morgan Freeman (He's been lauded enough, don't you think?)

--Jeremy Renner (Yep, he's a hot one. But too new to the Academy. The nomination is honor enough, yada, yada, yada.)


Actress:

--Sandra Bullock (She's my choice, but she shouldn't win for this. She was brilliant in Crash, though it was a small role. Again, this is a career win, and her career deserves it.)

--Helen Mirren (She's won too much already.)

--Carey Mulligan (I'm sure she's great, but like Jeremy "Hottie" Renner, she's too new.

--Gabourey Sidibe (What a beautifully expressive face. I really want to see this film but I'm a little scared to watch it around people. I've run into quite a few girls like Precious in my classroom and Gabourey gets that "I hurt so deep down" look perfectly. But, I feel like if someone wins an Oscar before they are established, it does them more harm than good. I hope we see her nominated again someday.)

--Meryl Streep (Great impersonation of Julia. It could have been totally Dan Ackroyd campy but she pulled it off. Oscar worthy, though? Um?)

The rest: Supporting Actor: That guy everyone is talking about from Inglorious Basterds. He does creepy really well. Supporting actress: Mo'Nique (There's a forcefulness about her). Screenplay: Up in the Air (adapted) and The Hurt Locker (original). And that song from Crazy Heart is awesome and should win (The Weary Kind.)

So, do you guys agree or do you think I'm going down this year too?

Milestones

Today my oldest son turns ten years old. Last night the family said goodbye to the birthday boy's nine-year-old self and this morning we said hello to a ten-year-old (sniff!). I love you, baby (Yeah, you'll always be my baby!). The next ten years should be interesting...let's enjoy the adventure!

Today is also my best friend Jean's birthday. She's totally OK with the aging thing, so she won't mind that I tell you it's her 4oth. Yep. A big one. This year is also the 26th anniversary of our friendship. We became friends at our high school freshman orientation (!) and have remained close ever since.

Since I write about people in high school, Jean is always in my thoughts as I sit at my computer. We were so different. I had a thing for black eyeliner, army jackets and threadbare sweaters found at the Salvation Army. Jean liked Esprit, Coach purses, and Ralph Lauren. She liked the jocks; I liked the guys who wrote bad poetry and never washed their hair. She's five (!) inches taller than me and can actually can stand to listen to country music (barf).

But she could always make me laugh harder than anyone else. She never teased me when I added Cherry Coke to my beer because I didn't like the taste. She took me cruising in her little Dodge Omni, past the houses of the boys I liked. She listened and never judged and always looked out for my best interests.

Our friendship has lasted through college and marriage and children and more. She's seen me through heartache and joy, and I hope I've done the same for her. We've sustained our friendship because we value it, and realize how rare it is to find someone you connect with so well in this great big life.

So happy birthday, Jean! This one's for you.

(OK, that is a condom bouquet on my head. It was my bachelorette party!)

Friday Five

Very random this week:


1. Common Sense Media: OK, this topic has been kind of tweeted/blogged to death this week, but I just wanted to add my two cents. As a parent, I understand how difficult it is to filter through all the television shows/books/movies kids might be interested in. Organizations like CSM attempt to highlight the potentially objectionable, to save parents some time and uncomfortable questions. I understand the motivation; however, I think the process dehumanizes both the art and our understanding of art. Plucking odd moments from a story and attaching a label to them (lying, alcohol use, sexuality, consumerism) does nothing to communicate the worth of a story, or its potential impact on a child. If my mom saw the CSM label for "Are You There God, It's Me, Margaret," a book that made me sigh with relief that maybe I was normal, I wouldn't have been allowed to read it (emerging sexuality, Playboy references, etc.). That would've been a travesty.

2. Dandelion Greens: I know how good dandelion greens are for me. In fact, I've known for a long time, but until a few weeks ago I never tried them. What I couldn't get past was the image of my 86-year-old neighbor obsessively spraying every budding dandelion with the gleeful intensity of Chemical Ali. He hates them, and is none too happy with me when I let some pop out of the ground and turn to seed so my kids can blow on them, spreading the love. Last spring I considered eating the ones found on my lawn, but then my OCD took over and I imagined all the pesticides from my neighbor's lawn seeping into mine during the heavy spring rains. Anyhow, I was at Whole Foods about a month ago, found myself in front of the dandelion greens and, feeling brave, bought two kinds, regular and red. I love them so much I'm adding them to every recipe I can. So good!

3. Rewards: I believe in rewarding myself after completing a writing project. The rewards need not be material, but hey, they usually are. I'm not quite done with my revision yet (I'm sure my crazy smart agent will have even more ideas for making it better), but when I am, I'm buying myself this.

4. Olympics: Continuously awed. Amazingly proud. Totally inspired.

5. Recycling: This week our family did not have one bag of regular garbage to throw out come garbage day. Everything was recycled/composted, etc. Yay, us!

Stepped on a Pop Tart

For most of my adult life, I thought the line in Jimmy Buffet's song Margaritaville, I blew out my flip flop, stepped on a pop top, was actually ...stepped on a Pop Tart. Someone kindly pointed it out to me while I energetically sang along at a concert (OK, maybe not so kindly. It was more like, you dork!). I also thought that in U2's Where the Streets Have No Name, our love turns to rust, was actually our love tends to rush. I went to see them when they toured for the Joshua Tree, like, seven times but didn't discover my mistake until last year. A week ago, while listening to the radio on my way to work, Carol King's song Jasmine came on. I like to sing in the car. Loudly. I cranked it up and realized, OMG, she's singing Jazz Man. This song is clearly about a jazz musician, but I probably warped the other lyrics because I reaaaally like the smell of jasmine. Go ahead, say it...dork.

I thought maybe my hearing was bad. But then I realized, I heard what I felt was right. And now, even though I know the proper lyrics, it takes everything I have to hear them the right way.

For the past few weeks I've been working on a tough revision project. My friend Alexa called it a reimagining, which is probably more accurate. I just stared at my original draft on Day 1, thinking, how in the heck am I going to do this? Then I realized I shouldn't be looking at my earlier draft at all. In my head it was a finished product, and, like with the song lyrics, it was excruciatingly hard to train my brain to hear it differently. I opened a new doc and typed Chapter 1.

It made a world of difference.

So, to all my writer friends out there tackling revision projects: my thoughts are with you. Just don't ask me about the lyrics to Poker Face (You don't want to know what I thought...)

The Beatles on Query Letters

OK, I don't claim to be an expert at writing query letters. But I did do pretty well with mine, so all those hours spent combing the Internet for examples must have paid off. I could have saved myself a lot of time, though, if I'd just listened to one of my favorite songs, Paperback Writer. Turns out Paul McCartney knew a heck of a lot about what not to do when querying agents. Check it out (and my apologies if someone has done this before):



Paperback Writer

Dear Sir or Madam, Will you read my book? (Too general a salutation--personalize!)

It took me years to write, will you take a look? (Not relevant.)

Based on a novel by a man named Lear (This makes the book sound derivative.)

And I need a job, so I want to be a paperback writer, (Desperation is never attractive)

Paperback writer.



It's a dirty story of a dirty man, (Repetition=poor vocabulary)

And his clinging wife doesn't understand (Vague. Why doesn't she understand? We need plot! What is the basic conflict?)

His son is working for the Daily Mail, (A laundry list of characters. Again, what happens?)

It's a steady job, but he wants to be a paperback writer, (Lack of originality.)

Paperback writer.



It's a thousand pages, give or take a few, (Word count, not pages!)

I'll be writing more in a week or two. (Only query one work at a time.)

I can make it longer if you like the style, (Only query completed works.)

I can change it round, and I want to be a paperback writer, (Find a critique group. Revise. Then Send.)

Paperback writer.



If you really like it you can have the rights (Copyrighting your material = amateur)

It could make a million for you overnight (No room for bragging in a query.)

If you must return it, you can send it here, (Agents need full contact info!)

But I need a break, and I want to be a paperback writer (Let the book speak for itself.)

Paperback writer.



Paperback writer--paperback writer. (Again, repetition=bad.)





So there you have it--the Fab Four on what not to do when writing queries!