ANTM Cycle 16: PORN

Well, so I just got home from the incredibly awesome Elephant 6 Holiday Tour, which was gold and crystal and warm worn t-shirts, and ended on this even more amazing moment, and the whole thing was just pure and wonderful and beautiful. Scott Spillane has the best voice of all voices, and I got to hear Glue live, during which I mostly just closed my eyes and stood in the middle of the room. Did you know you can be completely alone when you close your eyes? There was a snowball thrown at the moon, and a parade of horns, Tara danced a bunch in her cute stripey sweater, and I said hi to lots of people and there were lots of hugs. David brought the French Nouveau looking beauty from La Petit with him, and Lauren bought me an Elf Power LP which I don't have a turntable for but the next boy I date will own a turntable for sure, and it was magical. Except for the part where my sister and Jere made out with the same girl at different times. We are going to gloss over that story. Everyone I know is a slut. Carrie freaked me out by telling me I had not one but actually two hickeys on my neck (it wasn't true). Some girl he made out with stole Jere's phone.

Driving home in a sequin dress causes all these little reflections from the street lights, and they bounce into your eyes, and make you think there are cops behind you the whole ride home. When I started the stretch down Lorain towards my street, there were multiple lonely boys in green, stumbling home alone from the bars at Kamm's. Way to be survivors boys.

So a wonderful night, and I've forgotten that tomorrow's Friday already, and as I sit here typing this the wind is picking up outside and all my windows are open to let in the sounds.

Which is why I almost feel bad giving you the link to this, the live blog from this week's ANTM.

Sarah: why is Miss Jay dressed like Dorothy Parker?


You should probably just listen to this song a few dozen times instead.

What the hell am I going to do now?

So here is my own personal post-modern contemporary womanly dilemma...

All of my TV is ending.

Not really true. TV has always, and will always exist. TV is like a mythical smoke monster that came out of a giant glowing island vagina, and can never die, or leave, or have sex with the crazy blonde girl he's been keeping alive for no apparent reason.

Sigh.

Specifically, America's Next Top Model is over, which was my favorite writing exercise every week. Now I'm going to have to find some other mid-week topic that involves little to no thought. But nothing is going to replace Tyra's special brand of fantasy crazy. Luckily, I will soon have the first novel in her three book deal, MODELLAND, to hold me over till the next Cycle starts. I will totally be liveblogging that shit. I mean, this is from her website guys:

"The story happens in a make-believe place called Modelland - every girl in the world wants to go there because it’s where “Intoxibellas” are trained. Intoxibellas are drop-dead beautiful, kick-butt fierce and, yeah, maybe they have some powers too... The story follows a teen girl and her friends who find themselves magically transported to Modelland, even though they’re really not supposed to be there. (Okay, now, that’s ALL I’m saying!) "

There's nothing more that needs to be said, Tyra.

That picture above reminds me of a lot of the reasons I love ANTM so much. The dirty mattress. The open door. The zebra stripe pattern and random bright pink paintball splatter. And the radioactive slime. I think "Intoxibellas" must be birthed here from a Queen, and then gain their special powers from the ooze before they are mentored into fierceness by a giant talking rat.

So no more models for a while. I guess I could go back to liveblogging Top Chef, which starts in June, but that's never as much fun, because I generally actually care who wins that show. And I feel bad making fun of people with so much more talent than me. Also there is less opportunity to mention dragons and androids.

Lost is over on Sunday, which is scaring me, because I don't think there is any way for them to resolve this satisfactorily, unless someone ascends into space all Mother Mary style, and unless that someone is Desmond, and also he absorbs all the electro magnetic mojo of the island and then blows up, scattering it across the universe creating thousands more islands where everyone can go live and be cured of cancer and have Dharma smoothies.

America: The History of Us just covered the industrial revolution, so that's probably got only what? 2 episodes left? I really hope the last episode is the one where Bank of America reveals it's super secret Grand Plan for America. I hope that plan involves algae food factories and Group Think.

I'm always so optimistic when it comes to programming.

I would seriously contemplate regular Mad Men parties, but I don't have the funds to be investing in those duds, and I am terrible at cleaning my house because I have a job and a social life, so take that 1970s!

This blog is going to get SO boring.

Why My Mother Doesn't Like Mad Men

It seems appropriate to me that the Mad Men premiere should take place the weekend of the Assumption of Mary, a celebration of motherhood. For those of you not raised on unleaven bread and communally spit-in grape juice, that's when Mary, instead of dying, was raised bodily into heaven. Technically making her luckier than Jesus, who had to shed his mortal coil first.

What's the connection, you say? Well, if you watch the show (which you should, tonight, 10pm, AMC) you're thinking I'm going to draw some Betty Draper metaphor here. You're wrong. In many ways, fuck Betty Draper. I'm a Peggy Olson girl. Just dressing impeccably and having nervous breakdowns does not make me a fan, even though January Jones is the closest thing to Grace Kelly I've ever seen alive. She's a living Barbie doll.

The connection here between Mary Mother of God and the best drama on television at the moment is my own blessed mother. A devout Catholic, a humanitarian, a nifty nurse, adopter of strays, and a huge TV addict. She doesn't have cable, normally, but I thought for sure if I brought over a DVD, she would get into this show. After all, period costumes? Witty dialogue? Realistic depictions of social issues? So my sister and I went to the video store last Thanksgiving, and railroaded my brother into getting the first season of Mad Men as our family activity for the day.

My mother was not having it. She wouldn't even watch it. According to her, it reminded her too much of when she was a secretary in the 60s; the smoking, the drinking, racism, uncomfortable bras, and rampant sexual harassment. She found nothing entertaining in the nostalgia of a time period that represented everything that the 70s, and she, had rebelled against.

The interesting part about this is that my mother's attitude towards this show seems to be the minority. Over half of the audience from last season seemed to be over 50, at least according to this. Of course, that could be because nobody my age watches tv anymore, we all watch it online or wait to get it through Netflix. It certainly seems to be true that all the people I know who watch it are girls hovering around 30 who spend too much money at vintage stores. But that might just be all the people I know anyway. It's been widely proclaimed to be a feminine show, and 2/3rd of the writers for the show are women. It's a period soap opera. Girlfriends get raped. Office assistants have abortions. Housewives have neurological breakdowns. Every single husband or boyfriend cheats.

Maybe the disconnect here is that people would rather forget that the world used to be this blatantly bad, and so they can watch because they don't put themselves in that dirtiness. All these problems still exist, but we've hidden them under a guise of trying to be politically correct, and making an effort to see ourselves as evolved. The fact that the show also gives us beautiful dresses and glamour, that the characters themselves are oblivious to their societal ugliness, it allows us to write off these moments as soap opera rather than facing the fact that all this crap really happened to, and was perpetuated by, people we still know. We react in the same way that the characters react to it, incorporating it, accepting it, but not getting angry about it. Yet. I have high hopes for the story arc.

Mad Men's depiction of the lives of our mothers should act as a magnifying lens to anti-feminist sentiment, classism, and racism in our own lives. It should point out to us how much they fought against to make our lives better, and how we shouldn't allow the same shit to happen today. Every character's storyline points out another aspect of America's problems and America's ugliness. What I enjoy most about the show is how it deflates the generalized view of the 60s that has become acceptable history. My mother and father lived through the 50s and 60s, and understand the details. But for my generation, the details are lost in stereotypes of flower children and McCarthy monsters. We dehumanize, romanticize, and forget. I wonder if this has happened to members of my parents' generation - they choose to forget and accept watching from a distance, not directly associating themselves with any of it. Or is the demographic audience age so high because they do remember?

Of course, it is a show about an advertising agency, not Everytown USA. And it's an entertaining show. But I understand why my mother doesn't like it. Sometimes you remember all too well, and you just don't want to.