I have to say I do spend quite a bit of time wondering who would go on my page 14.

While at first glance  this post may possess the tropes of your run-of-the-mill film review, I beg you to look again.  I do not intend to list the merits (many) and pitfalls (few) of Whedon’s creation,  rather, I intend to focus almost entirely on the newest entry on my ‘Potential Future Husbands’ list: one Tom Hiddleston.  Hiddleston, you say, who is this Hiddleston?  Well, ladies and gentlemen, I introduce to you the Cambridge educated Etonian, with a dashing smile and floppy hair who brought to life the sardonic villain of this cinematic wonder.

That’s right.  I fancy Loki.  Yes, Loki, the bady with the long hair and the silly hat.  But before you juge me, do not think I have dismissed all the other fine specimens of SASsy manliness exhibited so kindly by Mr Whedon’s production.  The Avengers provided a veritable Smörgåsbord of abulous man candy.  From gracious butt shots of Chris Evans’s Captain America to the nearly-nude Mark Ruffalo, with a smattering of scarily-massive Australian biceps, and sculpted archer’s shoulders in between, The Avengers did not scrimp on providing the female audience members with an aesthetically pleasing male cast.  Indeed, even though there were plenty of moments focused on Scarlet Johanson’s very lovely neoprene clad rear, this was by no mesans a film littered with female beauties.  On the contrary, this was a film overflowing with testosterone, biceps, and explosions.  What more could a girl wish for?  And while I do have an affinity for the blue eyed boy next door, with a side parting and a smile that is Captain America (his rippling abs, and bulging chest might have something to do with that), this time it was the villan that caught my eye.

As with any science fiction, fantasy, or action film a great deal hinges upon the quality of the villain; both in inception and performance.  As Loki, Hiddleston transforms what could be an otherwise insipid and not too believable nemesis for the Avengers into an entirely convincing and beautifully malicious cinematic bad boy.  At it’s most basic level, Hiddlston’s performance outshines his brotherly counterpart in every way that is unrelated to physical bulk.  I hate to say it, but as beautiful as Chris Hemsworth is, his acting chops are no match for this RADA graduate.  Hiddleston, for me, made this film.  His verbal sparring with Robert Downy Jr’s Tony Stark was one of the highlights; so much sarcastic wit in one room was almost too much for me to take.  Indeed, this trickster God left little to be desired in terms of quick-witted responses and teasing hints at his nefarious plans to rule the world.  Delivery of such lines as ‘kneel before me’ and ‘the bright lure of freedom diminishes your life’s joy in a mad scramble for power’ is not an easy task if one wants to be taken seriously, especially given the fancy head gear.  Indeed, the potential for Hiddleton to look like a bit of a tit was fairly massive.  Maybe it is something to do with the skin-tight costumes, team-work in the face adversity, and comic book innocence of it all, that endows The Avengers with a pretty high naff factor.  Let’s face it, this could easily have followed in the footsteps of failed comic book adaptations and been one of the worst films ever made (Cat Woman, anyone?).  Whedon, however, delivers a film that is not only enjoyable, but also pretty slick.  In large part, I feel, to the quality of his villain

Hiddleston is a pleasure to watch as the God gone bad who wants to free humanity from their freedom.  Again, the naff-risk factor is pretty high here, but The Avengers makes this if not a plausible, at least a genuinely exciting bid to take over the world.  Loki is really just an angry younger brother who got in with the wrong crowd and let things get out of hand.  Cosmic power and cry for help, never mix all that well.  But naff-potential aside, Loki is a genuinely devious bad guy.  His desire to use the Tesseract, a cosmic energy source of unknown potential a.k.a. the biggest, badest Duracell in existence, to enslave humanity and subjugate earth is pretty dastardly .  That Tom Hiddleston manages to be both witty and scary while sporting a green cape and what amount to shiny gold antlers is a feat in itself.  But to achieve both of these things and still be dashingly sexy in the shadow of the testosterone fuelled bulk of Chris Hemsworth and Chris Evans is another thing entirely.  Sex appeal, it would seem, is not just about biceps.  Give me a good voice, a mastery of vocabulary, and a perfectly timed jibe over chunk of man-bulk any day.

I feel that my love for Hiddlseton can only be demonstrated through a series of visual aids, or what my fellow mountain resident refers to as the ’21st century hieroglyph ’.  I dare you to look at these and not fall in love…

Silly Hats aside, Tom Hiddleston may have just topped my list.

The end of an era … kinda.

This year has been, without a doubt, one of my most productive years in all of the many, many years I have lived (as my birthday nears and I come closer to adding another number to said years, I felt the need to add another “many” here).  I’ve just finished four solid months of writing a poem or a something a day, and I’m kind of shocked to be able to say that I actually, really, truly and honestly never skipped a day.  I’m even more shocked to be able to say that I actually, really, truly and honestly sometimes wrote more than one poem a day — sometimes up to four?!  It’s as if some kind of super-productive zombie interested in eating ink and paper instead of brains took possession of my body for four months.*  A lot of it also had to do with the support of my colleagues and friends and fellow writers, both my fellow Grind members and the Georgia Southern folks, especially those who wrote along with me through NaPoWriMo, and I can’t even express how grateful I am to all of them.

I guess, in a lot of ways, it feels like it’s not entirely my accomplishment: it just happened, and kept happening because the people around me are amazing and, well, I’m really stubborn.  However, even if it doesn’t feel like my accomplishment, it’s still my writing — and I’m the one who has to take the next step (or, rather, the next series of steps, which will probably lead me to more steps).

The question I’m facing now is this: what happens now?  It seems like a simple question but it’s really one of the most difficult ones with which I’ve ever been faced: what does happen now that the zombie is gone and I’m just plain old Emma, sitting here and staring at pages and typescript that’s starting to not even look like words?  Now that the manic pace of production has slowed, what’s next in the process?

Really and truly and actually and honestly, though, I think perhaps the answer might be simpler than I thought.  I think perhaps the answer is just this: the process.  What’s left is what’s left.  What’s next is what I do with it.

First, of course, comes the processing part of the process: putting together the puzzle of what I’ve produced and what needs to be further processed.  I thought I’d share my results on the blog through a series of stats and averages, so here goes it:

Even cats with literary namesakes are apparently not fans of literature, when it really comes down to it, and when they really want their owners to stop reading and/or writing to fetch them some treats.

The Grind Daily Writing Series Stats and Facts

Player: Emma Bolden

Poems Drafted: 128

Essays Drafted: 3

Various and Sundry Bits and Bobs and Pieces of Prose (Typed): 9

Ill-Advised Trips to the Gas Station to Purchase Chocolate, Which Was Nearly Always Kind of Old and Nasty: 9

Preferred Beverage: Diet Coke

Average Hours It Took Me To Get To Sleep Because I Drank Too Much of My Preferred Beverage and/or Was Thinking About Poems and Bits and Bobs and Pieces of Prose: 2

Average Number of Nightly Feline Arias Performed by Gertrude Stein in Protest Over the Fact that I Either Was Not Asleep or Had Just Moments Before Fallen Asleep: 3

Average Cups of Coffee Consumed Every Morning: 3.75

Poetry Manuscripts Drafted: 2

Essay Collection Drafts Completed: 1

CILANTRO! Every year, you ruin me with your will to DIE.

Average Hours a Day Spent Shopping for Shoes on the Interwebs Rather Than Writing Poems: 0.75

Cartons of Ben and Jerry’s Consumed: 2 (Red Velvet Cake and New York Super Fudge Chunk)

Memoirs Outlined and Begun: 1

Number of Abandoned Projects Returned To: 2

Average Number of Times I Said “Why in the Name of Everything Holy or Unholy Ever Am I Writing About Jellyfish All the Time I Mean Really?” Out Loud and Confused My Cats: 3.8 a day

Number of Times Alice B. Toklas Accidentally Trapped Herself in the Closet, Bathroom, and/or Screened-In Porch: 12

Number of Times I Decided to Write Found Poems to Justify My Watching Reality Television Programs: 4 a week

Print-outs of the work I’ve typed, shoe-shopping, Del-Rey-listening.

Chapbooks Drafted: 1

Container Garden Plants Planted: 16

Container Garden Plants Surviving Even After I Forgot to Water Them: 15

Preferred Beers: Innis and Gunn (Original) or Shock Top (Raspberry Wheat)

Preferred Wine: Pink Moscato from the Rite-Aide**

Preferred Albums to Play Over and Over Until I Think My Neighbors Were About to Call the Police and Report Me for Being Kind of Creepy: Born to Die, Lana Del Rey; The Hunger Games: Songs from District 12 and Beyond; The Execution of All Things, Rilo Kiley; Blackout, Britney Spears***; Birdy, Birdy; Elton John, Elton John; Les Miserables: Complete Symphonic Recording; Collected Works, Simon and Garfunkel; Chess in Concert starring my future husband Josh Groban.

Average Number of Times A Week I Took the Nonsensically Long Way Home in Order to Sing Along to One or More of the Aforementioned Albums as Loudly as I Could So My Neighbors Wouldn’t Make the Decision to Finally Call the Cops on Me: 1.74

Bizarre Drawings Made to Serve as Notes for Poems: 36

Volcano notes. Crazy, crazy volcano notes.

Number of Days Since the Grind/NaPoWriMo I’ve Worked on My Writing and/or Wrote Something New Despite the Fact I No

Longer Have To: 5. In other words, every single one.

Surety that I Need a Daily Writing Routine After All So Um Oops: Infinity.  Plus one.

*For a far better and far, far more lucid description of what The Grind is like, please do travel to my good man Ross White’s blog for his entries about how it started and why in the name of God we do this to ourselves.
** People, this is a NO JUDGEMENT ZONE, okay?
*** Seriously.  NO JUDGEMENT ZONE.

I had a hard time narrowing it down, but if I HAD to marry a celebrity, I would pick from the following front runners:

1. The one who could make me laugh (and isn’t too hard on the eyes)

a notorious prankster and a tad easy on the eyes. Who doesn't love a man who is HOT and has a great sense of humor.

2. If I needed help doing my laundry…

Washboard abs and smouldering good looks...Hell, even I would fold laundry with this man.

3. If I wanted someone just to stare at me all night and day…

With those eyes, I would let him stare at me all day

He could stare at me too, and repeat lines from the most romantic movie ever, The Notebook

4. If I wanted to stare at him all day…

I would make sure his shirt was removed (and possibly his pants) before staring

This is perfect...I could look at him all day too. Easily.

5. If I wanted an extremely attractive nice guy…

He has a toothpaste ad smile, a heart of gold, and is friends with really hot guys!

6. And if I wanted a guy from my all time favorite movie…

Love Actually...best movie ever! He learns Portuguese for a girl!

7. And if I am going to marry for money (and someone of a decent age and not an 80 year old magazine owner)…

Mark Cuban...not the hottest guy on the list, but rich, fun, and young.

Okay, so it’s not too hard to pick just one.  I would take any, and possibly some on this list.  At this hour of the morning, it’s hard to think outside the box about who its hot.

This posting was inspired by Mama Kat’s Writer’s Workshop prompt- If you HAD to marry a celebrity, who would make your list and why?

So here’s my listing of hawt guys I’d totes have sexual relations with… (in no particular order btw)

• Ed Westwick

Not only is he goodlooking, but he is british aswell! And his full name is Edward…

—

• Chace Crawford

• Ian Somerhalder

Came into my life as DaMoan in The Vampire Diaries but I wish I’d discovered him before. And I totes ship him with Nina Dobrev so…

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• Baptiste Giabiconi

Ok honestly, who would not fall for a model?

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• Tom Parker

Yes, he is a boyband member. But I didn’t have a Backstreet Boys or N’SYNC phase so I gotta catch up! Oh and he’s a Brit aswell btw…

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• Pitbull

This man’s voice does wicked, very sinful things to my body… *shivers*

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• Francisco Lachowski

He seems so cute and innocent. And I really wanna find out if he is.

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• Taylor Lautner

The newest addition to my list: Damn him for being so nice and goodlooking at the BD Berlin Premiere!

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• Jared Leto

The only guy that could be my dad (he’s like 6 years younger than mine) on the “Celebrities I am allowed to fuck” list. Not that it changes a thing. I’d still do him any day.

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• Eric Saade

OMG the best thing from Sweden since H&M! (H&M is swedish right?)

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• Jackson Rathbone

This is kinda selfexplanatory  but well, Jackson is hawt. Nuff said.

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• Matt Lanter

The only guy that I ever tolerated being “the other” Edward. He pulled the “Pretty” part off pretty well.

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• Kellan Lutz

I always saw Kells more like a big brother type of guy. Thank god he is not my big brother, because after that video (ya’ll know which one I am talking about) I def made a spot for him on this list.

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• Tom Sturridge

He was so überduber cute in that movie with Summer! What was it called. Uhm… waiting for forever?

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• Zac Efron

Don’t you dare freak out mk? He is one hawt mofo. There’s just no point denying it.

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• Xavier Samuel

Was I the only one crying at the End of Eclipse because “They killed Riley! WWWHHHYYY?”

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• Dave Franco

Some may thing that his bigger brother James is da thing, but I personally prefer Dave… He is a stud!

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• Alex Skarsgard

The second Swede on my list. Who knew I had the hots for british AND swedish guys…

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• Alex Pettyfer

Superhandsome and british. What else would you ask for?

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• Penn Badgley

Mainly on this list because he reminds me of a summercrush I had a few years ago. Though I don’t remember if he reminded me of Penn or Penn reminds me of him…

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• Ben Barnes

And here goes another Brit. Ben’s jaw is mesmerizinh, no?

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• Ryan Gosling

OMG FOREVER IN LOVE WITH THE GOS! He is the type of guy I’d actually want to marry aswell. Js.

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• Michael Trevino

Hottest Werewolf in TVD… hands down!

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And last but not least (and because I always save the best for last):

ROBERT FUCK-ME-HARD-PLEASE PATTINSON

I could fill a whole post with reasons but I don’t need to. This blog should be filled with enough.

I am such a slut,

Image

Here are 5 reasons why I love Pinterest

1. It’s a much better version of my bookmarks. Any time I see something I like I can simply “pin” it to my board. No more huge lists to find that cute dress that would be perfect for my trip to Fiji.

2. I can follow other people’s boards! It’s like twitter for images.

3. Giggling at funny quotes without hunting them down.

4. Gift ideas!

5. Future husbands boards.

You can check out my Pin Boards here. I’ll send you an invite if you’re interested.

Get Pinning. It’s wonderful.

An example of his sweetness is how he asked her to prom.  He asked Devon to go with him by putting the letter “P” all over her car before she left school for the day, which was a feat in and of itself because he goes to a different high school than she does AND she gets out early every day because she only has three classes instead of four.  Then he drew an “R” in chalk on our driveway and on the street in both directions because he wanted to make sure she saw it. He knocked on the door and asked to put “O” and “Ohs” all the way upstairs on the walls, and finally, he sprinkled M and M’s all over her bed. All together, the letters spell prom.

Of course she said yes!

It would simply be too cruel for me to post an entry about Josh Groban and not include an angelic portrait of his angelic face. Also, in this photograph, he looks kind of angry, which might well be his response to someone saying "Dude. Your version of 'America'? It's perfect, but I ain't feeling it."

beyond all measure of thrilldom to come across a copy of Josh Groban: Live at the Greek at a used record store (even though it led to a particularly awkward conversation with the store’s owner at the check-out in which, I believe, the term “girly man” was used to spin me into a incoherent rage.  But that’s an entirely different story).  I was particularly thrilled beyond thrilldom because the disc featured a cover of what is my second favorite Simon and Garfunkel song: “America” (“The Only Living Boy in New York” being my first favorite Simon and Garfunkel song, though I know it’s really more of a Simon song as Artie was off filming Catch 22, and “To Emily, Wherever I Should Find Her” being my third favorite Simon and Garfunkel song, though it certainly deserves a higher placement, if only because it’s the song after which I’m named, but in the past few years I’ve found it impossible to listen to said song without crying.  But those are entirely different stories altogether).  And, of course, seeing as it was sung by Josh Groban, it was beautiful.  It was perfect.  And that was the problem.

The reason I so love “America” has much to do, perhaps, with this: it’s January.  New York.  Terribly, terribly cold, and I’m having trouble adjusting to the temperature, mostly because I’ve just de-boarded a plane after a month at home, in Alabama.  I button my coat and adjust my scarf and prepare for the ride from Laguardia to Bronxville, to the imposing iron arches of Westlands Gate, airplane shuttle drop-off point and entrance to the snow-covered campus of Sarah Lawrence College.  I might’ve been 18.  Perhaps 19.  I was definitely one of those ages at which one can easily become unmoored, unsure of the waters she’s navigating (I wish I could say that every age was not that age, though I find more and more that I can’t, though that’s certainly another story altogether indeed).  While at home, I imagined that I’d feel — well, at home, or sheltered, perhaps, or in some way where I belonged.  I didn’t.  Then I imagined I’d feel those things — home, sheltered, in the place I belonged — when the plane touched down at Laguardia, or in the airport shuttle, or as I came closer and closer to campus.  I didn’t.  I felt, perhaps, more confused, and farther from home, and less sheltered, and less like I belonged anywhere, really, than ever before.  As the airport shuttle sped through black ice and falling snow, I wrapped my jacket and scarf around myself, leaned my cheek against the freezing shuttle window, and pushed play on my CD player (these being, sadly, the days before iPods) to find that I’d (probably intentionally) made off with my father’s copy of Bookends.  I fast-forwarded to the third track, “America,” and there’s this moment when Paul Simon’s voice shakes a little and moves to a different register, and in that moment, I found home.  I found shelter.  I found a voice able to say what I myself couldn’t:

“Kathy, I’m lost,” I said, though I knew she was sleeping
I’m empty and aching and I don’t know why
Counting the cars on the New Jersey Turnpike
They’ve all gone to look for America
All gone to look for America
All gone to look for America

The thing is that, at this moment in particular, Paul Simon’s voice is far from perfect, as it often is.  I wonder sometimes why Art Garfunkel, whose voice has that sweet angelic quality, doesn’t sing certain parts, and then I realize: it wouldn’t be the same.  It wouldn’t work.  The reason why Paul Simon’s voice does work is simply, I think, that it isn’t perfect, and it is, therefore, human, and expresses, in that moment, all that is most terrible and sad and sweet about the very state of being human.

And this is what I tend to look for, both in poetry and in music: this imperfection, this gorgeous moment of weakness when orchestration and rehearsal and all the time one has spent in pursuit of perfection fails, and the artifice crumbles and art remains.  It’s a moment of weakness.  It’s a moment when it’s just one human voice speaking to another human voice.  It’s a moment of acknowledgment.  And it’s the kind of beautiful human moment at which five octaves of sheer vocal perfection somehow fails.

Perhaps what Leonard Cohen, another artist whose voice is far from perfect but is, nevertheless, seeringly, electrically effective and effecting, said is true: “There is a crack in everything.  That’s how the light gets in.”

Tap into the USA!

Nigel sits at the piano bench and begins striking a series of minor chords — chords which, according to Nigel, will make a person weep instantly.  Then he begins playing in the minor key, a piece he says is inspired by Mozart and Bach — “sort of a Mach piece” — a heartrendingly, amazingly gorgeous composition which, upon finishing, he gives a title too obscene to be typed here.

It’s a classic scene from what may be the finest comedy film of all time (or, at least, one of the funniest) Spinal Tap, but it bears some serious thinking — obscenely named though it may be, Nigel’s piece is, indeed, so beautiful and sad as to make a person weep instantly.  The best art, Walter Pater famously wrote, “aspires to the condition of music,” which seems especially true in light of Nigel Tufnel’s “Mach” piece.  There just seems to be some kind of quality in music, some combination of chords, some tone or note of voice through which we are transported, emptied, through which we’re reminded, simultaneously, of how awful and awe-inspiring our world can be, through which we achieve nothing less than blissful catharsis, released and able to return to the world — purer, better, truer than before.

It’s a quality I’ve paid a lot of attention to in the past year, which was, quite frankly, perhaps the most hellish year of my life.  Now that I’m coming out of it and seem to be more or less in one piece, I finally feel like I can begin to talk about (though it seems more like confessing) what’s been happening.  I spent most of 2009 in one doctor’s office or another.

M.F.H. Josh Groban, from his official Website: http://www.joshgroban.com.

I found myself, after a particularly harrowing doctors’ appointment, reaching for the familiar but also for the cathartic — the chord, the note, the moment of music through which I could, however briefly, be transported and transformed.  After what was probably the worst appointment, I headed to Barnes and Nobles, a sweetly familiar spot, and then — there it was, the CD which transported me most as a teen, the CD which, perhaps, defined my adolescence more than any other (and, um, also shows what a total dork I was) (am.  Ok, am): the soundtrack to Chess.  This, however, was not the soundtrack I knew as a thirteen year old girl; this was the soundtrack of the concert performance starring none other than My Future Husband Josh Groban (who, years ago, became my Future Husband when my mother say him on Oprah and called to say that we were the same age and should definitely get married).  On the drive home from Lexington, I put in the CD — and there it was.  That moment.  Elevation and elation, the terrible and the beautiful, rejoicing and rending and release.

Though I admit that it sounds silly now, it’s certainly true: somehow, that CD had a power, and, while driving around and listening to Josh Groban elegantly belt out song after song about love and passion and frustration and anger, about feeling as though his life isn’t his, as though he’s torn asunder under forces which are far beyond his control, I felt better.  I rolled down the windows.  I turned the sound system up to full blast.  Sometimes, my voice blared along with his; sometimes, I listened silently.  And I felt better.

The interesting thing, though, was that I found it wasn’t the music itself.  When I listened to my old soundtrack, played and played again, so often and at such a ridiculous volume that I really wouldn’t have blamed my parents for throwing the thing away or at least sitting me down for A Talk about why exactly I was so obsessed with the politics of international championship chess, it just didn’t have the same hold on me.  And all of the songs on the soundtrack didn’t hit me.  It was, I realized, Josh Groban’s voice — there was something, well, Mach in his voice, some quality, some capability beyond explanation or description.  Perhaps it’s close to Lorca’s description of duende, those black sounds, those mysteries, those deep dark powers crawling from the toes to the throat.  Perhaps it’s just some God-given beauty that explanation can only dampen, that’s ruined and lessened by words.

I think that if there is one thing I’d like to do in my writing, it’s that — it’s what Josh Groban does with his voice.  That Mach chord.  That sense of duende. I wonder, though, if poetry can — if poetry can only aspire towards music, never reaching it.  I wonder how close poetry can come, or what poetry is closest — Rilke’s Duino Elegies, maybe.  Paul Celan’s “Death Fugue.”  Perhaps the water song in The Wasteland.  Or Inger Christensen’s alfabet.  But to be Josh Groban — just think of it! — to be able to open the mouth, to have that power waiting all the time behind his lips — how lucky, and how lucky are we, to hear him.

In their offer, the website said, “We feel confident that Leann will indeed find true love on our site OR at the very least, a fantastic one night stand.”

PHOTO COURTESY OF PEREZHILTON.COM

Now normally i wouldn’t  report on something this small but Mark Walhberg is so hot and future husband!!!

And on a more entertaining note, I have added another pair of future husbands to my ever-growing list:

Not only did I mean it, saying Jen had to have the stupid Jordan almond koufetta for her wedding because it is bad luck not to, but I did something else completely and utterly devoid of all logic and good sense. Probably set-back modern philosophy 3,000 years or so, and certainly made the suffragettes do unholy spins in their graves.

I slept with the almonds under my pillow.

Shhhh. I know. Totally revolting, yes? Are you as embarrassed to read it as I was to type it?

Probably not. But you will be when I explain. The reason a woman sleeps with ant-attracting, crunchy little hard pebbles of candy-coated almond under her damn head after attending a wedding is because doing so will result in the woman dreaming of her future spouse.

What had I to lose, I wondered, tucking the little rocks under the sectional pillow. Why not? Ancient Greeks, after all, invented philosophy, democracy, maps, the thermometer, central heating and coined money. Hell, they even invented true and applied sciences.

If they said stuffing a human brain under my pillow would make me smarter, I’d likely be en route to the morgue with my checkbook. ‘Tardette.

So. . .what did I dream of, with the koufetta tucked snugly under my big, stupid, fluffy head?

I don’t recall.

But I do know that it had more women in it than a Busby Berkeley synchronized swimming number. The absence of testosterone that night was both alarming and fodder for a Lifetime movie. (And no, wise-asses, I’m not gay.) Mildly depressed after that event? Yes. But not gay.

Apparently destined for a lifetime of singledom – but still not gay.

To hell with the Jordan almonds, prognosticators of nada. And to hell with the Greeks. What good has coined money ever gotten us, anyway?

(Nevertheless, if you do have any good special uses for salt, vinegar or now-cracked week old Jordan almonds, I’m all ears.)

Contrasting Norwegians oil wealth, which is discreetly hidden away, for no one to see. The Muslim-Arab ethnicitas recognise the true value of  money, its potential to turn the world into an oasis of beauty <3 More is more and the sky`s no limit…

Burj Dubai (edit: mistaken identity) Burj khalifa, a magnificent tower which will rise from the desert sand by the end of 2008:

The Dubai Towers, an imitation of a candlelight flame, too romantic…

And one must not forget, the good old Palm islands…  

My recent glomming onto NCIS for my hit of procedural drama-ness has resulted in a lot of throwbacks to teenaged fits of lust — which of course sent me trolling for information:

For those of you who have seen NCIS and remember the throwaway line in S1? About some guy who had tons of bank because he was the original importer of Swiss Army Knives into the country? I THINK THAT WAS ACTUALLY MICHAEL’S DAD. HIS MULTIMILLIONAIRE DAD WHO CUT HIM OUT OF THE FAMILY WHEN HE DECIDED TO PURSUE ACTING. SO BASICALLY: DINOZZO IS MICHAEL WEATHERLY.

This is what happens when you think of NO BACKSTORY for a character because it’s a procedural drama! Michael Weatherly worked in the tape library at ABC after being cut off to support his acting habit! He has a son! His son is named AUGUST. I — ! I — ! It’s all too much for me, really. D: D: D: Why haven’t he and I already made babies? I MEAN JUST LOOK AT HIM. GOD.

Of course, thinking about NCIS makes me think about Michael Weatherly makes me think about Dark Angel makes me think about what an APPALLING actress Jessica Alba was and still is to this day. Like seriously, I’m not kidding. Even though that sexual chemistry in the show (mmm) was sizzling off of the screen? She was just so bad — at everything. Which is only highlighted by the fact that if I’m to get my Michael Weatherly in glasses hit, I have to watch the damn show. Life = difficult.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with the source material, it’s Roy Mustang (blue uniform at the desk) and Ed Elric (where he belongs: on his knees like the hot piece of twink he is), and they’re totally living the dream.

I have no idea what fanartist drew this, but all I can say is that it might be the hottest thing evar.

(There are about 2394872393478343 of you with Asian backgrounds who just gasped and said, “Meteor Garden! That one stole my Asian drama virginity! And then when it finally did call, it was like it’d gotten worse in the sack instead of better!” As somebody who concluded that abusive relationship on my living room couch middle of my senior year sobbing my eyes out at the end of “Meteor Garden II” all I can say is: yes, yes I know.)

I’d seen Asian TV before — no second generation Chinese kid has managed to completely escape the Chinese New Year countdown variety show, and no one should: it’s good Communist motherland TV for us to grow glorious in our heathen American ways! — but you know, I’d never seen hot Asian guys. I pretty much thought there was something wrong with the Asian Y chromosome (well, something MORE wrong) — we will not speak of the One Who Was Hit On By Construction Workers, And Then Was Foolish Enough To Call To Tell Me About It, And Was Somehow Surprised When I Made Asian Twink Jokes For About A Thousand Years.

Anyway, the point was:

Then along came my Future Husband, whom my entire family — I’m not making this up, it’s entirely too embarrassing to be a joke — now actually refers to exclusively as The Future Son-In-Law. We work on the theory that Vic Zhou loves me, he just doesn’t know it yet, and as soon as he realizes — our eyes will meet across the white-lit showroom of a Ferrari dealership; he will be buying another speed toy, I will be stalking him — we will touch one another inappropriately and have somewhat less than optimally attractive babies because I’m bringing down our average, but I’m sure he’ll love me enough to forgive me.

That was it folks. I realized that China, Taiwan, Korea, and indeed even Japan (who else watched that wretch-awful and yet still unspeakably amazing “Majou no Jouken“? Don’t lie. It changed your life, shut up. And you’ll never be able to listen to Utada Hikaru’s “First Love,” ever again) dramas! They were…melodramatic. They had…sometimes horrifyingly poor production values. Couples expressed their eternal love and simmering sexual tension by not touching one another at all — kissing was all fake and awkward looking! Guys, it was a brand new world and I was all over it like cheap perfume on a Lindsey Lohan hanger-oner.

And now, I spend a lot of time watching Korean dramas, mostly because there’s a huge abundance of them, which helps because 90 percent of them have some sort of abusive relationship that would have, and I quote a conversation I had with somebody the other day “slapping the motherfucking life out of the man who was shoving me into the wall and then flinging his scrawny ass, 30 lbs dripping wet body out of a window.” (Who else “My Name Is Kim Sam Soon through the rage blackouts?)

At the moment, the two that have captured my attention are Witch Amusement, starring some adorable faces we might remember from “Goong” and some adorable faces we might remember from “My Name is Kim Sam Soon” who could not act in that drama to save his blessed life, but who was pretty to look at!. And also the concurrently airing “The Devil,” starring universally agreed cross-gender hawt-ass my future man slave of sexual plaything-ness. (I’m not kidding. I will fight all of Korea for him. Don’t worry: Vic knows how to share.)

Just be prepared — there might be episode reviews. I have to talk about this sickness with somebody.

Oh, and because you’ve all been so good to read the whole damn thing — gratuitous eye meat!

(For more mansluttishness of the Joo Ji Hoon (twink cowboy) variety go here — for more mansluttishness of the look don’t touch because he is mine and we are going to have babies and I am not kidding, I would fight Korea for Joo Ji Hoon but I will fight the entire continent of Asia for Future Husband, go here.)