grab-bag

* Fav scenes in Get Shorty: when John Travolta pitches J. Gandolfini down the stairs and when Bette Midler visits Gene Hackman's office at night. The first utilizes Travolta's trademark strutbounce and some great bass (the opening of DJ Greyboy's "Panacea") to good effect, not to mention that dead-eyed TonyS stare I love so much; the latter shows how sexy a scene with good actors can be, even a funny, reluctantly sexy scene.

* Spring appears to be here. Sort of. See?

* I hate the phrase guilty pleasure (hence using it is sort of a guilty pleasure), but if there is any true guilty pleasure in my life it's probably the years and stacks of Martha Stewart Living. Oy. [interminable essay excised here] I'm sorry to say though that it might be leaving the guilty pleasure category now that the magazine has been redesigned starting with the current issue. No more glorious, space-hogging expanse of glossy, well-registered photographs on thick paper, no more minimal text (mostly), no not-too service-y service pieces, no...luxurious image real estate. The new design, not to mention the new paper it's printed on, makes it much less special as a magaziney indulgence. It's packed and crowded...not to mention getting more and more dependent on its staffers--like every media--for modeling and ideas and such. Feels incestuous. It's losing some of its editorial authority and uniqueness.

* Speaking of GPs, in a desire to watch movies OTHER than those that contain any CGI, monsters, sci-fi, fantasy, video game or comic book premise, Nicolas Cage, excessive amounts of fog, dry ice, reaction shots, apocalyptic plot twists, natural disasters, mean cops, good cops, mean criminals, good criminals or the Jonas Brothers, I have been padding my Netflix queue with the fluffiest of choices recently, but even I couldn't watch (literally) more than about 60 seconds of 27 Dresses. Miserable-making. The kicker was the LuvIntrist (Male) being a sports journalist in yet another fake-ass movie NY newspaper. I just couldn't watch that ancient trope one more time while actual newspapers are burning out all around us, plus the movie was just ass. In a similar spirit: better than you'd think is He's Just Not That Into You, strangely, if you can avoid the Friends-like use of people of color as fringey plot padding and the seriously short male actors. At least stuff happens.

* Rilly rilly good: spelt gingersnaps. Rilly good.

* Something to do if you're bored: Bounce up and down on your exercise ball to a Janet Jackson video and take iSight pix every few seconds to make a mock film strip. Reinflate ball.