They are charming, sharp, handsome, hilarious, British, amiable, neatly dressed and likely a bit of a handful.?Altogether quite my cup of tea.?I think it unfair to put here preference for one over another, so I represent them collectively as they are my earliest, enduring crush.
Hunks »The Monty Python Crew
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Albums »The Two and Three Part Inventions
I enjoy classical music, but this is something quite stunning and special.?Each piece lasts only a few minutes, a few strange and glorious minutes one can scarcely believe is produced by ten fingers on eighty-eight keys.?I hesitate in more description because I believe it's far more fascinating to enjoy Glenn Gould's music fresh if you have never heard.
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Posted on January 19, 2009
Songs »La Vie En Rose
I find a particular thrill in affection for that which terrifies me.?A fair approach to conquering fear I suppose… sometimes.?Grace Jones.?A magnificent being.?I adore, I shrink and shutter, I envy.?It is said she hails from Jamaica, but I have no idea what it takes to create something like this.?That said, this lovely, lively cover of the French classic is my premier selection to lift low spirits, and successful under any circumstances.
Please watch this video – and this one too.
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Posted on January 19, 2009
Books »The Great Gatsby
I am far from unearthing a hidden gem, nor am I expressing a veneration not held by countless literary critics.?And it's cultural and artistic implications I need hardly describe.?Still, The Great Gatsby is my favorite novel and the finest.?
It's sustained power beyond its meager success in Scott's own lifetime (I believe only 25,000 or so copies were sold before his death); it's written in an ingenious, simple format that both child and adult can comprehend and appreciate.?There are no inflated, grandiloquent sentences.?No hulking, virile ego on display.?The proof of his intellect and the richness of ideas is phrased guilelessly.?
I love Fitzgerald because these words, his words, are what I most want to read.?Anytime.?Again and again.?”So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”?Sigh.
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Posted on January 19, 2009
Movies »Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
“Where is fancy bred??In the heart or in the head?”?/em>
-Willy Wonka via The Merchant of Venice
I have a particular affection for a charming parable.?I suppose I find comfort in the didactic illustration of life's lucid lessons.?Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory is my most beloved.?It's wicked, delightful, witty and sweet, a brilliant rendering of Roald Dahl's screenplay and book.?Everything little thing, from score to set, is spectacular and perfect.?A more charming cast I can't recall.?Truly, “There is no life I know to compare with pure imagination.?Living there you'll be free if you truly wish to be.”
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Posted on January 19, 2009
Recipes »Asparagus Goat Cheese Pasta
This Asparagus Goat Cheese Pasta recipe has very few ingredients – but they come together nicely in this belly warming pasta dish filled with lots of greens. Definitely one for those fans of asparagus, which has lots of vitamin B – necessary to boost your immune system during these days of colds and sickness.
The cook time is quick – especially if you too are madly in love with Fresh Direct's two minute microwavable pasta, so this is ideal for a quick, creamy and filling meal when you're run down from a day of work and don't want to slave in the kitchen.
Even Jim was a huge fan and he rarely eats any greens.
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Posted on January 12, 2009
Web Sites »Caustic Cover Critic
Caustic Cover Critic is a great, extensive and exhaustive blog on the sole subject of cover design by an Australian man clearly obsessed with the art form. This is a must stop on your internet travels if you, like myself am also a fan. When I came to New York, I dreamed and attempted to find work as a book cover designer, a portfolio deemed too strange and avant garde thwarted me though, and now I am satisfied with finding my pleasure seeing other artists who have done books well.
It's actually hard to find well designed books, hence the “ranting” element of this blog, but luckily for us readers, he's not too caustic (despite his huge self portrait at the bottom that would suggest otherwise) to be unreadable and when he does go off, it's most definitely on those that truly deserve it.
Mostly, though this is a consistently updated, in depth spot to see the best book covers have to offer. It's introduced me to many names in design including: David Gentleman and Coralie Bickford-Smith and it's been great to see considerable information and images for people I am already familiar with like Ronald Searle, Charles Burns, and the book cover as art's greatest modern champion Chip Kidd.
He also conducts some very interesting interviews with designers like Michael Kellner and David Drummond. Have fun exploring for hours. There are many archives with tons of fun images for the design minded.
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Posted on January 12, 2009
Drinks »Wally Harbanger
You all know how I love my Old Fashioneds, but as a woman who believes in the phrase “variety is the spice of life”,?I've been on the lookout for another cocktail I can give my love to. On New Years Eve, I found it in the Harvey Wallbanger ( 2 parts vodka, 1 part Galliano, fresh orange juice) spin off the Wally Harbanger:
1 oz bourbon
1 /2 oz Galliano
1 oz lemon juice
1 tsp sugar syrup
sprig of mint (optional)
Instructions:
Mix all ingredients except sprig with crushed ice in a shaker. Serve in a tumbler.
It's a refreshing, delicious drink that deserves a more prominent distinction in the mixology lexicon. I hate the idea that it's going to be next to impossible to order at a bar unless the tender is a truly seasoned and well versed cocktail devotee (which, thankfully, there are a few in this here city). But it's a pretty simple concoction to make on ones own so long as one of those beauteous Galliano bottles are on hand.
If you like slightly sweetened whiskey cocktails, you are really into a treat with this one, but beware – it's strong, strong stuff that's almost too easy to drink.
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Posted on January 12, 2009
Style Icons: Male »Tom Tierney
Tom Tierney's career as a paper doll artist began around the time I was born, so as a young person I reaped all the benefits of his work. Sadly, I found his works, that featured the designs of high fashion through the decade that truly inspired me, are not quite as popular as they once were. I bought several of them for a my friend who runs a vintage store, knowing she'd appreciate the detailed fashion illustration he was famous for – but when I went to Barnes and Noble, the clerk claimed that all the paper dolls were no longer being sold there.
Times change, I suppose, and the paper doll doesn't seem to have the same allure for little girls as it once did –?but Tierney's (which you can find at Amazon – take that B&N!) are still inspiring and make me a little more than nostalgic for days of sitting cross legged on the bedroom floor with my sister, pouring over images of Greta Garbo and Jean Harlow – draping them in fairly loyal illustrations of Balenciaga, Yves Saint Laurent, Erte, and Poiret. What a great man, to be putting that kind of glamour in the hands of children!
He says on his site:
“I feel that the most important thing about my paper doll books is that I am using the medium of the paper doll as an art form. To me, paper dolls can be more than just some 'cutsie' bit of fluff to be thrown at the children to perpetuate boredom. They can be artistic, vital, and alive and can tell us much about people, the clothes they wore, the way they lived and something of the times in which they lived.”
At age 70, he is still at it, and recently sold out of his Obama family book. He also has a new “New Attitude” Paper Doll Book coffe table book:
“You'll love this new deluxe edition of an underground classic. Meet 37 outrageous, sexy, glamorous swinging singles and socialites at a fabulous Manhattan cocktail party hosted by “Aunt Mary.” A parade of gay and lesbian stereotypes are trotted out in paper doll form for perusal in this reprint of the iconic, highly collectible Attitudes book first released by renown paper doll artist Tom Tierney in 1979. This new volume has been recreated, now in full color and with six new characters, to commemorate one of the early books in a long series of paper doll books for which Tierney has become famous. Enjoy hairdressers, movie stars, millionaires, models, drag queens, and others, each nearly naked in seductive loungerie, and with character appropriate clothing.”
as well as the very intriguing “Marie Laveau Voodoo Priestess” Paper Doll Book. Perhaps I am wrong, maybe as long as there are artists like Tom working in the field, the art of?the paperdoll will continue -?for my future kids' sake I hope so.
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Posted on January 12, 2009
Songs »Once Bitten, Twice Shy
Great White really didn't have enough mainstream hits to outweigh the band's later notorious involvement in the horrific and tragic Station nightclub fire, but the one big hit they left behind, Once Bitten, Twice Shy, holds a special place in my nostalgic heart. I've mentioned my sixth grade “bad” buddy Holly a number of times on this blog before; the two of us would listen to Eazy E in her very witchy bedroom in between playing this hair metal classic over and over.
But it wasn't Great White that first performed it. Ian Hunter of Mott the Hopple fame (who was a frequent collaborator with this week's hunk Mick Ronson) introduced this song to the world on his MC Escher meets the 80s first solo album. It's a song that fits nicely in the both glam rock and hair metal canons, two genres that in some ways are really not all that different.
Great White's version earned the band a radio and a subsequent video hit thanks to the inclusion of pinup girl Bobbie Brown. No, not the former Mr Whitney Houston, but the girl from Warrant's Cherry Pie video – which really was quite ahead of its time when you consider how the white background craze hit TV ads in the last decade. It was released on their album “Twice Shy”, an album that came two years after “Once Bitten” and it features wonderfully of the time album art with sexy legs in a sea of red satin sheets lying dangerously close to the fin of a predatory great white shark.