Inauguration anxiety

I am worried that inauguration weekend = New Year's Eve, in the following ways:

1.  It will be cold.
2.  There will be huge crowds everywhere. 
3.  There will be big parties, but I will not go to them, as they will be really expensive and, I suspect, possibly lame/depressing, like the New Year's Eve party Sally is at at the end of When Harry Met Sally, before Harry arrives, but still I may feel left out because I am not going to them. 
4.  Bars will probably charge a cover, and will be very crowded.
5.  Everybody knows it is supposed to be festive and celebratory, but all those expectations may collapse in on themselves, as happens to Gary Sinise's character in Forrest Gump, when he's sitting at the bar at New Year's Eve with confetti falling on him looking like he might cry.  I suppose in this case what one would be crying about would be, How long until I get disillusioned with Obama?  What if he can't fix the economy after all?  Gulp. 

But!  On the other hand, as my friends who may come to DC for inauguration* pointed out, we did spend New Year's Eve 2001-2002 in Chicago, with sub-zero temperatures, with about 15 people, many of whom got the flu, sleeping in 2 rooms in a Day's Inn, which had insane heaters we could not turn off, forcing us to open the window to counteract the heaters, resulting in alternating gale-force hot-and-cold drafts wafting across all the feverish, testy people.  And we're still friends! 


*I hope you guys do come!  I'm sure it will be fun! 

Sigh, Joe Jonas

Over the last 3 years (!) of this blog's existence, I have noticed myself slowly moving away from writing about celebrity "news."  This is largely because the celebrities in whom I am interested are getting older (sigh!) and their antics are thus either less antic-y and more boring (Katie Holmes, Angelina Jolie), or juts as antic-y but more depressing (Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan).  There are younger celebrities whose antics still hit that sweet spot of preposterous and amusing, but!  I increasingly have no idea who they are.

Take Joe Jonas.  People.com tells me that he wrote a masterpiece of a public, passive-aggressive, confessional missive, sort of to his fans, but really to his ex-girlfriend, Taylor Swift: 

Several things I will state with all my heart ... I never cheated on a girlfriend. It might make someone feel better to assume or imply I have been unfaithful but it is simply not true. Maybe there were reasons for a breakup. Maybe the heart moved on. Perhaps feelings changed. I am truly saddened that anything would potentially cause you to think less of me.

Ahhh, the lack of proper nouns!  The "maybe"s!  The vague, veiled barbs stated with "all my heart!"  It's a masterpiece . . . but who the hell are Joe Jonas and Taylor Swift?  My lizard brain tells me they are singers of some sort, but that pretty minimal information to get excited about.  

Yo

I apparently did not post on my blog a single time in October.  Christ!  So as to get the juices flowing, here is an eclectic assortment of updates:

1.  Obama won!  Which you probably know.  At first I felt like perhaps we were in the last season of Roseanne, where they win the lottery, and then in the finale it is revealed that this was all the daydream of a depressed and still poor Roseanne.  But it seems to be lasting!  So I am very happy about that!

2.  We went to Italy in October, and that was really awesome.  Italy, among other things, has a lot more ads for tourist destinations than we do here--or at least the BBC and CNN International do.  Based on those ads alone, I would like to go to India ("Incredible India"), Greece (no slogan, just smiling people), Malaysia ("Truly Asia"), and Croatia ("The Mediterranean as it Once Was").  The ads for Macedonia were kind of janky, so it's not at the top of my list, but if the recession continues maybe it would be a good cheap option.

3.  Speaking of the recession, I am happy to see that the fashion world seems to have foreshadowed it by making the big new look for fall . . . patterned tights.  About the cheapest thing you can possibly buy.  I got some cute ones at Target for $12 this weekend.

4.  I saw Role Models last weekend and it was GREAT.   Yes, it's another "men will be boys until forced to grow up on pain of incarceration" kind of tale, but it's a well-done version of that.  Also, the kid who I found annoying as McLovin' in Superbad was awesome as a very sincere, painfully awkward and younger-seeming kid into Life Action Role Play (LAIRE, I think) in this movie.

That is all.