Thursday, May 29, 2008

Nautica Guy

For the most part I am not a gawker.

Sure, I notice attractive men on the street (usually if they're significantly taller than me, wearing glasses, etc), but often it is with the same appreciation that I admire a woman's beautiful wool coat or fabulous spring dress.

Recently, however, DC Metro changed their ads. To this fella. CLICK IT.

And I objectify him, okay?

There's no two ways about it.

I admit it.

He is really very good-looking. Congratulations, Nautica. Because while I have always been able to appreciate beauty, I am now the pervy girl on the train. If I am unlucky (read: lucky) enough to get onto a car with this ad, I do my best to stick my nose in the Express or become very interested in my ipod. Else I start ogling like a teenage boy. Ogling an advertisement! Who have I become?!

This is inappropriate and embarrassing. I am not proud of the lip-biting and glazed over eyes that invariably occur when I see cute blue-deckshirt guy. But it is Nautica who should be the most embarrassed. After a few weeks of enjoying attractive Nautica guy, I am retracting my congratulations, and I'll tell you why:

Who in God's name thought it a good idea to couple this photo, of this very attractive man removing his shirt and exposing his perfectly tanned midriff with ads about Father's Day?? What the crap, Nautica? "Father's Day is June 15, make your dad a hottie"? "Is your father a FILF? Let Nautica help."

It was bad enough that he's plastered all over train cars where unsuspecting and sexually repressed 23 year-olds can be captivated without a moments notice. But Father's Day? Let's hope that I'm the only one who's so captivated, or DC is just asking for some weird string of Electra Complexes.

Saturday, May 24, 2008

**In the Spirit of Honesty

Of late I have been noticing the socially incorrect elements of my personality. There are an overwhelming number of things that, try as I may, I am incapable of faking. So, in the spirit of honesty! (or, **"things that I have found it, up until this point, impossible to fake, or lie about"):

My room will never be clean. A clean bedroom has a shelf life of about 2.3 days for me. In which I am inspired to rehang all my clothes after I've tried them on and discarded them in the morning. 2.3 days that I'll make my bed or organize my side table. In which I'll fold my clothes before stuffing them back in the drawers (but the drawers will ALWAYS be closed-- open drawers being something I have been unable to abide since as an 8 year old my tall bureau, too many of the drawers left open, tipped over on top of me and the small TV on top hit me in the face, leaving 2 small knots--1 on my forehead and 1 on the bridge of my nose-- that have remained to this day.). I recently heard a radio interview with 23 year old Tony award winner John Gallagher, Jr. in which he admitted to having a messy room. It inspired me. I, too, will wear it as a badge of artistic honor.


I like white bread. I realize this is a completely inappropriate behavior from a young lady raised in the suburbs and educated at Middlebury College. No properly reared, affluent young white person with real aspirations would ever choose white over wheat when given the choice. And should probably even turn down a sandwich, wrap or pasta dish meal in general if white is the flour used. But wheat pasta makes me want to gag. And why eat flax pancakes when you can have delicious pancakes? I will concede that as far as sandwich bread goes, whole wheat sometimes tastes best. But you'll never find me eating a whole wheat bagel. My wheat will always be frosted and mini. This predilection for eating things that taste good to 9 year-olds extends beyond white pasta and white bread. I like my oatmeal in packets and full of brown sugar and vegetables are best soaked in gravy or sauteed.


I can't walk around in high heels. I can barely handle most cute flats: narrow toes, unsupportive arch. Yes, I realize I live in a city now. A professional city. In which, for the time being, I work in an office and commute with the suits and the stilettos. But you will not see me in heels taller than 1 inch. And my shoes will never be as shiny as everyone else's. Even if I bought them shiny, they undoubtedly lost that luster after 1 day with me. My shoes will be comfortable, size 11 friendly (that's right, I'm a drag queen), rubber-soled, practical and probably ugly. (Ugly, because it is a universally acknowledged fact that women with big feet actually would rather their shoes be uglier, less trendy and look like they belong to Cynthia Nixon's girlfriend.) Even if they did make giant sized cute shoes, I still could not wear them like all those beautiful and empowered business women you see on the metro, because I am at my most unpleasant when my feet hurt. I will wear my men's Asic tigers or my hot pink and grey suede diesels with my pantyhose and pencil skirt during the commute and change into my 3 inch heels for walking back and forth from the copier to my cubicle: 9142C. Disregard, for a moment, my plantar fasciatis-ridden left foot. I still wouldn't be rocking the stilettos. I'm just not that girl.


Love me, love my ugly shoes, delicious pasta and messy room.

Friday, May 2, 2008

(ham and) Egg (croissant) on my face

Today I was called out.


I stopped into Heller's (awesome neighborhood bakery) on my way to work this morning. The same cool, tall, black guy with diamond studs and braids past his shoulders that usually helps me, called me over to the counter. I had to sidestep a ridiculously cute Mt. Pleasant family with an infant and a toddler in tow while their dog was chained up outside in order to reach the counter. I walked over and ordered my usual, perhaps a little embarassed that he might recognize me and my order from my 4 or 5 visits since I've moved to the area.


Me:"An apple fritter, please."


Now, this guy is pretty cool. He's way too cool to just be working in a bakery. He definitely has a funk band. Or does multi-media installation art using found materials. Probably he also bakes some of the delicious pastries and adds a secret Dominican flare that he no doubt learned from his senile island grandmothr. So, ordering a doughnut from him makes me a little nervous. I tend to get a little nervous like that around super hip and/or attractive people (Like when the Canadian and her boy are together, I shut down just a little-- there is just too much beautiful in one room.) Anway, his response was not what I expected.


Cool dude:"That's not how you really talk is it?"

Me: (thinking 'What does that mean? What is he talking about? Why would he say...?....Oh *realization*....I definitely just used my waif** voice.)
**The "waif" voice is what one Professor of Theatre Douglas Sprigg used to accuse me of having in Acting II, Voice and Body. It's where I sound like a pretty mcpretty little lacoste wearing Theta, and not a 6 foot tall hoss.
"Um....yeah....in the morning...."

Cool dude:"Really?"

Me: "Yeeeaah. Why?

Cool dude: *looking at me, trying to decide how not to offend me

Me: "Cause I'm tall?"

Cool dude: "Yeah, you're, you know....you're not...you're a..." (goes to get my fritter) (comes back) "You look like you know how to swing a bat at something!"


I guess "swing a bat at something" is a figure of speech that I never learned growing up in the suburbs. I know how to swing a bat at a softball. Or an intruder.

I left, mildly offended that super-hip counter help guy thinks he knows me and how I should talk. But then I realized he was totally right and even though that is how how I OFTEN talk, it's not how I REALLY talk. It's a fake voice. A lie-- trying to get people to think I'm sweet and charming and young. "Oh, she's such a sweet girl, what a quaint little voice she has!" The dumb voice came out because I was embarassed that I was having my second apple fritter of the week. And afraid that he was going to remember that I'd already been in once this week for the same sugar-loaded, deep-fried goodness.

Doug Sprigg would be overjoyed that a layman (despite the fact that he must surely be an artist of some sort) has assisted me in remembering my Linklater and freeing my natural voice.

Apple Fritter: $1.50
Impromptu Theatre Lesson: priceless