Author Archives: Molly

Best Dressed And Not-So-Favorites: Met Gala 2015

Posted in Entertainment, Outfit Girl by

We were nervous about this year’s Met Gala theme. Nervous because the theme was China: Through The Looking Glass, which seemed like an open invite for questionable or racist or racistly questionable outfits. Fortunately, most attendees stayed on the right side of homage versus appropriation. That’s why our best dressed list contains only attendees who followed our handy guide for how not to be a racist idiot at the Met Gala. Now on to the fashions – with not a single geisha costume or hair chopstick in the mix!

Fan Bingbing in Christopher Bu

American audiences might only be familiar with Fan Bingbing from the X-Men series, but she’s been performing in China for close to two decades, and with a recent deal with 20th Century Fox we may be about to see a lot more of her. This gold gown with elaborate emerald-green cape is my top look of the night – a modern, formal, lavish take on Chinese design. I want that cape framed and hung on my wall, because it is absolute art.

Beyonce in Givenchy Haute Couture by Riccardo Tisci

The best way to avoid offending anyone at a gala with a theme that’s practically asking you to make it racial: wear something that has little, if anything, to do with the theme. Also, be Beyonce. It always helps to be Beyonce. Bey wore a Givenchy gown… or, I guess, some Givenchy clusters of strategically placed sequins. Daily Mail said that the jewels were “protecting her modesty,” because the Daily Mail is the fussy English grandmother I never had. Beyonce followed our rule of “interpret the exhibit” by choosing a broad, flat shoulder and fitted cut (um, very fitted?) that is slightly reminiscent of some modern takes on the cheongsam. Which means she also followed our rule “know your Chinese influences” by not showing up in some sort of weird kimono.

Rihanna in Guo Pei

Oh my goodness, yes. The Met Gala dress code not only requires attendees to wear full evening dress but, as a fundraiser for the Metropolitan Museum Of Art’s Costume Institute, it allows the guests to play dress up. Stars can wear more creative ensembles than at major awards shows, but their creativity has to be tempered by better taste than at, say, the MTV awards. In other words, if you cannot wear a fur-trimmed yellow cape and bejeweled headpiece at the Met, there is simply nowhere you can wear it. Rihanna followed our suggestion of celebrating a Chinese designer Guo Pei. You can read more about her here. And yes, this dress has already spawned 1,000 memes. Good job, internet.

Anne Hathaway in Ralph Lauren

Now for something completely different. It sort of looked like Anne Hathaway was taking Star Wars Day (May the 4th, obviously) to heart – but in the best way possible. Sure, this Ralph Lauren gown is more restrained than Rihanna and Beyonce’s looks, but you still don’t get much of a chance to wear a hood on the red carpet. Could “it has a hood!” become the new “it has pockets?”

Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen in Vintage John Galliano

The Olsen twins took a broad interpretation of the theme, dressing as the ghosts of two old Chinese widows from the past. But seriously, I don’t think I’ve seen MK&A in matching outfits since the early 2000s, and I love that when they finally do it they both wear these giant black numbers. From what I can tell Mary-Kate paid tribute to the theme by wearing silk brocade, typical in traditional Chinese dress. Ashley looks sort of like Stevie Nicks in Victorian mourning dress, and I’m not making fun of her when I say that. I swoon over designs from The Row just about every fashion week and I love the 180 the Olsens have taken since their days in matching denim sunflower hats.

Rosie Huntington-Whiteley in Atelier Versace

So, what’s Chinese about this dress? That’s not a rhetorical question, I’m really wondering what’s Chinese about this dress. Grandma Daily Mail says that she “stuck to [the theme] and ran with” it. I suppose the swooping lines and minimalism is a bit reminiscent of modern Chinese design – I’m thinking of streamlined yet flowing interior design, more than anything. I don’t know. It’s pretty, though.

Amal Clooney in John Galliano

There was a lot of red last night. I assume it was a tribute to the Chinese flag, the importance of red as a lucky color in China, and those stunning Chinese wedding dresses. That’s why this tiered gown didn’t feel TOO off-theme, even if it wasn’t explicity Chinese. The skirt is really blowing my mind here, even if the structured, studded bodice isn’t necessarily my favorite.

Lizzy Caplan in Donna Karan Atelier

Janis Ian, killing it. The drape of this is just perfect, and the embroidered silk pays tribute to the theme without going into costume mode. A lot of folks missed a real opportunity to play with the theme in their accessories last night, but these tassel earrings are amazing. I really wish I owned this dress and also had someplace to wear it (Met tickets are only like $25,000, I’m sure I could come up with it??).

Allison Williams in Giambattista Valli Couture

Allison Williams: Met Gala 2015

Here it is again. Red and cheongsam-style sleeves – just enough tribute to Chinese design without straight-up appropriating traditional dress. I know Allison Williams does the princess dress thing a lot, and sometimes it can seem like a larger version of something a very fancy nine-year-old can wear, but I think that the demure and sweet look works for Allison and she knows it.

Hey, You Tried Something

As I said, the Met Gala is a time to wear outlandish, elaborate looks that just wouldn’t fit in most scenarios. While I wasn’t particularly feeling any of the looks below, at least they really went for it, I guess?

Kim Kardashian in Peter Dundas for Roberto Cavalli

Is it just because I’m not a huge fan of Kim K? Not sure, but something about this wasn’t working for me.

Sarah Jessica Parker in H&M

I know I said it’s a good time to go over-the-top. And I know that SJP is usually the belle of the Met Ball. And I love that this collection uses sustainable fabrics! The look as a whole isn’t my favorite, but she looks like she’s having a blast which makes it that much more fun for the rest of us.

Lady Gaga in Alexander Wang

It IS Lady Gaga. And Alexander Wang is an American of Taiwanese descent. And the sleeves are maybe a modern take on a hanfu (but it kind of reminds me of a Japanese haori??). So I have every reason to like this, I just don’t. It’s me, not the dress, probably.

 Kerry Washington in Prada

We LOVE Kerry Washington. And when she nails an outfit, she NAILS it. I’m just over this high-low thing and this particular shade of pink isn’t my favorite. Hair and face, though? Flawless as ever.

Katy Perry in Moschino

I almost feel like she bought this for the punk-themed Met gala in 2013. Even if I were into the dress, the spraypaint can clutch takes it from costume in a fun, classy, celebratory way to costume in a “My Mom Found A Costume For Graffiti In American Girl Magazine” way. I don’t know if it’s new, but short hair suits her.

Solange Knowles in Giles Deacon

On one hand, I love Solange’s style even more than Beyonce’s usually. And I think this is supposed to be the dress inspired by a Chinese fan, which is really fun. But on the other hand, I don’t enjoy looking at it.

Chloe Sevigny

Chloe reminds me of Mary Kate Olsen. Do they look disheveled, or is the way they dress so high-concept that I’m too simple to get it (probably)? But that doesn’t change that this looks like two Chinese robes from a public market vendor sewn together – in a way that doesn’t fit.

Justin Bieber

I don’t like you and I don’t like how you look, which is like Zach Morris’s long-lost torero cousin.

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Gilbert Blythe, Dream Man Or D-Bag: C+S Book Club

Posted in Entertainment, GSOY (Gratuitous Story of Yourself) by

Gilbert Blythe just died again. I say again because, had the fictional Gilbert been a real person, he’d be about 120 years old, and sorry friends – or sore-y, Canadian friends – there’s just no way. But for a lot of us, Gilbert lived and breathed through the 1980s CBC Anne Of Green Gables movies. Jonathan Crombie was a Toronto youth acting in school plays when he was cast as Gilbert, and he made the character more lovable than I think he even was on the page.

When Crombie died earlier this month, we lost a little bit of Gilbert Blythe. Ah, but which Gilbert Blythe? Things aren’t always black and white in Avonlea (don’t get me wrong, Avonlea is  very, very white, insomuch that Anne’s red hair is a real exotic shot of diversity). In a previous C+S Book Club installment, we dispelled the idea of Marilla Cuthbert as a kindly yet stern benefactress: in my heart, she is first and foremost a creepy church hag. Likewise, one could argue that Gilbert Blythe is an early 1900s dream man – but just as easily, he could be an old-timey sarsaparilla-scented burlap douchebag. Let’s discuss.

Gilbert Blythe, D-Bag

I’ll defer to our Anne of Green Gables synopsis from our last post about the book: “Published in 1908, Lucy Maud Montgomery’s story is a timeless tale of orphans and family and imagination and screwing up your hair and dreams and getting your friend drunk by accident and Canada and Canadians and will they/won’t they romance and child-buying. Especially child-buying. When Anne, a plucky carrot-topped orphan with a heart of gold, ends up in Green Gables, she brings love, light, and happiness to Matthew and Marilla, a brother and sister who are married or whatever. ” Today, we look into the romance in question, between Anne – a child nobody has ever loved, who longs to achieve despite an early childhood deprived of education – and Gilbert, a boy who has parents and stuff but is still really mean to the orphan who wasn’t allowed to go to school.

I mean, Gilbert. First of all. Your top academic rival is a little girl who had to raise a litter of Garbage Pail twins and talk to herself in the woods instead of going to school. You think she’s weird? I don’t know, maybe it’s because her only childhood friend was herself, in a mirror. Then she finally gets to interact with humans and basically manages not to seem like a feral child – success! And you mock her, day 1. Kind of a dick move, Blythe.

If you’ve forgotten, Gilbert called Anne “carrots” and pulled her hair. Here’s something boys don’t seem to get: it hurts when you pull hair, because that shit is hooked onto your scalp. Also, “carrots” is sort of a juvenile insult for a thirteen-year-old. Oh, what’s that? Isn’t Anne 11? Yeah, she is – but Gilbert missed school for a few years to help out his sick dad or something. If Anne of Green Gables were a 1980s sitcom that’s the part where Anne would scream “Yeah? Well at least you HAVE a father!” and storm off. But the point is, at thirteen it’s pretty pathetic to have to make fun of a child two years younger than you, much less one who is the indentured servant of a mean old bag and an elderly man who’s afraid of her. I’m sure it’s in part due to Gilbert’s teasing that Anne dyed her hair green that one time.

In our last Anne Of Green Gables post, I posited that we could call an Anne and Gilbert post “Anne And Gilbert: Shit Or Get Off The Pot,” or alternately, “Anne And Gilbert: When You Hate Someone It’s Probably Not Because You Secretly Love Them.” If you’re a young lady, I want you to repeat that last title to yourself a few times until it really sinks in. When you hate someone, it’s probably not because you secretly love them. Also, if a boy treats you like garbage it’s probably because he’s garbage, not because he’s in love with you and doesn’t know how to show it. What nonsense is that? But people believe it, and maybe Anne and Gilbert are a little to blame. Or maybe …. maybe she liked him for a reason. Maybe, just maybe, he was the dirtbag of her dreams.

Gilbert Blythe, Dream Man

First of all, in Gilbert’s defense, Anne is kind of an idiot. We know that she grew up in shacks and orphanages, and we aren’t saying it’s her fault she’s an idiot, but she still is. It’s like when that homeschooled kid whose parents forgot to socialize her would transfer to your school, and she just didn’t grasp social norms. You understood that she was struggling with the whole… milieu, or what have you…. but that didn’t mean you particularly wanted to hang out on weekends (don’t worry, I know, #NotAllHomeschoolers).

So, yeah, he did call her carrots. She was particularly sensitive about her red hair, so I do get that. But that was ONE TIME. Chill, Anne. You’re going to let that follow you for your entire high school experience, or whatever you call high school when it’s a one-room schoolhouse and your teacher is banging Prissy Andrews? He pulled your hair, he didn’t kill your parents. He couldn’t because you don’t have any. As far as insults go, carrots is pretty weak. Hair-pulling is admittedly shitty, but holy cow, Anne broke a slate over his head. Slates were what chalkboards were made of before Pinterest invented chalkboard paint, and those things had sharp edges. Disproportional use of force, Anne. Jeez. Anything stupid Gilbert did after that point is probably because you concussed him.

Also, Gilbert isn’t the one who declared an academic rivalry; that was all Anne. And when you really think about it, she picked the kid who had been out of school for two years taking care of a parent (pressed much?). Talk about low-hanging fruit.

Anne didn’t really chill out until Gilbert saved her life. Gilbert wouldn’t have had to save Anne’s life if she hadn’t set herself off down a body of water pretending to be a poem. Classic Anne, y’all. Also I was joking that it’s Gilbert’s fault she dyed her hair green; that was her own shit.

My take? As a kid, I was firmly in the Gilbert Blythe, D-Bag camp. He reminded me of boys who would make fun of me for having red hair, or freckles, or reading too much. But now I see that Anne needs to get a damn grip. A lot of people are kind of awful when they’re 13. I’d go so far as to say that most kids hit a developmental stage of just being horrible people somewhere around middle school. So Gilbert made fun of you one time? Meh. No big. I’m glad that Anne eventually realized that he had a good heart, sharp mind, and awesome hair so their six kids weren’t all total carrots. And considering they named their son Shirley, those kids needed all the help they could get.

 

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This Is Not Journalism: Best Dressed Of The Nerd Prom

Posted in Entertainment, Outfit Girl by

When Hillary Clinton officially announced her candidacy, I was 97% excited and 3% bummed. That 3% was because I knew that from this point onward, we were in for journalistic masterpieces like Pantsuit Watch 2016. At this weekend’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner, Cecily Strong solved that problem once and for all:

 

It should go without saying that a public figure’s appearance is not news – unless she makes it news. One time when that happens is on the red carpet: part of the deal is that celebrities help promote their designers by mentioning who they’re wearing. We’ll be the first to admit that there’s a home for fashion commentary online – we love outfits so much that we have a post category called Outfit Girl, after all. But what would it look like if journalists paid the barest attention to fashion – just the facts – then switched over to the stuff that really matters? Let’s try it out with the top looks from the White House Correspondent’s dinner.

Michelle Obama

Michelle Obama is a Harvard-educated lawyer wearing a metallic silver dress by Zac Posen. Her Let’s Move! campaign endeavors to reverse the childhood obesity epidemic in the U.S. by promoting exercise and a healthy diet. She has publicly backed economic stimulus packages, the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay act, and LGBT equality, and has made a number of diplomatic trips in the capacity of First Lady. It is an unpaid position, and her hair looks awesome curly.

Cecily Strong

Cecily Strong made her SNL debut at the age of 28, and quickly gained popularity for her off-the-wall characters like the Girl You Wish You Hadn’t Started A Conversation With At A Party. Strong has a BFA in fine arts from CalArts and will be a Ghostbuster next year. This year she served as host of the White House Correspondent’s Dinner, and her appearance was so hilarious that you should just watch the whole thing here. You can locate the funniest jokes by finding which ones nobody laughs at because they’re not sure if they’re allowed to. Here she is in a black and purple gown by J.Mendel and some strong eye makeup, mere hours before absolutely killing it in front of Washington and Hollywood elite.

Gina Rodriguez

Gina Rodriguez is the Golden Globe-winning star of Jane The Virgin, and she used her Globes acceptance speech to express thanks to the Latino community and call out the need for more, and more varied, representation of Latinos in the media. Rodriguez said “This award is so much more than myself, it represents a culture that wants to see themselves as heroes […] My father used to tell me to say every morning, ‘Today is going to be a great day. I can and I will.’ Well, Dad — Today is a great day. I can and I did.” At the White House Correspondents’ dinner, Rodriguez wore a rose-colored Gustav Cadile gown.

Idina Menzel

Idina Menzel is a Tony-winning actress who has also appeared on film and in television, but you may know her best as the voice of Elsa in Frozen … or as Maureen from Rent or Elphaba from Wicked; I guess that depends on your demographic. In addition to her impressive list of stage credits, Menzel created the A BroaderWay Foundation with then-husband Taye Diggs to support disadvantaged youth in the arts. At the WHCD, Menzel sported blonder-than-usual hair, perfect for her upcoming summer-long world tour.  She wore a Monique Lhuillier gown; clutch is by Judith Leiber and jewels are by Jacob & Co.

Lucy Liu

Lucy Liu, an actress known for her roles in Ally McBeal, Southland and Elementary, is also an accomplished visual artist who is fluent in Mandarin. Liu has worked to spread knowledge about human trafficking, as well as serving as a spokesperson for the Human Rights Campaign. Here she is discussing the importance of representation in television:

Also, that sparkly gown is to die for.

Jane Fonda

This sequin gown by Donna Karan is reminiscent of Jane Fonda’s costumes in her breakout role in the 1968 film Barbarella. Since then, Fonda has won two Oscars and built an exercise video empire which – speaking of outfits – popularized that 80s aerobic gear that looks like nothing so much as a full-body wedgie. After sparking controversy for opposing the Vietnam War and supporting the Black Panthers, Fonda’s activism efforts have included establishing the Jane Fonda Center for Adolescent Reproductive Health at Emory University and participating in anti-Iraq War protests.

Ashley Judd

It’s been a rough couple months for Ashley Judd on the internet, so first something positive: she looks fantastic in this Badgley Mischka gown. Missed the online controversy? After posting some rather innocuous tweets in support of her alma mater’s basketball team – the Kentucky Wildcats – Judd faced a deluge of vulgar and threatening messages from mean-spirited trolls. As people who write stuff on the internet, we wouldn’t wish this kind of attack on anybody. However, Judd has spoken out on the inadequacies of platforms like Twitter in dealing with threats, sparking a discussion of how scary and upsetting online bullying can be – and this high-profile commentary just might help change things for the better. This isn’t the only cause Judd supports: she is on the board of directors of YouthAIDS and the  Leadership Council of the International Center for Research on Women.

Connie Britton

On Friday Night Lights, Connie Britton played the fantastic Tami Taylor, my favorite Texan I’m not related to. In real life, Britton is a Dartmouth grad with a resume including television (FNL, Nashville), theater, and film. Outside of her day job, she is a goodwill ambassador with the United Nations Development Programme. Gown by Halston Heritage.

Laverne Cox

If you don’t know who Laverne Cox is, that means you haven’t seen Orange Is The New Black – so first things first, queue it up on Netflix and you won’t regret it. Cox, a graduate of Marymount Manhattan College, was the first openly transgender person to be nominated for an acting Emmy. She has participated in a number of interviews and documentaries to promote understanding and dispel misconceptions about trans people, and speaking of visibility, will you look at her in this silver Ines Di Santo gown?

Barack Obama

Barack Obama, best known as the President Of The United States, is wearing a classic black tux with a bow tie and a flash of white pocket square. Shirt buttons are a dark contrast – mother of pearl, perhaps? – and the lapel is accessorized with a Tiny American Flag Pin. When he isn’t dazzling crowds with red-carpet panache, President Obama is expanding Americans’ access to health care through the Affordable Care Act, tackling financial reform with the passage of the Dodd-Frank act, shoring up the post-recession economy with economic stimuli, and Obama still has time to raise two teenagers and play the occasional pickup game with his Washington buds.

Coachella 2015 Fashion Wrap-Up

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It doesn’t seem like a desert music festival – where people willingly subject themselves to sleeping in tents and peeing in porta potties – could house a fashion oasis. But sometimes, Coachella is just that. The festival is also home to its fair share of fashion missteps, but as a two-weekend event in which people can wear whatever they want without impunity, it may not always be pretty but it’s always interesting.

Jaden Smith

I don’t have a younger brother, but I do have Jaden Smith and that’s basically the same thing. Whether I’m shaking my head over his scrunchy forehead poop face or illustrating his grandiose philosophical musings, I can’t help but get a kick out of that little scamp. He has all of the youthful self-importance of Justin Bieber, but it’s less annoying because unlike Bieber he seems to at least have a good heart. Or any heart. Jaden’s latest exploit: wearing a kicky floral frock and a lush red flower crown at Coachella. Can we retire flower crowns from music festivals now? Because we have already established who wore it best once and for all, and it’s Jaden Smith.

Beyonce

LOL no just kidding, Jaden Smith didn’t wear the flower crown best. Beyonce did – and that’s no insult to Jaden, it’s just that anything that Beyonce wears, she probably looks better than everyone else in. That’s why her t-shirt reads “Go Burn Your Flower Crown.” With denim shorts and natural makeup, it’s like Beyonce is playing dress-up as a regular civilian.

Nicki Minaj

So apparently, those are plaid shorts with a faux plaid shirt sewn around the waist. It reminds me of those cardigans with the built-in half camisole I used to wear in 1998, or those skorts with the shorts attached to the skirt. Except Nicki Minaj is wearing it instead of 12-year-old me, so it looks cool. Note Nicki’s take on the once-ubiquitous feather headdress (ugh): a giant feather crown.

Joshua Jackson

Pacey Witter is wearing the same hat my dad always wears, and that feels weird to me. It’s also the hat that is ceremoniously bestowed at age 16 on American men who are really into people thinking that they have Irish heritage. Also pictured: Diane Kruger and Nina Dobrev. Yeah, they all just look like regular people in normal clothes. Let’s move along.

 Katy Perry

What I love about this is that the loose, billowy fabric is probably great in this weather, as is the slicked-down hair: I can’t even look at Coachella pictures without feeling like I’m losing a fight with the frizz-monster. Besides, she has such a pretty face (sorry, I’m your grandma) and it’s nice to have her hair out of it. Those sandals look great too. The choker is really fun but in the Indio heat, having metal clamped right against your neck might be a bit unpleasant. Anyone want to take bets on how often her train got stepped on?

John Mayer

Listen closely. You hear that? It’s my 17-year-old self, weeping. I want to draw your attention to the gentleman to the left. That’s how my face is right now.

Whitney Port

In the early 90s, the ladies’ pajama departments of stores like Ames and T.J. Maxx used to run ads with ladies in long, billowing nightgowns. They’d often be looking dreamy near a window or on a porch swing. They usually had long blonde hair in a french braid with meticulously curled-under wispy bangs. This is the exact nightgown they were wearing. It looks cute on her, though.

 The Kardashian-Jenner Sisters

I don’t know which Kardashian sisters are which. I mean, I know which one Khloe is. And I know which two are really Jenners, although I can’t tell one Jenner from the other. And I say this as someone who gets annoyed that none of my distant relatives or parents’ friends can tell me apart from my sister. So anyway, here are both Jenners and Khloe Kardashian (the one I can identify). They are wearing outfits I would hate sweating in. The far left Jenner will have some rough tan lines this week. I am very happy to see that they’re all confirming that ankle booties are still in though!

Florence Welch

Florence Welch sported the most badass accessory of the festival: a freshly broken foot. She fractured it leaping off stage, but carried on like the, well, machine that she is. Aside from the foot, she kept things loose and light-colored, perfect for a festival that, as we’ve said, seems really uncomfy to both of us.

FKA Twigs

Between this and the Jenner, I guess the in thing is dressing like Princess Leia when she was enslaved by Jabba the Hutt. Twigs is so pretty, though. Better her than me, having to represent this trend. Bless.She also wore this, which is interesting and probably lovely, but I can’t find a clear picture of it. Sculpted baby hairs haven’t been this in since the late 90s.

Rosie Huntington-Whitely

This is probably the most ladylike anybody has or will ever look at Coachella.

The Jenners, Again

These gals don’t look bad, per se. They just look like teenagers having fun at Coachella. But man, do I wish those hot pants that look like saggy diapers would go away.

Rihanna

When I was in my early makeup wearing years, I remember reading that you should not match your lipstick or your eyeshadow to your outfit, because that’s tacky. Rihanna probably read that same advice as a youngster, then realized that she’s Rihanna and she is wearing a full-length purple fur coat and she can put whatever the heck she wants on her lips.

Jourdan Dunn

These heavy metallic necklaces are  really making me cringe. Also did Coach just set a bunch of models loose at Coachella with their bags as some sort of viral marketing? Also, do you think I would look more like Jourdan Dunn or Rosie Huntington-Whitely if I were carrying a Coach bag??

Hozier

It’s like they always say. You can take the man out of Ireland… but he’s still going to wear some rumply brown stuff and like 5 layers. Also, Aaron Paul. I’m not sure what his hair is doing, but I don’t really need to know.

 

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Gwyneth’s Goop Kitchen: How Fast Would You Die?

Posted in Miscellany by

I’d love to live like Gwyneth Paltrow, but it would probably kill me. We’ve reviewed the ridiculous prices for, like, a plain white t-shirt on Goop. We’ve also looked at how to beautify your “conscious uncoupling” with a mock divorce Pinterest board. I surely couldn’t afford that sort of lifestyle, but what if Gwyneth tried to live more like us plebes? This week we learned the answer, when Gwynnie tried to buy a week’s worth of groceries on a $29 SNAP budget. Here’s what she came up with:

Yo. That looks like the food version of being grounded. It is the dinner world’s answer to being in-school suspended. It’s like if a spin instructor was in charge of the menu for a jail.

This hurts me more than it hurts you: I’m about to do some math. Let’s do some good old-fashioned calorie counting! Word problems! For anyone currently muddling their way through Common Core, feel free to draw a spirograph or make a hand-turkey or however it is that you do math now.

12 eggs, at 80 calories per egg: 960 calories

Black Beans, 16 oz: 1552 calories

Frozen Peas, 12 oz: 264 calories

Whole Grain Brown Rice, 16 oz: 1609 calories

1 medium sweet potato: 115 calories

1 head romaine lettuce: 108 calories

1 medium white onion: 50 calories

1 green chili pepper, I think: 18 calories

1 avocado: 320 calories

Roughly 10 scallions, at 8 calories per scallion: 80 calories

1 ear of corn: 100 calories

1 tomato: 25 calories

1 head of garlic: 50 calories

1 bunch of kale: 140 calories

18 Guerrera flour tortillas, at 130 calories per tortilla: 2340 calories

1 bunch of cilantro, if you’re into that: 23 calories

Seven limes. SEVEN limes. Seven LIMES: 140 calories

Want to add it up? You don’t have to. It’s 7,754. There are seven days in a week. That’s easy to remember, because that’s how many damn limes Gwyneth bought. Okay, 7,731 divided by 7: 1,107.7 Let’s round up to 1,108.

Let me just write that for you again.

1,108.

That’s how many calories a person is supposed to eat in a day, according to Gwyneth. I’m just assuming this is for one person, because otherwise we’re at something like 553 calories a day for two people.

I think Gwyneth’s point was supposed to be that eating healthy on food assistance is hard to do, but ultimately possible. Instead, she proved what a lot of people already know:

  • you can never have too many limes?
  • you CAN have too many limes, but that point is somewhere in the double-digits for a week?
  • a lime a day keeps the macrobiotics away? (Still not 100% on what a macrobiotic is, sounds like maybe a transforming food-monster action figure.)
  • roughly half of your food should be from the onion-and-garlic family (no wonder Gwyneth and Coldplay got consciously uncoupled)?
  • there’s no better afterschool snack than 1/7 of a juicy red tomato?
  • That if you have a very limited food budget, you may as well buy 10 Totino’s pizzas for $8 or a loaf of day-old white bread for a few bucks so that you don’t wake up in the middle of every night with food nightmares.

Oh, Gwyneth, Gwyneth, Gwyneth. You seem like a nice gal just trying to spread the word about something you care about. But I can tell you first-hand that writing about things you care about on the internet is the surest way to get insulted by strangers. I can also tell you that this diet blows. As they say, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. And the road to an electrolyte imbalance is paved with a menu of multiple scallions a day with a side of 1/7 of an avocado.

 

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Remember Titanic Mania? That Was Weird, Right?

Posted in Entertainment, GSOY (Gratuitous Story of Yourself) by

103 years ago today, the Titanic met its tragic fate. And 17 years ago today, we were all being tacky as hell. The Titanic craze of 1997-1998 was unlike any media phenomenon I’ve experienced before or since, both in how pervasive and fanatical it was, and also in that we all sort of acted super questionable.

Let’s recap a bit in case you’ve forgotten about Titanic Mania, were too young for it, or just weren’t paying attention. First, the Titanic sank. It was 1912 and a lot of people died and it was, of course, very sad. Fast forward 80-some years to late 1997. James Cameron directed a giant historical epic about the event, starring teen sensations Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet. That’s when things got weird.

For as long as cinema has existed, we haven’t been able to resist portraying real-life tragedies on-screen. Want to guess how long the first Titanic movie was released after the sinking? 29 days. Not even a full month, unless the month was February, which of course it wasn’t because every mid-90s tween has the date “April 15, 1912” etched onto their soul. There were actually three Titanic movies released in 1912 alone, so it’s not like I think that James Cameron’s Titanic was unusually iffy.

The way we all reacted to that movie though – that’s what was weird. We just lost it. Keep in mind, this was a movie about a real-life disaster, and survivors were even still alive at the time. You’d think we would have maintained a bit of decorum, or solemnity, or SOMETHING, but that sunken boat became a pop culture figure along the lines of Mickey Mouse or Rocky.

Real.

We had reasons, sort of. We were both obsessed, but we were also in sixth grade. It was the beginning of being interested in “grown-up” romances instead of kid stuff, making it much more touching and serious. I was rewatching Titanic a few years ago – mind you, I could rewatch Titanic in my brain any time I wanted because I still have it memorized thanks to that two-cassette pack I got for my 12th birthday – anyway, it jumped out at me that Rose and Jack had known each other for, like, four days max. They had all the emotional investment of a one-night stand. No wonder Old Rose hadn’t mentioned the story to her family. “I’m really sad about this guy I went out Irish Dancing with one time then banged in a car and he died 80 years ago?” Get a grip, Grams.

You know, like most randos you hooked up with when you were 17.

Even though Rose and Jack were two teenagers creating the 1912 version of nude selfies, in 1998 they represented a long-gone era of decorum. The winter all of the news stations were focused on the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal, we wanted stories about ladies and gentlemen. Maybe that was why even people over the age of 15 lost their cool. But what happened next… I don’t have an excuse for that.

It’s like this. Liking a movie about a horrific tragedy is pretty normal. Holding themed club nights about the tragedy is not. It’s not just that Titanic sold a lot of tickets. Here are some of wacky things that we did during Titanic mania:

  • You could buy reproductions of Rose’s Heart Of The Ocean necklace, a gift for a teen girl’s forced arranged marriage that she got painted in naked one time. If memory serves, the ads ran in USA Weekend for months, maybe years.
  • A local (Rochester, NY) club held “Titanic night” which sounds like an evening when a massive code violation results in the death of hundreds. Commercials played on our top 40 station, but I’ll never know what happened at Titanic Night because I was 11.

    You can still visit a Titanic club somewhere.

  • JC Penney sold t-shirts depicting the aforementioned teen bride and a boy who’s days away from death by freezing.

    It is a shirt with a dying man on it.

  • The Titanic soundtrack was a best-seller, and a follow-up soundtrack was even released. It was the first and only time in my life that it was really cool that I’m a good tin whistle player. Teens everywhere queued up fiddle music and Edwardian novelty songs (Come Josephine In My Flying Machine, anyone?), sat on our bedspreads, and had a good cry about the souls when went down with the ship.
  • That damn Celine Dion song. Everywhere. All the time. My favorite was the version where they interspersed clips of dialog into the song. There was also a club remix, which probably was played at that club’s Titanic Night.
  • Everyone had that one friend who saw the movie something like 13 times in the theater. This led to the film staying at the top of the box office for 15 straight weeks. I know this because I checked the box office reports every week to make sure Titanic was still at its rightful place.
  • In a pre-tumblr world, you would log onto Lycos and find AngelSites and GeoCities pages about the movie and the boat. I bet if you added up all the time I’ve spent on the internet in my life, a big chunk of it was spent trawling those sites. Most included a tinny midi file of My Heart Will Go On.
  • Just about every magazine launched a “Special Collector’s Issue” about the movie.
  • Titanic vacations allowed rich people to see a shipwreck/mass grave site up close. I wished I could be so rich.
  • The New York Times book list was full of books about Titanic, including then-50-year-old A Night To Remember and a nonfiction, full-color book about the making of the movie. Yeah, I checked the book charts weekly, too.
  • Kids threw “Titanic Parties.” Kids are stupid and the parties were tacky, including 11-year-old girls – commonly known to be the worst type of human – screaming “I’m The King Of The World!” throughout the graveyard where the frozen bodies of Titanic victims had been buried.

    SINKING SHIP WATERMELON BOWL. The grapes represent dead humans? But props to this mom for just being like “you want a Titanic party? Whatever. I’ll make lifeboat cupcakes.” I bet she’s fun.

  • It was also a popular prom theme… and you thought your prom was a disaster.
  • Websites popped up selling dress patterns so that you, too, could have the grace and panache of Rose Dewitt Bukater. I’m not ashamed to say that I would wear that swishy chiffon one right now.
  • In the area where sixth graders congregated before school, there was a massive snow-pile for the duration of the winter, as is typical of the North. What’s not typical is naming it after the iceberg that ultimately took the lives of thousands.
  • I won a game of charades by pantomiming Titanic.
  • Robert Ballard, who discovered the Titanic, visited my school to kick off a science program, the JASON project. A lot of 10-year-olds were suddenly very into marine biology.

Long after the film was released, Titanic Mania has lingered. In 2012 you could attend a cruise above the underwater gravesite, which hosted a huge fete on the 100-year anniversary of the sinking. You can visit Pinterest to learn to bake a Titanic cake, and tumblr has every Caledon Hockley gif you ever wanted.  But make no mistake: Titanic mania could never happen in the uniquely, grotesquely weird way it did today. We move through our obsessions more quickly than that. And although individuals joked about the story, the high-level schmaltz that pervaded our culture just wouldn’t stand. There would be jokey memes within the first day of release, and a #waterygrave hashtag in a week. Titanic mania was a strange combination of sentimentality and cheese. It was freaking weird, and I loved it, and my heart will go on.

 

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Adult Language: When Did I Start Talking Like An Old Lady?

Posted in GSOY (Gratuitous Story of Yourself) by

I used to think that old people used old-people words because it was how people talked when they were growing up. But lately, something strange has been happening. I open my mouth to speak, and the vocabulary of an old man tumbles out. I’m starting to think that as you get older your brain gets repopulated with a dictionary of “adult language.” I don’t mean the kind that nets you a PG-13 rating, or the deliberately stodgy words that some people say to be funny, like “kerfuffle” or “gee whilickers.”  They’re just these words that I thought only people who were born prior to 1950 used – until now.

Blouse

I cannot overstate how much I hated “blouse” growing up. It always sounded poofy and ruffly, like the Puffy Shirt from Seinfeld. A few years ago, I decided that it was sort of funny to refer to shirts as “blouses,” like I was the kind of lady who also planned vacations using a travel agent and had some sort of deliberate hairdo. It is slowly trickling into my regular vocab list.

Girlfriend

It’s kind of misleading to call your platonic female friends your “girlfriends.” Whenever a coworker or casual acquaintance mentions going to a movie with her “girlfriend” or her “girlfriend who lives downstate” I try to ask vague yet leading questions to figure out what, exactly, is up so that I don’t say something stupid later. But in some ways, girlfriend is more specific than friend – I always think it implies a fairly close friend, not some rando you get coffee with occasionally – and it sounds more adult than “best friend.” Just like “blouse,” this entered my vocab because it tickled my funnybone, but I think it’s here to stay.

Slacks

They’re slimmer and less schlumpy than “pants.” They aren’t necessarily khakis. They aren’t jeans. They’re slacks. Oh god, I’m the oldest lady in the world.

Pocketbook

I don’t know what it is, but lately my usual term – purse – has started to sound like an old-lady word itself. If you listen to it divorced of context, it even sounds like something they would have named a baby girl in 1905. Bertha. Maude. Gertrude. Purse. Handbag is a likely alternative, but I don’t think anything I own costs enough to qualify as a handbag. I usually just say “bag” – but I think “pocketbook.”

Chit-Chat

I remember a substitute teacher who always used to say “ladies, this isn’t the Chit-Chat Club” when my friends and I were talking. And I always used to think “I wish it were, that sounds like the best club ever!” Now I am an old lady both in that I use the phrase “chit chat” to describe idle talk, and also because I have developed a total aversion to it. Chit chat club? Blegh. No thank you.

Program

I usually call t.v. shows “shows,” because I am 28 years old. I know some people say “stories” from time to time, but that’s when they’re trying to be cute. But program is what my old Italian neighbor, Nancy, used to say. Apparently the old lady in my brain also says “program,” because I found myself saying it entirely by accident a few months ago.

Scram

Every day I catch the bus in a station teeming with high schoolers. They stand in clusters talking way too loud and laughing at things that aren’t funny. And every time I move through a chunk of teenagers trying to catch my bus, I think “why won’t these kids just scram!” “Get out” sounds too basic, and “dissemble” too dainty. What I really want these youths to do is scram.

Smart

Not in terms of intelligent, but as in crisply tailored. I don’t know if it’s so much an old lady term, or that before my mid-20s I wasn’t as interested in owning a “smart blazer.”

Sharp

I swear, I told one of my nephews he looked “really sharp” in his Easter outfit. But he was wearing a smart tie, what else was I supposed to say?

Book Bag or Backpack

Speaking of those crazy kiddos, several months ago I told one of the four-year-olds to get his book bag. Or backpack. I can’t remember which one, because in my mind they’re interchangeable. Apparently for children born in the 2010s, they are NOT. I was swiftly and sternly corrected. It’s already happening. Using normal words from my youth is making me sound like an old lady. He’s just lucky I don’t call his Leapfrog device a “Gameboy.”

Grade School

I thought this was normal, too. Apparently it’s not. Apparently you’re supposed to say “elementary school,” which I thought was the same thing. But whether you say elementary or grade, I think we can agree that the REAL old man phrase is “grammar school,” and I’m not there – yet.

Weenie

A few years ago, my cousin described Pete Cambell from Mad Men as a “weenie.” Pete is the ultimate weenie, and I was so tickled by the word that it entered my everyday vocab. It’s an outmoded term, but totally useful. There are plenty of guys you’d usually call a douche or a bro, but they have that extra simpering quality that makes them weenies.

TV Set

When I was shopping for a new television, I accidentally said “tv set.” Woah. Nobody really says that anymore. It reminds me of how my parents still say “vacuum sweeper.” Yeah, they put a nickname on my birth certificate, yet they go through the trouble of saying “vacuum sweeper.” The older I get, the more I understand.
I could keep going: housedress, lunch pail (this is actually what my dad used to say when I was a kid), luncheon, lollygag (another dad favorite). I used to be young and relatively hip, but those days are over. Now I just put on my blouse and slacks and lollygag in front of the TV set with my girlfriends, speaking in the least cool “adult language” ever.

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When Poets Blow It: Guess The Celebrity Bards!

Posted in GSOY (Gratuitous Story of Yourself) by

It can be very hard for celebrities to know what they’re bad at. I say that with genuine empathy. Once you reach a certain level of fame, you are probably surrounded by people telling you how wonderful you are at everything. It must be difficult to parse out who’s just humoring you. Somebody at some point told all of these celebrities that they were good at poetry, and you know what? I have to commend them for trying. See, even though an enthusiastic fifth grade teacher probably told all of us that “everybody can write poetry,” the fact remains that most people shouldn’t.

These stars aren’t exactly Dylan Thomas staggering through Chelsea or Mary Oliver roaming through a woodland with, like, a gentle fox, but they put forth an effort. Some of them – though not technically great writers – even managed to capture their personal voice in their poems, something that even accomplished writers can struggle with. Don’t believe me? Try guessing which celebrity wrote these tragic verses. If you’re up for it, you could even stage a poetry reading! With verses about three-way phone calls, an assistant named Fe, and bitchy organic food enthusiasts who don’t know how to stay in their gluten-free lane, you’re in for a good time.

Like all good fifth grade workbooks, we”ll even provide a “word bank”:

  • Suzanne Somers
  • Ashanti
  • Jennifer Aniston
  • Charlie Sheen
  • Pamela Anderson
  • Britney Spears
  • Sean Penn
  • Rosie O’Donnell
  • James Franco
  • Sarah Palin
  • Kate Moss
  • Ally Sheedy
  • Jewel
  • Kristen Stewart

Okay, here come the poems!

I reared digital moonlight
You read its clock, scrawled neon across that black
Kismetly … ubiquitously crest fallen
Thrown down to strafe your foothills
…I’ll suck the bones pretty.

  • ANSWER: Kristen Stewart, From My Heart Is A Wiffle Ball/Freedom Pole

Lucky in love
Lucky in love
Didn’t forget me when I asked you to leave me
Didn’t forget me
Now you’re alongside me
You’ve brought luck to love
I’ve been hit by a truck in love.”

  • ANSWER: Jennifer Aniston, re: John Mayer

honeymoon at last, to get away from it all
My assistant Fe gave me the call.

I remember it well, as she was smilin’
She said it was called Turtle Island.

I packed my bags light and quick,
Then grabbed my pink dress & favorite lipstick.

  • ANSWER: Britney Spears, in Honeymoon Poem

There had been a time
When we were up for the same roles,
10 Things I Hate about You
(Based on The Taming of the Shrew),
And The Patriot —
Funny, you were Australian and so was Mel —
You were the knight in A Knight’s Tale
Although I’m sure you wished you weren’t.

  • ANSWER: James Franco, in Ledger

Excuse me, aren’t you…?”
“Hey, you look just like…”
“Oh my God, that’s…”
“Sorry to interrupt your dinner, but aren’t you…”
“Look, I never do this, but, my wife thinks you’re…”
“My friend is so convinced that you’re…”
“I’m so embarrassed, but, aren’t you…?”
“I know you must be tired of this, but…”
“WAIT!!”
All eyes held in stare, all mouths locked open in shock, as he pulled the latex [REDACTED] mask from his head, revealing the rotted skull of President Lincoln.

  • ANSWER: Charlie Sheen, in I.D. Blues (redacted = “Charlie Sheen,” of course)

Organic girl dropped by last night

For nothing in particular

Except to tell me again how beautiful and serene she feels

On uncooked vegetables and wheat germ fortified by bean sprouts—

Mixed with yeast and egg whites on really big days—

She not only meditates regularly, but looks at me like I should

And lectures me about meat and ice cream

And other aggressive foods I shouldn’t eat.

  • ANSWER: Suzanne Somers, in Organic Girl

I do not like this Uncle Sam. I do not like his health care scam.

I do not like — oh, just you wait — I do not like these dirty crooks, or how they lie and cook the books.

I do not like when Congress steals, I do not like their crony deals.

I do not like this spying, man, I do not like, ‘Oh, Yes we can.’

I do not like this spending spree, we’re smart, we know there’s nothing free.

I do not like reporters’ smug replies when I complain about their lies.

I do not like this kind of hope, and we won’t take it, nope, nope, nope.

  • ANSWER: Sarah Palin, in an actual speech at a real convention

 

I’ve been thinking you’ve been cheatin
and you know that’s just not right
So just to be sure
I gave you a call
to see exactly what you’d say
You said, “Girl you know I’m not lyin!”
Good, lets call her on three-way

  • ANSWER: Ashanti, in Three-Way

…ME – I miss PLAYBOY – The end of an Era – Chivalry, elegance, celebrated imperfections…

  • ANSWER: Pamela Anderson, in Untitled Facebook Poem

we wait
it passes
kito – we figured out
was the place they stopped
b4 the galapagos

ee cummings was just lazy

  • ANSWER: Rosie O’Donnell in Aloha

brighter and brighter every day
calmer
my insides slosh about like a nauseous ocean
it takes great gulps of air
words from religious books
and Diet Cherry Coke to quiet the sound

  • ANSWER: Ally Sheedy in On The Road

I saw a woman
whose teeth were
straight like
White picket fensces
Until she looked
at her husband-
They they looked like
Shattered windows

  • ANSWER: Jewel in Untitled

What is this on my chin…?
It’s f**king s**t, man
All right
F**k this
F**k it
Give me a f**king shower.

  • Sean Penn in This Water’s Cold

 

 

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There Are A Lot Of Reasons To Hate Surprise Parties

Posted in GSOY (Gratuitous Story of Yourself) by

I’m not an April Fools’ Day person. Neither of us are. Wasting my time in the service of a joke that’s never even funny? No thanks. I’m also not a birthday person. I know this is aggravating, because I don’t want my loved ones to Sixteen Candles it and forget my birthday, but I also don’t want anyone to make a big fuss. This is actually more demanding than asking your friends to throw a straight-up bash, and for that I apologize. But you know what I don’t apologize for? Hating surprise parties, a.k.a. the birthday version of April Fools Day, a.k.a. the kind of parties they throw in hell. Seriously. When the devil has a birthday, John Wilkes Booth and freaking Hitler and like … is Genghis Khan something people still talk about?… all collude to get the devil to “meet his sister for brunch” so all his friends can leap out at him from the shadows. Screw surprise parties.

Surprise parties play into two of my biggest fears: people doing things without me, and people knowing things that I don’t. I’ve felt this way since I was a toddler. My mom used to make my siblings put on a mock-bedtime, saying their prayers and brushing their teeth, because I couldn’t go to sleep if I thought that everyone else was awake. Strike one: doing things without me. When I found out that everyone had been faking bedtime behind my back, I was livid. By the way, I found out when I was like 22. Strike two: knowing things I don’t.

I don’t even like when the animal kingdom tries to get the better of me. The other day I was walking my dog when we came across a flock of deer. As we passed not 20 feet away from them, the deer stood statue-still, hoping that we wouldn’t notice them. I could not let those deer think they had fooled me. I yelled “bye, deer!” after we passed them just so those animals knew damn well that I knew.

You ever know someone where your friends are like “you two should totally go out” or “we all know you’re going to end up together?” I will never let that happen, so strong is my aversion to people thinking they know my life.

And let’s talk about outfits. At least one day a week, I hate what I’m wearing by midday. That means that there is a solid one in seven chance that I would attend my own party wearing something I don’t even like. See? There are a lot of reasons to hate surprise parties.

Worst of all, all of your loved ones have to make a ruse of forgetting or not caring about a major life event, whether it’s a birthday, an engagement, or an anniversary. Two hours of being showered with love do not make up for weeks of thinking that everyone’s being a dick.

It wasn’t always like this. I was the victim of a surprise party when I was a kid, and I liked it.  It was a simple pool party at my aunt’s house, in late summer when I hadn’t seen some of my friends for months. My birthday was in September, so I never saw it coming. But even at 11 years old, I felt like such a putz. Having the wool pulled over your eyes isn’t better just because there’s confetti in the wool. My aunt didn’t really pick me up because she wanted me to go swimming at her house … I mean she did, she just wanted me to go swimming with cake and all of my best friends. Okay, I already admitted that my anti-surprise party stance is aggravating. And my mom didn’t ask who my best friends were because she cared, she asked because … she cared and wanted to invite them to a party to celebrate my birth. She’s a good mom, okay? But my outfit was still stupid.

Besides, I was a child then. As far as I’m concerned, big birthdays, as well as low-grade holidays like April Fools’ Day and Valentine’s Day, are for children. They just aren’t a good use of time. I mean, everybody was born once, it’s not that big a deal. Also, Surprise Parties are the party version of pranks, and you know how we feel about pranks: they’re jokes for unfunny people.

The worst is when you meet a family or friend group who do surprise parties for everything. Every time Ruth has a birthday or Margie has a baby, everyone pretends they aren’t doing anything for it, makes them go to some dumb fake outing, then – BAM! – they throw a party at them. And if you ask why they didn’t just tell Ruth or Margie that they were throwing a party,they’ll be like “oh, she’d say she doesn’t want it.”

YO. THAT’S BECAUSE RUTH DOESN’T WANT A PARTY, THEN. Respect that. There are a lot of reasons to hate surprise parties. I get it.

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The Frappuccino, And Other 20-Year-Old Foods

Posted in Miscellany by

Happy birthday, Frappuccino! Starbucks’ premier beverage – proof that a milkshake by any other name really would taste as sweet – just turned 20. That means that this year’s incoming college freshmen never even lived in a world without the frap. Good for them. Who would want to?

Okay, I’m not actually a hardcore frappuccino enthusiast. However, I can remember what a big deal they were when they first came out, during a time when “iced  coffee” was spoken in such a tone that you could actually hear the quotation marks around the phrase. The frap brought coffee and espresso beverages to a whole new season (summer) and a whole new demographic (children). I felt super grown-up ordering a Venti Mocha Frappuccino with Whip at Barnes and Noble in 6th grade while perusing James Cameron’s Titanic book for the third time because that shit costs $19.99 and my gift card is only for 15 dollars, and this became my gateway drug into the world of caffeinated drinks. Starbucks, at least in me, you have created a monster.

The mid-90s were actually a big, weird time in processed food history. While you’re sipping your signature Birthday Cake Frappuccino today, raise your glass to these other treats that turn the big 2-0 this year.

Stuffed Crust Pizza – Pizza Hut

Two of my childhood obsessions – pizza and mozzarella sticks – combined into one food? Pizza Hut, you shouldn’t have. I can still remember my excitement when my friend Patty’s mom ordered the stuffed crust pizza at a sleepover. There was a marinara dipping sauce, and despite the resemblance to mozzarella sticks, her mom didn’t remind me not to choke and die like my mom always did. [There was, like, one well-publicized news story about a kid choking on mozzarella sticks, and I’m pretty sure it was a baby, but moms grabbed onto that information and wouldn’t let go.] The commercials said that you would want to eat your pizza “crust first” but that’s not true. You’d save the best part for last. Stuffed crust pizza was at once entirely unnecessary and seriously so necessary.

DiGiorno Rising Crust Pizza

What about when it’s NOT delivery? In those cases, it’s probably DiGiorno. In 1995, the rising crust pizza burst onto the scene and while I wouldn’t say I ever confused it for delivery, it was a hell of a lot better than Boboli. Remember Boboli? Anyway, the main pitfall of the frozen pizza – the flat, crispy crust – faded into the past, and suddenly it seemed a lot more respectable to dish out the frozen pizza at a slumber party. Just not AS respectable as Stuffed Crust*.

*Don’t worry, the future is now and you can currently buy DiGiorno stuffed crust.

Blue M&Ms

Next time you pour a handful of M&Ms, take a good look at the color selection. Then imagine if all of the blue M&Ms were tan instead. Yes, tan. Prior to 1995, M&Ms were significantly less colorful, like the first part of the Wizard of Oz, but after a popular mid-90s contest, the candies brightened up, like the second part of the Wizard of Oz. There was a big, pre-social media campaign to name the new M&M color, but the other entries – purple and pink – were obviously not as M&M appropriate. I voted blue and was thrilled to see the Empire State Building lit up blue after the winner was announced (we’ve said it before, but it bears repeating: the 90s were weird).

Here’s a curveball. Shortly after the contest, my mom noticed that the M&M-sponsored worksheet she’d been using in her classroom for years referred to “blue M&Ms.” So, did they know it was going to be blue all along? Had the worksheet guy time-slipped into the future? And why was my mother using an M&Ms handout to teach fourth grade?

Fruitopia

Fruitopia celebrated two decades in 2014, or it would have if the bev hadn’t died with pogs and sunflower hats. It’s hard to believe that they could bottle so much 90s into one little drink. It had psychadelic branding, “natural” juice that … wasn’t, Gen X-y marketing, and Peace And Love(TM) product names. Remember begging at the gas station for a bottle of Strawberry Passion Awareness, The Grape Beyond, or Fruit Integration? Those NAMES, oy. Coca Cola retired the Fruitopia brand in 2003, folding some surviving flavors into their Minute Maid flagship. Yeah, although Fruitopia was for awesome skaters who hung out under wall tapestries and Minute Maid was for moms who make the bed by billowing a crisp, white sheet into the air near an open window, they were basically the same thing.

Twizzler Pull n’ Peel

The mid-90s was all about taking time-honored junk food and doing weird stuff to it. Enter the Twizzler Pull n Peel. I have to say, I was never a huge fan of Twizzlers, but something about breaking the hard, flat rope into a twisted mass of smaller, softer round ropes was absolutely delicious. You could savor a single Pull ‘n Peel twist for ages, or you could bite through the whole thing for a whole mouthful of Twizzler. These bad boys are twenty years old and show no signs of slowing down.

French Toast Crunch

French Toast Crunch was just one of many high-concept, dessert-y cereals, like Oreo Os or Cookie Crisp. If the idea of toast and syrup condensed into cereal-sized nuggets and doused in milk doesn’t appeal to you, that isn’t surprising. For nearly a decade – from 2006 until the recent past – the product was off the shelves.  But it’s back now, so if you want to relive the 90s head to your nearest grocery store. Be warned: this crap had some sharp corners.

Arch Deluxe – McDonald’s

Looking a bit ahead, next year we will be celebrating the 20th birthday of the most adult burger of all time. Do you remember this? McDonald’s marketing concept was to bill this as a “grown-up” menu item, even though it was just a regular burger with bacon and some sort of sauce on it. It worked, I guess, because I was so offended that McDonald’s thought kids would hate the Arch Deluxe that I begged to try it. It was okay, not great, but at twice the price and twice the calories of a traditional cheeseburger, it didn’t last long.

Pop Tarts Crunch

Like I said: the mid-90s saw a lot of tinkering with junk foods to create Franken-junkfoods. Pop Tarts were already so unhealthy that I was only allowed to eat them for breakfast after I’d had an acceptable breakfast. I think this was actually worse than just letting me eat them for breakfast, since not only was I eating PopTarts, I was also eating two breakfasts. But I digress. What if you couldn’t choose between pop tarts and cereal? For a brief, shining moment from 1994- 1995, that’s not a question you ever had to answer. Pop Tarts Crunch cereal combined all the sugary unhealthiness of Pop Tarts with all of the sugary unhealthiness of kids’ cereals. What a time it was.

Doritos Tacos – Taco Bell

Wait, aren’t these new? Yes. And no. Taco Bell launched the Doritos taco shell a few years ago, but the shell was invented by advertising interns in 1995. I am not at all surprised. Doritos were THE Food in 1995, and we were obsessed with morphing our snacks into other snacks. Plus Taco Bell was super cool at the time – just not cool enough to incorporate Doritos into their fake Mexican experience.

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