the slack daily

Things I Learned While Watching Pretty in Pink.

• That first outfit that Andie wears was my dream outfit that I attempted to recreate (poorly.) I don't think there re pictures, although I rocked the vest CONSTANTLY and did a lot of boxy jackets with pins.


• If you didn't want to be Annie Potts character Iona in Pretty in Pink when you grew up, then we wouldn't have been friends in High School.


• Iona talks about her friend missing Prom... "She realized nothing was missing...it was side effects from missing the Prom." WHICH IS WHY I WENT TO PROM STAG.


• I coveted that pink Kharmann Ghia. I now drive a pink Mini Cooper.


• I met director Howard Deutch at a party a couple of weeks ago. I tried not to fan out, so I turned to talk to the person he was with. His wife.


• Watching Andie listen to her messages from Duckie reminded me what a big deal it was to get a phone in my room. The phone jack was there...I just wasn't allowed a phone of my own until I was in 8th grade.

• I modded my gym suit my freshman year. I think there were boxer shorts with a ruffle that I wore under my gym shorts.


• I'm still a Duckie girl. (I married mine.)

Five Movies I Don't Want to See on my DVR.

Note: This post initially was published a couple of years ago on the comedy blog Pointless Banter, which Bobby Finstock traded for a "gently used" copy of Ted Bundy's address book.

The other day I was scrolling through the “to-do” list on our DVR to make sure that the LOST premiere would be recorded when I came across the following movie title, scheduled to record the next morning:

How to Murder Your Wife.

Will and I have an open relationship. Not meaning that we bone other people, but we’re pretty communicative about our thoughts and our feelings and all that sappy bullshit that you hear on Oprah (if I watched Oprah. Okay, I watched Oprah that once, but I was young and needed the morale boost.)

We’ve only been married nineteen months, so I’m sure this will eventually harden into a crust of resentment and rage.

Give us time.

But this got me to thinking about other things I don’t want to see showing up on my DVR:

 

Reversal of Fortune

Jeremy Irons gets an Oscar for being a possible-wife-murderer. This is not a good precedent for those of the wifely persuasion. 

I could fall into a persistent vegetative state by staring at Jeremy Irons' forehead.

 

Side note: I used to have a MAD CRUSH on Jeremy Irons, and now he's playing Pope Alexander VI in "The Borgias" and it's a little skeevy for this Catholic girl to have a crush on a Pope, although that particular pope would've been waaaaay into it.

 

The Lizzie McGuire Movie.

During my tenure on Lizzie McGuire, I discovered that the late-night airings were almost always our highest-rated shows. I don’t like to think about that too much.

 

Dirty Dancing, set for “Save Until I Delete.”

One could make an argument for a Swayze revival – now that we know he’s suffering from pancreatic cancer, he’s suddenly everyone’s new best friend (Christopher Reeve flashbacks, anyone?) and not the guy who did “Father Hood.” (Sigh. RIP, Mr. Swayze.)

Can I call you Baby? That’s what my father calls me!

 

Beaches.

Spoiler alert: she dies in the end. Girls in high school were obsessed with this movie. Watching the first few scenes made me wish I had been diagnosed with a terminal illness just to escape watching it.

 
"Some friendships last forever." That sounds like a threat.

Top Gun, cued up to the beach volleyball scene.

I don't want my husband asking me to be his Wingman, I want him to want to have sex with someone who has breasts. And I’m not talking about Goose - I'm talking about me.

 

It's weird to think there was a time when Tom Cruise wasn't crazy.

 

Anything you'd be freaked out to see on the DVR?

Et Tu, When in Rome?

There's a little RomCom coming out called "When in Rome."  You probably know this from hanging out around the bus stop and wondering why Kristen Bell is chewing on her finger "seductively" (who decided the finger chew was seductive? FREUD HAS GONE TOO FAR, PEOPLE) while Josh Duhamel lurks over her, deciding apparently whether to date her or serve her for dinner.

In the grand tradition of Commedia Macchina Del Pagliacci, Big People + Little Car = Nonstop Laughs.

I imagined that this movie would deliver exactly what they've promised. 

OR WOULD THEY?

SlackMom in Two Parts, and Another Thing.

Dinner last night: pierogi, galumpki (stuffed cabbage), polish sausage and rye bread. SlackNiece j. eats, then decides it's time to "run away." She takes off and promptly takes a header in the kitchen. Crying ensues. Most moms would run over with a hug or some ice. SlackMom runs over with sausage.

Here. Sausage makes it better.

SlackNiece stops crying.

SlackMom knows stuff.

...

Dinner tonight: Burgers and bloody marys at Alfies. I relate the tale of the last time I had dinner with A. We went to what had been our favorite restaurant when we were dating.

I don't come here a lot, he had said. They always ask about you.

That's funny, I responded, they never ask about you.

My mother shook her head. You're such a bitch.

But that great thing about SlackMom? She said it with pride.

...

Go see Casino Royale. Fun, fast, and the Daniel Craig is fabulous. My thoughts on the attractiveness of blonde boys is being challenged everywhere these days...