"He looks like he likes men."

I’m getting worried. Haley Joel Osment (of The Walker Texas Ranger “Walker told me I have AIDs” fame) is getting hot.

Oh, don’t get me wrong, it’s in a weird way.

But c’mon, isn’t he a little too old to be carried?



Only Dakota Fanning (who can kick your ass) can get away with that.

And that’s only because according to Tom, it’s “in her contract” that she has to be carried. Yeah. Whatever. That’s just him being weird again. I knew he was batty. I knew it when I saw him lick that chick’s face in Top Gun (best movie ever). That wasn’t acting, he just forgot where he was. That and the way he shleps Kate Holmes around like a Berkin bag while screaming "I LOVE THIS WOMAN! (I'M STRAIGHT!)" at the top of his lungs as if he's in some Jared's commercial (Do I smell a tie-in wedding promotion? Hollywood is so sketchy! I love it).

I leave for New York tomorrow and tension is high, especially with my dad since he’s unsure he will be able to pack everything he owns into one giant suitcase for a ten day stay. I, despite being a girl, do not have that problem because I live by the rule “pack what you’ll wear”. Let’s be honest here, we all know I’m probably just going to wear the same thing four days in row. I’m prone to that anyway (it happens when you don’t hang out with the same person every day). Throw in some socks, some underwear, my push up bras and some pajamas and you’re good to go.

“But what if I want to wear my polo shirt?” I hear my dad call from his bedroom.
“You won’t,” my mother and I answer him back in unison because we are one person, but he packs it regardless. He can pay when his bag is over the weight limit.

My cousin said he has a laundry service and since we’re staying in his apartment (he’s staying at his girlfriend’s while we’re there), I’m pretty much set. Except for the fact that, oh yeah, if I want to check my e-mail, I have to use dial up. But NY is a big city and I’m pretty sure that;
a. I won’t have time to check my e-mail
b. I won’t really care once I get there to check my e-mail
c. Maybe one of his neighbors has wireless (please) that I can steal.

I’m getting a pimple on my chin, thank G0d, because I was really worried I’d have to go on the trip without a pimple to take with me. Whew. So close.

My mom had me run to the store for some last minute things and I bought an oversized bottle of Fiji water.
“What the fuck did you buy that for?” She asked me.
I didn’t know how to lie to her, so I just answered truthfully, “Because everyone knows that if you’re famous and you’re thirsty and you just happen to be in an airport, you drink Fiji water. It is merely an attempt at looking more important than I really am.”
“You really love Lindsay Lohan don’t you?”
“Actually, I’m more Nicole these days, but,” I add quickly, “No one can replace my Hohan.”

Look forward to seeing me gush over New York in some fancy pictures sure to pop up within the next couple days.

Quote of the day:
“You have to be careful what you say to this one. She writes everything down.”
- My mother, how she introduces me to people.

“I can deal with the fact that he doesn't have a chin.”

I woke up a little after nine this morning, because I heard the ringing of our doorbell. I have a feeling I have a past life where I once lived during the Holocaust or something. A time when Jews would be awoken in the middle of the night by David Hasselhoff and carted like cattle to tall towers where they turned straw into gold; because for no reason at all, every time the door bell rings or someone knocks at the door, I feel like throwing up and hiding. No idea why, but I’ve always been this way unless I know for sure that I’m getting a very pricey UPS delivered package that day. Then, it’s ok. Had it been any other noise, such as my cell phone or alarm (which, was already BLARING) I wouldn’t have even stirred in my sleep.

“Get Stephanie up,” I hear my mother tell someone, I figure my sister.
“WHAT?” I call from my room.
And at that exact moment, a big burly man comes waddling into my room like a pregnant Britney. I bet they smelled the same. “Hello!” he says in a cheery voice.
I nearly have a heart attack. I’m half asleep and try to cover myself up- as if I slept in something other than Paul Frank pajama pants and a t-shirt. I figure that I’m done for and that my mom wasn’t joking all of those times she talked about sending me to reform school while watching Brat Camp. She would tell me not to bother crying for help when the men come for me while I lay sleeping in my bed.
Now I was shaking in my boots.
I try to think of any thing that I’ve done that would have annoyed my mother or father enough to send me away. The only thing I can think of is that I have made it a habit to turn down the air conditioning more than my father would like. Also, I used to “miss” school a lot, and I am overly sarcastic. Oh, and I use my Dad’s credit card online. Constantly. Was that enough? I’m a good kid overall! Even though I refuse to get a real job!

I knew a boy who was sent to reform school once. He was a loser who never did his homework and spoke like Spicoli because he was high all the time. Once he left middle school, he never came back. Rumors went around for a while- “He was gunned down”, “drug overdose” and other general nasty things no middle schooler should know about- but finally his sister just came out and said he was taken in the dead of the night to some “survival” school in Mexico.

Whoa.

I couldn’t live without my laptop, hair products, private bathroom, and Hohan. Or I could, but G0d, I would not want to.

“Rough night?” the man chuckled and then my eyes came into focus and I saw the name on his brown shirt, “Robert” from US Pest Control. Oh, thank G0d. I could live another day of reading People and drinking Juicy Juice. Then I remember I’m eighteen, and had nothing to fear to begin with.
“Uh…” I tried to answer and my sister came in after him.
“Mommy says get up. The bugman is here.”

Quote of the day:
Alison: dude!
ShopGirlLA: sup?
Alison: i think you were in my dream last night
ShopGirlLA: haha
Alison: but you were weird
ShopGirlLA: ah man, why was I weird?
Alison: I dunno. You were acting all weird
ShopGirlLA: I'm so stupid! I should have taken advantage of the situation.
ShopGirlLA: we should have hung out somewhere
Alison: ha
Alison: dork
- Conversation between my cousin Alison and me this afternoon. I haven’t seen her in a while.

“See ya, Ol’ Droopy Drawers!”

Grandmar is coming over tonight, much to my (and my mother’s) chagrin. She was starting trouble earlier today when she brought up my maternal grandmother (the classy one) to my mother and then proceeded to badmouth her, perhaps because she forgot to whom she was talking to. It wouldn’t surprise me if that actually did happen, she keeps calling me by my sister’s name, Danielle, and when I correct her, she ignores me.
“Ok, Dawn-yell,” She even pronounces it wrong.
“Stephanie.”
“OK.”

It’s really windy here and cloudy, and even though my mother has made a ton of food (my grandmar is eating for ten), we’re both secretly hoping that due to the weather, she decides to eat over on her side of town with the brother she’s staying with. We’re doubtful that will happen though. Grandmar’s not one to turn down a free meal.

The other day she made my mother and I laugh though, unintentionally natch.
My mother was explaining how she changed hairstylists because her former woman was running late every time she made an appointment. Grandmar, who only has two remaining strands on her head, which she just loops around like a Kewpie Doll, began saying that she too, had to change hairstylists because she had been rude to her.
“I said to her,” my grandma began between bites of pancake, “keep my hair full on top, and she said, “How can I when you don’t have any hair?” I couldn’t believe the nerve of her. I haven’t been back since.”
My mother and I sat silently looking at our hands, both knowing that if we looked at each other or spoke, we’d crack. So, neither of us came up with an answer for her. Later in the car we laughed until we cried.

I’m enjoying the weather here in Arizona; I like when it’s not sunny, but it’s bringing back bad War of the Worlds flashbacks. Can’t say I don’t enjoy telling my mother every two minutes that the wind is blowing towards the storm though. She laughed the first four times. What a sport.

I’m sure there will be more to write later after Grandma leaves.

Quote of the day:
Uncle David: "It may be small, but it does the job."
Stefi: "That's what she said."
- Conversation the other day. I think he was actually talking about his cell phone. Anyway, after I said that he started telling me how his girlfriend is actually "Quite pleased" in the bedroom department. Uh, thanks for sharing. I have to go throw up now.

“Oh my God! I love your bracelet!”

Grandma is in town, most commonly referred to as “Grandmar” or “Gdawg”.
Because I can.

She’s not all bad, if you ignore how she walks around in heavy cotton wool blend sweaters, sweatshirts, and long pants during the summers, repeats herself constantly, and carries Cheeze whiz around in her bag at all times.

“Anyone want some?” she asked, pulling the can out of her giant purse a summer ago when she was last here and my mother had set out appetizers before a nice dinner. My younger sister was in awe, believing it just to be orange whipped cream, and was all in for that.
She put her plate out immediately, “ME!”
My mother snatched it back, “No, thank you,” she said, but was looking at my sister. “We don’t eat cheese spelled with a “z” in this house.”
My grandma sprayed some on her finger and licked it off, “Aw, but it’s really good! Are you sure?”
“Positive,” my mother said, then added, “but thank you, anyway.”
My mother never forgets her manners.

So we wouldn’t say my dad’s mom is the classiest of the bunch.

It’s been one long dinner after another for the past week or so- everyone in my father’s family (who lives in Arizona) gathering in one home, or worse, a restaurant.

A home isn't bad, because at least there you can walk around, go into another room, watch some Old People TV (I.E. Cable-free) or something; but at a restaurant, you’re pretty much stuck. I mean, there are only so many times you can excuse yourself to use the restroom before they begin to wonder. Any more than two trips and you’re gonna find yourself fielding questions.
“Are you OK?”
“Yes.”
“Is it something you ate?”
“No.”
“When was your last bowel movement?”
“… I’m eating here.”

Old people just love to talk about their illnesses and bowel movements.

"You look like someone," Grandma told me the other day, but she says this to me at least once every year when she visits. It alternates between someone famous I don't know from one of her daily soap operas, who I look up and find out is a really a man, and my Aunt Sandy on my dad's side who is now celebrating her “alternative lifestyle” as Grandma likes to call it, or both.
"Who?"
"This girl from Passions. Oh, I can't think of her name now. But your hair is just like hers. You look like her. You look so much like your Aunt Sandy, too."
See, I knew it was coming. I also know my mother will now disagree.
"I think she looks like my side of the family," my mother counters.
"Yeah, she looks like her mother," my dad says and then messes up my hair. I can't tell you how much I hate that. He wakes me up like that when I've fallen asleep on the couch.
I continue staring into space and thinking about nothing, catching every other word. My mother, who goes through the same process at most dinners, calls this “losing time”. My sister across from me has her head in her hand and her elbow on the table. I think to myself that if we weren’t at Applebees (old people love, love, love their Applebees) and we weren’t with my father’s family, my sister would be reprimanded for her lack of table manners. I figure at this point, my mother doesn’t care. I blink so that my sister still knows I'm alive. She makes faces at me whenever my grandmother speaks. I roll my eyes and mouth words to her I doubt she can understand. She laughs anyway. My mother text messages me from three people down, “HELP”.

Later, the three of us bond over who thinks Grandma is the most boring and cake.

Yesterday, Grandma decided she wanted to come shopping with my mother and I, but she was feeling a bit “antsy” as she put it.
“Do you have anything I can take?” she asked.

So we gave her some Xanax.
“Will this interfere with my other medications?” Grandma wanted to know, “Can you call the pharmacy?”
My mother got on the phone to find out.
“Well,” I could hear the pharmacist ask, “How many do you want to give her?”
There was a slight pause and then my mother answered [truthfully], “About… seven?”
He didn’t laugh.

Grandma was asleep in the car by the time we got to the mall, “Should we leave her in here?” I asked. My mother paused at the thought and we turned around to get a better look at her because she was sitting in the back with her head bowed and her hair was so thin I could see her white, white scalp.
“Would you be more comfortable in the backseat?” my mother asked her when we picked her up, with her long sleeves and extra sweater (the heat just “doesn’t affect [her]”), at my uncle’s house. We only ask because otherwise she gets cold and shuts the air conditioner vents off, leaving the two of us to die in this “dry heat”.
“Yes,” she says, and my mother and I practically threw her in.

“She looks so comfortable…” I offer. My mother shakes her head and taps my grandmother on the shoulder, startling her.

The medication must have knocked her out because instead of shopping with us, she decided just to stay in one of the lounge chairs in the food court.
“But, oh, when can I take another Xanax?” she asked before we began to walk off.

I can only figure she wants to escape from here as much as we do.

Quote of the day:
“SMILE! You’re on Candid Camera!”
- My grandma to me twenty times a day.

"She was caked out."

I was asked to take my sister to the orthodontist today. She’s years behind me in the way of a gorgeous Hilary Duff influenced smile. She beat me in the boob department though, so I suppose we’re both winners in our own way.

Getting a tightening isn’t as bad as feeling completely awkward and gross next to the beautiful Brazilian orthodontist assistants as they shove their gloved index fingers into your mouth.
“Does this hurt?”
Only my pride.

It’s hard to feel pretty next to tall, blonde, foreign chicks, much less when you’re sixteen, in high school, and going through your awkward stage four years too late as all of your other friends are braces free and having sex, or at the very least, some form of it. And you can’t do anything even if you wanted to because you have a palate expander.

The horror I went through because I couldn’t pronounce words correctly with that thing in my mouth. That was the worst part of all. The braces I could deal with, that palate expander killed me. It was like being stuck as Jan in a Brady Bunch episode for six months.

With better clothes though, natch.

I haven’t been sleeping much lately. Not that this is an abrupt lifestyle change or anything, but I’ve been trying to go to bed earlier because I firmly believe I will become a better person if I do. This is a lie of course, but if I say it to myself enough, maybe it will come true. I kinda doubt it though. Mind you, I’m half asleep right now, so if this blog doesn’t particularly interest you, blame in on the hour and a half of sleep I had last night.

The fat Olsen is on Harper’s Bazaar this month, with trademark duck lips and surprisingly, not her sister Mary-Kate. They had to surgically separate the girls at their boring personalities by first carefully removing the “&” sign between their names. Ashley showed up in a rag just recently; cross -legged on the phone while getting her nails done. BORING. I want them to put out a sex video so that I have something to look at and enjoy this summer. I don’t even care if Mary-Kate wants to wear her giant glasses while going down on Ashley, that’s fine. Eve just doesn’t do it for me.
Plus, I’m sure it was a publicity stunt since Lil’ Kim is getting all of the attention (I get them confused so often), what with her going to jail ‘n’ all.

Grandma is in town this week, so the blog should be brimming with stories soon-ish.

Quote of the day:
“I love lamb!”
- Grandma, as she’s eating lamb, to my mother just minutes after telling my her that meat wasn’t on her diet, so she wouldn’t be eating it.

"Are you here all night?"

ShopGirlLA: If I see one more picture of "Kate" Holmes and Tom Cruise wearing matching sunglasses and teeth I'm gonna scream.
easyasawaitress: Fuck both of them
easyasawaitress: Tom Cruise ruined his credibility and Katie Holmes looks like she has down syndrome.
ShopGirlLA: I would because surely, that would get me into Hollywood
ShopGirlLA: that's enough credibility
easyasawaitress: Case settled, let them revel in their scientology and endless love.
ShopGirlLA: "I fucked both Tom Cruise and Kate Holmes"
ShopGirlLA: "Well then! You're in the club! Have a martini!"
ShopGirlLA: "Dakota Fannnnnnnnnnntastic."
easyasawaitress: I don't understand
- Conversation between myself (ShopGirlLA) and Brown (easyasawaitress)

If you actually want to be surprised during War of the Worlds, don’t read this post. I’m just saying because I mock it, and in turn, let slip some details such as, Tom Cruise dies at the end.

Saw War of the Worlds yesterday night, the new Katie Holmes Tom Cruise flick. The 10:50 PM showing at AMC 30 was surprisingly, well, empty despite morning reports that the movie made 101 million kajillion dollars this weekend. I just assumed people were too busy watching their Access Hollywood (where Tom Cruise would be talking about how straight and normal he is and how gay and irresponsible everyone else is for taking Claritin, a street drug. Damn anti-histamined out punks) to contribute SEVEN (!) dollars to the Katie Holmes Engagement Ring Fund.

But I tore myself away from Gawker. I tore myself away from TiVo. I got into my car and I drove twenty miles over the speed limit because I left five minutes later than I should have. I wanted to get a good seat (as close to the center as possible while still two seats away from anyone I don't know, ideally) so I could see the fear in Dakota Fanning’s eyes as she acted against a green screen.

Thankfully, didn’t really have to worry about that after all. But I made it with twenty-five minutes to spare anyway.

However, at the viewing I went to it was just Hunter S. Thompson, myself, and three old guys who wouldn’t shut up about H.G. Wells for the first five minutes of the movie.
“WHO WROTE THE ORIGINAL?”
“H.G. WELLS!”
“WHO?”
“H.G. WELLS!”
“WHO?”
“SHUT UP, OLD MAN.”

My heart goes out to old people with hearing loss.


Tom Cruise, self proclaimed lover of all things vagina-y (see: Kate Holmes regarding the I LOVE THIS WOMAN AND I’M STRAIGHT! Promotional World Tour ’05), plays a careless and aloof dad now living on his own after finally coming out of the closet to his wife (Miranda Otto) and children (Dakota Fanning and Billie Joe Armstrong of Green Day).

I didn’t even realize the movie had started until twenty minutes in because I thought I was just watching an infomercial that happened to have Tom Cruise AND Dakota Fanning. “What luck!” I thought, “And the cinematography for this is great. See, this is the shit they should show on CBS at 3 AM. This stuff.” And then something exploded and I was like, “Oh.”

The product placement in this movie rivals that of Josie and the Pussycats back in 2001.
-Apple iPod
-Sony flat screens
-Sponge Bob
-CBS
-Nokia
-Swatch
-Oprah
-TiVo
-Sony Camcorders (odd, because all power was down, but the camcorder still worked…)
-Major League Baseball
-Soccer Moms (second movie so far this summer that uses a mini-van as a primary vehicle that stands between them and death.)
-Picnic condiments (mainly some disgusting looking peanut butter, look closely, its Smuckers.)
-Arrowhead water
-Air plane food
-Hummus (this is like the fourth movie this summer where they eat hummus)
-Penzoil
-Scientology

There were a lot of things about the movie that were unbelievable, one of them being that Tom Cruise’s gay dad character failed to name the capital city of Australia (Canberra by the way, go impress someone), but did noticed that the wind was blowing towards the storm. I’m smart and I wouldn’t have noticed that, probably because I’d be like “Whatever, when is Cox getting here to fix the wireless?” and Tom Cruise would say, “Speaking of cocks…” making this unbelievable occurrence number one.

“Dakota, Dakota!” Tom Cruise playing the gay dad calls out, as the wind blows towards the storm, “Want to see something weird?” he asks and then immediately begins fondling himself. Why he had to touch himself in this scene, I’ll never know. Drew Barrymore, superimposed from old E.T. footage thanks to Lucas Industrial Light & Magic, barges herself into the door frame and screams bloody murder as lightning and wind cause everything in the city to stop. But wait a tick- “Where’s the thunder?” asks the gay meteorologist (also played by Cruise). And, uh-oh! Where’s Robbie? The son Tom Cruise’s wife gave birth to before he told her he was gay.

Why, he’s blowing the next door neighbor out in the car! Like father, like son.

They grab him, and to make 40 minutes short, there’s a big hole, everyone’s like “Holy cow! These are aliens! Like, from outer space! Not, like, Europe.” and Tom Cruise is like, “See, I knew this would happen. I told you, Matt Lauer.”

Then this plane crashes, but the van is ok.

Whew, that was a close one.

Then more people die and there’s this boat that promises freedom in a new country far away. But they’re only taking white people. Tom and Co. end up on the boat which hits an iceberg causing 1500 to perish in ice cold water while aliens blow them apart.

But not Tom (or his kids) yet. What stamina.

Now they’re back on land and running because a bunch of camera tripods are after them. So the son, using his don’t ask/don’t tell rights, decides he wants to join the army.

Tom Cruise is furious because as an openly gay man, he’s never been able to fight for his right to paaaar-tay. He grabs his son and shakes him like a newborn, “YOU THINK YOU HAVE TO FIGHT!” he screams over canons and Dakota Fanning shrieking again, “BUT YOU DON’T, RAMBO!”
His son then shouts, “FUCK YOU, DICK-WAD! I HATE YOU! I HATE ALL OF YOU!”, punches Tom Cruise in his crooked (note: not straight) little nose, and pumps away as fast as his little legs sponsored by Levi® jeans will take him.

Gay and lost with this Jim Henson Workshop creation he’s forced to carry all over the place because, apparently, it’s in its contract, Tom Cruise meets another gay survivor who offers him shelter in a cellar.
“We might be down here a while,” Tom Cruise’s new ‘friend', Ogilvy, says.
“Well, in that case,” Tom Cruise replies, “Let me tell you about the amazing world of Scientology.”
This causes Dakota Fanning to start screaming again, “Daddy no! Sing me a showtune! Or a lullaby! Just like you used to when you and mommy pretended to be married.”
“Dakota, Dakota, Dakota, Dakota, Dakota, Dakota, Dakota,” Tom Cruise says, “Lullabies are for babies and whores. Take responsibility. Educate yourself. They’re just… they’re just… they’re just…”
“Googlie-Gook?” Dakota offers.
“No. No. No. No. No. I did not say that!”
“Well, I’m just asking you, what would you call it?” Dakota asks.
“No. No. No. Dakota. Dakota. Dakota. You’re asking two different things here.” Tom Cruise says as he rips off his shirt to prove he’s still manly and continues, “But what happens, the lullaby, all it does is mask the problem that the aliens are gonna kill us. I'm not saying that that isn't real. That's not what I'm saying. That's an alteration of what-- what I'm saying. I'm saying that songs aren't the answer, these songs are just useless. They're mind-altering, anti-psychotic songs. And there are ways of using them without that so that we don't end up in a brave new world.”

Dakota finally shuts the fuck up because she realizes her daddy is gay and crazy while the new friend takes out a shot gun and tries to kill Tom. Tom ducks and lives; he has Top Gun training. What a badass. His friend apologizes and offers him some bad liquor which they drink until they both realize how horny they are. Ogilvy takes Tom’s hand in his own and holds it as Tom leans forward to kiss him. Then Tom remembers that Dakota Fanning is watching.
He breaks the kiss and says to his new lover, “Please, man, I have a daughter.”
“She can join…” the lover offers, “I can be her daddy, too.”

Tom decides instead to blindfold his young daughter and tell her to cover her ears while he plays with his new friend.
“Daddy!” She shrieks as he tries to explain, “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!?”
“Hold still,” he whispers wet with spit into her neck, “Daddy horny, baby. Use your earmuffs.”

Tom Cruise finishes off pretty fast and the scene is over almost before it started.
How realistic.

After that, nothing happens for at least twenty minutes except Dakota Fanning screams again for no apparent reason. Tom Cruise is so gay and sick and tired of her that he turns around and pistol whips her as he says, “Shut the fuck up, bitch.” She doesn’t get the hint and continues to cry as she repeats over and over again in Rain Man- like fashion, “Am I ever gonna see Mom again?” Her gay dad begins to feel sorry for himself and chucks her to the blood sucking aliens as he sings, “Take this goblin off my hands”. Then he turns to his daughter and asks, “How’s that for a lullaby?” She’s dead by this time, so she doesn’t respond. Tom Cruise spends the next five minutes jerking off.

Skip another hour to the end and Tom Cruise dodges a giant alien vagina and finally reaches San Francisco; the gay capital of the world only to find that E.T. is dying. And since Elliot feels whatever E.T. feels, Elliot dies too. But not before dancing in the street to Barry Manilow’s “Copacabana”.

Another Spielberg hit.
It was all right.

Quote of the day:
Taylor: don't come for anything below a 7
Stefi: I was gonna make a sex joke, but I won't.
- Taylor explaining when one should attend a party based on a scale of one to ten.