Just some stuff I thought about (PM)

I am absolutely the wrong person to ask about what one can and can not say regarding the Paralympics. 

I can't even talk about the most benign of topics without saying something questionable, so this is kind of a minefield for me. I'm just going to stick to the facts.

a) It is a fact that simply reading about the lack of punchlines in the Mooney/Pang/Zwar paralympic commentary makes my comedy balls ache so much I feel like I am going to have to watch some internet comedy before I can continue with this day. 

b) It is also a fact that a member of the wider Miss Soft Crab community is ON THE AUSTRALIAN PARALYMPIC TEAM IN CAPITAL LETTERS!

It's true!

This is her. She is a friend of Midbro and Lady Midbro. She is a swimmer and is short-statured which I am delighted to advise is the approved term. Apparently she competes in the next few days and is a dead-set medal chance. 

That's all guys. Nothing to see here. 

Just some stuff I thought about (AM)

Have you watched any of the Paralympics? Um... it's awesome. Even though I had access to a 3D TV during the regular Olympics, I actually hardly watched any of it. A bit of diving, some marathon, gymnastics (floor routines) but all that probably added up to about 45 minutes for the whole thing. And what I did watch I mostly watched in 2D. Boring. Maybe that was the problem.

I think I am already at the 45-minute mark for the Paralympics and it's only a few days in. I guess it's because anyone can swim 50m, and you can watch that on TV pretty much any time, but have you ever seen someone swim the length of a pool without arms?!? Or THREE pool lengths with half arms? I am not a great swimmer, and swimming 150m non-stop is tiring for me - I mean exhausting. Last night I watched an Australian swimmer swim 150m and brother only had half arms and legs. Can I say that? I don't know what I am allowed to say or not about the Paralympians. Shit, I don't know.

You know what is weird though? ABC have this nightly show of the day's highlights with a panel of comedians: Lawrence Mooney; Sam Pang; Adam Zwar; a sports reporter called Stephanie Brantz who I guess is the straight guy.  I think it is meant to bring a bit of levity to the whole affair. And probably to attract more viewers. But on Saturday night I saw a bit of it and Lawrence Mooney was talking about some chick who was crushed by a horse, her dad just died of cancer, some other bad shit, none of it funny, right? And yet, it seemed so bad and unlikely and coming from the mouth of a comedian, I was basically just waiting for the punch line. There wasn't one. So basically it's just hours of comedy blue balls of the worst kind. Constant unintended set ups with no punch lines about Paralympians. Is it just me or is that kind of... weird?

Understanding McCarthyism (PM)

This is what I texted J on Sunday morning, after I discovered she had tweeted "I'm beginning to think the movie Mannequin doesn't make any sense" at about 10pm the night before:

You see, my brothers and I used to watch Weekend at Bernie's and Look Who's Talking all the time when we were little. We taped them off the tele and though everything else we recorded we eventually taped over,  for some reason, WaB and LWT endured. I think because of this, perhaps I ruined myself for McCarthy. And babies. Just kidding! I love babies, especially Baby and Niecey and Little Nut. But I can't watch McCarthy. Every time I see him now I think 'ewww', and also 'Andrew McCarthy looks a little like Ethan Hawke when he smiles. Eww'.  You just can't watch WaB as many times as I have and think anything else.

Understanding McCarthyism (AM)

I realised something about myself this weekend. A few things in fact. First, even though Mannequin is a classic, important film for my generation, I’ve never seen the whole thing. Oh maybe I did once years ago, but it hasn't stuck with me. I’ve seen bits of it on TV a bunch of times, but maybe never the start, always the end. And for a girl like me, that’s a strange, confronting thing to admit. The second thing I realised was that even though Andrew McCarthy has never played a character I’ve loved I can’t help but feel something for him when he is on the screen. 




I want to make it clear that I am not now, nor have I ever been, in love with Andrew McCarthy. Certainly not as Blane McDonnagh in Pretty in Pink. I mean his best friend is that d-bag Steff. I know that people love a young James Spader, and in many ways, although a right a-hole, Steff is kind of more appealing than the wet Blane. Ugh, with his sensitivity and his affection for Molly Ringwald despite the fact he is rich and she is poor. You can’t love Blane. Also, did I mention his name is Blane? But he is the romantic lead, so, if I'm being honest with myself, you can't entirely ignore him either.

 

I did not love Andrew McCarthy as Kevin in St Elmo’s fire. How could I when he was playing next to a young, reckless Rob Lowe? And yet, I guess all that pathetic pining for Ally Sheedy makes you feel a little something. Pity, becomes affection becomes some subconscious attraction. 

Probably the same thing is happening in Pretty in Pink on some level too. Though it happens on no level at all in Weekend at Bernie's. That I know for sure.

But as I watched the end of Mannequin on Saturday night (only the end – I still haven’t seen the whole thing), watched Andrew McCarthy scramble up a conveyor belt to save his inanimate mannequin love before she is eaten by the giant mannequin disposal unit that no doubt exists in the basement of all department stores, I was struck by a little shimmer of affection. Even though in my actual brain all I was thinking was “What? I’m meant to care about the romance between a man and a mannequin.”

I know that the mannequin is not always inanimate and their love is based on the times when she becomes Kim Cattrall, still I was having trouble buying it. Or I thought I was, until, inexplicably I felt something when Andrew McCarthy saved the mannequin before she was ground into so much polystyrene. She becomes Kim Cattrall, they kiss, I micro-swooned.

I thought that maybe this is to do with my age. That I am unable to resist the McCarth because in my youth he was everywhere and I guess he was something of a heartthrob. Or something. In fact he was a heartthrob before heartthrobs were really on my radar (yes, I realise that it is hard to believe there was a time when heartthrobs weren’t on my radar but it’s true!) His prime had passed by the time I was interested in hunks. (No seriously, there was a time before I was interested in hunks.) But it’s like I am so attuned to the films of the eighties I have to find him attractive.  Or that's what I thought. K sent me a text on Sunday which indicated I was the only Crab to have these feelings about McCarthy. So while I think that age is a factor, that I have to find the hunks of the films of my youth somewhat attractive (or something - I use the term very loosely). I think it is also just me. I think I am just a sucker for a romantic hero. Idiot.

Robert Pattinson: I don't know what to feel (PM)

Last week I could not stop reading stories about K-Stew cheating on R-Patz. Because, you know, they were all over the internet. Not because I went looking for them and kept clicking through links to see that R-Patz had moved out, that he was staying at Reese Witherspoon's ranch, to see that he finally responded to K-Stew's texts. No, I did not mean to click those links at all.

While this was happening all I could think was, "Geez, I can't believe K-Stew and R-Patz really are a couple!" And also, "OMFG K-STEW! I can't believe you cheated on R-Patz!" And also, "K-Stew looks really cute in that t-shirt and I like her baby blue nail polish a lot!" It was a real roller coaster of emotion.


Let's remember that at least my very first introduction to R-Patz was when he played Cedric Diggory in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.

Um, Cedric Diggory, guys. Only the handsomest character to ever grace the pages of Harry Potter. A decent wizard and the first death we actually have to experience in Harry Potter. Cedric Diggory  is a turning point. And even though when that movie came out R-Patz was an actual teenager and I was an actual woman in my mid-twenties, it's fair to say I thought he was quite attractive. But then... Sparkleface ugh!

One of the few vampires in history to make vampires unattractive. And that is no easy feat.

So where does that leave us?

Cedric Diggory = hot
Sparkleface = not hot
Cheated on = sad = kinda hot (?)
Twilight Saga movies about to be over = no more Sparkleface = potential future hotness

therefore

hot + not hot + kinda hot + potential future hotness =  maybe hot = I'm still confused

= oh god why can't I stop thinking about R-PATZ?!?!?!?