Just Because I Feel Like It

That's why I'm posting pictures of people I have crushes on - just because I feel like it.

For example, when Gilmore Girls was on the air, I had crazy, seething hatred for the Jess character which made me hate Milo Ventimiglia by extension. I was all prepared to hate him on Heroes too, with his emo bangs and his whiny attitude and his drippy love for that art dealer chick, but to my great surprise, I didn't hate him. I ended up kind of loving both the Peter character and the actor which freed me up to realize that Milo is, in fact, incredibly hot.




Here's another one who grew on me. Back in the late nineties when David Boreanaz was just starting out as Angel on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, he was way too pallid and cromag for my taste. He hadn't really developed his acting talent yet and had a bit of an awkward presence as compared to the more talented actors he starred with on that show. As the years passed and he became a more skilled actor, he also grew more mature and distinguished looking. Suddenly his cave-man brow wasn't as noticeable and the lines on his face were making him look devilishly handsome. By the time Angel came to an end and I'd seen him bare all in These Girls, I was all crushed out on him. Now I never miss his hot ass on Bones.


Here's a three-fer. So a few years ago I watched a terrific documentary called The Heart of the Game about a high school girls basketball team in Seattle, Ludacris was the narrator. One of the extras on the DVD for that doc was a one-on-one conversation between Ludacris and the main subject of the doc, a teenage girl named Darnellia Russell. Upon watching the DVD, I developed a crush on Ludacris. I also have a small girl-crush on Mila Kunis who has some of the most beautiful eyes ever. Then there is Mark Wahlberg, whom I was recently reminded I met once, back in his pants-dropping, Marky-Mark days. I recall him as being very short and very good looking in person. He was also very nice for the roughly 15 seconds that I spent with him.



Yesterday I took Meg to Target to stock up on snacks for her plane ride home today (sniff!) and while we were there I swung through the movie section because I always like to see if they have any movies I love for bargain prices. I happened on the box for War stuck incorrectly in a $5.00 spot and said "he's good looking enough for me to pay $5.00 for a movie I didn't enjoy just because he's in it, but I can't pay full price for this movie no matter how hot he is." Megan said "ew, you think HE'S hot?" That's right, she "ew'd" Jason Statham. Megan and I are no longer speaking.




Well it goes without saying that if she can't understand the hotness of Jason Statham, she really doesn't comprehend my crush on Seth Rogen. It seems to be a more wide-spread phenomenon in these post-Knocked Up times, but my crush on Mr. Rogen goes back to Freaks & Geeks and especially Undeclared. He's like the perfect example of a smart, funny, schlubby geek which is VERY hot to me. Particularly with the short hair...rawr!




This is another "husky" Jewish man that I have a long-standing crush on - Greg Grunberg. I fell for him as Sean Blumberg on Felicity and have continued to love him deeply through his years as Agent Weiss on Alias, his brief stint as the quickly eviscerated pilot on Lost, his co-starring role in the tragically short-lived Jake Effect and his current role as Matt on Heroes.




Karen's sister and niece went to the American Idol's Live concert in Rochester, NY last weekend and along with their FRONT ROW tickets they also had meet & greet passes so they, you know, met and greeted My Boyfriend David Cook. At Karen's request, they took several pictures of him just for me and sent them over. Isn't he just as cute as can be?

Alright so David Cook is My Boyfriend and I shall continue to refer to him as such until I develop a new obsessive crush. But I'll always, ALWAYS refer to Joshua Jackson as My Future Husband. That is unless he actually does marry me in which case I'll drop the "Future" part. Anyway, the point is, in the last 10 years no crush has bumped him from the top spot and I see no signs that any will in the foreseeable future either. Especially not now that he's starring in one of the most anticipated new shows of the season - Fringe. Great day in the morning, just look at the man!


*Most of these photos were taken at ComiCon and the photo credit for those goes to James Dimmock and Entertainment Weekly from whom I stole them. The David Cook photo goes to Karen's niece...thank's Karen's niece!

I [Heart] David Cook

I went to the opening night of the American Idols 2008 summer tour last night in Glendale. With few exceptions, the performances were either as good or better than they were on the show which made for a very enjoyable concert.

The performers were presented in ascending order starting with 10th place finisher Chikezie. His vocals were strong and he really put some personality and performance into it which started the evening out well.

Chikezie finished up his three songs and out came Ramiele who as every bit as lack-lustre as she'd been on TV and wearing pants that gave the illusion she had thighs bigger than mine, which she obviously does not. She mumbled her way through her three songs and she looked pretty awkward trying to work the stage.

Next up was Michael Johns. He couldn't resist the siren song of Freddy Mercury so he started off with a Queen medley, then tried his hand once more at Aerosmith's "Dream On" (which, incidentally, I recently heard Brooke White do a version of when I downloaded her pre-Idol CD and I have to say, hers is superior to his, but that's neither here nor there I suppose). He was better at it in full length form, I'll give him that, but still I wished he'd spent more time being bluesy and less time trying to imitate other artists. Speaking of bluesy, he wrapped it up with a touch of "It's All Wrong, But It's Alright." That was my favorite number of his from the show and he worked it pretty damn strong in concert.

Kristy Lee Cook was probably quite enjoyable for the country fans in the audience though I myself recognized only one of her songs ("Proud To Be An American" - natch!). I thought it was weird that she wore a top she'd worn on the show, I think if I were going on tour I'd wear something a billion people, including every single person in attendance at the concert, hadn't already seen me in - at least for opening night. Maybe that's just me.

Carly was awesome and in person looked about half the size she appeared to be on TV. I don't think anyone will be speculating about whether or not she's pregnant now. They may be speculating about whether she's had a head injury though since she chose to wear black leather fingers-only gloves. In every other way she looked fierce as hell but those gloves are ridiculous and since Paris Hilton has worn them on numerous occasions, she really should have known better.

She was in very strong voice and worked the stage beautifully. She also gave Brooke White a sweet and funny introduction. Brooke was raised up through the front part of the stage sitting at a baby grand piano and nailing "Let It Be." Then she slipped her shoes back on and awkwardly toddled out to the front of the catwalk (even making an "I'm Too Sexy" joke poking adorable fun of herself) where she donned her acoustic guitar and sang "1, 2, 3, 4" during which she commented that snapping is the new clapping which I thought was kind of funny. She followed that up with another sit-down at the piano for "Yellow" which she covered on her CD as well. I love her version of it (I've never been much of a fan of Cold Play's original) and was thrilled with the performance and the beautiful twinkling stars on the big screen behind her.

When she finished "Yellow" she gave a(nother) shout out to Idol Gives Back and then the previous 5 performers joined her on stage for a group number before intermission.

Intermission was painful with the obnoxious Pop Tarts/Guitar Hero guy screaming into the microphone for about 30 minutes and then two guys from the stage crew came out to have a Guitar Hero battle that was as boring as it sounds. But one of the guys, Neil, was kind of cute. Then they showed a commercial that the Idols did for the newest Guitar Hero (which appears to include drums and possibly singing? I don't know, it was hard to tell from the commercial) where they dressed up in '70s costumes and played/sang "American Band." David Cook was in the commercial for a quick second but was clearly added after the rest of the folks taped their portion together. That was so obvious it seemed a little sad - like he's really busy having an awesome career so he only had 15 minutes to plop on a bad wig and play one riff while everyone else has nothing going on right now so they had all the time in the world to hang out in hair and make-up all day and shoot a very intricate music video.

Anyway, once the Pop Tart dude finished giving a copy of Guitar Hero away to a kid who already had front row seats and therefore had enough going for him and didn't need to win shit too, the intermission was over and the show started up again with Jason Castro sitting on a stool with his ukulele plucking away at "Somewhere Over The Rainbow." There was a bit of business with a stage hand in the middle of the song that Jason tried to explain after the fact but the crowd was loud and Jason is not so the only word I understood was "ukulele." He then mentioned that he was going to sing a song that helped all his dreams come true, a song he'd song many, many times during the audition process but that never made it on the air - "Crazy" by Gnarls Barkley. He did a great job with that and then wrapped up with "Daydream" which he prefaced by saying something cute and typically Castroesque.

Syesha was a bit of a let-down for me. Her voice wasn't all that clear (a bit of the mumbling problem Ramiele always suffers from) and she didn't seem quite comfortable on the stage. She appeared to be wearing a cheap wig for reasons I cannot fathom and either she's pregnant or the dress she was wearing did her no favors at all when the billowing black panels in the front blew apart to reveal the silver satin under-dress laying in an unflattering fashion on her stomach. She sang "Umbrella" and...two other songs. I don't have any idea what those were. I think she was the biggest disappointment of the evening for me because I thought she was so much stronger on the show than she was in concert.

Archuleta emerged from the stage just as Brooke had, only he was accompanied by the smoke machine from hell which obscured him for the first half of his song. The one about angels. He also sang "Apologize" and a couple of other songs (heck if I can remember what they were though...jeez, my memory is really shot when I can't remember something a mere 12 hours later!) then gave a genuinely sweet intro for David Cook.

David Cook was awesome in every possible way and I seriously would like to marry him. He opened it up with a full length version of "Hello," then moved into "The Time of My Life." He took a moment to tell the crowd that the first thing he bought himself after he won was a video camera which he brought with him and intends to use to document the tour so he had them turn the house lights up so he could get a good shot of the entire audience. Just before he put the camera away he caught a sign in the crowd (right in the front no less) that said "I Demand a Recount." He read the sign aloud and very kindly said "for what it's worth, so do I actually."

Once he put the camera away, he told the crowd that he'd gotten good news today from his family - his brother's tumor has stopped growing. That got one of the biggest cheers of the night from the crowd, which I thought was nice because if anything deserves a cheer it's the fight against cancer for sure. Anyway, he dedicated the Foo Fighters "Hero" to his brother and then played that Aerosmith song from Armageddon that I have a total mental block on. He left the stage then and waited the requisite 90 seconds while we all dutifully screamed and clapped for an encore. His one-song encore was "Billie Jean" which he sang perfectly.

David Cook plays to the audience like a pro; like he's been playing stadium concerts his entire life. He is charismatic and fun and in perfect voice every inch of the way. It is absolutely the right thing that he's a star, it seems like it is what he was born to do.

Anyway, as he left the stage everyone else came back out for a group number and after a quick change of shirt he joined them. The song was something about not wanting the music to stop. Halfway through the song Cookie noticed a woman in the front row waving a souvenir shirt so he motioned to her and she threw it up to him. He tossed it over his shoulder then went on with the song. The song wrapped and the house lights came back up and everyone started heading for the exits and about 2 minutes later David came back out onto the stage, borrowed a Sharpie from a stagehand, signed the shirt then handed it back down to the owner. He did that quietly, slyly, not making a big deal, just being a nice guy. Then he gave a wave to a couple of people who noticed him and shouted or woo'd and went backstage again.

I love him.

Why this week was great:

I KNEW IT!!! Zack was in cahoots with Gormagon. Poor, socially awkward Zack. I'll miss his total inability to understand metaphor, hyperbole, and what is and is not appropriate to say at any given time. But I'm sure he'll make appearances from the loony bin now and again next season...at least that's what Executive Producer Hart Hanson told reporters who asked him about it after scores of fans threatened to boycott the show in the wake of the "startling" discovery. Like, dude, it's just TV!

Also the Gossip Girl season finale was awesome. I'm not sure how he does it but Ed Westwick manages to make the line "I'm Chuck Bass" the most awesome thing anyone on TV has ever said every single time he utters it. He's a genius. I miss that show already. I hope it comes to DVD soon just loaded to the brim with extras.

David Cook, who is totally my new boyfriend, is the incredibly deserving winner of American Idol. When the top 24 first hit the stage so many weeks ago, I did NOT like Big David (not to be confused with Lil David or Stripper David - this was the year of the David). His hair was atrocious and he had that stupid soul patch and he really did come off kind of smug (also, the dude does have a giant head). But then he rocked an emo "Hello" that had me shamefully confessing "if you close your eyes, he's totally hot." Shortly after hitting the big stage, on Dolly Parton night, he unveiled a new look that included shorter hair, not combed forward and the beginnings of a beard and he sang a beautiful version of "Little Sparrow" and that caused me to declare "oh my God, he's hot even when my eyes are open! I think I love him!" That feeling only grew over time and even during the occasional misstep in song choice or performance, I remained smitten with Cookie. Prior to January, 2008 and the premier of this seventh season of American Idol, I had purchased exactly one offering from any Idol winner or participant - Kelly Clarkson's Breakaway CD. That is it. Since this season began, I've bought 4 songs and 3 performance videos by David Cook from iTunes (also two songs from Brooke White and two from Carly Smithson). If he isn't at least as successful as Kelly Clarkson, I will be shocked beyond all measure.

Anyway, now that American Idol has retired to the shadows again until 2009, it is time once again for the best reality show in television history: So You Think You Can Dance. I could try to tell you why it's awesome, why you should watch, why it's the most compelling, entertaining, fun, inspiring show around but someone else beat me to it. And she said it better than I could anyway.

Last night kicked off with auditions which is my least favorite part of SYTYCD just as it is with Idol but I'd rather watch that than almost anything else anyway so I soaked up every single bit of the 2 hours. I'm glad I did too or I may have missed the tragically brief appearances by Season 2 runner-up Travis Wall and Season 3 B-boys Hok and my favorite male contestant ever, Dominic Sandoval. I hope that's not the last time we see any of the three of them this season. And I hope that we see other former SYTYCDancers as well because every last one of them is lovely and talented and inspirational and I've missed them all.

You know who else I've missed? Nigel Lythgoe and his bizarrely genius approach to the show; Mary Murphy and the shrillest scream on earth; every single one of the choreographer judges most especially Mia Michaels and Shane Sparks. And of course the lovely Cat Deeley who is bar-none the nicest host on Television. Last year, after congratulating a guest-performing clog dancer on the finale she said "I've actually sniffed his shoes and they don't smell at all." Which sounds creepy right? But when said with a British accent in total seriousness by Cat, is actually like a little slice of Heaven in a brown tutu.

Brown tutu, you ask? Yeah. In addition to being the sweetest, most lovely host on TV, she also has a tendency to be the most wackily outfitted. To wit:


The brown tutu.

This isn't Dancing With The Stars. You probably won't see anyone you recognize and every single contestant will have more dancing talent than you, there is no ugly trophy and you'll see styles of dance that you'd NEVER see the "stars" attempt. The choreography is no joke here either and two of the routines from Season 2 won Emmy awards last year - Mia Michaels' park bench routine which quite literally made me cry when I watched it, and a Wade Robson zombie routine to a Roison Murphy song that was semi-reminiscent of Thriller but a whole lot more awesome. If I were a member of the Academy (which I have a feeling I'll be posting a whole other rant about when the nominations come out in a few weeks and they get it all wrong...AGAIN!), I'd nominate several of last years routines. Mandy Moore's table routine, Tony Meredith's Paso Doble routine for Neil and Sabra, Shane Sparks' "transformer" routine, Benji Schwimmer's west coast swing routine, and Wade Robson's hummingbird routine. And maybe Dmitry Chaplin's samba and Shane's slow hip hop routine for Dominic and Sabra. Oh...and I really liked that one hip hop routine that Pasha and Lacey did where she was a mannequin. And the...you know what? If I were a member of the Academy, I think I'd nominate 92% of the dances on the show and all of the dancers in the special category of "super-duper awesomeness in pursuing your dreams" which, honestly, should be a category anyway because THAT'S the kind of thing that really deserves to be rewarded!

Ok, I'll stop now. Have a great Memorial Day weekend everyone.