A Spice Girls Xmas

I don't know where my closest Tesco is, but I sure want to buy some pudding there thanks to the Spice Girls!

My Meat Plate

Please behold one of my best holiday meat plates EVER!

The Savages Review

Last night, I saw the new film The Savages. I can't say it was the greatest movie I saw this year, but it has stayed with me today. The movie stars Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman as siblings who have to put their father into a nursing home. The thing is, neither sibling really had a relationship with their father who abandonded them and are torn between emotions of obligation, loss and guilt. Laura Linney's character is a neurotic self-obsessed survivor living in New York with her cat. (I kind of related to her.) PSH plays a drama professor living in Buffalo who can't commit to his Polish girlfriend. Both performances were amazing, and the script had some killer dialogue such as, "This isn't therapy. This is real life." There is also a hilarious exchange where the siblings equate their father's situation to the Emergency Alert system determining that their father's situation is in "yellow" status. Yet, as I watched the film, I kept thinking about how every year my family argues about going to the Lancaster Outlet malls on Black Friday. I used to enjoy the outlets, but now the outlets don't sell outlet clothes. They just sell cheap crap that is manufactured for the outlets and while I can find something good sometimes, I don't enjoy the experience as much as I used to ten years ago. The Banana Republic outlet sells last season's styles replicated in cheap single ply fabrics. I'd prefer to do my discount shopping at H&M and Target where the bargains are genuine and not pretending to be something they are not. Somehow, I always still wind up on the outlet trip, despite my better judgement. Inevitably, I always get really cranky at the outlets and this results in a family fight where we yell at and insult each other's life choices, fashion sense and finally, each other's weight. Jabs can include everything from "Why are you so angry?" to "I hate you" to "Well, since you put on weight...." And, I'm always the bad guy because I didn't want to go to the fucking outlets in the god damned first place. After the outlet trip, The Savages drama seemed slightly obvious and trivial to me. I think my family status is in Orange.

Dancing with the Stars

I admit that I am not watching The Dancing With the Stars finale. And, now that Marie Osmond is voted off, I don't care who wins. It's not that Marie deserved to win, but she tried so damned hard that I kind of wanted her to take the "glory."

Pissed

OK, I've been really pissed off since I had to drag my ass to the ER by myself a week ago in the middle of the night. Going to the ER alone is a very sad and lonely experience. You face your death and realize that nobody is present to even share your last moments with you.

Plus, I'm mad at someone else, but I'm too mad to talk about it right now. I don't like feeling this angry. It's not attractive.

Talking Cats

OK, this is the cutest thing I've seen in awhile.

Barely Breathing

So, last night my peak flow went below 200 at around 1:30AM so I had to haul my ass over to St. Vincent's ER. Let me tell you, there is nothing worse than going BY YOURSELF to the ER in the middle of the night. They admitted me immediately and hooked me up to the nebulizer pronto. My bed was between one drunk guy vomitting and another guy getting a catheter who didn't speak English. I felt like the supermodel of patients. Also, there was no McDreamy or McSteamy or Dr. Ross present. Now, I'm home and breathing and realizing I don't want to die alone.

The Bachelor

OK, I'm sick AGAIN with a cold and I'm watching The Bachelor and this Austin asshole Brad is actually not picking EITHER woman. I mean this is the fucking Bachelor and I'm wasting two hours of my life to see this asshat actually choose someone and instead it's like real life and not what "reality tv" is supposed to be. It's full of confusion, false promises and "grey" matter. I could write about my own life, but you could just watch the series finale of the Bachelor instead and I'll spare you the drama.

Writer's Strike Late Night Break

It may be the writer's strike, but that doesn't mean you can't go back in time (thanks to YouTube) and watch some of the greatest moments in TV history.

Warning: If you are a homosexual male, you may spontaneously combust when you watch this clip.

Bandar's Bitch

One of my new adult qualities is my ability to talk about fashion, celebrity gossip and now, financial services. A couple of days ago I wrote how fucked up Citi is and about Chuck Prince's resignation. Now, that I'm in the world of beauty, I feel freer to write about the crazy state of the bank.

When I was at Citi, I was ready to propose a credit car incentive program where customers could redeem points to donate money to their favorite environmental cause. Management told me I had to be very careful about the "cause" aspect because of Saudi Prince Alwaleed who owns part of Citi. For example, if the cause was environmental, Alwaleed could get word of it and get pissed off because he's Saudi and has ties to oil and oil hurts the environment and my program would just be one big mess of corporate hypocrisy. I could never remember Alwaleed's name so I just called him Prince Bandar and the project became known as "Project Bandar." In any case, after reading this interview with Prince Bandar aka Alwaleed, I realized that Prince was Bandar's bitch. In any case, Project Bandar never even made it through one round of paper passing and any profit the bank makes in the future will continue to make the Prince richer.

More Entertaining Than El Cantante

Bobby Brown Where Are You?

As most of you know, Tyra Banks did an entire show about vaginas the other day. I'm going to channel my inner Tyra and talk about another taboo topic which is constipation. I've been regular my entire life but due to some stress and some antibiotics, I found myself painfully constipated last night. Don't read on if scat talk freaks you out.

I felt that I had to go, but I just couldn't get it out. The stool was stuck in my rectum. I wasn't sure if I should go to the emergency room so I Googled my problem and could find very little information about what I should do. The only information out there is for babies, seniors and pregnant people. I think this indicates most people are too embarrassed to discuss stuck stools, but it turns out that this is a pretty common ailment. I tried a suppository and two Exlax with little success. I was kind of wishing Bobby Brown would stop by and help me out, as he did famously with Whitney Houston. So, I called my doctor today and told him my issue. He told me to use a Fleet enema which solved the problem. So, if you are in the situation I was in last night and are googling, "I have a stool stuck in my rectum" and get to this site, go get an enema. It works.

Chuck Prince Gets Druskined

Today was a big news day for me. First of all, my former boss Chuck Prince resigned from Citi. Last year, when Robert Druskin was brought in the bank to create a "cost cutting" program, we referred to our unfortunate colleagues who lost their jobs as being "Druskined." The truth is, as Prince will admit, the bank just is too big and has too many layers. Citi wants to service clients and be innovative but they are too slow to market because there are just too many people who have to sign a piece of paper.

For example if nycbabylon was a Citi site, I would have to have at least 10 signatures each time I wanted to add a blog entry. And, those 10 signatures would require days of negotiation since every stakeholder would have his or her opinion which I would have to debate and defend my own choices. Plus, I'd have to have the entire negotiation in writing and with screenshots to show how choices were made so that I wouldn't get nailed during the quarterly audit. So, by the time I'd want to comment on the new Spice Girls album, Posh would already be in her grave. This sounds ridiculous, but this is a problem, especially for marketers where customer's needs are in constant change in today's rapidly changing world. I saw a lot of talented people with great ideas take their talent elsewhere simply because they were spending more time walking around with a piece of paper than being able to do their actually work.

Let's Make the Headlines

OK, it's been 10 years and I confess, I love the Spice Girls.