JD Salinger just became extra extra reclusive

Famous author J.D. Salinger passed away from natural causes yesterday, at the age of 91 at his home in Cornish, NH.

I'll confess - I've never understood all of the hulabaloo about The Catcher in the Rye. It's a fairly well written coming-of-age novel, but I never got what people loved so much about it. Or how it could have such a powerful and profound influence on so many people in both good ways (several prominent and accomplished authors list it as their favorite book), and tragic ways (the most infamous being Marc David Chapman citing it as an inspiration for him to kill John Lennon).

The character Holden Caulfield is a brat, and not even really an interesting one. I've only read the novel once, in 9th grade as assigned reading for English. I recall most of my class mates LOVING the book and getting caught up in all the fervor that so many people generate about Catcher. But I just wasn't moved.

Later in college I read Franny & Zooey and liked that novel a little better but it still wasn't earth shattering. And don't get me started on the boringness that is the Salinger short story collection Nine Stories. I never did finish it.

Anyway in the next few days I expect to be inundated with famous people gushing and reminiscing about how Catcher saved their life or whatever. I'm more interested in finding out if crazy recluse Salinger had in fact been writing non-stop all these years and whether there's hundreds of unpublished manuscripts stuffed in his mattress or what not.

Also, any new stories about Salinger being bat-shit crazy and sitting around in his bathrobe Howard Hughes style would be appreciated.

The difference between Kathryn Bigelow and James Cameron

It would be too easy to say - "She's classy, he's a douche", and be done with it.

But there's more to it than that. I've been thinking about this since before this past Sunday's Golden Globes because I thought it was very interesting that Kathryn Bigelow and James Cameron were up against each other in the directing category.

See, Bigelow and Cameron used to be married for a brief time. You know, after he left then wife, agent/producer Gale Anne Hurd; and before he turned around and had an affair with his Terminator star Linda Hamilton. He then married Hamilton, had a kid with her and then divorced her after having an affair with his current wife, actress Suzy Amis, who starred in Titanic.

See a pattern here?

Anyway, I don't really care about all of Cameron's lady troubles or divorces, I'm just trying to explain what was swirling in my head as I thought about Best Director category on the Globes on Sunday. A couple of days before Bigelow had won the prize at the Critics' Choice Awards for her amazing The Hurt Locker. Pretty much for the past decade the director who's taken home this prize has gone on to win the Oscar, so it was understandable that Cameron opened up his acceptance speech at the Globes saying that he thought that Bigelow was going to win.

Oh if he had only stopped there. Instead he went into full-throttle pompous ass mode. First by paying tribute to his current wife (the aforementioned Amis, who I actually totally love even if she did leave awesome Sam Robards for lame Cameron) while holding the award that he'd just beat his former wife for; and then going on to actually speak part of his speech in Na'vi, a language he made up!

Through it all Kathryn just kept on smiling and/or sharing humorous glances with a seemingly drunk/bored Jeremy Renner. I mean the whole Amis praise thing probably would've hurt more if he'd still been married to Hamilton who he left Bigelow for; and Bigelow has a lot of other amazing things going for her right now. Her movie The Hurt Locker has been universally praised as not only one of the best of the year but of the decade. And although Cameron is gaining momentum that I'm afraid might sway Oscar voters, I still think Bigelow has a great chance at a win there.

And? Even though she's 3 years old than Cameron? TOTALLY hotter than him and aging better than any of his wives.

Linky link...NBC's late-night debacle edition Part deux

Conan O'Brien responded today to NBC's suggestion of moving The Tonight Show to 12:05 AM.

He was brilliant and witty, as usual. "People of Earth" indeed.

Linky link...NBC's late-night debacle edition

A really interesting perspective from Television Without Pity on how NBC's late-night talk show shit storm might actually have some silver linings for both the struggling network and us viewers.

My own take on this situation? Both NBC and Jay Leno should be ashamed of themselves. Conan O'Brien should take his 80 million from NBC, not host a talk show for a couple of years, write a book, write a screenplay, do something fabulously funny with Andy Richter, hang out with his kids, and then come back to late-night on Fox in an 11pm slot and slaughter the competition.

Jimmy Fallon has of course been silent and totally professional concerning this whole thing; it's made me like him even more than I already did. But you know who I feel the most sorry for in this whole mess? Carson Daly. The poor man with his 7 head will be out of a job me thinks very soon.

This "Twilight" Madness has gone too far!

I blame not hearing about this nonsense before today on being sick and out of it for the latter part of December.

Washington state's once sleepy little res town is supposedly getting its own reality tv show! This saddens me more than you can know.

Okay, I don't really blame the residents of Forks. Before Stephenie Meyers and the Twilight juggernaut, this town was poor and really pretty depressing. So I get that some/all of the folks that live there want to cash in on this thing as much as they can, while they can. But damn does it seem exploitative and gross.

Most of the town's shops and businesses have turned over to some kind of Twilight themed nonsense like the once quaint Pacific Inn, whose Twilight themed room is shown in the picture below. So even though this reality show will supposedly not focus on the books/movies and just be about the "regular folk" in Forks, there's no way that it won't end up being bad for all involved.

And it's all going to crash and burn within the next decade and I think Forks will end up being even worse off than they were 5 years ago. So while I will continue to travel out on the peninsula to the Pacific coast, I won't be going back to Forks anytime soon. I'm not interested in Bella Berry smoothies or Cullen caramel.

"Concrete jungle where dreams are made..."

I know I'm late to the party but OMIGOD how awesome is the Jay Z and Alicia Keys duet, Empire State of Mind?
I've had it on a constant rotation this week playing with Alicia Keys own version of "Empire State" called Part II Broken Down. Both songs put me in the best mood. And seriously make me want to hop on the first plane I can get to NYC.
If I lived in one of the 5 boroughs I would be skipping down streets, grinning like a fool, and throwing my hat in the air Mary Tyler Moore style.

Celebrity Apprentice

Ok, something that you should know off the top - I HATE Donald Trump. Seriously, if I saw him on the streets of NYC, I would weigh the pros/cons about kicking him in the nuts.

And generally I have hated the Apprentice franchise that NBC has been running into the ground for the past decade. I haven't watched the show since the 2nd season (except for the one season that Martha Stewart did), and the clips I have seen over the years on The Soup or other various "news" shows have been ridiculous and not in a good way.

But last season's celebrity addition seemed to be quite over-the-top and like a bad fever dream in the best possible way; what with Joan and Melissa Rivers being well, themselves, and Clint Black making a commercial where he simulated masturbating with laundry detergent? Ummm, yeah. Anyway, last year's celebrity edition has seemed to have resuscitated the series and it has a new lease on life.

The proof? Check out TWoP's link to get a gander at the celebrity contestants for Season 3. Brett Michaels and his bad wig? Rob Blagojevich and his bad hair? Sharon Osbourne who always brings a tinge of the crazy but is an insanely good business woman? Cyndi Lauper (love her)? Hottie chef Curtis Stone? Sinbad!?

Count me in people!

Uggh 2010

I have been very ill for the past couple of weeks so all of my plans for year-end lists and "best of" collections has been thrown aside in favor of bed, bad tv, and a few good books.

2009 was a tumultuous year. It had great highs and staggering lows. So far 2010 hasn't rocked so much as sucked, but I still have high hopes for it.
Shower me with good thoughts as I try to get well.