was Patti Smith Johnny Depp's date last week or what?? How totally unnerving.  Not "unnerving" b/c they appeared to be together, but that the photos from the event are so goddamned awful! I mean, come on. Patti Smith is like a notoriously skinny woman and they managed to capture her with, like, triple chins. I'm not kidding you. And the "sexiest man alive" -- what is going on with him? Am I the only person on planet Earth who thinks that for the last 6 months, he's been, like, gaining a bunch of weight or something? It is just so perplexing to me. Are they purposely making sure that he's followed around by a bunch of bad photographers just to make me insane?

I have to say that I feel sorry for movie stars nowadays. Gone are the days of glamor for sure. Digital cameras are merciless. Absolutely merciless. For women, it's doubly worse b/c, given the right lighting their make-up probably looks spectacular. But a digital camera just makes an actress's make-up look like a whole fucking ton of make-up. It is so not flattering. It sets my teeth on edge. With men -- well, I'm not going to even talk about what digital cameras are doing to men.

Anyway. The footage of the Tim Burton retrospective at MoMA has me fidgeting in my seat! I have to get back to New York and see that thing! I have decided to go in February. That's right! February. The only month of the year when no one in his or her right mind goes to New York if they don't have to; it is usually the month of all-out ice and snow. But it also makes it a lot cheaper to travel there, so onward! Now all I have to do is try to find enough time to see everybody while I'm there. I'm only planning on going for 2 days. And I think I'm going to stay at the Warwick. Not only is it just around the corner from MoMA, it's also where my parents stayed when they visited New York in, like, 1966 and saw The Man of La Mancha on Broadway. (And while they were gone & my grandma was staying with us, 3 convicts escaped from a local Cleveland prison and one of them hid out in our garage in the backseat of our station wagon, under our dirty laundry. It was really scary. Not our dirty laundry -- having convicted killers so close to our house when our parents weren't home.)

Anyway. Reluctantly, I leave you with this. Pause, reflect, and compare, gang. (Weren't the 1930s a whole lot better?)


(Johnny Depp & Patti Smith)

(William Powell & Myrna Loy)


Okay. See ya, gang!