This weekend, I nearly died of hipsters. Luckily, I not awash in dismissive, smug conversations about Best Coast, Small Black, School of Seven Bells and Grizzly Bear and how Animal Collective and MGMT are ‘so over’.  It is probably good that music wasn’t a topic of conversation, because I’d have been taken down in a hail of skinny jeans, Salvation Army eyeglasses and ironic t-shirts.

I was celebrating friend Gerard’s birthday when it all happened. “I’m just warning you,” Natasha warned me, “Gerard’s friends are pretty hipsterish.”  But I was not prepared for the fashionably unwashed and forcibly ironic wave that washed over me when I answered the door to let them inside.

After being in close proximity to the hipsters for more time than a sane man could have stood, I don’t really think I hate them anymore. They’re all just kind of naive and anchorless, and I kind of identify with that. In fact, so many of them are disillusioned English majors. Was that me? I don’t think it was, but I knew them when I was their age.  There was a guy I knew in grad school who was one of them and I don’t remember his name but he was one of those people who is rude all the time because he has Great Thoughts about art and you don’t.  I personally can’t think of any art that is more important than the viewer, but that’s how I roll, I guess and that’s maybe the wrong way to roll up in the scholarhood.

A scene from the evening:

I retire to the living room and turn on Food Network. After awhile, I join Natasha and friend Michael out on the front porch. They both meander back inside as a clutch of hipsters comes outside to smoke ironically.  As they mill about, one of them, completely unaware that it was I who once sat in the living room, peers into the window and says:

HIPSTER: What loser is watching The Food Network?

Like Miranda Bailey, I stayed mum. Instead I watched Charlie die and now I feel guilty about not ever having liked him.

HIPSTER 2: I guess maybe if you aren’t paying attention to it, it’s good to watch. Like, ambient.

HIPSTER 3: Ooooh, CUPCAKE WARS!

Because the cool kids are doing it.

With a hat tip to the Bea Arthur, Mountains, Pizza meme, I present Francis Bacon Kevin Bacon Actual Bacon. Pray for me.

Dear Carolyn,

My name is Jeff. I don’t think you know me. Certainly, I have no idea how you got my phone number. You might have misdialed, Carolyn. Someone might have even given you the number in error.  Whatever the genesis of the misunderstanding that occurred between us last night, Carolyn, I want you to know that I think you’re a bit of a psycho and that I strongly urge you to seek help.

You see, Carolyn, during the period between 1:08AM and 1:36AM, you called me nine times. Nine times, which is the number of times Fifty Cent was shot. Do you remember hearing that Fifty Cent was shot nine times and not only survived but fully recovered? Do you remember how incredulous you were at the stunning overkill insinuated by that two-word phrase: “Nine Times.” You can hear the capital letter suggest themselves as they roll trippingly off the tongue.  Do anything nine times in a row and an unbiased observer will tell you that it’s a bit of overkill.  Do anything nine times in the span of twenty-eight minutes and you’re bound to end up hospitalized in a fair number of plausible scenarios.

Strange phone calls in the middle of the night from strange phone numbers?  It’s not a bad start, Carolyn, but then you left me two voicemails.  In those messages, Carolyn, you do not speak; you merely breathe heavily, perhaps trying to suss out why whoever you were calling has changed his or her name to Jeff.  Or maybe you were calling a different Jeff; it’s not an uncommon name.  It is, I can tell, a Herculean task on your part.  You did, after all, leave two messages, Carolyn.

Finally, Carolyn, you sent me a text message at 1:41AM. In it, you tell me:

Its Carolyn I’m suprising shawn so can u open the door for me lol

You should know that I don’t know who Shawn is.  I didn’t consciously lock you out of wherever you were.  But maybe, if I did know you, I would have, Carolyn. I don’t think I like you much, and not just because you called nine times and left two voice messages in the span of twenty-eight minutes.  That “lol” is obviously forced, a mask for the furious rage I imagine you feeling just then, standing outside Shawn’s door and waiting, wistfully, for the door to open. The door that would never open, Carolyn, because my phone was in my jacket pocket, sound off, while I lounged on a couch watching Sex and the City with my significant other.  It was a scene that was perhaps similar to one you wish you could stage with Shawn, him cuddled up next to you on a sofa, you huddling close for warmth against the cruel and snowy night outside.

I have to tell you, Carolyn: even if I knew Shawn, I don’t think I’d open the door.  The nine calls, the heavy-breathing voicemail, they wouldn’t have put me at ease.  It reminds me, Carolyn, of a movie.  A movie called The Strangers.  You remember Ben Covington from Felicity, Carolyn?  Well, in The Strangers, Ben Covington gets brutally killed because he answers the door in the middle of the night.  Unlike Ben Covington, I’m not dumb enough to choose the psycho on the porch over an attractive brunette.  I’m of course taking it for granted, Carolyn, that you aren’t a brunette and that Shawn has a porch.  But my argument stands.

lost souls
a sound of thunder
thr3e
doogal
the adventures of pluto nash
the fog (2005)
swept away (2002)
bloodrayne
soul survivors
house of the dead
happily n’ever after
the whole ten yards
the covenant
feardotcom
battlefield earth
texas rangers
half past dead
alone in the dark
one missed call
ballistic: ecks vs. sever

EDIT: The full 100 can be found here.  This is a flawed list, because it does not include Skeleton Man or Dead Above Ground, mind you, and seems to be based on freshness data from Rotten Tomatoes only and not necessarily common sense.  Battlefield Earth is much worse than its appearance on the list would indicate  and Ecks Vs. Sever, conversely, is slightly better than its “worst movie” title warrants.

(Click teh kitteh to download)

PLAYLIST

1. Final Fantasy – Power Of Love (Celine Dion cover)

2. Beck – Ghettochip Malfunction (Hell Yes)

3. Black Kids – I’m Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance With You

4. TMBG – Experimental Film

5. Regina Spektor – Dance Anthem of the 80s

6. Ben Folds – There’s Always Someone Cooler Than You

7. Ted Leo and the Pharmacists – Me and Mia

8. Dar Williams – Teen For God

9. Defiance, Ohio – Oh Susquehanna!

10. Cake – Arco Arena

11. Death Cab For Cutie – Marching Bands of Manhattan

12. Fiona Apple – Extraordinary Machine

13. Lene Lovich – I Think We’re Alone Now (Japanese Version)

14. The Dynamites – Body Snatcher

15. The Saturday Knights – 45

16. The Hooters – And We Danced

17. Hospital Bombers – The Devil’s Music

18. Josh Joplin Group – Siddharthas of Suburbia

19. Paris Texas – Bombs Away

20. Mark Ronson – God Put A Smile On Your Face (Coldplay cover)

21. Elvis Costello – Radio Sweetheart

22. Chocolate Rain (8-Bit Remix)

As the title of this mix implies, this is a bit less dreary than the offerings of the past two days (although, I’ve heard good reviews from a few of you who have actually listened to it).

I have been thinking, and I have determined that I don’t really have any dedicated, emotional rivalry or hatred with other bloggers online. I want to change that. So, I’m putting out an open call for someone to embroil myself in a blog war with. Under the glaring light of my snarky cynicism, you will wither away like Lot’s dessicated, salt-turned wife and vanish in the breeze. That is what I bring to the table. Silver members also receive a commemorative tote bag.

As a follow-up to today’s sad-about-girls mixtape, I am going to revisit my “Things I Hate: Being Single” posts from 2008, which were ruminations on the trainwrecks and horrorshows that await the newly single.  Since that time, I’ve had a brief and generally good relationship that ended largely due to environmental factors, a few dates that I felt were really promising with someone who brushed me off without explanation (after telling me point-blank that she wasn’t brushing me off) and sundry other encounters that have been stunningly un-noteworthy, either from a positive perspective or a “Oh My God, what was that?!” one.  Because I don’t have the stark, existential horror of vapid youngsters, drunken marrieds or mistaken identities to cull from in this report, I can’t promise it will be as amusing as previous installments.

One of the thoughts that occurs to me frequently when I consider my wedmancipation from a year away from the incident is this: that I have traded environmental stability (as defined by a mortgage, a garage in which I fixed things with power tools, a firm knowledge that I would be going to bed with another person) for emotional stability (as defined by general happiness, the energy to pursue things I am creatively passionate about and the creation and repair of human connections).

It is a bargain that I’m pleased with.

As a consequence of this, though, I feel like I’m in like Adventure Mode or something: cut loose of baggage, I’m looking to reclaim some kind of nebulous value that I may never have actually had. It is neither a quarter life nor mid life crisis; it is a Quest of a Gawainesque bent. With a capital Q.

Many of the women that I’ve been on dates with recently simply aren’t looking for that. Some are looking for a guy with a stable job and a car in good repair and a stable air of stable stability about him. I have two of those things.  One of these especially has been too defensive and fixated on her own past for my taste (and a date that consists of nothing but dating horror stories over dinner and drinks definitely counts as fixated on the past by my reckoning).

I was told on one of my most recent sojourns into the land of dating that I am not inquisitive enough.  That I should be asking all about her job and her family and her et cetera, and that those will be the metrics by which our compatibility will be determined.  I don’t buy that – that’s all stuff I can find out organically, over time.  I want to know if a woman will make me laugh, or make me think or make me giddy or forget what time it is.  I don’t need to know the facts of someone up front; I need to know the ephemera of them. Perhaps that makes me odd.

The best conversation I’ve had on a date within the past month was a lengthy discussion on our top 3 desert island CDs.  I learned more about the woman I was with from that than I did from the relentless Q+A portion of the evening.

Lest you maybe think I’m bemoaning the fact that I’m still single and casting blame on a (small) parade of diverse women, I fully admit that the dissonance here is with me.  Most people my age are looking for someone to settle down with, but that’s an embrace I am not in a hurry to rush back into.  I’ve already done it, and I spent much of the time when I should have been not settling down doing the opposite. I am like Merlin or Brad Pitt, aging backwards eternally. Perhaps next I’ll join a fraternity or something, like in that one movie with those guys.

Does it bother you that so many of my recent posts are predicated on time spent at bars?  Do you want me to go back to posting ranty musings on pop culture garbage?  That maybe I should blog about each episode of Daisy of Love or spend more time discussing Batman?

I hope not, because this post may be a bridge too far for you.

Saturday, I was celebrating frequent commenter Erin In Scranton’s birthday with a bevy of smart, attractive Scrantonians, when the conversation turned to dating disaster stories (datesasters?  I do love portmanteau words).  Because dysfunctional relationships and poor life choices are the cornerstones of my existence, my eyes lit up and my ears perked up, doglike.  Fueled by alcohol, I pulled back the curtains of the sad, dark period of my life that consists of my first frustrated, fumbling attempts at dating post-divorce.

I was given two pieces of advice that, in retrospect, are incredibly stupid.  The first was to “get back on the horse,” which is some kind of T. Boone Pickens metaphor for building a wind farm, I think.   But he may not have meant that I should invest in renewable energy production.  More likely, it was that I should start dating again as soon as possible in order to aid in the healing process.

The second pearl of wisdom came from a female friend, of all things.  When I had remarked sullenly that it was like a decade of my life had vanished, she said – with an earnest seriousness – that I should behave accordingly and try dating significantly younger women.  To recapture my youth.

My friends mean well.  But sometimes they’re dumb.

In retrospect, neither of these were good ideas.  The former led to at least one date where I did nothing but talk about my marriage, at her prompting, which I did in vague, melancholy terms that caused the girl to leave me with a hug that I might describe as ‘interventive’ and an exhortation to call her if I ever needed to talk (an experience which has led to a staunch reluctance on my part to talk about  ‘The Inciting Incident,’  as I’ve codenamed it, in any great detail in fear of evoking either a ‘flight or pity’ response.    The latter…did not work out so well as the former did.

Through some kind of prestidigitation, I’d met a girl about seven years younger than me.  I described her to the bar-hoppers I was with on Saturday as ‘cute, but slightly vapid,’ a phrase that continues to haunt me, days later. Knowing that she was any level of vapid, I’m asked, why were you even talking to her?  I have no defensible answer save that she was cute.  Coupled with my learned unwillingness to believe that anybody worthwhile is interested in me (which I think I’ve maybe started to get over, finally), cute can go a long way toward forgiving obvious faults.  Besides, I’m operating under the influence of two very bad pieces of advice.  [I also, for the interested, am unable to arrest any senior OCP employees; any attempt to do so results in shutdown.]

When I intimated that I’d be interested in getting together with her for dinner or the like, she asked me if I owned my own car, as though it were the most important thing in the world.

To my credit, I snapped out of it right at that moment, but that doesn’t stop the moment from being a bit of a personal nadir.   [Full disclosure: I drive a Ford Taurus, which I do own, ladies.]  Now, to be fair, everybody has their own idiosyncrasies.  There are standards that one must abide by, after all.  I can’t date a woman that has never seen Star Wars, for instance.  Or who owns the movie Glitter on DVD, even if it is for ironic value.  And you can’t like Twilight.  But those are completely different arbitrary standards, I assure you.

Comments are open for mockery below.

One of the enduring lessons of horror cinema is probably “Never fuck with gypsies.”  Seriously.  If you hit them with your car, embarrass them in public or even grab the last box of Fruity Pebbles at the grocery store, they will come after you and curse your ass.  Oh sure, you’ll try to appease them.  Buy them a whole truckload of Pebbles, give them all of your livestock, buy their dog, arrange a murder – anything to get them to stop, but the gypsy won’t care; they’ll mumble something in Romani and call you a gadjo and then leave you to your gruesome, ironic fate.  Movie gypsies (as opposed to real gypsies, mind you) are an unstoppable force of blood-soaked, malicious nature.  If you suspect that you are in a horror movie and you see one, run as hard and as fast as you can and pray that your running in front of them does not offend their strange Romani code.

Drag Me To Hell is a movie about what happens when you fuck with gypsies.  It is as terrifying as you’d expect.  A mild-mannered former farmgirl who’s trying to make good in the big city forecloses on an old gypsy woman’s house and becomes the object of the crone’s unceasing torment in the form of a demonic haunting that will claim her life after 3 days.  Yes, it sounds a bit like The Ring.  The trailers for the film even make it look like The Ring a bit. Ignore that, except for the similarities in quality that the two share.  Drag Me To Hell is the best supernatural horror film that I’ve seen in the past decade.  It’s taut, well-paced, and unafraid, with a strong moral center that challenges the preconceptions of the viewer all while grossing them out and making them laugh, occasionally at the same time.  The movie has few cheap jump scares and kills in the tension management department (the control of the audience’s emotional state, which reader of my horror content at my old blog know is a huge, huge structural issue in horror for me).

Sam Raimi is channeling Evil Dead 2 here, not Spider-Man 3, and that should make the hardcore very pleased.  Alison Lohman is as instantly likable as she’s always been and Raimi coaxes a performance other than “I’m a Mac” out of Justin Long, which is positively shocking.

If you’re on the fence about Drag Me To Hell, it’s not exactly what the TV spots portray it as.  Evil Dead-heads should definitely give it a chance, definitely, but it’s genuinely entertaining for everybody else, too.  Besides, if you don’t check it out, a gypsy will put a curse on you.