Well, there aren’t any advance screenings of the new “Sex and the City” movie in Memphis (I started asking John Beifuss weeks ago), but I’ve already heard of a couple of fun things going on May 30 … the day, as you surely know, that we get to find out what happened to Carrie and Big, whether Samantha still does yoga and Smith, and how Charlotte’s aspirations to motherhood really turned out. In other cities, lots of girlfriend parties are afoot.

Are you and your gal pals going out that night? And what do you hope is going to happen in the movie? (I’ve made a point of not reading any reviews … I’ll love it, if just for the clotheswatching potential.) 

Here’s something I’ve discovered while off work: Daytime television can suck you in quicker than a Dyson upright. The great thing about soaps is, you can be gone for months – years even – and catch up on the storyline in a matter of minutes. And I’m not sure how I’ll ever be able to go back to work and not see The OC and Gilmore Girls re-runs in the afternoons.

When I tuned in during my recent unemployment stint, Guiding Lightwas beginning a storyline where a young woman, “Ashlee,” was having lap-band surgery. She had come to this decision all on her own. Only her boyfriend (who, of course, loves her just the way she is and doesn’t care how much she weighs) was the only one who knew of her plans. Her mother – the DA – found out just as Ashlee was about to be wheeled into the operating room and so charged in and tried to talk her out of it. But Ashlee is an adult (although just barely) and can make her own decisions. She went through with the surgery.

I wondered right away how this was going to play out. A week or so after Ashlee had the surgery, there was a scene where she held up a pair of her (supposedly) old jeans that were several sizes too large for her. And I thought, “Please tell me they’re not going to dress her in larger clothes and expect us to believe that she’s getting smaller.” Because I’ve seen soaps do that with anorexic storylines before. And it kind of sucked then but it was definitely not going to work for the whole lap-band-surgery storyline. Read the rest of this entry »

Did you hear? They’re bringing back The Electric Company. Not the original, with Morgan Freeman and Rita Moreno. No, I don’t believe kids today would be adequately entertained by that. I imagine this revisited version will have more flashy content. For shorter attention spans. I wonder if Joan Rivers will reprise her narration of THE ADVENTURES OF LETTERMAN! Faster than a rolling O, Stronger than a silent E, Able to leap capital T in a single bound!

I have a lot of great memories of The Electric Company, not to mention Mr. Rogers Neighborhood and Sesame Street. Of course we watched them; there were only four channels. I was part of the original Sesame Street generation; the show debuted in November 1969, just as I was turning 3 years old. I was their target audience, and part of their broadcast experiment: Can we teach children to read with *gasp* television?? The answer was an unequivocal YES. Read the rest of this entry »

Heard all the fuss about Vanity Fair and Miley Cyrus? Evidently the magazine’s topless (though covered) portrait of the star of the Hannah Montana franchise suddenly doesn’t sound like such a great idea to both the star and the folks at Disney who care about keeping Hannah the sweet teen she is marketed to be. And I’m sure that being on set with photographer Annie Liebovitz is intimidating to stars way older than Miley Cyrus. Aside from the fact that she’s nearly unrecognizable in this picture, what do you think? Is this portrait really a bad idea … are the tweens who love Hannah going to be led astray by a Vanity Fair story/portrait? I think the Chicago Sun-Times headline is right — is this really a scandal?

I just saw the trailer for the Sex and the City movie. I haven’t decided yet if I’m going to see this movie. Don’t get me wrong – I loved the television series. I LOVED the television series. I had the theme song as my ring tone. I had the group photo with my face photoshopped in as my desktop. I quoted Carrie Bradshaw like she was a cult leader. Which she kinda was really, wasn’t she?

 I have a new friend (I didn’t know her when the show was on) who talks about their “SATC Parties.” Every week, she and her girlfriends would get together, drink Cosmos and watch the show. There may or may not have been a drinking game regarding the number of times SHOES were mentioned in the show.

Since the show ended, a lot has changed in my life. Coincidentally, I’m sure. But I’ve come to realize that Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte and Miranda fed us an awful lot of lies. After the jump: Lies that SATC made us believe.

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