Mindy Kaling

I'm pretty sure I would love Mindy Kaling. She seems clever, quirky, imaginative, funny, self-aware, down-to-earth, relate-able, and sweet. Kind of like a lot of my current friends!

In this NYT article, she writes about her penchant for imagining her future fantasy families, and one can really hear her tone and sense of humor. Instant girlcrush.

"This time, the family that I assumed the parking attendant was referring to included a dark-haired agnostic architect husband named Alex who liked ethnic food and zombie movies. (For the record, Alex is a product of my imagination. I realize that no real people are actually architects, and that it is a profession that exists entirely in movies, like art gallery owner or children’s bookshop proprietor.) [a/n: hahaha this is my favorite line. Incidentally, I do know someone whose father is an architect (in Dubai, natch), but I think this is generally a truism.]

Anyway, back to Alex. He was ethereal and dressed terribly because he didn’t care about clothes, but I kind of liked that about him. He did little things that drove me crazy like leaving his suitcase in the middle of the room when he returned from a business trip, an idiosyncrasy I once heard Michelle Obama attribute to her husband.

Alex and I lived in Hancock Park — a hip Los Angeles neighborhood — and I loved him so much that I was in a perpetual state of grinning. The kids were, I don’t know, kids. Really cute, etc. I have less experience with cute kids than I do with cute guys, so I’m not able to describe them as well, but trust me — super cute."

Read the rest of the article here.

Do you ever picture your future life? Mindy Kaling is about 10 years older than me (us?), so she's in a different place in her life. Accordingly, I don't think I've spent as much time imagining an exact future, but I admitted to Fay the other day that after watching The Wedding Planner on TV, I wouldn't mind marrying a doctor (i.e. Matthew McConaughey as a pediatrician) and she confided in turn that she has been waiting to marry Hugh Grant in Four Weddings and a Funeral. Hugh Grant is a different story though -- I think he's just manufactured for women to swoon over. That's why he's consistently cast in the same role, British accent intact, regardless of the setting or time period. Instant swoon.


P.S. Mindy Kaling is also a writer and actress on The Office and a Dartmouth grad... and drew comics for The Dartmouth, which both Fay and I have written for at one point/continue to write for.

natalie portman's shaved head

fyi i have a song on my itunes right now by the band "natalie portman's shaved head". nbd.

I'm pretty sure this is right about when I fell in love with her (and then that SNL skit... girlcrushies). I remember discussing with a girlfriend how Natalie Portman is the kind of girl that other girls respect, admire, like, and emulate, whereas, say... Megan Fox is the kind of girl that boys "like". Or some verb similar to that, but more misogynistic. My guys friends have literally said "Megan Fox is the perfect woman," direct quote, full agreement among all males present. And between all of them, not one could verbalize a reason aside from her obvious beauty. Megan Fox herself mentions in multiple interviews that guys love befriending her because she has "a badass personality," and that girls don't like her because they are jealous of that. I could see her being right about both statements, to an extent. As to the "girls don't like me" part, I could see why, potentially. There's something about her tone, demeanor, self-presentation that seems ... pandering to men. The things she says, the way she poses in photographs, her ubiquitious "sexyface" and unrelenting bedroom eyes... she comes off as very self-sexualizing (if that's a word) with no "artistry" reason behind it, which I think is unattractive or not quite respectable to fellow females. (Not that artisticness is an "excuse," if such a thing is even necessary, although I think it normalizes the behavior and makes it more socially accepted in general and in turn, more accepted among women.)

Case-in-point:

It's not that she takes many, many nearly-nude or lingerie photos. I'm sure Natalie Portman has taken very similar risque photos and I very distinctly recall Keira Knightly taking nearly-topless photos for Chanel ads and fashion spreads. In fact, googling "Natalie Portman nude" produces this as the no. 1 image result:


And we've all seen her pretty much naked in Closer. So what exactly is the difference? Both girls are undeniably beautiful. Why are they in different boxes in my head? Is it that Natalie Portman is a Harvard graduate, and thus obviously intelligent and "automatically" more respectable? Is it that she acts in "better" movies? Do you view them the same way? Are you male or female?

Thoughts?

Agh I totally didn't even mean to write an entry! Have tons on the to-do list!!!