Too Much Quirk?

There are too many publishing jobs on Craigslist requiring knowledge of that damn Quark software.  There is also a soft cheese called Quark that hails from Eastern Europe.  I’ve never tried it, so I can’t say if there can be too much of that, but too much cheese is usually never a good thing.  Oh, this is exciting–”The Quark” is the narrowest segment of the Baltic Sea between Sweden and Finland.  Its only claim to fame is there being very little of it, so it’s really not in its best interest for there to be too much more of it.  And then there are those quarky subatomic particles, but I digress.  What I’m getting at is, there can indeed be too much quark, but no, there cannot be too much quirk.

I’ve been itching to dedicate a post to Zooey Deschanel lately.  Every time I see a trailer for Yes Man I remember how much I love her.  In this week’s Onion Keith Phipps reviews Yes Man and describes Deschanel as a “go-to quirk-provider.”  Reading that was a bit of a revelation for me because I have a strange obsession with quirkiness and it’s gotten worse since I’ve graduated college for some reason.  It’s to the point where I can’t pick up a book unless it’s at least as quirky as something by Tom Robbins.  Same with films.  If it’s got Bill Murray having a life crisis of some kind, I’m there.  Anyway, apparently I look for quirk in my leading ladies, too. 

I haven’t seen everything she’s been in, but Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy makes me cry it’s so perfectly quirky.  I really need to read the actual Douglas Adams books.  Also, she was pretty much the only redeemable thing in Failure to Launch, that ridiculous Sarah Jessica Parker/Matthew McConaughey romantic comedy.  Then, thanks to Pandora, I came across her music:

 I want to make music like that.  Dammit.  Except the tone of my voice is more comparable to, say, Bing Crosby’s pa rum pum pum pums in this quirky duet with David Bowie:

Okay, that might be more awkward than quirky.  Anyway, one final Zooey Deschanel clip.  Probably my favorite.  1. Because she has such a good voice, and 2. Because she’s naked.  Okay, really just because she’s naked.

Six Decades of Bedding Starlets and Wardrobe Girls and Counting!

Here’s a gift idea for anyone on your list who recently wrote a blog post that referred to Captain Von Trapp: Christopher Plummer wrote a memoir!  I thought I read about it in the AV Club section of The Onion, but when I googled “Christopher Plummer The Onion” all that came up was an old review of that Keanu Reeves/Sandra Bullock movie The Lake House.  Yeah, I rented it.  No, I didn’t realize that Christopher Plummer played Keanu’s architectural genius father.

Publisher’s Weekly says of In Spite of Myself:

Plummer drinks and parties his way through a six-decade career; beds starlets, prompters and wardrobe girls; and endures countless mid-performance indignities and pratfalls. (Lesson repeatedly learned: actors and stagehands should not get drunk right before the show.)

Sounds like a good read for the holidays.  Take a break from James Stewart lassoing the moon for Mary and Bing Crosby making out with George Clooney’s aunt for a dose of drunken thespian reality. 

New celebrity-related tangent: I walked into Rite Aid a few days ago.  I had to use my debit card to get cash back for the laundry machine across the street.  I usually end up buying a candy bar in situations like this because they’re cheap, but I still wander around the store for 30 minutes just in case I spot something that is equally cheap that I actually need. 

Long story short: Diana Ross and The Supremes’ “I Hear a Symphony” was playing.  After walking around for 30 minutes I resigned myself to the check-out line and the candy bars and decided upon a Hershey’s Symphony bar because my mom really likes them.

It wasn’t until I was crossing the street, humming “I Hear a Symphony” and opening up my Symphony bar that I even realized what had happened and I began to wonder if I bought it because I like them and they remind me of my mom or because Diana Ross sung a song about a symphony in 1965…

I’ve Been So Happy Since Tuesday Night

THIS is why I love the ridiculous genius that is The Onion. Right after I devote a post to the time-space continuum, they go and devote an article to not only the time-space continuum, but to how “skyrocketing consumer prices coupled with stagnant wages have forced many Americans to work a fourth shift in another dimension in order to make ends meet.” It’s so silly and satirical and subversive and it makes me so happy.

I read it on my commute home from work yesterday/earlythismorning and probably disturbed quite a few 3am Flushing-bound subway sleepers. I never officially announced not being unemployed anymore, but that’s just because I still kind of feel poor and unsure of everything. I’ve been thinking about taking the GREs, but that requires something like $140 and…I don’t even know what I want to go back to school for or when or even if. I’ve entertained ideas of getting my master’s in a different country. Canada, Australia, or North Korea. Still deciding. Australia has Hugh Jackman, but North Korea has this guy–

Too gorgeous for his own good.