methodwriter85

She's not a romantic lead, but Sarah Paulson of American Horror Story and 12 Years A Slave is having one hell of a career roll right now, and she's been an open lesbian for a pretty long time. I think Ellen's career isn't really going to be hurt by this, because Ellen Paige was never going to be the leading romantic lady in films, anyway. She's pretty much stayed in indie mode with some forays into blockbusters, and her career seems firmly on the character actress Parker Posey kind of track. However, if you're someone like Portia de Rossi, who DOES have the leading lady look, doors will indeed close because I think the thing about the leading lady status is that you need to be the woman that men want to sleep with, and fantasize that they can. I do wonder if Amber Heard's career faltered a bit because of her dating another woman and supposedly coming out, although she's now with Johnny Deep. I think it's okay for a leading lady type to say that she's bisexual, because then men can still imagine that they have a chance with her. There are a lot of openly bisexual women- Madonna, Evan Rachel Wood, I suppose Amber Heard, Angelina Jolie, etc etc.

I'm digging on Nikita Katsalapov. Russian ice dancer, but his look is so classic fraternity boy:

I'll admit my reaction is kind of Meh to this. Ellen Page is not the first actress to come out of the closet, and that people are treating this like such a big deal kinda surprises me. If this were 1994, yeah. But in 2014? It's not like Ellen Page is this huge A-level star known for an ultra heterosexual bombshell image, so there isn't even really the shock factor. Good for her, but Heather Matarazzo, another indie darling, came out a very long time ago to very little a-do. It just feels kinda dated.

Speaking of Manhattanization: Festivities Planned for New Wilshire Grand 20-Hour Concrete Pour Pretty cool- L.A. is getting their second "super-tall." (That means over 1,000 feet.) It seems like there's renewed interest in building American skyscapers again, which is pretty cool. I remember after 9/11, there was talk about how the skyscaper was going to become obsolete in American life.

I think everyone is an asshole to some extent. Really, who survives being a meek little "yes or no ma'am" kind of person in 21st century America? And in your case, weren't you like a venture capitalist before you became a professor? You're actually surprisingly mellow like 90 percent of the time, considering. To get things back to CAP, how great was that break-up scene between Matt and Wade? I thought it was realistic, I thought it was a long time in coming, and I thought it emphasized how much Wade wants to be an adult and grown up while Matt really wants to go back to being that happy college couple. I also thought that it's a good thing Facebook doesn't hit Stanford until March 2004, because god, how nasty would it have gotten? (Why people post about break-ups on Facebook, I'll never know.)

He'll probably be much hotter than Bieber, to be honest. Justin's always going to have that ambiguous Peter Pan look to him.

Very true. Henson, I really need to disabuse you of your notion that I somehow "strong-arm" Mark into changing the story against his wishes. That couldn't be further from the truth. Mark is not a delicate flower who bends to the will of others. Mark and I will debate, but at the end of the day, it's his story, and he's going to go where he wants with it. For example, I absolutely and totally hit the roof when I found out about the JJ molestation storyline. I begged and pleaded with Mark to change the story so that Wade and Matt "rescue" JJ from a molestation attempt. Mark absolutely and unequivocally told me, "No, this is the way I'm going." And the storyline turned out great, and it's created long-lasting implications and drama for the JJ character. Without the molestation storyline, we wouldn't have gotten that wonderful little scene between Will and JJ at the hospital after his coach died, and in this story, the scene between John and JJ where we could see just how messed up he is. The only time Mark ever decides to change a story is when he himself realizes that the direction isn't working, or he agrees with one of us that something just doesn't make sense for the character, or a plot is really unrealistic.

Well, it's not like Austin Mahone is obscenely far away from legality. He was born around the time you were a sophomore in high school, in April of 1996. He'll be 18 in a couple of weeks.

Silver medalist slopestyle skier Gus Kenworthy... A cute college-aged guy in a backwards baseball cap holding a puppy making goofy faces to the camera. What's not to love?

So I need a pick-me-up, and what better way than to listen to great 80's pop? Let's start! Pop Goes The 80's Playlist, Part 1 (1980 - 1985) 1. 2. 3. I remember seeing an interview with Madonna where she said that had she know this song would have branded her the Material Girl for the rest of her life, she might not have done it. LOL. 4. "Let The Music Play" by Shannon 5. "Cars" by Gary Numan 6. 7. 8. This is one bat-shit crazy video. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. It's hilarious how obvious that they used multiple stunt dance doubles in this. 14. And you get a double shot of Irene Cara! I think it was my great sorrow that my high school never did something like this. We didn't have enough really good dancers, unfortunately. 15. 16. " 17. Valley Girl. God, what a wonderful teen movie. Also, Nic Cage was surprisingly hot when he was young. 18. "Mickey" by Toni Basil 19. 20. 21. 22. The Boy George Behind the Music episode was pretty good. So, basically this song is about how Boy George was getting extremely pissed at his lover, the drummer of the band. 23. 24. I remember this tune being the closing song for "The Ryan White Story", which was a t.v. movie starring the little boy from Witness as the real-life Indiana kid who was banned from school for contracting A.I.D.S. after his bloodclotting treatments. 25. 26. " 27. 28. "Down Under" by Men At Work 29. "The Neverending Story" by Limahl 30. Hands down, my favorite music video from the 1980's. Sure, Thriller is technically the best video from that decade, but there's a whimsy fantasy about Take On Me that's just so irresistible. God, I wish it could be 1984-1985 again...what a fun time for music.

Chapter 75 -When Wade and Matt officially break up. "Don't Dream It's Over" by Crowded House You remember this tune when it came out, Mark? It was a big tune the summer you were in your mid-20's. According to the commentary for Adventureland, it was released in the fall of 1986, languished for awhile, and then suddenly hit big the following summer of '87. It was apparently perfect make-out music.

See, in my case, I thought I was finding a happy medium- making sure that three important things about the shape of figure skating for the 2000 to 2010 era stay there, but also allowing for some flexibility so that Mark can have the freedom to do what he wants with the JJ career. Plushenko is a living legend, and nobody but him was expected to win at Torino. The Johnny Weir lore is really shaped by the fact that he bombed at the '03 Nationals, but then won '04, '05, and '06. Because Johnny Weir was so good but seemed to have his middle finger permanently stuck in the air, the USFSA really started pushing the family-friendly Evan Lysacek, further exacerbating the rivalry. And the Johnny Weir/Evan Lysacek rivalry of the 2000's gets topped at the end with Evan ultimately winning everything at the end. Those three things really seemed like they shaped the vibe of men's figure skating in the 2000's, and the idea is to weave JJ into the narrative, without completely changing it. It's what Mark has tried to have done by having myself and Daisy research the vibe of that era in figure skating. That's all I'm saying. And yes, Blue, I came into being part of Mark's team because when he posted chapter 2 or chapter 3 of CAP, he was having JP and Peter Gordon spirit themselves down to the Delaware beaches to hide out for a week. The problem? It was late March, 1962. A huge NorEaster, called the Ash Wednesday Storm, had destroyed the whole area in early March. Mark incorporated the whole thing into the story, and I thought it really made the chapter even stronger. Exactly. Really, Henson, if I ever get too forceful with Mark and he isn't convinced by me, I get shut down pretty quick. It's been that way for 5 years, and it works.

I agree as well. There are certain cardinal facts that can't be changed- Plushenko wins the '06 Gold, Evan wins the '10 Gold, and Johnny Weir is national champion from 2004 to 2006. But for this storyline to be worthwhile, and for it be believable that people like Evan or Johnny are even deigning to interact with JJ, he'll have to start displacing real medal winners. Otherwise, he can't ever medal at an event...which...well, we couldn't really call him elite, could we? I've thought about whether or not we should write out Jeremy Abbott from skating history and have JJ "take his place", so to speak. He can be the skater that's really good at U.S. championships but then chokes at Worlds or the Olympics. Then again, from what I understand, Jeremy Abbott is a total headcase and he apparently lost it at the 2010 Worlds because Johnny Weir stole his boyfriend. That might be a fun thing for JJ to comment on. When I watched the Team Figure Skating, I was wondering how JJ would react if he were on that team and had watched Jeremy Abbott's choke and 7th place finish. I'm guessing he would have smiled pleasantly at the camera, patted Jeremy Abbott on the arm, gone to his hotel room, and spent a good 30 minutes screaming his lungs out.

I wonder if eventually San Francisco will have to give in to Manhattanization and start building more skyscapers. It sounds like people are very NIMBY about them in SF: http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2013/04/11/san_francisco_zoning_needs_more_density_and_tall_buildings.html

Mark, your move. I do kinda wonder what SF would look like if they hadn't clamped down hard on skyscaper development- on one hand, all these great early 20th century houses and buildings might have gotten knocked down. On the other hand, you'd probably have better affordability. Washington, D.C. has a similar problem.

As an aside...anyone else notice that it seems like a lot of gay men in their 20's and 30's are rocking facial hair now? Stark contrast from the smooth-faced Queer Eye days.

Right. There's also that. We had JJ scheduled to go to the 2000 Junior Grand Prix Final in Scotland on December 14th-17th (which he qualified for because we had him win a bronze at the Grand Prix in St. Gervais), but Mark had us change it because he wanted JJ around, and the result of JJ doing badly in school with Brad banning him from going off to Scotland led us to a really fantastic reveal. We've learned to flexible, in any event. We had JJ's 2000-2001 season so minutely planned, too. We learned from that when we refined the '01 - '02 season. For older guys, I see JJ with an Anderson Cooper type- an urbane, witty guy from a rich family with a killer fashion sense. For young guys, I see JJ with a gay version of Nicholas Hoult. Or maybe a Ronan Farrow type.He seems like a rather fey and a massive bitch, but with a pedigree and crazy family like his, it'd be hard not to be. He also graduated from law school at 21 and was a Rhodes scholar- impressive as hell. It's alleged that Woody Allen is not his biological father, but Frank Sinatra. Either way it's a pretty cool pedigree,. and this guy has one hell of a list of accomplishments for a 26-year old. I could see JJ attracted to that type even though he's not a genius himself. But yes, in any event, I can't see JJ with muscle boys.

Right. See, the thing is, Daisy and I have been writing out and planning a career timeline for JJ for 3 or 4 years now- we have a rough draft of where JJ goes up to the 2005-2006 season. Now that we've reached the point where JJ is a senior skater, we're going to see him start "displacing", so to speak, actual senior figure skaters. It's inevitable if we're having him be someone that people like Johnny Weir and Evan Lysacek would even bother with. It's been cool to bring in the real events though- we can't find actual dates for the regionals and sectionals, but Skate America and Skate Canada were real. Johnny Weir actually placed 7th at Skate Canada, interestingly enough. Which was probably an decent result, considering that Johnny Weir was probably only doing senior skating events for two seasons. I liked how JJ got really unrealistic and obsessed with the idea that he could and should win the two Grand Prixes and make it to the final Grand Prix. My guess is that the general impression of JJ isn't that he's washed up and that it's cool that he even got to the Grand Prix during his first senior season, but I'm betting he overheard one of his competitors saying nasty things about him and JJ's decided that EVERYONE thinks it about him. *cough* Johnny Weir *cough*

9.11 Chapter 74 -When JJ starts punching Zach in the stomach. "Jeremy" by Pearl Jam -When Will tries to talk JJ through the grieving process while being on the rooftop. "Mad World" by Gary Jules -When they all enjoy and cheer for Zach at the football game. "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger" by Daft Punk

Well, in terms of emotional healing, yes. In terms of figure skating, that's more of a question mark and depends on how much Mark decides to re-write skating history to accompany him. Is JJ going to take off in his early 20's and become legendary like Johnny Weir and Evan Lysacek did? It remains to be seen. I do wonder if Will's blackmail of the USFSA isn't eventually, years later, going to bite JJ on the ass. What I really loved about this chapter was JJ not even realizing his own strength, and that he kind of sees himself as weak and girly and that Zach probably couldn't even feel his punch. That was great insight into his mindset.

If Austin can get a major hit he really could be the final 1-2 punch to finish off Bieber.

I got pretty unsettled tonight. My friend Ethan, who was really close to our friend Steve who died, called me up to talk. Pretty soon it obvious that Ethan was completely and totally loaded, and on the phone he admitted to me that he was on cocaine, Adderall, and Vodka. We just had this ten-minute conversation- well if you could call it that- and he just kept saying these snippets of things. Like about what Steve meant to him, how I'm one of the few people that got Steve, and telling me about how he can't get the image of the last time they hung out and did drugs together out of his mind. It was so incoherent. The conversation lasted for 10 minutes until he likely passed out or something. After I stopped freaking out, I figured that Ethan, who has kind of been serving as the backbone for everybody else in this grieving process, must have hit a snap point and he needed to unload. I was pretty shocked- I really thought he'd been handling this so well, and I'd never heard Ethan this loaded and fucked up before, and I partied with him a lot in college. But grief is indeed a long and fucked up journey to make, and there are some big detours. The backstory to this, from what I've gathered...Steve's girlfriend T is in rehab somewhere. Ethan has been talking to her quite a lot- maybe too much, and maybe he's been the backbone so much that he hasn't really dealt. I don't know, I'm just surmising. Maybe something just set him off- and this has been his way of coping. It was so weird, though. I haven't really dealt with people being that messed up since college, and like I said, I never heard or saw him get that messed up in college. He was a recreational drug user, yeah, but I never thought he had a big problem like I admittedly thought with Steve. I mean, Ethan DID have his sober moments in college, which I can't really say about Steve. Anyway, if I'm right, it makes me kinda glad that I've been talking it out continually and admitting whenever I feel bad, rather than letting it all bottle up. I'm proud to say that I haven't had any drinking sessions to try and numb this...not to bag on my friend Ian for doing it, but in my own personal view, it doesn't help. It really doesn't. I've tried to tackle this as head-on and clear-headed as I can, and I think it's largely worked. I called up a buddy and asked him for advice on this, and he got me to calm down and figure that I'll call Ian up tomorrow and find out how he's doing. I really do hope he's alright and it was just a bad night.

I think Los Angeles is top dog in terms of industry and population, but San Francisco is still top dog in terms of being a cohesive city with a distinct, legendary culture. Isn't Los Angeles mainly just suburbs and industrial towns knitted together by expressways with one relatively small urban core? As Tim put it, L.A. is the proud anti-city. There's actually this interesting book, called Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser, which delves quite a bit into how fast food and suburban sprawl of the Greater Los Angeles area came hand in hand. Anyway, speaking of Los Angeles, Buzzfeed is running a quiz called: Where In Los Angeles Should You Live? I got The Valley. Which is fun in one sense, because I fucking LOVED Valley Girl. But I also really hate suburban sprawl, which I grew up in as people in Philly and New Jersey started moving down here to take advantage of the low taxes in Delaware. Unless the Valley isn't actually a suburban sprawl area? Wouldn't they actually be kind of dense at this point? Older suburbs usually tend to develop walk-ability with mixed-use areas at some point. That's what happened in my surburb, Bear, and what seems to be happening in the small farming town-turned-Philadelphia bedroom community Middletown. In any event... I kinda figure the accent is totally different now, but man, that song still remains hilarious. "Like, OMG. Like, totally. Encino's like so bitchin'." I remember watching The Bling Ring, and thinking that the depiction of Calabasas with the whiny vocal fry accent made me think of a modern-day Valley Girl. Only the colors were a lot more muted.

That's a really good point, Private Tim. I think there were some things about high school that were better than college, especially early college- in high school, it was easier to just hang out with people and talk....college everybody wanted to get fucked and party. I was thinking though that the sense of freedom you had where you could call up a friend at 1 a.m. in the morning and ask if they wanted to hang out at the late night diner, as well as being away from the tedium of classes from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. everyday that never changed up and having to ask for hall passes, risking detentions, etc etc really outweighs any positives that there were about high school. I think my favorite part about college, especially coming from a small high school like I did (Cab Calloway's class of 2005 had 82 members and it was the largest class they'd graduated by that point), was that if you didn't like someone, it was so much easier to avoid them as opposed to high school, where if you didn't like someone you still had to see them practically every day. Hence why college B.S. wasn't nearly as bad as high school B.S. However, like you said, people tended to take college B.S. more seriously because the stakes in college are higher- the fighting in my drama club was pretty damn bitch, not to mention the saga of my Resident Hall Council during the fall 2011 semester. Ugh. If you've read JWolf's The English Year, he does a really good job of showing how self-important people can get in college. Kevin Reynolds yeah...his face isn't right, and the hair isn't right because it's that purposefully messy hair that I can't see JJ doing, but the haircolor, the bod and the suit were so damn spot-on. Frank was 7 or 8 when Aaron "died", as opposed to Nathan, who was 17 or so, so Frank didn't really grow up with Aaron, and he likely didn't have enough pleasant memories of him to outweigh how pissed off he was. And you can't really underestimate what addiction can do to people- we can assume that Fred Hayes likely WAS a decent guy, but grief and the ensuing alcohol addiction really changed him. Well, if Tiffany and JJ do wind up going with Wade to Boston, it's a given that they'd have to compete at the Eastern Sectionals to get to Nationals. Johnny Weir is going to be interesting: At this point, Johnny Weir is the 2001 Junior World Champion, so I imagine his ego is pretty much taking off. I remember Mark and I had some back and forth about whether or not JJ would be as flamboyant as Johnny Weir, but Mark's been insistent that JJ would have more of a Junior GQ look. As for attitude, I feel like JJ's going to be more like Evan Lysacek in terms of following and obeying the rules set out by figure skating- he doesn't strike me as a Johnny Weir trying to buck against the establishment. (Who then paid for it.) One thing we haven't done yet when it pertains to JJ's career is seeing what it's like when JJ goes into "family-friendly image PR mode." I'd imagine it'd look sort of like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3z303ybN-E Notice that Evan is doing here exactly what Johnny Weir disparaged in his interivew.

The body and outfit, totally. The face and hair- not quite. Like Tim said, JJ would be less goofy-faced and cuter- didn't Brad basically describe JJ as looking "stunningly handsome", and I don't think Brad's one to think his children are better looking than they really are. I do think he'd have elfin features like that, though. Like you said, JJ's hair would be short and spiky. But I did have the same reaction of thinking of JJ at the moment he came on, at least from the neck down. That is soooo an outfit that I could see JJ wearing, and the haircolor's right. Speaking of JJ... It's fun now that we've got JJ at senior levels, and we know that Evan Lysacek exists, which means that Johnny Weir has to exist as well. It's going to be interesting to see how JJ plays into that 2000's rivalry, and see what parts of figure skating history we'll be re-writing to include JJ into it. JJ could technically skate at 2014- Jeremy Abbott is his age, although both Johnny and Evan are done. My guess is that he'll be out by circa 2007, though. Interesting theory. I used to think that it was because you just didn't want to end the story and have them hit current time, but I think I like your theory much better. In my case, I've gotten over it, although I think I really wanted to see more of the 2000's get covered because they were a pretty big decade in my psyche as I went from 14 to 23 for that decade. There's a hell of lot of material to work with in any event, especially with 2003, 2004, 2005, 2007, and 2008. I also think I really wanted to have Will and co. hit college age so that we can stop having the "OMG, he's too young and precocious!" reaction stuff, and in general being more interested in college shenanigans instead of high school b.s. That's why Bloodlines still remains my favorite. Is there anybody who would actually pick their high school years over their college ones? Every time I think of who I was in high school I just cringe even though I do have pleasant memories of it. As for Brad and Matt, really good explanation as to why they've drifted apart despite once being pretty tight. It's a good thing Matt, Zach, and Gathan don't look exactly like Robbie, or else it'd be pretty hard for Brad to be around that for a regular basis.