The Hanukkah Hotness, Night 4: Joseph Gordon-Levitt

My original idea for Night Four was David Duchovny. 

It's been a few years, but once upon a time, I had a huge crush on David Duchovny. Today he may be best known for Californication, but back in the day, the Scottish-Jewish fox was must-see TV as Agent Fox Mulder of The X-Files. 

For David Duchovny, I saw a movie called Playing God in the theater. It's a bad, pulpy crime flick about a drug-addicted doctor who goes to work for a gangster. It did have a rockin' soundtrack, though ("Trigger Hippie" by Morcheeba? Still a great song). It was also the first movie in which I ever saw Angelina Jolie.

Oh yes, and Bree Sharp had a minor pop hit with a song called "David Duchovny:"

But now, I'd much rather do a post about the Hanukkah Hotness that is Joseph Gordon-Levitt. At first, you just thought he was the kid from Third Rock From the Sun.

But then, hubba hubba. Oh, yeah, and isn't he in some kind of Batman movie or something? 

Of course you remember him in 10 Things I Hate About You, right? Based on The Taming of the Shrew, 10 Things ranks among the greatest of near-Shakespeare films, right up there with Hamlet 2 and Were the World Mine. 

It is a science fact that a hot boy is 39% hotter when he is reading a book. 

With short hair or with long hair.

(Fun Hollywood Babylon fact: the book originally referred to Montgomery Clift by the nickname "Princess Tiny Meat," but Clift's lawyers made author Kenneth Anger take out the reference. I think I can say that without getting sued now, because Patricia Bosworth reported it in her biography.)

The Hanukkah Hotness, Night 3: Ellen Barkin

Don't be fooled by the rocks that she got; Ellen Barkin's still Ellen from the Bronx. You may know her as the less-than-enlightened Nana on the NBC sitcom The New Normal, but you've gotta admit: at the age of 58, Ellen Barkin makes one hot granny.

Photo: Rosetta Argento, Creative Commons license

The stunning actress did do one thing ass backwards: she split with Gabriel Byrne to get with makeup mogul Ron Perelman. Silly girl - you're supposed to leave the plain guy for the Irish hottie, not the other way around.

Barkin and Byrne met filming Siesta, the second-best movie she's in with Julian Sands. (My Irrelevant friends will recognize Sands as Alistair Wesley on Person of Interest.) The cooler one is Mercy, an erotic thriller in which Barkin's character is bisexual.



As Dorothy Surrenders can tell you, Barkin is internationally world-famous for her salty-tongued Twitter tweets. Check her out: https://twitter.com/#!/EllenBarkin

Unlike her character on The New Normal, she will not put up with any sexist bullshit. When Bret Easton Ellis said this about the Oscar-winning director of The Hurt Locker:

...Barkin fired back with:

Literary adaptations that star Barkin include This Boy's Life, based on the memoir by Tobias Wolff;  Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, based on the writings of Hunter S. Thompson; and Crime and Punishment in Suburbia, loosely based on the Fyodor Dostoyevsky classic.

But really, someone should just collect her funniest and sauciest tweets into a book, a la Justin Halpern's Shit My Dad Says. Shit Ellen Barkin Says has definite bestseller potential.

The Hanukkah Hotness, Night 2: Hank Azaria

Henry Albert (Hank) Azaria is my Sephardic Hanukkah Hottie, 'cause after all, you can't even spell Hanukkah without Hank. Why do I love Hank Azaria? The short answer is, The Simpsons. But he's so much more than the voice of Chief Wiggum, Apu, Comic Book Guy, Frank Grimes, et al.

Though that would be enough.

His literary-leaning accomplishments include:

• Playing the role of Mitch Albom in the TV-movie version of Tuesdays With Morrie
• Reading the role of Allen Ginsberg in voiceover in the PBS documentary Chicago 10
• Playing Walter Plane in Great Expectations (the version with Ethan Hawke and Gwyneth Paltrow)
• Appeared in a production of David Mamet's Sexual Perversity in Chicago in London's West End

I like the sound of that last one. 

Of course, when our people actually lived in Egypt, we weren't the pharaohs, we were the slaves.

David Mamet, by the way, is himself an Orthodox Jew. Along with Rabbi David Kushner, he wrote a series of Torah commentaries called Five Cities of Refuge, and he's explored anti-Semitism in works including The Old Religion and The Wicked Son.

My #1 reason for interest in David Mamet, though, is that in 2005 he wrote a screenplay for James Jones' Whistle. See this listing at IonCinema, for example. Apparently it's never been produced. That makes me sad. I want it to be produced, and I want Jim Caviezel to have a small role as, say, the doctor who wants to cut off Prell's leg, or something.

Mamet was a guest star on one episode of The Simpsons. He was supposed to have written the treacly 1980s family sitcom Thicker Than Waters, with which Homer becomes obsessed.

The Hanukkah Hotness, Night 1: Barbra

Happy first night of Hanukkah! To celebrate the Festival of Light, who better than this member of the elite Oscar-Emmy-Grammy-Tony club?

If you are very young, you might only know her from her most recent project: playing Seth Rogen's mom in The Guilt Trip. If that is the case, go watch Prince of Tides now. Reading Pat Conroy's novel first is not a requirement.

My favorite Barbra Streisand quote? From her June 12, 1992 Women in Film speech:

"Welcome to the year of the woman. We’ve come a long way. Not too long ago we were called dolls, tomatoes, chicks, babes and broads. We’ve graduated to being called tough cookies, foxes, bitches, and witches. I guess that’s progress. Language gives us an insight into the way women are viewed in a male dominated society. Take our business for example. Though I’m sure this would hold true for women in positions of power in any field.

"A man is commanding – a woman is demanding.
A man is forceful – a woman is pushy.
A man is uncompromising – a woman is a ballbreaker.
A man is a perfectionist – a woman’s a pain in the ass.
He’s assertive – she’s aggressive.
He strategizes – she manipulates.
He shows leadership – she’s controlling.
He’s committed – she’s obsessed.
He’s persevering – she’s relentless.
He sticks to his guns – she’s stubborn.
If a man wants to get it right, he’s looked up to and respected.
If a woman wants to get it right, she’s difficult and impossible.

"If he acts, produces and directs, he’s called multi-talented. If she does the same thing, she’s called vain and egotistical.

"It’s been said that a man’s reach should exceed his grasp. Why can’t that be true for a woman?"

My favorite Barbra Streisand song evah? "Don't Rain on My Parade" from Funny Girl. I know, I know - she does so many awesome renditions of songs by my historical Hebrew crush, George Gershwin. This number is irresistible, though!

I'm still a little pissed at Fanny Brice for getting that nose job, though.

Of course, I also appreciated that RevoLucian remixed her into "Bale Out." Christ(ian Bale)mas comes a little early this year.



In reality, Barbra is saying "Shut the fuck up" to a supporter of then-president George W. Bush who heckled her during a 2006 performance. The mouth on this one!

Endlessly talented, endlessly fascinating, Barbra even wrote the book on interior design. Literally. She has a fascination with architecture.

Guest Post - Do You Prefer Reading About Sex to Having It?

Erotica gives men a lot to live up to. Sex in erotic fiction books is always hot, steamy and exciting, which is a far cry from the real world, where many women find that it can often be a letdown. The disparity between the quality of fictional sex and real sex has become so great that some fans of erotica even report preferring reading about flesh-on-flesh action to actually participating in it. In fact according to the New York Daily News, a recent poll conducted in Britain concluded that forty-four percent of women who took part would rather snuggle up in bed with an erotica book than engage in sex with their partner. Four hundred women aged between twenty-five and forty took part in the survey that led to these results and an impressive ninety-one percent stated that they had read at least one erotica book, meaning that these women were talking from experience as opposed to merely hypothesizing. What is it that makes fictional sex preferable to actual sex in some people’s eyes? Could it be that their partners simply don’t cut the mustard?

Fictional Men Do It Better

The male characters in erotic fiction are always prepared for sex. They never find themselves having to desperately search for a condom at the last minute or finding that they have ran out of Viagra and can’t get it up. You wouldn’t find the men in erotica having to rush to a twenty-four-hour supermarket for a packet of Durex or moaning that they didn’t buy blue pill supplies and are unable to get hard. It is perhaps little wonder that some men don’t like their partners reading this genre, although they should try and get used to it because the New York Daily News claims that sales of erotica now account for fourteen percent of books sold via retail website Play.com, making it one of the most popular literary genres.

http://goo.gl/sv73S

Ideal Lovers

Perhaps one of the reasons that some women prefer erotica to sex is that enables them to let their imaginations run wild. They can visualise the characters in the books as looking however they want them to look and imagine them to possess characteristics that are hard to come by in the real world. It is also a damn sight easier to paint a picture of the perfect man in a book than it is to shack up with the perfect man in real life, meaning that by picking up an erotic fiction title, women can read about somebody that they perceive to be their ideal lover as opposed to somebody who is human and possesses imperfections.

Erotica Makes for Easier Orgasms

It isn’t all bad news for men though, as clinical psychologist and sex therapist Dr Janet Hall claims that erotica can make women more receptive to sex even if they do prefer reading about it. She says that it can help to get women in the mood and often ensure that they are turned on to the point where they are able to orgasm. The problem is that this means that whilst a woman is having sex with her partner, there will be a strong likelihood that she will be thinking about a sex scene from an erotic novel. Whilst not many men are likely to complain about this if it means that they are in for a better quality of lovemaking, it still means that real life sex will always play second fiddle to book sex even when it results in the woman reaching the perfect climax. This is bound to be damaging to the male ego even if it does mean that they will be able to sleep with their partners more often than they would have been able to do if the erotic fiction genre had never come into being.

Final Thoughts

Ultimately men will never be able to compare to the characters depicted in erotica in the same way that women will never be able to compare to the fantasy figures that are created in men’s heads. Luckily most people are grounded in reality and realise that nobody outside of the domain of fiction is perfect and grow to love their partners’ imperfections. Is sex in erotica as good as the real thing? No because it lacks a genuine human connection and the emotional response that comes with it.

#OrnamentSwap2012 Reveal: Cute as a Button

http://tutusandteaparties.blogspot.com/2012/11/ornamentswap2012-show-tell.html

Time for the reveal! My ornament swap partner was Julie E. from whitelightsonwednesday.com. This is so cute!

Julie handmade this adorable button craft with the help of her eldest. I didn't tell Julie this, but I LOVE button crafts - I used to do them all the time when I was kid. My Irish granny bought me a box of buttons at a yard sale one time, and I was just in heaven. Thanks so much, Julie!

Not being crafty other than crafty with words, I did not make Julie's ornament. I picked out a mini cupcake ornament from Shana Lira's Etsy shop. Those who can craft do, and those of us who can't craft Etsy.

Hubby and I aren't doing our usual top-only Christmas tree this year - we're putting the wreath on the outside of the house, so obviously none of the good ornaments can go out there. Instead, I made a holiday shelf.

If your holiday shelf doesn't have room for Rainbow Brite, Bella-Edward-Jacob, Pat the Bunny, the Oscar Meyer Weinermobile and a sequin menorah box, then I just don't know how to begin to help you.

An eclectic celebrator of Winter Solstice holidays am I. Fortunately, when you're part Irish and you're part Jewish and you get excited about Hanukkah, there's a song just for you:

Yep, it's House of Pain's "Jump Around" remixed with a klezmer band. Happy Hanukkah (starting Saturday at sundown wherever you are), peeps!

OHP! Ridin' Nerdy

It's not exactly Jane Austen Fight Club, but it's still pretty funny.



I personally made this one at SomeECards.



I didn't do this, but this is like the kind of silly book puns that I enjoy: On the Road is on The Road.



The children's classic Charlotte's Web could have gone a completely different way.



This only furthers my opinion that anything Erica Jong writes is worth reading.



This is all I really want for Christmas. It's from Nat B.'s blog, which used to be OhEmGee, but is now The Spunky Poser.