RIP Suzanne Pleshette. Angie Dickinson, you’re our only remaining hope!

Suzanne Pleshette

Feast your eyes on this glorious Youtube and wonder no more at whether or not Bob married above himself: oh, he did, baby, he did! This is a clip of a classic catfight showdown of the very iciest type in good olde timey Hollywood style; duck and cover, boys! We blondes have to stick together, but just this once I’m calling it for the brunette; Suzanne Pleshette really knew how to take it up a life-threatening, eyebrow-arching notch. The men in this case are as incidental and interchangeable as chess piece Disney Princes, those vacuous, photogenic losers.

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately, inspired, I suppose or no, I actually know for a fact, by VF’s piece on Angie Dickinson, and today by the sad death of the original MILF, Suzanne Pleshette (okay, maybe second to Anne Bancroft’s Mrs Robinson, but there can’t be many straight Gen-X males who didn’t have a thing for the divinely sensible and sexy Emily Hartley).

Now, I’m a chick. Been one for years, actually. So I’m used to it. But there’s more to it than meets the eye: when you think about it, women as diverse as Princess Diana and Paris Hilton have managed to become some kind of arche- or at least stereotype. And it pays to type well, not fast or you can get stuck as your 7-year-old self’s idea of a cool chick, which explains the whole Madonna wannabe situation. So when you’re a little girl and you want to grow up to be a woman, what, exactly, do you have in mind? Britney Spears? Madonna? Marie Curie? Isabel Allende? Amanda Lepore? You’ve got to choose your icons carefully, if you don’t want to end up dated by nothing more than your accessories and identified by nothing more than the labels your mother sewed into your underwear.

I picked Pepper.

Angie Dickinson Police Woman

It wasn’t until the seventies… that Dickinson met her pop-culture destiny, playing Sargeant Suzanne “Pepper” Anderson on Police Woman. Pepper was a lot of firsts: the first woman to have men report to her, the first unmarried female officer, the first to display self-doubt and, occasionally, a weakness for Jack Daniels. While she was doing all that, she also carved out a new look for the powerful woman—briskly beautiful in minimal makeup, blond hair permanently tousled from running down perps, her white Bianca Jagger–esque pantsuit adding to her unconscious swagger. Take that, Sydney Bristow.

She was also the first officially-sanctioned over-forty hottie, Dickinson being a young slip of 43 at the series’ start. I’m 44 now, and when I realized that my idol Pepper Anderson was my age, bells rang, the clouds parted, and angels sang the greatest hits of Burt Bacharach.

But only the ones Angie likes.

Angie Fucking Dickinson

“It’s a pleasure to meet a lady who’s a gentleman.”
Frank Sinatra

Unlisted but indelibly a part of this pantheon are Catherine Deneuve and the fictional, yet nonetheless iconic, Catwoman and Emma Peel, about whom I’ve written elsewhere and will link up once I find it.

Am I forgetting anyone?

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quiz: are you a hippie?

Another smart quiz. It’s uncanny how accurate these can be! Prepare to be amazed!


You are a Hippie


You are a total hippie. While you may not wear birks or smell of incense, you have the soul of a hippie.

You don’t trust authority, and you do as you please. You’re willing to take a stand, even when what you believe isn’t popular.You like to experiment with ideas, lifestyles, and different subcultures.

You always gravitate toward what’s radical and subversive. Normal, mainstream culture doesn’t really resonate with you.

every little thing she does is Peanuts

Two of my favorite things: Linus sings The Police! A natural followup to the classic Peanuts Hey Ya.

Lyrics after the jump, and yes, I’m feeling a little low lately (like, since mid-December) so it’ll be YouTubes and quizzes and quotations and such unoriginal things (I lack even the strength to bother putting in the social bookmarking links!) until I feel up to laying down my righteous “Meet the Jasons” or “Marathongate” posts. Stay tuned!

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Cute Overload: Nick Cave and Shane McGowan singing “What a Wonderful World”

Yes, as promised it’s the twin princes of darkness, the Anti-Piteras. Nick Cave, the Black Crow King, and Shane McGowan, patron saint of immoderation, performing Louis Armstrong‘s own ode to joy, What a Wonderful World. Lyrics after the jump.

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Christmas: it ain’t over till the fat lady uses up the last of her Sears Gift Card!

Alas, that would be me, the fat lady. I usually have curves, but the past couple of years I’ve gotten rolls instead. Not what I’d call a fair trade, but then, I could get off my plushly-upholstered butt and get some exercise, yes? Speaking of which…

I’m not sure if the Cybergypsy intends it to be a Christmas present, but I can see the stationary bicycle that was in the garage is now out on the patio; the unfortunate thing is, unless I remember to buy a tarp, it will simply rust there, same as everything. I know he has no intention of using it, that’s for sure. Unfortunately, until he gets his own space, there’s not enough room in the apartment to put it in here; well, not and use the bathroom.

I could use the patio. It’s a Chinese building: I’d hardly be the first. We really should give new members a user’s guide that includes the words “just because it has a drain doesn’t mean it’s a bathroom.” Urk.

In any case, the Christmas haul now includes a pressie I bought for myself, one upon which I have had my beady little eye-stalks for some time. This:

Sacred heart of cthulhu!

Yes, it is the famous Sacred Heart of Cthulhu tee, about my longing for which I have previously blogged. It was, of course and naturellement for this is the way the Universe works, in strange ways, particularly relating to me and Cthulhu-themed casual wear, the only thing in the store not on sale, but a sigh, a wistful “oh, I guess it’s not on sale?” and a twisting of coppery-blonde locks resulted in a meagre 10% markdown. What the hell, I was going to buy it come Nodens or Ragnarok. At my age the mere idea that hair-twirling could cause a twentysomething salesboy to give me 10% off is itself worth 90% of retail.

This was, of course, purchased with the complete aggregate of all my Christmas money, leaving me just enough to pay my bills and live off CG’s food for the next week or so. At least I’ll lose weight: right now, he’s soaking some seaweed that looks like sheets of green, striated rubber. It is his intention to use these sheets to make nutburger buns… although if the final product isn’t a helluva lot more appealing than the ingredients you’d have to be a nutburger to put the damn things anywhere near your mouth.

As well, I got a deck of trick cards, two books on true crime (one a how-to), one book about death, a squid tee, a bottle of perfume (a public service as much as a gift, and thank GOD; if my perfume level drops below a certain point, the scent of fish becomes overpowering and you may make of that what you will), one book about health, one book about snobbery, an MP3 player, a Sears gift card, an AT&T card which I hope I can use in Canada but am not sure, and three restaurant gift cards. So I will be fat, fragrant, and funky.

So, no change.

I also got lei’d, but that’s another story.

And, as I am a known Christmas nut, I am determined to keep the holiday going until the last of the gift cards has been drained dry. If I find myself at Milestone’s in the middle of June spending a few Christmas bucks, you’ll find me requesting the calamari with a side of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.”

Giant Squid Tee

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