Denim Duds Definitely a Dud

[Cue circus music] Step right up folks! American fashion has officially hit an all time low, ladies and gents. If you thought Crocs and the Ed Hardy logo were bad, get a load of this: Pajama jeans. Yes, you read that right. And no, I’m not referring to the current “boyfriend jean” trend. No, my fellow forward-thinking fashionistas. Sadly, we’re not talking about loose-fitting, artfully ripped and torn denim that you’ve been seeing on runways and hanging off of anorexic celebrities’ hip bones. We’re talkin’ straight up spandex and jersey masquerading as well-fitted designer label jeans, complete with high-contrast stitching (I sense a True Religion lawsuit coming on) and rivets “so they look like they were made by some European designer”. (Hey, is anyone else wondering when rivets became an outsourced fashion accessory?)

I mean let’s face it, if you’re gonna call a spade a spade, pajama jeans are really just the awkward cousin of another recent fashion faux pas also touted for its convenient marriage of comfort and style: denim leggings. A co-conspirator, if you ask me. As if American fashion doesn’t already have a bad rap. And just when Tom Ford and Marc Jacobs thought they had the upper hand too! (Actually, both American high fashion boy wonders revived European luxury brands so what does that tell you? Hey, maybe they can demystify the whole rivet controversy!)

Aside from its “sneaky” act of deception (seriously, you almost expect the women in these ads to turn around and wink at the camera, point with both hands and yell, “Gotcha!”), these jeans apparently boast a comfortable fit that mimics the feeling of pajamas. So you can run your errands in comfort AND style. “The best of both worlds”, the website says. Hmm. Kind of reminds you of Carls Jr.’s campaign for the six-dollar burger, doesn’t it? Trying to force upscale dining into the mold of fast food when at bottom, we all know we’re still eating Carl’s Jr. no matter how you spin it. And really, how gourmet is it to be wolfing down a burger with one hand while speeding perilously down the 405? Pajama jeans can mimic designer jeans all they want, but it’s a mediocre impression at best.

C'mon, everyone knows that part of what makes real jeans irresistible to a woman, makes them THE go-to casual-but-put -together outfit, is precisely what also makes them uncomfortable; the stiffness of the twill spun fabric which holds it all in -especially since real women have curves, right America Fererra? Taking away the very essence of denim itself seems almost emasculating, an act of sartorial castration if you will.

It’s an insatiable desire, wanting the best of both worlds. I mean, there are equally bizarre manifestations of such desire everywhere you look: North Korea wants to be both loved AND feared. Baptist missionaries in Haiti want to help AND kidnap. Is it too much to ask that we exercise a little more caution before combining two antithetical concepts into one “convenient” package? Or maybe it’s not caution that we lack, so much as a basic acceptance of the universal rules of fashion: no pain, no fashion statement. Deal with it ladies. If you wanna look good, you gotta pay your dues. Or you can pay $39.99 and get a free t-shirt with your order - hey at least that part of the outfit won't be ridiculed. Just don't tell anyone you got them by purchasing the Jeans for the Inordinately Lazy Dresser.

TVLesson Writing Contest now Open - Get Creative and Win Prizes!

This month, love is in the air with TVLesson's Valentines Day Competition. We are looking for new talented creative writers to enter our contest and submit Valentines-themed articles, tips and recipes to TVLesson. You’ll have a chance to win monthly prizes, whilst building up a following and promoting yourself to our 5 million yearly viewers.

CONTEST DETAILS

Are you a romantic whiz in the kitchen? Do you know a recipe for chocolate lava cake that drives women wild? Or do you have any real-life relationship or romance tips that you'd like to share with our viewers this Valentine's Day?

Send us your favorite original Romantic Recipes, relationship advice and love-tips (PG-13 only!) and you will be entered into our Contest. The top 3 entries that get the most votes on our website will win a $50 Best Buy gift card. 10 runners up will get $20 Best Buy gift cards.

You are allowed unlimited entries. Have fun with your recipes and tips, and let your creativity run wild. Feel free to include pictures, advice, commentary, funny stories and anything else you think might make your entry stand apart from the pack and win you a prize.

CLICK HERE to enter!

PRIZES

* 3 Winners - $50 Best Buy gift card

* 10 Runner's Up prizes - $20 Best Buy gift card

RULES

* Theme – Valentines Day! Romantic Recipes or Love/ Relationship/ Dating Tips and Articles
* Please include the word 'Valentines' in the title of your article

* Winner will be decided by viewer voting - so tell your friends to vote for you!

* Your entry must be original, in English, unpublished online* and unproduced, not accepted or

displayed by any other online or print publisher or producer at the time of submission

* Unlimited entries. Enter as many times as you like (one entry per submitted article).

* Winner will be decided by viewer voting - so tell your friends to vote for you!
* No Illegal or explicit content or images
* No copyrighted images or content

PRIZE RULES

* Gift cards for all winners will be posted to the address you register with when you sign up.

* We hate spam too and will never sell or give out your personal information, ever.

* No cash alternative to gift cards.

* US Entries only

Contest Starts: 2.1.10

Entry Deadline: 2.17.10

Good luck everybody! :-)

iPad Unveiled: An Interesting but Pointless App Displayer

These days, we can all name at least one thing that has failed to live up to its hype. In no particular order: over-commercialized holidays (will Hallmark never let up?), Avatar minus the visuals (disgruntled cultural critics unite!), Obama’s presidency (apparently, secretly right-leaning leftists have officially taken over the approval rating polls). Oh and how could I forget the billboard-hogging McRib sandwich – I mean, is anyone else wondering how you can make a comeback if you never really came to begin with?

News pulses and online trends are unanimous though: Apple is finally slated to be the underdog in THE techie tourney of the year: die-hard Steve Jobs worshippers vs. the rest of us in a chokehold deathmatch for the title: the 2010 (Un)Justified Hype Championship. I guess it’s not so much a title as it is a kind of geeky bragging right (move over Tina Fey) and maybe a cover story in Wired magazine. Geek or not, no one can deny the way Jobs has had the general public eating out of the palm of his hand since the advent of the iPod and its ubiquitous high-contrast black and white ads of dancing audiophiles. And I have to admit, it was a teensy bit inspiring to watch the still-enthusiastic iCEO (his moniker, not mine) present his shiny oblong brainchild to the masses: a moment of elation for sure. But I still think it's a bit of a false alarm: in other words, we can all put our heads back down and continue texting on our iPhones now.

Seriously, at the end of the day, when the blinding white lights turn off at the Apple store and Shaq stops being a good sport about the “finally an ipod that can fit in his hand” jokes, is there a real justification out there for this toy? In order to keep the price “reasonable” (still an elastic word given the current state of the economy), the iPad can’t 1) take pictures and can’t 2) run Flash. I mean, wow. For a 10-inch LCD screen , that’s 2 for 2 folks.

Still, I really can’t talk too much smack about a brand whose products underwent the most famous makeover in techie history (Skittle colored iMacs anyone?). And given its lucrative success immediately following the late 90s, you can hardly throw iPad updates into the Who Cares Hindenburg (props to the LNWJF writers for that one). I mean, Jennifer Aniston probably wouldn’t agree with this (according to Vogue), but I think the rumors flying around for this thing almost rivaled the Brangelina fiasco. Yep, it was right up there along with the Haiti earthquake and Susan Boyle's album release date.

Ahh well, what are you gonna do? If technological advances are really just a mad scramble towards obsoleteness, then all this iBashing is really just killing time until the iPad nano comes out anyway.

V is for Vodka

If you’ve decided to forgo the night out and just keep it low key this VD (or as I like to call it, Vodka Appreciation Day), it doesn’t get any easier than popping in a DVD (or VHS for the oldies-but-goodies out there!) and staying in for the evening. (If you’re still on the fence about braving a V-day crowd of coupled-up kooks this February, here’s an image for laughs: SJP and Cynthia Nixon in last year’s SATC flick batting away curled balloon strings while trying to have a meal.) If you’re wondering how to revolt against yet another over-rated and overly-commercialized holiday- here it is: a no muss, no fuss movie night. For all you single ladies out there (who, despite the catchy tune, feels Beyonce strutting around without a ring is really just Ms. Jay-Z wanting to rule the airwaves yet again by penning a kick-ass girl power track-remember Survivor?), I know what you’re thinking: Just spare me the saccharine happy-endings, right?

Yeah, I’m with you on that one. My personal favorites expertly turn the genre on its head. My Best Friend’s Wedding has an exquisitely bittersweet finale, with a jilted Julia Roberts in one of her finest performances. A more recent take on the doomed relationship is 2009’s 500 Days of Summer, a break-up framed entirely as a series of flashbacks. Another delightful surprise is Broken English (2007), an under-the-radar indie flick with none other than the indie queen herself Parker Posey playing an unlucky single in her mid –thirties dealing with her own painful bouts of self-sabatoge when the too-good-to-be-true French hunk (played by Melvil Poupaud) enters her life.

Speaking of movies, it seems as though the large ensemble cast formula for feature films is here to stay. After Crash took home the Oscar for best picture in 2005, it seems like every production company and team wants to take a crack at it. Some would say 2003’s Love Actually revived the form for rom coms, especially in terms of the seemingly random (but carefully orchestrated) inter-connectivity between initial strangers; since then, with films like 2006’s Paris, Je’taime (which spawned the New York version New York, I Love You), 2009’s He’s Just Not That Into You and next month’s highly anticipated start-studded ensemble Valentine’s Day, the market for movie viewers who want to kill 15 celebrity birds with one movie ticket seems to be a pretty sure thing.

Of course, movie execs and marketing experts know to release these (and other cheese-tastic celluloid delights) just before V-day. How else would countless hopeless-romantic s justify the one day they get to drag their kicking-and-screaming boyfriends (or discreetly resistant but outwardly compliant and enthusiastic boyfriend-hopefuls) to shell out the 10 bones to watch Kate Hudson or Mandy Moore frolic around in too many costume changes (when let’s face it, they’d much rather be at Daybreakers watching a zombie throw down or the Denzel flick)?
Though it’s interesting to note that to date, the highest grossing rom com since the late 70’s is My Big Fat Greek Wedding, a cross-cultural story which revolves around a thirty-something year old single woman who finds love after already being labeled a veritable old maid by her family members. Guaranteed laughs revolve around the film’s comedic rhythm which depends primarily on the moments of hesitation with which most of us approach situations of cultural difference and unfamiliarity. The whitest of whites and the Greek-est of Greeks collide in scenes of hilarious courtship and an equally flamboyant and poignant marriage ceremony.

Nia Vardalo’s overnight success is followed closely by Nancy Meyer’s hit film What Women Want, starring Mel Gibson (pre-Passion of the Christ) and Helen Hunt. The plot revolves around a chauvinistic Gibson who, by way of a serendipitous electrocution, is able to read women’s minds, (unbeknownst to the women). Film as escapism at its best, my friends. If only men were half as intuitive, am I right ladies?

Whatever you end up doing (or not doing), here are some other ideas on how to pass the time this Valentine’s Day! And since some have argued that the best remedy for depression is hard liquor, my last word of advice to you would be to keep your bar fully stocked come February 14th.

Brrrrring on the Heat

For various reasons, I rarely rave about the weather here in Socal. Most locals take the sun for granted, I suppose. If you've been surrounded by something your whole life, you hardly see it anymore until an outsider mentions it. The sun, the traffic, the superficiality. That's why I can always spot an out-of-towner by the way they talk about the weather (or by the fact that they even mention it at all). I guess by comparison, I must admit that having an 80 degree Christmas is pretty insane. While others freeze their tails off trying to stay warm and out of the snow/sleet/cold, us SoCalers are slathering on sunblock and schlepping around in flip flops.

Seriously, if you're from the East coast (or from anywhere in the Deep South where temperatures are at record lows right now), I bet you're scoffing at me right now. I sleep with the window open, yell at my roomates when they leave the heater on too long and wear scarves primarily as a fashion accessory. But I secretly long for the kind of weather that would warrant the guilty-pleasure purchase of the infamous Ugg boots. Though I can’t help but think that every time I see those ubiquitous Sherpa-lined suede concoctions it must be a veritable slap-in-the-face to those truly struggling to keep warm. Especially when paired –quite intentionally- with mini skirts, booty shorts and sometimes just spandex tights with no additional bottoms (Lady Gaga would be so proud). No matter how much I want them, Socal weather doesn’t seem to justify shelling out the 150 bones.

But this recent cold snap is no joke. We’ve got people falling over dead in their own homes, iguanas shutting down and going into hibernation (no really, that’s not a joke) and falling out of trees. And that’s in South Florida, the state of year round humidity. If you’re wondering how to stay warm under genuinely cold circumstances, check out some of these helpful bits. Otherwise, I suggest you find a working heater (or someone that has one) and hold on to it for dear life.

Entertain This

“When a word ceases to be a term of description and becomes merely a term of praise, it no longer tells you facts about the object: it only tells you about the speaker’s attitude to that object. (A ‘nice’ meal only means a meal the speaker likes.)”
-C.S. Lewis

Recently, I was asked why something unpleasant would be categorized under “entertainment.” The inquirer was someone considerably younger than myself, and seemed to be under the unsurprisingly common assumption that what entertains must necessarily be pleasant or at least pleasure-inducing.

I did what anyone put on the spot would do: I started feverishly racking my brains hoping I wouldn’t have to pull something out of my ass (like a lot of adults do when children ask pointed, naïve questions). Luckily, the astounding array of unpleasant reality TV shows both past and present came to my rescue: Jersey Shore, Fear Factor, Dirty Jobs, The Bachelor, The Real World, and Keeping up with the Kardashians to name a few.

His question answered, the satisfied pupil went along his way, and I was left wondering about the elasticity of words. The more I thought about it, the more perplexing his question became. And the more I began to wonder if I had shortchanged my answer to his question.

My initial reaction was to dub his query unsurprising because of the typically positive connotations that the word ‘entertainment’ often carries. Historically used to refer to generally pleasant diversions and occupations of the mind, ‘entertainment’ has long been used to refer to recreational artistic performances (think court jesters and medieval minstrels) which brought relief from the every day by inducing amusement and laughter.

The equally surprising nature of his question, though, lies in the seemingly unacknowledged omnipresence of more modern forms of entertainment that eluded him perhaps momentarily. Because let’s face it: you would be hard pressed to find someone today who is unaware of the ubiquitous presence ‘entertainment’ has in the collective consciousness. Young people of today’s generation most likely won’t be able to recall a time “Entertainment” didn’t have its own category on veritably every local and international news channel; in fact, the volume and demand of what many consider entertainment today has now warranted its own channel just to keep track of it all (Entertainment Tonight, ENews!, etc.). And by ‘keep track’, I mean all of it: the good, the bad and the ugly. Brangelina’s latest adoption case and Oprah’s recent trip to Africa is right up there along with rumors of a Jolie-Pitt split and the day time talk show goddess’s fluctuating weight patterns. Fashion faux pas, box office flops and award show flubs all get equitable time under the limelight.

What’s more, with the advent of Youtube, Myspace, Facebook and other such user-generated sites, entertainment (and ensuing celebrity) is no longer exclusively the domain of the rich and famous: the recently coined term “Youtube sensation” attests to the rising number of self-made stars today’s generation boasts. Of course, you’ll always get a bad apple or two (or three…). I still don’t know if it’s entirely a ‘good’ thing that anyone and everyone has access to post whatever they want, whenever they want (case in point: the popping of the biggest pimple in history – look it up if you want to experience simultaneous gagging and vomiting)- though there is no denying the many useful ramifications and effects of such technology (cell phone videos capturing political chaos and acts of civilian murder in the Middle East).

Yeah, I’m off my soap box now. But before this turns into a moralizing rant on the state of the media, I must admit that not all reality shows are from the devil. My rule of thumb tends to be: If a shows states upfront its premise to be a kind of ‘show’ in the traditional sense (American Idol, So You Think You Can Dance), it will often have nothing to hide.

But I can't ignore the nagging feeling that there is something to be said about the unremitting public demand for a very particularized phenomenon of entertainment, as evidenced by the highest ratings in series history for the episode in which Jon and Kate Gosselin announce their separation in Jon and Kate Plus Eight: invasive documentation of family life. Where does this kind of insatiable curiosity come from? (Newlyweds: Nick and Jessica, anyone?) Perhaps this is a question best left to sociologists and psychologists (and therapists) but it does strike me as an interesting coincidence that the term often used to refer to the strange attraction to such shows is “guilty pleasure”. Entertainment it is and therefore pleasurable it is too, but why the guilt? If the act of deriving pleasure from another’s pain is partly to blame, one can only wonder why such desire, even in small doses, even exists.

2010 will undoubtedly be another year of such entertainment (as we speak, Snookie is rapidly turning into a household name and New Jersey into a tourist hot spot), and I don’t pretend to state my case as the first of its kind, or the most effective way of getting to the root of the problem (if you even think it is one). But the next time you hear the word “entertainment”, if you find yourself tacking on “for who?” or “at whose expense?” you might be moving closer to the real answer to the unassuming question that triggered this blog entry, an entry which has, finally, reached its end (for now).

Musicomedical Ingenuity

Ahh, there's nothing like some good ol' late night TV to unwind from a long day at work and get you in the holiday spirit, eh? Where else can you get two of my all-time favorite entertainers on the same show improvising like there's no tomorrow?

Now I know what you're thinking. Jimmy Fallon doesn't really compare to the veterans of late night - Leno, Letterman, and company. Well, I don't care what you've heard about Jimmy Fallon's Late Night Show, the guy is amazing. Okay so his monologues aren't like Conan O'Brien's, but that's cuz he's NOT Conan O'Brien. Jimmy's still gotta retain his Jimmy-ness, and he does his best to do just that. Hilarious SNL-esque sketches, some down-to-earth stand up in between introducing his guests, and relatively non-threatening audience interaction. You don't ever have to worry getting completely roasted by Jimmy if he calls you out because, well, he's just too sweet to take it that far.

But let's take Fallon off the pedestal for a sec. By now, you probably know that he generously shares the spotlight with THE best house band to boot: Rockin' the stage every night (and commuting nightly from their hometown of Philly) is the Legendary Roots Crew. It’s like a free mini-concert every night, even sans musical guest performances. Original ‘sandwiches’ (intros and outros composed by the band, led by its amazing drummer and producer ?eustlove) keep the audience members on their toes. Did Max Weinberg and his late night band compose original and personalized intro music for each and every single one of Conan’s guests? Exactly. Hands down: one of THE best moves in comedic (and musical) history since Adam Samberg’s unapologetically crass and wildly successful album Incredibad – another ingenious brainchild of the inherently organic collaboration between comedy and music.

Dave Chappelle once commented on the way comedy and music often go hand in hand: "Comedians and musicians - we're like this [interlocks all ten fingers with both hands]. Every comic wants to be a musician. Every musician thinks they're funny." Case in point: Jimmy Fallon and Horatio Sanz perfoming an original Christmas song (first aired on an SNL episode) which Julian Casablancas, frontman of The Strokes, then covered - with a little help from the Roots of course - on a Late Night episode last week. A kick ass cover if you ask me. Simultaneously you get a dose of hilarious comedic effect and astounding musicality all rolled into one song initially meant for laughs only.

Some of you overachievers are probably already thinking about after-Christmas sales, and how to start the New Year off on the right foot. But if you’re like me and winding down from a low key, at-home Christmas celebration, hunkering down in your PJs and watching TV just might be the perfect way to conclude yet another hectic holiday season.

Merry Christmas!