- if Taylor Swift dated women and also played a lot of Iron Maiden covers
- if those clear dishwashers Jack Donaghy thought of in the season finale of 30 Rock existed
- if no one ever wrote another article that was just a link to a clip from a comedy show that aired last night with the caption “Watch John Oliver/Amy Schumer/Key & Peele DESTROY/EVISCERATE/EXPLODE _________”
- if I got personalized text-message updates about episodes of Intervention I saw ten years ago and haven’t been able to get out of my mind
- if at the start of every Q&A session the person about to be Q&A’ed was allowed to say “How many of you have questions that aren’t questions at all but statements designed to demonstrate how smart you think you are or advance the axe you have to grind?” and everyone who did had to put their hands down and also leave
- that Colin Jost would be outfitted with an ascot, a pair of boat shoes, and a three-day’s supply of food and water, placed on a thirty-foot yacht, and pushed out to sea, never to return
- That God would come to me in a dream and tell me the location of Katharine Hepburn’s secret lesbian diaries, and that Katharine would somehow posthumously give me her blessing to read and publish them, and no one would ever believe the fiction that she and Spencer Tracy had sex even once ever again
- If all the money that went into a single Avengers movie was redirected for a sequel to The Craft with the original cast
- if everyone would stop trying to get me to watch prestige television and just let me go at my own pace
- if Jimmy Fallon were placed in a secure location and treated humanely but forbidden from ever leaving or attempting to communicate with the outside world
- if a good 20% of the AP American History course was about President James Buchanan’s canonical gayness
- if at least one restaurant in every city was in an abandoned train car and all the servers wear conductor hats but they don’t have to say any train stuff because that’s demeaning
- if I personally were able to translate the Voynich Manuscript and the contents DID turn out to be super important and they renamed it after me
- a full-length Samurai Jack movie, every year until my death, non-negotiable
Tags: humor, life is pretty good, some minor improvements
Wow. I’d settle for a piece of pie.
except, perhaps for an occasional “CHOO CHOO MOTHERFUCKER”
also permitted: “I choo-choo-choose you” or lines from the Monorail Song.
They don’t have to participate when Quad City DJs come on once a day.
if a good 20% of the AP American History course was about President James Buchanan’s canonical gayness – my son’s taking that class next year. I will start supplementing his reading this summer so he’s prepared.
Looking forward to the Ortberg Manuscript and the new world order it will usher in!
“if Jimmy Fallon were placed in a secure location and treated humanely but forbidden from ever leaving or attempting to communicate with the outside world” <3 <3
I dream of such a world.
Maybe he can get on the boat with Jost
Yeah but then the boat would have to come back a couple weeks later to see which of them ate the other. Because I am way too curious and morbid of a person to not desperately need to know that information.
ME TOO, MAN. ME. TOO.
if I got personalized text-message updates about episodes of Intervention I saw ten years ago and haven’t been able to get out of my mind
AND HOARDERS TOO PLZ
YES.
I think about the guy with all the rats like, all the time.
I want to know about the Intervention lady who chewed her food then spit it into cups. That was the grossest/saddest one that I can recall.
But also yes, I hate Jimmy Fallon with the burning hate of a thousand suns and would like very much for him to Goe Away.
I guess late-night comedy TV is something you either grow up with, or you don’t, and I sure didn’t, because I cannot think of a single one of “those guys” I find funny. I saw a clip with Conan O’Brian for the first time the other day and found him stilted and creepy. I am still not sure Jimmy Fallon and Jimmy Kimmel are different people. What is a David Letterman? Put them all in a box and let them amuse each other.
Right?? I am not sure how they can be at once so interchangeable and yet so individually loathsome.
The difference between Kimmel and Fallon always confuses me, because I know at least one of them is a jackass and one of them got in a fight with Kanye West, but I can never remember WHICH IS WHICH.
Jimmy Fallon is the one who always laughs at his own jokes ::stabstabstab::
I agree overall though I found Craig Ferguson pretty great.
Seconded!
I miss him so much. His interviews were the best, especially with Kristen Bell.
Also his lyrics to the Doctor Who theme song
We sing this fairly frequently at my house. Intellect and romance! Brute force! Cynicism!
I just remembered that Jimmy Fallon and Jimmy Kimmel both exist seperately (allegedly!). I can’t actually remember what either of them looks like. I have a fuzzy memory of a bland face with a stupid expression on it, but I have no clue which of them it is.
I think my brain put both Jimmy Fallon and Jimmy Kimmel into the same category, and now i can’t work out which one of them I am actually picturing. (Also, the name “Jimmy” suddenly sounds overwhelmingly weird.)
They exist in the same category as Gary Busey and Nick Nolte and Gary Oldman and Daniel Day Lewis. That is, they basically are two people existing in the same corporeal form and when one is visible, the other winks out of existence.
they are in a box, it is a TV box, and it is FINE until they impinge on my internets….
But Conan did give us this:
Which is why I’m a little worried for Colbert, he was so great on his own show but will late night rub off all the stuff that made him fun? He has all his old writers and stuff so I guess we’ll see.
Yeah we don’t really have it in Australia and the first time I saw Letterman I could stop focussing on his constant buttoning and unbuttoning of his jacket. Like I have no idea if his jokes were even funny or not because it was the most distracting thing ever. God, I have needed to get that off my chest for awhile.
#3 is most excellent and I have so many possible addenda re: other articles that need not be published that I’m gonna not even start listing them because I will never stop.
BUT SERIOUSLY IF A THING IS REASONABLY POPULAR, PEOPLE WHO WANT TO SEE IT KNOW HOW TO FIND IT STAAAAAHP
(ETA: Ta-Nehisi Coates column exception, because you find a new treasure of a point or turn of phrase when you re-read it after the 17th Facebook friend shares it)
In the same vein as point 3, if we could all stop describing everything as “epic” please and thank you.
“Then there came a time, my children….when all was clickbait…and across the land there were only things you would not believe would next occur”
(this is part of my “In The Time Of Beard” future campfire lectures)
“This [Comedy Central video] is EVERYTHING”
*waits for paddlepickle to jump in with a really interesting linguistic observation I can spend the afternoon Googling*
but “epic” is AWESOME
if at the start of every Q&A session the person about to be Q&A’ed was allowed to say “How many of you have questions that aren’t questions at all but statements designed to demonstrate how smart you think you are or advance the axe you have to grind?” and everyone who did had to put their hands down and also leave
Any god in the universe who wants to make this come true– I will devote my life to your worship, and build you the sweetest dang church/temple/shrine you have ever seen in thanks.
EMPHATICALLY SECONDED
I think we have ourselves a cult in the making because: THIRD.
they do this, more or less, at many events at my college! before the q&a, the excellent bosslady moderating will dramatically declare that you can ask QUESTIONS that are SHORT and also QUESTIONS!
I would say it is medium-successful
I was at a Q&A with Judith Butler and when there was a brief silence when she joked “Who wants to talk to me?” Then a woman stood up and said “Well, I don’t have a question but you asked who wants to talk to you, so here are FIVE THINGS I think about your talk/the world/life in general”.
Then someone else found a way to make everything about Israel/Palestine, as is the ending to all good Q&As.
I went to a Q&A with Marjane Satrapi several years ago where an older man went up to the microphone and said, “I just wanted to tell you that you’re a very spiritual person, and you’re beautiful when you cry.” He then followed it up with a question that I don’t think anyone heard or paid attention to, because we were all supremely distracted by the horrified “what the FUCK” look on her face.
well hello new conversation opener
My favorite question somebody asked TNC at his Q&A was, essentially, “you’re really awesome. How did you get to be so awesome, and do you have any recommended reading for other people who want to also become awesome?”
That should be the only question accepted at Q&A sessions going forward.
i am too jealous to actually respond
The line to get into this thing was like. . .a One Direction concert for queer nerds.
[walks up to mic] “This is more of an observ —”
[LIGHTNING]
[walks over pile of smoldering ash to mic] “Two part qu—”
[LIGHTNING]
ahahaha those are exactly the lead-ins they use!
The worst of these I ever saw was a dude whose lead in was “Someone else asked my question so I’m just going to stand here and babble until I think of another one” and then he did, and of course the question he eventually came up with was dumb.
He was right after the moderator said there was time for one more question. There had been people standing in line behind him who probably actually had questions. It was the worst.
[walks over heap of smoldering ash, which by now is fairly significant] “I’d like to play devil’s adv–”
[EXPLOSION]
THISSSSSS.
“Thank you for an interesting talk. My own work deals with–”
And then I just stop listening and start fantasizing about lunch.
YES PLEASE. Bonus points if anyone who approaches the microphone at an author Q&A and starts their non-question with “Hi, I’m a writer too” automatically bursts into flames.
Especially since what they mean is “I own a laptop and can type words.”
Also lazy Questioners who do not think up an real question to ask, they just say “Can you talk about ________?” I mean I GUESS it’s a question but it doesn’t give the Answerer a good starting point and leads to terrible answers.
In the academic circles I used to run in, it was usually phrased as “I’d like you to speak to _______,” which is usually something only tangentially related to the speaker’s topic but the dude in the audience who is speaking has definitely published on it and would like everybody to know the fact.
Ooooooo nooooo, Ijust anxiety-vomited thinking about “I’d like you to speak to.”
Among the reasons I *used to* run in academic circles…
I am still running on that there hamster wheel. AND I’m concerned that I might have, in a moment of weakness/low blood sugar, used those very words. Don’t worry, I’ll reduce myself to a pile of ashes by dusk.
I’m pretty sure I’ve said it too, for the same reasons combined with an eager desire to fit in. “See me over here wearing a suit that more or less fits? I totally belong at this conference, I’m not an impostor at all, nosirree Bob!”
“Well, I wouldn’t particularly like to speak to that. Next.”
I once saw Eleanor Catton handle this type of thing beautifully – Obnoxious Acadmic pulled a variation of this to highlight her knowledge and EC just said, “That’s not something I’ve chosen to engage in with my work.” AND SCENE. She saw the game and refused to play. And so began my wrter crush on her.
I’m at an academic conference right now so this is especially relevant. If I could like burn some incense to this god in my hotel room every morning…
If this were true, no science seminars would ever overrun again.
YES. I made the mistake of going to see Peter Singer talk at the University of Pennsylvania Wharton business school (so, like, super-concentrated mix of privilege, immaturity, and elitism in the room mixed with a healthy dose of back-patting for being at a talk about charity) and OH, the questions. One girl spent at least five minutes describing a charity she’d created as a teenager, criticisms she’d recently gotten about its strategy/mission, and her reasons why those criticisms were wrong. Her question for him? Weren’t those criticisms really unfair, especially as she’d created a charity?
Is there a video of him EVISCERATING her?
(Not like in #3, but like with a machete?)
I wish. Alas, he was very polite (though didn’t indulge her). If I had the power to set people on fire with my brain, though, there would have been a little pile of ashes next to the mic. (And across half the auditorium, really. I got there about 10 minutes late, and even though the auditorium was only about half-full, the Wharton kids had figured out how to cluster at the edges of every single row.)
#5, but especially for men who want to speak in panels about promoting women in any kind of industry ever. EVER.
……..remembers to not be surprised at the thought of this, and just winces
JAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK
Raise your hand if you just immediately googled james buchanan gay. The Toast is so educational.
Reading this little snippet of a letter he sent to Mrs. Roosevelt (I’m not sure which one) is clearly the highlight of my day.
“I am now “solitary and alone,” having no companion in the house with me. I have gone a wooing to several gentlemen, but have not succeeded with any one of them. I feel that it is not good for man to be alone; and should not be astonished to find myself married to some old maid who can nurse me when I am sick, provide good dinners for me when I am well, and not expect from me any very ardent or romantic affection.”
I. AM. SO. HAPPY.
I feel like you’re going to get a lot of Winter Soldier slash with that search.
I knew he was gay, but he was also a really bad president according to most historians, one of the worst, so I’m not sure how much we should emphasize that. First gay president super-sucked!
And not in the good way.
…I’ll see myself out.
My hometown has a “famous” “historical” diner in a train car but they don’t wear conductor hats (too silly for them?) it’s still great though, visit someday: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7iTTUhNhxZY
seriously though, why is colin jost on weekend update? bring back cecily
The last one. THE LAST ONE!!!
No, fuck James Buchanan. The gayest president is *also* WORST PRESIDENT EVER according to polls of historians in a bunch of papers, and I have to agree. What we really need is more on the fictional queerness of James Buchanan Barnes.
As long as I can still sing “James K. Polk” to unhappy toddlers to try to calm them down I’m fine with your choices.
Napoleon of the Stump.
i still am never sure if it’s “here here” or “hear hear” but essentially: WORD.
“hear here!”
Damn, why didn’t I scroll down further before leaving my own Winter Solider joke.
Would it be bad if this now devolved into a Stucky recommendation thread? Because I can totally make it do that.
If I dedicate any more time to thinking about Bucky Barnes (in general but also specifically in terms of queerosity) I’ll have to hire a full time housekeeper/valet because I will run out of time to do things like feed and dress myself…
Buchanan was a garbage president. He wrote Lincoln a letter saying something along the lines of “if you are as happy to come into the presidency as I am to leave it, you must be a very happy man indeed.” I always felt like he was pressured into the role, when he’d rather spend his time w/ his boo William R. King, far away from Andrew Jackson’s bullying (he called them Aunt Fancy and Miss Nancy, like the jackass that he was and always will be).
We already have that. It’s tumblr. Join me.
If all the money that went into a single Avengers movie was redirected for a sequel to The Craft with the original cast
Mallory, more & more I think you should just be running Hollywood.
For. Real.
NEGL, I still have a boner for Fairuza Balk.
What I love most about this clip is how much she looks like Eddie Izzard’s daughter.
OH MY GOD.
THAT IS EXACTLY WHAT I WAS THINKING!
You are angry, Ortberg
(And I’m probably in a good environment to say that I can’t put into words how attractive Fairuza Balk is, right?)
I mean, there’s not exactly a dearth of other places on the internet where dudes can talk about women they find attractive.
No, but it’s usually tacky and not mentioning Fairuza Balk.
(I like it here because the bros *aren’t* here)
Oh and they wouldn’t get any of my jokes either. That’s really important.
Men……
Scuse me for the foreseeable future please. I’ll be in my Surprise Omar Sharif Recovery Room trying to recuperate. You can’t spring that on a woman without warning.
Suave Motherfucker
Seriously. Vintage Sharif is my kryptonite.
I only object to the Jimmy Fallon one because it would make my mom very sad. Tolerate Jimmy Fallon for my mom, everyone! She’s worth it!
He co-brought us Lip Sync Battle! And now he’s been on an episode, so we’ve gotten that out of the way and can just enjoy the rest of it!
(actually loves Jimmy Fallon and is sad to be in the minority on here) 🙁
Honestly his Nicole Kidman interview brought me so much joy.
His cover of U2 when they cancelled on him stunned me into silence. He was actually better than Bono (I know, low bar, but still).
I never watch his show but any time I see a clip from it I’m not sorry.
I don’t actively follow Fallon’s show, but whenever someone shares a clip, he always looks like he’s having a ton of fun. That’s infectious to me.
Kimmell had some kinds on the show who were chess champions, or Scrabble champs, or something. He was a complete ass to them, trying to show them up and then asking a bunch of passive-aggressive questions that the kids actually fielded pretty competently. But after that, I was totally done with him. NOT THE SAME.
I’m worth it too, right? I love that he seems to have so much fun at his job. I wish I had that much fun at my job.
I can’t hear or read “James Buchanan,” without immediately thinking “LAME DUCK., LAME DUCK PRESIDENT.” One of the key facts I remember school.
Safe and warm, but unable to rule.
That Q&A one would result in workshops being about 15 minutes long. Which is fine by me since it would leave more time for loading hors d’oeuvres into one’s purse or pockets.
Seriously, free food > macho academic dudes engaging in what is effectively intellectual exhibitionist masturbation.
Most important thing I learned in grad school.
Yessssss.
Academic Q&A sessions: whose Derrida is bigger?
I basically need a sequel to The Craft to happen or basically every life choice I’ve made will have been for nothing.
How Did This Get Made refers to those Q&A non-Qs as “Observation Hopes” when they do live shows.
Zouks is normally the one who trots it out and then swears heartily at the audience member who “asked” the non-question. It’s the best part of the live eps whenever it happens.
Also, if Fallon leaves, replace him with Ferguson and Geoff Peterson with the same crew on the same set with no network interference just like the late late show. Bring along the “racist” producer Michael. Kristen Bell will either be on every other day or a co-host.
He’d be a perfect complement to that rule.
Wherever you are in the world, whatever is being discussed, the moderator will then say
“If you start lecturing the panel Jason Mantzoukas will appear here and tell you to shut the fuck up and throw a can of beer at you.
“Now I will ask again–who doesn’t actually have a question?”
That would literally be completely bonkers and amazing!
if at least one restaurant in every city was in an abandoned train car and all the servers wear conductor hats but they don’t have to say any train stuff because that’s demeaning
Seattle has that covered.
MOTHERFUCKIN CO-SIGNED on the Q&A one! I work for/attend a lot of theatre and talkbacks are EVERYONE’S GOD DAMN CHANCE to grind various axes about color conscious casting, gender neutral casting, “what about the original intent of the piece”, etc etc etc.
jfc talkbacks are the ACTUAL WORST, I HATE THEM SO MUCH
Taylor Swift is far too prissy to ever get with a woman. Even if she fancies women she’d still hide it because she’s too TAYLOR SWIFTY.
It’s all so untidy this sex stuff.
What does that even mean?
This just in – queer femmes don’t exist! Everybody go home.
Is a Taylor Swifty like a Tom Swifty? “She wears short skirts,” said Taylor shirtily.
Mallory, have you seen this Tumblr post proposing a Grease AU starring Taylor Swift as Sandy and Kristen Stewart as Danny? Because I thought it would be relevant to many of your interests *aggressively fans self*
“tell me ’bout it, _______”
Fill in the blank
A true-to-book adaptation of The Dark Knight Returns that adequately portrays all of the tragedy and beauty of the comic. Don’t even talk to me about this Affleck bullshit.
Shit, shit, eyes filling
You get me.
Niagara Falls, Frankie Angel
The animated version is pretty great!
The Katharine Hepburn one is all I want from life.
You and me and everyone we know.
The Real-Life “Cheever Letters”
Oh God yes yes yes samurai jack BUT WHO WOULD PLAY HIM? https://thenewcomer.wordpress.com/2013/09/14/my-h…
couldn’t they just get the original actor or is he too old now so he couldn’t do any of his stunts?
If Taylor Swift was your girlfriend? Or is that article basically just Blank Space?
Swap in Judas Priest for Iron Maiden and you have my vote.
I will trade every superhero movie that has been made and will be made* for Samurai Jack movies. Unquestionable.
*and I like superhero movies!
Every SINGLE time I watch The Philadelphia Story and it gets to when Tracy Lord’s father says to her: “You have a good mind, a pretty face, a disciplined body that does what you tell it to. You have everything it takes to make a lovely woman except the one essential – an understanding heart. And without that, you might just as well be made of bronze,” I yell in response, “Fuck all of those undeserving fuckers who want to tame and define you!”
STAY BRONZE, TRACY.
Every time he gives that speech, I want Tracy to just sneer at him and yell, “YES, THANK YOU, life advice and chastisement from a man who’s constantly cheating on his wife and humiliating his entire family THANK YOU VERY MUCH SIR.” At least, that’s what I always yell.
Didn’t he blame his infidelity on his daughter, too? I only saw the movie once, because that speech pissed me off so much, but I could be remembering wrong.
It’s pretty much SOP for every man in the movie to (1) define her essential nature, (2) define what’s WRONG with her essential nature, and (3) explain that her essential nature is UNWOMANLY.
All of which basically translates to WHY OH WHY aren’t you devoting all your time to propping up our sad and fragile boners instead of being a BRONZE GODDESS?
And then Cary Grant knocks her down.
if Taylor Swift dated women and also played a lot of Iron Maiden covers
if taylor swift ever publicly dates a woman they will have to write it on my coroner’s report because i will be so thrilled that i will actually die.
“if Taylor Swift dated women and also played a lot of Iron Maiden covers”
SEE ALSO: ST VINCENT (she was in an iron maiden cover band in HS) and did this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fVhCo7PoVpA
St. Vincent >>>>>>>> TSwift. Sorry not sorry
I love them both – not sorry either 🙂
I also have a sneaking suspicion she took her moniker from Edna St. Vincent Millay, who is The Best Ever and remains my celebrity crush even though she died in 1949.
Hey, wouldn’t it be neat if St. Vincent and Tswift dated each other?
It would without a doubt be epic.
I was gonna post that link if it wasn’t what you’d posted.
Annie can throw DOWN.
Ahh St. Vincent is great!!!
I settled for a Coors Light and a viewing of Dirty Dancing. I made the right decision for the evening.
As much as I adore Mallory’s writing, I’ve come to accept that she and I just don’t see eye to eye a lot of the time when it comes to pop culture-related stuff. So you can imagine how thrilled I am to discover that we’re both proud members of the “Jimmy Fallon is an Unfunny, Overrated Hack Who Lacks Charisma and Also You Can Just Tell He’s a Total Starf**ker” Club! We should build a treehouse! NO JIMMYS ALLOWED.
Number 1 would greatly improve this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCC7QvHOk84
I was not physically ready to read this article when I first saw it posted on Twitter and I wasn’t physically ready when I clicked on the link just now, but goddamnit I am lying dead on the floor at the moment and loving it. “Katherine Hepburn’s lesbian diaries” EVERYTHING I NEEDED IN MY LIFE WAS HERE ON THE TOAST TODAY THANK YOU GODDESS ORTBERG
Hepburn/Garbo 4ever
if everyone would stop trying to get me to watch prestige television and just let me go at my own pace
For the love of God, YES. No, I do not HAVE to watch [insert show you are currently loving] rightthisverymoment. I am still catching up on mid-2000s tv. So just calm down.
“that Colin Jost would be outfitted with an ascot, a pair of boat shoes, and a three-day’s supply of food and water, placed on a thirty-foot yacht, and pushed out to sea, never to return”
Ok I have never loved the Toast, Mallory, or yachts more than I love them now.
That is the dream.
(Also that Lee Pace somehow was my boyfriend but I will settle for the Jost fantasy)
Your penultimate wish sounds like a paperback action thriller to read on the plane.
THE ORTBERG REVELATIONS
An ancient document. An explosive secret. A conspiracy that could unravel the world.
OMG, I was the mic runner one time and a guy asked a dumb 5 part question and every time I tried to take it he would fucking lean away from me.
The world would have lost so much from not hearing Parts Two through Five! FIGHT THE POWER, dude.
The q&a one should also apply to the douchey libertarian kid in college lectures.
It’s weird because in my mind I was like “Man, what did Colin Jost ever do to you?” but also I was like “Yes, and can we put Michael Che in the boat with him?”
“the Ortberg Manuscript” sounds like a document antisemites might falsify to justify the Holocaust
"if at least one restaurant in every city was in an abandoned train car and all the servers wear conductor hats but they don’t have to say any train stuff because that’s demeaning"
You mean this isn't true already?
I : Colin Jost :: Ian Rubbish : Margaret Thatcher.
That analogy is imperfect, because the Jostbashing is inexplicable.
Sometimes the A’ers DO begin Q&A sessions with awesomeness, like when Malcolm McDowell began a session, “I will only answer smart questions, and I am the final arbiter of what are smart questions.” He then refused to answer anything that wasn’t smart questions. Or answered, “Is that seriously your question?” to things such as, “What was it like to work with Stanley Kubrick?”