New York Times Needs to Stop Messing with Psychotic Wedding Fetishists, Now
WTF? The New York Times made a huge "teachable moment" in this weekend's weddings, and we got tipped off to it! Phyllis Nefler, who polices the mean streets of the Weddings & Celebrations, is on the case. Sick 'em, Phyllis.
People named Phyllis are kind of like drivers of Jeep Wranglers: when you pass one on the highway, you always do the head-nod and wave. It's a special club. So when I saw not one but TWO Phylli in the announcements this weekend, I felt an instant kinship. Mazel, Phyllis Cossin and Phyllis Feldinger!
Unfortunately, neither of them were the blushing bride; they were the moms. No one names their kid Phyllis anymore! Seriously, try to think of someone your age with the name. It's impossible. Look at this chart! The height of Phyllis was during the Great Depression. I think this means that the name fills people with the hope for a better life, but we'll have to wait for the 2010 census to see how many Obama voters chose that for their kid's handle.
We have another Phyllis this week, albeit indirect. An eagle-eyed tipster sent us the following screenshot, with this explanation:
"Check out the attached screenshot and the 2 links below. The picture on the April 18 announcement is Tracy Zuckerman (I know her; she worked at my former law firm). Sarah and Robert must be pissed."
Yeah man, they must be! (And word up, Phyllis Zuckerman!) The print copy has what is ostensibly the correct photo – I checked it hoping to see a shot of Mark and Randi, not gonna lie – but as I write this, the Times has still not amended the website; we will be watching to see if a mea culpa is run. Dude, you would think that Zbigniew Brzezinski would have made some phone calls by now! Particularly because this is a power couple: the bride graduated from Stanford, where she met the groom, and she has like a hundred degrees from as many countries at the tender age of 28, and the groom is just casually getting a joint MD and MBA degree from Harvard right now, and what have you done what your life? But whatever, at least they didn't put the wrong photo on your online announcement for the world to see hahahah.
So anyway, this weekend I plowed through Amy Sohn's new book Prospect Park West. What can I say? It's definitely a guilty pleasure, although it's annoying as fuck that she basically casts herself as the Rebecca Rose character and then writes all about how hot and sexy that particular character is. She calls her(self) a butterface, sure, but that's just the New Self Deprecation at work and I see right through it. But anyway she also writes her character as meeting a famous movie actor as she trains him at the Park Slope Co-op, kind of like how this couple met, and there is also this line in the book:
"She told him about the day she met Sarah and how she had fallen in love with her because of the way she moved her lips when she said "the male gaze."
And so when I read this line in the actual New York Times:
"As Ms. Squires remembered it, he had her when he uttered the phrase "global hegemony."
I was like damn, Amy Sohn sure knows whereof she speaks.
So a lot of people got married this weekend. Do you people never stop? Two musical theatre dorks oversang their vows; an old man seduced a younger woman because hey, Canadians are always just a little off, you know?; I would never want my wedding announcement to contain the sentence "The Rev S. Brooks Keith III, an Episcopal priest, officiated at Beano's Cabin, a restaurant."
I would like to know more about becoming a minister of the United Centers for Spiritual Living; sailor recognize sailor; and oh my god Harvard Princeton AND Yale.
Here is where I am supposed to sit here circling words in the print copy and trying to remember Intern Alexis' patented Weddings and Celebrations scoring system but you know what? To paraphrase Colonel Jessep, I have neither the time nor the inclination to do those things because it's late August and I'm on vacation and so are you and if my bosses are allowed to take Summer Fridays then I, Phyllis Nefler (head nod) am allowed to take a Summer Sunday.
So I'll leave you with J. Richard Pilsner, who is a hockey player and who is H-O-T, just like this weather. Well done, Christine Foley! Happy summer!