Yes, Sparklers, today is the day you have all been waiting for. After countless countdowns, plot-spoiling blog posts, and rumors about on-set love affairs, the cinematic event of the 21st century is finally upon us: Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans comes out today!!!! I’ve been camping in this line outside the movie theater for 12 days now, and I can’t wait to slide my aching body into a velvet seat and let my sore eyeballs be caressed by the handsome visage of Nicolas Cage, that dreamboat hunkadoodle who plays an unhinged, drug-addled cop struggling to stay sane while investigating a murder in the Big Easy. I heard he looks super cute in all the scenes! Especially the one where he's hallucinating about the iguanas! Anyway, it looks like they're starting to let people into the theater, so I have to fold up my lawn chair and gather my socks and move on out. And since I was chilling outside a theater for almost two weeks, I had the chance to tackle a few more Chris Listens questions. Thanks for all your great submissions! Now bring me some Nic Cage!
GeekGoesGlam is a self-help guru-in-training. We have a feeling she'll have her own book series, podcasts, and talk show in 10 years! —SparkNotes editors
There is this one person and s/he is your life. You think about this person constantly. You doodle her name in the margins of your notebooks and all over the back of your calculator. You love being with her—and then, suddenly, it's over.
When you break up, your feelings for the other person, and the good things you see in him, don't go away instantly. But by following my five step plan, CAOGI (no, it does not mean Can Any Other Guy/Girl Interest Me?), you will be over the ex fast, no matter how hot s/he is. Before you hit the rocky road ice cream, try this:
Last week, after revealing a few (some might say scant) details about myself and how I obtained this listenership, I was accused of being “vague,” “a tad vague,” and also “a bit vague.” Well, you already know my real name and what I look like when posed against various geographic backdrops—New York, Vermont, North Carolina. But charred_rose11 does get it (mostly) right: SparkNotes wanted someone to write an advice column, and I wanted to give advice. Is there more I could divulge? Sure. Would it be interesting? Perhaps, except for the complete lack of sordid details. Let’s just leave it at this: While I might be vague about myself, I am very specific about you and the answers to your questions. And what excellent questions we have this week. Let’s get to them!
Is there any way you can convince me that some guys really like you not for the way you look? And while I'm asking, just how important is it for a guy to be taller than you?
Hi there, amigos, and welcome to the 4th Circle of Hell, otherwise known as “I’m Trying to Be Friends with My Ex.”
If you’re here, it means you’ve bravely grappled your way out of the Pit of Despair (or “I’ve Just Been Broken Up With and Will Most Likely Die of Misery/Bury Myself Under Three Truckloads of Buffalo Hot Wing Ice Cream”) and have somehow managed to find your way to higher ground. You’re clearly a courageous soul even to consider bridging the gap between fiery, all-consuming hatred/heartbreak and platonic friendship, and you deserve an enthusiastic pat on the back and a celebratory bacon cheeseburger with a bottomless bucket of fries. And as long as you’re not attempting to be friends with your ex for reasons involving bids to win him/her back, heat-seeking missiles, illegal bonfires, high-pitched confessions of your undying love/hate, deportation to Guam, or re-enactments of “Fatal Attraction,” then you just may be up to the task of enduring casual encounters with the person who not so long ago brutally ripped your heart out of your chest.
Last week Kathryn had some excellent advice about not posting personal love notes to your bf/gf/crush on Facebook where everyone and their mother can see them. But sometimes it’s not the unbridled passion of new love that makes everybody on Facebook the most uncomfortable—it’s what happens when the people who spent six months posting “ILYSM BABE!!!” on each other’s walls suddenly split up. Now your Newsfeed is clogged up with two people having a meltdown in the form of Facebook status updates.
We here at Sparklife wholeheartedly sympathize with anyone going through a rough breakup—it sucks. But there are a lot of good reasons why typing “I HATE YOU DEREK” on a public forum might not be the best way to handle a bad situation.
Earlier this summer, SparkLife gave you a brief-but-comprehensive lowdown on the vagaries of summer love—from getting to know each other to getting, in the immortal words of Danny Zuko, “friendly, down in the sand.” Later, we hinted that summer romance doesn't always lead to lifelong bliss. Now, as we near the middle of August, it’s time for us to lay it out with brutal honesty: Whether you’ve been sweating your way through a beach romance, snogging your fellow Dairy Queen shift-worker, or taking illicit nature walks with a summer-camp SO, your summer fling is doomed.
Sparkler WishYouWereMe is good at seeing the bright side of a bad relationship: a great playlist of her favorite pop music! —SparkNotes Editors
Most MSGs (My Summer Guy) do not last. In fact, a typical MSG is gone by Labor Day. (MSG also stands for monosodium glutamate, the ingredient that tricks your brain into liking food. Coincidence?)
Anyways, though it may seem like it, September isn’t that far away, and as my mom always says, "better safe than sorry." So, I have prepared the perfect playlist for you in case that horrible time does come or already has. These songs will carry you through any breakup:
Programs like Summer Success at Agua Fria High School in Arizona are helping students prep for ninth grade by teaching them how to do things like "plan course schedules, make friends, join teams and clubs or even find a seat in the lunchroom." We love that lunchroom-seat-finding unit and want to sit in out of sheer morbid curiosity. But we can think of a few crucial additions to Agua Fria's course schedule. Freshly-minted froshes, you'll need classes on how to:
Summer is no time to wallow, and Sparkler ArtsyPants05 has offered us some great tips for coping with horrible breakups. Enjoy! —SparkNotes Editors
We all know that relationships are hard, and breakups are even harder.
“But I LOVED him! He LOVED me!” you cry. And then you make the mistake of saying, “No one has ever felt this depressed! You have NO idea how hard this is!”
There’s no getting around it: Being dumped is the pits. One day you’re sooo happy together, skipping hand in hand down the rainbow-colored Path of Romance, wandering in the unicorn-infested Forest of Love, snuggling together on the couch to watch Nick and Nora’s Infinite Playlist for the tenth time… and then suddenly, your beloved kicks you to the Curb of Despair and tells you that not only is s/he breaking up with you, you're a horrible kisser, and, oh yeah, Nick and Norah are a pair of unbearable hipster toolsheds with no compelling story, and the soundtrack SUCKED.
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