The New Classics

So, one of my favorite magazines, Entertainment Weekly, has just published its 1000th issues and to commemorate their pop culture stability in my life and in yours I wanted to share with you a few excerpts from their "New Classics" list. Yes, that's right, our generation is aging to the point that we have our own classics now. Before you become depressed, I want to encourage you to view these new classics with a sense of nostalgia and pride because I truly believe the last 25 years has contributed a great deal to our generation's unique identity. The lists are separated into several categories, so without further ado here are some of my favorites and some you'll appreciate as well:

MOVIES

#1 Pulp Fiction (Jules, I know this one is definitely on your personal list.)
#5 Toy Story (Dina, I know you'll agree that animation going digital changed the genre forever, and Toy Story was one of the first of its kind.)
#29 The Bourne Supremacy (Matt Damon as Jason Bourne...nuff said!)
#33 The Breakfast Club (Yamanda, I know this one hold a dear place in your heart.)
#34 Fargo (The Coen Brothers are legitimate storytellers and absolutely deserve a spot in the top 50)
#42 Clueless (Amy Heckerling created a completely new language and I know I had fun "rolling with the homies.")
#65 Dirth Dancing (Our generation's sexual dance revolution may be traced back to this very film.)
#73 Office Space (Workplace humor gave us hope for our possible adult cubical lives.)

TELEVISION

#1 The Simpsons (We all grew up with this dysfunctional family that made our own families seem a little less dysfuntional. Thank you, Matt Groening.)
#7 The Cosby Show (Yamanda thinks my family is its inspiration or vice versa. The Huxtables provided some good laughs from 1984-1992.)
#9 Friends (The last great laugh track sitcom!)
#10 Buffy the Vampire Slayer (While I never really got into this show I don't know what Jules and Nora would have done without it...especially the musical episode.)
#14 The Daily Show (Finally, politics can be funny, really funny.)
#15 The Oprah Winfrey Show (I thought I would share this one b/c I found it interesting and awesome that The Daily Show beat it!)
#16 Arrested Development (Model homes, The Blue Man Group, and Federal Crimes
have never been funnier!)
#52 Felicity (I think we can all relate to the girl who goes to college and discovers a little more about herself, and who can forget that awful haircut!?)
#60 Xena: Warrior Princess (Nora, that one's for you!)
#61 The Office-US Version (In my personal opinion, this would be much higher on the list.)
#67 Planet Earth, Discovery Channel (Absolutely Incredible!)
#100 Saved By the Bell (Zach Morris, Screech, c'mon! Where else can you find teens overdosing on caffeine pills!? Classic!)

MUSIC

#1 Purple Rain (My Prince obsessed Aunt and Uncle would be so proud!)
#2 The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill (So good!)
#13 You Are Free-Cat Power (Yamanda, your musical tastes have been confirmed!)
#36 CrazySexyCool-TLC (Don't go chasin' waterfalls...such good advice.)
#41 Legend-Bob Marley and the Wailers (I'm pretty sure I heard this album at least once a day while living in EBF.)
#54 Rhythm Nation-Janet Jackson (My very first cassette tape!)
#65 Elephant-The White Stripes (Indie Rock makes the grade.)
#85 Home-Dixie Chicks (You all know I'm a fan, but if Dina can find a song to listen to on repeat off of this album, that says it all.)
#98 Transatlanticism-Death Cab for Cutie (I think they owe The O.C. a little credit.)

BOOKS
#1 The Road-Cormac McCarthy (I've read two of his book and really liked them. I'll have to read this one before the film comes out.)
#2 Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire-J.K. Rowling (Rowling took Harry to a much darker place in the 4 th installment of the series.)
#7 Maus-Art Spiegelman (PWR actually introduced this graphic novel to me.)
#26 Neuromancer-William Gibson (I think between me and Jules we've read this one about 10 times.)
#34 The Lovely Bones (Did you read this one Yamanda?)
#48 The Poisonwood Bible-Barbara Kingsolver (Jules, one of your favorite authors.)
#65 The Giver-Lois Lowry (Middle School would not have been the same.)
#96 The DaVinci Code-Dan Brown (So, it isn't a literary masterpiece, but it was entertaining...too bad everything else he's written follows the same formula.)
#100 America-John Stewart (Nothing like it.)

VIDEO GAMES
#1 Tetris (This game saved many boring days at The Sharper Image.)
#4 Super Mario World
#5 Guitar Hero (For you Julia.)
#6 Street Fighter II
#17 Sim City
#38 Call of Duty 4 (Poor Jim, he never did catch on to this one.)
#49 World of Warcraft (MMORPGs could have had their own class in the Comm Dept.)

That was a fun walk down memory lane, wasn't it? If you want to check out the complete lists just pick up that latest issue of Entertainment Weekly. It's worth it!

ONE YEAR EXACTLY!

I thought I would post a short note commemorating the one year anniversary of our college graduation and just to say that I can't believe it has been an entire year since I've laid eyes on all you beautiful people! Way too long!! I miss you all terribly!

Oprah 2008

For being called the water cooler, this blog hasn't been hydrated much lately. Tisk tisk. I went to commencement today, and Oprah was there! Cool, right? And you like how we all totally called it? She was pretty great, but honestly I liked our commencement speech better. There are probably a million reasons for that. I was the one actually graduating for instance or because I was with all you fabulous people or perhaps it was because a speech about society undervaluing the arts really speaks to me. Oprah was awesome, and she is amazingly accomplished, but I was weirded out by the fact that her speech was mostly about her. She spent the first five minutes talking about Kirby. Not just like "oh Kirby is my goddaughter. I love her and congrats," but literally five minutes about how Kirby doesn't like people knowing that she knows Oprah. Way to blow her cover (not that anyone was unclear about this). The whole time I imagined Kirby was squirming in her seat.

I kind of felt like I was graduating again today. Except without all the wonderfulness of ya'll. This is the year I am actually leaving Stanford though, which is both huge and extremely sad and exciting for me. Wish me luck!

Also, in keeping with the trend of documenting my life and making it available for public consumption, I started my own blog. Right now it is mostly about random topics, but it will eventually be more about my life in law school and DC. judgejulia.blogspot.com Enjoy!