Eat Pray Love Shop

[This post is Rated P for Pop Culture, Parenthetical Phrases, and Poor Taste]

 For Elizabeth Gilbert fans, Julia Roberts' "Eat Pray Love" movie is the place to be on this hot, hot weekend in the South. I asked the gals on the weight circuit this morning if they were going to the matinee and got nothing but blank looks--how can that be? I thought the entire female population of the country was waiting at the ticket window for this flick! For a popcorn lover like me, who buys the Butt Buster Bucket and eats two-fisted, I might as well be watching "Eat Eat Eat." Have you read the book? Are you going? Did you love it?

I "read it" as an audio book, which worked wonderfully because Gilbert's writing voice is entirely conversational; she writes much as a blog writer does, speaking directly to her readers. Thereafter, I "read" read her Last American Man, which was a psychological picture of an obsessive-compulsive uber-hero. It was good, but I like that sort of thing. And I finally got around to reading Committed, the follow-up to EPL, which was right up my alley. It's not been as well-reviewed, but I almost preferred it. The book uses the story of her relationship's somewhat tortured and torturous path toward marriage as the infrastructure of an anecdotal study of marriage across cultures.

Gilbert interviews the women she encounters in her travels about their decisions to wed and what marriage means in their world, employing the conceit that the insights she gathers along the way will inform her decision...which is foregone, since she can't bring her beloved back into the U.S. unless she marries him (a timely nod to the immigration issue--has this chick got timing or WHAT!?). She also references a few scholarly studies on marriage, but it's not a scholarly work in itself. It's Liz; you'll recognize her.

The author and her husband Jose Nunes, own a business in Frenchtown, New Jersey, Two Buttons Imports, which also looks just like me, as we say in the South. The website is charming, Frenchtown is charming, Elizabeth and Jose are probably charming, and I'd like nothing better than to show up at their front door, eat one of Jose's fabulously simple dinners with them, drink a little wine, and shop myself silly in their warehouse. I imagine they'll be beating people off with a stick after the movie's aired for a whole week in a row. The online shop isn't open yet, but you just know that's because Liz and Jose have been busy offering a lot of relaxed, warm, and intimate dinners and impromptu picnic lunches to a few thousand of their closest friends. Bookmark that link and check often.

Two Buttons Imports

Segue. So I was sitting in traffic in our little tourist trap town (Last weeks before schools starts, so we sit in traffic a lot. Welcome to our beach, now beat it), when I noticed this rear window decal on a pick-up truck cum rifle rack (tourists, retirees, and rednecks comprise 97% of our traffic):

Blasphemy for Gilbert fans! Okay, clever but...jarring. Which came first, the book title or the deerslayer's mantra, do you think?  I got curious and looked it up online, just googling the motto, and found it on Cafe Press. There, I discovered that I hadn't really experienced jarring yet.  


Here's jarring.

Cafe Press Maternity T-shirt

We are famous in this neck of the woods for being tasteless, but I can't even wrap my head around that item. Ya'll better stock up; Southern women like to have all their Christmas shopping done by the end of August. (What the hell IS THAT?! I keep hearing it in the South. I don't even think about Christmas until Thanksgiving, which comes the week after Labor Day, right?)

If you don't know anyone who's expecting, perhaps they would like to be. This item is bound to effect the overpopulation issue one way or the other:

The "Classic" Thong - $12.00. (It could ONLY be) Made In The USA

Imagine with me, Dear Reader, the set of circumstances under which this gift might be the very thing.

Namaste.

Follow-Up: Best Answer To This Question--Ever!


I cross-posted this entry from Mature Landscaping, where my daughter, Paula, left the perfect comment that I just had to share:


Paula Said:
WTF? what the heck does "hunt dead" mean? is it a zombie hunter reference?
zombie hunters are making a comeback, there is a zombie TV series in the works in Hollywood.

So.... dedicated goth girl finds herself knocked up and hits the internets for maternity clothing that will allow her to maintain her goth-y look and express her inner turmoil through clothing choices.

Knowing that vampires are SO .5 seconds ago, and based on the fact that she saw the zombie TV show propaganda at Comic Con this year, she was wickedly close to showing some emotion when she found the "'Make satirical fun of movies my Mother enjoys' meets 'zombie humor'" section of tackyFreaksFrocks.com online store.

Based on this back-story, which is the ONLY logical explanation for the words "eat, sleep, HUNT DEAD" to be printed on a maternity shirt, the REALLY TRAGIC marketing disaster made here is....

 offering it in PINK! What self respecting, tradition dissing, ex-vampire now zombie-loving, knocked up goth girl wants a PINK maternity tank top! Duh.