Pop Tart : A Fresh, Frosted Sugar Rush Through Our Pre-Packaged Culture

by Langley, Liz

• ISBN13: 9780967338002
• ISBN10: 096733800X
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1999-12-01
• Publisher: Octavo Books

Summary

Humor columnist Liz Langley's observations about hillbilly vampires, Farrah Fawcett, confessional TV, and America's other bizarre fixations and fads are assembled in this wry look at pop culture. "Little Amish Crackhead", a delicate piece of social commentary prompted by an obscure news item about two Amish men arrested for dealing cocaine to a gang of bikers, exposes America's love for seeing its own stereotypes trumped. Within the pages of Pop Tart, no cow is sacred -- marriage, Southern Baptists, Barbie, the Virgin Mary; even golf is subject to ridicule: "Golf originated in Scotland, also the birthplace of haggis, the tam-o'-shanter, and Sheena Easton. The motives of any people who eat sheep intestines, wear head pom-poms, and unleashed the singer of 'Sugar Walls' should be considered highly suspect". Amusing and entertaining observations about Hugh Grant and hookers, Kenny Loggins and colonics, and Martha Stewart's resemblance to the Stepford Wives abound in this collection.

Author Biography

Liz Langley got to Orlando the same way everyone else did - involuntarily. She has been there far longer than anyone in town would have liked. She has killed her time in O-Town writing a celebrated column for the Orlando Weekly, which has won several awards and web fans around the globe, a neat trick for the only person in North America who doesn't have a home page. Her column managed to sneak across the border, where the beer is better, into the Sunday Toronto Sun. Liz's goals are to bring world peace, have her nail polish match her cocktails and "get me one of them pens with a knife hidden inside it." She is single; close friends believe she will end up living in an Air Stream. You should probably buy her a nice gift.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. ix
Little Amish Crackhead	p. 1
Leading men	p. 5
Around the world in 80 drinks	p. 9
Baked, bony and terrified	p. 13
Baptist boycott inspires a turn for the verse	p. 18
Barbie's emotional makeover	p. 23
Monkey see, monkey screw	p. 27
Cool doesn't count if it requires a sweat	p. 31
Covenant marriage	p. 35
Dress code	p. 40
The ins and outs of confessional TV	p. 44
Farrah: still ahead of her time	p. 49
Girls just wanna have--huh?	p. 53
Golf curse	p. 57
Hyllybylly vampyres	p. 61
An attraction that's a real mother	p. 66
We know sex sells; why shouldn't it be sold?	p. 70
The ultimate makeover	p. 74
How Kenny Loggins found his inner self or got someone else to find it for him	p. 78
Kenny Loggins II--A hose is a hose	p. 82
Get thee behind me, Martha Stewart	p. 86
Making Mr. Right	p. 90
Taking the waters at the Spa Deliverance	p. 94
If Poe had written Pooh	p. 99
Possession is nine-tenths of the fun	p. 105
Pregnant space	p. 110
Princess Diana	p. 114
Stalking myself	p. 118
Olympic spirits	p. 123
The content of their character	p. 135
Naked aggression	p. 139
Swallow the leader	p. 143
I ate, I drank, I got sick--it was bliss	p. 147
The Disney cruise	p. 153
Is it cramped in here, or am I crazy?	p. 156
Overstating their impotence	p. 160
Where the boys aren't	p. 164
An ill wind in the willows	p. 168
Feeling a little cocky	p. 173
Working It Out	p. 177
Purple passion	p. 181
A woman's touch	p. 185
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