Love--recorded, animated, & sure to make you cry.

Danny & Annie from StoryCorps on Vimeo.

You may have heard stories from StoryCorps on KPCC. The non-profit roves the country allowing folks to record their stories--the happy ones and the sad ones--in a portable recording studio.

Danny & Annie's story is simple: love, cancer, more love, death. It's the kind of simple story that Hollywood has told over and over, but adds bells and whistles and melodrama too. There are no bells necessary here. This story will make you cry, even without a Nicholas Sparks ending on it.

[via VSL]

Tobias Wong. His awesome killer ring. & his passing.

In a year of seemingly endless celebrity deaths, it is always hardest to embrace those of great talents who pass too, too young. Tobias Wong, the Canadian-born, New York-based artist and designer, passed away on Sunday morning. Wong’s brief body of work was overwhelmed by creativity, innovative design, and twists on tradition.

Wong’s ‘Killer Diamond Engagement Ring’ (pictured left) is my favorite example of Wong’s subversive style. To take a romantic icon and turn it on its head–literally–to create a piece so much more interesting and inspiring than the original–genius.

I used to think this was the ring I'd want should some poor guy ever propose to me. He'd be poorer for having me cut him in his sleep though.

[This post originally appeared on Curated.]

Xs & Os: Smart people DO get married.

The Vows Video section of the New York Times Weddings & Celebrations section (which you should know by now to be a favorite of mine) often evokes a lackluster response from me. The videotaped stories are generally cute (think: baseball games, blind dates, wet kisses), sometimes even practical (husband loses wife, wife loses husband, widows find each other in last attempt at lifelong companionship). But usually not smart--no, no, not very smart at all.

Today's featured couple, however, has proven both smart (think: ivy leagues, masters degrees) AND clever [well, sardonic, really]. Rachel Natelson and Seth Fogelman--cheers to you; you have my blessing. Because, c'mon now, you know you were waiting on it.

Watch their sort of weird, sort of endearing video here.

The Modern Day Prince Valiant: hunk or chutzpah?

This morning, on the way out of my early morning workout in Silverlake, I passed a gentleman getting out of his car. He smiled. I smiled. And I continued walking up the hill to my car. As I was climbing in, I noticed him all of a sudden beside me in his car. He'd clearly gotten in his Yaris, turned it around on the narrow street and driven up to meet me. He motioned to me. I gave him the thumbs up sign. He wanted my spot, I assumed, and I certainly didn't object to him taking it. I drove out, turned my own car around and noticed he was now standing outside his car. His hair was dark and longish--he was like a modern-day Prince Valiant if Prince Valiant were a bit bulkier...and Persian. I rolled down my window and he approached.

'Hello,' he said.

'Hello,' I replied.

He is really grinning now. 'I have a question. Are you married?'

I am smiling awkwardly. 'No, I am not.'

'Ah, I like you. You are so beautiful. May I give my number to you?'

'I am actually seeing someone. I'm just not married.' I wave my hand to show him my ringless finger.

And we part our separate ways--he, still grinning, me, smiling but not sure why. I can't figure out if I'm flattered or offended. Granted, my post-workout glow was surely alluring. And I had smiled. But does my friendliness seriously welcome such crazed approaches from tall, dark, accented courters? Am I a walking target for wooing until I get a diamond on my finger? Well, I'll be heading to the 99 cent store soon after work then to pick up a faux bauble to sport on my ring finger.

Aspiring beaus beware.

Xs & Os: Marriages rally as economy falls to pieces.

My cousin--we'll call him Joe--is married to a woman with no job, lots of problems, and a generally unpleasant disposition. The kind of woman, when love's worn thin and senses have been come to, that a man might think to divorce. But the economy's tough right now, Joe's business is suffering, and his adjustable mortgage has increased. To quote Joe, he "can't afford to divorce her."

It seems the economy has reached a new low--one that is forcing people not only to be miserable, but to remain in relationships with individuals even more miserable than themselves in order to save bank.

It's times like these that remind me how lucky I am that I've never had the money to buy property, nor a suitor interested in marrying me. That's right, all you married folks in your million dollar homes that are now only in the upper hundred thousands--boy, oh boy, do I have the upper hand now.

For more information on the economy's impact on divorce, check out today's NY Times article on the housing fall.

For those thinking about getting married this year and buying a little love nest together--it's not, I repeat not--the time to do it. Just say no.

Photo Credit: InsideDivorce.com

Xs & Os: Marriage. If you fail, try, try again.

Every Sunday, I read the NY Times' Weddings and Celebrations 'news' online. It's within the Style section. Apparently love and marriage are stylish. I read the stories of couples--finding each other, falling in love, getting married--because I would like to follow this path myself one day. But the NY Times writers leave out the drama, the fights and the divorces. I generally prefer it this way.

Today, the highlighted Vows story discusses Jane Kallir and Gary Cosimini's wedding. It'a a second marriage, which is not uncommon for the Times to feature these days--tales of second chances are the new American dream after all. But today's featured couple has just married each other for the second time. At reading this, I first thought 'but that's unfair. they've had their turn with each other. leave it alone for someone who's not yet had a go. who's still single godammit.' But their story's actually quite touching--it's one about loving each other too soon, and then finding each other again when the time is right. Well, Jane and Gary--you have my blessing. Which is, I'm sure, what you've been waiting for.

Photo credit: NY Times

The desert: Ed Hardy, palms and a bride to be.

Nothing says nuptial bliss like the drunken stupid fun the bride and groom are allowed one last time before the big day. (Personally, I don't intend to stop having stupid, if not drunken, fun for anything. And my future-husband--God bless you whoever you are--should know this. But I am not most people and I digress.) And this past weekend I had the great pleasure of helping one of my best friends celebrate her last moments of single, un-attached freedom.

Early on Saturday morning, gal-pal A and I rode the long way East to Palm Springs. The trip should have taken 2 hours. I drove. It took 4.

In transit, we got lost, discovering the wonders of 'cities' on route to the desert. The towns may be small, hot and have a disturbingly high ratio of mullets to non-mullets, but even the DMV office appears tropical and alluring when it's surrounded by sand and palms. Heck, if I lived in the desert, I'd make a point of violating traffic more often to get the chance to return to this government building oasis.

No bachelorette party is complete without the offering of naughty gifts to the bride to be. Even the most demure of girls get gifted with lingerie, oils and sex toys to last a lifetime...or, until the sex stops. Here, the winning gift of the night came from K--a paddle from every bad girl's fave shoppe, Agent Provocateur (that is, every bad girl who can afford to drop several hundred for a corset and a bottle of lube).

Later in the evening, all of us girls had the pleasure of attending the most rip-roaring dance club in all of the desert. (For those who've been to Palm Springs during Coachella, note that the crowd during the off season sports a little less hipster flare and a little more Ed Hardy, but who's counting the bedazzled muscle tees? Oh right--the cougars with the fake tits in the corner were keeping tally all night.) The JW Marriot's Costas Nightclub boasts the title of 'Valley's Nightclub of the Year' and calls itself the 'playground to the stars.' Seeing as the rules at the entrance of the club call for no facial tattoos and no Dickies, it seems that nearly every LA star to speak of would be ruled out, but maybe that tranny with all the work done who was on line before us was somebody--I'm not really sure.

Well, we didn't get in to Costas--apparently the doorman didn't find it impressive that we were visiting from LA, had natural breasts and didn't have anything sparkly on. But the men (pictured left) that we met in the Lobby Bar were enough to remind us all that marriage is indeed preferable to the single life. And I couldn't be happier for my amazing bff D, who's about to embark on the journey toward commitment. (Thank goodness because I am planning on returning next week to Palm Springs to score that muscley fellow on the right for myself. Here I come Don Juan de Mentally Challenged!)