Goddamn.

Heath Ledger is dead.

Dead.

Fuck. Goddamn it. No, no, no.

Take it back.


I know there are those who would think me ridiculous for sobbing, wracked with grief, snot dripping as I read a news story about someone who was a stranger. But those aren't the people who read me, anyway. I haven't read my emails or written here for a while because I've been off in a divergent fantasy land, trying to escape from the reality that my escapist world had become. Knowing every semi-public detail of Jake Gyllenhaal's life was no longer the source of distracting joy it had been before those details grew to be almost exclusively about his relationship. Too painful to dwell on.

So I escaped into fan fiction, a thing that swallowed me alive just as efficiently as I knew it would. But how can I go on reading Brokeback Mountain fics now? There is no Ennis for me without Heath. And it feels criminal to indulge in something that evokes his image so vividly as a form of escapism when he himself has, it appears, achieved the ultimate escape.

I'm sorry.
I'm so fucking sorry.

Surfacing

9,861 days of artless charm.
1,408.714 weeks of heart-stealing talent.
324 months of keen intellect, mostly expressed in confounding verbal spirals.
27 years of loveliness in every form.

Happy birthday, baby. I love you.



(Real posts will resume shortly. I swear.)

Eager prey

Against you,
what defense?

That any mere mortal
breathe in air
charged by your presence
not exhale it, now your slave
No

To keep muscles engaged
thighs,
calves,
back,
neck
not fall to knees
and hands
but stand to meet
your deserving gaze

This, perhaps.

But so, while the heart
having any human quality
beats faster
dizzying
squeezing
a seething, wounded thing
its rhythm, permanently altered
suffused
conquered

No, no defense
but the only one afforded:
physical denial
circumstance
cruel, mean truth.


(I promise, I really will work on that other topic today. You know how it is sometimes--Jake just suddenly demanded some adoration from me this morning. He can be very intense and...imperative. Best to do as he commands.)

Photo: Esquire, via IHJ.

The $20,000 man

Congratulations of a sort are in order for royandronnie, who last night committed to shell out twenty thousand dollars for the privilege of spending an afternoon with Jake Gyllenhaal. Things started heating up just before 3 pm yesterday, with the competing bids of rammzoo, who apparently couldn't quite swing ten grand. That's when jiblumen stepped in and gave royandronnie a real run for her money, literally. Bidding trickled over into the final ten minutes of the auction, pushing the close time back by ten minutes per bid, though when I refreshed the page it looked more like a total of fifteen to me.

There's some confusion in the fandom over the ultimate outcome of last year's auction, no one able to remember hearing any account of the actual "date" with Jake. I'll be keeping an eye out for different results this time around. Check out the bid history for yourself. Marvel at the deep pockets of fanfic writers. Contemplate a change of career. Prepare for the coming apocalypse.

That is, for me, a serious amount of money. As Jake's price climbed, I began to imagine what I could do if I had that much disposable cash to my name. Here's a brief list of

Things I could do with $20,000

• Pay off the balance on my auto loan, twice


• Pre-order 635 copies of the Zodiac 2-disc Director's Cut


• Buy 200 pairs of Nike sneakers


• Fly to New Mexico today for the Brothers open casting call, and stay through the end of the shoot

Believe me, I'm not saying that even one hour with Jake wouldn't be worth twenty grand. I'd give the ACLU a million dollars just to spend ten minutes with him, if I could afford it. And that's what it all comes down to: relative value. One's definition of afford, as well. The inherent evil of an auction like this is that it's so easy for someone who can't really afford it to justify going into debt to fund what will certainly be a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Especially someone susceptible to fandom to begin with, and in particular the appreciation of a man whose appeal has surprisingly little to do with his outer beauty. We're even more presupposed to emotionally-driven choices, by our nature. While it's not up to the ACLU to stop someone from behaving irrationally or irresponsibly, it's ethically questionable at best to bait us with the promise of something we could never otherwise have.

By extension, I guess that means Jake should take some of the responsibility for what might happen. I don't have access to his bank balances, but I'm thinking $20,000 is not such a big deal to him. True, by offering his time instead of just handing that much over to the ACLU himself, he has given one or two fans the chance to fulfill a dream. He's probably not even aware of how insane he makes people; he's not an idiot but he doesn't really know how bad it is. Or maybe, maybe he figures that anyone foolish enough to go beyond their means for something like this deserves everything that comes with that choice, good and bad. We'll probably never know.

Photos: IHJ, and I don't know where.

Warm fuzzies

Happy birthday to Jake's big sister, Maggie Gyllenhaal! Maggie turns 30 today.


This makes me happy. Esquire calls Jake Gyllenhaal's performance in Rendition one of six Performances of the Year in their December issue.


Looks like Jeff Wells at Hollywood Elsewhere would have gone with option number three in my poll at right.

It's not that Gyllenhaal plays his Egypt-based CIA guy badly or ineffectively, but that Egypt-based CIA guy is written as such a revoltingly passive wuss....For me, Gyllenhaal's inactivity is infuriating. He's not just a guy doing nothing, but an emblem of do-nothing types the world over.

He sounds like he's blaming Jake for Douglas's actions, or inaction, as the case may be, which misses the point entirely. If you found him infuriating or revolting, Jeff, then he kicked ass, because you were supposed to feel all those things. And Wells's statement about what Douglas's character lacks expresses precisely why Jake's was an incredibly difficult role, and why his performance was that much more worthy of praise. I'm glad the editors of Esquire recognized that, even if Wells doesn't.

Something else that makes me happy: seeing Jake happy. IHJ has posted those photos from Jake and Reese's recent Napa Valley visit, and while the level of paparazzi interest in this relationship still bothers me, seeing Jake so obviously at ease and happy literally brought me to tears. Even Reese smiled at the camera this time. That's the way I like to see them.

Meanwhile, it looks like Jake's about to become the subject of a sniping showdown. Slash writer (it's amazing the things you can learn while browsing around Jake's fandom) royandronnie's opening bid remains the only one so far, and the auction ends at 6 pm EST. At least, I'm sorta hoping it will be sniped. Well, I mean, I totally will understand if no one can afford to bid $5,500, because I can't, but I guess I'd like to see the promise of his company bring in more than the bare minimum for the charity of his choice. Plus it would be fun to watch and see just how crazy Jake can make people.

Update: Well, here's another nice treat I hadn't seen before. This transcript, which the source claims to be from the Los Angeles Rendition press conference, has lots of priceless Jakeisms. I don't understand why I'm just now finding this. This stuff is gold and should have been all over the 'net by now. Some examples:

Reporter: You and Peter shaved your heads in Jarhead. Now, you both have beards.
Jake: Peter and I are dating (laughter). I can see the headlines now.
~~~
Reporter: What qualities do you admire in Reese, as a person and an actress?
Jake: She can grow a mean beard, that's for sure (laughter)! I don’t know if you’ve seen her beard--it's amazing!
~~~
Reporter: Will you comment on rumors that you are dating Reese?
Jake: No. Apparently, I am dating a lot of people, not only of the opposite sex (laughter)--it's very interesting and amusing.
Reporter: The first time we interviewed you, you talked about not having enough sex...
Jake: Are you offering or what? (Laughter)
Reporter: You talked freely during that interview. You have become a star since. So, has your sex life changed?
Jake: I've become an ascetic--I live in a cave now. That's why I am growing a beard. I have no sex, so I’m much more interesting!

Damn, Jake. Could you be any more lovable?

Photo of Maggie thumbnailed from The Internet Movie Database; all others from IHJ.