Beyond the Valley of the Stephanie: 12/28/08

hear ye hear ye, the ladies of fishtown have thus spoken!

my friends and i have had real life crushes on many dudes in the last year. it'd be far more interesting for me to write about the real life crushes we've all had but i'd be tarred and feathered by my friends and pretty mortified to reveal some of my own. now admittedly some of the people we've chosen for the celebrity list we are a little bit late on the boat on but the consensus is that these are who we all had crushes on in 2008.

the one celebrity i think we ALL agreed on this year who is, was and ALWAYS will be setting our hearts all a-pitter-patter is the one, the only christian bale.

i mean come on. he's frickin batman.

don't get me wrong- heath ledger completely stole the show as the joker in the dark knight. but that said i don't think any of us wanted to jump the joker's bones. however i can say with complete confidence we all fantasized about batman swooping in to save us in the nick of time or bruce wayne rolling up in his lamborghini for dinner.

batman aside, christian bale is one of the most brilliant actors of our generation. he throws everything he's got-physically and emotionally-into every role he's ever been in. if you look at his transformation from the machinist as a 120 pound insomniac (which bizarrely enough i STILL thought he was hot in) to buff superhero playboy in batman begins which took place in only a matter of a couple of months it's pretty shocking.

and he's the only person in the world who could make me believe i could possibly fall for someone like patrick bateman.

maybe we are nerds at heart but we have to move from one superhero to the next-iron man played brilliantly (as we all knew he would) by robert downey jr.

i've always loved his acting - my personal favorite robert downey jr movie being less than zero-but i just never saw the sex appeal until seeing iron man. he's definitely got this rakish charm that i never noticed before that luckily iron man was able to open my eyes to.

the next pick has been one of my crushes since at *least* 1995 but he's included in this year's cream of the crop since he's been a lot more in the public eye.oh how do i love thee paul rudd let me count the ways.

in my fantasy world paul rudd is the *perfect* boyfriend: we'd go see great little underground movies and have long discussions over them during our walks in the park. he's the kind of guy you want to snuggle in bed drinking hot chocolate and doing crossword puzzles with on a sunday morning. we'd go to baseball games and argue over the phillies versus the kansas city royals (imagine my glee when flipping through my world series collectors program when i came across a big ol article with my future fantasy husband in it). he'd be witty and funny and charming and clearly romantic. le sigh.

can i get an amen, ladies?

so we completely agreed on christian and paul but i honestly don't quite understand the jamisonian's choice of
eric wareheim of the tim and eric awesome show (great job!)

when recently confronted with the possibility of meeting wareheim, she became completely starstruck, speechless and nauseous-the likes of which i had never seen-especially from my friend who is usually so cool, calm and collected at all times.after he was basicly a jerk i'm kind of certain that her crush on him is probably o-v-e-r.

for some reason to me wareheim oddly looks like the weird older brother of the next choice submitted by a coat of white paint:

Dallas Green of the band City and Colour.

When she first mentioned him my first thought was ex-Phillies player/manager of the same name and I thought it was honestly pretty bizarre that she'd have a crush on someone in his 70s.

Which coincidentally brings me to one of my top choices-
MVP #35 Cole Hamels of the Philadelphia Phillies.

He was my hero this year bringing us the World Championship Title finally after 28 long years. AKA-my happiest day of 2008.

(photo courtesy of Rob Reed)

cole's an amazing pitcher who proved himself more amazing that i thought during historic game 5 of the world series. he seems like a nice polite boy next door- softspoken with not a lot to say most likely because underneath it all there isn't much goin on upstairs but i don't care. i even forgive him for marrying that survivor contestant/playboy model dipshit - i mean really he's still too young to know any better.he's still a fine fine specimen of athleticism among other things.

speaking of hometown favorites brings me to my next choice: it's always sunny in philadelphia's charlie day

he's cute and cuddly and he's the wildcard, bitches.

if the waitress won't have him i happily will take him off her hands (they're married in real life by the way).

this brings me to another comedic crush i've had for the past couple years.
flight of the conchords's bret mckenzie.he makes my heart go boom boom.

after just one season, flight of the conchords has rocketed its way into my top 5 favorite television shows of all time.
and while some may be jemainiacs i remain a breterosexual. i stand firmly with the fans who think that bret has got it goin on.

bret honey-you just let me know where to sign up.if you're into it....

speaking of funny, if we took away the rat's nest of a haircut and took away the probable std's russell brand is a hilarious version of captain jack sparrow.

he was great in forgetting sarah marshall and even better in his string of late night talk show appearances.

when it comes to cracking up, brooke and i often have our funniest moments of any given day courtesy of the surfer dude on tmz.

turns out he has a real name (max hodges-who knew?!) but he will forever remain "surfer dude" to us. he is some sort of combination of class clown/slacker/idiot-savant. i don't really want to make out with him or anything but maybe smoke a bowl with him and have a good time making fun of celebrities.

all of my friends are in love with emile hirsch.i thought he was a good actor based on his performance in "into the wild" (though i hear he's great in milk as well) but as far as being smitten with him that bug hasn't quite caught me just yet.

the same can be said for michael cera.

i loved juno. loved it. and michael cera is a likeable enough guy but i don't think he's great or anything (if you were an arrested development fan like i was then you know he's practically playing the same character).
anyway all my friends are in love with both of them and i dunno, maybe i'm getting older but they just look way too young to me. neither of them look like they've even gotten their pubes yet.

one guy who is the object of every teen's current affection that i happen to fully understand is robert pattinson.

he's definitely too young for me and i don't know anything about the guy other than he's british and goodlooking and in that vampire movie that was a book that everyone seems to be going crazy over. personally i remember him from one of the harry potter flicks and could definitely see a young heart throb in the makings.

when it comes to the uk they have been churning out practically a factory of young hot men into the world in the last few years.

sam reilly from control (one of my favorite movies ever)

was featured in a burberry ad this year that is to swoon over.

i definitely wouldn't mind having jim sturgess

sing me a beatles song.

i just realized that he looks a lot like someone i dated in 2008-the boy i dated being a combination of jim sturgess mixed with a less drug-addled pete doherty.

in 2008 i spent MANY an hour swooning over james mcavoy.

for me he IS the last king of scotland.

even though a lot of his movies came out in previous years i spent most of 2008 catching up on the mcavoy repertoire.

and i STILL have watching "wanted" to look forward to.

i don't know whether to consider him an american or a brit or just perfectly half and half but mark ronson is a musical genius and hot to boot.

i know a lot of fuss has been made over amy winehouse and lily allen who he's produced for and the papps are constantly stalking his sister (who currently happens to be lilo's other half) but mark ronson is so effing talented it kills me.

i can't wait for the next album!

one man who has been extremely busy this year much to our pleasure is james franco.

our daniel desario is all growed up.

he's cute, he's smart and he's hilarious.

The Hills with James Franco and Mila Kunis by James Franco

last but not least my other crush this year was someone i never thought i'd have a crush on. maybe this is because i had a preconceived notion of this person and his music. and i certainly never saw a picture of him. but i have to admit that conor oberst is pretty much both looks and personality of every guy i have dated in the last few years.

i finally gave his music a chance and the man is actually extremely talented.

though like some of the boys i've dated this year he IS awfully emo and one of the new years resolutions is no more of that drama. though maybe i'd date him if he were on meds.