All I expect from actors is the acting and the looking pretty. If one's strong enough, I'll ignore the other.

Hey, I didn't make the half-plus-seven rule.

Damn, I know that my comic book store guy and I were just talking about this yesterday, but when the fuck did I get old?

Gives people complaining about being old who are at least a decade younger than him the stinkeye.

I didn't make the half-plus-seven rule.

It's not the rule-makers I look askance at, it's the blind rule-followers. AH shows up heartbroken, newly single, and in need of comfort at your doorstep, and you whip out your ... calculator?

Tsk, tsk.

As an actress she strikes me as good at looking pretty in a way that doesn't make me sweat...maybe I haven't seen her best work. I meant like "comic timing" or something, not discovering cures for cancer.

Have you seen The Professional, erika? It's amazing, and she's really good in it. I have no idea if she has any comic timing, but I don't need all actors to be able to do everything (though it's nice if they can and they're cute too).

All I expect from actors is the acting and the looking pretty. If one's strong enough, I'll ignore the other.

Me too. It's nice if they're witty and interesting in interviews, but someone basically has to be a vocal supporter of the Ku Klux Klan for me to write them off based on what they do offscreen. Besides, they're actors, so even if they act witty and interesting for a journalist, that's no proof they really are in private life. (I think Reese Witherspoon is one of the few performers to point this out, for which I almost admire her.)

And on NP -- I think Natalie Portman was a tremendously interesting actress at 12 or 14, but her adult performances haven't lived up to The Professional or Beautiful Girls yet.

Gives people complaining about being old who are at least a decade younger than him the stinkeye.

Feh. Being old is a novel experience for me. I need the practice with my cane-shaking.

People born in 1984 can buy booze in the US. People born in 1987 can buy smokes. How did this HAPPEN?

There's a half-plus-seven rule?

Wait, how old is Timberlake?

There's a half-plus-seven rule?

Luckily Orlando Bloom squeaks in just under the wire for me.

There's a half-plus-seven rule?

I think it's from the Muslim faith. I heard about it first in Malcolm X's autobiography, anyhow. (Betty qualified.) The idea is that the woman should be half the man's age, plus seven years, though I suspect gris is applying it more loosely.