This column disturbs me. Referred to in this post by Dean Allen as a "lifestyle-slathered princess ditz earning a six-figure salary to rephrase the same fictions of urban hip every Saturday", The Globe and Mail's columnist Leah McLaren and all her pals are apparently on the sauce pretty much most nights. Far be it from me to say that youth ought not to have its drink - but these rules appear to be well beyond any guideline of a weekend after my mid-twenties...ok, mid-late twenties...and activites prior to that was during the shiftless 80's when you couldn't get a real job and you had silly hair, so what the hey, let's get bevvied on Tuesday. I guess I thought Ms. McLaren was a we bit old for this - she certainly seems to place herself well after 25 in the article.
Apart from that, is this the column that sees the beginning of the end for this fairly tedious (now we know why) columnist? If she is a boozer, aren't all of her witty observations on life now to be taken as seen through the bottom of a glass...like all but the most recent legislation out of the Province of Alberta.
Comments
leahfan - October 9, 2003 8:52 pm
First, I'd like to point out Alan that I believe it's "wee" as in "McLaren was a wee bit old for this." Another thing, I've heard nothing but negativity concerning Ms. McLaren's column, style, 6 figure salary, love life, personal life, and so on. Why is it that everyone who seems to loathe her, can't stop reading her articles?
As a 20-something journalism student about to graduate, I can only hope that I am as successful as Leah. Although everyone claims that she is shallow and her columns are empty, I think it's important to remember that she HAS a job, and a damn good one at that.
As for "being on the bottle," give me a break. It's not like there aren't 30-something people out there who don't drink in the middle of the week- hell at least she admits it.
Alan - October 9, 2003 11:59 pm
Fair enough. I didn't realize she was such a national bitch session until after I wrote that. Being a Kings grad, though, knowing Paddy G in Afghanistan and Iraq, and Marky R in the BBC, I know you can and should aim higher. Boozing: perhaps you are right, but there is more to it than the 1.1 levels that her column - and the needy bleedy Globe's bottom of the page "Man Column" - ever achieve. I know I don't read it anymore. I try to read the first paragraph and think - boe-ring.
Sue - February 16, 2004 9:54 pm
ok. i was searching around for some alberta stuff, and i came across the reference to alberta premier ralph klein's drinking habits and some (very weak) connection to alberta legislation.
there are legislators in alberta besides klein. blame the tories, and their policies, not the drinking.
as for l mclaren, or wtvr: DON'T READ HER COLUMN. it's true that it's generally silly, but it's probably aimed at older men who think she's a sexy airhead.
SayNay? - February 17, 2004 2:17 am
To "leahfan", all I can say is that I consider myself well read and never heard of this self- professed and self-absorbed alcoholic air-head auteur before Alan's posting. If you hope to be "as successful" as this "role model", then you better start sucking back the sauce now, you sound like you're way behind - in your posting, at least, I couldn't tell whether you were slurring your "s"'s.
So Leah's not only a drunk, but she's easy too. Yeah, that's exactly the kind of "sexy airhead" all older guys are looking for -she really gets the "social juices (if you know what I mean) flowing". Most guys would have one word after being paired up with her drunken self in a social setting: Taxi!
The "functional drunk", more appropriately termed the "dysfunctional drunk", as Alan points out, is never, ever interesting, and in fact is exceedingly dull, and is rarely, if ever, invited back for curtain calls at serious social gatherings, after his or her opening performance. They're just too much trouble. Leah and her friends "like to get drunk and talk". We all know those types - you know, the more they drink, the smarter they get - at least to themselves and that's what makes them ever so interesting to others. The points they want to make in social conversation are so important that they possibly couldn't discuss them with you sober - because, well, they might actually be exposed to be the dullards they are - not to you, because you already know that, but to themselves. McLaren states in her column she is now aware of how uninteresting she is when she's drinking - but that insight must just be the alcohol talking.
McLaren sounds like one of those callow dullards whose life is otherwise so uninteresting that she and her co-dependents "drink to get drunk...more nights than we don't". Well, look at the bright side; at least they're not sniffing glue. She apparently is being paid a "six figure income" for these insights; if that's the case, I hope all G & M columnists paid in Chilean pesos.
SayNay? - February 17, 2004 2:43 am
I know this is an "old" posting and "chain", but it was "new" to me - and I couldn't help myself. At this point in time, "leahfan"'s probably in rehab., and won't be reading this - but if she does she might find it useful for the "Dangers of Alcohol" essay she's probably going to have to write at some point as a term of her probation.