fine ladies and weeping lace

As you know, I'm sure, Katherine Hepburn has departed. I imagine her friends and family are very sad. I know I am, just generally devastated to think of the world not having a Katherine Hepburn. But... It is a bit less crushing since she leaves so much behind, and since she seems to have succeeded in having an interesting life, and the one that she wanted. I'm sure the ferryman envied her style on the way across the river, and that he refused to accept her coins.

Otherwise, what a classless fool that ferryman must be.

Lots and lots and lots of fitting and lovely tributes today; here are some that stuck out to me:
nice piece from the San Diego Union-Tribune's film editor,
Stephen Hunter's essence-distilling memoriam,
another post piece on her contribution to the world of style,
the New York Times' put up a long and possibly too stodgy obit and some very interesting reviews of her movies, and
the LA Times did a piece on her relationship with Spencer Tracy.

There are wonderful little tidbits about her in these pieces. Perhaps the one I found saddest and most fascinating (that I hadn't encountered before) is that she had a habit of incorrectly giving her birthday as the birthday of her brother who she found after he committed suicide. But then, I'm always one for the morbid detail that seems to say something simple that maybe no one, even the person it's a detail about, really understands.

Anyway. She is missed, just as her presence and stature and vitality have been missed for decades (really) on the screen. A marathon, very soon, I feel coming on.
_______

Other things, less depressing. (And also, probably less pride-inducing about human capabilities in general. You never know.)

In one of the WP's media columns, the following hilarious soundbyte from an editor whose newspaper dropped Martha Stewart's syndicated column:

The Palm Beach, Fla., Post may be the only newspaper to drop Martha Stewart's syndicated column over charges that she conspired to block an insider-trading investigation.
"If any columnist were indicted for anything resembling lying, we would suspend the columnist until the matter was resolved," says Jan Tuckwood, associate editor for features. Newsday and 200 others are still running Stewart's musings, according to the Long Island paper.
Tuckwood's move has drawn little reaction: "I get more calls when the crossword puzzle is wrong. . . . The last column of hers we ran had a low-fat hummus recipe. We don't feel deprived."

Meow. You just know he's going to wake up with a Christmas ornament of his severed head made from common household items on the pillow next to him some day very soon.

Ann Patchett on "Sex and the City" and female friendship. (Warm fuzzies to all you wonderful ladies I get to call friends. I wish we had that kinda time, she's right.)

And, back to the Washington Post, Hank Steuver went to an abstinence convention in Las Vegas.

My favorite moment from the story (though, really and of course, the whole thing's a hoot):

"Smile! We're not here to judge!"

The virgins and re-virginized (and their happily married monogamous mob of chaperons) march toward the Mirage casino's fake volcano. It feels almost sacrificial. There are drunks, and hoochie mamas and the ambivalent stares. There's that whole Krispy Kreme fryer vat feeling of the place.

Soon enough, at Siegfried and Roy Plaza, Unruh spies a young woman walking with a few men who appear to be military guys. With TV cameras and reporters following her, Unruh pounces on them, cracking jokes about STDs, and sparring with one of the guys about sex and asking them to wait. "It's already too late, I hate to burst your bubble," the man says, while his friends laugh. But she's more interested in his female friend, who has grown suddenly quiet. "You call me," Unruh says, pointing at her. "You call me and we'll talk."

And my absolute, most favorite story of the day, about a car-jacking gone terribly wrong in Northern Kentucky. "I was always mean.

Good night.