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	<title>Observer &#187; Why Oprah Spurned Me:  I Am the Un-Frey</title>
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		<title>Observer &#187; Why Oprah Spurned Me:  I Am the Un-Frey</title>
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		<title>Why Oprah Spurned Me:  I Am the Un-Frey</title>

		<comments>http://observer.com/2006/02/why-oprah-spurned-me-i-am-the-unfrey/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 06 Feb 2006 00:00:00 -0400</pubDate>
					<link>http://observer.com/2006/02/why-oprah-spurned-me-i-am-the-unfrey/</link>
			<dc:creator>Simon Doonan</dc:creator>
				
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		<description><![CDATA[<p><img class="alignleft" src="http://nyoobserver.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/020606_article_doonan.jpg?w=241&h=300" />Forgive me, Miss O., for I have sinned. Inspired by James Frey&rsquo;s contrite appearance on<i> The Oprah Winfrey Show</i> last week, I&rsquo;ve decided to come clean. The fact that Mr. Frey&rsquo;s &ldquo;autobiography&rdquo; is chewing up the best-seller lists and mine only clawed its way onto the<i> New York Post</i> list for one measly week isn&rsquo;t going to stop me from grabbing that confessional spotlight. For I, too, have lied. Naughty, fibbing <i>moi</i>! And just like Mr. Frey, my mendacity concerns my encounters with the cops.</p>
<p>In the recently published <i>Nasty: My Family and Other Glamorous Varmints</i>, I stated that I have been arrested twice, once for running out of a greasy spoon without paying (in full glam-rock attire) and once for driving while intoxicated (in plaid bondage pants). Well, I was lying. I have, in fact, been arrested on <i>three </i>separate occasions during my wild and otherwise accurately reported youth. So not only am I a liar, but I&rsquo;m also a total fucking idiot. Instead of seizing every possible opportunity to pump up my criminal record&mdash;thereby grabbing fistfuls of Freyish brownie points and street cred left and right&mdash;I actually subtracted an encounter with law enforcement. I am the Un-Frey.</p>
<p>In my deluded, queeny, old-fashioned brain, I figured that getting nabbed by the coppers twice was quite unsavory and gritty enough. To be arrested twice would seem unfortunate; to be arrested three times would seem like carelessness, was my Wildean thinking.</p>
<p>How was I to know that while I was diligently deleting arrests from my text, the Freys of the world were adding zeros left and right? Thanks, James! No wonder <i>Nasty </i>never got picked by Lady O.!</p>
<p>It&rsquo;s been a week filled with such mysterious annoyances.</p>
<p>Irritation No. 2: <i>People</i> magazine enlisted me to comment on the &ldquo;It&rdquo; bags of the moment. I took time out from my new Freyian lifestyle&mdash;shooting up heroin and raping entire convents of defenseless nuns, undergoing a colonoscopy without any anesthetic just for kicks, etc., etc.&mdash;and wrote quips about each designer purse. Despite overdosing 63 times last Wednesday, I completed this project with alacrity and efficiency and <i>for no money</i>. At the request of the editor, I even made changes. Imagine how much smack I injected when, last Monday, I received a peculiarly blunt e-mail informing me that the good people at <i>People</i> had decided to take the story in &ldquo;a different direction&rdquo; and would not be using my quips! James, if you are reading this, I would be grateful for any good revenge suggestions.</p>
<p>While reviewing these objects, I couldn&rsquo;t help wondering how come today&rsquo;s handbags&mdash;a good proportion of which resemble metallic elephants&rsquo; scrotums&mdash;have gotten so ugly. Familiar though I am with the concept of <i>jolie laide</i>, it&rsquo;s hard to understand why any gal would want to carry these overdesigned, overpriced horrors on her arm. If I were a chick&mdash;as I am sure Mr. Frey has been on a number of drug-addled occasions&mdash;I would rebel against this trend and tote the prissiest 80&rsquo;s Chanel number I could find. (See this season&rsquo;s black patent-leather model: $1,850 at Chanel 57th Street, Soho and Bloomingdale&rsquo;s.)</p>
<p>Incomprehensible annoyance No. 3: Last week, my bloke and I were passing Abercrombie and Fitch. &ldquo;Let&rsquo;s check it out,&rdquo; I said, fantasies of platonically wrestling with buff sales associates (in the manner of the hilarious Abercrombie <i>Mad TV</i> takeoffs) playing in my head.</p>
<p>We entered the store and recoiled. Every item of clothing looked as if it had been ravaged&mdash;and possibly pooed upon&mdash;by packs of wild dogs. No garment had gone ungnawed. Every outfit on display bore witness to some impossibly butch, stressful, rugged lifestyle. All this extreme-yet-bogus wear &rsquo;n&rsquo; tear seems to go unquestioned by the happy A&amp;F shoppers. Not <i>moi</i>. All I could think about was the lady whose dog mauling had necessitated a face transplant.</p>
<p>This munching/shredding trend, by no means limited to A&amp;F, seems to parallel the excesses of James Frey. It&rsquo;s no longer enough to break in a pair of jeans in the normal, time-honored fashion, i.e., by living your life. The rips and tears of a normal existence wouldn&rsquo;t be deemed fabulous or interesting enough. In order to be attention-worthy, you have to wear a jean that makes you look as if you&rsquo;d been dragged behind a truck through 500 Taliban training camps and 6,000 Bruce Weber photo shoots&mdash;i.e., one that makes your life seem more interesting than it ever could be.</p>
<p>Re that third arrest: It occurred back in the U.K., right before the notorious Weeley Festival of 1971. The headliners included T. Rex, Rod Stewart and the Faces, and a long-forgotten but fab group called the Pink Fairies. It was a memorable weekend: A hideous, violent fracas between the Hell&rsquo;s Angels and security guards turned this hippie scene into the British version of Altamont. No such excitements attended my encounter with law enforcement: I (clad in moderately frayed jeans) and my chums were taken into custody for&mdash;<i>yawn!</i>&mdash;snoozing in a cider-induced coma in the Weeley railway station. It was a heavy scene, man.</p>
]]></description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><img class="alignleft" src="http://nyoobserver.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/020606_article_doonan.jpg?w=241&h=300" />Forgive me, Miss O., for I have sinned. Inspired by James Frey&rsquo;s contrite appearance on<i> The Oprah Winfrey Show</i> last week, I&rsquo;ve decided to come clean. The fact that Mr. Frey&rsquo;s &ldquo;autobiography&rdquo; is chewing up the best-seller lists and mine only clawed its way onto the<i> New York Post</i> list for one measly week isn&rsquo;t going to stop me from grabbing that confessional spotlight. For I, too, have lied. Naughty, fibbing <i>moi</i>! And just like Mr. Frey, my mendacity concerns my encounters with the cops.</p>
<p>In the recently published <i>Nasty: My Family and Other Glamorous Varmints</i>, I stated that I have been arrested twice, once for running out of a greasy spoon without paying (in full glam-rock attire) and once for driving while intoxicated (in plaid bondage pants). Well, I was lying. I have, in fact, been arrested on <i>three </i>separate occasions during my wild and otherwise accurately reported youth. So not only am I a liar, but I&rsquo;m also a total fucking idiot. Instead of seizing every possible opportunity to pump up my criminal record&mdash;thereby grabbing fistfuls of Freyish brownie points and street cred left and right&mdash;I actually subtracted an encounter with law enforcement. I am the Un-Frey.</p>
<p>In my deluded, queeny, old-fashioned brain, I figured that getting nabbed by the coppers twice was quite unsavory and gritty enough. To be arrested twice would seem unfortunate; to be arrested three times would seem like carelessness, was my Wildean thinking.</p>
<p>How was I to know that while I was diligently deleting arrests from my text, the Freys of the world were adding zeros left and right? Thanks, James! No wonder <i>Nasty </i>never got picked by Lady O.!</p>
<p>It&rsquo;s been a week filled with such mysterious annoyances.</p>
<p>Irritation No. 2: <i>People</i> magazine enlisted me to comment on the &ldquo;It&rdquo; bags of the moment. I took time out from my new Freyian lifestyle&mdash;shooting up heroin and raping entire convents of defenseless nuns, undergoing a colonoscopy without any anesthetic just for kicks, etc., etc.&mdash;and wrote quips about each designer purse. Despite overdosing 63 times last Wednesday, I completed this project with alacrity and efficiency and <i>for no money</i>. At the request of the editor, I even made changes. Imagine how much smack I injected when, last Monday, I received a peculiarly blunt e-mail informing me that the good people at <i>People</i> had decided to take the story in &ldquo;a different direction&rdquo; and would not be using my quips! James, if you are reading this, I would be grateful for any good revenge suggestions.</p>
<p>While reviewing these objects, I couldn&rsquo;t help wondering how come today&rsquo;s handbags&mdash;a good proportion of which resemble metallic elephants&rsquo; scrotums&mdash;have gotten so ugly. Familiar though I am with the concept of <i>jolie laide</i>, it&rsquo;s hard to understand why any gal would want to carry these overdesigned, overpriced horrors on her arm. If I were a chick&mdash;as I am sure Mr. Frey has been on a number of drug-addled occasions&mdash;I would rebel against this trend and tote the prissiest 80&rsquo;s Chanel number I could find. (See this season&rsquo;s black patent-leather model: $1,850 at Chanel 57th Street, Soho and Bloomingdale&rsquo;s.)</p>
<p>Incomprehensible annoyance No. 3: Last week, my bloke and I were passing Abercrombie and Fitch. &ldquo;Let&rsquo;s check it out,&rdquo; I said, fantasies of platonically wrestling with buff sales associates (in the manner of the hilarious Abercrombie <i>Mad TV</i> takeoffs) playing in my head.</p>
<p>We entered the store and recoiled. Every item of clothing looked as if it had been ravaged&mdash;and possibly pooed upon&mdash;by packs of wild dogs. No garment had gone ungnawed. Every outfit on display bore witness to some impossibly butch, stressful, rugged lifestyle. All this extreme-yet-bogus wear &rsquo;n&rsquo; tear seems to go unquestioned by the happy A&amp;F shoppers. Not <i>moi</i>. All I could think about was the lady whose dog mauling had necessitated a face transplant.</p>
<p>This munching/shredding trend, by no means limited to A&amp;F, seems to parallel the excesses of James Frey. It&rsquo;s no longer enough to break in a pair of jeans in the normal, time-honored fashion, i.e., by living your life. The rips and tears of a normal existence wouldn&rsquo;t be deemed fabulous or interesting enough. In order to be attention-worthy, you have to wear a jean that makes you look as if you&rsquo;d been dragged behind a truck through 500 Taliban training camps and 6,000 Bruce Weber photo shoots&mdash;i.e., one that makes your life seem more interesting than it ever could be.</p>
<p>Re that third arrest: It occurred back in the U.K., right before the notorious Weeley Festival of 1971. The headliners included T. Rex, Rod Stewart and the Faces, and a long-forgotten but fab group called the Pink Fairies. It was a memorable weekend: A hideous, violent fracas between the Hell&rsquo;s Angels and security guards turned this hippie scene into the British version of Altamont. No such excitements attended my encounter with law enforcement: I (clad in moderately frayed jeans) and my chums were taken into custody for&mdash;<i>yawn!</i>&mdash;snoozing in a cider-induced coma in the Weeley railway station. It was a heavy scene, man.</p>
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