Comments on Happy Valentine's Day from The Stranger...

Does this giant letter U make me look fat?

(No, but the puffy shirt and pink pantsuit does.)

Oh my GOD. I love Karen Carpenter. LOVE. HER.

Auggghhh! Zee goggles! Zey do nosink for mein eyes!

Pooper> Wickedly sarcastic considering she died from anorexia!

I forever love the Carpenters. Unironically. Thanks, Dan!

It's funny because she's not fat!

Did you ever see a documentary about the carpenters (after Karen had died)? If so, did it not strike all of you that Karen was a lesbian (short-lived marriage to a man and no other significant boyfriends) who could not cover this up as well as her peacock brother? He's talented, yes, but he came off, in his own words, as the guy who should have been the big star and not his sis. It shocked the living beejesus out of me to see him, after Karen's death years and years later, married with children. It just seemed so...wrong.

Call me sappy, but this made me cry.

See, my significant other died last February and our last Valentine's Day was spent with me at his bedside in inpatient hospice, with him in an induced coma. One of his favorite things was tasteless Karen jokes, even though we both liked their music.

So, um, yeah.

Thanks, Dan. I mean it.

GOD Karen is SO DAMN FAT!!! Shit, she should go purge or something...

Good point @7. He was also a rather pretty fellow...which may have no bearing on anything, but I can't resist mentioning it. That said, I will always resent him for suppressing Todd Haynes's Superstar. Clearly, he didn't get it, and I suspect he never tried. Haynes meant no disrespect whatsoever--the exact opposite, in fact. I imagine he would've reacted the same way even if Haynes was straight, but you never know.

She ain't heavy. She's my sister.

What does Karen Carpenter's orientation have to do with this post? Oh well, as long as we're talking about it, I don't think she looks like a lesbian. I know looks and appearances don't always . . . .okay, I know what I'm trying to say on the general principle, but don't know how to say it and am afraid of accidently saying it in a way that offends other people. Anyway, KC just doesn't strike me as gay. My opinion, though. Your opinion too. The only people who definitively knew/know for sure are dead (KC) or are God.

There's a good chance you haven't seen a different biography of her life that posits that her marriage was an effort to find love and acceptance (obviously didn't go well) after someone in the media called her fat, that remark also kicking off her response that later ended her life, anorexia. It is also possible that her not being in other relationships had to do with fear of rejection or with low self-esteem, issues very closely linked with anorexia. Behind the Music?

@7.