Sailing on with our shirtless Sunday shenanigans, this Dazzler of the Day is none other than actor, designer and writer Theo Ford. He’s a social media sensation thanks to his robust collection of Twitter and Instagram followers, and content that highlights his piercing blue eyes. He’s traveled the world, sharing sensational photos of his adventures, and taking us all along on his spectacular journey. (He’s also Dad to a darling dog named Apollo, who has their own Instagram here.)
It’s been quite a while since we’ve had a proper gratuitous shirtless post in these parts, and before summer leaves, let’s celebrate the shirtless male form with these celebrities doffing their clothes. First up, with two pictures that still can’t quite contain his musculature, is Henry Cavill, who’s been seen shirtlessly here and here and here.
Nicholas Hoult appeared in even less clothing in this gratuitously-naked post, and also made a cheeky appearance in this collection of nude dudes.
He may not be on ‘Bridgerton’ anymore, but the memory of Regé-Jean Page and his multiple nude scenes lives on, such as in this Dazzler of the Day post.
Tom Daley has been so popular here that he has his own category, a la Madonna and Tom Ford. In post after post after post, he’s gotten into a Speedo, almost out of a Speedo, and all sorts of glory in-between.
The perpetual beach shots of a shirtless Shawn Mendes should never stop coming. Mendes has an extensive shirtless history here, especially in underwear posts like this and this and this.
Simu Liu was a Dazzler of the Day here, thanks to his entrance to the Marvel Universe. He manages to look even better in the pool universe.
Going the extra mile and bringing up the rear of this post is Charlie Puth, who’s been thirst-trapping hapless admirers of the male form on social media for years. This fully-naked Charlie Puth shot is a fitting end to this Sunday stretch of shirtlessness.
This is the week that summer ends and fall begins, and after completing the summer recap posts, and making inroads with the few new fall posts (including a revamped look for this space) I find myself thoroughly exhausted and spent. Do you know how many words I actually write every single week for this blog? Copy and paste them somewhere and let me know. I’m sure it’s a lot – and this isn’t even my day job.
Luckily, it’s a labor of love, and as I’ve kept my writing largely to the realm of joy and self-expression, I don’t have to worry about deadlines or perfection or word-count limits. That goes for minimum counts as well, and so I shall end this brief Sunday morning post with the promise of some fiery new content coming within the next few days. ALANLAGAN.com is about to be LIT.
Most of us have an inner dialogue, that little voice we hear which expresses everything we are too shy or scared or smart enough not to say out loud. (I say ‘most’ because there are reportedly some people who do not have such a thing, which is marvelously unfathomable to me.) That inner dialogue can often wreak havoc, especially when it gets out of hand, which it sometimes does for me. Mostly these conversations in my head happen in the evening, as I’m mentally remembering the day. Sometimes it’s just a case of replaying a moment and coming up with something much more brilliant than what I came up with then, a wittier comeback to something someone said; more often it’s a kinder and softer response to something more cutting that came out of my mouth. Virgos run the risk of overanalyzing and being overcritical, so this inner voice is the bane of my existence, because it cuts me as much as it cuts those around me.
Whenever I find myself getting bogged down in these dialogues, I try to calmly recenter myself, taking in a few deep breaths, and stabilizing myself by simply being present. Pausing to look around at whatever might be near, I pick apart little details to distract the mind before it heads off to the races. A smudge on the windowpane of the front door. A wrinkle in the silk curtain framing the window. The gentle drone of some faraway lawnmower, perhaps executing the final few passes it will make over the grass this year. I will tune into my body – the slight itch of a recent vaccine in my arm, the cold toes of an exposed foot, and the breath which I make deeper and slower and calmer.
This is how I calm the voices in my head. This is how to gain control of the inner narrative. This is how mindfulness manifests itself.
When one of your Instagram posts gets flagged and removed for nudity, I know you’re one of my tribe. That was more than enough for Ronen Rubinstein to get his second Dazzler of the Day, thanks to the nude sauna pic you see below. (His first crowning can be seen here.) Of course, Rubinstein was already on my radar for being so dazzling in so many other realms, such as his environmental activism, and the fact that he’s been acting, directing, producing and writing since he was a teenager. Check out his other work in ‘American Horror Stories’, ‘9-1-1: Lone Star’, ‘Orange is the New Black‘ and ‘Dead of Summer’.
Summer saves some of its sunniest surprises for the very end, such as these coreopsis blooms. Earlier in the season I’d planted a coreopsis – a tall variety native to this country – hoping it would be an easy fill for a tricky spot that wasn’t easily-accessible by hose. Then this summer hit – a summer with heat and sun and unrelenting rain-free glory – and even this hardy coreopsis saw fit to droop and wilt and, I assumed, expire. Its leaves fell off, and the spindly stems soon disappeared behind the ever-robust and pushy Northern sea oats. I forgot all about its promised yellow blooms.
A few days ago, after a few storms had taken the killer heat away, I saw this pair of bright yellow blooms from across the yard. The coreopsis had survived after all, and was giving us this final show before the clock ticked to fall. Best of all, there were a few more buds – a promise that there was more beauty yet to unfold.
The world’s pre-eminent source of Madonna knowledge and wisdom, Matthew Rettenmund is releasing an updated edition of his epic ‘Encyclopedia Madonnica’ and for that reason, among many more, he is our Dazzler of the Day (a long overdue honor). My adoration for Matthew goes back almost as far back as my love for Madonna, and so intertwined are they in my fan/stan mind, any time he does something related to her gives me a genuine thrill. (The Madonna entries on his BoyCulture website are often his strongest, and definitely some of my favorites.)
The last update he did on Madonna was a bodacious exercise in inspiration – and the results were an art book second only perhaps to a certain tome named ‘Sex’. While I won’t be promoting the new version with my ass like I did last time, here’s the info on the brilliant revision direct from the author himself:
I’m not at all confident that this will be the last time I go for a swim this year, but it’s a definite possibility, and rather than look back a few weeks from now and wish I’d made more of it, I dove into the water determined to make a memory. The air above the water was chilly – the first notably cool day we’ve had in months – but the sun was out, still cutting through the wind that was suddenly picking up.
On the water, little white blossoms from the seven sons flower tree floated across the surface, and occasionally the perfume from the flowers still dangling above the pool carried on the breeze. All these vestiges of summer should have been a comfort, a sign that bits of the sunny season were lingering until the very end, but mostly it just felt a little sadder being this near the close of the season. We are less than a week away from the arrival of fall.
It will be sad to see this summer slip into the past, so sunny and warm and glorious was it, but most of me is ready. Too much of a good thing has rarely been a good thing. Nature knows how to pace herself, and I trust in the seasonal time-table she has put in place. I know a number of people who would love for it stay perpetually summer, the way the sun sticks around year-round in places like Southern California – and there are moments when I think that would be lovely, but those moments are almost always at the tail-end of winter, just as the wondrous cycle of spring is about to begin.
Right now, the idea of nine more months of summer feels stale and stagnant, and I’m ok with turning to the next seasonal page. After this one last dip…
When you start your company at the age of eight, you’ve already accomplished more than most of us ever will, and such is the reason why Dazzler of the Day is likely the very smallest honor that will mark Maya Penn’s already-illustrious career. An artist, animator, entrepreneur, environmentalist, philanthropist, and the CEO of ‘Maya’s Ideas’, Penn has also given three TED talks. Check out her enchanting website here, and witness the crux of stylish sustainability and compelling inspiration.
Rejuvenating our hydrangeas (which had not been enjoying the heat and sun of this past summer) our recent run of rain has lended a fresh restart to the summer-beleaguered garden. The lawn is looking lush and tall, the fat leaves actually flopping over with their fullness, and the ferns have actually held their color. It’s as if summer is determined to shine beautifully until fall absolutely insists on her exit.
Amid the madness of Mercury in retrograde, this pretty scene of post-storm beauty is a welcome reminder to pause and take in the moment. Under the rain, I’ve been hurrying by these plants without hesitating, and I’ve been missing this show. I need to remember that it’s ok to get a little wet. It’s just water, and there isn’t much left of summer.
Currently ensconced in a social media renaissance thanks to her frank, funny, and often-enlightening Tik Tok posts, Rosie O’Donnell is one of those trailblazing entertainers who have managed to make a lifelong career in an industry that churns out and chews up even the most talented luminaries. She’s conquered television, Broadway, film, and talk shows with very few flops or foibles. She’s still a riveting on-screen presence, and her acting has never quite gotten the accolades it deserves – witness her current no-nonsense turn on the reboot series of ‘American Gigolo’. That said, it is when O’Donnell is just being her unabashed self that she truly shines. Follow her on Twitter or Tok Tok to see her in all her freaking hilarity. This marks her debut as Dazzler of the Day, yet another jewel in her luminescent crown.
Yesterday’s commute home was one of the worst I’ve ever had, thanks to a deluge of rain that opened up right before I left the office. Certain parts of Downtown Albany looked like they were under a foot of water, and I prayed the Mini Cooper would glide me home. Just a few days before this I’d been perusing the local nursery, where I found the flaming celosia you see here – a late-summer show. The juxtaposition was just another product of Mercury in retrograde, or so I am telling myself in an endless quest to make sense out of nonsense.
Watching the raging currents that were once solid streets, I once again thrilled at the newness of a stretch of road I’d driven through hundreds of times, all because of a storm. Nature orchestrates a new perspective at precisely the moment we think we’ve seen it all. Happily jolted into this new experience, I remembered to go with the flow, bend with the trees, and let the river swerve around me.
“Living only for the moment, savoring the moon, the snow, the cherry blossoms and the maple leaves, singing songs, loving sake, women and poetry, letting oneself drift, buoyant and carefree, like a gourd carried along with the river current.” – Asai Ryoi, Tales of the Floating World
Charismatic, gregarious, and commanding on any microphone, Ron Zacchi knows how to get an agenda done while working through it with charm and seemingly-effortless panache. He currently serves as the Director of LGBTQ+ Affairs for Governor Kathy Hochul at the NYS Executive Chamber, where he oversees the state’s LGBTQ+ efforts, and if you’ve been to any of the state’s Pride events this past summer you may have seen him working the mainstage. Prior to his position at the Chamber, he was the Director of External Affairs at the NYS Division of Human Rights. His impressive resume includes his role as Executive Director of Marriage Equality New York, where he played a pivotal role in bringing about the Marriage Equality Act. Since that time, Zacchi has worked on every major piece of LGBTQ+ legislation that has passed in New York State. Earlier this year he was named as part of the City and State NY 2022 Power of Diversity: Pride 100. Tomorrow he will help helm the Fall 2022 LGBTQIA+ Convening in Albany, which will present sessions on LGBTQ+ health and community issues. For now, he earns his first Dazzler of the Day thanks to an accomplished career of social advocacy and serving the state of New York to continually effect positive change.
Next week the season of fall will officially be upon us, and while there’s always the brigade of pumpkin-loving autumn amors, I will be one of those sorry to see summer go, especially after the banner one we’ve had this year. Still, there are joys to be had in the run-up to the changing of the seasonal guard, starting with this Sedum ‘Autumn Joy’ which has long been one of the most-celebrated garden plants for a perennial bed or border.
This is one of those rare plants that has actually four seasons of beauty and interest. In the early spring, it forms rosettes of leaves in silvery sage, with cool tones of silver dusting its edges. It keeps this fresh color as spring ripens into summer, at which point it begins to send up tight buds of promised blooms, which come just as summer shifts to fall. It will hold onto these, as they turn from light pink to dusty rose. As fall gives way to winter, the enchantment begins.
The leaves will drop, leaving the stems naked and drained of color. The blooms will have dried to a burnt umber crossed with copper – looking like rust, and surprisingly resplendent against a backdrop of snow. These sturdy umbrels will hold any snow that falls atop their heads like caps, creating a marvelous effect in the winter – and this will last and continue until the spring finds them sending up new green stalks again.
It is a plant I hold close to my heart because it sees us through the entire year without complaint or high maintenance demands. This particular specimen was a seedling that sprouted many yards away from its mother plant. It was actually on the outside of our fence, in the unkept and untended section of the backyard where it managed not only to seed itself, but to come back for several years until it was big enough to transplant to a prime location in the garden. I like plants that prove their worth.
Normally we’d kick off Monday morning with a recap, but things are switching up a bit as we get to it at the end of the day. That’s right, Monday’s already over, and in a period of Mercury in retrograde I am taking every little happy step with gratitude and appreciation. On with the weekly recap that includes a couple extra posts.
It began in stormy fashion, as a recent piece on the alleged abuses and cover-up inflicted by some in the Catholic Church rekindled memories of the priest who told our confirmation class that the Bishop might touch us, but that it wasn’t a big deal.
A fig finale comes to full fruition.
Rods of gold start the September fire.
A meditation on the verge of Mercury moving into retrograde motion.
The twins and I embarked on an end-of-summer weekend in Boston. It was a history-laden voyage, but we managed to survive it and tell the tale.
The day this website always goes dark.
Dazzlers of the Day included TJ Collins, Rita Moreno, Zac Efron, Leslie Jordan, Kelly Clarkson, and Kathy Hochul.
