Warning! Cougars are everywhere! They're reading you your evening news, confusing dead people, and threatening day hikers and naturalists nationwide. And now they're going to be on the damn Gossip Girl. Yes, impossibly-named actress Mädchen Amick (Twin Peaks) has just been cast on the Upper East Side teen soap as Catherine Mason, an older woman who aims to seduce our prettiest young thing, Nate (played by Chace Crawford). Well, that's good news I suppose. Nate could use some spicing up, as his character is currently about as bland as impossibly gorgeous bland people can get. Also nice to hear that they shored-up some casting after their Hamptons open casting proved to be a complete disaster. But "cougar." Grr. (Noise-pun not intended). That may just be EW's word, but we kinda doubt it. Is anyone as sick of that term as I am?
Don't get me wrong, I think the trend, or whatever you want to call it, of older women dating younger men is kicky good fun, but that word! What does it even mean really? Mädchen Amick is only 37-years-old. I think the term for a 37-year-old guy trying to mack on an 18-year-old girl is "Man at a bar." Not to get all shrill and double standard shrieky about it — I understand that "cougar" is supposed to be sorta complimentary — but it's just one of those dumb buzz words (like "fetch," heh) that's just not gonna happen. Or rather, shouldn't have happened. Even if Amick or anyone else was 67 instead of 37, what's so wrong with just simply "older woman"? At least that doesn't conjure up images of some feral pussy that lives in the mountains and devours teenage boys on camping trips. Am I just being weird here?
