Thursday, February 15, 2007

The Girls Are All Grown Up...

A few minutes ago, desperately needing a break from my Death by Power Point, I decided that a little procrastination was in order. What's my favorite way to waste a bit of time? Google, of course. For some reason I was inspired to look up old friends from elementary school. I discovered that Kate, who was somewhat of an archnemesis of mine, was a cross-country star in college and spent a year abroad in New Zealand. I found some photos of her breaking through the finish line in a race and smiled: Kate looks exactly the same as I remember her.

Free associating, I thought about the other kids that went to school with me and Kate at The Montessori School in Albuquerque. In 5th grade, two new girls joined our class. They were sisters, Nicole and Kristy Austin, who had moved from California with their hot, single mom Tina. In the midst of all the other moms in jeans or business suits, Tina Austin used to show up to school to pick up her girls wearing a leopard print tube top, spandex leggings and patent leather stilettos, her bleached blonde hair pulled back in a high ponytail with a matching leopard print scrunchee.

Nicole and Kristy were like junior carbon copies of their mom. Sure, they wore all the same 80's fashion as the rest of us girls, but there was always something different: their pants were a little tighter, their shirts showed a sliver of midriff, they wore red lip gloss to school, and they always had their hair styled as if participating in a pageant. Nicole and Kristy were my introduction to Valley Girl slang, to Paula Abdul, and to the wonders of the spiral curling iron. Part of me chalked it all up to the girls being from California, but even at the tender age of 10 I knew Nicole and Kristy were on a very different path from the rest of us. They were sweet girls, and we would have sleepovers and go to dance class together and share cherry coke slurpees from 7-11, but differences in our values, upbringings and interests kept us from being really close friends.

A few years ago, an old friend from The Montessori School sent me an e-mail with a link to some Hott Girls Swimsuit Edition calendar out of Phoenix, Arizona with the accompanying message: "Look closely at Miss October and see if you don't recognize her." I opened up the site and took a good look at the model. She had a disproportionately huge boob job and bright dyed blonde hair, but there was no mistaking it. "Coco", the bikini-clad testament to silicone, was Nicole Austin, larger than life and on the fast-track to soft porn. Kristy, her sister, was featured as an extra in the group photo on the calendar's cover and looked equally boobtastic.

So today in my quest to look up old classmates, I remembered the e-mail about Nicole and decided to google her. Imagine my surprise when all of the results that came up were for Coco, Ice-T's skanky wife that I always read about on Perez Hilton. Initially I thought, "No, that can't be Nicole. Ice-T's wife is, like, 35 or something." I don't know why I had this impression. Mabye it's because Coco smacks of some washed-up Hollywood "actress" who desperately clings to her youth by wearing stripper gear and being generally tasteless. Someone like Kimora Lee Simmons, perhaps, or Bai Ling. Whatever, the fact that both women are named Nicole Austin must be a coincidence.

But then I saw a snippet of a biography and my eyes locked on the phrase, "...born in California in 1979, moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico at the age of 10." Holy shit. I started browsing the photo galleries on Perez Hilton and imdb. It took me a while to see through the nose job, the cheek implants, the ginormous 39DD boobs and the butt implants (yes, butt implants), but after a while I saw it. Her eyes are still the same. Oh my God. I used to go to elementary school with Ice-T's Playboy-featured wife. The girl that went trick-or-treating with me in 1990 and taught me how to peg-roll the bottom of my jeans is now the woman with a perma-camel toe and a pound of silicone in each ass cheek. I'm shocked, but honestly not at all surprised.

Somewhere in a storage unit back in the US, I have a photo album full of pictures from 5th grade. I wonder how much a gossip rag would pay for pictures of Coco wearing a puffy paint sweatshirt and playing Twister in my backyard?

For some examples of this woman's class, click here, here, here, here, here and here.

17 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hey Ali,

GB here, was just reading Red's blog, and saw your name and wanted to see what you've been up to lately. Your post on your "old school mate" ?!? (Does that offend?) ho-ing it up all over the web was pretty funny. I'd never been to Perez Hilton's website before, but damn...Coco sure has some bad qualities that apparently her mother never told her not to share. Ouch.

Hope all is well in MZ.

GB

Kristine said...

That's crazy! It kind of gives me the willies to think that you two knew each other. She looks so much older than you! It's funny to me when women think plastic surgery will make them look younger and sexier. She looks really plastic.

Mimey said...

For some reason I'm really impressed. You're like friend to the stars! I'm also slightly ashamed that I'm so easily impressed by shallow, awful things ;-)

Anonymous said...

Oh I am DYING here. I immediately IM'd Colleen to tell her about this entry. Seriously, I thought she was like ten years older. COCO. Oh, man.

I especially love how you didn't even recognize her. Those are some massive life changes, right there.

Ali Ambrosio said...

~GB - Hey, congratulations on your new job! I agree - some things should never be shared, especially if they involve spandex outlines of one's private bits.

~Kristine - I seriously thought she had at least a decade on me. This sort of thing is a total reminder that I want to be natural, not turbo.

~Jemima - Girl, I was impressed too. I've spent the entire evening wondering if Coco, wife of famous rapper and Law and Order star, remembers choreographing steps to "Forever Your Girl" in my living room...

~Eliza - 'Massive' doesn't do justice to the changes brought about by silicone ass implants. I'd probably have gone forever without putting 2 and 2 together had I not decided to google elementary school classmates. Say hi to Colleen for me, okay?

Monkey McWearingChaps said...

Coco is NOT my age.

sara said...

One of the first things GB said to me when I walked in the door tonight was, "You should check out Ali's blog, she has a pretty freaking funny post on it about a school friend."

Can I tell you that we are *still* laughing about this and you are our dinnertime conversation topic du jour?

Left-handed Trees... said...

Wow...now I am completely frightened to look up any people from back in the day! Unbelievable...you might just be sitting on a goldmine, Ali!
Love,
D.

Anonymous said...

Vixiiiiiiiiiiii!
When time flies it flies...
I wonder what*we* look like for those who haven't seen us in 10 years!

Amber said...

Wow! That is funny.

I once found a school friend was a WWF wressling (sp?) star, through the net. And then I found out she had a small guest role on Nip/Tuck, and I remembered that when I had seen her I THOUGHT I knew her, but I couldn't place her!

On another note, I am very interested in your Montessori School experience! I tried to get Wyatt into one last year, and might try again for first grade, (and lil G for pre-school),but now I don't know. He is very bright (not to brag him up) but I know you are also bright, and I am wondering how you feel about that kind of schooling? Did it challenge you? Do you think it is worth trying again?

If you want to kill time, I would love an email from you abotu it? (believingsoul at hotmail)

:)

Safiya Outlines said...

Ewww camel toe is so nasty (and uncomfortable looking)!

Do you think she's happy?

Ali Ambrosio said...

~Monkey - I know. It's amazing how many years all that surgery added to her face...

~Telfair - It's now been a couple of days since I made this discovery and I *still* can't stop thinking/talking about it. Glad I provided some entertainment for you all. :)

~Left-Handed Trees - It may be a goldmine, alright, but I wonder if I'd ever be able to bring myself to profit off those photos. Hmmm. Tempting, yes - no doubt about that!

~Jo Ann - Personally, I think I look exactly the same as I did 10 years ago. I wonder if there are any other people I used to know who have undergone radical transformations a la Coco...

~Amber - Who was she on Nip/Tuck? We get re-runs of that show here on a channel from Portugal. I'm curious! As for the Montessori thing, I definitely recommend it. I'm going to write you an e-mail in the coming week with some thoughts, okay?~

~Safiya - Nasty doesn't even begin to describe it. I think that on the surface she probably feels very happy and successful. I mean, being in a position like this has likely been a long-term goal of Coco's. But deep down, underneath all the plastic and boobs and spandex...somehow I don't think so. But then again, who am I to make assumptions about what makes someone else happy, no?

Anonymous said...

Can you help? I am looking at moving there with an International Company but need to know more on safety, schooling and family life. I have 3 children aged 12/10/8 and they are my priority.

Any advice info you can share would be great. dmhwce@hotmail.com is the best address to get me.

Thanks heaps.
Dave

Alina said...

Ali, it is always hard to understand that some people have really shallow but really clear expectation of their lives. These are always a bit different from our goals, so it is a bit hard to digest, but never surprising.

deedee said...

Ha, you are inspiring me to google some fifth grade class mates!!

Anonymous said...

Holy. Effing. Shit. I can NOT believe that woman is our age and from the 505. That is CRAZY. I also can't believe you are reading Perez Hilton from all the way over in Mozambique. I see him at my coffee shop all the time, hunched over in the corner like a gremlin. He's soooo scary to publicists like me - doesn't play by any rules.

Anyway, hope all is well, this gave me a great laugh.

xo Rebecca

Anonymous said...

someone linked to your blog here:

http://jezebel.com/357152/modern-love

so i gather others will be visiting besides me. i think her ass could be real - why would she lie about that one item? obviously the rest is fake. the boobs, the hair, the skin, and maybe the nose, but what's worse is that it's all badly done. that orange tanning make-up she uses went out with the 80s.

anyway, i'm guessing you weren't *that* close with her or you'd be less snarky about her online. it is funny, but i'd be horrified if a former real friend said that about me publicly.