Ilana Ross

The voice that spoke to me from my mirror this morning was a little critical: "You look homeless in that hair!" "Did you pull that sweater out of the donations bin at the Goodwill? Or directly off a homeless person? You are so selfish sometimes! Blah, blah blah, we should...

One time I met a guy at a coffee shop, a place as good as any to meet your soul mate. Things were going well -- I was making a lot of deliberate eye contact and all that -- when he stopped the conversation to tell me that he thought...

My best friend Michaela and I didn't realize we were best friends until junior year when I rowed from Tangier to Spain to visit her, and save her from all the unkosher pig meat and predatory men that followed her everywhere. I told her that only a true...

"What is it about the Twentysomethings?" -- New York Times Magazine

As most Los Angeles love stories begin, I first met him when I walked past his set. He was out there leaning against a wall, in between takes, smoking a cigarette and leering at leggy extras. He was a man on the brink of great success, like a young Milton...

One Saturday evening, I called my mother to let her know that I was properly nourishing myself with late night cereal, instead of out prancing around in heels and coral lipstick. I thought this would make her feel good, to reassure her that I wasn't living the life of some...

Twenty-something-post-grad life tends to be plagued with questions: What should I do with my life? Who should I be? Who should I be with? Where should I live? Where can I afford to live? Should I eat gluten? Seriously, do you think this rash is a symptom of an undiagnosed...

I'll tell you what I'm not getting my best friend for her birthday: a Kindle. For one thing, she's turning twenty-three, not forty-five. For another thing, I only spend that kind of money on shoes.

But most importantly, I won't buy an e-reader because I refuse to be complicit in...

Goodbye my sometime friend. We had (mostly) good times.

I have a lot of appreciation for the punk-genius-billionaire-CEO of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg. I saw The Social Network five times, and three of those times I left believing that Mark had shown those uppity Harvard clones just what American meritocracy...

I'm too old to Trick-or-treat, but I am eligible to celebrate that other autumn holiday with the free giveaways: Election Day. This Super Tuesday will be the fourth year that I've been able to vote and the second time I've made it to the polls to collect my "I Voted!"...

Delaware Republican Senate candidate Christine O'Donnell made headlines last week when she confessed to having "dabbled in witchcraft." She claimed it was merely a foolish and "youthful indiscretion." The talking heads passed it off as a lame attempt to pander to the Harry Potter vote. But O'Donnell's casual...

In case you've been living in a wireless dead zone for the past week, there's a battle for the Internet going on, and it's tearing cyberspace apart! All the name calling and apocalyptic paranoia has got even the typically level-headed Wall Street Journal hot and...

Thanks to some time well-spent surfing the Internet, I now know all about the world's tallest man, Robert Pershing Wadlow, his eight-foot-seven-inches and pituitary gland abnormalities. In fact, I now know all about the pituitary gland--most notably, that it exists. I can now inform and entertain any new acquaintance with...

Am I the only one who found it a little bit rude of Amanda Bynes to announce her retirement from acting in the midst of the greatest wave of unemployment, maybe ever? Where does that comedically talented twenty-four year old think she'll get a job? The Coffee Bean? Because they're...

I hope the recent fascination with fantasy doesn't have larger escapist implications for the world of politics.

I like to think of myself as one of those "idealistic young kids" on whose back Barack Obama built his successful 2008 presidential campaign. I canvassed and I caucused, and...

Text Messaging is cheap and easy, but is it -- patriotic?

Like any self-aware young adult, I enjoy being told what trends I'm a part of. It makes me feel important, loved, and part of something larger than myself. Most recently, the New York Times reported that the

Now that President Obama has pushed legislation through Congress that will ease student loan penalties and increase money for Pell grants, I'm relieved that my classmates and I will not graduate in gargantuan piles of debt. Instead, I'm concerned about having our youthful enthusiasm mired by a...