Welcome to The Faster Times update. In today's edition, we bring you Bridesmaids, MLB picks, George Mitchell's mistakes, pheromones, and infamy. Enjoy!

“Bridesmaids” is a comedy that just happens to be written by women and starring women. This might not seem like the seed of social revolution, but it is, in fact, a big deal. As Tad Friend, writing in the New Yorker about comedic actress Anna Farris, recently pointed out, “Studio executives believe that male moviegoers would rather prep for a colonoscopy that experience a woman’s point of view, particularly if that woman drinks or swears or has a great job or an orgasm.”

I had a perfect bracket in the first round of the NHL playoffs, I nailed the NFL playoffs, and I’m going to try my hand with baseball. I’m 22-6 in my last 28 bets, so I figure I should share my luck.

I have thought for some time now that the Obama administration’s experiment with George Mitchell had failed. Special Envoy for the Middle East George Mitchell and his team made two key errors: they believed that the near term pluses of an ultimate deal between Palestinians and Israelis would outweigh the political benefits of intransigence by both respective governments — and they felt that helping Palestinian moderates deliver resources to their people would help them achieve a legitimacy competitive against Hamas. They were wrong on both counts.

When I was 12 years-old I fell in love with a girl called Amanda. It may be delusional to say a pre-pubescent accretion of feeling was “love.” 12 year-olds can’t know anything about love. You have to be at least, like, 23 or 24. And even then you’re probably fooling yourself in some regard. 30 may be a better benchmark, when one’s body and brain are finally weathered and leathered enough to withstand the tidal pull of feeling that happens when someone tickles your withers with their smile, or else seems to be using a private language you only just now realized you understood in their fidgets and subconscious gesticulations.

At a moment in history when so many Americans seem to want to be famous for something, anything–for being in a reality TV show, for having a popular Twitter account, for winning a televised singing contest–we’d do well to remember that being famous, in itself, isn’t all that fun. Especially when you’re mostly famous for being famous. Or infamous.