The Washington Ballet

These are absolutely stunning.




See more here.

Who William Shatner is Following on Twitter

Did you know that William Shatner is on Twitter? He is! Not such surprising news, I suppose. He almost uniformly begins his tweets with "Friends," and ends with "My best, Bill," which is probably as good a way to spend 21 characters as any other. And they're decent enough tweets. Straightforward, informative, occasionally wishing someone a happy birthday.

As is the case with most celebrities, he's followed a lot more than he follows. Specifically, he's currently following 12, and he is followed by 124,841 (10,000 times as many!). Obviously the twelve caught my eye. Who are these chosen twelve that William Shatner has deemed worthy of his feed? Well:

1. Carrie Fisher - This is like Romeo following Juliet and it can only end as badly.
2. Henry Gibson - The recently, regrettably deceased comedic actor. Actually check out his page, that guy was a card and clearly (probably) did his own tweets.
3. Twitter's Spam Watch - Riveting stuff, I'm sure.
4. Wil Wheaton - The actor who played Wesley Crusher on Star Trek: The Next Generation (as well as Gordie in Stand By Me). I guess it speaks to Shatner's somewhat difficult reputation that the only Star Trek castmember he follows is one who never worked with him (not counting that episode of The Weakest Link: Star Trek Edition).
5. Dame Elizabeth Taylor - Sure. Why not?
6. Arnold Klein - Michael Jackson's doctor, and a pioneer in the cosmetic uses of Botox. Well, this at least fits with the Elizabeth Taylor thing.
7. Leslie Shatner Walker - His daughter. I bet she's got some stories.
8. Giorgio Tuscani - An artist I have never heard of, but that's certainly not any slight on his legitimacy. He is in turn following someone called "Gay Spock." I now like him.
9. The Priceline Negotiator - Himself.
10. Paul Camuso - A guy who "work[s] with actor William Shatner on his online internet project The Shatner Project." Kind of a redundant sentence, but okay. A guy with a cool (I hope) job.
11. Fran Drescher - Huh?
12. TrekMovie.com - He's probably still mad about not being cast in the first reboot, but also wants to keep that window open just in case the sequel needs an "Old Man Kirk." It's plausible with this new timeline set-up, after all.

All in all a wild bunch. A regular Jesus and the Twelve Apostles. TrekMovie of course being the Judas that betrayed him. Camuso being Peter for building his online internet Shatner church project. Spam Watch being Doubting Thomas for always being on the lookout for tricky business. The Priceline Negotiator being James the Less because of his inferior heroic qualities compared to those of James Kirk. Okay, the analogy gets a little thin past there, but if I knew more about the apostles I think I'd be all over this.

Netflix Inventory Oversight #14753

I have waited 16 years to see Candyman. This additional "short wait" is almost too much.

Healthcare Riots

It's 7:36am and this is probably the best thing I will read all day (via NYTimes):

There was a telling incident at a town hall held by Representative Gene Green, D-Tex. An activist turned to his fellow attendees and asked if they "oppose any form of socialized or government-run health care." Nearly all did. Then Representative Green asked how many of those present were on Medicare. Almost half raised their hands.

PS. Lily and I are celebrating our four year anniversary! Mostly apart!

More Youtube Comments

From Beyonce's Single Ladies video:

I think the song speaks about girls who didn't got married and their boyfriend broke up with them and now they miss him, and the "if you liked it then you should've out a ring on it" means that if they didn't marry him then they have no right to complain, and now it's too late to repent... Or maybe I'm just reading too much into it

Sundance

I have a feeling that I'm about to be able to act really superior about having seen Humpday back in February. I really can't wait.

Best Casting News of the Year

My days as a hack movie news reporter are long past me, but you must be told: Abel Ferrara is making a modern re-imagining of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde with Forest Whitaker and 50 Cent in the lead roles. Is Lorne Michaels producing this or something? What's going on?

In other Abel Ferrara news, Werner Herzog is doing a remake (an extremely loose one it would appear) of Ferrara's "Bad Lieutenant" that looks NUTS.

I'm in a Slumberous Reverie of Grain

We've been all out of cow milk for the past three days. We've got Rice Dream, but I can only drink it in shots, and my face when it's down is pretty similar to the one I wear after scotch but with more shuddering and less rugged bravado.

The Tonight Show with a Wax Sculpture of Conan O'Brien

I'm looking forward to seeing Conan's first show tonight. There's been some naysaying as far as whether or not he can be as edgy or absurd at 11:35, but I tend to think as long as he's using most of the same bunch of writers and performers who've served him this well this long, the proverbial chuckleboat should be sailing on smooth gigglewaves. Until of course the writers get into their 50s and lose touch with contemporary issues, technology, and the ever-renewing touchstones of youth pop culture. So I figure we've got at least five years until that really kicks in.

That said, the banner ads (click the image for larger picture) that NBC has been using to promote the new Tonight Show are terrifying. Surely an actual photograph of Conan couldn't have been the basis for that illustration. It looks like carefully molded plastic with a few laugh lines at the sides of the eyes to humanize it up. Thoroughly weird-looking.

Politics and Psychology

I read an Op-Ed piece this morning over a bowl of Honey Bunches of Oats (okay, Star Trek cereal) called "Would You Slap Your Father? If So, You’re a Liberal." All right, that's a good hook. I'm listening.

The premise of the article is that studies show that in general liberals and conservatives think and feel differently on more subjects than just "the issues." If you want to find out where a new acquaintance's political sensibilities lie, Nicholas Kristof (an occasional topic kicker-offer around this blog) suggests you ask them questions like "Would you be willing to slap your father in the face, with his permission, as part of a comedy skit?" and "Does it disgust you to touch the faucet in a public restroom?"

"Studies suggest that conservatives are more often distressed by actions that seem disrespectful of authority, such as slapping Dad. Liberals don’t worry as long as Dad has given permission.

Likewise, conservatives are more likely than liberals to sense contamination or perceive disgust. People who would be disgusted to find that they had accidentally sipped from an acquaintance’s drink are more likely to identify as conservatives."

I guess it makes sense that as a Democrat raised by Republicans I'd been fine with slapping my father in a sketch but I can't help but be mildly disgusted by public restrooms and sharing drinks with people who aren't romantic partners. But I think the latter just makes good health sense. If being a true liberal means loving getting sick, then count me out.

Best Exchange This Week

Lily: A man on the street just told me that white people are becoming a minority and that as a white female it's my job to have a lot of babies. He gave me some GREAT literature and then walked past a young and pretty Latina girl in favor of a 60 year old white lady. I don't think she's gonna help

Dave: Save the lit, want to read. Also fyi, that text was split into 2 where you said "he gave me some"

Woodstock and Cannes

IMDb's WENN can at times have about the most shallow and content-deficient reporting imaginable, but occasionally a headline will catch me and I'll read the story. Here's a recent article in which they describe the lukewarm reaction to Ang Lee's new film Taking Woodstock.

After skimming some negative reviews, they quote writer-producer James Schamus, who said that it was difficult to cast young people today who looked like the hippies you see in the old Woodstock footage.

"When you think about it, a generation of people who weren't fat, who weren't staring at themselves in the mirror all the time, and not shaving everything off down there, it captures the difference of 40 years right there."

So Schamus wanted people who were not image-conscious, but also, no fatties?

Ah the glorious 60s. When America's beautiful youth stood for something and stopped showering and got wasted every day to prove it. But in all fairness they did have better popular music.

Restraint

Sometimes I find it very difficult not to (try to) use humor as a defense/deflection mechanism. Recent example: Someone from my elementary school who I haven't spoken to in ten years just posted on her Facebook feed:

_______ is glad to be home with the family, back to ____ College tomorrow....R.I.P. Uncle Mike

I will not say "I like this." I will not say "I like this."

Books and Meaningless Coincidences

On Tuesday, I read "Chronopolis" by J.G. Ballard, the first and to-date only story I've ever read by him. At the end I thought, "Hey, this guy's pretty good. Too bad he's probably been dead for a decade." More like two days; the same day I bought the collection of short stories at the library's ENORMOUS $.50 book sale. Stranger things have happened, but not to me this week.

Morning musing

Tuthill loves the paper strips you peel off Netflix envelopes more than any toy we've ever bought her. Good thing we watch so many movies.

Taxes

I've been working on my taxes tonight using TurboTax, and I have to say, I prefer the H&R Block method (which I pursued last year). Sure, it costs about $200 more, but there's something relaxing about telling a stranger about the year you've had and letting them do the incomprehensible paperwork. It's like therapy mixed with civic duty and laziness.

March Post

It disappointed me that neither I nor Lily had anything notable to write for the whole month of March, so I thought I'd just add these unnecessary words to the internet, whose ratio of unuseful words to useful words is already about 84367103254785379:1.

One exciting thing about March is that I think our team has gone undefeated at the weekly trivia night at Jabu's Pub for the past four or five weeks. The other regular teams are beginning to resent us, which is an odd feeling since even though we're winning, we each only end up netting a few dollars after drinks and what have you. So we're basically provoking the ire of dozens of people for about ten dollars a week. Worth it? I guess.

Books

I'm wanting to read like crazy (thanks library!) and I want more and more! Recommend books please! I may have killed the laptop, leaving us with one computer, but that should give me more reading time!


List your favorites please!

Dancing in the Dark

I only saw this fairly recently and I can't figure it out. What made Springsteen think this dance was cool? Up until this point he'd been putting out some of the best and most accessible stuff of the previous decade, and even this number is a fun little pop gem, but then he made a music video that's goofiness is matched only by how boring it is.

If blame for the former belongs to the Boss, we can pin the latter on the video's director: Brian De Palma. Did they really need to hire the guy who had already made movies like Carrie and Scarface to direct a straight-forward concert video like this one? And can you believe that this is the gig that launched the career of a twenty-year-old Courteney Cox? She blushes twice and then awkwardly does the Bruce dance as the camera pulls away. Let's put this girl on sitcoms!

It's also strange to me that the official Bruce Springsteen Youtube channel thinks that this song came from the nonexistent album Dancing in the Dark instead of the real and famous Born in the U.S.A. Does the official Bruce Springsteen Youtube channel even like Bruce Springsteen?

And yet... I can't stop watching.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pk8VZgJkpeg
(embedding disabled by request)

"Can't Believe It" Acoustic Covers: A Brief Showcase

I was listening to T-Pain and Lil Wayne's... excuse me... T-Wayne's hit song "Can't Believe It" not long ago and thought it would actually work really well as an acoustic song. I said to myself, "Sure, white folks doing self-conscious acoustic covers of rap songs has been done to death, but I bet no one's thought to do this one yet!" As per usual, Google burst my bubble*.










(beat boxing in this one)

This is but a small sampling. Well, at least I don't need to learn the guitar and develop a better voice now. I wonder if anyone's gotten around to a bluegrass rendition of "Ghost Ride It" yet...

*Another disappointment rendered upon me by Google is that I did not officially coin the term "in-between drink," meaning a beverage that would be more likely to be consumed with a snack or on its own as opposed to with a proper meal (sodas, lemonade, and other juices for example, though these are not hard and fast rules). Apparently a 1935 article in Coca-Cola Nachtrichten (or at least the English translation) deserves the credit on that one.

Little Dizzle Trailer

Yeah, that about sums it up. It also just got into SXSW, so the hits just keep coming. I would highly recommend checking it out if you have an opportunity. And I think I would make that recommendation even if I hadn't worked on it in a few small and humble ways.

Notes on Facebook

1. My 91-year-old grandmother is now my friend on Facebook. A little weird, sure.
2. She is listed as single. A little weird as well, but "widowed" is not currently a marital status option (but certainly will become one in time).
3. Every day in my feed I get the report: "Gladys is now single." So either Facebook has a glitch specific to her, or she's really actively trying to put herself back on the market.

Link Parade

Things I've been enjoying lately, so you all don't get bored we go out of town next week! Although, in all likelihood, we would not have updated next week even if we were going to be here.

Worst Poetry Book Covers of 2008
Some of these are truly awful!

One time I got a crackerjack prize that was a little square of cardboard emblazoned with the words "Fold Up Corners and Flick For Far Out Fun". It was not fun. These people were luckier.

We Heart It is a "visual bookmark" where you can store images you love. My Heart is turning into something I really love looking at. I'm glad I can have these things stored in one place.

Free cosmetics next week! All the details you'll need are in there.

Not a link but this is the outfit I want to wear for Sundance:

Sundance Premiere Outfit by lilyface

Sadly, it appears I own absolutely none of that*. Back to the drawing board!

And finally, this entry as a Wordle. Because I think it's kind of fun.



*Lie. I own the perfume. And I have some Moleskins around. I lie to you guys all the time.

Happy New Year!

Don't let R. Kelly in your kitchen...



Best comment on the Youtube page:

"at leat(sic) Kelly didn't start a war over oil like G.W."

Real talk.