Things Learned After Another Halloween

-"The Joker" is in fact a far easier and lazlier costume than putting on a Canadian alt-rock hoodie you always wear and call yourself Chuck Klosterman.

-Asian girls can get away with wearing anything from a tennis skirt to a pair of riding pants and call it “Sexy Asian etc…"

-Do not dress as Hank and Dean Venture. People will demand Mecha Shiva constantly.

-Do not drink Rye mixed with Coke Zero. Zero Calories. Massive hangover.

-Drinking Rye does not suddenly give you powers of wit and charm. You also won’t be able to discuss British Premiere Soccer. You will do so anyway.

-If there is a rooftop, you will find at least four men peeing off it at all times.

-Ladders. You will climb them.

-Your cup filled with vodka. You will put it in your teeth as you climb the ladder and pour vodka over your face in the process. This will seem like a great idea.

-There is some weird mexican/spanish bar/restaurant on 9th between 4th and 5th avenue. They have baked corn kernels as a bar snack. I love the bar.

-Pork is delicious.

“We dress Barack like Gandhi and put him in the middle of a jungle in Papua New Guinea with a group of isolated natives. He does simple miracles—walking on water, swimming on land. He teaches them hopscotch. One day, he summons a whale into their river, jumps inside, and disappears. A bobblehead Obama doll floats to the surface. He is immortalized as their savior.”
— David Blaine (no, really) on what Obama’s Infomercial should’ve been. [NYMag]

From the Archives: The SciFi Channel Experiment

WSN, 2/17/07

The original point of the column was supposed to be about film. It quickly devolved into my still-standing obsession/affair with the Pioneer Theater.

That said, I wrote this when I realized I forgot to do a column on the Thursday before it was do and editing something else.

Rather than venture outside to do something productive last weekend during that frosty downpour, I decided to conduct a scientific experiment. What happens when you mix a strapping young lad with defining facial hair, the SciFi Channel and, what we’ll call, “Improvement Juice" mixed with Coke? Here, I present to you the minutes I may have taken while under the influence of truly horrible made-for-cable zombie movies.

7:51 p.m. John really likes this idea. He likes it so much he celebrates with some “Improvement Juice" and Coke.

8:00 p.m. Ran out of Coke.

8:05 p.m. Run to bodega. Buy Diet Coke, also six pack of Brooklyn Lager. Tell cashier my idea.

8:06 p.m. He’s very confused and says he worries about me. We bond.

8:20 p.m. Begin playing Guitar Hero. I rock out to “Ziggy Stardust." Am surprised at amount of coordination I still have, but attribute this to the “Improvement Juice," now with Diet Coke.

8:59 p.m. John is in a happy, warm place.

9:00 p.m. “House of the Dead 2" begins.

9:02 p.m. Sexy co-eds are being sprayed with water. Frat boys laugh. Sid Haig is in this movie as a mad scientist. This is the best film ever.

9:14 p.m. I was so, so wrong. More “Improvement Juice" is immediately poured, this time without the Diet Coke.

9:20 p.m. John is in a very dark place where only demons and my editor, Vadim, exist.

9:32 p.m. Sticky Fingaz is in this movie. How bad can this be?

9:50 p.m. Eight soldiers fight one zombie. All right, this is getting better.

9:52 p.m. Zombie inadvertently kills two soldiers. Pour more “Improvement Juice," this time remove Diet Coke.

10 p.m. Movie is not over yet. Depression sets in. Open a Brooklyn Lager.

10:03 p.m. Open another Brooklyn Lager.

10:10 p.m. Open another Brooklyn Lager

10:11 p.m. Wonder if I’m taking this too slow. Fat soldier is eaten alive by zombies. They steal his heart. Gives me an idea for Valentine’s Day.

10:30 p.m. Half a handle of “Improvement Juice" is gone. Open a Brooklyn Lager.

10:48 p.m. Why am I still awake? How am I still awake? Jesus.

10:57 p.m.IT IS OVER.

11:00 p.m. Play “guitar hero."

11:02 p.m. Go to bed with plastic guitar still on. Wake up uncomfortable, but not surprised, early Sunday.

02/16/06, 11:05 p.m."Goddamn it, John." — Vadim, my editor.

02/16/06, 11:06 p.m."Please write faster." — Sam, copy editor.

Perhaps after reading these notes I hastily compiled under the avenging eyes of our local copy editor, I question what exactly I figured out from this experiment. Did I improve the quality of life at NYU? Did I discuss GSOC and make the same comments we’ve made for the past two months? Did I prove that I’m a sad, lonely film editor with no social skills? No. I proved I fucking rock at “guitar hero," and I know how to fucking party. This week, “Rottweiler" is on at 9 p.m. You bring the “Improvement Juice," I’ll bring my love.

that is to say again...

…yes, original pay was based on daily quota. the pay-per-click came later.

i’m getting away from websites where i can generate ideas with type now. yargh.

also, had a friend relate to me why I should watch Mad Men and listen how it is apparently a prologue to The Sopranos.  Then read Matt Seitz’ somber and wonderful ode to Andrew Johnson and perfectly understand.

That said, I’ll never fucking watch the goddamn thing. Until I buy the DVD set or stop watching horribly awful shows about stained-glass vampires and bishonen guys who gather souls for flying dragons attached to castles and…ah, fuck it. I’m going to bed.

that is to say...

consider this for a second. All of Gawker was originally one editor, one site. Slowly as the brands grew, they took on more and more: this is evidenced through Gizmodo and Kotaku, later by fleshing out io9 and Jezebel with complete editorial staffs and months of beta.

But the Radosh thing: while not explicit, this had to have happened somewhere down the line in 2004 or early ‘05 when Gawker was gaining steam.

Which kind of makes me wonder, who else had these magical “way…to crosspost on Gawker" ? And more fun: would that mean he originally intended to have a Huffington Post format before doing the whole bloggers reporters writers masthead?

And more importantly: who the fuck cares.

Of course, it’s entirely speculation based on diet Dr. Pepper, whiskey and those delicious cheese/peanut butter crackers that are sold cheaply at Odd Lots. And there’s a good chance pay would’ve been based on the site traffic, as it is now, rather than a set quota.  Or not. Alternative Universe Gawker would still likely be staffed by 3/4ths of  The Black Table anyway.

This Paragraph Makes Me Hate Everything In Media.

Twenty-four-year-old Justine Ezarik, who goes by the moniker “iJustine," is bouncing around on my computer screen in a pink tank top and black bra, her platinum hair—ordinarily perfectly straight— increasingly mussed as she works herself into a frenzy about something. I have turned my computer’s sound off, so I don’t know what’s making her widen her heavily made-up eyes, flail her head from side to side, and fix the camera with an open-mouthed pout. My boyfriend glances at my screen as he walks by—and stops in his tracks and watches.

Now, I don’t want to speak ill of those more successful or famous than us. But let’s sit here for a minute and contemplate how utterly fucking meta this is. And if you don’t know who the author is, you’re so incredibly lucky. But let me introduce you to her: she is the template for modern online oversharing by a female audience and she is making it a-ok to dump your livejournal to represent reporting.

Then again, maybe that’s all this is. Sigh.