jersey shore gone wilde

this somehow makes sense. see more here.

It Was a Blood Transfusion

Lonely Island "We're Back" - Watch more Funny Videos

What up, blog?! Some fake rap to get your weekend started.

which transitions-lens wearing prof is a pulitzer prize winner?

why, occasional obsession eric foner, of course.

fonester wins the pulitzer prize for “The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery.”

"celeb" sighting in DC

email exchange between me and my friend:

me: so i saw an obama staffer at lunch today and i cannot figure out what his name is. he is bald, really hot, but not jon favreau. i've seen him on either daily show or colbert...any thoughts?

him: It wasn't Sam Kass, the White House chef, was it? He's HOT as all hell, like majorly hot. But it doesn't make sense that he'd be out having lunch.

me: YES that's the guy!!!!!!!

me (2): you are le genius.

in case you are in doubt: see here. and here.

home

i went to nyc for less than 24 hours for the final lcd soundsystem show. i dunno, i don't have any real responsibilities, so why not.

even though i go back and forth between nyc and dc fairly frequently for my job, i am always glad and somewhat relieved to return to dc after each trip. maybe i'm too tired and this is why i'm sounding fairly sentimental, but this time, nyc was so...stimulating. i was standing outside in nolita for like 10 minutes, max, and i saw (a) a dude dressed like andy warhol, (b) that redheaded gay dude on modern family and his young-ish boyfriend, and (c) this random man with an asymmetrical haircut, a souped-up alpine sweater, and aqua jeans (i remember him well bc we ended up sitting at adjacent tables during dinner). it would take me years to see even one of those people in dc. yeah, i know. it's not like a, b, or c will pay my rent.

so here's the lowdown on the concert: yes, it was over 3 hours long. yes, there were guest stars, many of whom i didn't recognize (aside from arcade fire and some dude from hot chip). yes, i saw donald glover walking out of msg post-show. and yes, madison square garden is a terrible place to watch a show and has miserable acoustics.

but who the hell am i kidding?! it was a freaking blast.

when we first arrived we noticed that virtually every guy was dressed in some permutation of a james murphy outfit: black suit white shirt / white t-shirt white painters' pants / white jacket plus something else. all the girls were in black & white, too. i was really weirded out and thought people got costume-y because they are from out of town and they didn't know that new yorkers don't do that. or that chunky guys everywhere took one look at james murphy and thought they, too, can get away with an all-white outfit.

nope, the explanation is much simpler: i'm an asshole. the band specifically requested that people come in black and white. granted, i wear those colors by default (and also happened to do so for the show) since that's 90+% of my wardrobe, but why must i be such a buzzkill?

i sat next to this rather inebriated couple, one of whom managed to convey that (a) DC is sterile, (b) he saw LCD in 2005 at bowery ballroom, then quickly corrected himself for being that dick who points out that he saw a band way before they got super mainstream, and (c) like everyone else present, could not stop dancing.

anyway, i am super sad that i missed the LCD bandwagon until it was too late and that i got to see them live only twice. i adore and admire james murphy for all of his doughy world-weariness. also, have you noticed just how much their first album references the b-52s? pretty neat.

some other stuff.

this originally was intended to be a rumination on what home is, but i'm tired. no energy for deep thoughts. the above is a video by someone with much better tickets than moi.

canada!

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Music Video of the Day: The Strokes, "Under Cover of Darkness"

Remember that time you were at that house party in Fort Green, circa July 2001 -- you know the one; the one with the ice luge and the kiddie pool filled with ice and PBRs. And you were talking to that aloof, skinny, ethnically vague girl from Vassar with the heavy mascara and the bangs and the Gauloises in her back pocket, and the black-frame glasses that weren't even a thing back then? Remember that? You were 22, and you didn't know how to humblebrag about the fact that you were a teacher in the Bronx, and your game was just totally wack. Remember that? And maybe your best friend, his mom had just died, and you weren't able to process that shit, and maybe you were sort of in love with her, and confronting that shit was like running a lawnmower on your forehead. You know what I'm talking about, right? And then the skinny girl with the bangs stops -- abruptly -- telling you about the equestrian events she competed in when she was at Greenwich Country Day, and says maybe let's go blow rails in the bathroom, and you're trying to be cool, but you've never even seen cocaine before in your life. Remember that? No? Well, this song will transport you back to that very moment.

(Drugs are bad.)

new lows

example 1: my sister was in town over the weekend and for some inexplicable reason we decided to pick up a quick cup of coffee at mcdonald's. don't ask. anyway, this old lady with her grandson cut in front of me in line and was completely unapologetic about it.

me: you are not setting a very good example for your grandson.
her: that's not my job. [ed note: what the hell kind of an answer is that?]
me (figuring i have nothing to lose if she's not interested in teaching her grandson anything): go to hell.

end scene.

example 2: knut the adorable german polar bear died over the weekend. so sad!! i was reading this article about how people are mourning when i came across this:

Children wrote farewell poems for him, and a group of "die-hard" fans stayed all day, many of them crying. "I've been crying nonstop since I heard about his death," Ingrid Rommel told the AP.

i'm a jerk so my immediate thought was, this woman is nuts. then i moved onto the following sentence:

She said visiting Knut weekly since 2006 helped her get over her husband's death.

that is one of the saddest sentences i have ever read. i dare you to come up with something sadder.

:(

wait, i may have a winner:

Knut was raised by zookeeper Thomas Doerflein after the cub's mother rejected him. Doerflein died from a heart attack in 2008, around the same time that one of Knut's keepers warned he was becoming a "psycho" bear. Doerflein had been banned from playing with Knut because he had become an adult bear and it was too dangerous, leaving Knut sad and lonely.

:( :( :( infinity.

what language old white dudes think i speak

this guy obviously is one of the most inadvertently entertaining people i've ever worked for/with/whatever. he and i gave a presentation to a group of legal services attorneys last week. we were basically asking them to submit certain reports to us from their clients. that's not the important part. one of the attorneys in attendance asked what our language capabilities were.

partner: yes, we can speak spanish and also (petering out) oriental...

even though i was seated next to him i managed to miss this wonderfully antiquated utterance, and one of the aghast associates told me afterward. i laughed uproariously and then realized, oh wait: one, he's obviously referring to me since i'm the only person of "oriental" descent in his vicinity. two, he probably thought he was being extra aware by not referring to me as "chinese."

how old white dudes make me work hard

so the firm associates and i pulled an actual all-nighter to get our filing in on time. indeed, i entered the building at 1 p.m. and did not leave until 7 a.m. the next morning. then many of us had to attend a media event at 9 a.m.

8 a.m. email from partner: how are we doing? i'd like for us to meet today.

response from lead associate: [partner], i will be back in the office after the media event and am happy to meet with you. the team has pulled an all-nighter so to the extent this meeting can be postponed until tomorrow, we would appreciate it.

response from partner: i enthusiastically endorse sleep but i would still like to meet today.

guess who got a meeting at noon.

what old white dudes talk about in law firm elevators

alas, just as i'd imagined.

old white dude 1 to old white dude 2: "so how is GM doing this morning?"

Happy Birthday to Me

On Saturday, a bunch of people are going to wish me a happy birthday on Facebook. I am just that kind of guy. What kind of guy? Loved. I am just loved. By people. By people with birthday calendars in their Facebook and two seconds to spare. But, here's the thing. They don't need to wish me happy birthday. My birthday happiness is preordained.

GALIFIANAKIS BACK ON SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE.

comment of the day

law firm associate to me: "you are one of the happier attorneys i know."

Music Video of the Day: Thom Yorke, "Walk It Out"

On the one hand, juxtaposing very serious white people with a banger-cum-meme from the Dirty Dirty is played out. On the other hand, Thom Yorke's dancing! The best.

Nicolas Cage, National Treasure

Over the weekend it was revealed that the New York Times, in keeping with its ongoing recent mission to trash journalistic standards it once held dear, actually concealed from the public the fact that Raymond Davis, who killed two Pakistanis in Lahore some weeks back, is actually a former Special Ops/Blackwater guy and a member of the CIA. He claims that the men in question were attempting to rob him. Whether or not that is the case, one of the men he shot in the back as he was fleeing. In broad daylight. In the streets of a country we cowardly drop remote control bombs on routinely, a country we claim to be a great ally in the muddled global war on terrorism.

Why is this important? In part because the Pakistani government has detained Raymond Davis, and the American government insists he's entitled to diplomatic immunity. It may be the case that he is, but it is also looking very likely that the American government sent a trained killer into the streets of Lahore to do intelligence gathering, and he used this license instead to murder someone. As for the New York Times, at the behest of the Obama Administration it decided not to report the truth of Mr. Davis' employment, and has instead allowed its readers to accept as credible Administration claims of Mr. Davis' fictional employ with the Consul and/or Embassy's offices.

So, basically, once again, fuck the New York Times. Thank God for Wikileaks. Et cetera.

But if the Times is ever going to weasel its way back into my heart, it will do so by continuing to celebrate in barely contained snark the full-bodied wonderfulness of Nicolas Cage. Here is a piece in today's Times about good actors who appear in schlock. I clicked on it, hopeful for a nugget about my friend Nic. But a mere nugget? I should have known better. The article, largely a meandering stupidity that perpetuates the lie that Anthony Hopkins is a good actor, crescendos in the final paragraphs thusly:

And it is what good actors bring to movies, even bad ones: discipline, conviction, the ability to help us suspend our disbelief by persuading us that they believe in what they are doing. The more preposterous the situation, the more impressive the feat of seeming to take it utterly seriously. There are other measures of excellence of course — emotional subtlety, psychological acuity, wit — but this kind of unwavering, fanatical commitment is surely a sign of greatness. You might almost say that greatness shows itself precisely in the discrepancy between the performance and the material. If that is true, then it is something like a mathematical certainty that the greatest actor in the world today is Nicolas Cage. 

This hypothesis will be tested next Friday, when “Drive Angry 3D” opens in theaters, just two days ahead of the Academy Awards broadcast. Mr. Cage is no stranger to the Oscar — he was a best actor winner for “Leaving Las Vegas” and a nominee for “Adaptation” — but he has also been an action star, a comic player and, in recent years, the American cinema’s most popular and prolific purveyor of craziness. 

With a handful of exceptions (Werner Herzog’s “Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans” and Gore Verbinski’s “Weather Man” among them) critics have not smiled on Mr. Cage’s films of the past decade, which include a grab bag of hits and flops in various genres. He has anchored the juvenile action “National Treasure” franchise, and also science fiction and fantasy like “Ghost Rider,” “Knowing” and “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice.” Mention must be made of “The Wicker Man,” Neil LaBute’s transcendentally awful remake of a 1970s horror movie, which has enjoyed a rich afterlife as a YouTube laughingstock. 

Mr. Cage may have been driven to some of this by well-publicized financial difficulty, and some of his admirers have surely been puzzled by his choices. But it can never be said that he phones in a performance. He is more likely to scream into the telephone, or smash it to pieces, or some other sublime and unpredictable piece of business. Just doing his job, in other words.