Ginger's follies, foibles and fixations.
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| You Listen to Me, Mr. Kick-Ass Ginger's follies, foibles and fixations. |
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Saturday, August 10, 2002 Between being busy and being sleepy, this is my first chance to get to The Friday Five 1. Do you have a car? If so, what kind of car is it? Are you kidding? I'm a New Yorker. (No.) 2. Do you drive very often? I only drive when I'm in Nebraska. It's easy there. 3. What's your dream car? I've always had a fondness for the black Mercedes-Benz sedan. Only the best, baby. 4. Have you ever received a ticket? Yes, and I had to go to one of those useless all-day traffic classes so I wouldn't lose points. 5. Have you ever been in an accident? As a passenger I've been in several, none serious. I had a couple of fender-benders when I was driving, one that I think was mere weeks after getting my license. Well, that wasn't very exciting, but I can't imagine having to come up with five fascinating questions every damn week... I feel important because I have to go to the Cherry Lane tonight to be the offical mucky-muck from Mike's management office, because everyone else is out of town. It's no big deal but fun to be there not to see the show (though I love it, I've seen it like a hundred billion times already), but as a job. I just find that kinda cool. posted by Ginger | 5:18 PM Friday, August 09, 2002 Looks like I had the right idea about my "secret admirer"... check out this article from Salon. (Thanks to Steve for the tip!) But now I have to face the fact that nobody likes me! *Sigh* posted by Ginger | 12:48 PM Wednesday, August 07, 2002 Let the Sunshine In You know I'm quick to bitch about the weather, and I've done my share of whining about this hot 'n' sticky city summer. I need to learn to give props when props are due, and darlin' we've had a couple of mighty bee-yoo-tiful days here. Like the kind where it's actually pleasant to be outdoors (and you know coming from me that's saying a lot). Yes, my apartment is still an oven, but I've come to accept that. It just weirdly retains heat, something about that west window letting in all the late-afternoon sun. Anyway, I just wanted to send some love to the weather gods because it is real, real nice (and it's sure not to last long). Thank you. Read Your Television If you read the previous post you know that I've determined that FOX refalsity (my new term for so-called reality-based shows) series American Idol is evil incarnate. As such, I've hardly been able to think about anything else today (grants be damned!). But I did refrain from going next door to the Roach Motel to sneak a peek at the half-hour "somebody gets booted" follow-up show tonight because I knew it would be hell. I mean, what's the reason to watch? To find out who is gone, and maybe see some crying. For that fifteen seconds worth of information, I am going to sit in front of the TV and get fed product placements? Please. That is why I am so tickled to discover that there is a way to have my trash TV without the unpleasant side-effects: Television Without Pity. Not only can you get minutely detailed and joyously snarky recaps of every AI episode, the recaps are far more entertaining than the show itself. "Shack," the AI reviewer, mercilessly skewers all the right things: the painful unfunniness of the hosts (he calls them Black and Decker "because they are a couple of tools"), the ineptitude of judge Paula Abdul (one poll asks readers to judge her emotional age, on a scale from 6 to 16 years), and the brazen obviousness of the show's product placements (kudos for not actually mentioning the brand names of the products). Never fear, if American Idol isn't your thing, you can find recaps and message boards on just about any show out there--refalsity shows seem to be favored in the lineup--including "classic" reruns of popular hits like The X-Files. There's even a mailing list for you to get notified when recaps are posted of your favorite shows. Sure, visitng the site means suffering through couple of pop-up windows and banner ads, but at least they are easy to ignore. It's got all the joy of TV without feeling like you need to take a shower afterward. Highly recommended. posted by Ginger | 10:53 PM Hi de hi de hi de hi... I just watched American Idol for the first time. No, I didn't fix my TV or get a new one, but I'm catsitting for my neighbor in her roach-infested apartment (ew) and she has one. No cable, but I was able to watch The Simpsons and Malcom in the Middle on Sunday, which is really all I could ask for. Thankfully the roaches don't seem to congregate on the couch, so I can catch a show or two over there before I get creeped out and have to leave. So, I've decided: TV fucking sucks. Not so original, maybe, but I've always been quite an apologist for TV. It's always been crap, but fun crap. And there are the handful of decent shows--the aforementioned Sunday night strong points seem to be as solid as ever. It's not so much that American Idol is bad (though it is), but that it seems like network shows aren't even trying to pretend they are entertainment anymore. While it's not hard to see that most TV shows are simply filler between commercials, now the shows and the commercials are just one seamless entity, from the Coke cups sitting on the judges table, to the completely senseless and unfunny (how about anti-funny?) "comedy" bit with a trumpet that had Coca-Cola as its punchline, going right into a commercial for--you guessed it--Coke!* The only difference between the "show" commercial and the "commercials" commercials is that the commercials focus on only one product--Coke, Venus razors, MSN (I remember the products better than the contestants--any doubt what this show is selling?), while the "show" part can advertise all three things at once! If there hasn't already been an episode where the female AI contestants are shown in a semierotic leg-shaving scene while drinking Cokes in a bathroom done up in the MSN logo color scheme, I can only assume we will. I know this is nothing new, but being away from it a while makes you extra-sensitive to it when you come back. That rant out of the way, I'm glad to have seen the show. True, that out of the whole hour there are about 15 minutes of "show." I think all of the folks are talented in some way, but this is really nothing more than a Next-Gen version of the Miss America pageant. The outcome of this show has nothing to do with how these people will do the rest of their lives. It can be a vehicle for exposure, but that's all it is. The most important thing they'll get out of this is not a record contract, but contacts with the agents, managers, publicists, stylists and other folks who will be the ones to make or break their careers from here on out. The contestants' biggest challenge will be to separate the wheat from the chaff in the mountain of business cards they will receive. In a year or two, I doubt anyone will remember who won this contest, but it will be clear who (if anyone) had the savvy to be remembered long after the show is an embarassing footnote on his or her resume. (PS. Go Kelly!) I've gotta get to bed, all this grant-writing, cat-sitting and knitting is taking away from my blogging time! I did make it to the movies this weekend. I ran right out to see Signs, and I tell ya, I should have run the other way. The Sixth Sense was a masterpiece, and Unbreakable was an engagingly quirky, weird little film, but Signs is just garbage. By the way, forget about avoiding (or seeking) "spoilers," because there is nothing to spoil. There is no "big secret," it's all just marketing smoke and mirrors. Stupid, stupid. I have to say the kids did a good job though--especially Rory Culkin. If Macaulay is secretly as talented as his younger sibs, hopefully his brothers' good reps can help pull his career out of the shitheap (it worked, sorta, for Donnie Wahlberg). *This blog entry sponsored by the Coca-Cola Company, Inc. All rights reserved. posted by Ginger | 12:36 AM Sunday, August 04, 2002 You Like Me... Bah. I just got a "someone likes you" message from a website I'll not justify with an advertisement. I actually thought it was a virus and deleted it immediately, but then checked the website and it appears to be "legit," if you can call it that. Not that I utterly reject the idea that someone might be interested in me (Christian Bale? Is it really you, my darling??). If true, it is flattering, and heck--it's more action than I've gotten in a while (overly friendly cab drivers and neighborhood ass-oglers excluded). However, looking at the site it's clear that the whole thing is just a high-concept e-mail address collection device--signing up is an invitation to get spammed to death, and take all your friends down with you. I say, don't give these dirtbags your business. If you think I'm cool, get a spine and 'fess up (you obviously have my e-mail address) or leave me the fuck alone. Sorry if that makes my fan club feel unwelcome, but the idea of "secret admirers" is a little too close to stalking for my taste. On the other hand, I wonder if it's real at all. Could it be that the site is actually harvesting e-mail addresses from the easiest target--blogs--and sending out bogus "someone likes you" messages? See, the only way to find out who "likes you" is to enter the e-mail addresses of people you "like," and if there's a match, you both get notified. But like most people, the curiosity will get the better of you. After you've entered the e-mail addresses of everyone you've had a crush on in your life and still no matches, you'll start entering the e-mails of people you don't really like "that way," just to try to unearth the mystery. However, everyone you enter into the website gets an e-mail saying "someone likes you!" and they have to go back to the site to try to figure out who you are. So, if the site generates it's own bogus messages to random e-mail addresses, the curious and lonely frantically enter their entire address books into the website, desperate to discover the identity of their potential true love. But since the message is bogus to begin with, you never learn the identity of your admirer, and in the meantime the website has just collected a boatload of new e-mails to sell to their advertisers. Clever, no? Stop the insanity! If you like someone just ask them out, for chrissakes. If you cannot bear the thought of being turned down, you shouldn't be dating anyway. posted by Ginger | 11:47 PM |
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