The Only Argument You Need for the Oxford Comma

via Facebook

Human categorization via social media

(click to enlarge)

I'd like to thank Facebook for making it so easy to fit my life into various pre-defined categories: education, music preferences, favorite athletes, things I "like." It's nice to see political views taken so seriously as an option as well. Facebook is, after all, an extension of ourselves, and that freedom of expression is not to be trifled with, no sir. Especially if you're tired of being nice to people who don't give a shit. Sign me up for that one.

And apparently drunken twats don't know the proper usage of the various forms of "your." Go figure.

The Blackberry Suicides

Let me tell you a story. It is one of loss, betrayal, and first-world hardship. This is a story that proves it may, in fact, be better never to have loved than to have loved and lost. This is the chronicle of my pathetic history with the Blackberry.

I bought my first Blackberry in the summer of 2009 as a personal reward for completing college and obtaining a real-person job. It felt appropriate: I was an adult, and people would thus require constant access to me. In turn, I would need constant access to Google maps, Facebook, and the TFLN mobile website. I even bought a gel skin to protect my investment. Life was grand.

The following Thanksgiving, I was helping my grandfather haul a Christmas tree over a porch railing, forgetting about my prize Blackberry encased in its feeble gel skin in my front pocket. I leaned hard, resulting in a broken screen. Goodbye, Blackberry #1.

Blackberry #2 fell victim to a friend's birthday bar night in Kenosha, Wisconsin, a few months later. It was left on a table, whereupon some douchebag picked it up, turned it off, and probably sold it on eBay, instead of replying to my frantic texts and phone calls. People are a-holes.

Blackberry #3 also fell victim to a broken screen, but I was particularly irked because I hadn't done anything to deserve it this time. It was just sitting in my bag, minding its own business, when it got the living shit kicked out of it by another member of my purse community. No one has stepped forward to claim responsibility. It was probably domestic terrorism.

Blackberry #4 was lost in epic fashion while vacationing in Las Vegas this past February. To protect the integrity of those involved, I'll just say that the last time I saw it, my fourth Blackberry was somewhere in Treasure Island. (Trust me, it's not the weirdest thing found there.) Needless to say, Vegas marketers don't fuck around.


At this point, my cell phone insurance provider dropped my coverage. I was officially on my own. But that didn't slow my irreverent momentum, as Blackberries were dropping like acid at a Flaming Lips concert. Blackberry #5 was in my hand during a softball team bar outing this spring. Fifteen minutes later, it was nowhere to be seen. Again, I suspect some douchebag picked it up and made an eBay profit. Seriously, people suck.

Blackberry #6 was obtained from the T-Mobile store in June, but within a couple days it was clear there was a defect that prevented certain necessary actions. I could not, for instance, upload photos to Facebook from my mobile device. Finding this injustice unacceptable, I took it back to the store and traded it for one that worked. This, I submit, was the most innocent and painless of the Blackberry deaths. At the very least, it was definitely not my fault.

But Blackberry #7 only lasted two weeks. It was lost this past Thursday, somewhere between a River North club and the cab ride home. I honest to God have no idea what happened.

The cosmic message is clear: I was not meant to be a smartphone owner. In an act of contrition, I've downgraded to the "Samsung :)" -- a slide phone designed for a 13-year-old girl with an emoticon fetish. If I can keep this flimsy not-smartphone alive for a year, I'm allowed to get another Blackberry. We'll see how it goes.

In the meantime, I urge you, dear Reader, to observe a moment of silence for the seven Blackberries that had to die to teach me this unpleasant lesson. What was meant to be a symbol of my triumphant entry into adulthood has turned into the insolent shitshow of my early twenties. Let their demise not be in vain. Learn from my tale. And don't bother with the gel skin.

Alas, if only I'd gone for real protection. At the very least,
thieves would have been deterred out of pure disgust.

Stephen Colbert at Northwestern last weekend

Northwestern alum Stephen Colbert gave the commencement address to the class of 2011 in Evanston last weekend. There are many, many great pull-quotes...

"[Northwestern] represents humanity at its best. And on Dillo Day, it represents humanity at its worst...today evidently armadillos are honored by drinking Four Loko out of a supersoaker while dancing to the New Pornographers in a drunken mosh pit filled mostly with National Merit finalists."

And it gets better. Totally worth the 20 minutes, I promise.

And if you can't get enough, check out this feature on Colbert from the winter 2010 Northwestern Magazine.

Go 'Cats!

I'm pissed

I spent a lot of time last Friday finishing up a blog post about memoir and narcissism, and then Blogger spazzed over the weekend and lost it and still hasn't restored it. Anyone else have this problem? Did it get fixed?

I suppose common sense would be to back up all these posts on Word docs...still, I feel wronged.

Nonsequitur: I started Bossypants by Tina Fey this morning on train. My. God. I was worried it'd been overhyped and wouldn't live up to my grandiose expectations for basically the funniest woman on the scene right now. I needn't have fretted. It's awesome: I'm 10 pages in but it's already jam-packed with humor and good writing and good humor writing. Pick it up immediately.

Wikipedia Burn

Last night, Bears Quarterback Jay Cutler proposed to girlfriend and "actress" Kristin Cavallari. The news is already on Wikipedia, and I'd like to thank the anonymous editor for putting it bluntly. Who says you can't use Wikipedia as a source of absolute truth?

(Click to make it bigger.)

--

UPDATE, 1:16pm: The Powers That Be fixed it. Oh well.

Ke-dollar sign-ha

I desperately wish I'd been at the planning session for this music video.

"So...we need unicorns. Unicorn heads on human bodies. Yes. Alright, that's solid. What else? How about James Van Der Beek? Yeah, the guy from Dawson's Creek. No, I don't think he's done anything since then...What? He was in an episode of Ugly Betty? Uh, okay, that's great. He also does some Funny or Die videos, but those are usually riding the Dawson gravy train too, so it's a wash. Anyway, he'll be cheap, and he's still pretty good-looking. Okay, so how do we get Dawson Leery into the unicorn room? He should send Ke$ha something. What, like a diamond? A love letter? Hmmm...how about a piece of cheese? That's a winning idea right there! What kind of cheese? Well, that's a silly question. Only one type of cheese deserves this sort of centerpiece attention, and that's muenster. No, fuck you, I hate Swiss, we're using muenster. Okay cool. Unicorns, James Van Der Beek, and muenster. We're missing something. Wait, what's the song about again? Let's look at the lyrics:

Hahahahahahahahaha.Dance.

Back door cracked
We don't need a key
We get in for free
No VIP sleaze

Drink that Kool-Aid
Follow my lead
Now you're one of us
You're coming with me

It's time to kill the lights
And shut the DJ down
(This place about to)
Tonight were taking over
No one's getting out

This place about to blow (blow) (x4)
This place about to...

Um...yeah, I don't know. Can Dawson dance? No, no, he definitely cannot dance. Let's just ignore the lyrics, give Dawson and Ke$ha rainbow laser guns, and call it a day.

Oh, also Ke$ha will make out with one of the unicorns. The one with an eye patch."

I think I'm pursuing the wrong career path.

White Chocolate: A Dennis Miller-Style Rant

copyright David G-H @ flickr (http://flickr.com/photos/19998197@N00/)

Chocolate is beautifully simple. There's a reason people go crazy for the stuff; it's delicious and enjoys a culturally iconic status on par with bacon. (And when the two meet, it's magical.) But the love is not unconditional, so can we all just agree that white chocolate is a terrible, utterly failed concept?

Now I don’t want to go off on a rant here, but no one worth their weight in Godiva enjoys white chocolate. It is an affront to the institution of chocolate, a merry “F-U” to the elegant beauty of mouth-watering morsels that are so awesome, they’re an aphrodisiac. Dark chocolate can literally get you laid. White chocolate hasn’t gotten anyone lucky since the 1970’s, and that was only because everyone was exceptionally stoned and named Lucky.

White chocolate isn't even chocolate: It doesn't contain cocoa solids, which are what give other chocolates their brown color. It's mostly milk and sugar. It might as well be a breakfast cereal aimed at eight-year-olds. Is Tony the Tiger looking for a new gig?

White chocolate is the Boone's Farm of chocolates. It's eaten out of necessity, not desire: Your parents are gone for the night and you’ve got one shot at getting drunk for the first time with your dumbass junior high best friend. You consume it because it’s there. It gets the job done. And then you weep with relief later in life when your taste buds encounter the real thing.

In case you’ve ever deceived yourself into believing that it isn’t that bad, allow me to present the pièce de résistance: White chocolate can’t be used in candy bars. How fucking useless is that? Think about it: Reese’s, Snickers, Butterfinger, Milky Way, truffles would all be terrible if encased in white chocolate. It’d be like eating vomit-coated peanuts. With nougat. And I know for a fact that the only people that enjoy that are the French.

If you're still on the fence, take a gander at the sort of marketing available for white chocolate:


I dare you to ever look at white chocolate the same way again.

Death to white chocolate. But that’s just my opinion. I could be wrong.

Irony, thy name is Writer's Block

Damn you, Dennis Miller.

FDA Approves Alcoholism Treatment Pill

The time has come. Despite a volatile and expensive lobbying effort on behalf of the Southern California Rehabilitation Clinic Consortium, last week the FDA officially approved a revolutionary new pill that purports to cure alcoholism. Pharmacies have since been overwhelmed with prescription requests as alcoholism sufferers camped outside Walgreens all over the country, with some street corners turning into booze-soaked “last hurrah” parties.

“I bought my last bottle of gin today,” self-described alcoholic and Skokie homemaker Terry Davis said. “I’m excited to transfer my dependence from alcohol to pills. Fewer calories! I’ll be a Real Housewife of Cook County yet!”

The pill, dubbed the Voluntary Opportunity to Definitively Knock Alcoholism (or VODKA) pill, represses the desire to drink alcohol and replaces it with hallucinations of puppies and rainbows. Preliminary clinical trials reported a 99-percent success rate, but the limited choice of imagery has left some disappointed.

“Unfortunately I’m a cat person, so I’m looking forward to the next generation that is more animal-inclusive,” Davis said.

Alcohol rehabilitation centers have already felt the economic crunch induced by the VODKA pill. The Lindsey Lohan Suite at the Betty Ford Clinic – a room that is infamously booked months in advance by starlets anticipating their next rehab stint – has been vacant since Tuesday, with all future bookings canceled.

The Ford Center’s marketing director, Don Welsch, said the clinic is looking into a new advertising campaign to combat the exodus.

“We need to remind people that the presence of the VODKA pill hasn’t changed our mission: To offer safe haven for those struggling with addiction,” Welsch said. “Our clinic continues to offer top-notch rehabilitation service in the form of a 12-step program, counseling, business center, daily massages, personal trainers and fitness regimens, access to luxury retailers and custom boutiques, five-star chefs, a 12-screen movie theater, and a whole campus of recreation destinations, including private bowling alleys, swimming pools and an eighteen-hole golf course. Our new slogan is ‘Betty Ford: A home away from home!’”

In other news, retailers report that DVD copies of the ‘60s-era psychedelic children’s show “Spot and His Pet Rainbow” have seen an inexplicable 3,200-percent spike in sales since Monday.

--

Our assignment for Humor & Satire Writing this week was to take an actual Newsweek story from 2007 about the development of an alcoholism treatment pill and turn it into satire. This is what I ended up with. I have new respect for Onion writers.

Question, for my own enlightenment: At what point did you realize this was satire? Or did you? What sounded realistic enough to be true?

One person's subjective list of the best webcomics

My cat elicits a similar response from me and others. From xkcd.com.

With the death of the newspaper -- for which the inevitable obituary will ironically and cruelly be broadcast through every available non-paper channel -- we're losing an important art form: the comics section. A piece of my childhood was nestled amongst the movie listings and crossword puzzles, from the lasagna-guzzling and Odie-hating Garfield to the neurotic and "ACK"-inducing Cathy to the Peanuts gang and Family Circus and even Doonesbury, which I totally didn't get at age 10.

As I got a little older, I gravitated toward a slightly more mature (but still juvenile) brand of humor. In junior high I had a weekly calendar composed of Far Side comics, which are beautiful in their simplicity, sometimes not even requiring a caption:


The history of American cartoons goes back to Ben Franklin, but the modern era began in the 1920's when The New Yorker was founded on the basis of the urban, New York-centric humor that filled its pages. New Yorker cartoons have become iconic -- die-hards enter the caption contest every week and dream of the day their caption is chosen -- and remain a large part of the identity of one of the world's most respected magazines.

The comic format is straightforward and endlessly replicable. In just a few frames (or just one), a joke, a one-liner, is executed in classic fashion: foundation, build-up, punchline. This form of comedy is so simple and yet often so badly executed (ex. the last many seasons of SNL). But done well, the humor can be subtle, outrageous, thought-provoking, uproarious -- the good stuff touches a nerve in some way. It taps into pop culture, or shared experience, or human nature. Comics are a succinct, expert rendering of short-form comedy.

Luckily for us, the comics don't have to go down with the newsprint ship. The Internet has swooped in to save frame-by-frame humor. Below are the webcomics that make me laugh and that I purport to keep up with on a semi-regular basis. Warning: I appreciate webcomic humor that incorporates wordplay, existential crises, rampant pop culture references and occasionally the voice of God.

xkcd - A classic, and the first webcomic I ever read. One day, while really, really, really bored in college, I went back and read every single one. (There are almost 900, and the first few are sparse save the suggestion that the author had some deep thoughts to work out on graph paper while sitting in class.) Published M/W/F and billed as "a webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language," xkcd is particularly popular with the tech nerds who probably understand the 20% of the comics that go completely over my head. The other 80% is pure gold for everyone, though, especially if you're even the slightest bit geeky/bereft/pretentious about language/a pop culture junkie.


garfield minus garfield - For the particularly angst-ridden among us. Or those who enjoy the Garfield cartoons with Garfield erased, leaving a severely depressed and lonely Jon talking to himself in the suburbs. For some reason I find it funny, and if that makes me a bad person, then so be it. At least I'm not alone. This isn't one to be "kept up with" as much as checked out every once in awhile when you need reminding of how inconsequential your own problems really are.

Dinosaur Comics - Probably the most existential comic on the list, DC utilizes the same artwork every day, changing around only the dialogue. And it's bloody brilliant. It's published almost every weekday and usually deals with some sort of personal realization or crisis in the life of "27-year-old" T-Rex, with an occasional cameo from God (in bold print because, you know, he's God). Be sure to look for the Easter eggs in captions and RSS feed descriptors. (Hint: Look at my blogroll on the right!)


Hyperbole and a Half - With a completely different format than most webcomics - author Allie Brosh creates individual, crudely drawn frames interspersed with autobiographical text -- the humor of this one sometimes feels manic. In short, I like it alot.

Cowbirds in Love - The most recent addition to my webcomic repertoire, I'm not completely sold yet but some funny moments have kept me coming back, like this one. Not exactly laugh-out-loud, but still funny.

My knowledge of webcomics is minuscule compared to what's out there; I left out a number of notables that are amusing but not as much my style (Homestar Runner, Penny Arcade, etc.), so if you're still not satisfied, the good people over at Mashable and Cracked.com have a few more suggestions for you. Whatever your personal webcomic style, rejoice in the knowledge that we can all share in a form of writing that is as robust in the Internet age as it was when New Yorker founder Harold Ross and his jocular compatriots gathered around the Algonquin Round Table in the 1920's.

Other comics I should be reading? I can't promise anything -- my time is so valuable, after all -- but give me a shout in the comments.

---
UPDATE, 12:15 pm: I just realized one of the primary reasons webcomics have a leg up on newspaper comics! No censorship.

At least we're an equal-opportunity dream-squasher

The longer I don't work in journalism, the more I feel my membership card is expiring. Once a journalist, always a journalist? The term "writer" is a lot more broad and welcoming, and doesn't require me to follow the same set of rules. It's a club that the journalists are part of, but admission isn't as difficult. No hazing, at least. So while journalists are so easy to make fun of, it was a treat to see someone over at xtranormal find the humor behind the capacious study of English.

We watched this video in my Humor & Satire Writing class last night. A Ph.D was never really in my personal plans, but I'm curious as to whether the rest of the world finds this as funny and distressing as a room full of English master's students.

Non sequitur: How sad is it that I knew more HTML code when I was 12 than today?

It's my Friday

I'm going to Hawaii tomorrow for a long overdue vacation and to see my family. As a result, I'm finding it hard to get anything done today. Join me.

This is pretty much the best thing I've seen since the Pachelbel Rant. Enjoy!



via Gabby Frate.

These days, a self-pleasuring bear isn't enough

Wrong Conan, but just as amusing.

I watched the new Conan show on TBS last night. It was fairly engaging, but I can't shake the latent concern that Conan's weirdness, while an endearing quality, is also what drives viewers away. It's obvious that the target audience is my generation: The show was preceded by a Family Guy marathon, the guests were under-30'ers Seth Rogen (who told a bunch of weed jokes) and Lea Michele, as well as prodigal musician Jack White, and the cameos included pseudo-household names Larry King, Jon Hamm, Ricky Gervais and the teenage-boy-gag masturbating bear, among others.

But while it's amusing to revel in Conan's self-proclaimed awkwardness for awhile, the ruse can't last an hour every night of the week. My 20-something attention span, which has been ravaged for years by things with glowing screens, is over it after a few revolutions.

I hope Conan succeeds. I want him to, because he's sincere and cleverly droll, and I appreciate his brand of vaguely band geek humor. But at the end of the day, awkward is just awkward, and if the first show was supposed to wow me, I don't think they're quite there yet.

Bo Burnham Update

After spending so much time on this post last week, I caved and paid the $8 from Amazon for the new (DRM-free) Bo Burnham album. And you guys...it's pretty good. Mostly recordings from live shows, with a few studio versions, it's a comedy album that I'd put in the same league as Stephen Lynch, with more re-listenability than Dane Cook.

Also, two weeks ago Collegehumor posted an instructional video on how to parlay playing the piano into getting laid starring -- you guessed it -- Bo Burnham. (Embedding disabled, you'll have to hit the link, but it's worth it.) Apparently all it takes is some hair flipping, arpeggios and scribbling of notes. PMA boys, take note.

Oh Bo! Or Oh No?

So I wrote this post last night and I woke up this morning with a mash-up of both these songs (the new ones, "Words Words Words" and "Oh Bo") stuck in my head. I can't help but be both impressed and annoyed, and I'm curious as to what you guys think of this guy, so let me know in the comments!



I first heard about Bo Burnham when a friend sent me the above video in November of 2008. My response to the email: "Ha...pedophilia..."

(For context, that video was posted on YouTube in July 2008, more than a year and a half after this kid posted his first video in December 2006 at age 16 to amuse his older brother, who was away at college.)

Despite my caustic response, I enjoyed the video; the quips are quick and the puns roll off almost effortlessly. He's obviously got talent. About a year later (fall 2009) I looked him up again to find, along with a slew of other videos and appearances, this:



I mean, c'mon. That's hilarious. It looked like the kid's career was really taking off. I then forgot about him again until this week.

Turns out Burnham's been busy. In 2008 (before I'd even seen the first video), he headlined an episode of Comedy Central Presents. That was four days after he turned 18, making him the youngest stand-up comic to be on that show. Ever. He also released an EP, "Bo Fo Sho," via Comedy Central. (He's got an agent and a record deal for three more.) In 2009 he released a self-titled CD/DVD and had a bit part in Judd Apatow's 2009 flick Funny People and in his spare time, he wrote a script (an "anti-high school musical") that Apatow might (maybe) produce. To top it off, this month Burnham released a third album, Words, Words, Words, that has already hit #1 on the Billboard Comedy charts (a chart I'll admit I didn't know existed), paired with yet another Comedy Central special (aired October 16th), and he's launched his second national tour, making a stop in Chicago next Friday.

Whew. Did you get all that?

The point is...

I've decided that I want this kid to succeed. Sometimes it takes a few listens to get into (and to catch all the jokes), but I think he's legitimately funny, and I appreciate the heavily satirical and un-PC subject matter. I especially appreciate that he considers himself a comedian (way) before a musician, but he can still hold it down on the piano.

Not to mention that he's 20 years old. Twenty. He's got a better comedic sensibility than the collective mind of the Saturday Night Live writers room at this point and he's just starting out. He's not a household name but, as they say, he's doin' it right. There are two videos off the new album and this one is legit funny, well-produced and well-directed (warning: not safe for work):



Even though his intended audience is in college, I'd bet a decent number of Canadian dollars that a large portion of his fanbase is under 18, and so the same sexual references that I find hilarious are also being watched by my 10-year-old cousin. But I mean, I would have loved this guy when I was a teenager. So who am I to say?

Though I'm not really sure what to make of this one...



P.S. It doesn't hurt that he's much cuter at age 20 than he was at 16. Just sayin'.

(That's not creepy, is it?)

(Hi Mom.)

UPDATE