jay leno is so bad.

it's been months since i posted anything here. i'll admit, it's been a combination of laziness, disinterest, and overall ennui.

but when i heard the reports that NBC was thinking of booting conan and/or giving leno the tonight show back, i had to spring into action. and thus, i finally joined the evil world of twitter.

please follow me and retweet and whatever else the kids do at http://twitter.com/lenoissobad

hiatus.

so it's been a few days since i've posted anything sweet or snotty, but unless i find something post-worthy over the weekend, it's going to be a few more. i'm taking a trip to peru, and won't be returning until sept 12, when i'm sure my life will be consumed by job-hunting and football season. so we'll see. until then...

total eclipse flow chart

via buzzfeed, the most brilliant chart i think i've ever seen. please please please sell a t-shirt.

lemonade movie

i recently lost my job in advertising. but i was so miserable that, despite the fact that i'm bringing in zero money, i'm happier than i've ever been. i have some exciting new prospects for projects that i actually WANT to work on, and i feel as though my vision looking forward is clearer than ever.

that's why i was excited when a friend pointed me to this trailer. notice that not a single person missed their former life. i think showing up at a job 5 days a week (or 6 or 7) is almost the easy way out. when you have to look around and find possibilities and opportunities for yourself, that's when the really good stuff starts happening.

i'm actually going to contact the writer and see if there is a way to get involved. in any case, please enjoy.

highway2healthcare

i don't click on banner ads very often. but how do you not click on a healthcare take on appetite for destruction? i certainly don't know.

turns out this is a clever effort by the AFL-CIO to gain support for reform, even a public option. you got me to sign up, fellas. nice work.

silhouette masterpiece theatre

my friend directed me to this awesome website. enjoy.

no. no. no. no.

argh. nightmares. enough said. part of me doesn't even want to post a picture because it's so disturbing. eeeesh.

happy birthday, lincoln penny.

fascinating, great trivia about the lincoln penny.

the fiery furnaces' new album

it sounds like some silly avant-garde concept at first, but the fiery furnaces' plan for a silent album is fairly brilliant.

"Since bands can no longer sell audio, FF decline to provide it"

instead, they're basically going to present sheet music for fans and tribute bands to interpret, perform, and record. in this way, they're making their new album completely interpretive, interactive, and viral. ummm.... sounds damn smart to me.

i think it's going to be an interesting experiment. and at the end of the day, every indie band is gonna say, why didn't we think of that?

gawker stole ian shapira's story.

i loved this article in today's washington post.

at first glance, it seems like another "how will newspapers survive in the internet age" sort of story. but i think the point made is valid:

Current law basically allows the Gawkers of the world to appropriate others' work, repurpose it and sell ads against it with no payment to or legal recourse for the company that paid me while I sat through two hours of a generational seminar.

Marburger compared my article and the Gawker posting and concluded: "This is what in our opinion is a huge contributor to the demise of those who are originating news reports. If you don't change the law to stop this, originators of news reports cannot survive."

i don't pick up near the traffic a site like gawker does. at least not yet. but i like to think there is a responsibilty on the part of the blogosphere to give credit where credit is due. but i also think it's interesting how newspapers and aggregators both need each other in order to survive, yet the former is faltering financially while the latter is cleaning up. a good read and thought-starter, for sure.

if you fight for freedom wherever there's trouble...

... then you need this t-shirt.

unfortunate tattoos.

i saw this story about hayden panettiere's misspelled tattoo. and it made me think of the tragedy of bad body art.

this has become an especially touchy subject in my dating life. i seem to have a talent for picking guys who pick the dumbest tattoos ever. unfortunately i have no pictures, but it's probably better that way.

exhibit A - i slept with a guy who i've known for almost my whole life. except it wasn't until he was naked that i realized he had a tramp stamp. i kid you not. a male tramp stamp. does it matter what the tattoo was of? no. it was a male tramp stamp.

exhibit B - a guy i dated earlier this year who had two fish on his arm. now, fish can be cool, but they usually aren't. i learned this when another guy, pablo, showed us his. "it's a guppy," was my best friend's reaction. that about sums it up.

well, this guy's fish weren't guppies. they were opposite each other in a way that he explained "was supposed to symbolize the yin-yang." it went even a layer further because this guy also happened to be a pisces. first off, white people should never get anything chinese on them. i don't care if that sounds racist. they shouldn't. i have this fantasy in my head where all the chinese character tattoos actually say something drastically different than what we think they do. "peace" really means "tampon" and "serenity" really means "kick me." it's my wish for the world.

but secondly, i'm a little skeeved by the whole astrological sign thing. i mean, i think there's some credence to it. i certainly exhibit every characteristic a leo is supposed to. but, i happened to meet this guy on eharmony. and for those of you familiar with the system, i swear one of his "can't stands" was superstitious. what a douchebag.

exhibit C - same guy! i know, tragic. he explained this one to me too. his grandparents ran an apple farm. and so on his shoulder, he had a tattoo of an apple in a crate with their farm name on it. now, i'm not cold-hearted, i think that's sweet. but here's the rub:

the crate only had one apple in it. which means it was either a monster apple or midget crate.

has anyone else had bad luck with dating bad tattoos? if so, i'd love to hear them.

shiantology

holy. crap.

and i really mean that.

the website shiantology.com has created religious imagery around the one and only leboeuf. two things i hate put together somehow make something i love. now they're inviting you to submit your own. have fun.

united we serve

the latest in president obama's web savvy, united we serve offers an easy way for citizens to get involved in their local communities.

new rule

bill maher did a great segment ending his show last night. if you missed it on HBO, it's written up in the huffington post.

subtle butt

i bag on orange county a lot. mostly because it sucks.

but one good thing has come out of the OC: subtle butt.

this little patch supposedly neutralizes fart odor. the video pretty much says it all better than i ever could.

style your garage

i really love this idea, mostly because i love anything that could potentially upset an HOA.

slow cow

finally, a new drink that isn't supposed to make us EXTREME.

on the contrary, slow cow invites us to relax and take it easy.

on a personal note, may i just say i'm a little disturbed that i heard about this via my ad agency? they're usually so out of touch, that... now i just don't know what to think about myself.

miami airport

a proposal was made to introduce slots to the miami international airport, in an effort to increase revenue.

but a florida law (which was written in an effort to keep slots at racetracks), states that slot machines can only reside in places where the ponies race.

the answer? bring ponies to the airport as well.

hey, why the hell not.

dave barry had an amusing chat about this very topic with NPR's robert siegel.

15th ave coffee & tea (& wine & beer)

NPR reports on a new starbucks in non-starbucks clothing. is it smart branding, or insidious corporatism? you decide.