I Feel Crazy

The Gift of the Tragi

I cannot begin to express how much I love this: 

Triple Crown

A style piece in Details that manages to be deeply repugnant, utterly meaningless, and boneheadedly ill-timed?  Good work, guys!

This Is Why You Hire a Design Professional

Just watch. Seriously.  Dystopia never looked so good.

Attempts at Continued Online Relevance

Have you heard?  Blogging is out.  I mean, like waaaaaay out.  It's for grannies!
See, now that the economy has exploded and no one has jobs anymore and can't afford medicine or college or new clothes or what-have-you, people don't have the time or energy or basic literacy to handle dense blocks of text.  It's just too exhausting.

The youngsters and "digerati" now are all about swift internet jottings--Facebook status updates, Tumblr blogs, and perhaps the most confusing of all, Twitter.  It's sort of like a status update, but it's on a weird basic website and people can "follow" your Twitter feed, and you can follow other people's Twitter feed (there are famous people on it!) and such.  I don't really get it.  But hey, gotta stay young and hip and fresh like Slate's John Dickerson (swoon)!  So I have a Twitter now.  You can read it on the sidebar here at old, stodgy web 1.0 I Feel Crazy, or put it in your "RSS" reader.  Or you can go to twitter.com and attempt fruitlessly to figure out how to make it work.

Whiz-Bang

So, I have to admit, it's totally exciting to be actively blogging and using the internet and whatnot on a flight from New York to San Francisco.  American Airlines has some kind of venture called GoGo on select routes that lets you buy a Wi-Fi connection...IN THE AIR.  Though I am morally opposed to paying for the internet at airports or coffeehouses or what-have-you, I decided it was worth the hefty investment of $12.95 to see what it's like. 

Before making this decision, I had previously decided that in-flight WiFi was a Terrible Idea--that it would take away one of the few remaining places where quiet contemplation, sustained reading, and extensive introspection could happen.  But then I read all my newspapers and did the crossword and jotted some pensées in my journal and listened to the old couple bicker next to me continuously for thirty minutes, and then I revised my thinking and decided that in-flight WiFi is actually an Exciting Frontier, a bit like being involved in a space mission (or at the very least like being a travelling salesman for Spacely Sprockets). 

My initial thoughts?  Being on the internet in the air is exciting in that ineffable way that technological newness can shut down all critical function.  Like the first time you encountered a cell phone, yes you are doing the same function you have been long been able to do, but in a new place!  "Mom, you won't believe where I'm e-mailing you from!" 

I have several chat clients open, though I'm not at the moment talking to anyone.  It's funny, how strangely terrestrial chat suddenly feels--everyone is where they are, down there, and I can talk to them, from here.  Chat has always erased distances--I talk to people across time zones, borders--but somehow, this technology makes everyone seem very far away, while simultaneously rendering that long distance null.

So...Hello down there!

I'm Gonna Live Forever (Or Until They Remake Me)

So it seems they are going to be remaking Fame.  Sigh.  Is nothing sacred?

Go Ask Alice

Hello, Future!

Make My Sweetener a Corn-Based Sweetener!

Finally, the Corn Refiners Association is fighting back against the scurrilous swift-boating by nutritionists and doctors and environmentalists!  What took them so long?  See, as their unbiased website clearly shows, high-fructose corn syrup is the best, most awesome, healthiest sweetener in the world.  So, that solves that.  Kinda like how corn-based ethanol is the bestest.

Best. Natural. Disaster. Ever.

See, as Bobby Jindal points out, that Katrina thing was exactly the kick in the pants Louisiana needed to get on the fiscal conservatism track!  And now it's totally all fixed and better now and everyone is totally happy! Well, except for the fixed, better, and happy part.