It’s Friday—Goodbye Work, Hello Cupcakes!

Cupcakes have been all the confectionary craze for a couple of years now in New York and LA, with Amy Sedaris as the cupcake pied piper.   San Diego is now jumping into the batter with its own twist.  Square cupcakes!  Personally, I didn't need a square version to get me on board but if this is what it takes to get a pistachio cupcake with pomegranate frosting, so be it.  I'll worship the square.  Other unique flavors: Lilikoi--vanilla cupcake with lilikoi (passion fruit) buttercream frosting, Peanut Butter and Jelly--peanut butter cake and strawberry frosting, Vanilla Chai--tender Chai cake with vanilla/orange buttercream frosting, and the other siren in the bunch for me, a Lemon White Chocolate--white chocolate cake with a hint of lemon frosting with white chocolate ganache.  These sweets are only $2.75 each.  Grand opening is today!

This interactive feature from The New York Times is so, so fun.  You can look at a sampling of Al Jaffee's back cover fold-in's for Mad Magazine.   Jaffee still does the fold-in's for Mad, drawing them by his 87-year-old hand!  I went through the feature twice trying to find the elements of the resulting images in the original drawing.   A worthy time suck.

McSweeney's has a mini film school course in three lines.  Citizen Kane, The Godfather, and other greats are hilariously boiled down.  For example:

West Side Story

TONY: Cinema has a long literary tradition. This one's based on Shakespeare.

MARIA: Just like that Amanda Bynes movie!

TONY: (Sigh.) Let's just dance-fight.

Errol Morris seems to be everywhere right now, which is really a good thing.  He has a new documentary coming out about Abu Ghraib (the site for his film is really good - but be prepared to look at the unbelievably disturbing photographs again).  Can't seem to find an opening  date for San Diego... anyone? Tentative opening in San Diego is May 2nd.   Morris and Werner Herzog chat it up over at The Believer.  I regularly have the dinner party fantasy:  what's the most interesting mix of 8 people for dinner?  My fantasy guest lists change all the time, but Werner Herzog and Errol Morris together is a bang-up start.   Morris has also written two interesting opinion pieces in NYT about using re-enactments in documentaries.

KPBS Senior Editor Alan Ray on the new Scorsese-helmed Rolling Stones documentary Shine a Light:  "All rock and wrinkles."  He doesn't recommend it. 

A lot of you probably know about Flickr, the online photo sharing site, but have you ever browsed the photographs in Flickr's San Diego group?  There are some great images of our fair city by visitors and local photogs.  Enjoy!

And finally, check out these Garfield comic strips without Garfield... way better.  Thanks for the tip, Edward!

This Crew Rolls Deep… Or How To Squash The Monday Blues

Zombie Strippers Coming To A Theater Near You

I never, in a million years, thought I would write a title like that.  And it's true.  On April 20th 18th, fans of zombies, strip clubs, and porn can come together in celebration of the wonders of cinema.  I'm more than a little frightened.  The press release reads:  "As one of the strippers gets the virus, she turns into a supernatural, flesh-eating zombie stripper, making her the hit of the club."

Barack Obama At Comic-Con?

There are rumors swirling that Barack Obama will come to Comic-Con in San Diego this summer to court the young vote, that is if he wins the primary.  Rumors appear to be false.  Dang! 

A Mixed Bag Of Lunchtime Reading From Culture Lust

Focus Features has announced the next Coen brothers film will be released domestically on September 12th.  It's called Burn After Reading and described as a "dark spy-comedy" written by the Coens.  Actors include George Clooney, John Malkovich, Frances McDormand, Tilda Swinton and Brad Pitt.   Malkovich plays an ousted CIA official whose memoir accidently falls into the hands of two bumbling D.C. gym employees intent on exploiting their find.  I'm guessing Clooney and Pitt are the gym rats.  Back to comedy for the Coens... not sure that's a good thing after say, Intolerable Cruelty.  

Another account of memoir fabrication!  This time a white woman named Margaret Seltzer made up a foster family, gave herself mixed racial heritage (half-white, half-Native American, and a life on the gang-ridden streets of South Central LA.  She recounts all of this in a well-reviewed memoir called Love and Consequences published just last week  Seltzer's older sister was the first to squeal, calling Margaret's publisher to tell them the truth.  I'd like to know the story behind that sisterly bond - not that what sis did wasn't called for, it's just a bold move against one's own sister.  

This is the second frabicated memoir in the news this week... 

LA Times' web scout David Sarno writes a good piece about YouTube and the good and the bad of online videos.  Recent discussion on Culture Lust regarding parents videotaping their children gets some Sarno attention.   

Here's a list of the 30 fastest growing careers, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.  Funny, they left off arts bloggers.  Clearly the list is bunk.  

The baby from Nirvana's Nevermind album is now 17 years old! 

And, finally, here's a list of the worst nude scenes of all time.  Apparently McDreamy wasn't always so dreamy.  

Kiddie Mani-Pedis

How disturbing is this article from The New York Times?  Seven and three-year-olds getting pedicures, thumbing through People, putting on MAC make-up which, by the way, is very expensive.  I didn't start having pedicures until my late twenties.  When I was seven and running around Florida beaches, my toes were for elaborate sandprints.  And at three, well, at three is was all about "this little piggy games," not "Jungle Red" or "Passion Pink."  And let me make a distinction here, I'm not saying that glittered kiddie toenail polish is a bad thing.  I'm saying that actual child pedicures and group pedicure outings involving OPI and heated whirlpools is going to far.

This excerpt only confirms a trend well underway: 

But today, cosmetic companies and retailers increasingly aim their sophisticated products and service packages squarely at 6- to 9-year-olds, who are being transformed into savvy beauty consumers before they’re out of elementary school.

“The starter market has definitely grown, I think, due to a number of cultural influences,” said Samantha Skey, the senior vice president for strategic marketing of Alloy Media and Marketing.

Other trends laid out in the article have left me agog:

Sweet & Sassy, a salon and party destination based in Texas for girls 5 to 11, includes pink limo service as a party add-on, which starts at $150 a ride. And Dashing Diva franchises often offer virgin Cosmos in martini glasses along with their extra-virgin nail polish, free of a group of chemicals called phthalates, for a round of services for a birthday girl and her friends.

Now, it seems to me that a fair amount of child's play is about mimicing adult behavior and experience, like the easy bake oven (do they still make these?), baby dolls, doctor kits, playing school, etc.  But why would you construct play experience around adult consumer-driven behavior?  And worse, adult forms of partying, letting loose, and physical adornment?  For me and I suspect for many of my friends, pedicures are about many things:  luxury, maintenance, reward, and, it can't be denied, sexuality.  These are not the concerns of a 7-year-old unless we make them so.

Looking back, I wouldn't have wanted to be so conscious of my body at age seven.  The psychological weight of such body consciousness would have distracted my growing mind and curiousity.   I'll admit my imaginative play sometimes involved a pink Barbie corvette (which I put tons of stickers on) but it never included a ride in one.  

The Grammy Awards: It Was The Best of Times, It Was The Worst of Times

The Best and the Worst, in no particular order:

Best:  Morris Day and The Time performed a little Jungle Love.  Jerome even brought out the mirror for Morris to check his hair, recreating the sheer poetry of their Purple Rain performance.  I was giddy! 

Worst:  Their performance was hijacked by Rihanna singing about umbrellas.

Best:  Tina Turner, at 68, sounded fantastic.

Worst:  She performed with Beyonce, everyone's favorite fembot.

Best:  Both Prince and Stevie Wonder were there.

Worst:  They were both tasked with introducing Alicia Keys (she doesn't do it for me, people) and nothing else.

Best:  Some country star named Brad Paisley perfomed a song about ticks!  The refrain:  "I want to check you for ticks."  Hilarious!

Worst:   Some country star named Brad Paisley perfomed a song about ticks.  Downright horrifying.

Best Hair:  Cindy Lauper's bird's nest, Kanye West shaving MAMA onto the back of his head, and Amy Winehouse's bouffant.

Worst hair:  Kid Rock's grease fest persists, The Foo Fighters, Carol King (deep condition alert).

Best:  Amy Winehouse was able to perform from London ( I stayed up just to see it).  I know she's a train wreck, but the girl has serious talent.

Worst:  Randomly, Cuba Gooding Jr. introduced her.  Why? 

Best:  Fiest sang.

Worst:  So did Fergie. 

Best:  The Beatles tribute was good.

Worst:  The Barry Gordy tribute was WAY too short.

Best:  Kanye West scolded producers for bringing up the music during his acceptance speech, before he was done talking about his mother.

Worst:  When they listened and turned off the music, West then used the opportunity for self-aggrandizement. 

Best:  The White Stripes won two awards.

Worst:  I didn't see it.  Not sure when it happened.  I may have dozed off. I hate it when I miss Jack. 

Wiseguys Have The Best Nicknames

Bobby the Jew.  The Greaseball.  Tommy Sneakers.  Little Nicky. Jackie the Nose.  One Eye.  Johnny Red Rose.  These are some of the wiseguy names listed in a racketeering indictment filed today in New York District Court in Brooklyn.  They are members and associates of the Gambino crime family, the second most powerful mafia family in the United States (the most powerful is the Genovese family).   The list of charges is murder, narcotics distribution, robbery, extortion, loansharking and other nasty mafia behavior. 

These boys may be bad, but how about those names?  Good stuff.  Charles Carneglia is known as "Charlie Canig."  Can't you just hear it roll off a Brooklyn-accented tongue?  Joseph Corozzo has a couple of different names, as do many of them, but his are moody in nature.  Corozzo is both "JoJo" (happy, fun, the kind of guy you want to whack a stoolie with) and "Miserable" (which really cuts to the chase).  Who gets the nickname Miserable?

It's a fun list, giving you a little window into a real-life Sopranos world.   

Nerdy Obsessions Sweeping The Nation

The Onion's A.V. Club has a list of the top 20 nerdiest pop-culture obessions.  A lot of what you expect gets a shout out:  Star Trek, Buffy, D&D, Renaissance Fairs.  But there also are some interesting choices, like Frank Zappa and The Simpsons. 

Then there are some obsessions I've never heard of, like game show tape trading.  From the description:  "so the stalwarts gather on the Internet, offering videocassettes and DVD-Rs of Classic Concentration and The Joker's Wild, and comparing notes about the greatest hosts, the greatest contestants, the greatest celebrity guests, and the greatest eras of long-running series. And the really faithful gather in person at the Game Show Congress in Los Angeles, where they attend panels, meet legends, and play the games themselves." 

Come to think of it, I can't remember the last game show I watched.  I think they should have a trivia show about The Wire - not only would I watch, I would totally dominate. In fact, in the spirit of the list, maybe there should be Wire role-playing games.  Oh Oh, I get Omar.  Or Bubbs.  Even being Avon or Marlo would be fun for stretch.  Totally scaring myself.  

Back to the list, Rocky Horror Picture Show is on it, as is World of Warcraft - to which the listers say:  "Five minutes in a room with any two World Of Warcraft players will drive any non-player mad, amid jargony babble like "Next time we run MC, sheep one of the core hounds while I rush in and pull aggro. Damn, I wish they hadn't nerfed paladins."  Every show/game/fantasy has its own jargon.  Like for me, I often say to myself, "Yo, a man's got to have a code.  You feel me?"

Bookstores, Obama on The Wire, and Other Things Grabbing My Attention This Morning.

Big surprise! The ratings for this year's Golden Globes were terrible.

Researchers have found that consumers will believe a wine is better if it costs more. The pleasure centers of the brain actually undermine us in the discerning process...then again, all that wine tasting hardly makes one a vigilant watchdog against marketing manipulation.

Here's a fun article on writers throughout history who have chosen to remain anonymous at times in their career. It was once a very common practice, for what turns out to be strategic marketing on the writer's part: "If you follow in any detail the use of anonymity by literary writers - satirists, poets, dramatists and novelists - you will find that only rarely was final concealment the aim. Provoking curiosity and conjecture - highlighting the very question of authorship - was more often the calculated effect."

Violinist Pinchas Zukerman says Americans spend too much money on sports and not enough on the arts: "We're not cultivated people, as a culture," he said. "We have a vast culture here, yet we're more divided than ever before." He goes on to warn: "Most of it has to do with government not wanting to cultivate its own product. We'd better start looking at that soon, or this is going to become a jungle."

And this could seal the deal for my vote in the presidential primaries. Barack Obama's favorite TV show is The Wire (this has been well reported) and his favorite character is.... drumroll please.... OMAR! In short, Omar don't play, y'all.