I would just like to point out: all those people who once said that the internet would turn everyone into little Madagascars–lonely and isolated and incapable of communicating with other people–never counted on Facebook or Twitter or the bejillion other web means we’ve developed to be in constant contact with everyone we’ve ever met.
Sorry. The voices in my head and on my laptop, they are loud today.
My birthday is in a few months. Cough, cough.
In other news: I need your help.
Revised: I need your help if you live in New Orleans and know of an apartment for rent that’ll accept dogs.
Backstory: my dear friend Jack and his invisible boyfriend–whom we call “Snuffy” for reasons obvious to anyone over 30–live in Murderville. This is not to be confused with Greater Murderville (aka New Orleans), but Murderville proper, the pulpy, gooey core of Greater Murderville.
Murderville, you might be surprised to know, is a dangerous place. I have no doubts about Jack or Snuffy or their ability to prevail should an incident come to fisticuffs. However: Jack is also a very talented actor (photo above!) and is playing the role of Lyon Burke in our upcoming production of VALLEY OF THE DOLLS, which I believe I have mentioned before, and if Jack has to go to the hospital for a shiv wound, someone will have to replace him onstage. Yes: me. That cannot happen.
So please: spare me the trouble and Jack the pain and New Orleans theatregoers the exquisite torture and find Jack an apartment so he won’t get stabbed and the show can go on as planned, with no understudies or directors filling in at the very last minute.
Seriously: got a place? Know a place? Email me or leave a note in the comments.
“A Gentleman is one who never inflicts pain.” – Cardinal Newman
“Unintentionally.” – Oscar Wilde
[via Bon Bons of Impertinence]
In Which I Geek Out
I admit it: I’m nerdily excited about Facebook Connect. If it takes off–as it probably will–it’ll help shrink the web. Which would be nice, because girlfriend is getting too big for her britches.
If you haven’t fiddled with Facebook Connect, it’s a lot like OpenID (not that you’d know what that is, because you don’t use it and neither does anyone else). Basically, it’s a third-party system that allows you to log into multiple sites via a single user account. So, for example: think of Gawker, where you have just one identity that you use on every Gawker site, meaning that your comments on Gawker, Jalopnik, etc. are all viewable on your one Gawker profile page. Facebook Connect is a lot like that, but it’s not limited to a particular family of websites; it works on any website where it’s enabled.
On the one hand, that’ll probably save me a lot of time that I’d otherwise spend trying to remember usernames and passwords I haven’t typed in months. It’ll also allow me to stay in closer touch with friends and interact with them outside the relatively small Facebook playground.
On the other hand, it’ll seriously impinge on web anonymity–if such a thing even exists anymore. College-age folks aren’t so concerned about privacy, but I’ve always found that a little mystery is a good thing.
I wish I were as excited about Twitter, but honestly, I think it’s overblown. As a toy, it’s great fun, and it has some nifty applications here and there, but there are idiots out there ready to dump their RSS readers and use Twitter exclusively, and, well, that’s just dumb. RSS is news and full posts and all the info I need in one little ol’ place. Twitter is 140-character updates from friends about lunch and rush hour and hey, do you know of anyone with an apartment for rent that takes dogs. I don’t even subscribe to my Twitter timeline in my RSS reader–that’s how separate I think they are. I’ll be glad when Twitter gets consumed by Google or Facebook or some other entity so I’ll have one less tab open in my browser.
I’m sure that other people have said this better, but: the downside of love is having something else to worry about.
[via the seriously entertaining Richard Metzger]
Oh, summer. Full of strawberries and handkerchiefs and ceiling fans and these:
I hate to say it, but there’s something comforting about that image. Not the storm, obviously, but the graphic. For folks along the Gulf Coast, those particular shades of blue and green–garish and jarring–they’re the look of summer. From now through October, they’re what we see first thing in the morning and what we look at all day long. They’re like the curtains at your grandmother’s house: dated and kind of ugly, but pleasantly familiar.
Dude. Am I getting nostalgic about hurricanes? Holy crap.
Oh, green goddess in a bottle:
http://www.traileraddict.com/emd/11246
Among the many objections I have to the entire harmonicaporn genre, please tell me: WHAT HAVE THEY DONE TO JENNIFER COOLIDGE? AND WHY?
[via TheAwl, again]
Okay, I find this kind of offensive:
Not for any predictable reason, like, you know, talking about sex on TV or the ridiculousness of the scenario or even the fact that the attractive folks in bed are too covered up. (Though they are too covered up.)
No, I’m hating on it because the ad purports to be all ludicrous and naughty, but it ends with the number for a hotline that addresses the very problem discussed in the spot. So, as bizarre as it seems, the set-up leads to a logical conclusion. It is painfully literal. If this were an ad for pizza or hot wings or the latest in an unnecessarily long line of Swiffer products, I’d be much, much happier.
[via TheAwl]
