The Friday Hot Sheet

Short weeks are weird, because so many of our lives are built around rhythms. Monday and Tuesday are a certain kind of beat that lead into the chorus of midweek madness -- which (hopefully) fades into the coda that is Friday that sails you into your weekend. But when one of those days is taken away -- especially when it's a Monday, you're thrown off track in the worst of ways. Because a Tuesday can feel like a Monday if you start your week off with it, but if by the time Friday hits you haven't gotten all your weekly stuff done -- you're left so rushed and disoriented that it can spill over into your weekend.

Like a lot of you -- I've been seriously pushed at work this week with things to do. The worst part of it being that most of the work I've had to really dig into was left to me by people who decided to make their holiday weekend the start of a short vacation -- meaning that they basically just dumped whatever they thought was enough for me to work with, and then headed off to live underwater in the lost city of Atlantis, Where mermaids sing and tuxedoed dolphins bring you breakfast.

One year later I was transferred to the moon
Worse pay -- better hours
I was transferred to the moon
Worse pay, better fellow workers..

The good thing though is that I've still found lots of time to hang out with my little boy and write, and as a result this blog has had one of it's best weeks all year. This was also the week that one of my stories got published locally in Folio Weekly magazine, which is always a good feeling. It's weird, because my writing has been on the web for years -- but there's just something about seeing it in newsprint and being able to hold it in your hands.

Need to get some more of that feeling, you know?

But with the weekend racing up fast there's little time to dwell on past victories when there are adventures to find and new battlefields to conquer.

So before I crush my enemies, see them driven before me, and hear the lamentation of
the women -- here are this weeks risers and fallers, and the buzz as it looks from here..
The Oil Spill Disaster Are there really even words left at this point to describe the outrage, the disappointment, the utter palm to the face anger that comes up when you see the images of the oil just pouring out, the animals hopelessly drenched and dying in the gunk, and the hands thrown up in bewildered surrender from the executives at BP who don't seem to have any idea what the hell they are doing at all, only to have them turn around and spend millions on marketing campaigns to try and save their bottom line?

Satorical posted this graphic the other day over at Highly Recommended Thing of the Moment -- which if you haven't had a chance to see it yet is an utterly sobering realization of just how bad all of this has gotten. My suggestion? Take every one those smug BP Oil executives who act like all of this destruction will eventually "work itself out" and plug the hole up with them.

The Shapewriter Keyboard When they started advertising and pimping all these Droid phones, the whole push was that "Droid Does" -- as in they were supposed to do all the things that iPhones and Blackberries couldn't. To a certain extent that's true (especially when it comes to all the cross-integration between apps) -- but if you ask most any android phone owner, they'll usually tell you that the trade off for all that cool factor is the way that the phones don't do a very good job at some of the most basic things you need it for. Sure, my camera has the flash that your iPhone lacks -- but the camera itself sorta sucks. And although it's great at surfing the web -- it's actually not a very good telephone. It drops calls like nuts and people frequently ask me to repeat things I've just said. Worst of all, the touchscreen keyboard takes forever to get used to and work with.

Then earlier this week my man Minista sent me a link over twitter for a free app called Shapewriter. You've probably seen the commercial on TV where the guy's sort of drawing lines over a touchscreen keyboard and having words come out -- and if you're anything like me you sort of thought it was a cool idea, but looked like a pain to work with. But the app was free, and Minista was really talking it up, so I decided to give it a shot. It is weird to get used to at first, and it makes you think differently about the way you type (essentially you're drawing lines between the letters, so you have to mentally know where you're going before you do it) -- but once you start to get the trick down and words start appearing, it's not only seriously cool, but it's also incredibly fast, especially compared to the old way of doing things. It's available for iPhone as well -- although I'm not sure the need for it is as great (iPhone folks seem to have less issues with their touchscreen keyboards) but if you're really looking for a way to ramp up how you use your smart-phone, you've gotta give this a shot.

OneChanbara Finally a movie that comes along to answer the agel old question -- How can a movie called Samurai Bikini Squad be no fucking fun at all? My god this film was a letdown. It's supposed to be a movie about a hottie in a bikini killing zombies -- How could anyone screw that up? And yet it took me two days to get through all 86 minutes of this travesty. Instead of campy fun, it ended up being a serious samurai story where two warriors build to a climactic and tragic final battle. Seriously, who the hell asked for that? Even the zombie storyline was a throwaway plot.

All of which does nothing to quell my confusion over Japanese cinema as a whole. Tokyo Gore Police (which I thought would be a fright festival) was friggin' hilarious. But here we have a video game adaptation about bikini-clad zombie killers from the same country that gave us the Boob Laser Girl I was writing about a few weeks back -- and it put me to sleep the first time I tried to watch it.

Prince of Persia Sooo, what's up with this movie? -- Remember when they first started making it and there was all this buzz about Jake Gyllenhall (who's star was admittedly a little brighter at the time coming off flicks like Donnie Darko, The Day After Tomorrow and Brokeback Mountain) getting all buff for the role? It was being touted as this super blockbuster that video game nerds and women with a taste for musclebound pretty boys could equally enjoy -- and now it's like a day from opening and the marketing for it feels so utterly ho-hum and whatever that it's hard not to be curious what the hell happened. It's almost like you can tell the studio and just wants to get it out the door so they can try to make their money back on it.

Not that I'm losing any sleep over what appears to be a surely sinking ship, but wasn't the whole point of this thing supposed to be about two hours of roided-up Gyllenhall with his shirt off? It's not like there aren't chicks out there who aren't still going to be paying to see that. But when you consider the utter shift in energy surrounding this one, compared to say the pre-hype surrounding The A-Team (shirtless Bradley Cooper), Get Him to the Greek (Shirtless Russell Brand), or Jonah Hex (Megan Fox in a bustier) -- it makes you wonder why the suits are backing away from this so hard. Kinda weird, if you ask me.

Dunkin' Donuts Those of you who don't live in Florida, and even those of you who don't live in Southside of Jacksonville might not realize this -- but the Baymeadows Road Dunkin' Donuts is the center of the universe.

Every morning there's a line. Every morning there are people at the tables working on stuff, reading newspapers, meeting friends. On weekends you see people meeting dates there (Hell, I used to have a regular coffee date there myself back in the day). Sure there are nearby Starbucks with their own crowds -- but it's nothing compared to the utter buzz around this place in the mornings (especially considering how long it's been there and the corporate lack of variety in their menu). Plus, once you start to become a regular not only do they know your order before you give it to them, but you start seeing the same people in line waiting. It reminds me of mornings in Brooklyn with Satorical where you'd really get the flavor of how close-knit the neighborhoods in the area were. How everything sort of circled around a certain Bodega or public park.

To be honest, Jacksonville doesn't have a lot of that, and could really use more of that kind of vibe. In fact, the only thing similar that I can think of is Beethoven's Bistro out in the Riverside area -- but that's sort of a secret spot, so do me a favor and don't spread that one around too much, ok?.

Crocs I know someone's gonna try and tell me that these are the most comfortable shoes ever, or that they're perfect for gardening, or that they're really just for kids and it's just some sort of fad of convenience -- but I know better. I've seen fools wearing these in the club. Maybe it's just because I'm stuck in the deep south, but this Croc thing is faaarrr more widespread than people want to admit. I know they're supposedly comfortable and all, but that doesn't overtake the fact that they're just fugly, fugly footwear. You can't be wearing kid shoes to the club, people.

But more than that -- there's something else all of you Croc wearers need to know. Something maybe the Croc salesman neglected to mention when they sold these things to you in their assorted rainbow of awful, awful colors:
They're Dangerous.
Oh they seem innocent enough, sure -- all frumpy and full of airholes like that -- but in reality, they're walking deathtraps for your toes.
Seriously, could you imagine just walking around minding your own business, only to have this happen?

[Listening to: Killing Joke - "Whiteout" ]

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The Friday Hot Sheet

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	The Oil Spill Disaster	Are there really even words left at this point to describe the outrage, the disappointment, the utter palm to the face anger that comes up when you see the images of the oil just pouring out, the animals hopelessly drenched and dying in the gunk, and the hands thrown up in bewildered surrender from the executives at BP who don't seem to have any idea what the hell they are doing at all, only to have them turn around and spend millions on marketing campaigns to try and save their bottom line? Satorical posted this graphic the other day over at Highly Recommended Thing of the Moment -- which if you haven't had a chance to see it yet is an utterly sobering realization of just how bad all of this has gotten. My suggestion? Take every one those smug BP Oil executives who act like all of this destruction will eventually "work itself out" and plug the hole up with them.

	The Shapewriter Keyboard	When they started advertising and pimping all these Droid phones, the whole push was that "Droid Does" -- as in they were supposed to do all the things that iPhones and Blackberries couldn't. To a certain extent that's true (especially when it comes to all the cross-integration between apps) -- but if you ask most any android phone owner, they'll usually tell you that the trade off for all that cool factor is the way that the phones don't do a very good job at some of the most basic things you need it for. Sure, my camera has the flash that your iPhone lacks -- but the camera itself sorta sucks. And although it's great at surfing the web -- it's actually not a very good telephone. It drops calls like nuts and people frequently ask me to repeat things I've just said. Worst of all, the touchscreen keyboard takes forever to get used to and work with. Then earlier this week my man Minista sent me a link over twitter for a free app called Shapewriter. You've probably seen the commercial on TV where the guy's sort of drawing lines over a touchscreen keyboard and having words come out -- and if you're anything like me you sort of thought it was a cool idea, but looked like a pain to work with. But the app was free, and Minista was really talking it up, so I decided to give it a shot. It is weird to get used to at first, and it makes you think differently about the way you type (essentially you're drawing lines between the letters, so you have to mentally know where you're going before you do it) -- but once you start to get the trick down and words start appearing, it's not only seriously cool, but it's also incredibly fast, especially compared to the old way of doing things. It's available for iPhone as well -- although I'm not sure the need for it is as great (iPhone folks seem to have less issues with their touchscreen keyboards) but if you're really looking for a way to ramp up how you use your smart-phone, you've gotta give this a shot.

	OneChanbara	Finally a movie that comes along to answer the agel old question -- How can a movie called Samurai Bikini Squad be no fucking fun at all? My god this film was a letdown. It's supposed to be a movie about a hottie in a bikini killing zombies -- How could anyone screw that up? And yet it took me two days to get through all 86 minutes of this travesty. Instead of campy fun, it ended up being a serious samurai story where two warriors build to a climactic and tragic final battle. Seriously, who the hell asked for that? Even the zombie storyline was a throwaway plot. All of which does nothing to quell my confusion over Japanese cinema as a whole. Tokyo Gore Police (which I thought would be a fright festival) was friggin' hilarious. But here we have a video game adaptation about bikini-clad zombie killers from the same country that gave us the Boob Laser Girl I was writing about a few weeks back -- and it put me to sleep the first time I tried to watch it.

	Prince of Persia	Sooo, what's up with this movie? -- Remember when they first started making it and there was all this buzz about Jake Gyllenhall (who's star was admittedly a little brighter at the time coming off flicks like Donnie Darko, The Day After Tomorrow and Brokeback Mountain) getting all buff for the role? It was being touted as this super blockbuster that video game nerds and women with a taste for musclebound pretty boys could equally enjoy -- and now it's like a day from opening and the marketing for it feels so utterly ho-hum and whatever that it's hard not to be curious what the hell happened. It's almost like you can tell the studio and just wants to get it out the door so they can try to make their money back on it. Not that I'm losing any sleep over what appears to be a surely sinking ship, but wasn't the whole point of this thing supposed to be about two hours of roided-up Gyllenhall with his shirt off? It's not like there aren't chicks out there who aren't still going to be paying to see that. But when you consider the utter shift in energy surrounding this one, compared to say the pre-hype surrounding The A-Team (shirtless Bradley Cooper), Get Him to the Greek (Shirtless Russell Brand), or Jonah Hex (Megan Fox in a bustier) -- it makes you wonder why the suits are backing away from this so hard. Kinda weird, if you ask me.

	Dunkin' Donuts	Those of you who don't live in Florida, and even those of you who don't live in Southside of Jacksonville might not realize this -- but the Baymeadows Road Dunkin' Donuts is the center of the universe. Every morning there's a line. Every morning there are people at the tables working on stuff, reading newspapers, meeting friends. On weekends you see people meeting dates there (Hell, I used to have a regular coffee date there myself back in the day). Sure there are nearby Starbucks with their own crowds -- but it's nothing compared to the utter buzz around this place in the mornings (especially considering how long it's been there and the corporate lack of variety in their menu). Plus, once you start to become a regular not only do they know your order before you give it to them, but you start seeing the same people in line waiting. It reminds me of mornings in Brooklyn with Satorical where you'd really get the flavor of how close-knit the neighborhoods in the area were. How everything sort of circled around a certain Bodega or public park. To be honest, Jacksonville doesn't have a lot of that, and could really use more of that kind of vibe. In fact, the only thing similar that I can think of is Beethoven's Bistro out in the Riverside area -- but that's sort of a secret spot, so do me a favor and don't spread that one around too much, ok?.

	Crocs	I know someone's gonna try and tell me that these are the most comfortable shoes ever, or that they're perfect for gardening, or that they're really just for kids and it's just some sort of fad of convenience -- but I know better. I've seen fools wearing these in the club. Maybe it's just because I'm stuck in the deep south, but this Croc thing is faaarrr more widespread than people want to admit. I know they're supposedly comfortable and all, but that doesn't overtake the fact that they're just fugly, fugly footwear. You can't be wearing kid shoes to the club, people. But more than that -- there's something else all of you Croc wearers need to know. Something maybe the Croc salesman neglected to mention when they sold these things to you in their assorted rainbow of awful, awful colors: They're Dangerous. Oh they seem innocent enough, sure -- all frumpy and full of airholes like that -- but in reality, they're walking deathtraps for your toes. Seriously, could you imagine just walking around minding your own business, only to have this happen?