Shots In The Dark

If it wasn't obvious already, I've been watching massive amounts of playoff basketball. And I've noticed an irritating trend mostly on TBS. It's creative camerawork. The standard shot in basketball games is from the side, slightly elevated. But we've started to see a bunch of huge crane shots, or wide angle shots from the below the basket. In all of these shots, you cannot see what's going on. It looks awful. In many of these shots, the person with the ball is even cut off. Who is producing this? They are trying to be creative but there's no need to try and 'FOX' up the NBA playoffs. They are exciting as is. Yet somebody is up there in the booth saying, "Go to the moon shot cam. Ok, now switch to camera 4, the mobile to get the perspective of that hot dog vendor. Now cut to that women who looks like she's going to cry. (Oops, she just picked her nose.) Cut back to the court, that player is tying his shoelaces, see if we can get a closeup on the laces." And on and on it goes. I hate it.
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Also, you can't have helped noticing that sideline reporter(Craig Sager) who always wears the most awful obnoxious ridiculous suits and ties imaginable, right? Apparently, he is advertising for his exclusive clothing line with Men's Warehouse. He looks like an idiot. But now it makes more sense.

More Mohels

So MOHELS made it through the gauntlet last night at Channel 102. So that means we'll get to make a second episode. Pretty exciting. You can go here and watch it if you weren't there last night.

How To Make Out In Arabic

That's the title that I saw of a man reading a book on the subway last night. It didn't look like a jokey book either. It looked very serious. But what can that mean? Does it mean like how to make out in arabic like how to throw in some saucy phrases in arabic while you're getting your moves on? Or does it mean how to be successful in arabic? I wanted to find out. But I didn't.
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I was bored the other day so I watched two movies that I normally wouldn't. One was Days Of Thunder and you prolly know this movie---it's about race car driving(NASCAR) and Tom Cruise has this vendetta with this other driver and they're so competitive with each other. Which leads to a ridiculous scene in a hospital where they are in wheelchairs and THEY RACE EACH OTHER. The scene is hilarious. But it's played serious.

The other movie was Monster-In-Law. I didn't get to finish it. Just saw the beginning. Which they have a whole build-up to it with J-Lo and her guy meeting and then finally meeting Jane Fonda as the Mother-In-Law. I was thinking about it and I can't think of too many of my friends who are Mama's Boys. Is it just me or is that just a comedic/dramatic conceit/myth? This is not to say that if there were more Mama's Boys that Monster-In-Law would be a better movie. It would still be terrible.

Hooky Pop

Last night, Huck Slim played in Union Square as we are wont to do when the weather is nice. At one point, somebody came up to us to request something which happens sometimes. This man was missing a hand and had a hook instead. Which is unusual. He was drunk. Which isn't. He wanted us to play some country music. Preferrably anything by Johnny Cash. We didn't know anything off the top of our heads. Seeing Vince's mando, he suggested bluegrass. We know 1 or 2 bluegrass tunes, so we launched into "The Old Homeplace". I said to the guys afterwards that I never experienced pressure like that, trying to play a song right. You try playing something with a man with a hook for his hand not inches away from you, and drunk. That's pressure! Did I mention he was scary too? Was it because he had a hook hand or because he was drunk? Maybe both.

Fashion Plates

It takes me a while to notice things. I'm not a Johnny-on-the-spot keen observer. After a while, though patterns start to emerge. I noticed the whole Burberry craze. Ugg Boots. The short tee over the long tee. And today, another one hit me. It's the whole girls-wearing-skirts-or-dresses-and-then-jeans-underneath. Which brings me to the following question: Why? When it's cold out, I can see wearing that as legwarmers b/c it's called in a skirt. But now it's nice out, so it's clearly some sort of fashion choice. Maybe like 'do rags and baggy pants, this fashion is coming from prison. Perhaps in ladies' prison if girls want to wear skirts this is how they have to do it. And now it has finally reached the mainstream. Or maybe it is a sort of ambivalent choice that allows the wearer the option to switch clothes horses midstream should the occasion warrant a hasty quick change. It is possible that these girls are trying to protect against pervs looking up their skirts too. Entirely likely that these ladies want to wear a short skirt but are still a little self conscious about it. Hence, the safety of the jeans. Still, most likely this started in prison. I'm sure of it.
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In other news, I'm in a Channel 102 screening! It's called Mohels. And it's about two competing mohels(the dudes who circumsize jewish male babies)played by Flynn and me. Check it out on Monday at the Anthology Film Archives(2nd Ave and 2nd St) at 8 pm if you're around. Dress code is casual. You could wear jeans under your skirt if you're unsure.

Water Is Free

There's a restaurant called Nino's here in NYC that likes to advertise and the owner has this big proclamation that "Water is free at Nino's!". Like it's a big deal. I guess it's sparkling water. But still, I ask, who drinks sparkling water? It tastes terrible. But Nino says that the three things that sustain life are free at Nino's. Bread, Air, and Water. Which nice work on the bread and the H20 Neen-Man, but what place is the air not free? Perhaps Nino has seen the future and it is not good.

Not Even Remotely Famous

I was on the set of a commercial yesterday and it boggled my mind that everyone thought that there was someone famous there. People would stop and watch us and assume that it was some movie or tv show and then they'd try and figure out where they had seen that person before. There was no one famous there. Trust me. One guy is on Broadway now and the gaggles were't even talking about him. But maybe I am naive. Maybe there was someone famous there and I didn't even know it. This is my normal M.O. when seeing famous people in New York. My #1 response is not,
"Oh there's Mandy Patinkin walking his dog." It's "Oh, there's a guy who looks like Mandy Patinkin walking his dog. I wonder if he knows he looks like Mandy Patinkin. He probably does. He probably gets that all the time. I mean, he really does look like Mandy Patinkin. How could he not? He should send in his picture to Metro, don't they do a thing like that in there? I think they do. I should look that up." And it is at this moment that I realize, wait, that WAS Mandy Patinkin. And he was walking his dog. I bet his dog doesn't care though.

Niblets

Porter had asked me to help him with some songs for a screenplay he's writing with a friend of his, so this weekend I sat down with his lyrics and fooled around some. Here's some of the results in a short crappy demo format:

Lying To You
Over Simplified

A work in progress!
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Stupid 'Zards conspired to break my heart on Friday. Gilbert Arenas choked by missing two free throws after 21-year old Bron Bron taunted him! Ugh. That's bad. Real bad. Luckily, in the other series, the Suns took down the Lakers and Kobe. So at least one superstar has been laid to rest. Why do I root against these stars so much? I don't know, but I do. Maybe I'm like everyone, we like to build stars up and them tear them right back down.
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Massive points to anyone who can tell me why they have the ticket system at Katz Deli. Went there on Friday and it's the weirdest arrangement I think. Did they have problems with people ordering something then eating it and walking out without paying? We sat at the table where Harry Met Sally(they shot the diner orgasm scene there--it's supposed to be the Carnegie Deli). If you're wondering, it doesn't feel any different than any of the other tables. I think my favorite strange thing about Katz's though is the bathrooms. Because the entrance to them looks like a phone booth. So it appears you are going into some room that's like a porta johnny. But then it opens out into a full sized multi stall bathroom. Katz is full of mysteries like that. They have soda fountains but they don't work. It's not like they are just out of the syrup, they just don't use them.
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Met with the Emergenza peeps about the third round. So we're playing at the Knitting Factory on June 8th(that's a Thursday) at 8:30 pm. Mark your calendars! And if you wanna buy a ticket from us pre-sale, let me know. It's $12 this time pre-sale 'cause it's at a bigger place. There's a balcony and everything. So if you're thinking of throwing your underwear at us, that's prolly your best bet.

Sweet Relief

So..... Huck Slim got into the third round of the Emergenza Festival!!! Pretty sweet. So we'll be playing at the Knitting Factory either late this month or in June. Not bad. Not bad at all.

In sad news, the 'Zards come back in dramatic fashion to force overtime with the Cavs after the Cavs blow a seven point lead with under two minutes to go. Sounds great right? But then, they lose it in overtime when LeBron makes a baseline layup. There was only 3.5 seconds left. They could have boxed him out. But they didn't. They could have fouled him. But they didn't. That left .9 seconds left. They had a full timeout left, which if they took it would have advanced the ball to half court. But instead, they panicked and took the ball in and threw up a hail mary full court shot which missed by 20 feet. Sadness. My poor 'Zards.

Breakout

I have been waiting for this stupid thing for like a year now already. This is the breakout box for Apple that will work with Garage Band. It is supposed to be out in January. It was supposed to be out last January. I'll prolly buy an M-Box in the meantime because I am impatient. Grrr....

The Old Yank Move

Reggie Evans of the Denver Nuggets was fined $10,000 for Saturday's playoff game in which he reached between the legs of Clipper Chris Kaman and grabbed his genitals and yanked. He was not suspended. How crazy is that?? This is one reason I love basketball. The fact that players will actually do something like this. And they are betting on the fact that the refs won't see it happen. You would expect something like this in football. It's full contact. Smashmouth. And of course, hockey is famous for it. They even have dedicated penalties for stuff like that. Hockey even has a box for it. But basketball just has fouls. And there's unsportsmanlike conduct call. The worst you could get is a technical. I suppose you could get ejected. But he wasn't. I wonder if he'll try the old yank move again the series. Hell, it worked once, right?

In other news, on the way to work today I saw an ad for 'Porky's BBQ' and it has a cartoon pig holding up some meat(obviously of himself or someone quite like him) and it says, "We've got the butt!" Ummm... gross. I mean, sure, I know it's butt meat but should we really call attention to it? It is something worth advertising? Personally, I feel we should just eat it but not really think about what it is we're eating. Like with a hot dog, say. Or hagis. Or Rocky Mountain Oysters. Do places in Colorado have ads that say, "We've got the testicles!"? They might. It's worth investigating...

Close, But No Cigar

So Huck played Saturday night and did well but not well enough. We came in #5 out of 10. Got 50 votes. The next person up got 22 more votes than us. Yikes! Thanks for those that came! Those that did not. Shame on you. That's why we lost. Anyway, there's still a chance that we might get to go on to the next round. The Emergenza folks seem to like us. So we'll see. Stay tuned Huck Faithful!
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'Zards win! 'Zards win! Watching Gilbert Arenas in the first half did not make me think good thoughts. Still, he came strong in the 2nd half. I don't like his pre-foul shot routine of circling it behind his back three times. What if he accidentally dropped it? If I were a pro basketball player, (and yes, I briefly considered it but I couldn't deal with the long season)I would only spin the ball and bounce it. And maybe wipe my face to say hi to my children ala Jeff "Dad" Hornaceck.
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Saw Guru Pitka(Mike Myers) at the Magnet on Friday. I asked the guru during the Q&A section what his greatest regrets were. He said never meeting Joseph Campbell. Something about a sandwich I think. And also missing the Miracle On Ice during 1980. I asked him what was he doing instead and apparently he was with a prostitute at the time. Ohhhh Guru Pitka!
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Ever since the bed guys stepped on 'Bert and he accidentally got out, he's been really terrified of strangers. So this weekend, when the Shelk parents visited, he was a big fraidy cat. I now can literally picture what that term means.