FuzzyCo

I'm not saying that JC Brooks and the Uptown Sound won Metromix's Rock 'n' Vote band-of-the-bands thing last night solely because we had just done a great photo shoot on Sunday. I'm just saying that looking that good has got to give you some confidence.

The Wire is, as I'm sure you're tired of hearing if you aren't already a fan, one of the best shows that's ever been on TV. It's also one of the most realistic police shows that's ever been, and with this season focussing on four kids in middle school, it was very hard to watch -- I just knew that any good thing that happened to anyone was sure to be followed by something horrible happening to someone. That's not 100% true -- it's not that show is without hope, it's just very honest.

FuzzyCo grade: A+

There's lousy cell phone reception in office where I work, unless you come stand right by the windows. That is, right on the other side of my cubicle wall. But you have a phone at your desk, so why would you need to use your cell phone? Oh, because you need to argue with your significant other or a collections agency or anyone else who needs a good arguing with and you don't want your coworkers to overhear. Just, I guess, me.

Team Gerdes-Plus-Noah is proud to present another in our growing stable of odd little websites: Onomatopoetically.

The site was inspired by a site cartoonist Adam Koford (aka Apelad) put up -- Onomatopedia.com. On that site, Adam sells original cartoons inspired by onomatopedic words supplied by his customers. (I bought a cartoon of the word "poot".)

I like making funny sounds, so I thought it might be fun to do a similar thing with audio. The domains onomatopeia.com and onomatopoeic.com are held by a domain speculators or somesuch, but onomatopoetic is an acceptable alternate spelling and I liked the way that that it has "poetic" buried in there. Onomatopoetically describes how we're going to be saying these things and makes the domain name so long and difficult to spell that no one is ever going to be able to find the site*.

So the way it works is pretty simple. You suggest an onomatopoetic word (either a real one like "bark" or just some sort of sound spelled out) and if we like it, we'll record ourselves using it in a sentence and then post it on the site. It's likely to be pretty sporadic, so I suggest subscribing to our feed in your favorite feed reader.

* Oops.

Another 30 days, another 29 photos in my 367 Days project. (Oops.)

This month I've taken photos underwater, with a LightWedge, and noticed that I seem to be spying on myself.

I love the bold stroke the kid always starts with.

(via Apelad)

In Cory Doctrow's new Young Adult Novel Little Brother it's the very near future and a teenager sneaks out of school to play an ARG at the same time as terrorists attack San Francisco and in the ensuing chaos is picked up the Department of Homeland Security. With a friend secretly imprisioned and the DHS tightening control of San Francisco, our hero decides to fight back and bring down the DHS.

The book is equal parts politcal screed, hacking and culture jamming HOWTO, and David and Goliath adventure story. I've been reading about the book on BoingBoing and elsewhere for months and I think I read it far too critically to get the sense of how someone coming in fresh, or say in the target demo, might experience it. For now, I'll just say that it's certainly an interesting book.

Note: like all of Doctrow's works, you can download the book for free.

FuzzyCo grade: B

• My Year Of Flops Case File # 40 Joe Versus The Volcano | The A.V. Club
  My favorite movie.
  (tags: movies)
• Roger Ebert's Journal: Ebertfest in Exile II
  Ebert on Joe vs. the Volcano, in passing
  (tags: movies)

Here's a funny thing -- I shared with a friend that I was playing EarthBound and he was in the middle of playing the same game and he had another friend who was also playing it. What has us all playing a 14-year-old SNES RPG?

Well, it's not the game mechanic. That's fairly straightforward RPG play -- hit points, experience points, turn-based combat, etc. There's no innovative job system or color-based combat bonuses or anything.

It must be the story. Instead of a "normal" RPG setting of a fantasy or science-fiction setting, the setting is a (relatively) normal small town and our hero is a (relatively) normal young boy. There's something fun simply by contrast. For example, instead of getting bigger and bigger swords, our hero gets better and better baseball bats and slingshots.

There's also a sense of humor running strongly throughout the entire enterprise. Bubble-blowing monkey! The Blue Happyness cult! And given the limitations of the 8 16-bit platform, the whole thing is really well written. If you like the RPG form at all, it's well worth a play.

FuzzyCo grade: A

The short letter I just wrote my Alderman:

As one of your constituents, I'm asking you to vote against the "Event Promoters" ordinance on Wednesday. Part of what drew me to Chicago so many years ago was the vibrant artistic culture that pervades our city -- and that culture starts from the ground up. This ordinance would salt the earth of our culture, to labor a metaphor.

Update: the ordinance has been tabled. Which doesn't mean it's gone, just that there's going to be "further research".

I didn't enjoy Rock On nearly as much as I thought I would. Dan Kennedy lucked into a job at a major record label in 2002. So sure, it's a dying industry. And even under the best circumstances, learning how the sausage is made is never fun. And too bad he didn't feel qualified for this job he doesn't even really like. But guess what, Dan, we're all working in dying industries we thought would be glamourous at jobs we don't feel qualified for, and we're not sure we want anyway. That doesn't mean you have to be so whiny about it.

The chapter about the Iggy Pop concert is pretty good, though.

FuzzyCo grade: C+

Erica and some other scoundrels were on the WGN Morning News this morning to promote Don't Spit the Water. I'll have video of their actual appearance up tonight, but for now we've got this clip, which is the result of the question "do you guys want to stick around for Senior Soul Train?" I'm not sure how any red-blooded performer could answer "no" to that question.

Update: And here's the DSTW segment.

For a 1951 sci-fi novel by a man who would really come into his own as an author of detective novels, Wine of the Dreamers is not half-bad. In context. For its time.

FuzzyCo grade: B-, but I'd still rather read a Travis McGee book.

I'd never even heard of Vanishing Point until it was referenced in Deathproof (and isn't great that Tarantino is now footnoting his influences right in the movie, rather than making you go and search for them).

The movie is nothing but a car chase -- Kowalski (Barry Newman) is delivering a Dodge Challenger from Denver to San Francisco and when a cop tries to pull him over he just doesn't stop. He just keeps on driving, listening to Super Soul (Cleavon Little -- the black sheriff from Blazing Saddles) on the radio. And meeting up with various freaks along the way. So it's just a car chase, unless it's also a mystical journey into the heart of America. Or something. It was the '70s, man.

I have to say I found the whole film strangely engrossing. Just be careful if you do go looking for it that you don't accidentally end up with the 1997 Fox made-for-tv-movie version. Unless you're really into Viggo Mortensen.

FuzzyCo grade: A

Tonight, Blewt! Sings! at Trader Todd's -- help send our rag-tag band of comedians to LA to make it big. Erica will be performing a song this evening as Cutie Bumblesnatch. I'll be handing out buttons and working on those unlimited drinks.

Friday, Pastor of Muppets at The Playground. Humbly, we continue to be delightful and I have every expectation we will be so that evening.

Saturday, you can see that aforementioned rag-tag band performing Don't Spit the Water at The Playground at 10. Erica will be returning to the stage as Cutie after a six-month hiatus. I'll be in the booth as Mr. Pickles, the announcer who loves pickles. At midnight, I'll be doing some standup at the Belmont Burlesque Revue. Might it naughty standup? It might, it might.

(If you're in LA, there's a bonus 5th chance just for you on Wednesday.)

Wow. Just... wow. I get bored pretty easy and I'll admit that lately I've been fast-forwarding through parts of tv shows or movies where there's a long, slow sequence and I tell myself, "I get it -- they're having this character stare out the window at the rain so we can tell he's tormented. Noted. Let's move on." Well, No Country for Old Men is chock-full of long, slow sequences and I sat, entranced, the whole time. I'd only not-recommend the movie if you don't like violence, because there's plenty of that.

FuzzyCo grade: A+

Erica and I and the whole Don't Spit the Water crew are headed to LA to do a show on Wednesday night (it's free!). Erica's never been to California, so we're staying through Saturday. Suggestions of fun things to do are appreciated, as are offers of crash spaces for Friday night.