Category: No Politics Friday

In 1974 Congress passed the National Maximum Speed Law (NMSL) establishing 55 mph maximum speed limits across the United States in an effort to reduce fuel consumption (that 1973 Oil Embargo done spooked 'em good) and reduce highway deaths (as most modern safety features, from airbags to tempered glass, were not yet in place). Some people argued that the law worked, others argued that it failed, and pretty much everyone agreed that driving long distances on empty country roads or Interstate highways at 55 mph sucked a whole bunch. Furthermore, oil shocks and 1950s Deathmobiles were a thing of the past, so in 1987 the law changed to permit 65 mph limits; in 1995 it was repealed altogether. Since that time, speed limits across the country have been creeping upward. Texas – really, who else? – and Utah currently lead the nation with an 80 mph maximum. Don't worry, though. Texas about to raise it to 85, which would be the highest posted speed limit in the world.

In 2010, the last full year for which data are available, total motor vehicle fatalities in the U.S. were the lowest since 1949. That's incredible if you stop to think about it. We drive a ridiculous amount as a nation and at increasing speeds, yet fatalities are declining sharply. This is evidence that today's new cars, with their dozen airbags, ABS, safety cages, crumple zones, and countless electronic safety features, are clearly capable of handling 65/70 in relative safety (NB: car accidents are still a leading cause of death for every age group under 55).

That said, 80 and 85 mph limits seem to be tempting fate at the point at which the average driver's skills and the physical limits of many of the cars on the road are strained. I'm going to start from the assumption, possibly overweighting my own preferences and experience, that most of us and our vehicles feel comfortable cruising between 70 and 75 mph on the highway in good weather. Since speed limits are neither followed nor enforced strictly, let us assume that posted limits of 80/85 mean that actual traffic will move anywhere between 85 and 90+ mph.

As a parent, child, or both, most of you have said or heard the phrase, "It's not you I'm worried about – it's all of the other drivers" at some point in your life (Is there anything we agree upon so completely in this country as that Other People are terrible drivers?) Simply put, 90 mph is really fast. Probably much too fast for most drivers to do safely. Cars handle much differently at that kind of speed and the time available to react to the road declines precipitously.

The real issue, though, is…well, look around you on the road. Maybe even look at your own car. Lots of us are driving what could charitably be called shitboxes. Unlike motor vehicle fatalities, the average age of vehicles on the road in the U.S. is at a record high of 11.2 years. Remember, that's an average in a year in which new vehicles sales increased sharply. We're talking about a lot of 15+ year old vehicles out there. And I'm sorry to say that your 1990s minivan, compact car, or family sedan is not really in any kind of condition to drive 90 mph. Hop in your 1994 Taurus or 1997 Chevy Cavalier, try going that fast, and tell me that you did not begin to lose faith in the structural integrity of your vehicle (and the validity of your will) beyond 75 mph. I'll wait.

Even with new-ish cars, the safety margins and specifications are for a new vehicle. Even regular age and wear dramatically reduce the car's capabilities in a short time. You might think that your 2008 car is still fairly new, but the shocks are softer, the steering is looser, and the brakes have a lot more play in them compared to when you drove it off the lot. Since most people skimp on or completely ignore regular maintenance on their cars, this is a big issue. But the biggest issue is your tires. Most compact and midsize cars, even brand new ones, have P, Q, or R speed rated tires. This means the design limit of the tire is between 95-105 mph. Consider how many cars are driving around on worn-out tires that should have been replaced years ago. Now consider those same cars being pushed to and beyond their speed ratings. Yeah.

I'm not so comfortable with Other Drivers doing 90. If everyone drove a brand new Volvo and had good driving skills, jacked up speed limits would be irrelevant. Here in the real world, that ding-dong in the 1991 Plymouth Duster (with more Bond-O than metal in the body at this point) going 90 on bald Chinese summer tires that he bought for $19.99 at Tire Barge's 2003 President's Day Blowout sale is probably going to kill someone. A lot of the vehicles on the road are not even safe at 70 or 75, and the danger increases exponentially at higher speeds. Since we seem to be so eager to follow the example of the Red States these days, I'm not looking forward to what another decade of Speed Limit Creep is going to bring.

Perhaps more so than any other creative endeavor, moviemaking is in a codependent relationship with technology. The milestone advances in film technology over time – color, Kodachrome, stereoscoping, analog special effects (rear screen projection, etc.), THX/Dolby, CGI, "bullet time" (a modern version of the old time-slice photography trick), and now plug-and-play 3D rigs like RealD – have unavoidably changed movies by altering what is possible.
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They are part of the numerator in the fraction of a director/producer's vision that makes it onto the screen. Each leap forward has provided us with stunning new films taking advantage of technology to do things that have never been done before…and each has also been an annoying fad in the hands of hacks who don't know what to do with new sounds or special effects except to lay them on thick to overstimulate the audience. Loud noises! Bright colors! Epic battles! Unfortunately a shit movie with incredible technology behind it is still a shit movie (see: every summer blockbuster action movie of the past 10 years).

We all remember the first films to use these tricks to memorable effect: The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex (and to a much less deserved extent, Gone With the Wind) for color, Return of the Jedi for THX/surround sound, King Kong for stop-motion and rear screen projection, Jurassic Park and Terminator 2 for CGI, The Matrix for a whole shitcan of audio-visual indulgence, and…as best I can tell, there hasn't really been such a movie for 3D yet. The post-2008 resurgence in 3D has been, in my view, a big scam desperately trying to make crappy movies interesting (Green Hornet, The Last Airbender) and to extract more per-ticket revenue from audiences, justifying an upcharge with claims of added value in the final product. 3D seems to have potential in the right hands, but it does not appear to have found them yet. Compare what George Lucas did with CGI in the christ-awful Star Wars prequels to, say, what Peter Jackson has done with it; unless I've missed something, 3D is still waiting for its Peter Jackson/Lord of the Rings moment.

I must admit that I am incredibly biased and heavily predisposed to like this film from the outset, but I have high hopes that Prometheus might be that movie. Reviews, which have criticized the predictability of the script (Charlize Theron appears to be little more than Paul Reiser's character from Aliens but with boobs, for example) have universally praised two things: Michael Fassbender's android performance and Ridley Scott's use of 3D. By using it mostly to enhance the depth of scenery and backgrounds as opposed to using it to make things explode out toward the audience every 10 seconds, the critics seem to believe that Scott has finally managed to use 3D to make a film better and more compelling than it could have been without the technology. I don't know if this is true, but I've read it consistently enough from reviews of varying tone to believe that it might be. I'll find out on Friday evening.
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On a side note, I rarely get excited about movies. In the past year I've probably been to the theater twice. The last movie I couldn't wait to see (to the point of distraction) was The Watchmen, and that was simply because I liked the book so much. But I have had Prometheus-related ants in my pants for weeks now. I was a late bloomer who did not come to appreciate the Alien franchise until I was in my twenties, but I really appreciate it (at least the first two installments) now. The ability of the directors to create fear – not horror, but actual fear – and suspense is remarkable. Anything built up to this extent is bound to be a little disappointing, but I'm really looking forward to seeing if 3D can finally add something to a movie other than nausea and $5.

In the past decade the publishing industry has seen a minor boom in what I like to call "Noun Books", non-fiction books written about a single object or item that appears to be simple and uninteresting but, the author reassures you, actually has a fascinating back story. Mark Kurlansky appears to have kicked off this trend with the surprise best-seller Salt (followed by Cod), which inspired a host of imitators from Spice to Banana to White Bread to Dirt. One of the few truly excellent ones, in my view, is Susan Freinkel's Plastic: a Toxic Love Affair. The overly trashy title misrepresents what is actually a detailed and interesting look at possibly the most transforming discovery of the 20th Century.

Plastic is so important to understanding our society because it essentially created, or at the very least made feasible for the first time, the modern culture of the disposable. Without it, the vast majority of the common single-use products – and there are a shocking number when you really think about it – would not be economically viable. As this recent discussion (responding to a recent lecture by Freinkel) emphasizes, we rarely pause to consider what such products used to be made from. Two of the most common disposables (pens and cigarette lighters) became disposable simply because we lose them so frequently – or do we lose them more frequently because they're disposable and we don't care? Syringes being single-use makes sense. Diapers, plastic kitchenware, and razors are a function of laziness, if you're a cynic, or the desire to make life easier and more pleasant if you're trying to be positive. But the biggest disposable isn't a product per se but the entire universe of packaging. Plastic bottles dominate the beverage industry, plastic packing materials are integral to shipping,and everything comes swaddled in plastic, plastic, and more plastic.

I'm having a hard time envisioning what a lot of products would end up looking like without plastic packaging. The most obvious answer would be a lot more tiny cardboard boxes. After all, no one's buying a toothbrush with a head that is exposed to all and sundry. Products in plastic dispensers – deodorant or cooking oil, for example – would end up in metal canisters (or glass bottles! Like Prell!) Of course these alternatives are more costly but more durable and potentially easier to recycle/reuse, so once again we're trading convenience for a continent-sized mound of plastic that biodegrades at rates best measured in decades?

Zinc! Zinc! Come back, Zinc!

At the risk of channeling the famous Simpsons instructional film "A World without Zinc", it's difficult to imagine a world without plastic. Despite the ample evidence to the contrary, a part of me believes that it might be a better one in a strange, Luddite way.

I turned 13 in 1991, so my teenage years overlap the heart of the 1990s perfectly.
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Let's put it this way: I have an impressive collection of flannels, thermals, and Docs. If I have mastery of any pop culture knowledge, it would be from the 1990-1996 era.
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These were my junior high and high school years, and not coincidentally my years of peak TV/radio consumption, video game playing, and the like. I recall most things that were on TV, in theaters, or in heavy rotation on MTV/rock radio at the time. With these years alone am I anything other than useless during the pop culture portions of trivia competitions.

Combined with my explicit love for a good old fashioned trainwreck, I have absolutely no idea how I managed to miss the Jim J and Tammy Faye Show. Just so we're all clear…that's Jim J. Bullock, star of 1980s powerhouse sitcoms like Too Close for Comfort and ALF, and Tammy Faye Bakker, ex-wife of televangelist and fraud enthusiast Jim Bakker. Watch this. Please.

OK. A couple things here.

Watching this video clip gives me the overwhelming feeling that I have accidentally consumed a significant quantity of peyote. What is going on here? Is this a real thing or a Saturday Night Live skit? What possessed someone someone to greenlight this thundering shitshow? And most importantly, how did I not know about this when it happened?

The studio audience looks lost, confused, heavily sedated, or all three. They look like someone grabbed them off the street and promised them that it would be fun to sit in a studio audience for some unnamed talk show…only for the show to begin and the enormity of their error in judgment to become apparent. But by then it is too late.

Did this actually happen, or have I been the victim of an elaborate prank? Tammy Faye looks like John Wayne Gacy and Jim J was clearly up all night doing poppers with the sword swallower. I cannot believe that someone involved in the production – which, based on the overall "snuff film" ambiance of this video, could not have been many people – didn't euthanize this thing halfway through the filming. You'd think one of the cameramen or segment producers would just stand up and say "Stop.
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Everyone stop. Return to your homes." or possibly chaining all of the exits shut from the outside and setting the studio on fire.

What network aired this monstrosity? Are there other things this horrible out there that have escaped my attention?
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I thought I had the bases covered. I was wrong. After seeing this, I will never be the same.

I haven't done this in a while, but today is the all-too-brief break between the end of finals week on Thursday and the beginning of the ultra-condensed summer session on Monday. To say that I am not highly motivated to do real work today would be an understatement on the order of, "You know, these "LMAFO" fellows aren't very good." Thankfully it's Friday and you don't want to work either, so here's a sampler of Grade A time-wasters for a Friday afternoon at the cubicle farm.

1. The UK's National Physical Laboratory has a wonderful YouTube channel full of Olde Timey science videos dating back to the late 1940s. This particularly neat one (in color!) details the creation of one of the first atomic clocks:

2. Apparently it's pretty easy for anyone with a decent amount of money to buy a frickin' island and live like Robinson Crusoe. Here's an 86 year old Briton who bought an island in the Seychelles in 1962 for the hefty but not totally outrageous price of £8000.

I kinda want an island.

3. Let's keep going with Britons here. Here is a photo of young Stephen Hawking. Young Stephen Hawking looks like a smartassed hipster.

I find this worth sharing because I've been seeing and hearing Hawking on PBS specials (and even in filmstrips!) since I was old enough to remember, and he has always been the wrinkled man in the wheelchair who talks like a robot. For many of us it's somewhat surprising to see a reminder that prior to his mid-twenties, Hawking walked, talked, and looked like any other 1950s science-nerd stock character. I wonder what his unmodified voice sounded like.

4. If your faith in humanity requires restoration, watch this video of a guy rigging up his bicycle with a compressed air powered train horn. The video description describes this as a test run and tantalizingly promises a "full power demonstration" soon.

5. Oh, and speaking of things that are loud and/or look like Stephen Hawking, Reddit did an Ask Me Anything with…Steve Albini. You won't find a more entertaining way to kill an hour today, I promise.

Work is for suckers.

No one should reach adulthood without being given in earnest the sage advice, "Never lend money to friends or family." It's genuine wisdom, although not a hard-and-fast rule.

For example, if someone I know well was fired or had cancer or (fill in the tragedy) I would certainly give them whatever assistance I could muster, and if they did not ask I would offer. But for less life shattering reasons, there is something unavoidably uncomfortable about being solicited by people we know well.

Your brother-in-law who tries to sell you a timeshare. The guy with a "great idea" for a business that requires your start-up capital. Your friend who has candle / makeup / jewelry / etc parties at which guests are expected to make purchases on which she gets commissions. The co-worker who corners you with Amway pitches and endless requests to buy candy for little so-and-so's school fund raiser. Or the people who just flat-out ask for money for no discernible reason beyond suspecting that you might be willing. They are all violating one of the basic rules of interpersonal relationships: We are friends/family, not business partners. I am your co-worker, not your customer. I am your friend, not a venture capital fund.

At this point many of you are wise to the imminent Kickstarter rant. I have done what I can to make it less rant-y. In all honesty, it sounded like a great idea when I first heard of it. It did not take me long to sour on it, though, aided substantially by the half-dozen weekly requests that float across social media. Part of the problem is that the vast majority of my friends are writers, artists, comedians, musicians, or wannabes of any of the preceding. This is Kickstarter's prime demographic. I understand this. That does not make the constant panhandling any less irritating.

In the past two weeks, I have received requests from:

– The Baffler, which is basically my favorite thing in the history of the written word, asking subscribers (who already pay over $10/issue for the privilege) to fork over more money to meet some nebulous $20,000 "goal".

– Two local musicians with $5,000 and $10,000 goals, respectively, to record an album. Aside from the Andy Rooney-ish "Get the money the old fashioned way – play shows, you ingrates!" response, please note that it costs nofuckingwhere near that much money for a local band to record an album. My old band recorded two, both of extremely high technical quality, at a studio used by Big Time Bands, with an engineer who is well respected in the field, and with mastering by an indie rock legend. I don't think it cost us $3,000 combined. And we could have cut some corners, too.

– An artist, also aiming for $5,000, who appears to have all of the necessary supplies to produce a series of paintings and who apparently wants to raise the money to pay rent and utilities so she can paint in lieu of working. As opposed to the rest of us, who enjoy working and cannot think of any way we'd prefer to spend our time.

– A guy trying to jump on the Food Truck bandwagon.

Good luck, pal.

Yes, in an ideal world we would simply throw open our palms and have people give us money to pursue our ambitions.
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I would certainly like it if a bunch of people sent me $50,000 so I could devote all of my time to writing and telling jokes. What, however, would lead me to believe I've earned that? Where does one get the self-confidence and complacency to ask one's social circle – most of whom are just as hard up for cash, mind you – for financial support? Were other sources of potential funding exhausted before resorting to friends as a last plea, or was the Kickstarter set up first because it's so easy?

This brings us to the second problem: People who don't actually need the money asking for it. Why would actor and director Colin Hanks, son of bajillionaire Tom, waste $50,000 of his pocket change to fund a documentary project when he could just ask his fans to give it to him? It's not like he shits money or anything! Does Amanda Palmer (of the Dresden Dolls) need a Kickstarter-record $460,000 to record a fucking album? It's good to hear her whine/note that this is hundreds of thousands more than the mere $100,000 her old record label offered her as a recording budget. I feel for you, my little lamb.

Tacky, gaudy, crass, and other words come to mind when I see things like this. Yes, I know, free will and open access and no one forces anyone to give and yadda yadda yadda. This is one of those issues in which can and should are two very different questions with, in the vast majority of cases, two different answers. I'm specifically NOT claiming that no one can/should ever ask for money; what bothers me is the ease with which it can be done now and the lack of forethought that appears to go into it. "I'd like to record an album. Let's just ask our friends to give us money." Requests for money, as any fund raiser can tell you, have rapidly diminishing returns. Whatever potential Kickstarter might have had to fund the next great inventor or the next great artist has been diluted rapidly in a crowd of outstretched hands, palms up and open.

Four overtime playoff games in a single series – with the Blackhawks on the losing end of three of those so far – have made this week a late one and a rough one for me.
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For those of you expecting something in depth about the now-retired Space Shuttle, don't worry. It's a-comin'. But not today. Today we need something that will make us all feel better, and I nominate this 30 minute lecture by John Cleese on how to be creative. I'm sure a lot of you like to write, or paint, or play instruments, or build collages out of your discarded hair clippings, or whatever, and you understand the frustration of writer's block. Or maybe that isn't an issue but you just want to start improving the quality of your creative output.
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This should help – or at least entertain you on a long, pointless Friday.
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It's fun, and almost as useful as his instructional video on how not to be seen:

Mrs. B.J. Smegma…

NPF has taken on a regrettably serious tone lately. Let's get back to having a few ha-has.

One of my colleagues is a devotee of terrible 1980s action movies (I believe his favorite is Road House, from which you can see every punch and kick condensed into a single 10 minute video). He recently sent me this clip of the opening sequence from the short-lived TV series Blue Thunder, which is based on (and uses copious amounts of stock footage from) the film of the same name. It is basically Airwolf, which defeated it in an epic ratings battle for the "Shows about helicopters" market. For reasons that will become clear in a few moments, I think this may be the finest of all TV intros:

A few things.

1. 22 year old Dana Carvey. Regardless of his age, role, or station in life, I cannot see Dana Carvey and think of anything except a) "It's sucking my will to live!" and b) Strom Thurmond, the best part of the single greatest cold open sketch in the history of Saturday Night Live. Also, Chris Farley was essentially born to play Howell Heflin ("That's a good mooovie, jurrdge.")

2. Dick Butkus is cast as "Ski" Butowski. Attorneys for the network vetoed the writers' initial choices of "Stereotype McTypecast" and "Polack J. Polackson" as ethnically insensitive. I don't know anything about the character, but I bet that beneath his gruff exterior lies a heart of gold and a softer side.

3. There's an actor named Sandy McPeak. I can't even.

4. The "Turn around and make a serious face into the camera as we put your name on the screen" intro. You don't see that one very often anymore, do you?

5. The theme song. Good god, the theme song. It's like they boiled the 1980s, collected the vapors, and distilled a pure, concentrated Eighties Essence…and made a song out of it. Horn section! Sound effects! Muted, Boss-distorted guitar lead/solo! It reminds me of that song Mark Wahlberg's character recorded in Boogie Nights after his porn career melted down.

If there is anything more ridiculously 80s than this, I don't think I can handle seeing it. (Small Wonder excluded. That…that is its own category. It has no competition.)

Although this quote is often mangled, in his essay "The Triumph of Stupidity" Bertrand Russell offers the best one-sentence summary of all that ails modern industrialized societies that I have ever seen or that I am likely to see: "The fundamental cause of the trouble is that in the modern world the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt." Yep. That's pretty much it.

Not only is that true, but it's widely applicable as well. In the spirit of No Politics Friday, I want to talk about my year-and-a-half of experiences in comedy and the baffling relationship among stupidity, confidence, and talent. You may already have seen this viral video of an asshole heckler-turned-comedian ("comedian") getting her due on stage; if not, watch it now. Be sure you watch long enough to hear her "joke". (Update: Video appears to be removed, but read the HuffPost Comedy summary if you missed it.)

One of the most amazing things about being around comedians – including some Very Famous Successful ones with names you would recognize – is that the ones who are good are almost unanimously A) intelligent and B) wracked with self-doubt and low self-confidence. Conversely, every person I've met who remains convinced that he or she is great is complete shit and usually dumber than a sack of marbles to boot. It is absolutely stunning how little confidence talented people have and how much the total hacks can manage.

The young woman in this now-infamous video is a good example. She just knows she's awesome. She knows that her material is great (A female comedian talking about her vagina – what a revelation! What next, a male comedian with dick jokes?). She even reveals on stage that everyone in the room hates her because they don't like women. It's not that she was an asshole who got shitfaced, heckled, and interrupted everyone else who performed all night.

Nope. They hate her because she's female and she's, like, too real or something.

People who suck at comedy are fantastic at that kind of excuse-making. Everything just rolls right off their backs.
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Nothing sticks. Nothing shakes their conviction that they are great. They can walk off of a stage after 8 minutes of material without one single laugh from the audience and immediately dismiss it – the audience was tired, the audience sucked, the audience wasn't able to understand his/her complex material (about dicks and boners and pooping), the room is bad, the previous comedian "killed the energy" in the room, and on and on and on. There seems to be no part of their brain that says "Maybe the problem is that you suck."

Then I talk to talented unknowns, Famous Comedians, and people who have succeeded and whose work ethics are legendary among comics. Jim Gaffigan, for example, despite being successful beyond most of our comprehension, continues to work 3-4 open mic nights per night in New York to improve his material. This is a guy with TV specials and movie credits and albums who sells out big venues at expensive ticket prices. And yet he constantly feels the need to improve. I once saw Famous Guy do a show in Atlanta with a 45 minute set of near-uninterrupted howling laughter. He walked backstage and the first words out of his mouth to me were a lament about the punchline he missed and the new joke that was "just OK". This seems to be par for the course for people who are actually funny.

I wish I understood this, and I wish I could fake the kind of self-confidence that some of these people have.
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I know I'm not terrible – people actually laugh when I am on stage – but all I do is beat myself up. I'm hardly unique in that respect. Most comedians I know are the same way – I screwed this up, I blew this punchline, I totally bombed tonight (even though there was plenty of laughter), my material is lame. We're all more than a little amazed at and envious of these people who manage to avoid even the slightest hint of critical self-analysis. Everything's the crowd's fault, or they simply imagine that the crowd laughed even when it was silent. Nobody likes them because they're (old/young/black/white/female/fat/skinny/"too real"/etc).

Comedy is one of the few things I've ever done with the potential for some outcome other than complete failure and royal suckage. And I want to figure out the secret to the Fountain of Eternal Confidence that seems to be known only to douchebags. Maybe it's just a front in some cases – i.e., they put on a brave public face but cry a lot when no one else is around – but more often than not it seems quite real.

These people honestly think they're awesome, and no amount of evidence to the contrary can dissuade them. That's a pretty useful superpower to have.