Challenge . . . Accepted!

Earlier today I was posting this most important thought on Twitter and I noticed that my program was not responding as I confidently struck the ENTER key. Naturally, I thought it might be a problem with my ancillary Twitter-related program, so I CRTL-C'ed the tweet, shifted over to the Web and signed in to Twitter.com.

The non-responsiveness continued and when the tweet in question did not load, I got an error message saying that Twitter was OVERCAPACITY.

Because I thought it was funny, I OVER-REACTED to this and breathlessly told my cube/row-mates that TWITTER WAS OVERCAPACITY. (Much arm-waving ensued.) As I designed, they thought this was funny . . . but the (to some degree, at least) miscalculated my sincerity. Because they immediately challenged me to a weekend challenge.

The terms of the challenge are:

1. The duration of the challenge is from this Friday at 5 p.m. until Monday at 9 a.m.
2. I am not allowed to view any Web sites.
3. I am not allowed to use any social networking, i.e. Twitter or Facebook.
4. I am not allowed to read emails.
5. I am not allowed to play any online games.
6. I am allowed to use my iPhone for phone calls only.
7. I am not allowed to use my iPhone to listen to music or podcasts.
8. I can listen to music on the radio or from CDs, but not from iTunes.

If I successfully make it through the challenge (and I presume Lynda is responsible for verifying that I do so, since my Challenging Colleagues don't live with me and are therefore not positioned to effectively monitor me), my Challenging Colleagues agree to come and baby sit for us so that Lynda and I can go on a much-needed date.

If I do not succeed, I must provide an assortment of delicious, homemade baked goods for their exclusive enjoyment.

 Really, though, the not succeeding bit is only academic because there is no way I'm losing this bet. First, they think it's gonna be harder on me than it will be and B.) did you see the part about the "much-needed date?"

Seriously . . . it's needed, okay?

I'd walk through fire to get a babysitter these days.

But ANYWAY . . .

as I said at the beginning, my friends are overstating my "dependence" on Twitter. Sure, they've made noise this afternoon that I immediately tweeted a teaser to this post. But I'm only using the tools that are available to me. And I can quit anytime.

Just watch and see.

Tom Strikes Back: 80s Edition

As you certainly know by now, the following celebrities died in recent weeks:

Gary Coleman

Rue McClanahan

and Dennis Hopper.

Mr. Coleman was "Arnold," McClanahan was "Blanche," and Hopper was (to me at least) "Frank."

The saying goes that Hollywood deaths come in threes. My saying goes that Tom Cruise's intermittant anger can never be predicted accurately. He hasn't lashed out at anyone for many months. So many months that you might have been lulled into complacency and comfort.

But the events of recent days should serve as a warning to you to never truly let your guard down. Tom may act out at any time.

"But wait," you may say. "You always have a theory. Something that ties them all together. How can you possibly tie together the chld star of Diff'rent Strokes, Golden Girls, and Easy Rider/Apocolypse Now/Blue Velvet?"

Part of the answer is right there in front of you--Tom loved the '80s and so did these three actors . . . may they rest in peace. None of them had such cultural impact and widescale success as in the 1980s, including Mr. Cruise. Sure, Tom has done quite well for himself in the 1990s and early 2000s but we all know that without his success in the 1980s we would have a better chance of celebrating William Mapother right now than Katie Holmes' husband.

So, Tom wanted to clear out some of the 1980s competiton. (Are you changing the locks on your windows Mr. Hanks?) But just as important as that, Tom was experimenting with Method acting.

Let me explain.

We all know that Mr. Cruise has been nominated for Academy Awards in the past. And we also know that he has failed to win the golden statue. Furthermore, we know that his greatest cinematic success in the last few years has been the few minutes of screen time in which he portrayed foul-mouthed studio executive Les Grossman in the movie Tropic Thunder. He won such good will for that role, in which he submerged himself into a character so carefully--and with the aid of quality makeup and other cinematic prosthetics--that some people didn't even realize it was Cruise in the role.

This was a revelation to Tom.

You see, a common criticism of Cruise's undeniably successful films in the past was that no matter who he was playing, you always knew that it was Tom Cruise on the screen. But in the case of Les Grossman, he managed to establish some cinematic distance between himself and the audience. This was such an important discovery to Cruise that he began investigating Method acting. This style of acting preparation encourages the actor to give oneself completely to the character, submerging into the fiction both on and off set until the job is done. In this way, the actor can best understand the character and present a "realistic" performance that is cinematically authentic.

As a new proponent (and a bit untested in the style), Tom's Method needs some work. And it is due to this uncertainty that Stars of the 80s were punished.

For, you see, Tom Cruise resubmerged himself in the character of Les Grossman recently to perform commercial bits and promotional moments for the MTV Video Music Awards. To get back into character, he turned his mind over to the Grossman characteristics of extreme arrogance, foul-mouthed pomposity, and general bad dude. In this guise, Cruise's nature of personal uncertainty was combined with "Grossman's" arrogance into a volatile, murderous mix.

You've been warned.

Are you a cat person, or a dog person?

I am a cat person. When I was a kid, the only pet that was mine was a calico cat named Dutchess. However, the main pet of my childhood was my brother's pug dog named Shorty. His name came from his stub of a tail . . . which wasn't always so short and stubby.

You see, Shorty used to have a longer, curly tail. But after an unfortunate driveway incident (no . . . not THAT kind my lunch companions) in which my mom backed over Shorty's tail . . . well, it had to be amputated. And his tail was forever after a stub of a thing.

None of that has anything to do with my preference of cats over dogs. (All of the Shorty driveway incident happened either before I was born or when I was an infant.) I just happen to like cats over dogs, mostly because I think they are more self sufficient. Cats don't need to be walked, thought you do have to clean out their litter boxes for them.

I guess I just prefer
1.) indoor pets

that

2.) can curl up in your lap

and

3.) I think of "DOG" as a larger animal not suitable for lap curling. (Smallish lap dogs . . . I guess they should just be cats.)

So . . . I'm exposing all sorts of vital, critical information about my inner personality. And I'm sure to be alienating a wide swath of my loyal reading demographic in the process.

So, I'm sorry. But that's my answer.

Thanks for asking.

Ask me anything

The ban on texting while driving just passed. What kinds of things do you think should be banned? (serious or silly)

I don't like banning things--unless it is something like passing a law such as the texting while driving ban. That seems sensible and necessary. Most often in my experience, however, when I think of banning eforts it regards censorship of art or books. I remember when I was in college and we were reading "The Last Temptation of Christ" by Nikos Kazantzakas. This was around the same time that the Willem Dafoe movie was being banned by the Catholic Church. But I don't know if the work ever ended up denting the people that would have gone to see the movie in the first place. It seems that doing so doesn't truly stem the desire to do the thing being banned. Rather, it makes the thing being banned more desirable.

In recent years, I have heard about Banned Books Week (http://www.ala.org/ala/issuesadvocacy/banned/bannedbooksweek/index.cfm), where authors who have had their books banned by (most often conservative) protestors who find the book's content objectionable.

Because I follow a few authors via Twitter and YouTube, I've heard the arguments of banning from the point of view of those being banned. So, I suppose my opinion is one-sided. But . . . I'm not in favor of banning things. I do monitor the things that my children watch, because I feel that is my responsibility as a parent to them. But eventually they will grow up enough to make those content decisions for themselves. And in the meantime, I'm not in the business of telling other kids what they should or should not do. As a result, I don't work to ban books.

To hear an author's position on book banning--as well as the opinion of the official Nerdfighter wizard, read this blog post by YA author (and Nerdfighter) Maureen Johnson. She wrote this and posted the YouTube video a few years ago when participating in the Brotherhood 2.0 project with John and Hank Green. While the video might be a bit dated, the mysterious views of this Central Park wizard is more entertaining than anything I could write right now.

So, there is my answer.

Thanks for asking.

Ask me anything

to know spoilers or not to know spoilers?

A good question.

Oddly enough, I have already provided an answer to it a few months ago.

You can read it via this link to Why Won't You Grow?!:

http://www.whywontyougrow.com/2010/03/spoiler-policy.html

So, that's my (previously created) answer.

Thanks for asking.

Ask me anything