Product 19: I saw a box of Product 19 for sale in my local supermarket the other day, and I was just oh so thrilled. Not thrilled enough to actually, you know, buy it, but, you know... It was more a low-level "seeing a random celebrity that you don't actually care about" sort of thrilled. (Calling friend on the phone: "Hey, guess who I just saw." "...Who?!" "Robert Urich!" "...Oh." "I know!") So sort of like that.
Anyway, as a child I was raised under somewhat draconian measures that required that my breakfast cereals be neither:
1) Fruity. 2) Pebbley. 3) Sugary. 4) Tasty. 5) Or featuring cool animal logos of sugar-freaked out lions, tigers, birds, etc...
It was sort of like being raised in Moldovia or Lithuania or some other moldy distant foreign land. Not only did I never get to eat "Super Sugar Frosted Bam Flakes" like other normal children, but I never even knew what I was missing! It was like living under a Communist regime. And "Product 19" fits in perfectly with all of that. Just the name itself is sort of... Soviet. "In Communist Russia, breakfast cereal eats you!" And so on. I just imagine a long line of people standing in a gulag somewhere... "Hey, Comrade, what ever happen to 'Product 18'? Thud! "Unh!" "...Anyone else have other question?"And so on.
...And as for the taste of "Product 19" itself, it tastes sort of weirdly... malty. Like if you removed all the sweetness from a can of Coca-Cola, and turned that into a cereal somehow. Anyway. Whatever. Grade: B
Lucky Charms: I know we've all heard the "why can I remember X bit of trivia when I can't remember Y important thing" question before, and usually this question is misapplied. Obviously it's important to remember how to get to the Star Road secret entrance on Super Mario World, even if you're thirty-two. You just never know when this kind of shit is going to come up, y'all. For example, I could be seated at an important diplomatic dinner at the French Embassy, and:
"Yes, yes!" (pounding the table) "You make an important point, my friend! But what about zee Star Road?"
And I could say, by rote, going into almost a zombie trace: "Grab shining shell, jump to avoid Super-Boo, hit flip-brick, jump to third row of bricks, hit middle one, have Mario climb up vine, enable flight feather, fly all the way to the left." Easy, right?
...But in the case of Lucky Charms, why in god's name do I know the theme song? I've never even eaten the cereal, damn you! But still: "FROST-ed LuckY Charms... They're MAGIC-llyDeLICIOUS!" ...The hell? I even remember the commercials starring the horse with the purple horseshoes, and why? Why?
Perhaps some questions are better left unanswered. ANY-way, "Lucky Charms" sort of reversed the traditional bit that they used to do in cereal commercials. Whereas, generally speaking, in cereal commercials, the cartoon mascots would have to beg desperately for a taste of the cereal like a pathetic crack junkie jonsing for a fix (see also: Rabbit, Trix; Cocoa-Puffs Bird, Sonny) ...in the case of "Lucky Charms," this wasn't how things worked at all. Lucky the Leprechaun controlled the source of Lucky Charms, y'all! The pathetic children would have to chase and beg him for it. Now that's somewhat better.
But why was this? I could go into some sort of philosophical discussion about how Lucky was a human and the Rabbit was a rabbit and some sort of whole animistic Pico della Mirandola rap here, but the simple truth of the matter is this; General Mills discriminated against the rabbit and the bird because they were gay. So. Now you know.
Is anyone else impressed that I've managed to write 1,500 words about "Lucky Charms" without ever having eaten them? I know that I am. Anyway, just look at "Lucky" on that box there... staring greedily down at his own bowl of Charms, knowing that he controls them; that he has the power. He's even licking his lips. That fucking smarmy bastard. Okay. I think I'm done here. Grade: A-minus
For those of you who are excited by such things, my list of the best artistic movie sex scenes -- with accompanying sexalicious video! -- is up at Nerve.com. You can go to http://www.nerve.com/video/ssdb/ to read the list. I'll be writing more "Best of Whatever" sex scene lists in the upcoming weeks...
The New Orleans Bookfair (www.bookfair.com) was a resounding success, with me handing out over a hundred 'zines, and receiving over 65 bucks in "tips," including a much sought-after two-dollar bill.
Sweet! Anyway, I am generally paranoid that events in general will suck, but the Bookfair turned out not to suck. I had visions of sitting alone at a table in room that no one entered while being stuck sitting next to crazy Wiccan and Anarchist writers who tried to win me over to their world-view... but it was nothing like that at all. It was really fun and busy and there was booze and free cotton candy and funny comic books and cute girls and gutter-punky looking boys who generally turned out to be dating the cute girls and the weather was beautiful and we did readings out on the balconies of the French Quarter.
So, if you haven't yet been to the Bookfair, I'm going again next year, and so should you.
The Magazine will also be at the Alternative Arts Expo in New Orleans in Feburary, but I'm too hungover to get the link for that right now.
In the meantime -- hey, did you know that bitches ain't shit? According to N.W.A. and the singer Ben Folds, they really aren't. Check it out. And yeah, I know this song is on my front page, but it still kills me for some reason. It seems so depressing and profound to me even though it's also really awful. Enjoy!
First of all... this blog has now been read over 30,000 times. Thanks to my mysterious readership, whoever you are!
Secondly, I hasten to remind you that the magazine will be at the New Orleans Book Fair on November 10th. Visit www.nolabookfair.com for more details.
And, er, thirdly, I'm going to be writing additional stuff for www.nerve.com soon, and the "Quote Board" below will be a part of it. Leave your own favorite quotes in the comment section below, and I'll post them (along with your name, screen name, nickname, whatever...) in a later column for Nerve. I'll make you vaguely famous!
the quote board
some points to ponder...
Go too far in every direction; cross every firebreak, and then cross that one. Pile extremity upon extremity, and then more extremity, and then more.
--Martin Amis, London Fields
If personality is a successful series of unbroken gestures, then there was something gorgeous about him, some heightened reactivity to hope... such as I have never seen before, and never hope to see again.
--F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
Shut up, he explained.
--Ring Lardner
Hold onto the here, the now, through which the future plunges into the past.
--James Joyce, Ulysses
And no more turn aside and brood Upon love's bitter mystery; For Fergus rules the brazen cars, And rules the shadows of the wood, And the white breast of the dim sea, And all disheveled wandering stars...
--W.B. Yeats
Do you know it? Do you know what it is that I'm going to tell you?
--Flann O'Brian
Let them say what they liked, but I didn't mean to drown myself. I meant to swim until I sank – but that's not the same thing.
--Joseph Conrad, The Secret Sharer
Suicide is the night train, speeding your way towards darkness. You won't get there so fast, not by normal means. You take your ticket, and you climb on board. It's a one-way ticket, but it costs everything that you have. It's the night train.
--Martin Amis, Night Train
When I remember that dizzy summer, that dull, stupid, lovely, dire summer, it seems that in those days I ate my lunches, smelled another's skin, noticed a shade of yellow, even simply sat, with greater lust and hopefulness -- and that I lusted with greater faith, hoped with greater abandon. The people I loved were celebrities, surrounded by rumor and fanfare; the places I sat with them, movie lots and monuments. No doubt all of this is not true remembrance but the ruinous work of nostalgia, which obliterates the past, and no doubt, as usual, I have exaggerated everything.
--Michael Chabon, The Mysteries of Pittsburgh
These were people I would never have spoken to out of this room, but here, at the party, I loathed them more than I thought possible.
--Bret Easton Ellis, The Rules of Attraction
I say we nuke this place and get the hell out of here.
--Lt. Ripley, Aliens
GOOD ANGEL: And now, poor soul, must thy good angel leave thee.
(Music. The throne descends.)
The gates of Hell are open to receive thee.
(Exit. Hell is discovered.)
--Christopher Marlowe, The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus
Alas, my friends. He looked not like the ruins of his former self, But like the ruins of those ruins.
--John Ford, The Broken Heart
Now I dream of the soft touch of women, the songs of birds, the smell of soil crumbling between my fingers, and the brilliant green of plants that I diligently nuture. I am looking for land to buy and I will sow it with deer and wild pigs and birds and cottonwoods and sycamores and build a pond and the ducks will come and fish will rise in the early evening light and take the insects into their jaws. There will be paths through this forest and you and I will lose ourselves in the soft curves and folds of the ground. We will come to the water's edge and there will be a small, unobtrusive sign that says, THIS IS THE REAL WORLD... AND WE ARE ALL IN IT. ...I am not making this up, it will all really happen, it is all already happening.
--Charles Bowden
First of all:
—I am tired, I am true of heart!
And also:
—You are tired, you are true of heart!
--Dave Eggers
Nothing can come from nothing.
--William Shakespeare
Where you have nothing, there you should want nothing.
--Samuel Beckett
The process of getting shot by a bullet is very interesting and I think deserves to be described in great detail.
--David Markson
"You hear that? The kid here says he's never been crazy yet."
"He's got a lot coming to him."
--Ernest Hemingway
Where are my women now, with their wild wet ways, and their songs?
--Denis Johnson
Thy fingers make early flowers of all things. Thy hair mostly the hours love. A silence that sings, saying-- Though life be but a day, We will go a-Maying.
--e.e. cummings
Brown hair is sweet, Brown hair over the mouth blown...
--T.S. Eliot, Ash Wednesday
And meanwhile, time goes about its immemorial work of making everyone look, and feel, like shit. You got that? And meanwhile, time goes about its immemorial work, of making everyone look -- and feel -- like shit.
--Martin Amis, London Fields
Prediction? Pain.
--Mr. T, Rocky III
"Baby, when you were young and your heart was an open book, you used to say live and let live. You know you did, you know you did, you know you did."
--Bret Easton Ellis, Glamorama
And the days are not long enough, And the nights are not long enough, And life slips by like a field mouse, Not even shaking the grass.
--Ezra Pound
A. A violent order is disorder; and B. A great disorder is an order. These Two things are one. (Pages of illustrations.)
--Wallace Stevens
It is difficult to get the news from poems yet men die miserably every day for lack of what is found there.
--William Carlos Williams
...As I sd to my friend, because I am always talking, --John, I
sd, which was not his name, the darkness sur- rounds us, what
can we do against it, or else, shall we & why not, buy a goddamn big car,
drive, he sd, for christ's sake, look out where yr going.
In today's Nerve Video Blog, I wrote a possibly overly serious article about Gawker, blogging in general, and the age of meanness.
Click the button below to go to the blog. If you want to go directly to the article, click on this permalink: http://www.nerve.com/nerveblog/nervevideo.aspx?id=144e1492214922 (Okay, fuck that. The permalink refuses to work because Myspace insists on deleting a single character of it.)
"Nostalgia: the magazine for lame hipsters" will be at the NOLA Book Fair in beautiful New Orleans, Louisiana. Please adjust your schedules accordingly. I'll be selling 'zines, and Tiffany will be selling cupcakes, or something. Visit www.nolabookfair.com for more details. We're not on the list of people, 'cause I only signed up today.
That is all.
--Oliver
p.s. If this blog is read 184 more times, it will have 30,000 "hits." Once that happens, I am allowed to buy myself a small present to celebrate; possibly a 'Star Wars' toy of some kind.
"Nostalgia: the magazine for lame hipsters" issue three is coming!
...Eventually, eventually it's coming. Within the next few months or so. And so... people who wrote in saying that they wanted to submit stuff for issue three -- rabbit guy, Florida girl, DJ Sweetie Pie, and other people that I am forgetting -- anyway, I have a couple of things to say to you:
1) I am a lazy asshole for not writing back to you.
2) You should still submit stuff anyway. Only two submissions to "NTMFLH" have ever been rejected. This gives us about a 97% acceptance rate for all submissions.
3) Now that I have a real blog that several thousand people read each day (that'd be The Nerve Video Blog) ... now that I have that, we can get a lot more people to read issue three. Although at least a thousand people read issues one and two in print form, and nearly thirty thousand have read the magazine in online form. Good shit, no?
Anyway... here's an exxtreeeeemely tentative listing of the stuff for issue three that we have thus far:
--Any reviews of stuff (sex, toys, girls, games, etc...) that I haven't already printed in issues one or two.
--Dating stuff from when I had to write about dating for a living.
--Stuff from my as-yet-unpublished hilarious memoir about sex and drugs and OCD.
--Tiffany's hilarious prank where she humilated me, which is the only thing I ever deleted from the online version of the magazine.
--Some other, secret stuff, that I don't feel like listing here yet.
As we can see, this is all stuff by me (except for the one thing by Tiffany). I refuse to release a 'zine that is just stuff by me... because that would be lame. So once again, you guys will submit stuff.
People who submit stuff that is accepted receive:
1) free copies of the 'zine.
2) an official "Nostalgia: the magazine for lame hipsters" T-shirt, possibly even one with a new design on it.
3) but you will receive no money whatsoever. None. None at all. This 'zine has never made any money. It probably never will make any money. If someday it makes money, then you can have some.
Quiz: Which dead hot confessional poet would you rather f**k?
Hey!
I'm tired of people reading this blog and not The Nerve Video Blog. So starting now, anytime that I write something non-shitty for TNVB, I'm going to post a link to it here. The catch being that you have to click on the link to my Nerve blog to read it.
I think this is funny; maybe I’m watching too much reality TV these days, though, I don’t know.
n.b.: you can also read this on "The Nerve Video Blog." Click the below button to go there:
What would happen if Oliver was on the hit Bravo TV show "Top Chef":
Wednesday, June 6, 2007 -- For his first "Quick Fire" challenge, Oliver wows the judges with his creation of... "Quesadillas"!
"...What I do is, I take a tortilla, then put some stuff inside of it," Oliver explained to the camera. "And then I cook it in a pan. I've been doing this ever since college. I put shredded cheese inside, mostly, plus 'Pace' brand salsa. Sometimes, if I'm feeling especially flashy, like today, I throw in some avocado as well."
"Mighty tasty," said judge Tom Colicchio, munching on the corner of a Quesadilla. "Sometimes, chefs in these competitions, they veer too far toward the avant-garde. But I like what Oliver did today. He took a classic, an old standby, and then punched it up to eleven with the inclusion of avocado."
Wednesday, June 13, 2007 -- Narrowly avoiding elimination, Oliver pulls it out during the first full day of competition with his creation of "Tex-Mex Quesadillas." "...Strictly speaking, it's not Tex-Mex," said Oliver. "It's more of a fusion. What I do is, I take your traditional Quesadilla, then kick it up a notch with the inclusion of 'Kraft' brand bar-b-que sauce, as well as some finely diced onions."
"Great!" raved guest judge Ted Allen. "What I liked here was the 'wow' factor. You're staring at it from the outside, and you're thinking to yourself, 'Oh great, another Quesadilla.' But then you take a bite, and – blam! -- from out of left-field! Bar-b-que sauce!"
Wednesday, June 19, 2007 – The first team challenge. Working with his teammate and competitor Marisa, Oliver completes a "Traditional Hawaiian Luau Feast." His dish: "Quesadillas Ahola!" (Quesdillas with pineapple and Canadian bacon.) This dish captures the imagination of the judges, vaulting Oliver into first place for the day, and guaranteeing him immunity for the next "Elimination Challenge." Unfortunately, his partner Marisa does not fare so well. The judges find her "Amaretto Poi Comfit" to be "sub-par," and she is bounced from the show.
Said host and head judge Padma Lakshmi, "You could tell there was a real personality clash in the kitchen today between Marisa and Oliver. Thankfully, the two of them were able to rise above, even though, as we see, Marisa did not make it today. As a chef, you're going to have to deal with all sorts of hairy situations. I'm just thankful that Oliver could rise above, and stay true to his roots."
"Exactly," said fellow judge Gail Simmons. "As a side-note, I really enjoyed the inclusion of pineapple in this dish! And the Canadian bacon hinted at the traditional use of pork in Hawaiian cuisine, without hitting you over the head with it. Sometimes it's better to whisper, not to shout."
"I don't know," concluded Oliver, summing up. "Sometimes you just have to improv. I didn't have 'Quesadillas Ahola!' in my pocket. I just had to come up with it on the spot. You do the best that you can." He added, shrugging one shoulder: "It appeared to work for me today."
Wednesday, June 27, 2007 – The semi-finals! The "Top Chef" contestants are transported to beautiful Marseilles, France, where guest judge P-Diddy will help judge their reinterpretations of traditional Southern French cuisine. Oliver's creation of "Bacon-dillas" (Quesadillas with bacon), earns him some boos and cat-calls from the judges, and lands him in the dreaded "Bottom Three." Due to his immunity from the last challenge, however, Oliver is excused from elimination.
"Bacon?" said judge Tom Colicchio. "I just didn't see the relevance. How often do you see the use of bacon in traditional Southern French cuisine? Oliver was just clearly off his game today; clearly letting himself coast on account of his immunity from the previous challenge. I don't like to see any coasting here on "Top Chef." That's just not the way the game should be played. Just a disappointing, disappointing day here for Oliver. As a side-note, P-Diddy rated the Bacon-dillas 'atrocious.' Those are some strong words, coming from P-Diddy."
"I don't know," Oliver said. "Bacon. What? I don't know, I guess, I thought – you know – everyone likes bacon. Not my strongest performance, I guess. The judges had one point of view, and me, I had another. I stand by my work in the kitchen today, though."
Wednesday, July 4, 2007 – The "Top Chef" finals! Squaring off against rival and competitor Elia, Oliver manages to take home the crown with his creation of.... the Quesomelet! Incredible!
"You know what it is, is," said Oliver, "it's basically sort of your traditional Quesadilla, except, instead of using your traditional tortilla, I sort of twist things 180 degrees by putting the Quesadilla fillings inside an omelet!"
"Wow," said head judge Padma Lakshmi. "Just – gosh – wow. I don't think anybody was expecting this today! You know, all through this – all through this competition, there have been those people who have said, 'Oh, Oliver's playing too much to his strengths,' or, 'Oh, Oliver's not taking any risks.' But I think Oliver managed to silence all of those critics here today. I certainly felt so, at least. ...And in the end – in the end, what 'Top Chef' is all about is – well, it's looking into the soul of the chef, and saying, 'Is there creativity here? Is there passion? Is there struggle?' And today, we decided that for Oliver, there was. And we decided to honor that struggle."
...Unfortunately, during the award presentation ceremony, Oliver was retroactively stripped of his "Top Chef" crown for insulting the head judge, Mrs. Padma Lakshmi. According to the other contestants and judges, the statement made by Oliver was, "...Well, I guess you can go back to your home country now, trophy wife. ...You know, whatever country that you're from. What? Africa? Mozambique? I don't know."
A tearful Elia was then awarded with the crown.
***
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Oliver's Basic 'Quesadilla' Recipe.
1 tortilla Some shredded cheese Some medium "Pace"brand salsa Some onions, or avocado, or mushrooms, or spinach Some olive oil
In a medium frying-pan, heat the olive oil until hot. Put the tortilla in. Add shredded cheese, salsa ,and mushrooms, onions, spinach, or avocado (optional). Fold tortilla edge over the contents of the quesadilla. Heat until golden brown on one side, then flip over, and heat until golden brown on the other side. Put on plate. Serve.
Serves one.
(Note: to create a 'Quesomelet," simply substitute a two-or three egg omelet for the tortilla in the recipe above. You know how to make an omelet, don't you? You beat up some eggs and add some milk. And then you cook it.)
The first Myspace blog in long time, or, I am outraged!, or, here’s some nudity for y’all.
Howdy! So, for the fourth time in a row, I was asked to judge The Nerve Amateur Photo contest. Except this time, www.nerve.com rejected my submission! Whatever. I had to write this whole thing, so now you guys have to read it. Plus, it has boobs in it, which is nice. And feel free to read my blog, The Nerve Video Blog, which you can get to by going to www.nervevideo.com and clicking on "The Nerve Video Blog." Or, you can click on the below button thingy.
...That was easy, right? And now, here's the naked people photo contest thing. Cheers!
Oh my. I seem to have landed a permanent position as the judge of The Nerve Amateur Photo Contest. By the way, I'm writing this in a cafe right now, 'cause my internet at home is busted, and I feel like a TOTAL PERV. What with the looking through tons of photos of naked guys and girls in cars thing. I feel like hanging a sign around my neck that says, "I'm working." But that would probably attract too much unneeded attention. Anyway.
So this month's spectacular theme is "Sexiest Photo of Someone in a Moving Vehicle." Okay then. Has anyone out there not done it in a car? We've all done that, right? It's sort of an American tradition, a homage to our love for the automobile, and a mixture of the two great American passions: fucking, and ceaseless motion. ...Fucking in cars is a tribute to the spirit of Kerouac, to the spirit of the original pioneers who settled this great land, and who did their traveling (and fucking) on foot, and in covered wagons... traveling and fucking through endless fields, majestic rivers, snow-capped mountains, and primeval forests. ...Fucking while moving is manifest destiny, is spreading our seed, is -- um -- words fail me.
Or, as my good buddy Jack once wrote:
...So in America when the sun goes down and I sit on the old broken-down river pier watching the long, long skies over New Jersey and sense all that raw land that rolls in one unbelievable huge bulge over to the West Coast, and all that road going, all the people dreaming in the immensity of it, and in Iowa I know by now the children must be crying in the land where they let the children cry, and tonight the stars'll be out... the evening star must be drooping and shedding her sparkler dims on the prairie, which is just before the coming of complete night that blesses the earth, darkens all the rivers, cups the peaks and folds the final shore in, and nobody, nobody knows what's going to happen to anybody besides the forlorn rags of growing old...
Beautiful, right? And moving and fucking is part of all of that.
Okay, I'll stop now.
By the way, I know that we've all given/received oral sex in cars, or fucked in a parked car. But I myself have also had sex while I was actually driving down the freeway (at night). ...And at this time, I would like to formally apologize to the other people who were driving on the freeway that night. Seriously. That's an actual genuine apology from me. I could have killed you all with my fucking while driving. I am sorry. Really.
Let's move on to this month's winners...
First Place -- "Backseat" by Gary M:
This photo was this month's clear winner. So clear, in fact, that I have almost nothing to say about it. It's a girl. She's in a car. She's naked. Therefore, this photo manages to fulfill all the contest requirements, and it's a very good photo, so it wins.
Second Place -- "Mechanic," by aMix:
Another winning photo about which I have very little to say, except that it's kind of sexy in an archetypal way. It's almost like a grainy, nostalgic, Depression-era tribute to lost sexiness. Or something. And since I have nothing left to say about this photograph, let me once again give my suggestions for the hilarious punning title to this month's contest. Here they are:
"Moving Violations"
"Riding in Cars with Boys (and Girls)"
"(Getting It on) the Road"
"Shift Stick"
"Hard Top"
"Automosexy"
...You're welcome.
Third Place -- "The Chase Scene..." by aMix:
Two wins for aMix! Congratulations, whoever you are! By the way, the girl-on-motorcycle photo below this one was originally going to get Third Place, but the girl in it looks exactly like my ex-girlfriend Carolyn, and I'm really paranoid that it's her, and she dumped me, and I really don't want to award her $100 in prize money. ...See all of the fascinating interlocking factors that go into the judging of The Nerve Photo Contest? Anyway. That's it for this month. ...Until we meet again. Shalom!
La le lo le la loo la... My new twice-updated-daily blog starts on Monday. I don't have a link for it yet, though, so you'll just have to scan desperately for it at www.nervevideo.com. My new best friend Jennifer Prediger (http://www.jenniferprediger.blogspot.com/) will be writing for it, and Jeremy and Tiffany will be submitting stuff as well. Enjoy!
2)Type into the search box whatever you want to find a video of.E.g., "Star Trek II," "Lindsey Lohan," "Noam Chomsky."
3)A bunch of videos will then come up.After you choose one, write something about the video that is either...
a) ...about the video or the subject of the video or your feelings about the video, etc...
b)...or is about your own life but at least sort of vaguely relates to whatever the video is about.Did something funny just happen with you and your girlfriend?You and your family?Etc.?Find a video that vaguely relates to one of those topics and use that as a platform to talk about whatever.
4)To the upper right, next to the video, are two boxes.One has a link to the video.The other has the "embed" code for the video that lets it be embeded into, say, a blog.Copy one or both of these codes.
6)Done!I will now post your blog on www.nerve.com, and will then put your name at the bottom of the blog, and plug whatever it is about you (person X currently lives in Seattle, is working on a novel, is the world's best freestyle bareback horsewhisperer, etc...) that you want to have currently plugged.
picture, plus a desperate cry for video submissions
Below is a picture of what my webpage for www.nervevideo.com will look like. That'd be my extremely tiny frowning face to the sort-of-upper right, next to some random Latin "sample web text." I'm panicked just thinking about this. I have to write a column about a video each and every day for the rest of my life, or at least until video-blogs become unpopular, which should be in what? Six months? Ten months?
Anyway, send your funny/sexy/sad/whatever video to me on Myspace or to nostalgiamag@hotmail. The video can be homemade or can be a Youtube.com video. ...If you want to write something about the video too, that would be groovy. And then I'll put you on my new blog that will be read by thousands and thousands of people and I'll mention your name and you'll be famous!
Feel free to come up with a title for the non-fiction book, sort of vaguely about the year after Hurricane Katrina, but not really totally about that, which my best friend Tiffany and I are writing:
Here's what we've got so far:
The Hurricane Diaries
Contraflow
We Came Through These Things
Jew and Me
That's all so far. Vote or leave your alternate title suggestions in the comment section.
Product 19: I saw a box of Product 19 for sale in my local supermarket the other day, and I was just oh so thrilled. Not thrilled enough to actually, you know, buy it, but, you know... It was more a low-level "seeing a random celebrity that you don't actually care about" sort of thrilled. (Calling friend on the phone: "Hey, guess who I just saw." "...Who?!" "Robert Urich!" "...Oh." "I know!") So sort of like that. 
