Tweets from the O-Zone

The Television Critics Association press tour is going on this week and next, and one of the events was a presentation by Oprah Winfrey about her OWN network. During her press conference, a reporter asked her a question about her dreams as a child, and she used it as a launching point for what is apparently an unprecedented filibuster in TCA history.

Critic Alan Sepinwall provides some background on the event (and a complete transcript of the filibuster), but the real gold is this snarky collection of tweets from the assembled critics. Start at the bottom and read up to the top. As critic Alexa Planje put it: "Adult class clowns vs. the world's richest 'teacher.'" Good stuff.

Rob

Zoinks! It's a Celebrity Memoir!

Years ago, in college (and occasionally since), my friends and I would play a game called Zoinks. The rules were simple: As a reference to that season of Scooby Doo where every episode had a guest star, we'd just say "Zoinks!" followed by the name of someone inappropriate or odd for the gang to team up with. As in, "Zoinks, it's Walter Cronkite!" or "Zoinks! It's Rush!"

Last night on Twitter, I got the same feeling, participating in the thread #fakecelebmemoirs. Again, the rules are simple: Everyone just throws out their ideas for fake celebrity memoir titles, the more awkward and strained the pun, the better. And wham! Suddenly it's 3:30 in the morning.

So in order to think my late late evening wasn't completely ill-spent, here are a few favorites that I came up with:

"Devito, Devidi, Devici" #fakecelebmemoirs

"A Longoria Day's Journey Into Night" #fakecelebmemoirs

"Earnest Borgnine" #fakecelebmemoirs

"And Ringo Is His Name-o" #fakecelebmemoirs

"Who Is Alex Trebek?" #fakecelebmemoirs

"Wheel-ing in the Years: Pat Sajak Remembers" #fakecelebmemoirs

"Olmos, Famous" #fakecelebmemoirs   

"Seeing John Malkovich Being John Malkovich," by Mrs. John Malkovich #fakecelebmemoirs

"Mullet Over: The Billy Ray Cyrus Story" #fakecelebmemoirs

and 

"I Taught You To Read, So Buy My Damn Book," by LeVar Burton #fakecelebmemoirs

And here are a few of my favorites that other people came up with.

Rob 

#Tweetsfrommyweekaway

I spent a week without updating Twitter, or, really, this blog. So I just took five minutes and recapped the week on Twitter, and I see a second bird over here that I think I can nail with the same stone. THWAK!

• This is the week where I start regretting my car's AC is broken.
• Sea Bear vs. Grizzly Shark? I gotta go with Grizzly Shark.
• Who knew sake could freeze? 
• Five guys fires don't need ketchup, vinegar or anything. They are inherently perfect. 
• The problem with the cliffhanger to Legion #2 is that it's the same cliffhanger as Legion #1. 
• Flash 2 had the same problem. 
• Damn, this is the best barbecued chicken I've ever made.

And, of course: 

• GOOOOOOOOAAAALLLLLL! #tweetsfrommyweekaway

Rob
 

An Update

Regarding my plan of last week. So far, so good. On the days when I haven't been going into the city to freelance -- and even one day when I did -- I've woken up early (for me), showered, gone to the coffee shop, and made some progress for my book. There's a new character I've just introduced, who seems incidental, but might not be, and I've made a couple of plot breakthroughs I didn't see coming, either. And somehow, I still haven't written the seance that's coming up. But I will, I will.

So that's good. I also made myself a commitment to start a new Twitter feed. It's called Your Daily Lie, and it stems from the realization that one of my favorite things in life is to lie to children. Well, to everyone, really, but it's a specific type of ridiculous lie that no one would ever believe, and it works best when explaining things to children. The sort of lie Calvin's dad would tell him in the Calvin & Hobbes strips ("Up until 1935, the world used to be in black and white," that sort of thing). It looks like I can manage at least one of these a day, so I figure it's safe to tell you about it.

Also, I promised myself I'd do a blog post every day through March. Hence, mere moments before a postless day draws to a close, this update.

Rob

P.S. Also, check this out: Old Jews Telling Jokes!

Six Words

Newsweek just tweeted:

In 6 words, your thoughts on a Dick Cheney presidency. Send entries, along with your full name, city, and state, to sixwords@newsweek.com

Here's my entry:

Things would get so, so, so, so much worse.

I know that's not six, but I'm having trouble cutting it down.

Rob

They Can Have My Orwell When They Pry It From My Cold, Dead Hands

Okay, I'm a bit of a Luddite.

As I mentioned on my previous post, I'm not on the Twitter. And I still buy CDs, rather than downloads. It's not that I don't know how to download music -- that's easy enough. The Avett Brothers offered a free track off their new album to mailing list subscribers about a month ago, and you better believe I jumped on that.

But music I buy? I want to make sure I can keep it. I don't want it to be lost in a system crash, or be unable to transfer if I decide to upgrade my computer (or heaven forbid, swithc platforms!), or prevent me from lending it to a freind. (I'm not a big filesharer, but it's really nice to hand someone a CD of a band I like and say "check this out.")

I'm the same way with books. The Kindle looks cool as hell, but a book is a book. Not all reading has to come from books, but I'm not quite willing to make the leap. Because who knows what could happen -- I want to own the books I own.

Case in point: As the result of a publisher deciding it didn't want to offer electronic copies -- some of which had already been sold -- Amazon reached into everyone's Kindle and plucked out two books: George Orwell's 1984 and Animal Farm. (They credited the customer's accounts for the deletion.)

Sure, doing this with Orwell books is poetic irony at its finest. But it doesn't make me any more likely to buy a Kindle, that's for sure.

Rob

I, Twit.

So a year ago, maybe two -- right when Twitter started, whenever that was, I can tell ya that -- I signed up for a Twitter account. And then never did one damn thing with it.

I just let it sit there.

Waiting.

But today, I was curious about a hashmark on a friend's tweet, so I went onto the twitter page and tried to log in with my user name and a possible password I might have chosen back in the day. And whaddya know, I'm on!

In my excitement I actually tweeted: "Holy shit I have a Twitter account!"

It was then that I remembered that there was a feed of all the people who are cursing on Twitter, and I could watch my inaugural swearing scroll up the page along with the words of my filthy-mouthed brethren.

But I couldn't remember the url of the curse word feed, and a quick search didn't turn it up, either.

Sigh. Fuck that, then.

Rob