The Day the eReader Jumped the Shark

When I first saw the Wikireader, I assumed that it was a hox. Then I checked was Wikipedia. This is real.  And highly unnecessary.

Okay, Who Ordered the Ewoks?

I don't understand anything about modern television culture and I don't know anything about Star Wars, so I certainly don't know what a pair of seemingly intoxicated Ewoks was doing on The TODAY Show this morning. I do know that those charming Halloween-themed crafts that the presenter is trying to exhibit were the handiwork of my super talented friends Alicia and Sarah, who crafted them specifically for this broadcast segment.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Um, good work girls!  Sorry all of your hard work was upstaged by a moon-walking, amorous Teddy Ruxpin wannabe.  This is why I stick to the Internet - a place where Ewoks never pop up out of context. 

Look. Up.

As a person who still gets Citigroup Center confused with the Bloomberg Tower, I am particularly fascinated by Stephen Wiltshire's current project at the Pratt Institute.  Wiltshire, a British artist on the Autism spectrum who didn't learn to speak until he was nine years old, has a remarkable gift for drawing city skylines in great detail ... from memory. Wiltshire has been drawing the New York City Skyline from memory on-site at the Pratt Institute since Monday, October 26th.  You can watch him, live on webcam, here. Designboom has close-up photos of the canvas and the work is stunning.

Here's a profile of Wilstshire that aired on BBC as part of the German-produced "Beautiful Minds"  series (Expedition ins Gehrin).

 Since the Balloon Boy fiasco, it's nice to have a new reason to look up. 

NY Media Hit and Miss

I returned from my California vacation with a 24-hour stomach bug, so I dared not leave my home to venture up to the Upper East Side to see Ira Glass at the 92nd Street Y last week.  Fortunately, my friend Jesse was able to use the tickets and he told me today what I missed.  Apparently, during the evening Ira announced that he asked the Showtime Network not to renew the This American Life television show.  A devoted fan of the TAL radio show, I never really got into the television adaptation, so I can't say I'm sorry to see this go. I really believe that the magic of This American Life is rooted in the ethereal transmission of voices; the stories are so perfectly produced for radio, I found the television treatment awkward and distracting.

In other Public Radio news, I'm excited to catch the new Moth Radio Hour on WNYC.  I've been a fan of The Moth podcast for about a year now and I've been lucky to attend a few of The Moth Story SLAMs live in New York. I'm curious to see how this 15-minute podcast transitions to a one hour radio program, distributed by PRX. The Moth is doing some interesting work using online and offline media.  If you're interested in appearing on the new radio show, you can pitch your story idea via phone, website or Skype. The group is also facilitating "Moth Up" private events based on the meet-up model. Content will be recorded and uploaded to the website for sharing.  Stories may be featured on the podcast, radio show and the process will also be used for future expansions of the official Moth Story SLAMs.

Finally, I got to attend a live taping of one of my favorite podcasts, The Sound of Young America, live at the new Jerome L. Greene performance space at WNYC on Friday night.  Jesse Thorn presented one of the most diverse bills I've seen in a long time: comedian Kumali Nanjiani, musicians Nellie McKay and Andrew W.K,  director Rik Cordero and actor Scott Adsitt. The performance was webcast live, and you can see some footage from the night here. Can you see me in the audience? Probably not. After the show, Jesse Thorn autographed my poster, so now I can go to Nerd Heaven when I die.

If you're not familiar with The Sound of Young America, here are a few great episodes to check out:

Terry O'Reilly (CBC's "The Age of Persuasion") Interview

Online Branding with Merlin Mann, The Brothers Chaps and Jeff Olsen

Radiolab with Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich

Zach Galifianakis Interview

Awkward Family, No Photos

There is only one time I can remember that my parents decided we needed to be professionally photographed. I was around four years old and my brother was a baby. Instead of going to the local Sears Portrait Studio or the Wal-Mart, which had not yet arrived in Rhode Island, we visited the small studio of a family friend. The family friend was never seen again in my memory and, now that I think about it, his studio may very well have been a front for an entirely different business all together.  My parents brought along my older cousin Christine to do my hair; I was dressed in a white dress trimmed in pink satin ribbon, and my brother wore a three-piece polyester baby blue suit, which I'm sure seemed like a good idea at the time.

I was only four years old, so my memory of this outing is very vague. I know the following events happend, although I may have the sequence out of order.  My cousin began brushing my hair and encountered some nasty snarls, which caused me to cry. I wet my pants, which was totally out of character for me. I was finally calmed down and posed, in my wet Underoos, against what I remember as something that looked like a pommel horse.  They put the baby in my arms and he slipped right out and fell onto the floor. 

When I reminded my brother of this story a few years ago, he couldn't seem to get past the part when I dropped him.

"You dropped me on the floor??"

"I didn't mean to do it! I was just a little girl."

"Is this why I can't do math in my head?"

"Do you have any idea how slippery polyester is?"

The resulting photos from that night 25 years ago are adorable (although my brother does have a slightly startled look on his face).  For some reason, my parents declined to repeat the experience - a decision I fully support now that I realize it has dramatically decreased our chances of showing up on this website.

Photo from Awkward Family PhotosOn the Internet, everything awkward is new again.  When you tire of browsing the archives at the Awkward Family Photo blog, you can check out Sexy People and then reminisce about the "greatest school photo backdrop there ever was" over at We Have Lasers.

Why are these photo blogs chronicling the not-so-distant past so compelling?  Are we relieved because no matter how dysfunctional our own childhoods were, at least no one ever dressed us in matching bear costumes?  Do we feel vindicated that our parents never shelled out the extra four bucks for the special laser background because LOOK HOW STUPID THIS LOOKS NOW? Or do we hope that if we click though enough photos, we'll find someone we recognize - probably that weird family who lived at the end of the street and handed out plastic-wrapped bologna sandwiches to trick-or-treaters on Halloween.

Actually, I think the fascination is not with the things that set us apart but with the common motifs in these photos we can all relate to: bad perms, hexagon-shaped eyeglass frames, straw hats, androgynous bowl-cuts, mouths full of metal, old dance recital costumes and unsmiling photographs taken at the happiest place on earth.  So, you won't find my family photos on any of these blogs, but that doesn't make me any less guitly of the sideways ponytail or side-sprayed bangs. And if you can't remember who the awkward family was in your neighborhood, chances are that it was probably yours.