Some verbal Zoloft for that pitiful update I just posted:
Why 2008 Is Off to a Great Start and Will Continue to Show Up 07:
1. Dubai with Lucy, Feb. 9-16, with a 9-hour layover in Amsterdam.
2. Joanna Newsom, The National, and St. Vincent concerts in February.
3. Hunter, Ellen, and Conor moving to Brooklyn in the spring.
4. Obama clearing a path to the White House.
5. Promising talk of an April Puerto Rico reunion trip.
6. Mom moving to a fabulous new condo in Indy and Dean upgrading to Mark Cuban's old dojo in Dallas.
7. Finding a music school where I can take guitar lessons.
8. Belonging to the Y for the unheard-of monthly rate of $49 and taking shit-tons of yoga.
9. Ongoing: inordinate amounts of time spent with my new fella.
Sunday, January 6, 2008
Get Thee Behind Me 2007!
The past two months, which ended with my Psych Today internship expiring and a couple of (thanks to Matt's edits, unrecognizable) articles in the current issue, left me feeling ambivalent about science journalism. I applied for a job at the Museum of Natural History- Moveable Museum Educator, which would entail driving a fossil mobile (a transformed Winnebago) from borough to borough, teaching the wonders of dinosaurs to young'uns who'd otherwise not visit the museum.
That would be the coolest job ever, but I never heard back, and haven't applied to anything else, so it looks like I'm going to ride out my (excrutiating) internship at CRI. (Where they just blocked gmail.)
Tuesdays and Thursdays, though, I'll be working, from home, as a sort of publicity agent for one of the editors at Psych Today, Hara. She wrote a book called A Nation of Wimps (www.nationofwimps.com) and in lieu of paying an agency (in addition to Random House, her publisher) $20K, she offered me the job of... well, I don't know exactly yet, but from our business brunch yesterday I gathered that I'll be, uh, publicizing the book. Which entails contacting people in the child-rearing business (the book is about overprotective parents wimpifying their kids), such as headmasters of schools and college parents' groups ("helicoptor parents"), and promoting Hara's book to them. And coordinating book-release parties on either coast (the one in LA is being thrown by Peter Guber, head of Mandalay Entertainment). And scheduling talks for Hara to give at conferences.
The best part of T/Th at home is being 23 streets and a Brooklyn Bridge away from the white-sneakered, gray-mustachioed Michael, the PT office lech, who offered me bananas and to show me the view of Gramercy from the balcony.
That would be the coolest job ever, but I never heard back, and haven't applied to anything else, so it looks like I'm going to ride out my (excrutiating) internship at CRI. (Where they just blocked gmail.)
Tuesdays and Thursdays, though, I'll be working, from home, as a sort of publicity agent for one of the editors at Psych Today, Hara. She wrote a book called A Nation of Wimps (www.nationofwimps.com) and in lieu of paying an agency (in addition to Random House, her publisher) $20K, she offered me the job of... well, I don't know exactly yet, but from our business brunch yesterday I gathered that I'll be, uh, publicizing the book. Which entails contacting people in the child-rearing business (the book is about overprotective parents wimpifying their kids), such as headmasters of schools and college parents' groups ("helicoptor parents"), and promoting Hara's book to them. And coordinating book-release parties on either coast (the one in LA is being thrown by Peter Guber, head of Mandalay Entertainment). And scheduling talks for Hara to give at conferences.
The best part of T/Th at home is being 23 streets and a Brooklyn Bridge away from the white-sneakered, gray-mustachioed Michael, the PT office lech, who offered me bananas and to show me the view of Gramercy from the balcony.
Saturday, November 17, 2007
P.S.
I admit, that last diatribe was slightly under the influence. I'm a violent drunk only in terms of my criticism of film. (And of Dave Eggers, apparently.)
The last shot of the movie was of the real Christopher Candless. I can't imagine what the real-life Candlesses think of the cinematic version of his last two years and his death.
The last shot of the movie was of the real Christopher Candless. I can't imagine what the real-life Candlesses think of the cinematic version of his last two years and his death.
Friday, November 16, 2007
Do Not Go See Into The Wild
I wasted $10.75 for 2.5 hours of an episodic, begging-for-parody string of platitudes featuring a brat of a kid, Emile Hirsch (Alpha Dog, Sabrina the Teenage Witch) who probably has never, in real life, had to cook for himself.
It is possible that Sean Penn, in the making of this movie, was like Saddam Hussein, in that no one was brave enough to challenge his directorial decisions. Lots of unanswered questions (Why does Vince Vaugh, a South Dakota wheat farmer, get hauled away suddenly by the FBI?) and lots of scenes where it appeared that the only direction that Hirsch received was "Go scavange in the berries." "Be really, really hungry."
Lots of heavy-handed symbolism ("God is light," says the old man, and then the clouds part and there's a burst of blinding sunlight) and lots of spotty makeup jobs (you can see the makeup in his pores when they zoomed in on the Poisoned/Dying Face of Alexander Supertramp, nee Christopher Candless.*)
Lots of archetypes for characters (Marcia Gay Harden is the first lady-esque uptight mother; the skinny Tracy, a hippy community's own Joni Mitchell, is Supertramp's last chance for sex (and she looks perpetually wan and sex-starved), but the ascetic abstains).
I was most disappointed because, going into the movie, I confused the book, on which the movie was based, with Hatchet, by Gary Paulsen.
*Warning: Plot Spoiler.**
**Whoops too late.***
***Guess you're not going to see the movie now.****
****Good. Best to spend that $10.75 on a block and a half of cheese.
It is possible that Sean Penn, in the making of this movie, was like Saddam Hussein, in that no one was brave enough to challenge his directorial decisions. Lots of unanswered questions (Why does Vince Vaugh, a South Dakota wheat farmer, get hauled away suddenly by the FBI?) and lots of scenes where it appeared that the only direction that Hirsch received was "Go scavange in the berries." "Be really, really hungry."
Lots of heavy-handed symbolism ("God is light," says the old man, and then the clouds part and there's a burst of blinding sunlight) and lots of spotty makeup jobs (you can see the makeup in his pores when they zoomed in on the Poisoned/Dying Face of Alexander Supertramp, nee Christopher Candless.*)
Lots of archetypes for characters (Marcia Gay Harden is the first lady-esque uptight mother; the skinny Tracy, a hippy community's own Joni Mitchell, is Supertramp's last chance for sex (and she looks perpetually wan and sex-starved), but the ascetic abstains).
I was most disappointed because, going into the movie, I confused the book, on which the movie was based, with Hatchet, by Gary Paulsen.
*Warning: Plot Spoiler.**
**Whoops too late.***
***Guess you're not going to see the movie now.****
****Good. Best to spend that $10.75 on a block and a half of cheese.
Thursday, November 15, 2007
R is for Robot
I've learned something about myself, and that is I have a proclivity for theories about things. Self-generated theories, preferably.
Okay, this is an obvious statement, because that's what people do, they come up with theories and explanations to make sense out of things. Everyone, I assume, has a proclivity for theories about things.
(Is life a continual amassing of theories to make one giant oevure? One huge collection of theories of everything? On one hand I sort of hope not. Because it would suck to feel like you have pretty much everything figured out.)
Observation/Generalization: No one expresses any sign of emotion when on the subway.
Theory: Physical privacy isn't an option, so hiding your thoughts by withholding expression is the last stronghold on "personal space."
I had a terrible day at work not too long ago--one of those days where you feel hot and trapped and find yourself in the bathroom for not the traditional reasons. I, being a novice, was really trying hard to keep the tears balanced just at the rims of my eyelids as I was riding the train back home to the BK, the beloved R train. Just two stops into the journey, I was treated to a medly of songs, including gems such as "If you like my body, and you think I'm sexy..." and "I'm too sexy for my shirt, too sexy for my shirt, so sexy yeah," performed soulfully by a small, toothless blind man with an underbite. He swung his can back and forth with abandon as he progressed down the length of the train, collecting coins for his services.
I was facing a girl who must also be a rookie in this whole "We are robots" game too. She used her book to cover her face, because she was laughing (silently, so it was more like shaking). I had no book readily available to hide my face, which broke into a cry-laugh spasm. (That little man is funny.) Everyone saw that I was sad-amused.
I admit, I felt a little violated.
Okay, this is an obvious statement, because that's what people do, they come up with theories and explanations to make sense out of things. Everyone, I assume, has a proclivity for theories about things.
(Is life a continual amassing of theories to make one giant oevure? One huge collection of theories of everything? On one hand I sort of hope not. Because it would suck to feel like you have pretty much everything figured out.)
Observation/Generalization: No one expresses any sign of emotion when on the subway.
Theory: Physical privacy isn't an option, so hiding your thoughts by withholding expression is the last stronghold on "personal space."
I had a terrible day at work not too long ago--one of those days where you feel hot and trapped and find yourself in the bathroom for not the traditional reasons. I, being a novice, was really trying hard to keep the tears balanced just at the rims of my eyelids as I was riding the train back home to the BK, the beloved R train. Just two stops into the journey, I was treated to a medly of songs, including gems such as "If you like my body, and you think I'm sexy..." and "I'm too sexy for my shirt, too sexy for my shirt, so sexy yeah," performed soulfully by a small, toothless blind man with an underbite. He swung his can back and forth with abandon as he progressed down the length of the train, collecting coins for his services.
I was facing a girl who must also be a rookie in this whole "We are robots" game too. She used her book to cover her face, because she was laughing (silently, so it was more like shaking). I had no book readily available to hide my face, which broke into a cry-laugh spasm. (That little man is funny.) Everyone saw that I was sad-amused.
I admit, I felt a little violated.
Thursday, October 25, 2007
Lessons in Networking
A funny thing happened on the way to the pharmacy.
Saturday morning I was waiting in line (or "on line" as they say in this foreign land) at CVS when an older man (mid-60s I'd say), whom I'd incidentally just seen emerging from the mansion on Pierrepont and Henry (around the corner from CVS), started chatting to me about the weather. He had an air of skeeze*, so I reservedly commented about the drop in humidity. He persisted: "What do you do?"
I told him I was a science writer.
"Oh? Who do you write for?"
"Psychology Today."
He perked up at this, even more. "Oh I know Hara, she's an editor over there, right?"
Okay, so he knows Hara, and Hara's great (we had coffee in the park and she interviewed me for an article she's writing; we're tight, and neighbors too--she also lives in Brooklyn Heights), so maybe he's harmless, at least to talk to in the CVS line.
"I'm a psychologist myself. I have a private practice, and I also do research on the criminal justice system and drug addiction, and I advise Governor Schwarzenegger on reforming the California prison system."
This following my conversation with the professor at Duke, I thought that was cool.
"So if I were looking for, say, a ghostwriter for a book I want to write, I'd go to someone like you, right?"
I nodded.
He introduced himself as Harry Wexler, and more getting-to-know-you conversation ensued. (At one point, Harry referred to himself as a "bachelor," per skeeze linguistics.)
Harry gave me his contact information and we agreed to meet and discuss project ideas.
Something else worth mentioning: I'd just read Malcolm Gladwell's article "Six Degrees of Lois Weisberg"--Lois Weisberg knows everyone in the world apparently, and Gladwell discusses how new contacts breed new contacts (ooh, maybe "breed" isn't the right word here...). I figured, isn't this networking? Potential professional opportunities?
Something else worth mentioning, but more to myself: Beware of skeezy "bachelors" in the CVS line.
Our meeting yesterday lasted an hour and a half. He talked a lot about himself, highlighting how "famous" and "smart" and "successful" he is, and how he works for the Governator. He volunteered inappropriate details about his personal life, like how he'd gotten his girlfriend knocked up at age 18 and how he thinks Hara** is attracted to him but he's not attracted to her. He talked about being offered a guest professorship at Dartmouth, and how his writing endeavors (which I presumed was where I came in) would somehow prepare him for that. I don't think he had any concrete plans for a project, just that I would somehow be involved.***
So after he talked about himself and his motorcycle and the bad choices he'd made in life, he said, "What do you think? Free associate."
I hesitated, then said, "Your life sounds really interesting."
He then suggested that we sit down and write a "concept paper" about the importance of prison reform, that would come from more interviewing/brainstorming sessions (again, so vague). Then we would pitch it to PT as a story idea. My next step was to research the demographics of the readership and see whether this sort of story would be something PT would want to publish.
He sent me an email 30 min. after we parted ways: "I think we have chemistry."
This morning, after the editorial meeting, I told Hara about my experience, and she launched into her history of knowing Harry. Hara knew Harry's wife Ellen, whom she worked with on a column. But Hara was unaware of their marital problems until she saw Harry's profile on JDate (an online dating service for Jews)--apparently they'd divorced and not a week later "BigDoc" was on the prowl. (Hara: "How much closer can you get to "BigDick"?) Hara made the mistake of looking at his profile; on these dating websites you can see who's viewed you, so I'm guessing this is why he thinks Hara is interested in him.
She told me about the pictures he has of himself on his JDate profile. One is of him with a do rag on his massive Harley (again, with the endowment reference), which was the laughing stock of the PT office for a while, apparently.
Also, he lied about his age on his profile. (He's 65 in real life.) Also, he has a 45-year-old daughter.
The gab fest ended with the affirmation that A) Harry is indeed a skeeze, through and through, and B) that I need to disengage myself from any association with him.
Hara's trying to locate the Harley pic for me, and if she does, I promise to post it.
*Skeeze + Geezer = Skeezer. As in, "This old dude who was hitting on me in the CVS line was such a skeezer!"
**Hara is a widow in her 60s, btw.
***I ran into Kaja, another PT editor who also lives in Brooklyn Heights, in the bathroom and we had a little laugh about BigDoc. She said "I think you ARE the project." Hlumph (*vomiting*).
Saturday morning I was waiting in line (or "on line" as they say in this foreign land) at CVS when an older man (mid-60s I'd say), whom I'd incidentally just seen emerging from the mansion on Pierrepont and Henry (around the corner from CVS), started chatting to me about the weather. He had an air of skeeze*, so I reservedly commented about the drop in humidity. He persisted: "What do you do?"
I told him I was a science writer.
"Oh? Who do you write for?"
"Psychology Today."
He perked up at this, even more. "Oh I know Hara, she's an editor over there, right?"
Okay, so he knows Hara, and Hara's great (we had coffee in the park and she interviewed me for an article she's writing; we're tight, and neighbors too--she also lives in Brooklyn Heights), so maybe he's harmless, at least to talk to in the CVS line.
"I'm a psychologist myself. I have a private practice, and I also do research on the criminal justice system and drug addiction, and I advise Governor Schwarzenegger on reforming the California prison system."
This following my conversation with the professor at Duke, I thought that was cool.
"So if I were looking for, say, a ghostwriter for a book I want to write, I'd go to someone like you, right?"
I nodded.
He introduced himself as Harry Wexler, and more getting-to-know-you conversation ensued. (At one point, Harry referred to himself as a "bachelor," per skeeze linguistics.)
Harry gave me his contact information and we agreed to meet and discuss project ideas.
Something else worth mentioning: I'd just read Malcolm Gladwell's article "Six Degrees of Lois Weisberg"--Lois Weisberg knows everyone in the world apparently, and Gladwell discusses how new contacts breed new contacts (ooh, maybe "breed" isn't the right word here...). I figured, isn't this networking? Potential professional opportunities?
Something else worth mentioning, but more to myself: Beware of skeezy "bachelors" in the CVS line.
Our meeting yesterday lasted an hour and a half. He talked a lot about himself, highlighting how "famous" and "smart" and "successful" he is, and how he works for the Governator. He volunteered inappropriate details about his personal life, like how he'd gotten his girlfriend knocked up at age 18 and how he thinks Hara** is attracted to him but he's not attracted to her. He talked about being offered a guest professorship at Dartmouth, and how his writing endeavors (which I presumed was where I came in) would somehow prepare him for that. I don't think he had any concrete plans for a project, just that I would somehow be involved.***
So after he talked about himself and his motorcycle and the bad choices he'd made in life, he said, "What do you think? Free associate."
I hesitated, then said, "Your life sounds really interesting."
He then suggested that we sit down and write a "concept paper" about the importance of prison reform, that would come from more interviewing/brainstorming sessions (again, so vague). Then we would pitch it to PT as a story idea. My next step was to research the demographics of the readership and see whether this sort of story would be something PT would want to publish.
He sent me an email 30 min. after we parted ways: "I think we have chemistry."
This morning, after the editorial meeting, I told Hara about my experience, and she launched into her history of knowing Harry. Hara knew Harry's wife Ellen, whom she worked with on a column. But Hara was unaware of their marital problems until she saw Harry's profile on JDate (an online dating service for Jews)--apparently they'd divorced and not a week later "BigDoc" was on the prowl. (Hara: "How much closer can you get to "BigDick"?) Hara made the mistake of looking at his profile; on these dating websites you can see who's viewed you, so I'm guessing this is why he thinks Hara is interested in him.
She told me about the pictures he has of himself on his JDate profile. One is of him with a do rag on his massive Harley (again, with the endowment reference), which was the laughing stock of the PT office for a while, apparently.
Also, he lied about his age on his profile. (He's 65 in real life.) Also, he has a 45-year-old daughter.
The gab fest ended with the affirmation that A) Harry is indeed a skeeze, through and through, and B) that I need to disengage myself from any association with him.
Hara's trying to locate the Harley pic for me, and if she does, I promise to post it.
*Skeeze + Geezer = Skeezer. As in, "This old dude who was hitting on me in the CVS line was such a skeezer!"
**Hara is a widow in her 60s, btw.
***I ran into Kaja, another PT editor who also lives in Brooklyn Heights, in the bathroom and we had a little laugh about BigDoc. She said "I think you ARE the project." Hlumph (*vomiting*).
Friday, October 19, 2007
I Miss Middlebury Professors
Intimidation abounds in New York. And I've been feeling intimidated about my writing lately, and honestly not feeling up to it, so that's one of my excuses for the lag time between posts.
I've gotten no feedback on my work at CRI on the twelve 300-word profiles I've written and submitted so far. However, no feedback might be good feedback, if Brian (CRI boss) regards my work the same way Matt (PT boss) does. Three assignments for the next issue (that being January) got me jazzed, and I exuberantly wrote the first draft of a short piece on intimidation (ironically). Matt provided a few constructively critical comments on that first attempt, so I revamped it and sent it back. "Nice effort," he said, but this second draft won't work at all either. So he rewrote it for me. Entirely new and annoyingly quippy. Then he tacked on my byline, but I'm not okay with that.
The second assignment I submitted, on the correlation of attractiveness and length of hair (stupid topic anyway), and I got comments similar to those on my first draft of my first assignment. I'm disinclined to put effort into the second draft.
Another editor boss, Jay, has assigned us interns to research for a story on unconscious motivation. So I called up this researcher/professor at Duke, Gavan Fitzsimons, who studies unconscious motivation as it pertains to consumer decision making. We talked for over an hour and had this great rapport. He's doing really fascinating work, especially what he told me about the voir dire process, when attorneys question jurors before the trial about their backgrounds and potential biases. Apparently, leading questions, such as "how likely would you be to judge the defendent guilty if you knew he were in a gang?", influence a juror's inclinations--in this case, they'd be more likely to favor a harsher sentence.
He took a break here to say that this is why science writing is so important. Marketing and advertising industries have incentive to keep abreast of the latest psychological findings--it pays to know that consumers associate a class of characteristics with certain vowel sounds, for example--but there's still a chasm between evidence-based psychology and policy. I'm not going to pretend that I know about how policy is made, but I don't think it's risky to guess that there isn't as much money in policy as there is in advertising. DUH.
Anyway, Dr. Fitzsimons pointed out that judicial consultants aren't likely to read every issue of the Applied Behavioral Science Review (they should). But it's more likely that they'll be reading the newspaper, Popular Science, the like. Or someone they know might. More accessible, more digestible than academic journals.
So that was inspiring.
I went to transcribe the tape a week later and discovered it was blank.
I sent a fiery email to Jay, subject: "F***", to solicit some solace, but he didn't respond and I haven't seen him.
I've gotten no feedback on my work at CRI on the twelve 300-word profiles I've written and submitted so far. However, no feedback might be good feedback, if Brian (CRI boss) regards my work the same way Matt (PT boss) does. Three assignments for the next issue (that being January) got me jazzed, and I exuberantly wrote the first draft of a short piece on intimidation (ironically). Matt provided a few constructively critical comments on that first attempt, so I revamped it and sent it back. "Nice effort," he said, but this second draft won't work at all either. So he rewrote it for me. Entirely new and annoyingly quippy. Then he tacked on my byline, but I'm not okay with that.
The second assignment I submitted, on the correlation of attractiveness and length of hair (stupid topic anyway), and I got comments similar to those on my first draft of my first assignment. I'm disinclined to put effort into the second draft.
Another editor boss, Jay, has assigned us interns to research for a story on unconscious motivation. So I called up this researcher/professor at Duke, Gavan Fitzsimons, who studies unconscious motivation as it pertains to consumer decision making. We talked for over an hour and had this great rapport. He's doing really fascinating work, especially what he told me about the voir dire process, when attorneys question jurors before the trial about their backgrounds and potential biases. Apparently, leading questions, such as "how likely would you be to judge the defendent guilty if you knew he were in a gang?", influence a juror's inclinations--in this case, they'd be more likely to favor a harsher sentence.
He took a break here to say that this is why science writing is so important. Marketing and advertising industries have incentive to keep abreast of the latest psychological findings--it pays to know that consumers associate a class of characteristics with certain vowel sounds, for example--but there's still a chasm between evidence-based psychology and policy. I'm not going to pretend that I know about how policy is made, but I don't think it's risky to guess that there isn't as much money in policy as there is in advertising. DUH.
Anyway, Dr. Fitzsimons pointed out that judicial consultants aren't likely to read every issue of the Applied Behavioral Science Review (they should). But it's more likely that they'll be reading the newspaper, Popular Science, the like. Or someone they know might. More accessible, more digestible than academic journals.
So that was inspiring.
I went to transcribe the tape a week later and discovered it was blank.
I sent a fiery email to Jay, subject: "F***", to solicit some solace, but he didn't respond and I haven't seen him.
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