27 is just 72 backwards

And that's the best title I can come up with. Nonetheless, that's how old I am (the first number), not the second (yet) and I guess it's how old I feel, if it's possible to detect the chronological nuance between mid-20's and late-20's, and I don't think it is.

Well, that was a boring fucking first paragraph. I guess I am getting older. Anyway, to begin with, on Saturday I made the aforementioned trip to Vidal Sassoon, which is definitely a trip in more than one sense. I'm not used to being asked if I want something to drink, or, really to being afforded any courtesies other than old copies of W magazine. By the way, to settle the issue of stylist Yuka's identity -- she's a girl, and Japanese. And I'm not sure, but I think she might be a backup singer for the 5, 6, 7, 8's (but younger and punkier).

Yuka sat me down, pawed through my hair and we discussed what to do with it. It was a lot different than when homeless people paw through my hair looking for change. Less dirt under her fingernails, for one thing. Then she sent me over to get shampooed, and I wasn't really keeping track but I think that part alone took longer than one of my typical "snip, snip, pay, bye" cuts. After the shampoo girl had done her magic (and this is a family blog, so I'd rather not get into just how "magical" it felt, even though I guess I already have), Yuka busted out the scissors and went to town. It was a little Edward Scissorhands-ish, the way the bits of hair were cascading down my forehead and nose. Also kind of made me feel like sneezing. Eventually she finished and did the styling part, using some fancy grey clay stuff that she had no trouble convincing me to buy before I left. After that, she sent me back to the shampoo girl yet again (I didn't request that, I swear) to wash out the grey stuff so she could make some final adjustments.

Somehow, the whole process only took about 90 minutes. I'm happy with it, it's different from the Blandy McBland cuts I've had lately, and I'll do my best to enjoy it while it lasts, since I'm not in the economic bracket who can afford this kind of thing on a regular basis.

More on the birthday later.

Ah, the poseur industry lives on

Spray-on mud for your SUV!

"Why yes, I have just returned from a vigorous weekend of four-wheeling. As you can see, I most certainly do not just use this $80,000 Hummer to drive up and down the same 4 miles of Wilshire."

More plugging

Episode 3 of Pop Whore is now up, and once again features Eti and I rambling on about who-the-hell-knows for a little over an hour.

You can download the MP3 version over there, or you can get the AAC version right here.

"It was a birthday present... from me to me"

On Saturday I have an appointment with someone named Yuca at the Beverly Hills Vidal Sassoon. That's my self-birthday present this year: a haircut from someone who doesn't act like they're running the Indy 500 with the scissors as the car and my hair as the track.

It's not really that expensive. You want to know how much? Fine. $91. I really hope that's the full charge for the haircut, and not just the ante to get me in the door so we can start discussing her hair-vision. (Or his hair-vision. Right now I have no idea if Yuca is a guy, a girl, or starchy Central American plantlife.)

Here you go...

Stuff like this alternately makes me laugh myself sick and then get all insecure because I'll probably never be this funny:

Angelina Jolie vs. Bottled Water (on Fametracker.com)

Yeah, so it's June

And TV season is over and my weeknights are suddenly so freaking unstructured. Yeah, I mean in theory I could use the extra time to read and write, and I'm trying to do that; but really, that's about as easy as trying to learn something else in the summers between school years. In fact, the reason I'm writing this right now is because I'm procrastinating working on a screenplay. The nine o'clock hour just passed and all I've watched tonight is Daily Show and Jeopardy. Shows I usually watch during breakfast or lunch (if you're handy with the Tivo, you can burn through a Jeopardy in like 15 flat). And in the words of the doctor who examined Jerry Garcia's last stool sample, that shit ain't right.

The first Charlie's Angels is on ABC right now. Tita is watching it in the living room. I think it's a pretty darn good metaphor for the summer television void. The ABC programming execs probably know it too. By airing it, they're basically saying, "Sorry, this is about as good as it's going to get for the next few months. Suck it up and wait 'til mid-September."

Thank god for Netflix.

More crosspromotion

Episode 2 of the Pop Whore podcast is now up at http://www.popwhore.net. Eti and I yammered on for over an hour this time, so better put on a pot of coffee before you put the headphones in.

Today's celebrity wisdom

Some days the jokes just write themselves. (From E! online this morning.)

"Because these tabloids are making so much money, and yes, I consider Us Weekly a tabloid, they go to great lengths to corroborate their stories, whether they are true or not," Pitt said in a statement to Access Hollywood.

Unfortunately, while Brad was giving that statement, two other Access Hollywood reporters were digging through his trash and uncovering the DirecTV bills into which Angelina encoded her love letters to him. They have advanced Access Hollywood-level cryptologists working on them right now. Apparently the first one says "Ur hot want 2 m33t?"

Your Darwinism At Work

http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,16633,00.html

UPN bashing Thursday

Eti and I weren't able to get together to record another podcast this week, but we did pound out a couple of treatises on UPN's crimes against humanity this week.

They're over at Pop Whore.

Science imitating art

The following headline is from the web-magazine New Scientist. But I really thought it was from E!, or maybe even The Onion:

"Star's Erratic Conduct Hides Predictable Nature"

Quit trying to confuse me, science writers.

2 things I learned from listening to my podcast on my iPod at lunch just now:

1. FOR GOD'S SAKE STOP SAYING "LIKE," LIKE EVERY THIRD, LIKE, WORD!

2. The volume is WAY too low and many of my comments are completely inaudible. The jury's still out on whether this detracts from or actually enhances the listening experience, but regardless, I have to go back and fix it.

I only link to E! Online stories in case of emergency

And I think it's fair to say that this one qualifies. The baby-naming thing is out of control. Really. It has to be stopped. Eventually kids with normal names won't stand a chance in the elementary schools of the future.

"Laird?" "Here."
"Apple?" "Here."
"Jaden Rayne?" "Here."
"Pilot Inspektor?" "Here."
"Banjo?" "Here."

"Michael?"

(And laughter erupts in the classroom as the kids relentlessly tease this bizarrely named kid, the only one in the bunch who wasn't featured on Access Hollywood in utero.)

There goes the podcasting neighborhood

Now that Eti and I are in the game, podcasting is dead for sure.

So get over to Pop Whore and enjoy the wake!

Podcasto Numero Uno

Check it -- Eti and I recorded the inaugural podcast of Pop Whore, destined to spur millions of Americans to plug in their headphones, listen, and ask themselves, "What the fuck is this?" The file will be up for download a little later today. If you have podcast software like iPodder (and click that link if you don't) here's the feed address to add:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/PopWhore

Also, feel free to peruse the Pop Whore blog for other fun stuff.

Let the podcasting commence

I... uh... yeah

There's some guy out there working on this kind of equipment for animals. It's not even an April Fool's joke or anything. You can read the whole article here.

Attention!

Do you say "on accident" instead of "by accident"? If so, I'm making fun of you in my head right now.

That is all.

The new Garbage

I realized I never wrote down anything about Garbage's new album Bleed Like Me. I probably should.

Preface -- Garbage's Version 2.0 is probably the album I have spent more hours listening to than any other. From about 1999 to 2003, it was in my Honda's CD changer pretty much nonstop, usually in slot number 6 because that was easy to remember. If there were ever a time where I didn't know what to listen to, or my iPod was burned out, or there was nothing on the radio (highly likely), I'd just start that disc from the beginning and listen all the way through, skipping only track 5 in the process. What the hell's so great about it? I don't know, and even most Garbage fans seem to consider it a step down from the self-titled debut album. But to me, there is no greater source of pure sonic pleasure than the combination of overproduced backgrounds (like, probably around 92,000 tracks) with overly distorted Shirley Manson singing her overly cynical lyrics. It should be unlistenable, or at least tired and cliche, but it's neither (at least, to me). I really, really love it and I don't think I'll ever get sick of it. I can be convinced that there's much better music out there, I can be convinced that one guy with a sharp mind and a guitar is a lot more impressive than a bunch of super-producers with a warehouse full of electronics, but all that philosophy becomes pretty irrelevant once the chorus of "Temptation Waits" kicks in 40 seconds into the album.

So, yeah, I like Version 2.0 quite a bit. I also like Garbage's first album, though not to the same fanatical degree, and I think that Beautiful Garbage, their third, is more or less a piece of crap. Thus was the mindset with which I began listening to their four-years-in-the-procrastinating fourth album, Bleed Like Me. I had expectations that were, simultaneously, unbearably high and unbearably low. So I guess I was ready for anything.

Anyway, Bleed Like Me has its moments. The first single, "Why Do You Love Me," has all the forward momentum that was completely lacking on the last album. It wouldn't be out of place on Version 2.0, and I think that's mostly a good thing. The other track I really like is "Metal Heart," which is more confidence-inspiring because it's highly catchy without being a retread of anything 1998-ish. What I like less are the slower songs. The title track is pretty good, but I was hoping for more of the electronically drenched downbeat stuff that Garbage did so well in their earlier years. So I guess the whole thing is a mixed bag. But it's a step in the right direction, and proof that Garbage can still survive in a day when every third band is using a laptop.

Yeah, I don't usually write about music. No, really! I know you'd never be able to tell based on this Pitchfork-quality review, but it's the truth.

Exciting Referral News

Apparently, if you do a search on Yahoo! for "is gallagher a jewish name", this site is the #3 result... thanks to this old list.

No, I didn't figure this out on my own; someone actually did that search, found my blog as a result, and clicked on it. So don't tell me I'm crazy; I'm way back in line behind that dude.