I really enjoyed this photo series from the March issue of Vanity Fair. They are recreations of classic Hitchcock moments restaged with some of my favorite actors [Javier and Jim, I'm talking about you...]. Not to mention the pictures just look incredible.

So I found this blog Girls Are Pretty Forever and have been enjoying it this week... I thought I might share an excerpt since it's a fun example of writing in the second person. It's the opposite of daily inspiration, celebrating each day as a holiday with an accompanying [funny/twisted] vignette:

Your Robot That Carries Drinks From The Kitchen Into The Living Room Is In Love With Your Teenage Daughter Day!

Thanks to the miracles of science, you now have a Cocktail Robot that carries drinks from the kitchen into the living room, and it only cost you eleven thousand dollars. It will even sometimes gather your empty glasses and bring them back into the kitchen, though it doesn't know the difference between "empty" and "still working on it" just yet.

It also doesn't appear to know the difference between a robot composed of wires and circuits and a human teenage girl. Any time your sixteen-year-old daughter Christine walks past, your Cocktail Robot will follow her with its robot eyes, its clunky robot head whirring on its neck until his head has turned all the way around. It will always try to offer Christine a gin and tonic, which she thankfully doesn't accept. And yesterday, you found out that your Cocktail Robot can teach itself words. When Christine passed through the living room, out of nowhere your robot blurted out "Beautiful."

Tonight something tragic is going to happen. While you're out at a ribbon-cutting ceremony, Christine will have her new boyfriend Ronald over. The two of them will order your Cocktail Robot to bring them peppermint schnapps all night long. Then Ronald will get fresh with Christine. She will playfully put up a fight, but your Cocktail Robot won't think she's being playful and it will tear one of Ronald's arms off.

Happy Your Robot That Carries Drinks From The Kitchen Into The Living Room Is In Love With Your Teenage Daughter Day!

So I basically started from scratch with my fruit design and spent Sunday afternoon photographing fruit. Here's a behind the scenes shot...

I just submitted my six word memoir to SMITH. I finally decided on: All the good words are taken.

Kinko's killed my will to live was a close second choice...

I find this site completely amusing. I can't help clicking over and over again...

So, I'm finished with my comp for Assignment 1, and I have to admit that I think I might hate it...so on to Assignment 2. I wrote this for/in the style of Complex Magazine. That means I'd love feedback from the guys out there. Is it man enough for you? It's also too long. So if it drags in any spots let me know.

All Bets Are Off

Back in June Adam Ryan celebrated his retirement at a pub a few blocks from his Center City apartment. Raising a pint, he drank to the end of 6 am, to no more deadlocked traffic on Philadelphia’s Schuylkill Expressway and no longer working. The 26-year-old former engineer was now a professional poker player.
 The decision to quit his job played out slowly over a year and a half. Work left him restless and unfulfilled. He wanted a life that was about more than just “grinding out a living,” he says. But in early 2007, his wife, Joy, was hesitant. As time passed and he became increasingly withdrawn, Joy agreed he needed a change. He spent the next three months determining if it would be financially feasible, playing 50,000 hands of low-stakes hold ‘em to see if he could make enough money consistently to cover their expenses before giving his notice.
 Since then, he’s enjoyed the life of a poker player: roll out of bed around 10 am, make coffee, check e-mail, eat breakfast, screw around online for a while. He hits the tables by 12 or 1, playing four to eight tables at a time. After 1500 hands, roughly three to four hours later, he packs it in.
 He also has a policy for triaging the inevitable down swing. “If I get down $1000 for the day,” Ryan says, “I shut down and get out of the house.” Recently he broke this rule and followed a bad player to a higher limit table. He risked a lot of money on a pot with a pair of pocket kings. His opponent had pocket aces. He ended the day down $3500, the most he’s lost in a day since going pro.
 Despite occasional down swings and bad beats, the money he makes playing poker has given him a chance to escape his job and the opportunity to explore other interests such as photography. “I don’t want to be playing cards in five years,” says Ryan. “Right now, I’m enjoying the freedom of not having to work, but I can only play poker for so long before burning out.” He hopes to use the time to explore ways he can make money while doing things he really enjoys.

One of my favorite profiles is "The American Man Age 10" by Susan Orlean. She's the New Yorker writer, whose book The Orchid Theif inspired the movie Adaptation. In it she was played by Meryl Streep.

Here is an excerpt from "The American Man Age 10". It's only a few minutes but worth a listen. [READ: very entertaining] And I love how specific the details are. I've read that she spends weeks, sometimes months with her subjects, and I think that's reflected in this selection. If you read the whole piece, she does and amazing job crafting a compelling story around a very ordinary 10 year old. The piece really focuses on how he is on the cusp of becoming an adolescent but is still very much a child. My favorite observation is:

The collision in his mind of what he understands, what he hears, what he figures out, what popular culture pours into him, what he knows, what he pretends to know and what he imagines makes an interesting mess. The mess often has the form of what he will probably think like when he is a grown man but the content of what he is like as a little boy.

Hope you enjoy!

I heard this on the radio today and thought it might be interesting for anyone using bananas in their first assignment or anyone with a general interest in bananas. It's an interview with Dan Koeppel, author of Banana: The Fate of the Fruit That Changed the World. Lots of really interesting information. The author even sings the Chiquita banana song.

I'm off from work today and playing around with some label designs for my school projects. I think I'm liking the first best:

Really nice ad for the Metro in Madrid.

One of the things that get me out of bed on Monday morning is the This American Life podcast. I thought I'd share this because for our next assignment, we are writing profiles, and TAL is a great source for (mostly) true stories of everyday people. If you ever wanted to write for the Onion this is a great episode to listen to, and the Malcolm Gladwell piece had me laughing out loud in my cube.

One of the best movies of 2007 is now available on DVD.

SMITH online magazine is accepting six word memoirs for their next collection. Some details from the site:

Legend has it that Hemingway was once challenged to write a story in only six words. His response? “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.” Last year, SMITH Magazine re-ignited the recountre by asking our readers for their own six-word memoirs. They sent in short life stories in droves, from the bittersweet (“Cursed with cancer, blessed with friends”) and poignant (“I still make coffee for two”) to the inspirational (“Business school? Bah! Pop music? Hurrah”) and hilarious (“I like big butts, can’t lie”).

You can read a ton of them here.

Also wanted to post some eye candy, a banner designed by Marian Bantjes' for New York Times Square love fest ‘08.



Check out more of her work here.

So here is my rough draft for my class assignment. I found that I am relatively happy with my ideas for how to visually compare and contrast the fruit, but I found it much more difficult to compare and contrast them with words in a way that doesn't feel forced...

Fuyu Persimmon
Don’t be fooled by this tomato look-alike. Beneath its saffron-hued skin, the fuyu persimmon is ripe with sweet, succulent pulp more akin to the apricot or mango than the tomato.

And unlike the tomato, the fuyu’s origins are far from the Americas. It first appeared in ancient China and continues to be enjoyed as one of Asia’s most popular fruits. From the genus Diospyros (dios meaning God and pyros meaning food), the fuyu is considered an acceptable gift to Buddha. It was only introduced to America in the late 19th century, but it continues to gain popularity in the states as it is an excellent source of vitamins A and C as well as fiber and potassium.

Find the fuyu persimmon in season between September and December. When the fuyu is just soft to the touch, it's ripe and ready to eat, and its brown spots are the sweetest part. Try pairing this fruit with your favorite soft or hard cheeses or as a topper for cereal, salads, and yogurt.

$2.99 per pound

Tomato
Although the Supreme Court ruled in 1893 that the tomato is a vegetable, the tomato is technically a fruit, a berry in fact, that originated with the Aztecs of South America. It was introduced to European cuisine by 17th century explorers and quickly became an essential ingredient.

Like the persimmon, the tomato is very juicy, being comprised of more than 90% water, and it shares a similar a soft, meaty texture. Varieties can vary in flavor from sweet to savory and are available all year round.

If you are going to use it in tonight’s dinner, pick the most ripe, red tomato available with a texture somewhere between soft and firm. If you’re not going to be using the tomato until later in the week, pick one that still has some ripening up to do.

Add chopped red onion, fresh cilantro, lime juice, and diced jalapeño pepper to tomatoes for classic pico de gallo. Or if you are looking to try something unexpected, replace the tomatoes with peeled chopped fuyu persimmons for a salsa that is tangy and sweet.

$2.59 per pound

Posting some photos from my trip to the Asian market. I went to research some uncommon produce as part of an assignment for my class this semester. I am taking Words & Images, in which we'll be exploring the interrelationship of writing and graphics (as you may have guessed from the title). Our first assignment involves writing copy and designing a sign to advertise an exotic fruit, and I thought a trip to Hanahreum would be pretty inspirational. [From top left: baha, Seekel pear, mango, Indian bitter melon, Korean crunchy pear, mandarin orange, fuyu, and pommelo.]