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!