Those Are People Who Died, Died
I was in the middle of reading about the fascinating people profiled in the annual Lives They Lived issue of the New York Times Magazine when I heard shocking news about the passing of another fascinating person. One that I knew, actually: Brad Graham of Bradlands.com. It appears that he died in his sleep of natural causes on December 31st, at the young age of 41. Yeah, I don’t believe it, either.
Brad was one of the earliest bloggers I knew of, and pretty much the kingpin of the (small) community of gay bloggers around in the early ’00s. Back then it was such a thrill to be writing on the net, and having someone else noticing what you were doing was an even bigger thrill — especially when that someone was as friendly and witty as Brad. His August 3, 2001 post, using the first Scrubbles redesign to explore childhood fear of Dow Scrubbing Bubbles, was typical Brad. We weren’t close friends or anything, but his warmth and humor was something I treasured over the years (we even briefly bonded over the ’70s kiddie-com Big John, Little John on twitter last year). I’ll miss you, Brad.
Twitter and Facebook
Twitter and Facebook. What’s your opinion? I proudly avoided both sites for a long time — Twitter for being dumb and trendy, Facebook for being home to smarmy real estate agents and lawyers. Now, however, I can’t get enough of either of them. If I want to share a short link or observation with the world, I’m much more likely to do it via Twitter or Facebook. If that thought or link needs a longish explanation to go with it, the story will get posted here.
I know a few people who post identically to both Twitter and Facebook, but I actually use both sites for different means. Twitter is an extension of my “blog” persona. I use it to (try and be) witty, make nonsensical observations, and share my love of goofy pop culture of the past. Facebook is for the “real life” me, a way to stay in contact with flesh-and-blood folks I know or once knew. I first joined it when some non-online friends of ours suggested joining to play games of Scrabble. I also have a guilty tendency for completing all those stupid Facebook quizzes and polls. I’ve notice something over time, though — the longer I’ve been on both sites, the more these distinct personae are merging. Many blogging friends are also Facebook contacts, and I’m sure the “real life” family and friends in my life will eventually find out about Scrubbles.net. Thoughts, anyone?
A Redesigned Scrubbles.net
Hey there — notice something different? I’ve redesigned Scrubbles.net. This is the first true sitewide retooling in five years. Although I still have some kinks to work out, I’m happy with the swanky retro-computer look we’ve got going here.
This redesigning process began about a year ago, actually, in search of a good Wordpress theme. I’ve noticed that many of the popular and nicer looking WP themes have one element that works, and a whole bunch of other elements that don’t work. Either the typography is fabulous and the layout is lousy, or the sidebar is beautifully designed but the rest of it uses terrible colors. It’s always something. I was about at the end of my rope before coming across a gorgeous and subtle theme called Vanilla Cart. Top to bottom, I love it. For the logo fonts, I went with Eurostile condensed and Gala (which cost a lot, but it’s absolutely perfect — sometimes one has to spend money for perfection). I also brought back this weblog’s original tagline, which hasn’t been seen here since about 2002. There’s even a new cartoon portrait of yours truly on the sidebar.
Although I currently have about 80% of the redesign in place, there are a couple of issues with the CSS that I’m sending out a plea for help on. Specifically:
- I have a kickass repeating background for the redesign, similar to the one on my Twitter profile — but I can’t get it to work. I’ve tried everything on this theme’s CSS stylesheet, but the only changes result in a pure white background. Any CSS experts out there who can help?
- This theme also has an option for you to use your own logo — but when I tried it, the logo was positioned down at the white space above the blog entries. I want it positioned above the “Home” and “About Me” tabs (which is where the blog name and description are normally positioned if one does not use a graphic logo). How can I move it up to its proper place without screwing everything up?
We Are Married, Too
From Christopher: “I want to let you know about a new blog I have started called We Are Married Too over on blogspot. It is intended to be a showcase for lesbian and gay couples around the world who have been legally married.”
The first entry is on our July 3, 2008 union. Awww. Wanna contribute? Contact Christopher at wearemarriedtoo (at) yahoo.com.
Twitter Bird
Advertising Age’s Simon Dumenico analyzes why Oprah Winfrey and Twitter might not be such a good match. I gotta admit that I’m really taking to Twitter. I enjoy reading the 71 people I follow there (which really isn’t that many, all things considered), and I often post a “tweet” once or twice a day. If I think of something short and pithy, my first impulse is to post a simple Twitter tweet rather than do a long weblog entry. It’s a fun diversion, but it doesn’t replace blogging for me.
It’s interesting to note the Twitter users who, unprovoked, chose to follow me. Some are bloggers that I follow, or ex-bloggers who fell off my radar. Others are perfectly random people. Often I’ll get a fellow designer or illustrator that I never heard of before (similar to Flickr). Sometimes I’ll follow a famous person, and be thrilled when they follow me back. Then I’ll check their profile and find that they’re following 17,000 other Twitterers — oh well.
Steve and Jayne and 8K of RAM
Andy Baio of Waxy.org shares a curio from the past — Computability, in which Steve Allen and Jayne Meadows explain the concept of home computing to the layman of 1984. I think I deserve some kind of award for listening to all 35:45 of Steve and Jayne bantering over modems and monitors. The accompanying hour-long video remains to be seen, however. Hmmm, wonder where I can view episodes of their old PBS show, the one where they played famous historical figures?
Comp DOA
Two nights ago, I had a little computer situation. The screen on my six year-old iMac went black, just like that.
Granted, it wasn’t completely black. I could still see a very faint impression of windows on a desktop. With some research, we found out that the bulb on the Mac’s LED screen burnt out. The rest of the computer was okay, but since the monitor is attached we had to find a way of fixing it. Turns out this problem is fairly common, but the methods of fixing it are neither easy nor cheap. While trying to figure out how to proceed, I set out to save as much data on as many writeable DVDs as I could. This involved shining a halogen lamp directly at the screen and trying hard not to lose the cursor in the murk on the screen.
Since the old iMac was getting to be a painfully slow dinosaur anyhow, we decided to truck out to Best Buy and get one of the new iMacs. These things are huge. The smallest, 20″ model just barely fits in the hole on my computer desk. To insert disks in the side, I have to drag the thing out of its cubbyhole. That aside, it’s a gorgeous and speedy machine and I’m so glad to have it. No longer will I have to endure the “rainbow pinwheel of death” just to load a web page or something. In the meantime I have to go through the laborious process of reinstalling software, fonts and (the worst part) configuring my email. I haven’t even started on rebuilding my iTunes music library. It’s going to be a long weekend.
Library Club President
I don’t think I’ve giggled so hard as while browsing through Flickr’s Yearbook Yourself photo pool. On another note, I’m impressed with how the mall marketing aspect of Yearbook Yourself is integrated with the site (meaning it’s not nearly as obnoxious as it could’ve been). You can swap genders, too! Here’s how I would look as a Class of ‘54 girl with two-day stubble:
Big Fat Link Log 3
We’re nearing the end August. Do you know what that means? Sticky thighs and melting ice cream? Yeah, that — and it’s also time for an update to the annual list of the weblogs I’ve been reading. It just keeps growing and growing, which is another reason why I prefer to keep this thing on a single entry as opposed to taking up lots of room on a sidebar. The starred new additions are not exactly new (even for me), but they are some of the weblogs that have caught my eye over the past year or so. To them and all the other hard-working bloggers on this list, thank you.
2719 Hyperion | * A Child Of Atom | A Joshua Tree In Every Pot | A List Of Things Thrown Five Minutes Ago | A Sampler of Things | ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive Project Blog | A.V. Club Blogs | * The Avant Garde Retard | Awful Plastic Surgery | Back of the Cereal Box | Bibi’s Box | The Blackwing Diaries | Bill Crider’s Pop Culture Magazine | Boing Boing | Bob Sassone | Book Covers Blog | * The Book Design Review | Booksteve’s Library | * Boom Pop! | Bostworld | Bradlands Must See HTTP:// | Brand New | Branded in the ’80s | Cardhouse | Cartoon Brew | * Cartoon Curio | * Cinebeats | * clydefro | Coudal Partners | Crack Skull Bob | Davelandblog | Design Observer | Designing Magazines | * Discover A World Of Sounds | The Disney Blog | Disney History | Drawn! | Dynagirl | * e=mcbrennan | Ephemera | * Evan Dorkin | Eye of the Goof | Fanboy.com | * Fawny.org | Fimoculous | Folded Space | Friday Fishwrap | Gatotchy’s Blog | Ghost In The Machine | GlenMullaly.com – The BLOG!!! | gmtPlus9 | * Grain Edit | greg.org | Hacking NetFlix | Hit or Miss | The Hits Just Keep on Comin’ | i like | In Black And White | * Ironic Sans | Irregular Orbit | Jinjur | Just Ask Christopher | * Kevin Kidney | Kottke.org | Lady Bunny Blog | Lileks The Bleat | Little Yellow Different | Lots of Co. | Malls of America | * Mark Simonson | Martin Klasch | Mimi Smartypants | mod*mom | * My So-Called Strife | Neato Coolville | News From Me | * Nintendo Wii Fanboy | The Other Andrew | Other Stream | Passport to Dreams Old & New | Patrick’s Journal | PCL LinkDump | Pop Culture Gadabout | Pop Culture Junk Mail | * Pop Culture Petri Dish | Posterwire | Push. Click. Touch. | Quiddity | * Randomopolis | RaShOmoN | Re-Imagineering | Robot Action Boy | Robot Johnny | * Secret Fun Blog | Self-Styled Siren | Snarky Malarkey | Something Old, Nothing New | Sore Eyes | Swapatorium | * swissmiss | * tikiranch | things magazine | This Justin | Thrilling Days of Yesteryear | Tim Lucas Video WatchBlog | The Tin Man | Tiny Pineapple | Today’s Inspiration | Tom the Dog’s You Know What I Like? | Turbanhead.com | TV Guidance | * Ultra Swank | Ultrasparky | UnBeige | Veer: The Skinny | Vince Keenan | Ward-O-Matic | waxy.org | Web Goddess | WFMU’s Beware of the Blog | Wiley Wiggins | * The World Of Kane | x-entertainment.com | * Your Souvenir Guide
Twittering Our Lives Away
I’m on Twitter now. I know. This seems like one of those trendy social networking sites that everybody flocks to, then abandons after a year or two — but it’s actually pretty fun. Since I don’t own a mobile, I’ll end up using it to post little observational bits that are too short to make it as a Scrubbles entry. Thanks to Bob for the heads-up.
Eight Years of Scrubbles.net
Psst. I never notice these things until they’ve gone and went, but over the past week this very weblog has entered its ninth year of operation. Happy birthday to Scrubbles.net! To celebrate the occasion, I put on my best metaphorical party dress and cherry picked a few of my favorite vintage (don’t call them old!) posts.
Looking back, I’d venture to say that Scrubbles.net’s legacy (if there is one) might be that it was among the earliest of the “look at the crap I found” type weblogs. It’s always been my mission to write about whatever ephemera or pop culture catches my fancy, with a distinct lack of trendiness, and hoping what amuses me amuses others. Gotta admit that sometimes I come across popular, more thematically focused blogs and wish I had even half their traffic. But in the end I’d rather have a small, loyal audience than a large, fickle one. “Love me, love my quirks” is pretty much the dictum around here.
So sit down, grab a piece of cake, and savor the results of trolling the archives going all the way back to the beginning (note that the pre-2006 entries suffer from broken style sheets, outdated links, and a general look of krep). Behold, “Scrubbles.net: The Greatest Hits”:
09/11/01 — September 11th, 2001. A personal observation of what happened over the course of that day. For some reason, I could only process the horror of what I was feeling through the lens of pop culture.
09/27/01 — A floor-by-floor analysis of the break rooms at work. Quirky, navel gazing posts like this were unusual in 2001 but would become more common as the years went on.
06/13/02 — Introducing Discards. A cache of found slides becomes a little-known corner of the Scrubbles.net universe.
10/27/02 — On the groovy costumes in UFO.
01/28/03 — A rant against Frida Kahlo. Honestly, I forgot about this. Didn’t know I hated Frida Kahlo so much!
01/09/03 — Influential songs in my life.
06/26/03 — Recollections of ’80s Movies Filmed in Arizona.
10/31/03 — Seven Things That Frightened Me As A Child. Fun.
02/02/04 — A Yuppie Teakettle for Everyone. Musing on design for the masses.
04/22/05 — Illustrations of Charles Harper. Ladies and gents, the most visited page at Scrubbles.net. Had I known, I would have included more examples. Unfortunately, other weblogs still link to this page even as I’m coming up with newer, better stuff. Attention, Charles Harper fans: please read my new stuff. Please.
05/30/05 — Captured on Film. Screen shots and commentary on the glamorous Manhattan of The Best of Everything (1958).
06/02/05 — Wonderland in Chrome. An unassuming little post that got linked on Boing Boing and drove hundreds of curious clicks. Who knew?
07/10/05 — Off the Treadmill. On learning to enjoy a downsized life. I need to write a sequel to this one.
01/07/06 — Artistry In Motion. More Harper discoveries, given a nicer setting.
02/14/06 — Blogging Tips from a D-Lister. Somebody had to find that advice useful.
03/26/06 — White Lace and Promises. Ruminations on twenty different versions of “We’ve Only Just Begun.” May have been Scrubbles.net’s definitive “jump the shark” moment.
05/12/06 — The Exploding Plastic Inevitable. The first time embedded video was used on the weblog.
01/01/07 — Another Year of Couch Sitting. A self-pitying reflection on 2006, the year of lowered expectations. 2007 and the first half of 2008 followed right along in the same vein.
01/22/07 — What Makes a Making Of. I thought this was a nice post. I worked hard on it. It generated zero links or comments!
06/04/07 — Cheap Thrill: Joan Crawford on The Sixth Sense. This was fun; I have to do more “Cheap Thrill” posts.
01/21/08 — Cheap Thrill: Children’s Books 1957-69. Speaking of which. This might be the most real estate hogging Scrubbles post ever.
04/23/08 — WDW Day One: Epcot Future World. In which I bore my dwindling audience to tears with an exhaustive, five-part travelogue.
07/04/08 — Riverside, July 3.
Weekly Mishmash: June 29-July 5
Endless Ocean. This game was pretty much what I expected — an open-ended scuba diving simulator on the Wii. One can go on dives, get to know fish better by petting them (yeah, that works in real life), deal with a whiny girl on deck, and perform tasks to earn scuba equipment and other rewards. Though the above-water graphics suck, the diving itself is an enveloping, scarily realistic experience. The fish and various undersea creatures behave so true to life it’s like being in a real aquarium. Though it didn’t knock my socks off, this is a beautiful excuse to chill out and relax.
The Guilt of Janet Ames (1947). It’s Rosalind Russel month at TCM — yay! We kicked it off with a viewing of this little-seen thriller which Russel made for Columbia in 1947. In a plot plugging into the Psychiatry Chic zeitgeist of the era, Russel plays a war widow haunted by the fact that her husband sacrificed his life so his comrades could go on to lead productive lives. On a quest to confront each veteran, she’s intercepted by reporter and part time lush Melvyn Douglas — a guy who also happens to be one of Russel’s targeted men. Although there’s nothing to write home about in the film’s hokey storyline (penned by the wonderfully named Lenore Coffee), Miss Russel does a great job being agitated and lovely at the same time, Douglas is solid and there are several effective, moody scenes. It certainly is an unusual film, structured around Russel’s dreamlike impressions of the various men — and when a young Sid Caesar shows up to mug away things decidedly turn surreal. It was a fun time, which is not something I could say about the other two cinematic efforts from this week.
Heading South (2005). A muddled and ugly little film about middle aged female tourists rendezvousing with Haitian prostitutes. Granted, someone could have made an interesting film dealing with that subject, but the direction is so bad that huge chunks of screen time just amble along aimlessly — which only makes the central women look even more pathetic. This film has nothing remarkable to say, the leading actress is a wishy-washy bore, and the talents of Charlotte Rampling are completely wasted. Avoid at all costs.
Three… Extremes (2004). A trio of stomach-churning and bizarre vignettes by the leading horror directors from Hong Kong, Japan and Korea. I love a good scary Asian movie every once in a while, but this shorter format really underscores how cliché-ridden much of this stuff is — the requisite Creepy Little Girl even shows up! Though all three films had their moments, none of them grabbed me. Kinda like the evil kid from The Grudge, come to think of it.
Weekly Mishmash: May 18-24
C.R.A.Z.Y. (2005). A French Canadian film about a dysfunctional family of five brothers growing up in the ’60s and ’70s — centering on Zac, the twee, self-possessed brother with a supernatural “gift” for healing and a serious Bowie fixation. The first 45 minutes are brilliant and darkly funny, calling to mind Amelie, but in the end it dragged on too long and seemed a bit “meh” to me. I was expecting a penetrating gay-themed coming of age tale, but in fact the central character is bisexual and the film dwells more on how the other characters perceive him. The soundtrack and period settings are great and it’s worth a look if you like screwy family films, but don’t expect to be blown away.
Critter Roundup. A title from Nintendo’s new WiiWare line in which you’re a farmer who has to fence in various animals (shades of the classic arcade game Qix). Not worth $10, but fun in its own modest way. Might be the only videogame in which one can get killed by bumping into a chicken.
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984). “You’ve never seen Temple of Doom?,” Christopher said to me recently. Yep, I’ve seen films #1 and 3 in the original trilogy, but this one passed me by until recently. Why it took 24 years is beyond me, but now I can see why it was never very attractive to me — Kate Capshaw and that Asian kid. Really, could they have found two more shrill, annoying actors to play those parts? I believe Raiders was about as perfect as an action-adventure can possibly be, but with this one Spielberg clearly dumbed things down into a loud, gross kiddie flick. The movie is okay if you watch it with lowered expectations (it’s beautifully mounted with some ace set pieces), but really the only reason this one still gets love today because many saw it at an impressionable age. Nostalgia rears its ugly head again!
Johnny Belinda (1948). Never saw this one before, either, and it was much better than I believed it would be. For a ’40s studio film, it’s refreshing both in the abundance of outdoor photography and its honest, unflinching treatment of rape. Jane Wyman is excellent as the deaf, childlike Belinda, but I think the part could have been done just as well by a dozen other actresses working at that time. The supporting cast, all of ‘em, are also excellent.
My Muxtape Is Chullin’
I have been so busy lately, getting some extra work in before taking the dream trip next week — but I did have time to do a little fun thing last night. I went to Muxtape.com and set up a little playlist at scrubbles.muxtape.com (thanks to Jonny). This playlist is the result of an early ’90s female R&B fixation I was on earlier this week, and it’ll keep me briefly hopping for the inevitable more work later on. It’s phat, it’s da bomb, Bill Bellamy digs, peace out.
That ‘Screen Saver’ Look
A new Two Bunnies and a Duck hatched today … and now for something completely different. I was rearranging shelves in my bedroom yesterday and came across a few stowed-away items that have been saved since my first computer came into my life in 1992. First is the sheet of Apple Computer decals which came packaged with my Mac IIci machine. Very rainbowy. Second are a pair of items from Berkeley Systems, makers of the popular-in-the-day After Dark screen saver. An ad for More After Dark carries all the hallmarks of clunky early desktop publishing — including a garish color gradation. Finally there’s a brochure where one could purchase a variety of After Dark attire, modeled by the fashionistas pictured below. Flying toasters away!
