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Operation Watch This: The HBO Documentaries Summer Series

Gabe — Tue, 07 Jun 2011 18:15:20 +0000

HBO Documentaries kicked off their new summer series last night with Bobby Fischer Against the World, a documentary about the notorious, world-renowned chess champion and maniac, Bobby Fischer. I haven’t finished watching it yet, because life is what happens you’re busy making other huh? But I’ve watched half of it and it’s really good! Did you know that people used to actually care about chess? It’s true! I’m currently watching the segment about Bobby Fischer playing against Boris Spassky in Iceland in 1972 for the World Championship title and it’s very riveting and compelling (who will win the chess fight?!) but it’s also just interesting to see what a cultural event it was. Late night talk shows about it! Nightly news reports! People crowding around department store television sets! It was a whole thing it turns out. Later, of course, Bobby Fischer would become an anti-Semitic lunatic who had his passport revoked and was detained by the Japanese for extradition and a whole bunch of other Classic Maniac Stuff. But the point is that it’s pretty good and there are going to be new documentaries each Monday throughout the summer and we should watch them. Here is the complete lineup:

We Should All Be So Lucky As To Find Something In This World That Makes Us Happy: Record Number Of Quarters In Belly Button

Gabe — Mon, 03 Jan 2011 20:30:53 +0000

In the flush of the holiday season, it was almost possible for a moment to forget that the world is an endless and inescapable nightmare. Would an endless and inescapable nightmare have so much EGG NOG? (Go to bed, church. Egg nog is the true opiate of the masses.) Although, anyone who was, for example, trapped in an airplane on a snowy tarmac for five to six hours when all they wanted was to get home and who could see the winking lights of the airport right there right through the window so close and yet so far away, only to spend another two to three hours waiting for luggage in the baggage claim–an event so traumatic that even seeing Alec Baldwin waiting for his bags and talking to him about how he was stuck on his airplane on the snowy tarmac for even longer couldn’t have alleviated the sense of existential suffering–those people, whoever they may be, certainly got a brief reminder of just what was awaiting them on the other end of 2010: MORE OF THE SAME. Now, of course, in the clear light of this day the memories come rushing back to all of us, and we are brought around once more to the inevitable and throbbing conclusion that this world was a trap built to kill us.

So we might as well find happiness in it wherever and whenever we can! For example, if we want to stick 20 quarters into our big fat gaping apparently-bottomless belly buttons in our dorm rooms while our friend giggle and videotape us on their Motorola RAZRs, confirming our place in the World Record Books for most quarters in a human belly button–although we might also realize that we’re kind of opening the floodgates here and there might be a whole slew of bigger fatter gapinger more-bottomless belly buttons that can suck up more change belonging to people who, like most of us, didn’t even realize that was a thing until now, waiting to come after our crown–but if that makes us happy, let’s do it! This guy did:

Holiday Gift Giving 2010 Open Thread

Gabe — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 23:01:34 +0000

“Could the Internet BE any more boring today?” — Bandler Ching

Boy oh boy, was it just me or was the Internet VERY boring today? It’s almost as if no one even cares about Trampoline Accidents when there is so much SHOPPING and WISHING to be done. Is anybody else having trouble sleeping at night because you’re just lying awake staring at the ceiling imagining all the presents sitting under the menorah?! Just kidding. I don’t do that. I’m an adult! All I want for Christmas is to pay my rent. But what do you guys want for Christmas? AND/OR what do you not want for Christmas? Good God I am bored! (Image via TheDailyWhat.)

Watch The 33rd Chilean Miner Get Rescued

Gabe — Thu, 14 Oct 2010 14:15:31 +0000

Watching this barely makes up for reading that. But I do like how quiet it is. Things should be more quiet. (Thanks for the tip, Bailey.)

Space Balloon!

Gabe — Thu, 30 Sep 2010 20:30:51 +0000

This is just wonderful. Even better than Space Chair! Someone get this man a Father of the Year Mousepad for his home office, ASAP (As Soon As Possible).

Eventually The World Will Be Covered In Ash And Silence

Gabe — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 19:30:28 +0000

There used to be a restaurant in my neighborhood that I would go to a lot. One of my fondest New York memories is of taking a cab from the airport late at night and going straight to the restaurant with my suitcase and eating a late night dinner at the bar with a group of friends. They also had these disgusting brunches that just made you feel so sick, but were reasonably priced and a ton of food, so we ate brunch there most weekends. Tuesday nights we’d all meet up for a drink there and the bartender would make us booze milkshakes if we wanted. Once there was a rumor that the restaurant was being scouted for a scene in the Sex and the City movie. And once I was there on a date and a surprise burlesque show started for some reason. But then the restaurant changed their menu and redecorated to try and improve their business. It didn’t work. And then the restaurant closed altogether for awhile. They opened it a couple of summers ago as a pop-up barbecue place, but who wants to eat barbecue from a pop-up barbecue place inside of a failed restaurant? (Answer: no one. It closed again.) Then it was remodeled once more, and renamed, and had a new chef and a new menu and a new vibe. I ate there once and hated it. Then it closed again for the final time. They’re currently remodeling the building and I heard that it is going to be a paper store, like for fancy stationery or something. The friends I had that memorable dinner with that one night years ago have all moved. And, of course, all the burlesque performers in the city have been rounded up and placed in Federal Burlesque Performer Internment Camps hundreds of miles from the city.

The point that I’m trying to make is that the world changes. Sometimes when you stop and look at it you barely even recognize it, because it’s a new world. The world in which that restaurant existed and was a central location in my life has disappeared. And gone is the world we used to inhabit together, in which a woman in a motorized wheelchair could videotape herself “dancing” to Madonna while encouraging people to awaken their bodies if she wanted to, but she didn’t have a forum for posting that video and making it public.

This Should Be The Ad For Everything

Gabe — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 19:15:46 +0000

Seriously, just have that fuzzy little guy at the end landing next to ANY SINGLE PRODUCT and I will buy it. I just ordered an embarrassing amount of Pedigree, and I don’t even have a dog. (YET!) (Via Urlesque.)

Videogum Everywhere Completes Its Second Successful Mission

Gabe — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 11:23:11 +0000

The first time that our unobtrusive improv comedy troupe, which attempts to bring joy to the world by mostly leaving it alone, successfully accomplished a “mission” was when we peacefully participated in Parade magazine’s fascinating readers’ poll to determine which actor would be best suited to play Clark Gable in a make-believe biopic that doesn’t exist. We voted for Topher Grace respectfully and like adults, as many fellow readers and fans of Parade magazine did, as was our right. Our calm and non-invasive voice was heard, and it was determined that Topher Grace was indeed the best choice to play Clark Gable in a make-believe biopic that is not being made whatsoever. And no one even noticed that we were there. Success!

Now, we have confirmation that a second Videogum Everywhere “mission” has been accomplished! It is, in fact, the original mission for which Videogum Everywhere was created. I am referring to the Videogum Everywhere Paranormal Activity DVD Name Bomb Mission. As you may recall, the creators of Paranormal Activity invited fans of the movie, and also people who had not even seen the movie, to submit their names for inclusion in the DVD credits. Videogum Everywhere “agents” were called upon to submit their names, and one reader, John, has provided the final proof that we have succeeded (thank you, John! Many of us continue to not have seen or have any plans to see Paranormal Activity, so we might never have known of our own accomplishments):

The Season Premiere Of Lost, Family Style

Gabe — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 17:46:36 +0000

GET IN HERE! IT IS ABOUT TO START! You know, I never fully understood the fanatical passion that women of a certain age feel towards their soaps, or “stories”, if you will, until now. Imagine having the rush that we are feeling tonight, but every day, for a thousand years. It would probably kill you! But what a delicious death (Delicious Death is the name of my metal band, we suck) it would be. Anyway, I’ll do a fuller write up of this epic event tomorrow, but for now, tonight, let’s just share this together. You have to capture these precious moments while you can. (This post was written by a bottle of Designer Imposters Perfume.)

Holy shit, you guys:

Teaser Trailer For David Simon’s Treme

Gabe — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 12:43:30 +0000

So it is going to be like The Wire, but set in New Orleans, and instead of being about the human cost of the drug trade, it’s going to be about Ghost Jazz? Got it.