Steve Dyer

“I feel like ‘embattled’ or ‘disgraced’ will always follow my name. It’s like that black football player who recently came out. He said, ‘I just want to be known as a football player. I don’t want to be known as a gay football player.’ I know exactly what he’s saying,” – Paula Deen.

Not really.

neriede:

Can I just…..?????

Like, this is the single most beautiful piece of animation ever, I mean

Go ahead, click and drag it, I fucking GUARANTEE that whatever frame it lands on will make you feel better about your day.

• Andresr/Shutterstock
• "AMIGAYAMIGAYAMIGAYAMIGAY?"

From the ABC News report on 'Homosexual OCD': Straight Men Who Suspect They Are Gay:

Steven Brodsky, a psychologist who specializes in obsessive-compulsive disorder, says that at any one time he has a "handful" of clients who are straight and suspect that they are gay.

Brodsky, who is the clinical director of his OCD and Panic Center of N.Y. and N.J., said he had one adult patient who was so crippled by obsessive thoughts about being gay that he was unable to live independently and had to move back in with his parents to cope. Brodsky said he determined his patient had OCD associated with homosexuality.

"He had a classic case," said Brodsky. "He had some sort of feeling that he was attracted to other guys."

This patient was straight, according to Brodsky, but he had intrusive thoughts that were not based on any hard reality in his behavior.

These intrusive thoughts can have real-world consequences:

Brodsky said a previous therapist had misdiagnosed his patient as gay, and at the patient's request, sent him off to reparative therapy, a controversial method that has not been proven to be effective and can be harmful....he says health professionals need a better understanding of OCD so patients receive proper treatment for a mental obsession, rather than counseling for a sexual orientation crisis that he says has nothing to do with mental illness. This type of OCD falls under the category of sexual obsessions, according to Jeff Szymanski, a clinical psychologist and executive director of the International OCD Foundation.

Read more here.

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Lena Dunham is going to have her first turn at hosting SNL. According to Deadline, the Girls creator and star is set to host the March 8th episode with musical guest The National. SNL returns this Saturday with host Jim Parsons and musical guest Beck. Hopefully during Dunham's episode, Blerta from Albania will at least make a cameo.

At the Olympics if you want to protest a decision, you must have cash:

The reason that Mathieu — and many other coaches across most Olympic sports — make certain they always have a specific amount of cash on hand is that if they want to protest an official decision during competition, they need more than just a strong opinion and an angry yell.

They also need money.

…Depending on the sport, the fee varies: for luge, it is 50 euros (about $67). Cross-country skiing, like snowboard and Alpine skiing, demands 100 Swiss francs (about $112) but stipulates that all protests must be submitted in English. Bobsled and skeleton are among the most expensive: they require a deposit of 100 euros before any protest will even be considered. If multiple countries want to make a similar protest, sharing the tab is allowed.

Hat tip to the excellent PriorProbability who also points out that if your protest is successful you get your money back so these payments are also protest bets.

Last Thursday, I took my son to meet Lucia McBath, because he is 13, about the age when a black boy begins to directly understand what his country thinks of him. His parents cannot save him. His parents cannot save both his person and his humanity. At 13, I learned that whole streets were prohibited to me, that ways of speaking, walking, and laughing made me a target. That is because within the relative peace of America, great violence—institutional, interpersonal, existential—marks the black experience. The progeny of the plundered were all around me in West Baltimore—were, in fact, me. No one was amused. If I were to carve out some peace myself, I could not be amused either. I think I lost some of myself out there, some of the softness that was rightfully mine, to a set of behavioral codes for addressing the block. I think these talks that we have with our sons—how to address the police, how not to be intimidating to white people, how to live among the singularly plundered—kill certain parts of them which are as wonderful as anything. I think the very tools which allow us to walk through the world, crush our wings and dash the dream of flight.

Jordan Davis was also given a series of talks, which McBath believes ultimately got him killed. We were sitting in the bar area of the Millennium Hotel in Times Square. She had a water. I had a coffee. My son sat back and watched. She talked about Jordan's first days in public school after several years of home school. She talked about how he went from shy caterpillar amazed at the size and scope of his new school to social butterfly down with kids in every crowd. He had strong opinions. She thought he would be a politician or an activist. It was in the blood. Her father, Lucien Holman, was head of the Illinois NAACP and served on the executive board. Lucia McBath herself is now the spokesperson for Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America.

"We always encouraged him to be strong. To speak out," McBath told me. "We tried to teach him to speak what you feel and think diplomatically."

She took a moment here. Her voice quavered but held. She said, "Even in that case with Jordan and the car, I think that he was not as diplomatic as he could be. That does not let Michael Dunn off the hook," McBath told me. "But I say to myself as a mother, 'I didn’t teach you and train you to do that. Adults are adults and you are still a child.'"

Agency is religion in black America. Benjamin Banneker made it. Harriet Tubman made it. Madame C.J. Walker made it. Charles Drew made it. Malcolm X made it. Barack Obama made it. You must make it too, and there is always a way. The religion of autoliberation is certainly not rebutted by the kind of graphs and stats that keep me up at night and that can easily lead to suicidal thoughts. Yours is the only self you will ever have. One must discover how to live in it or perish. 

She continued, "In my mind I keep saying, 'Had he not spoke back, spoke up, would he still be here?' I don't know. But I do know that Jordan was Jordan to the end. I think Jordan was defending his friends. 'We’re not bothering you. We don’t know you. You don’t know us. Why can’t we play our music as loud as we want?'"

I told her that I was stunned by her grace after the verdict. I told her the verdict greatly angered me. I told her that the idea that someone on that jury thought it plausible there was a gun in the car baffled me. I told her it was appalling to consider the upshot of the verdict—had Michael Dunn simply stopped shooting and only fired the shots that killed Jordan Davis, he might be free today.

She said, "It baffles our mind too. Don’t think that we aren’t angry. Don’t think that I am not angry. Forgiving Michael Dunn doesn't negate what I’m feeling and my anger. And I am allowed to feel that way. But more than that I have a responsibility to God to walk the path He's laid. In spite of my anger, and my fear that we won’t get the verdict that we want, I am still called by the God I serve to walk this out."

I asked if she'd considered that Dunn might never be convicted of Davis's murder. "It's a strong possibility," she said. "The minute we looked at the jury instructions, we thought, 'That right there is what will keep Jordan from getting a guilty verdict.' I was crushed but not surprised."

A thought came to me that had been swirling for days: Dunn might win on appeal. I considered the possibility of him walking free. I considered the spectacle of George Zimmerman walking free. I considered the great mass of black youth that is regularly interrupted without any real reckoning, without any consideration of the machinery of black pariahdom. I asked McBath how she felt about her country.

She paused, then gave an answer that perfectly summed up the spirit of African-American patriotism. "I still love my country. It's the only country we have. This is the best that I've got," she said. "And I still believe that there are people here who believe in justness and fairness. And I still believe there are people here who don’t make judgments about people based on the color of skin. I am a product of that. But I am disheartened that as far as we've come it doesn't matter that we have a black president. It doesn't matter how educated we’ve become. It doesn’t matter because there still is an issue of race in this country. No, we have not really arrived. If something like this can happen, we have not arrived. And I ask myself, 'At what point are we going to get there?' And I have no answer. And I want to be able to answer."

She wanted you to know that Jordan Davis was an individual black person. That he was an upper-middle-class kid. That his ancestry was diverse. That he had blacks in his family. Mexicans in his family. Panamanians in his family. That his great-grandfather was white. That some of his ancestors had passed. 

She wanted you to know that Jordan Davis was not from the "Gunshine State." That he was from Atlanta—Douglasville, Georgia, to be exact—where black people have things, and there is great pride in this. She wanted the world to know that Jordan Davis had things. That he lived in a three-story home in a cul-de-sac. That most of the children there had two parents. That original owners still lived in the development. That she was only the third owner. That Jordan Davis had access to all the other activities that every other kid in the neighborhood did, that he had not been deprived by divorce.

And she wanted you to know that Jordan Davis had a father. That this was why he was living in Jacksonville, where he was killed. That she was battling a second round of breast cancer and Davis's father said to her, "Let me raise him, you get well." She wanted you to know that she never ever kept Davis from his father. That she never put Jordan in the middle of the divorce, because she had already been there herself as a child—placed as a go-between between her mother and father. She said that this had wreaked havoc on her as a young woman. That it had even wreaked havoc on her own marriage. That she had carried that pain into relationships, into marriage, and did not want to do the same. She wanted you to know that Davis's father, Ron, is a good man.

She wanted you to know that what happened to Jordan in Jacksonville might not have happened in Atlanta, where black people enjoy some level of prestige and influence. That Jordan believed the level of consciousness in Jacksonville was not what it was in Atlanta, and that this ultimately played into why Jordan spoke up. That this ultimately played into why he was killed. I thought of Emmett Till, who was slaughtered for not comprehending the rules. For failing to distinguish Chicago, Illinois, from Money, Mississippi. For believing that there was one America, and it was his country.

She stood. It was time to go. I am not objective. I gave her a hug. I told her I wanted the world to see her, and to see Jordan. She said she thinks I want the world to see "him." She was nodding to my son. She added, "And him representing all of us." He was sitting there just as I have taught him—listening, not talking. 

Now she addressed him, "You exist," she told him. "You matter. You have value. You have every right to wear your hoodie, to play your music as loud as you want. You have every right to be you. And no one should deter you from being you. You have to be you. And you can never be afraid of being you."

She gave my son a hug and then went upstairs to pack.

A Kansas lawmaker is concerned that parents and teachers aren’t hitting children hard enough:

Democratic Rep. Gail Finney has introduced a bill that would allow parents, teachers and caregivers to spank children hard enough to leave redness or bruising. Under current state law, spanking that does not leave marks is already permitted. … Finney’s bill would allow “up to 10 forceful applications in succession of a bare, open-hand palm against the clothed buttocks of a child and any such reasonable physical force on the child as may be necessary to hold, restrain or control the child in the course of maintaining authority over the child, acknowledging that redness or bruising may occur on the tender skin of a child as a result.”

The chairman of the House Corrections and Juvenile Justice committee says they won’t even consider the bill. Other states, however, have laws on the books that are even more spanking-friendly:

Yes, it’s all the usual suspects. As of 2013: kids are still getting paddled (yes, paddled) in Georgia, though that’s declining in Mississippi. Florida banned paddling elementary school students and then un-banned it. A city in Tennessee almost banned corporal punishment, then decided to do more research. In 2012, there was an uproar in Texas when two male assistant principles paddled two girls so hard they had bruises. Parents thought it was inappropriate for men to paddle girls without a same sex administrator in the room. As long as the paddler can prove they’re beating the paddlee for “discipline,” it’s all legal.

company:

THE END OF FLAPPY BIRD WHAT THE FUCK

there

Molly Shannon is taking her first regular TV job in years. She's been cast as one of the leads in an untitled ABC sitcom pilot that was created by Happy Endings writer Brian Gallivan, THR reports. The comedy, which has a working title of Bambi Cottages, follows a father who, sick of his teaching job, moves his wife and six kids from a big city to New Hampshire where they run a set of cottages for tourists. Shannon will play Cathleen Burke, the wife and mother who's caught off-guard by her husband's decision but decides to go along with it. The pilot, one of two Brian Gallivan is developing this season, was sold to ABC last year. If the comedy goes to series, this will mark the first regular TV gig for Shannon since NBC's Kath & Kim ended in 2009.

Dear Cecilia:

I’m delighted that you’ve decided to work with us on your screenplay, “The Wind Whispered Her Name.” First of all, I think it’s a very strong piece. I have some preliminary thoughts, attached here, that will help us move forward. The notes are somewhat negotiable, but my deep experience and industry knowledge will help you sell this script.

Page 13: A minor dialogue tweak. When Caroline asks Fran, “how do we get out of this two-bit town,” I think the more honest answer is, “shoot ourselves out of a cannon.” The line you have (“I suppose we have to make something of ourselves”) is a little too on-the-nose. The scene also desperately needs some levity, since the only other discussion for six pages are depression, escaping cycles of poverty, dying family members, etc. Oof, downer!

Page 30: The first act break is great. We really feel for Fran as she learns from the mailman that her father has died, interrupting her work on her poetry manuscript. We understand Fran’s tendency to sentimentalize what she knows is hurting her.

I just don’t think the discussion of Leaves of Grass will grab an audience. What about something more dynamic, that an audience already knows? Like the famous Zacchini Brothers, who rode their human cannonball act to American citizenship, fame and fortune. It’s perfect! Edmondo Zacchini’s first spring-powered cannon broke his leg but later a compressed-air model launched them (literally and figuratively!) into their new life. This is exactly what Fran is hoping her poetry will do. It’s a perfect parallel. To boot, we have the chance for some really exciting flashbacks during the mailman conversation – imagine if we see Edmondo cradling his broken leg as we hear the mailman’s crying on Fran’s “dust-laced porch?” I smell Oscar buzz!

Page 56: The fight between the drunken John Marshall, Jr. and the jealous and equally drunk Rich Clement is well-paced. It’s rare in film to see an accurate depiction of a bar fight, with the sloppy punches and insults. And I can’t wait to see a talented actor handle John’s spurned look as Rich flings the barbed, “fighting’s not as fun when you’re not in one of your stories is it, pretty boy?” And the return of Fran’s lost family dog at the end, amongst the broken bottles, is an exquisite touch.

One quick note on the scene: when Rich wakes up from John’s knock out blow, what if he says, “I feel like I was shot from a cannon!” Much more pizzazz. And viewers already know that most human cannon-balls black-out in flight, but if you’re worried it won’t read, the bartender can quickly say “apparently many human cannon-balls black-out in flight like that man just did.” Or something to that effect – just sprinkle some of your writer’s magic on it!

Page 88: Rightfully, the anchor of the second act is the powerful sequence at the literary conference. Boy, when Fran and John Marshall, Jr. see each other at registration, I got chills! One change here: what if we lose the static literary conference and the protagonists are instead invited to a big traveling carnival?  It’s a wonderful opportunity for some exciting “show, not tell” moments. Imagine John Marshall, Jr., back from the big city and still a pile of ego and selfishness, watching someone shot thirty yards into a giant net? Is that not the perfect mirror of his own hubristic flight, leaving a heartbroken Fran to pursue his own literary dream only to land right where he started?

Page 97: In the same vein – what if John Marshall, Jr., instead of being invited to New York to finish his manuscript, instead joins P.T. Barnum’s circus, having always harbored dreams of becoming a human cannonball (rather than a fiction writer)? And then if Fran is an aspiring cannonball too? Their shared professional dream will only serve to heighten the tension between them. And it’s a small edit, really: the themes are much the same! Both writing and human cannon-balling are rare dreams for small town Southerners, and both deal in human emotion and explosive flights of imagination/human bodies.

Plus, I think viewers identify more with characters aspiring to be shot out of cannons than those aspiring to sit and write. To fly hundreds of yards through the air and join the ranks of greats like Ildebrando Zacchini?! I mean, wow! How inspiring!

Also what if the title were changed to “The Wind From My Cannon” or “Cannonball Whispers” or simply “Human Cannonballs?” I think that will grab viewers, especially in foreign markets.

One last note: Wow! Cecilia, great script, really wonderful stuff! I think with those few minor tweaks this story is going straight to the top!

I’ll see you (as we say in Hollywood) in the cannon!

-Jules

Read more Notes on Your Screenplay From a Producer Obsessed With Cannonballs at The Toast.

via

cant-faze:

iamsuchajerk:

buzzfeed:

Every Pixar movie summarized in terrible Microsoft Paint drawings.

what

Lmao had me Rollin

After an exhaustive and comprehensive study, doctors have finally been able to pin down the vague but persistent set of symptoms plaguing everyone and come to the surprising conclusion that every single American human suffers from seasonal depression.

“It’s true,” Dr. Kim Bass, the lead scientist in the study announced dully from a podium, “not that it does anyone much good to know it. But now you know it. Everyone has it. That sinking feeling in your heart when you start to notice the sun setting at four in the afternoon? The early-morning nausea that keeps you from getting out of bed? The seizing, flushing, frenzied attacks that grip you alone in the car as you barrel down the road in the dark to your windowless office building; that’s seasonal depression, and you have it, and everyone has it, even the people in Hawaii have it, they just don’t know it yet.”

“Everybody has it and nothing’s any good.”

Scientists were at a loss when it came to practical treatments. “I guess we could just move,” Dr. Bass said quietly, as if only to herself, hunched over a chair mechanically eating a peanut butter and Fluff sandwich, “but where would we go?” She burst into tears. “Our whole lives are here.”

“Those stupid lamps don’t do anything,” she added, folding the rest of the sandwich into her mouth and gesturing furiously at a very expensive, carefully calibrated light therapy chamber. “It’s a stupid fucking lamp. It’s not the sun. It’s not summer. It’s not anything.”

“It’s not anything,” she concluded, before burning the rest of her lab notes for warmth.

Read more Doctors Diagnose 100% of Americans With Seasonal Affective Disorder at The Toast.

A reader writes:

A little story from my own life. Many years ago, I met a young man at a showing of the Rocky Horror Picture Show. I managed, despite my fear of rejection, to ask him out on a date and, miracle of miracles, he said yes. Just before our date, I stopped in a little neighborhood florist shop and bought him a single yellow rose. He loved it. From then on, we bought each other roses from this shop for every occasion, however little – we’re having hot dogs together! – or important – will you move in with me?

Finally the day came when I asked him to marry me and I went to buy him a single red rose from “our” florist.

In those days, we couldn’t legally marry, but my church, the Religious Society of Friends, would marry us anyway. When I told the florist how special and important this rose was, that I was asking my great love, a man, to marry me, she pulled back the rose and told me she was a good Christian and wouldn’t sell me the rose or roses ever again, not for something sick like that. We had been buying from this florist for five years and never happened to mention what they were for.

The place was always busy, we were in a hurry, so it never came up, but I was so bursting with pride and joy that I was asking the man I loved more than life itself to marry me, to be with me until death, I said something that day. I left empty-handed and broken-hearted. The joy in what I was about to do had a cold pail of hate thrown on it. I asked him to marry me without a rose from “our” shop. He said yes anyway and he was with me until he died from a fire in 1981.

I still bring a rose to his grave every year, but not from our florist.

well-thats-ood:

Ariel and Herc are technically cousins.

#socially awkward gingers

Yeah, that and: Ariel is the daughter of Triton, son of Poseidon, brother of Zeus, who is the father of Hercules. So yeah technically, they are literal cousins. Cool, isn’t it?

HOLY

thebigbadwolfe:

That was FUCKED up

queenxmedusa:

life on point

Most recently in this series of unspeakable torments: New Year’s Fallout.

To: Katie; Allison; charlotte.smith857@gmail.com; Caitlin; Ashley; Ali; Morgan L.; Jen
From: Nicole
Date: January 24, 2014
Subject: LOVE IS IN THE AIR LADIES

Hey, Ladies!

Okay so Valentine’s day is right around the corner and as we all know, usually I am TGFHOWMGACHH (totally game for hanging out with my girls and cursing Hallmark holidays) but I am afraid I may be on FEMALE HIATUS for the first time IN MY LIFE this Valentine’s day and that is because….I have met….an amazing man.

Okay remember when I told you all about the guy from Tinder who was like an “analyst” (boring) but also like he knew three of my camp friends so we had mutuals and both voted for Obama according to our similar interests? Not him.

THIS GUY is, okay. Apologies to anyone who I may have already told this to (Katie, Charlotte, Morgan, Ash (??) (Ash did I tell you??), but his name is TYLER and he’s literally amazing and I didn’t even meet him on Tinder!

I met him on OkCupid and he’s 6’2 (minimal height I allow), a Scorpio (most sexual sign) and loves dogs, his family, his friends and his job (he’s a teacher! I’m dead). Honestly he is amazing. We went on our first date last night to the Mermaid Inn which I feel like, is a definite sign that he’s into me because you know what they say about oysters…

But date one at the end of Jan is SUPER RISKY as V-day approaches quickly and it’s like, do I initiate the talk? I know it seems soon but I read in Cosmo that guys are more likely to lock a woman down in the winter (something about snuggling and no outdoor seating at bars for day drinking), and I just….when you know you know…in a way.

ANYWAY, LADIES, PLEASE ADVISE..

xoxoxxox
N I C O L E

I came here tonight because when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.” ― Nora Ephron, When Harry Met Sally

—

To: Nicole; Katie; Allison; charlotte.smith857@gmail.com; Caitlin; Ali; Morgan L.; Jen
From: Ashley
Date: January 24, 2014
Subject: LOVE IS IN THE AIR LADIES

no you didn’t tell me but wait tyler who???????????????????????????????? does he bartend on the UWS ever?????????????????????????????????????(jw)

Ash

—

To: Ashley; Nicole; Katie; Allison; charlotte.smith857@gmail.com; Caitlin; Morgan L.; Jen
From: Ali
Date: January 24, 2014
Subject: LOVE IS IN THE AIR LADIES

Hey Ladies!!

OMG Nicole this is so exciting!!! He sounds amazing! We must strategize this! As everyone knows, Mike & I broke up, and I LOVE that you know how confident I am and over it and how I’m so drama-free and like a nurturing Earth Mother type so I can talk about these things and be 100% excited for you and not at all jealous!

Ok, dating less than a month before Valentine’s Day is the best ever cause it makes everything get serious really quickly and puts pressure on the dude to be forthcoming about his feelings.

First off, what’s Tyler’s last name?? Are his parents still married? If he’s a teacher, does that mean he has roommates? Are you sad he’s a teacher? Do you think it’s cause he likes being around high school girls? What happened with his last relationship? Have you searched for him on one of those sex offender apps? I usually do that on dates when the guy is in the bathroom, just to make sure we’re on the up and up. I mean how cray would that be if Chris Hansen came barging in to the Mermaid Inn on one of your dates lol.

My friend at Bank of America can totally run a credit/background check on him, which I think we should do sooner rather than later!

Def make him bring up V-Day first!!!!! But drop a ton of hints about it!!! Guys love hints and are usually great at picking up on them!!

So are we doing a girls night for V-Day or not? I might have a boyf by then, but I’m so not THAT GIRL where I’d ditch, so LMK by COB!

Tell me everything.

xoxo,
Ali

“I’m hopeful I’ll find love.” – Juan Pablo, The Bachelor
“Tears are gonna fall, rolling in the deep. You had my heart inside of your hand” – Adele

—

To: Ali; Ashley; Katie; Allison; charlotte.smith857@gmail.com; Caitlin; Morgan L.; Jen
From: Nicole
Date: January 25, 2014
Subject: LOVE IS IN THE AIR LADIES

Ladiesssssahhhhhfodigjsko,

Ali, thanks so much. I know this is probably a really hard time for you because of your seasonal depression/breakup/everyone else finding someone and then you have to kind of feel like you’re lonely and will end up alone but you definitely won’t!! YOU WON’T. Your hair is too amazing for you not to find love (seriously)….lyl.

OKAY SO LET’S REALLY GET DOWN TO BIZ:

I’ve bolded your questions and then answered them so everyone can read along easily!!!!! Morgy are you still with us????

First off, what’s Tyler’s last name?? NEED TO FIND THIS OUT

Are his parents still married? Yes this is always the first question I asked after the Phil fiasco of 2011.

If he’s a teacher, does that mean he has roommates? Just 2!!!!

Are you sad he’s a teacher? no i think it’s cute >>> i beLiEVe tHAT CHiLDREN aRe OuR FuTuRe RIP WHIT <<<<<<

—

To: Nicole; Ali; Ashley; Katie; Allison; charlotte.smith857@gmail.com; Caitlin; Jen
From: Morgan
Date: January 26, 2014
Subject: LOVE IS IN THE AIR LADIES

I totes do NOT think at all that you should feel depressed about his roommate situation!!!

It’s like, NEW YORK!!! Everyone has a roommate until they’re 40. Like, look at Bethany Frankel!

Has he mentioned v-day plans yet?? does anyone want to go to Fly Barre tomorrow??? I have a Groupon.

—

To: Ali; Ashley; Katie; Allison; charlotte.smith857@gmail.com; Caitlin; Morgan L.; Jen
From: Nicole
Date: January 26, 2014
Subject: LOVE IS IN THE AIR LADIES

wait who said i was depressed???

you guys should i just move on from this guy?? is 2 roommates two too many???? ugh this is how i know i’m a carrie.

xoxoxoxoxoxo N I C O L E

—

To: Ashley; Nicole; Katie; Allison; charlotte.smith857@gmail.com; Caitlin; Morgan L.; Jen
From: Ali
Date: January 26, 2014
Subject: LOVE IS IN THE AIR LADIES

Hi Ladies!!

Ok let’s do a deep dive! I think Tyler sounds great, except for his job and living situation but you can totally change those things. With Mike, I thought his best friend was a total douche so I just flirted with him a ton and Mike got so weirded out I never had to see him at things. Guys will change for the right girl!!

When’s your second date? What are his friends like? Does he want to have a Groundhog’s Day party and invite us all? Or are all his friends teachers too no offense lol. I think it’s DEFINITELY time to drop V-Day hints. Your first holiday will set the tone for the entire relationship.

Have you dropped hints for what you want for a present?? You guys are so new as a couple but I would aim for the Tiffanys/Agent Provocateur/flowers at work trifecta. Do you think he’ll say I love you at V-Day?? Is his phone password protected??

I’d show him you’re laid back yet down while still retaining mystery while also seeming low-maintenance in terms of hangs yet high-maintenance in terms of emotions and trust yet commanding respect but in a fun sort of way.

THIS IS SO EXCITING AHHHHHHH

Also, what’s our cut-off for older dudes to date?

Loves!
Ali

Money can’t buy you class
Elegance is learned my friends
Elegance is learned oh yeah
- Countess Luann

—

To: Nicole; Katie; Allison; charlotte.smith857@gmail.com; Caitlin; Ali; Morgan L.; Jen
From: Ashley
Date: January 28, 2014
Subject: LOVE IS IN THE AIR LADIES

I pulled an all-nighter last night (excel is such a fucking betch) and now I scheduled an emergency 911 therapy because my life is falling apart.

sorry i cant deal with this can you guys take me off the chain.

i need inbox 0 this isn’t helping

ash

—

To: Ali; Ashley; Katie; Allison; charlotte.smith857@gmail.com; Caitlin; Morgan L.; Jen
From: Nicole
Date: January 28, 2014
Subject: LOVE IS IN THE AIR LADIES

This is really typical of you Ash. I answered ALL of your snapchats when your Tinder date made you go to BUSHWICK.

I think you’ll see your email’s language differently after a few hours of sleep. I can forgive you but really lol, that was rude.

xoxoxooxo N I C O L E

—

Read more Hey Ladies: Love Is in the Air at The Toast.

Flappy Bird Think Pieces Dot Tumblr Dot Com has helpfully aggregated segregated all the long pieces of writing about the short-lived app sensation Flappy Bird, so that they will not appear anywhere else on the Internet and you won't be disturbed by them. LOOK ONLY IF YOU DARE. An emotional winter is coming. No but seriously, the trick is picking the good one!

The post The "Light Thinking Followed By Typing" Industry Strikes Again appeared first on The Awl.

The NYT profile is quite something. And what you glean from it is that, for Sam growing up, his sexual orientation was the least of his troubles:

Life had hardly been kind to him or his family. Michael Sr. and his mother, JoAnn Sam, were separated after having eight children. He went to North Texas to work as a trucker. She tried to keep what was left of her family together. A sister drowned when she was 2, before Michael was born, when another child accidentally knocked her off a fishing pier. Another brother, Russell, was 15 when he was shot and killed trying to break into a home, in what his father said was part of a gang initiation. Another brother, Julian, has not been heard from since he left for work one day in 1998; his family believes he is dead. Two others are in jail.

One of the more frustrating things about being gay can be the assumption that your sexual orientation must have been the toughest thing about your childhood or adolescence. And so the gay identity – attached with every good intention – can erase the complicated identities of actual gay people, whose lives are shaped, like those of straight people, by all the slings and arrows of general fortune. For some of us, being gay was a minor variation in the symphony of our childhood and adolescence, compared with all the other things going on. And for some of us, being gay wasn’t a trap, it was also a form of liberation. It wasn’t the problem we had to solve; it was the solace that made those problems surmountable.

You see that in Sam’s life – the clear importance of his friendships in sustaining him, the camaraderie of his fellow gays at the local gay bar, and the overwhelming role of football in giving him a way out of his deeply challenging background. It seems to me that Sam’s real breakthrough is therefore not just in being a gay potential NFL player, but in showing how, for a new generation, being gay need not be the defining issue of life, and yet can also be a liberating gift.

This is not a life made tragic by homosexuality. It is a life empowered by it.

Inspired by the recent surge of publicity Nathan Fielder is getting for his "Dumb Starbucks" stunt, Comedy Central has put the entire first season of Fielder's show Nathan For You online for free on their website, hoping to get new viewers into the show while everyone is talking about Fielder and Dumb Starbucks.

Nathan For You returns for its second season sometime this summer, and the Dumb Starbucks experiment will be the focus of one episode. Fielder is also making a last-minute appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live tonight to discuss Dumb Starbucks.

1. 
Kids don’t think about jobs, what is a job.

2.
If you wanted a job, you just got it. Like say if you wanted to be a doctor, you just grew up and then you were one. Manifest destiny.

3.
Job fairs. You have to print your resume on nice paper with a watermark. Wear sensible shoes and black pants. Smile. Firm handshake.

4.
Monster dot com.

5.
Craigslist. No attachments!! Personalize your cover letter, show your enthusiasm. And refresh all the time because you have to be in like, the first ten to apply or forget about it.

6.
You stalk people on the internet and then ask them for informational interviews and then you meet them for coffee and they’re so impressed with you they give you a job.

7.
Okay forget Craigslist. It’s all about specialized job boards. They hide the jobs so only the best people can find them. Look harder!!

8.
Make your resume POP! Use those InDesign Skills. Add visual elements. Make your personality shine through. Vamp up your cover letter. Shine on. Consider a sexier font.

9.
Make your cover letter really boring. Use only language in the job ad. Undesign your resume. It’s a numbers game. Apply to everything.

10.

Who do you know that can give you a job. Who. Think harder.

Over the weekend, the internet was abuzz with news of a new Los Angeles coffee shop called "Dumb Starbucks," a near-fully functioning Starbucks that 1) was blatantly not affiliated with the company and 2) used the company's name and logo "for marketing purposes" but adds the word "dumb" in front of everything to protect the business under parody laws. Dumb Starbucks, which had its windows tinted to prevent passersby from looking inside, didn't charge money for coffee and pastries, instead giving away free cups of coffee featuring the Dumb Starbucks logo.

Since it opened Friday afternoon at 1802 Hillhurst Ave in LA's Los Feliz neighborhood, the legally questionable establishment attracted a lot of internet and media attention and by Monday, the line for the parody coffee shop wrapped around the block and had a four-hour wait.

After The AP discovered TV production company Abso Lutely, run by Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim had obtained a filming permit for the location, Nathan Fielder, star/co-creator of Comedy Central's docu-reality series Nathan For You, revealed himself to be behind Dumb Starbucks yesterday afternoon, as many speculated. Fielder held a press release outside the storefront, promising tongue-in-cheek that he intends to keep the store open "forever," and uploaded the above video to YouTube identifying himself as president and founder of Dumb Starbucks. The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health came and shut down the store for operating without a food permit shortly thereafter. Thankfully, in the press conference Fielder said he plans to open a Dumb Starbucks in Brooklyn in the coming weeks, so east coast lovers of parody coffee shops will get their chance to wait in line for four hours for a free cup of dumb coffee too.

Fielder's Dumb Starbucks stunt will be the subject of an episode in Nathan For You's second season, which will consist of 10 episodes and is expected to premiere sometime this summer. This isn't the first time Fielder's antics have made headlines. Last year, a video of a pig rescuing a baby goat went viral but was just a stunt for an episode of his show and he has attracted media attention from encouraging his Twitter followers to text weird things to their loved ones.

Comedy Central's attorneys confirmed that they believe the Dumb Starbucks stunt to be legally safe, with a spokesperson for the cable network's parent company Viacom telling THR, "The episode relating to 'Dumb Starbucks' constitutes protected free expression. Viacom takes intellectual property rights seriously, and also recognizes the important constitutional protection afforded to expressive works characterized by social commentary."

A Starbucks spokesperson disagreed, saying, "We are evaluating next steps and while we appreciate the humor, they cannot use our name, which is a protected trademark."

Patrons of the store were handed this FAQ sheet about the legality of Dumb Starbucks:

Here's an Instagram shot actor Rainn Wilson took from within Dumb Starbucks that captures most of the stuff inside it:

You were too flappy to live.

The post A Video Tribute To Flappy Bird, 2013-2014 appeared first on The Awl.

DIRTBAG SHAKESPEARE imagines modern remakes of Shakespearean plays with a teenage dirtbag cast. The rest is pretty self-explanatory.

A GHOST appears.
GHOST: have you ever listened to Sublime
HAMLET: [makes j/o motion]

CLAUDIUS: who drew this dick on my face
HAMLET: does your face not always look like that

GERTRUDE: Hamlet I invited some of your friends over
HAMLET: [smoking] theyre not my friends
i wish i were dead

GHOST: hamlet you must avenge my death
HAMLET: i dont have to do anything
youre not even my real dad
GHOST: yes i am
HAMLET: whatever

GHOST: have you killed Claudius yet
HAMLET: no
GHOST: why
HAMLET: fuck you is why
im going to the cemetery to touch skulls

Enter HAMLET, skateboarding
OPHELIA: My lord, I–
HAMLET ollies over OPHELIA’s head
HAMLET [offstage]: we were never dating

GERTRUDE walks down the hallway. Enter HAMLET, skateboarding.
HAMLET: SLUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU
(HAMLET skates backwards) UUUUUUTT

LAERTES: Ophelia is dead
HAMLET: damn
LAERTES: she drowned herself
HAMLET: thats metal
i knew she was cool

(HAMLET is dying)
HAMLET: Horatio
come here
(he does)
HAMLET: Closer
(he does)
(HAMLET draws a dick on his face)
HAMLET: ahaha
(He dies)

Images by Matt Lubchansky, who makes comics and occasionally leaves his apartment in New York. His work includes Please Listen to Me and New Amsterdam Mystery Company. He’s on Twitter, and doesn’t expect you to get his name right.

Read more Dirtbag Hamlet at The Toast.