I may dress up for the Oscar party after all

I've never been into the Oscars. Award shows are silly fodder. Bread and circuses, right? But today I saw a nominee for best animated short, and I think I may actually care who wins in this category.

I know it's 16 minutes long, but it will be worth every minute. Watch it twice. The first time I saw it was like the first time I read Tom Robbins: You mean, other people think like that too?




Even if it doesn't win, I would have probably never heard of this short if it weren't for the Oscars. So I guess maybe award shows aren't all bad.

Gangsta For Life (G4L)!

I've been listening to a lot of hip hop and Top 40 bullshit lately. Some people have reality TV, others trashy romance novels -- my guilty pleasure is terribly bad music. Or at least it is terribly bad to the music fascists out there. It makes me happy. So really, what's wrong with that?

My roommate and I were listening to the radio in the car last night and Rihanna's new song Hard was playing. I commented that she was on Def Jam now and had to get some street cred. Read: Pop/Rap song with Young Jeezy. Oh dear lord. Can you believe how ridiculous it is that I know this? (BTW: Check out the song. I really like it.)

hard - rihanna ft young jeezy

I started thinking about how silly real life would be if we all acted like hip hop artists:

I stayed up partying past midnight last weekend. We were drinking Sierra Nevada and sauteing shrimp for dinner. Watching Curb Your Enthusiasm we rented from NetFlix: Larry David is a genius. I'm not scared to laugh.

I caught the 71 from Aptos to Watsonville. It runs once an hour. Some of the drivers know me. I look so fly walking to the bus stop that cars driving by honk and people wave. I wave back. Yeah, I know I rule.

During the week I kick it at Smith Micro Software. I'm always writing the coolest shit so people will want to buy our software. Other software companies are wishing they had our products. Their marketers would kill for my skills.

After work I'm hitting up Target for some Clear Care contact solution and Crest Whitening Toothpaste. You don't wanna question my hygiene. I'll shower once, maybe twice, a day. But I'm not washing my hair that often. Don't get it twisted.

I don't always ride the bus. Sometimes I walk. I can walk for miles. I walk 3 miles every day. Up hills and shit. That's how tough I am. Once in a while I ride in my roommate's Ford Focus. Or my boyfriend's Toyota Tundra. I don't know if it has sweet rims or anything, but I would bet it does. He doesn't play.

And that was just this past week! I gotta say, I feel pretty hard. And awesome. Don't hate. Give it a try. You just might find out you're extraordinary.

P.S. Rihanna's new look is really hot. And I am going to shamelessly promote her and her new album, which kicks ass and is being released November 23.

This blog is brought to you by FCI

Last week I sent a message to my friend on Facebook telling him how I really didn't like the desert because the only experience I had with it was neon lights and soul-sucking gambling. Since then many of the advertisements on my page have had something to do with gambling addiction hotlines.

Last night I was told by a friend that Bert's Bees products are actually owned by Clorox. We then discussed how sooner or later the air we breath in Steven's Square (or Phillips or LynLake) will be brought to us by some corporate sponsor -- most likely Best Buy or 3M.

This morning I read that the new Twins stadium will be called Target Field. (For now I will just ignore the fact that it was mostly funded with public money. That's for another rant.)

You know how people freak out about our children being desensitized to violence at a young age? What about them being desensitized to advertising? I know some people that don't even notice that Volkswagen paid for product placement in the Bourne movies, and the company had corresponding car commercials!

Being a journalism major gives me a small window into the psychology of advertising and it frightens me that some people don't notice the barrage of commercials, billboards, and mind-reading advertising.

(Side note: If you read The DaVinci Code -- one of the most popular books in the past years-- did you notice the product placement in it? IN A BOOK???? Ack!)

I have challenged myself to rethink the attitude I have about wants and needs. I think this is one of the only ways to battle the steep mind control we are up against.