Will Hines Dot Net

If you’ve talked to me for more than 10 minutes the past week you’ve heard me mention how I’m reading Getting Things Done, a book on better organizing your time. I’m halfway through and while I do think it’s a helpful, sensible book — I also find it hilarious because of the incredibly vague “business” specifics these type of books use as examples.

How good could that conference potentially be? How effective could the training program be, or the structure of your executives’ compensation package? How inspiring is the essay you’re writing? How motivating the staff meeting? How functional the reorganization?

On one hand, I understand why David Allen, the author, chooses such non-examples as “how functional the reorganization.” The bulk of his audience is probably busy executives, and by keeping it somewhat vague, but still “businessy” he’s sure to not leave any of them out. Still, good writing is having the guts to choose a specific example, knowing that it will illuminate your point even if your reader has not had the same experience. If I were writing that paragraph, I would shamelessly use real examples from my current life:

How good could that sketch about the hyper-evolved burro be? How effective could PHP be for building the web site of that celebrity news magazine? How inspiring is the post you’re writing for the blog which you named after yourself? How motivating is the footage of your friend punching another friend in the nuts which you’re using to open a five minute homage to the Three Stooges? How functional the reorganization?

I’ve read a handful of these “make yourself a better businessmen” productivity books, but I’ve also read a handful of “you’re having a nervous breakdown” self-help books. They are almost identical in their tone. That chatty, just-between-you-and-me tone. The only difference is in the examples. The first has sentences like “Let’s say you’re planning a presentation for your vice-president” and the second has “Let’s say your husband has left you for your sister.”

The only one that tried to cross both is the hilarious Dale Carnegie book How To Stop Worrying and Start Living which I read while super-depressed and unemployed in Cape Cod in 1995. It is the most subtly hilarious book I have ever read. Old-school Dale Carnegie tries to talk you out of depression with the same folksy advice and examples he used to psyche up salesmen in the 1940s. Sample chapters:

• A Law That Will Outlaw Many Of Your Worries
• Put A “Stop-Loss” Order On Your Worries
• A Magic Formula For Solving Your Worry Problems

I don’t know — it’s probably a good book. How To Win Friends And Influence People is a truly good book, I think. But If I could bottle the humor I get from reading How To Stop Worrying And Start Living, I could be the most famous comedy writer on the planet Everywhere.

Come on out tonight and see a sketch show called Sketch & Awe that I helped write.

Sketch & Awe
UCBT, 9:30pm
More Details

I had to create a burro costume for it, if that’s the type of thing that entices you. I couldn’t find a burro costume, so after conferring with Dyna Moe I purchased white bunny ears and went to get grey spray paint. When I got to the paint store, the guy there asked me “What kind of grey spray paint?”

I said “I’m not sure.”
He said “What do you need it for?”
“I’m going to paint these white bunny ears grey for a burro costume.” I held up the bunny ears.
He paused for not that brief a time, turned around, grabbed a can of spray paint from the wall and handed it to me. He added “It’s gonna mat the hair, but if you just want it for a quick costume, this’ll do you.”

Thank God it’s Halloween. If it were July, I’d have to explain to this guy that it’s not for Halloween but for a sketch show, which is an entity of entertainment that few retailers easily understand. And I find that retailers in New York are not that helpful when they don’t understand why you want their product. When I turned 30 I wanted to buy business cards that said “I attended the 30th birthday party of Will Hines and found him to be charming and accessible.” I thought that’d be a funny party favor to give out. At the print store, the guy read my order and said in a Russian accent:

“What you wrote isn’t a business card.”
“I know.”
“I don’t understand then.”
“it’s for my birthday party. It’s a joke.”
(Re-examines form) “But it’s not funny.”

He might have been right. But after a prolonged justification I got him to let me order the cards from him anyway. We are happily married today and are expecting our fourth child which I will name Business Card. The previous sentence is fictional.

Come see Sketch & Awe!

Eliza pointed out that when my cats meow, it sounds impressively close to “hello.” This is because my cats draw out their meows for a split-second longer than you expect, and that is because they are selfish, quarter-feral creature who tend to do everything in a primitive we-still-think-we-live-outside way. Thanks to this observation, whenever my cats meow I can now hear the “hello” buried within it as clearly as a bell ringing. That’s some creepy shit.

If you are a web programmer, and you want to have fancy fading- in- and- out, sliding- up- and- down, refreshing-without-full-page-load effects, then you should check out JQuery. It is a TINY Javascript library that lets you accomplish all this nonsense with remarkably little code. The Javascript portion of a page is normally a huge spider-web of messy code that barely works on more than one browser type — but JQuery somehow lets you get the same amount done with terse, readable lines — that NEVER mixes with your HTML! When I read the documentation, it was like someone pointing out that every door in my house had another knob that I had never noticed before. I’m impressed! And their site is clean and easy-to-read, as far as these things go. Wordpress-esque.

There is a web revolution going on, I’m certain. I’ve been doing this long enough to recognize it just be feel. And it FEELS like 1998. Hugely overpriced buyouts do not interest me, but elegant solutions that actually help do.

I hope Neil Casey reads this post, because no one else is going to give a rat’s ass.

I know I’m more than 30 years behind on this, but The French Connection is a really good movie. It was my second movie from Netflix and I enjoyed it very much.

The commentary by director William Friedkin is good too. You know how on some, maybe most, commentaries the director either talks in such minute detail about what lens they used that it’s useless? Or else they go in the other direction and say basically NOTHING, just summarizing what is going on on the screen (“and now the main guy picks up the stapler — there, he’s done it”). Friedkin actually explains his thinking behind story decisions and filmmaking in a direct and accessible way. He pointed out when he used long unbroken shots, and which sequences were made in the editing room versus made by the actors. I felt like it was a good film class.

Today is the birthday of Jerry Siegel. In 1932, when he was 19, Siegel and his artist friend Joe Shuster came up with the character and story of Superman. That’s more than just the first superhero, more than just the most famous comic book character — that is arguably the most successful and popular STORY from ANY medium in all of Western Civilization! There, I said it! And you know what? It’s not that crazy what I just said! You put on a red cape with a S on your chest and walk up to any child on this planet and say “Who am I?” and that kid will know. That is some story. Two kids in Cleveland thought that story up, and the writer of the pair was born today.

There should be a parade or something.

Interviews with Siegel: http://theages.superman.ws/Creators/siegelBio.php

I am performing stand-up tonight as part of this showcase. Maybe you could like come out and watch? The show is called “Low Profile” hosted by a bunch of silly people I am friends with. Details, arbitrarily boldfaced:

Low Profile (show), at Fat Baby (bar)
112 Rivington St near the corner of Essex
Time: 8PM, cost: 5 bucks

And a round-up of things:

• I drink coffee mostly for the chance to run out and buy it, which is to say: for the breaks. It’s like a smoke break for non-smokers. I also believe that if I had ever smoked a cigarette even once I would be the most hard-core chain smoker you knew. It’s life-changing observations like this that you will be able to absorb from my set tonight, folks.
• Reading PKD’s Martian Time-Slip — this is book number 11. Reading these books are really just about bumping up the totals, now. What should YOU read, if you want to sample PKD? Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? is probably his best overall. Now Wait For Last Year is one of his best of the “so trippy it’s hard to keep track of what’s going on” variety and Ubik is good for the “cool idea taken to the millionth degree” book.
• I am Freedying on the song “Be My Baby” by the Ronnettes. I want Eliza to teach me the drum part, which she says is easy. I also need drums.
• Kevin and I played ping-pong Friday night. We are… ungood.
• “do” is such a weird verb to apply to stand-up. I am “doing” stand-up. It’s like the English language doesn’t know what to do with the practice of performing stand-up comedy and can’t come up with a better verb. More stuff like this tonight, guys!

…right down to the domain name.
http://www.5ives.com/

This is a funny one.

He also mentions a lot of songs. Someone get me a Ted Leo and the Whoevers album, please.

The largest amount of traffic to my site, by far, is to an old post about Liz Phair. The traffic goes there because in the comments Charlie Todd posted a link to a picture of her which showed the dark circular objects which naturally occur at the end of a women’s mammary glands. I am being clincial because using any common terminology would attract thousands and thousands of hits from Internet users, rabidly searching for any mention of “Liz Phair” and “common term for dark circular portions of the end of a woman’s mammary glands.” I had to change Mr. Todd’s comment because I feel violated that all these pervy users are taking advantage of my blog.

I’m reading PKD book number 11: Martian Time-Slip. I love them all, but it is just plain SILLY how every single one involves 1) the main character discovering that there is more than one reality, and it’s impossible to tell at any given time which is “real” and 2) some powerfully addictive, awkwardly named drug (Substance D, Chew-Z, JJ-180).

I joined Netflix. Love the recommendation system. I’m ready to be innundated by media!

Finished up a Channel 102 pilot with DeCoster, Rocco and Thunder. I’d say there’s an 80% chance of it making sense by the time we’re done.

I’ve given up looking for a great Content Management System for web sites. Instead, I’m looking for great web site-building TOOLS. My latest great hope: CakePHP. You’re still building your app from scratch, but this takes care of a LOT of the database manipulation for you. A lot.