Blogs-to-books aren’t a well-respected genre. As the editor of Twitter Wit, which was simply a collection of funny Twitter messages, I was accused of killing American literature. (Spoiler: nope.) And the proliferation of picture books makes people assume every blog-to-book is made for people who hate to read.

Sam Greenspan’s 11 Points Guide to Hooking Up, a set of 11-item lists about sex and dating by the founder of 11Points.com, is actually funny, not in the “oh heh that was a joke” sort of way, but a respectably witty sort of way. And that’s not something to take for granted in this field.

It’s kind of a humor book, but kind of a how-to. The “tips” are all pretty common-sense, or at least no more elaborate than what you’d pick up on one of those giant forum threads where guys share sex and romance advice: Try street festivals for easy dates in the city, wait fifteen minutes before returning an after-date text. Greenspan is openly making this stuff up, so it’s easy to skip past advice you disagree with.

And I disagreed with plenty. This book isn’t pushing any boundaries, and in fact it can be a little regressive, e.g., when Greenspan advises women never to insist on paying for any of the first three dates. He does have a really good point about Thai food: It leaves your breath fresh for a kiss, so it’s a solid second-date pick.

But I want to reiterate that it’s funny! It’s cute right from the intro, where Greenspan mentions the “under-the-radar stereotypes” that “women only use one password for every website, Jews don’t drink milk with dinner, and all Goth kids weigh either under 115 or over 220 pounds.” He is correct, much later on, that men are wary of women with more than two inspirational quotes decorating their apartment walls.

It’s particularly funnier than the title or cover would imply. And that’s the problem — the gimmicks that make blogs popular are the ones that make a book seem like schticky bullshit. And publishers want bloggers to stick to the formats that made them popular, because publishers are in the business of finding something already popular, putting it on paper and collecting the money. (I guess that’s better than, say, film producers, who are in the business of finding something popular, mashing it into a pulp and collecting all the money.) I hope Greenspan gets a chance some time to stretch outside the 11 Points format — in a book-to-book.

Book: 11 Points Guide to Hooking Up by Sam Greenspan

Perfect Strangers is out on DVD, and there’s a browser game to advertise it.

Storyline: Balki from Perfect Strangers must catch all the stars in a music video of the show’s theme song, or he will misspell the dream you typed in.

Gameplay: Space to jump, arrow keys to move. Decently responsive, but not twitch.

Difficulty: Easy to get most of the stars, hard to get all of the stars without playing enough times to wonder whether you’re making good life choices

Graphics: Obscured by Balki’s butt.

Entertainment value: See screenshot of dreams entered by the most recent players.

Wreck-It Ralph looks so good. It looks like it’s the first good mainstream video-game-referencing thing ever created. When I first heard about it, I was optimistic based on early art but skeptical based on every “movie about video games” ever made. But man. This one looks GREAT. There’s so many great things in this trailer, I’m going to have to go through it shot by shot.

I love how there are three different character designs for Ralph. There’s his 8-bit sprite, his 3D model, and his 2D arcade cabinet drawing. I like how all three of those looks are so faithful to the aesthetic they’re based on. There’s a few discrepancies, like, an 8-bit game couldn’t have that many colors and probably wouldn’t have voice acting that clear.

But when you consider that these kind of subtle changes are important for keeping it connected to the rest of the movie, its understandable. But come on, just the fact that we’re even talking about color pallets as the only potential flaw in an 8-bit mock up is amazing. Most things branded as “8-bit” look more like a weird combination of 16-bit (in terms of pallet) and DOS games (in terms of sprite shape) — I’m talking about, like, the Code Monkeys and IT Crowd sprites. But Ralph’s sprite looks like an actual 8-bit sprite.

Huh! It’s really interesting to think of the individual *instances* of a video game character and not the in-universe characters. Like, this implies that this particular Ralph has been sitting here for 30 years in this one arcade. A lot like the Toy Story toys, where two Buzz Lightyears can have different personalities.

Man, what a great way to spoof Mario! There are so many Mario spoofs on the internet and I feel like Fix-It Felix is probably the best one I’ve ever seen. Showing the Mario character as overly sunny and sort of privileged, in contrast with the down-trodded Donkey Kong character. It’s a really interesting angle on it. It’s a much more interesting way to make Mario funny than “he’s Italian so let’s make Italian jokes.”

Felix and Ralph’s dynamic really distills the heart of the dynamic between Mario and Donkey Kong, especially in the arcade games. Even though the story to the arcade game is extremely simple, the moral lines between Mario and Donkey Kong were always meant to be a little blurry. Remember that in Donkey Kong Jr. the bad guy was actually Mario.

The removal of a princess or damsel, and changing Ralph into just a big guy instead of a gorilla is also a really smart move. If there was a girl, the story would have to be about the girl. And if he was a gorilla, the story would have to be about how he’s a gorilla. Just making them two guys really focuses on the relationship between the good cop and bad cop.

Oh huh! They did a really good job of translating that 30s-cartoon-inspired 80s manga aesthetic into 3D. In fact, they probably do a BETTER job than the Mario games. This movie’s art style preserves the wide mouths and rosy noses that the Mario franchise abandoned when it moved into 3D. And it looks really cool.

WHAT. I guess licensed characters are in this! At first I thought it was like Who Framed Roger Rabbit where the licensed characters play walk-on bit parts, but upon closer inspection they seem to have tight integration in the story. Disney must’ve secured the licensing deals before writing the script. Which is really cool.

Man, Zangief is great.

I read some YouTube commenters complaining that Zangief isn’t a bad guy. Ha ha ha. KIDS THESE DAYS.

Zangief is a Russian character introduced in 1987. He is a bad guy.

Russian + 80s = Bad guy.

THANKS FOR THE REACTION GIF, DISNEY.

Felix/Mario has a B-plot that’s about how he actually really cares about Ralph/Donkey Kong. INTO IT.

I love the choices they made with the “gamer” character.

It’s really neat how the characters travel between games via a power strip and power cables. Rather than like, the internet. It’s neat that the mechanics of this world are based more on how you think video games work as a kid and less on how the technology actually works. Also works a lot like Monsters, Inc.

It’s also a really cool, not-for-nothin’ observation that the archetypical villain in an 80s game looks a lot like the archetypical hero in a 00s game.

Man, Jack McBrayer as Mario is such perfect casting. Like, of COURSE the correct direction to go with a Mario parody is “southern bumpkin” and not “Italian”… It really does a great job of characterizing Felix as being both likable and oblivious to the torment he’s causing Ralph.

Sugar Rush is a cool name for a Mario Kart clone.

Sarah Silverman’s character design is … ehh….

But Jane Lynch as a Samus Aran parody is AWESOME.

Ralph can talk to the player through the screen. Cool.

This scene is kind of the weakest part of the trailer… But it’s also interesting that they showed what a few lines of typical dialog in this movie would sound like. Instead of showing an onslaught of jokes and pratfalls and weirdly avoiding any completed sentences — like the Brave trailer. This part isn’t very compelling but it’s super honest and makes me more confident in spending money on the movie.

Can we just talk about how great this 8-bit art is? Good 8 bit art is all about economizing colors and pixels. Trying to get as much detail in as few squares as possible. This pixel art is just really classic and perfect.

Also, man, good logo! And what a great title! It’s easy to say and the trailer basically explains to you the meaning behind it. He’s a guy that wrecks stuff and doesn’t want to wreck stuff! That’s a title we can all identify with! It’s basically the opposite of Prometheus.

Everything about this movie just looks so great.

I believe this YouTube comment sums it up best:

You know that crazy uncle who tells weird, rambling tales and says, “I’ve got so many stories from those days I could fill a book”? What if he went ahead and made it happen?

While watching the LA Kings playoff game I discovered one of those jarring, incoherent, often local ads with zero production value that you see during big sporting events. It was an ad for a book called It Never Rained in the Bronx by Steven Chanzes. I was mystified by the ad, because unless you’re a Grisham or a Baldacci, books aren’t advertised on TV, especially not during playoff games.

I went to the site and OMG it’s just the most wonderful thing. It’s this old Jewish guy living in Florida runs a blog (inexplicably archived in a series of individual PDFs) where he writes about everything from how his stomach flu ruined his cruise vacation to his quest to find a publisher. He signs all his “Blogs” with “Happy Writing.” It’s all there to promote his book.

My favorite story is how he met a supporting cast member from Laverne & Shirley, Eddie Mekka, whom he’d hired to perform the role of Italian Stereotype in his TV ad.

I was on the phone with him for no more than 5 seconds and I felt that I had known him all my life. What a nice fellow. No airs about him.  Just a regular everyday guy. We were on the phone for close to 30 minutes and we were into our goodbyes when I said to Eddie, “Would you mind saying a brief hello to my wife?” He said certainly. I gave the phone to my wife Joy. She had it on speakerphone so I could not only hear her but Eddie as well. What happened next was very funny, so funny that I wish I would have had the presence of mind to record it. My wife and Eddie started singing the song from the opening of the Laverne and Shirley show. ”Schlemiel, Schlemozel, Ossenfeffer Incorporated, etc., etc.” Joy still hasn’t come off of cloud nine.

What a classic crazy uncle story. I bet Joy is a really nice lady who gives Steven a good smack once in a while for his off-color humor at the dinner table.

And it’s all just so self-depracating. How can you not love this guy? Here’s more copy from his book’s site:

Then I checked out the Amazon page.

Life is a Collection of Memories. Without memories there is no life. These are my memories of growing up in The Bronx and later spending my adulthood in Florida where I still live.

Hilarious adventures of the author, his friends and family. Over 440 pages and 70 stories designed to make you laugh, laugh, laugh and then laugh some more. All stories are true and depicted just as they happened.

Read about the author’s Granma and what happened when they went to the nightclub in the Carillon hotel on Miami Beach; a 69 year old Granma with her 25 year old grandson. Except everyone in attendance that night thought the grandson was a gigolo and Granma made sure that everyone wasn’t disappointed as she gave them a fantastic show that evening, much better than the one on the stage.

The story Swollen Cheeks will have you rolling in the aisles. It’s about Leroy who used to pay nightly visits to the author at his place of work and would usually have a cup of coffee with him. Not anymore. Leroy probably never had another cup of coffee after the last time he had one at the author’s work place. After you read this story you might never drink another cup of coffee again either.

There were unforgettable characters like James “Burnell” Bell, a former motorcycle policeman in Boulder, Colorado who lost his job because one day an individual asked Jim to follow him on his motorcycle because the individual thought his odometer wasn’t working properly. And it wasn’t. The fellow said to Jim, “Officer, my odometer says I’m going 30 miles per hour. How fast am I really going?” Jim said, “You’re doing 35 and this is a 30 mile per hour zone. Pull over.” The fellow pulled over and Jim gave him a speeding ticket. It was the last ticket that Jim ever gave anyone as he was immediately suspended, came to Florida and was involved in one calamnity after another.

Then there was the story of the Viet Nam war where the Selective Service System requested my ass to go to Viet Nam. I figured that since the rest of my body wasn’t going to Viet Nam, then my ass could also stay home….and it did. But the story of how I managed to escape Uncle Sam’s services is a very funny read.

My friend Paul and I used to have a philosophy which said, “Just because you’re poor (and we were) doesn’t mean you shouldn’t eat….. well.” And we did with no money for a period of about 30 days in the fanciest and priciest restaurants in New York until one evening we were given an offer we couldn’t refuse. It’s funny now but I assure you it wasn’t funny then.

Then there was the time that I was having a tough go in life. So much so that I decided to enlist in the army with my friend Allan. It sounded great. I was married and had one son. The army would let me live off base with my family. My wife thought it was a good idea too. But then I gave it some thought and decided not to enlist. Of course I didn’t tell Allan as I didn’t want to ruin his good time. He had a very memorable experience in the army for all of three weeks.

And what book would be complete without a chapter or two devoted to sex. Here there are four chapters devoted to very pleasurable times, but not nearly what you would think them to be. Sex was very different in the 50′s and 60′s for young men. For sure it was different for the author. And in keeping with the tradition of this book it was funny, funny, funny.

Then there was the time that I was having a tough time finding a decent job, you know, one that pays a liveable wage. I wasn’t deterred. I had a family and nothing was going to stop me from making a living. I just didn’t know what kind of living so I did what I thought was the proper thing to do. I opened up an Employment Agency. Now all day long I’d listen to people who needed a job. I didn’t want to give them my secret because I didn’t need competition in the Employment Agency business.

The book has it all. This fuggin’ guy. This fuggin’ book. I hope he sells a ton of copies. Buy it. What do you have to lose with this money-back guarantee?

A Laugh a Minute…..Possibly Every 30 Seconds. Money Back Guarantee. If you’re not happy and delighted with this book, return it within 10 days and your money will be cheerfully refunded….well, I don’t know if it will be cheerfully refunded, but it will be refunded. GUARANTEED!!!

Hot Cheetos and Takis. That’s my favorite snack.

— Y.N. Rich Kids

Over 2.5 million viewers have watched “Hot Cheetos and Takis” over the past month and many have looked up at the sky and asked the god of all snacks, “Lord of snacks, what is a Taki?”

Takis are a corn chip snack from Mexican company Barcel, a division of the food conglomerate Grupo Bimbo, the same company known in the USA for selling Entenmann’s brand desserts. Takis come in five flavors: Guacamole, Salsa Brava, Crunchy Fajita, Fuego, and Nitro. The name Takis is derived from Taquitos, small rolled up tortillas with a meat or cheese filling that are fried and from which Takis derive their shape. While Takis are easy to find in the Southwest United States, in the North they are normally only found in Mexican specialty stores or bodegas that carry other imported snacks from Latin America.

I asked some neighbors who had never tried Takis to taste test each flavor. Do Takis live up to the hype?

To make this a more complete immersion immersion experience, we paired each flavor with the beverage also praised in the song, Lemonade Brisk. Between each tasting, each member of the group chewed on parsley to ensure that each Taki/Brisk pairing was judged only on its own merits.

The true names of the members of our panel have been kept anonymous to protect them from the long arm of the powerful Bimbo corporation (and also so that they can openly talk about their stoner eating habits). We’ll call them Mary, John, and Diane. What follows are the qualitative results of this tasting experiment.

Guacamole

Mary
On the nose: “I’m gonna take a whiff of the entire bag so that I can have to full sensory experience. It smells like peanut butter, and there’s something kind of stale there even though the bag was just opened.”
On the taste: Nutty. “It sort of just tastes like a Frito with a little bit of Tex-Mex flavor.”
On the Lemonade Brisk pairing: “The Brisk tastes like a Smirnoff Ice without alcohol.”

John
On the nose: “I totally smell that peanut. It smells like pad thai.”
On the taste: “I in no way taste Guacamole.”
On the Brisk pairing: “Putrid. The citrus compliments it nicely though.”

Diane
On the nose: “The bag does smell like pad thai.”
On the taste: “Kind of ranch-y. Like a ranch-y Bugle. With the shape I’d expect there to be more flavor powder in the middle.”
On the Brisk pairing: “It just takes like a Mike’s Hard lemonade without the alcohol.”

Salsa Brava

Mary
On the nose: “There’s a little bit of spice in this one. Kind of a sharp feeling in my nostrils.”
On the taste: “Because of the contrast of the spice to the inside of the cornchip, the chip almost tastes like cereal that’s been left out coated in paprika.”
On the Brisk pairing: “Nope. Nope. Very unusual mouth feel. That doesn’t work. It’s very sour.”

John
On the nose: “Smells like paprika and like my stairwell. It smells like my stairwell when I go to do laundry and it’s always raining outside and it gets this weird musty smell.”
On the taste: “It bores the shit out of me. Boring-ass Taki.”
On the Brisk pairing: “Not nearly as good a pairing [as the Guacamole]. I have no suggestions here.”

Diane
On the nose: “It’s a little bit like barbecue dust, KC Masterpiece, in there.”
On the taste: “It’s got a zing. It has a cereal bit. It’s almost a little sweet on the inside like a stale Lucky Charms marshmallow.”
On the Brisk pairing: “I think it would go better with a Zima. Doesn’t go well with the Brisk.”

Crunchy Fajita

Mary
On the nose: “If I were to choose a meat filling in this fajita, it smells like a pork or a beef. It’s definitely not shrimp.”
On the taste: “This is less awful than the Salsa Brava. There’s a sweetness to the heat of this that I find unpleasant.”
On the Brisk pairing: “Not as bad! [The Brisk makes it] genuinely not as bad! It tastes like a hot and sour soup from a really late-night Chinese food joint. It would be a lot better if I had consumed a bottle of vodka beforehand.”

John
On the nose: “There’s totally a lo mein vibe to the smell.”
On the taste: “It tastes like Kix. This is also pretty bland. I find it similar to the Salsa Not-So-Brava.”
On the Brisk pairing: “This didn’t affect it that much for me. I’m just getting more into the Brisk as this goes along. Sweet sweet beautiful Brisk.”

Diane
On the nose: “I appreciate the ‘grill marks.’ Smells a little musty.”
On the taste: “It really does taste like Kix.”
On the Brisk pairing: “It’s a lot better after the Brisk. You just want to keep having them.”

Fuego

Mary
On the nose: “I’m on the fourth Taki ever in my life, and I am not looking forward to this. I think three Takis is my limit. Maybe I just can’t smell anything or need a whiff of coffee or something.”
On the taste: “Just a comment on the shape. I don’t find the size of the Taki to be user friendly. This is definitely the best flavor so far. It’s sort of like a spicy Dorito with more artificial lime.”
On the Brisk pairing: “It’s not very good. I am not sure what would be good in this scenario. Nothing probably.”

John
On the nose: “This smells like peanuts again. You guys didn’t get that? It’s almost like concentrated chili.”
On the taste: “The flavor is the best. When I eat this, I just feel like I’m gonna be burping it up for days. But I feel like five of these and then I’m set, especially with the amount of flavor dust on here. If I was smoking weed, I would eat like 100 of these and hate myself.”
On the Brisk pairing: “It doesn’t add anything for me, but I don’t find that it detracts. Really Lemonade Brisk can’t do any wrong.”

Diane
On the nose: “The smell reminds me of this guy I know who kind of smells like balls, but also smells like this. Maybe he eats a lot of these. He’s only 12 years old.”
On the taste: “These have a nice lime flavor to them. Very 420 friendly.”
On the Brisk pairing: “The Brisk isn’t cool with it. This would be better with a milkshake.”

Nitro

Mary
On the nose: “These all smell the same to me at this point.”
On the taste: “I get a citrus on this still. It kicks later. The first flavor I get is more of an orange citrus than a lime. It’s milder. I can taste this on my lips longer than the other flavors. All in all this is my favorite flavor, but I don’t think I’ll be reaching for it on my own anytime soon.”
On the Brisk pairing: “No comment.”

John
On the nose: “It smells milder to me. I’m excited for this because Nitro was my favorite American Gladiator growing up.”
On the taste: “It tastes like Runts. It tastes like a banana Runt. It’s not really tasting spicy to me. It’s totally banana-ed out. I guess you could call that an attempt at orange.”
On the Brisk pairing: “I find that these flavors mingle more. I’m ok with that.”

Diane
On the nose: The smell reminds me of a time when my mom put Indian spices into some Chef Boyardee.”
On the taste: “The first bite is like a watermelon Sourpatch. I get the kick later. It’s like watermelon Sourpatch and pepper. This is my number one choice of what I would eat while smoking weed.”
On the Brisk pairing: “This isn’t doing anything for me.”

The Takeaway

Mary: “I think out of a lot of snack foods Takis would be the worst for making out. I lick my lips and it’s like a vomit and citrus flavor. I think it would be really unsexy.”

John: “My favorite was easily Fuego. The best pairing was the Guacamole and Brisk – it just danced around in my mouth. It definitely coats your mouth. I have Taki flavor in every part of my mouth.”

Diane: “I’m really glad I tried Takis. Fuego was my favorite, but I would love to get a bag of Fuego and Nitro and mix them together.”

Here’s a weird but totally factual statement: Because of the weather, I didn’t have a job last week. As someone who A) relies entirely on the internet for income and b) was among those who lost electricity because of Tropical Post-Rock Hurricane Sandy, I had a whole lot of time to be alone with my thoughts — a pastime everyone pretty much hates.

In the interest of beating back any nagging memories of embarrassment and wrongdoing, I resorted to the only form of entertainment that works when everything fun is broken: board games. This is how they’ve held up since my childhood.

Battleship

Pros: It’s a war game that doesn’t require almost any tactical strategy whatsoever.

Cons: I lost a bunch of the pieces (see: tried melting them, then threw them out) since the last time I wanted to play Battleship, putting me at a disadvantage that simulated actual warfare. Chalk it up to variant defense spending between sovereign nations.

Grade: C

Chutes and Ladders

Pros: Nostalgia; provides for upward and downward mobility.

Cons: Gameplay could be further simplified if all “chutes” and “ladders” were replaced by “stairs”.

Grade: D-

Yahtzee

Pros: Minimal meltable pieces required. Essentially poker for children.

Cons: Poker compliments heavy drinking better, and drinking, when done properly, also doesn’t require electricity.

Grade: C-

Monopoly

Pros: Gameplay tends to run long, so expect to avoid at least two hours of pacing in circle, eating fun-size Halloween candy, or sobbing quietly.

Cons: I have no memories of actually finishing a game of Monopoly. In the harsh light of adulthood the reason is that Monopoly is more boring than watching already-dry paint just sit there and be paint. And when even Billy Joel comes out of hiding to raise money for your helpless blacked-out ass, it feels truly petty to tax someone just for hanging out on a specific avenue or railroad which they ended up on through sheer chance.

Grade: B-

Scrabble

Pros: A massive timesink that provides a good mix of strategy and luck.

Cons: No one in their right mind owns a Scrabble dictionary — that’s what the internet is for. I found that this made inventing words very easy, much to the chagrin of my friends and fellow cothaliments.

Grade: B

Chess

Pros: The most abstract and historically significant popular game.

Cons: Only people who are already good at chess suggest a game of chess, and those people are dicks. It’s very, very easy to play chess for hours on end and not feel like you’re getting any better at it. I went outside to chop wood for the fireplace instead.

Grade: C+

Risk

Pros: Easily the longest game ever made besides the waiting game.

Cons: The power is back on, but my troops in Brazil still need to conquer North Africa.

Grade: B+

Settlers of Catan

Pros: Strategy-heavy and reasonably time-consuming.

Cons: Playing Settlers will probably involve hanging out with your nerdier friends, which can be a blessing or a curse. Relies on an obtuse “victory points” social contract that I felt shanghaied into.

Grade: B-

Connect Four

Pros: None.

Cons: Serves as a metaphor for the futility of human invention. Connect four, and then what? When will four no longer be enough? Are these red chips not connected in their opposition to the black chips and vice versa? The depth of man’s hatred for his own brother is yellow, plastic scaffolding on stilts.

Grade: F

Checkers

Pros: Chess for idiots! Chinese Checkers for occidentals!

Cons: Wait, is “Chinese Checkers” kind of racist? Or at least discriminatory? My life would be very different if I grew up in China. I’d look different, but that’s besides the point. Would I have the same parents? Probably not. But isn’t life inexorably tied to its circumstances, so what’s the point of drawing this comparison? What do you mean “king me”? China doesn’t have kings. They used to have emperors and dynasties. But an emperor controls an empire. Isn’t a dynasty more of a lineage thing rather than a territory thing? Then again, these are English words. Maybe the Chinese words for these concepts have different shades of meaning. Oh, you won? Great, I checked out half an hour ago man.

Grade: Screw you, Sandy.

The new James Bond film, Skyfall, hits theaters tonight! It’s got a 93% on Rotten Tomatoes right now, which should be enough to pique your interest.

I caught a sneak preview a couple nights ago, and let me tell you right now: This is a good James Bond movie. That’s largely because it’s not like old James Bond movies. None of that old James Bond shit would work today.

We just can’t be wowed with shoe phones anymore. Sean Connery basically used to get gadgets from the Sharper Image 10 years before they existed. What could Daniel Craig possibly receive from Q that would excite the audience? An iPhone 7?

There’s still the usual product placement, but it’s not as distracting. (Though I think all product placement seems relatively subtle ever since we watched Will Smith lace up Converse shoes for 5 minutes in I, Robot.) Didn’t one of the Pierce Brosnan Bond movies feature a remote-controlled BMW? I’m pretty sure Bond saw it for the first time he said, “Cool, a BMW car” and then his gadget guy was like, “Yes, this car is the height of luxury,” and he turned to the camera, winked, and said, “Go to your local BMW dealer to experience this car. It is a really good car for you to buy.” And the Bond theme played and the credits rolled and you know what maybe this didn’t really happen but you get the idea.

You know what else was really edgy back in the old Bond days? Sex. And not even actual sex. Just kind of hinting at sex. At least twice in every movie, Bond would embrace a lady and the camera would pull back slowly then cut a shot of Bond drying his hair after a post-coital shower. That used to sell movie tickets. But now if I want to see one guy have sex with a bunch of ladies, I have the entire internet.  Great, some smooth-talking British guy bedded 2 ladies in 90 minutes. There are websites where you can watch the same thing, but with those two numbers reversed. For free.

Skyfall knows these things, and because of that, it’s a better movie. There’s even a quip about how MI6 doesn’t make exploding pens more. The majority of the movie is driven by action, a compelling villain, and character relationships. Plus I think one of the sex scenes has a little bit of sideboob.

Now, there are still some parts in Skyfall where clearly the writers wanted to include technology but they didn’t know what to do with it. Computer viruses have these absurd graphical interfaces (like in that movie Hackers where those hackers hacked), and at one point a computer gets compromised and all hell breaks loose. It’s like the script said, “And then computers happen and everyone panics. CUT TO: Big chase scene.” It’s silly but forgivable.

So go see Skyfall! You’ll Sky-fall in love with it! It’s double-oh pretty-great! Additional James Bond pun!

Title image source via SmashCaptures

People seem to be skipping straight to the pure art, and yet nobody’s made the Caddyshack in games yet, right? So I’m like, woah woah woah, let’s put on the brakes – let’s make Caddyshack, and then we can make Anna Karenina or whatever.

— Erik Wolpaw, Portal series writer, on video games as art or as comedy

Grand Theft Auto V is, until I find a better comparison, the Beverly Hills Cop of video games.

Compare the two trailers.

Obviously one’s more anti-hero than the other, and the actual plots are totally different. There’s surely a better specific comparison. But the tone of GTA V — or these cherry-picked scenes anyway — is so well-matched to an action comedy that I would just straight-up watch this game as a movie.

I would watch another person play this game. And if you grew up with fewer controllers than siblings, you know this means everything.

What really nails it here isn’t just the writing, which has been a strength of the GTA series for a while. It’s the impeccable voice acting they showed off in the trailer. “Just ignore [perfect short pause] the bodies.” You couldn’t possibly improve that line.

Same goes for “we’re bouncing now” — a line one could easily overplay, but here is given just enough room. (Granted, it might not hold up when they don’t immediately cut to an explosion.)

The action scenes are fun and impressive — that kid swinging off a sailboat mast over a highway is more exciting than any multi-helicopter maneuver in any Bond film — and, I dunno, the water physics are pretty? But there’s a huge advantage you can’t credit to technology — the story bits are just utterly beyond the shit that made me spend all of GTA 3 in sandbox mode. It’s been a good decade for the series. Maybe I’m the last one to notice that — my co-editor Henry points out that GTA: Vice City was Miami Vice and San Andreas was Boys in the Hood.

But GTA V looks like a game that non-gamers might be willing to learn, just to hear the story. And that seems like a decent way to expand the gaming market.

So OK, we don’t know if GTA V will be as narratively and comedically entertaining as a movie, but the trailer is definitely as good as their trailers. And the mere fact they’re willing to use movie-level-funny jokes as a selling point is… cool.

My first exposure to Wheatus was in 2007, on the old community-run website flashflashrevolution, a Dance Dance Revolution ripoff that involved tapping the keyboard instead of dancing on a pad.

When the site was still being run as a for-profit venture, it partnered with bands and gave them little widgets to put on their MySpace pages so people could play DDR files (or “stepfiles”) for said band’s song. We had some slightly big names — 5 Finger Death Punch, Disturbed, Reel Big Fish. I would play these widgets for quick fun. One day, I came across a widget for a band that seemed familiar. It was Wheatus.

Now I, being 12 years old at the time, had pretty much no sense of what good music was, so what I listened to at the time included, but was not limited to:

• 64kbps speedcore songs
• whatever came on the top 40 rock radio station in town
• metal remixes of video game music
• the Diggnation podcast
• a podcast dedicated to They Might Be Giants
• more speedcore

Given my luck, the first song I picked on this widget was Wheatus’ “Teenage Dirtbag”. No lie — I played DDR with my fingers on a keyboard to Teenage Dirtbag and liked it. Now, to excise my past demons, I’m going to give you a play-by-play reason as to why “Teenage Dirtbag” is the worst song ever made.

The best way I can describe Wheatus’ target market for this song is that the first time I heard “Teenage Dirtbag”, it was in a fan-made anime music video using clips from both Bleach and Naruto. The song starts off with the typical late 90s college indie rock bullshit; vague record scratches and a hiphop beat to lure the listener into thinking that this song might actually have some artistic merit. The same kind of thing Limp Bizkit pulled for a decade and a half.

Then the acoustic guitar comes in playing the most fucking contrived melody you could ever image in a song. Imagine if you could take the most generic indie rock melody ever, make it even more generic, out of tune, and coming from a dollar store guitar. It might as well be a ukulele. In fact, Teenage Dirtbag sounds like it took about as much talent to play as most “ukulele cover” videos on YouTube.

Then the vocals kick in. There’s no word in the English language for how horrid the vocals are. There is honestly no way to describe the aural assault this whiny 20-year-old with a guitar puts into your ear-holes. Imagine if Beverly Hills-era Weezer got singing lessons from the Black Eyed Peas but will.i.am forgot to mention that they use Auto-Tune. That’s what it sounds like.

This song reminds me of what Weezer’s “In the Garage” would sound like if it were written by someone about 5 years younger. See:

In the garage, I feel safe. No one cares about my ways. In the garage where I belong. No one hears me sing this song. In the garage.

— chorus to “In the Garage”

Her name is Noel, I have a dream about her. She rings my bell, I got gym class in half an hour. Oh how she rocks, in Keds and tube socks.

— opening lines to Teenage Dirtbag.

They’re both the exact same concept; “Oh woe is me I’m a lowly nerd”. The difference being that “Teenage Dirtbag” shoots for the vibe of “I’M A LOWLY NERD AND I HAVE A CRUSH ON A GIRL BUT SHE DOESN’T LIKE ME IM NERDY HAHA!” angle, while “In The Garage” goes for the “Hey, I like weird things, and I get mocked for it, but I don’t really give a shit. I’m just gonna chill in the garage and play some DnD, fuck all y’all”.

Worse yet, there are times in the song where they play cheesy sound effects to accentuate the godawful lyrics. There are some bands that can pull this off (my thoughts go to That Handsome Devil’s “Charlie’s Inferno“, one of my all time favorite songs), but here it’s just too much:

Her name is Noel, I have a dream about her. She rings my bell.

$20 if you can guess the sound effect. Ding ding, that’s right! It’s a bell.

He lives on my block, and he drives an Iroc

No lie, they play screeching tires that sound like they came from a low-budget ripoff of The Last Action Hero.

After the first chorus, the lyrics devolve into what I can only call a word apocalypse. The second chorus is a veritable destruction of the human language and songwriting itself. Let’s break it down line by line:

Her boyfriend’s a dick

Alright, so we’ve established conflict. The girl the nerdy dude beats off to in gym class has a girlfriend and he’s “a dick”. Presumably he’s a dick to the narrator simply because he’s dating the girl of this shitbag’s wet dreams. No evidence is really provided of him being a “dick”.

And he brings a gun to school

Given when this was written, this would be rather out of the ordinary, especially since the guy who wrote this is from Long Island, but I think I’m missing out on the whole Having A Gun = Being A Dick correlation here? It really seems like he’s grasping for whatever he can.

And he’d simply kick my ass if he knew the truth

My biggest problem with this line is “simply kick”; is there a complex way this anonymous boyfriend would kick your ass? Would he set up a Rube Goldberg machine, with such accurate timing that it trips you while you ride home on your shitty bike, sending you tumbling down a giant hill into a broken glass factory, launched into the air, landing your ass square on this man’s foot? Is he going to verbally kick your ass with the teachings of the ancient philosophers?

He lives on my block and he drives an Iroc

The best part about this line is that, since the vocalist’s voice is so hard to understand, it sounds like he says “He drives and I rock” as if the narrator is forced to ride to school with this “dick” and spends the whole time presumably headbanging while the poor guy has to take this wimpy asshole to class.

But he doesn’t know who I am, and he doesn’t give a damn about me

At this point I think we can assume that this kid, who beats off to people in gym class and thinks no one cares about him, has some serious issues; paranoia, depression, probably is a stalker. There’s a list of shit this kid needs to get checked out for.

The song ends with, for some reason that no one fucking knows, the girl of this shithead’s dreams comes up as he’s all woe is me outside the school on prom night and, with literally no pretense, I don’t think she’s ever even talked to this dude, offers him *drumroll* Iron Maiden tickets. Yep! That’s right. The band that this song has been shamelessly namedropping the whole time is the fuckhead nerd’s dream girl’s favorite band. The whole time she reveals this, by the way, the lead singer somehow cranks up his voice another 5 octaves, making it sound like someone kicked his dick with helium-filled spiked boot.

Ultimately, Wheatus’ “Teenage Dirtbag” is a clusterfuck of horrible writing, horrible music, every college rock stereotype you could ever imagine, with lyrics that really only help to either make college kids nostalgic or to make junior high kids feel understood and an overall message of “if you just sit around and rub your cock in the middle of class some hot girl’s going to leave her boyfriend and invite you to a metal concert, you sad sack of shit.”

I’m glad Wheatus never really got commercial success outside of having a song on the Dawson’s Creek soundtrack.

Occasionally, Dan Wilbur and Jason Oberholtzer need some time off from writing genre-redefining books based on blogs. They usually watch movies. Then email about them. Spoilers below.

Jason Oberholtzer: So I saw this movie, Wreck-It Ralph. It wasn’t ground-breaking but it looked really pretty, made me think about graphics and how kids these days are super visually spoiled* and then left me with heart-warming messages of friendship. Maybe it’s because I’m in the midst of one of those intellectual cycles where you return to simple foundational messages or because I watched the movie with an audience of families together for Thanksgiving but I enjoyed the movie and am not ashamed to say it got a little misty in there.

* Remember how lifeless this sort of animation used to be? Computer-rendered movies were hit or miss (with some massive misses) when I was a kid. Same thing with 3D. Something, something, damn kids … my lawn …

Dan Wilbur: Great! Now we can spend this first film review fighting each other because this movie was awful. I thought for sure you’d be sending me a bar graph titled “hours spent on script vs. dollars spent attaining rights for famous video game characters.” One of the bars will be dwarfed by the other. When I think of the thousand or so jokes/observations that have been made about video games in College Humor videos and self-referential games like Paper Mario, aren’t you the least bit (no pun intended) upset that they abandoned the idea of games halfway through the movie for a lazy rehashed story about Candyland? Maybe it’s because I saw the movie at the Pavilion Theater in Brooklyn which means not only did I spend $12 but I also risked Bed Bugs to see something that only got good during the closing credits. I also sneaked a flask into the theater and drank whiskey. Might have also altered my review.

JO: This seems to be the tale of two theater experiences. The question really is about expectations — yours for metahumor tailored to your specific videogame nostalgia and mine for a movie kids would enjoy that still tugged at the old heart strings and delivered a valuable lesson. Well, you can enjoy your gold medal alone in the penthouse buddy, because this is a movie for the people not you frothing nerd types.

Besides, how many hours do you need to spend on a script when I’m pretty sure Fix It Jr.’s part consists entirely of scrap heap lines written for Kenneth from 30 Rock and Sarah Silverman just improvised the whole thing?

DW: I think you’re right. This movie’s not for me because I’ve seen other movies. And those movies were way better. Finding Nemo is mostly made up of funny scenes about how fish behave, in and out of tanks. I don’t expect everything to live up to Toy Story but that’s the most imaginative yet simple premise: they don’t want to be forgotten by their owner, they move around when you’re not there. The only premise of this movie seemed to be that video game characters “can’t die in other games or else they’re dead for real.” Once that was established I thought we were going to see Wreck-It Ralph go through tons of games and see funny situations with bratty kids at the arcade forcing him purposely into peril with the controllers. Instead, his trip to the new game made it seem that game characters’ main concern was to entertain kids so they’re game didn’t go “Out of Order.” (the ultimate death!). So now they’re entertainers. But THEN we go into the Candyland racing game and everything got away from the premise that these characters are in fact toys. Now we’re just a bunch of people trying to make Candyland survive. And then, just for the fuck of it, let’s throw a subplot love scene in there. Where was Pac-Man to eat some of those Mentos? Where was Sonic to give racing tips? Why can’t Bowser and all the other bad guys have a roll in fighting other bad guys? I think the first half of the movie struggled to find a reason the writers made a video game movie, then the second half ditched what they established for an uplifting “what are friends for?” plot that had nothing to do with the first half.

I did, however, love the voice acting. Jane Lynch is perfect and Sarah Silverman does a great job as a cute kid (though I would much rather watch her improvisations because I bet they’re darker and weirder than anything that made the cut). Since we’re talking about voice acting, why is a rip-off of the Mad Hatter in this movie for no reason?

JO: I was disappointed that we got locked into Candyland World or whatever for the bulk of the movie, especially after how promising Ralph’s first foray into a different game was — the first person shooter game sequence was visually stunning and nailed the mood. I would have loved to see them continue to render different worlds.

Okay, let’s look at motivations then. I think you are right here: there weren’t very many on the foundational level, but there is a reason for that. I think the writers bit off more than they could chew when creating the “laws” for this universe and had to steer clear of the ramifications. They raised some meaty questions and probably had to choose between ignoring them or reviving Dostoevsky for a few script punch-ups.

Below the love story, friend story and acceptance story, the exploration of being a “bad guy” was marred by existential problems unaddressed. The characters exist to “do their job” largely devoid of freewill. Ralph and his friends differ from the Toy Story characters in two major ways. First, there doesn’t seem to be any emotional connection to their job — the TS toys did their job (being toys) because they loved their kid and took pride in their role supporting him; the videogame characters in Wreck-It Ralph do their job because, well … they have to. I guess. That’s what they say. This bring us to the second major difference: the videogame characters are ruled by programming to an extent that is unclear. And they are aware of it. The lesson of Bad Guy Support Group? We are bad, it’s our job, we should accept it. But clearly, the joystick doesn’t completely control them, nor does their programming. But in some instances the joystick and programming control everything. The script never sticks to a consistent rule and the characters seem not to be concerned about it.

Then it gets even crazier! The Mad Hatter breaks from the laws of determinism — even going so far as to find and alter code — and is the bad guy. Is he God at that point? Why deal with other characters at all? His crime was vanity that led to the “ultimate death” of characters but isn’t his the most compelling motivation? Isn’t he Dostoyevsky’s dream protagonist, wielding the hammer to destroy the crystal city of bullshit illusions of free will?

Here’s the question that comes out of all of this: is this ultimately a “stay in your lane” movie? Everybody goes back to doing their job. Because … that’s what they do. Nobody plays with the code again. They just follow their path and hope not to die. This movie is about all of us. I’m lonely.

DW: Are you making fun of me now??! Or am I supposed to debate this?

We’re all lonely. That’s why we go to children’s movies about video games when we don’t have children. Errrr. Maybe that says more about our generation of men being perpetually adolescent. Especially if I’m now whining that I want MORE from my cartoons movies!

JO: You’re supposed to bask in the brilliance of my critical acumen … and worry that you are being made fun of.

Do you really buy that perpetual adolescence thing? People have been bringing that out since the 70s like it’s a new phenomena. I actually think our generation grows up rather quickly, as long as you use markers that plumb a little deeper than marriage, kids and a house.

As for what we expect of our cartoon movies, cartoons have always endeavored to please multiple age-groups simultaneously (well, at least cartoons that aren’t made in the Teletubbies school of children’s entertainment wherein we appease young potential-crying-things with shiny things and bullshit babbling) and we should count ourselves lucky to be in a time where we can expect existential continuity in our cartoons and children’s movies. This movie falls short there, but delivers where it matters most — the aforementioned heart strings. I’m lonely.

DW: I KNEW it. Everyone is always making fun of me!!! I guess the difference between then and now is that when I was younger I’d tell my mom I was being made fun of, and now I just tell everyone I know that the person talking shit about me isn’t cool anymore. You know: like middle school (adulthood).

I don’t buy into the “perpetual adolescence” thing to the extent that saying people act like children into adulthood shouldn’t be owned by any particular generation (regardless of how many video games they play at thirty). We’re all bitchy little kids and I feel the most bitchy when I try to have the simplest escape from reality and that escape sucks. This isn’t Lincoln. This isn’t a heady Werner Herzog film. This is a cartoon. It should be funny and touching but it wasn’t. It was hacky and I was bored. So you’re right. I won’t be ashamed! Cartoons are for me too! It’s like the end of Sullivan’s Travels when he realizes the only time everyone enjoyed themselves was when they were watching Mickey Mouse and laughing. If I really take that movie to heart, I should be holding cartoons to the highest level of criticism. I take it all back. There’s no hyperbole in this statement: this movie ruined my life. I’m so lonely.

You’re brilliant, and we SHOULD take the time to pick apart this film’s existential questions: Toy Story 3 brought up questions of what it means to live in a free, happy society under a tyrant Teddy Bear, and I thought maybe Wreck-It Ralph would go that direction with the mock-TSA-customs guy turning evil or instituting arbitrary rules to protect gamers, but instead he was just a dweeb.

I guess if the whole thing is about breaking with conformity, video games are a fun place to explore that, but where were the funny observations about evil bosses repeating the same moves? Where was the terror of the chef in Burger Time not knowing how to cook Vegan meals?! Why are his ingredients attacking him? This would have been funny, but instead we arrived at the statement: Kids like candy. Some kids don’t fit in. Your weaknesses are actually strengths. That has nothing to do with gaming! Gaming is all about learning the shortcuts and repeating the same patterns quickly until you’re the fastest, most dexterous player. Now that I think about it, aside from a small number of games, gamers are not creating anything artistic by playing, but merely conforming. Becoming a diligent part of the machine. The rails ride upon us! I’m cold and frightened.

JO: Let’s never watch movies ever again.

Below are real quotes from the Home Alone novelizations. We’re not kidding, you can fact-check. — Ed.

So we’re all on the same page here, right? We’ve all been in this situation? You’re on a stroll, you see a moldy box of books on the side of the road, and you have yourself a rummage, yeah? Usually the box is full of pre-highlighted textbooks about torts and those supermarket paperbacks where the cover artwork sinisterly depicts, like, a single stiletto heel, dangling over a silver platter serving up a wedding ring with a side of recently-shot handgun. But sometimes one can find a real piece of literature in this urine-soaked excuse for a Barnes and Noble.

Sometimes maybe two.

And, in my case, sometimes even 2: Lost in New York.

That’s right, my latest side-of-the-road finds were the junior novelizations of both Home Alone and its sequel Home Alone 2: Lost in New York.

I was eager to see how the authors handled reinterpreting such weighty source material. I soon found that the written-out descriptions of everyone’s favorite booby-trap scenes, rendered so cartoonish and light hearted in the family holiday films, feature more harrowing grisly violence and pitch black malevolence than an uncatered prison race riot.

The following, in no particular order, are direct excerpts from both of these books. Please read them as though they’re from the first draft of a continuation of the Saw franchise, or from the point of view of someone live-tweeting a snuff film.

“In a moment, Harry and Marv had their bodies wrapped around a torch. ‘Aaaaaahhhhh!’ Their screams rang up and down the street as they let go and fell downward.”

“The wire connected to the blowtorch pulled tight. Whoosh! A blue and orange flame shot out and Harry’s hair burst into flames. A second later a fireball shot through the living room and out the front door.”

“Marv finished prying the nails from his foot just about the same time Harry lifted his singed head from the icy porch.”

“The crooks were standing there. They were so banged-up they looked like escapees from a refugee camp.”

“He gave it a desperate pull. Rrrip! ‘Yeeow!’ Reeling with pain Marv looked down at the cloth. His eyebrows, mustache and goatee were there, completely removed by the glue from Kevin’s hot glue gun.”

“A few moments later Harry bumped into Marv in the living room. Harry was still pulling feathers out of his eyeballs. Marv was pulling glass shards from the bottom of his shredded feet.”

“They froze, their eyes bugged open. ‘Aaaaaaaahhhh!!!!’ they shrieked in unison. The pipe clipped them both across the chest. It lifted them off their feet and sent them downward through the foyer floor…and into the basement.”

“Harry opened his eyes. He was lying at the bottom of the steps. Every part of his body throbbed with pain and his mouth felt different.”

“Paint glopped over Marv’s hair. It coated his face and splashed his clothes. ‘Auuuggghhhhh!’ The worst part was the stinging in his eyes.”

“He didn’t see it pull the trigger of the blowtorch on the wall. But he felt the result. With a roar of flame the torch blasted Harry’s head.”

“In the basement, Marv shook himself into consciousness. Every muscle in his body ached – not to mention the cuts. ‘AAAAAAGGGGGHHHHH’ In the bathroom mirror, Harry saw the back his head engulfed in fire.”

“They gasped in horror. The birds converged on them, covering both men in a blanket of feathers, beaks, and claws. Harry and Marv fell to the ground, flailing helplessly.”

“They were so enraged they hardly felt the BBs. But Kevin had something they would feel. Old paint cans. Full of paint.”

“BOTH crooks dashed into the foyer, where Kevin had left his Micromachines neatly lined up. ‘Aaaaaahhhhhhhhh’”

“Marv lifted his head. His eyes were full of panic. ‘Harry…’ he pleaded. ‘No…’ Kevin let loose another brick. Marv collapsed to the ground, unconscious.”

“Marv heard Harry’s cry and started to the kitchen. In his path were a dozen little Christmas ornaments made of the thinnest glass imaginable. And Marv WASN’T wearing shoes. ‘Yaaaaaaaahhhhh!’”

“As his scorched hand cooled, leaving a five fingered imprint on the ice, Harry stared at the front door. What was going on?”

“Yeow! Harry grabbed his knee and jumped away. Marv bent down and stuck his face in the doggie door. Pop! Kevin shot him in the forehead”

“‘Ca-Chunk’ Marv’s eyes bulged. All the pain in his head was forgotten. Now there was a new pain. Sharp. Sudden. And excruciating. His mouth dropped open in silent agony. He was beyond screaming. The string was stapled to him.”

Needless to say, if anyone wants to read anymore from these volumes, you can find them somewhere near the bottom of the wet cardboard box outside my apartment, under some coloring books (too difficult) and a MAD Magazine (already had a copy).

Reprinted with permission from Aaron Nevins on Tumblr.

As a culture, we’ve all been inundated with buzz about The Beatles. They’re probably one of the most hyped bands since The Head and the Heart, and more power to ‘em. Clearly the dude handling their web presence is doing a bang-up job. I like to consider myself immune to these taste-making music blogs, but I finally gave in and gave the so-called “best fuckin band ever” (— Shitcakes2433, YouTube.com) a listen, and I was appalled at what I heard.

The Beatles are a band that shamelessly rips off everyone from Arcade Fire to Animal Collective to Sufjan Stevens to Vampire Weekend, and anyone in between who received higher than a 7.4 rating on Pitchfork. And believe me, the result is less than the sum of its parts.

Right from the distorted opening riffs of the title track, I groaned. “Oh, just what we need: another garage rock clone. Did Ty Segall release a fifth album this year?” Add orchestral flourishes and a hokey concept-band aesthetic and suddenly the song starts to sound more like a Polyphonic Spree B-side. Make that C-side.

Track one flows seamlessly into track two. (Yawn. Didn’t this old trick stop being cool when Red Hot Chili Peppers did it on BloodSugarSexMagik?) “With a Little Help From My Friends” sounds like a half-assed attempt at one of those upbeat Wilco numbers, but stripped of all emotion whatsoever. The lead vocals on this song are apparently handled by the drummer of the band, and an engaging frontman he does not make. Hey, they can’t all be Dave Grohl.

We move on to “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds,” a psychedelia throwback that sounds like it was written by your dad’s lame friend who tried pot once in college. It’s like, did these guys learn everything they know about trippy, drug-inspired imagery from the Harold & Kumar movies?

“She’s Leaving Home” attempts a cheesy back-and-forth role-playing effect. Think Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros’ “Home,” except no ad exec in their right mind would ever use this song to sell jeans.

“Getting Better” comes and goes like an Oasis filler track from when Noel and Liam were too mad at each other to write good music. “Fixing a Hole” sounds like a bad Grizzly Bear knockoff, only with 100% more unnecessary harpsichord.

By the time we get around to “Being For The Benefit Of Mr. Kite”, it has become clear that these Beatles are aspiring genre-hoppers, with “aspiring” being the operative word. Let’s just say they’re closer to Ween than to Yo La Tengo, but at least Ween know they’re being dumb.

I’m going to be honest, I dozed off for the next four tracks. Okay, that’s a lie. The truth is that I wish more than anything that I had slept through what turned out to be the least memorable collection of four songs since the last Broken Bells EP.

The penultimate track is called “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise)”, and at this point The Beatles come full circle and rip off a song from EARLIER ON THIS VERY SAME ALBUM. Unbelievable!

The album closer is a little ditty called “A Day in the Life,” a song that literally sounds like it was written by looking at the front page of a newspaper from 1967. Congratulations guys, you’re the Mort Sahl of songwriting. This one doesn’t even get an E for effort. And come on, people: Let’s get over the ’60s already. If you’re gonna rip your lyrics from the headlines, at least pick headlines from an era that’s actually interesting. Like 2009.

Originally published at AaronNevins.tumblr.com.