Friday, March 5, 2010 | by nathan

Currently Making My Day

…is this late-1960s ad for IHOP. It’s trippy on a level that … well, anyway. Just watch:

Wednesday, March 3, 2010 | by nathan

I Am Suddenly Possessed With The Insatiable Desire to Assassinate J. Edgar Hoover

My boss thinks it’s entirely likely that the following is some sort of Soviet-era KGB mind control. I’m not sure if that’s true, but I’m hard-pressed to come up with a better explanation. At any rate, your day should get much more Dadaist once you’ve seen it:

UPDATE: Well, now I’m obsessed with Soviet-era music television programming. Thanks, internet. Thanks a whole fucking lot.

UPDATE 2: I didn’t mean for that to sound sarcastic. Actually, here. Check this out!

Monday, February 22, 2010 | by nathan

the only difference being that I don’t have access to any liquid nitrogen. Not since the … unpleasantness.

When I matriculated at Wake Forest University in the fall of 1998, they were one of the most "wired" campuses in America. The internet boom had yet to turn bust, and recently-graduated Sanskrit majors were leaping headlong into the information revolution and becoming overnight millionaires (then, it turns out, overnight thousandaires). Wake had a really pioneering program wherein a part of our exorbitant tuition costs allowed each student to receive a laptop upon enrollment. Then, two years later, you’d trade in your laptop for a different, newer laptop.

It didn’t suck.

Since then laptops have become ubiquitous on college campuses; some people even argue that it’s hard to learn without one. To tell you the truth, I think that in my four years of free-laptopdom at Wake Forest, I actually took the thing to class exactly one time, and even then I sat there talking to a friend on AIM. We all had them, sure, but I never saw a Wake Forest classroom where people were wildly typing notes. You just didn’t see them in class. I’m sure this has changed now.

When I started my abortive half-semester at Yale Divinity School in the fall of 2002, I bought a brand-new Sony Vaio. Things were different in the Ivy Leagues, and on the first day of class, when I whipped out a pen and paper to take notes, I found myself in a minority of me; everyone else had their computers out. So I thought, what the hell, Nate, join the now.

Thing is, I found that I didn’t remember anything. I type about 110 words a minute, give or take, so I could literally almost type the lecture word-for-word. But none of it stuck. I quickly went back to being a one-man minority. I find that the physical action of writing things down, even if I don’t get every single bit, helps the information to stick in my mind. Typing doesn’t do that; it lacks the physical connection to the information. Going back and reading my typed notes later, I found myself thinking over and over, "I don’t remember him saying that." I felt disconnected from the lecture.

This isn’t true for everyone; it just is for me. At any rate, by the time I made another go at grad school and found myself as the teaching assistant for an Introduction to Mass Communications class at the University of Oklahoma, laptops were everywhere. So was MySpace. I warned the students in my discussion group within an inch of their lives about using the internet during the lecture. Bring your laptop to take notes, fine. But I stationed myself at the back of the class and watched those laptop screens.

One student in particular became a problem. Not only was she constantly MySpacing even after I asked her not to, she was distracting the people around her with it, showing them videos or photos or wall posts that entertained her. ALL WHILE THE PROFESSOR WAS TEACHING. Maybe it’s that my father is a college professor, but I found myself enraged by this behavior. The professor noticed it and asked me to do something. So, one day, after I’d already asked her once to either keep it on Microsoft Word or put it away, I walked down and sat next to her, a big, big grin on my face.

"Give me the laptop," I said happily.

She giggled. Oh, you’re so funny. Ha-ha.

"I’m not actually kidding. Give it to me." 

Her eyes got wide, but her smile remained.

"Right now." 

I’d tried to whisper, to be quiet, but now the whole class, comprised of somewhere in the neighborhood of 175 students, mostly freshmen, were staring at me.

"I want the computer. Hand it over. Right now." 

"Are you serious?" 

"Do I look like I’m kidding?" 

Her face orange with shame and fake tanner, she closed the computer and handed it over. I stood up and suddenly noticed the sea of kaiser-roll-sized eyeballs staring at me.

"LET THIS BE A WARNING TO THE REST OF YOU." 

The professor was barely managing to suppress a laugh. At the end of the class the student walked up to me.

"Can I have my computer back now?" 

"What computer?" I asked.

"My computer. My laptop. You took it away."

"Oh, that?" I said. "I threw that away. You might be able to dig it out of the garbage can out in the hall. But I also threw half a yogurt in there."

Her eyes welled up. I couldn’t take it anymore; I pulled her laptop out of my bag and handed it to her.

"You understand that MySpacing during class is, like, super rude, right?" I asked.

She nodded, chagrined.

"See you Wednesday." 

All that is to say, as awesome as I think the internet and mobile computing are, I somewhat question their value in the classroom environment. This long, long story drives home a point that was put much more succinctly by a professor at that same august institution, the University of Oklahoma, in a video I found on Engadget:

Monday, February 22, 2010 | by nathan

A Little Pee Shy? Miss Coco’s Here To Help.

As a man, there are few things to me more upsetting than peeing in public. Ladies might have to endure the momentary, temporary pain of childbirth, but men? Men have to use urinals OUR WHOLE LIVES. You never feel so much like some kind of barnyard animal as when you’re standing in a public bathroom, in front of a porcelain fixture, trying to go. And when you’re at a sporting event – the long troughs at Oklahoma Memorial Stadium are especially cruel – it can be like torture. Especially when some dude you don’t know wants to talk to you, like, "Hey, did you see Bradford throw that 47-yard pass?" and all you can say is, "Yep!" The whole time your mind is spinning, praying you can squeeze out some little stream of pee lest the other guys realize that a mixture of stage fright and social anxiety disorder have stopped the whole works cold. Your body is begging, BEGGING you to pee, but your mind is like, IN FRONT OF THESE JAGS? I DON’T THINK SO.

…until you’ve been to a gay bar. Specifically, until you’ve been to the Copa in Oklahoma City. Now – I haven’t been there in a couple years, but back in my day there were swinging saloon doors opening more or less into the line for the bar. So even after you go inside you can still see all the patrons lining up for their swill vodka with diet tonics. Occasionally the bar line backed up into the bathroom; that was when you just learned to hold it. Sometimes a sweet girlfriend would invite you into the ladies’, but that was rare. So, into the mens’ you go. And crammed into a seven-by-two foot space are four urinals without dividers. You find yourself standing shoulder-to-shoulder, and almost every time something like this happens:

You could sorta be okay if you managed to get the urinal on the very, very end; then you at least could pretend the wall on your left was a divider and that things would eventually be Okay. But more often than not you were at one of the two middle ones. The walls in there were painted purple, and over the middle urinals there was a frame with some ads in there, because what else is one thinking about while peeing other than, "Gosh, I wonder who has the best limousine service in this city? And does anyone know of a good, gay-friendly plumber? AND IT’S POSSIBLE I MIGHT BE GETTING A DUI LATER – COULD SOMEONE WRITE DOWN THIS PHONE NUMBER FOR ME?" 

What I remember about standing at the Copa urinal is that I was usually standing there next to some giant drag queen or leather daddy, and in my most authoritative, deep-throated, mentally-ill sounding growl, repeatedly saying, "EYES FORWARD. EYES FORWARD." 

So now, peeing in public doesn’t really phase me. Not if I can just close my eyes, picture a purple wall and a limousine ad and think to myself, "If you can pee in the Copa, you can pee ANYWHERE." And it works every time.

POSTSCRIPT: It’s stories like this that won me Runner-Up for Best Writing in the Okie Blog Awards!

Thursday, February 18, 2010 | by nathan

Loud and Clear

Some amazing video by Tanner Herriott from Saturday night’s show. For the full-on awesome, click over to YouTube and watch them in 720p Hi-Def:

In addition to being awesome, these videos make me covet a digital SLR that can do high-definition video. Canon just introduced its new ti2 digital SLR, capable of recording 1080p High Definition video in 24, 25 or 30 frames per second and snapping 18 megapixel photographs. My absolute favorite thing about it, though, is that unlike other cameras with these features, this one might actually be within my price range. It’s possible I will reward myself for reaching 30 with a one of these cameras.

At any rate, enjoy the videos. Buy Orchid when it comes out on March 2.

Thursday, December 24, 2009 | by nathan

MY [pajama] PANTS!

It wouldn’t be Christmas without an adorable child in Christmas pajamas dancing to awesome music. Behold, the night Dr. Pants taught Cooper Marshall how to dance:

MY [pajama] PANTS! from Okay City Nate on Vimeo.

Thursday, December 17, 2009 | by nathan

D’oh!

Today marks twenty years since The Simpsons premiered, which means that it marks nineteen years, three hundred sixty four days since it became fashionable to say, "The Simpsons isn’t funny anymore!" In all seriousness, I remember it well: when the show first premiered on Fox, I, like Bart, was a fourth grader. Now I’m about to turn thirty, and I still love the show. Brian and I watch it every Sunday; one of my favorite things about autumn is Treehouse of Horror. We may be out of the 1992-1998 golden era of the show, but the movie was fantastic and every episode of the current season has been solid. Salon has an interesting story about the anniversary today, (which I don’t entirely agree with, but interesting nonetheless). But in lieu of a long screed about what The Simpsons have meant to me and how I think that, in 1,000 years they will be studied as the archetype of turn-of-the-millennium American families, I’ll just present you with a few of my favorite clips over the years:

[Regarding the above clip: ever since this aired, any time it's cold and gross and windy outside, my brother and I will grumble, "Lousy Smarch weather."]

[And regarding that one, I have yet to come up with a better reply to homophobia and general gay-related psychological and/or religio-crazy phenomena than, "Oh, be nice!"]

And last, a clip from my favorite episode of the entire series’ run, "Lisa The Vegetarian":

You wouldn’t believe how many more clips I passed over; there’s some serious funny – and, I concede, a stash of serious lame – over the history of The Simpsons. But I’ve grown up with it, and though I’m sure it won’t be around forever, I’m nowhere near ready to see it end now. Okay, one more. This is Brian’s favorite:

Wednesday, November 18, 2009 | by nathan

Model-Ts and Law Degrees

Any professional affiliations I may or may not have put aside, I find this incredibly cool. I hope all the OKC denizens who read this website are planning on voting for MAPS3 on December 8. 

Tuesday, November 10, 2009 | by nathan

Sweepin’ The Clouds Away

It’s weird to me to think that Sesame Street is 40 years old today, especially since I’m almost 30. It’s weird that in my lifetime I’ve gone from being raised on PBS shows like Sesame Street, The Electric Company and Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood to cable, to internet, to … now. Because I remember when we had five channels and only rich people had VCRs. BEHOLD MY ADVANCED AGE.

That aside, I am, like many people raised from the 1970s onward, indebted to and grateful for the crazy experiment that is Sesame Street. Latter-day hippie Jim Henson created something truly unique and transformative. Who hasn’t seen Stevie Wonder’s performance of "Superstitious" from the fictional New York neighborhood:

Possibly my favorite Sesame Street memory, however, is a personal one. Jim Henson died just before I started the fifth grade, and for our spring concert near the one-year anniversary of his death, our elementary school music teacher thought it would be the BEST IDEA EVER to have a Sesame Street-themed concert, with 150 or so fifth graders singing songs from the show.

Now. As adults you might think "Oh how sweet!" Let me tell you something: as ten-year-olds, we were MORTIFIED. We were super-serious TEN YEAR OLDS, HELLO, and if we were still watching that show (which, cut the crap, some of us were), or any children’s programming at all, we were doing it in SECRET, thankyouverymuch, and most likely we had long since abandoned it for super-important adult shows like 90210, The Simpsons, and Fifteen on Nickelodeon (holla if you remember that one!) 

We were FIFTH GRADERS, fergodsake, and far too old and important and grown up to be singing baby songs from a baby show. We were HORRIFIED. Our rehearsals were a string of unmitigated disasters. Our parents cooed and teared up to think how adoringly cute we were going to be. Our siblings taunted us endlessly. Our music teacher all but had to attach us to a cart and whip us like Iditarod dogs. We were like Sam I Am – we would not sing it in the rain, on a train, not on a boat, not in a moat.

I don’t remember any group of ten-year-olds ever being less invested in something, but come the day of the concert, we all showed up, sang as well as we could, had our photos taken, were told we were "cute" about a zillion times, and then breathed a sigh of relief that it was finally, finally over and we could get on with our super important adult fifth-grader business.

All that is to say, when I found this clip on YouTube, I got a tinge of nostalgia that has yet to go away:

Monday, October 19, 2009 | by nathan

A Rock Band From Ireland

So, last night this happened:

Aaaand:

Aaaand:

It was so incredibly awesome to get to see U2 in concert for the second time, especially since this time we were TEN FEET AWAY FROM BONO OH MY GOD. Needless to say I’m rather in love with this band, and do you know what’s funny about that? The first album of theirs I ever owned and listened to seriously was Pop. I might be in a one-man minority of people who really dig that record, though to be fair I haven’t listened to it in awhile. I might have to remedy that tonight.

The opening act were the Black Eyed Peas, who did little if anything to change my relatively low esteem for their body of work. Though I do have to tell you that earlier this year when I realized that Fergie was Stacy Ferguson from Kids Incorporated, I about crapped my britches. And anyway, it didn’t matter, because my view for most of the Peas’ set was this:

This photo was taken from exactly my eye level and is a great representation of what happens to me every time I go to a concert. I’m pretty sure I’ve taken to this website to bitch about this before, but EVERY TIME I get great seats to a show, some six-foot-plus douche bag comes and stands DIRECTLY in front of me. In front of five-foot-six me. This guy was especially douchey, because not only was he dancing like a crack-addicted ape, which is dangerous when your elbows are at everyone else’s eye level, but he was also standing on a sort of riser, a large hump in the floor that made him even taller by about six inches. He TOWERED over everyone around us, as did two of the friends he came with. A lady next to me, who was about five-foot-two, offered him and his friend free beers if they’d move back a ways, but they wouldn’t. I know everyone wants to be close, but come on! If you’re six and a half feet tall, maybe give up a little distance so that the rest of us don’t have to jump to see the show, hmmm?

Anyway, we shuffled ourselves around and by the time U2 came on we had managed to find an arrangement that suited us for the most part, and when they played "Magnificent," my favorite track of the new CD, I was able to grab this video. The sound quality’s not great, but GOOD GOD LOOK! I GOT TO STAND UNDER BONO’S CROTCH!

U2 "Magnificent" in Norman from Okay City Nate on Vimeo.