Things of Interest: The Shut Up Issue

As in shut up anyone who hates series finales, science, and Sting.

Three bald men and a funeral.

Let me start off by pimping a "Breaking Bad" animated-GIF gallery I did for work.

Now. I don't mean to make anyone's head asplode with more Breaking Bad postulations, but I've been thinking about some of my favorite series finales. I'm confident BB is going to cook its way into my top three, in its rightful spot (maybe even at the top of the pyramid) next to Six Feet Under and The Shield. 

Not to get more morbid than the show has already become, but the endings of popular TV shows are a lot like funerals: They either offer finality and something resembling closure so we can more easily move, mentally unencumbered, onto the NEXT hit show (open casket), or they shroud the show's final moments in ambiguity, a tactic that makes for a lively Twitter feed for a few days, but also for a communally messed-up psyche — we never get all of the answers we so desperately seem to want and seek from our screens (closed casket). Go back and examine the excess all-caps rage that filtered down your feeds after the rather ambiguous Dexter finale last week if you don't believe me.

Of my favorite shows of the last decade, I place Six Feet Under and The Shield in the former category, The Sopranos and LOST in the latter. That's not to say I didn't enjoy and/or appreciate the way The Sopranos and LOST wrapped things up. I did, in a way. But in another way — not really. 

It's weird, because I've always preferred ambiguity over finality in movies. But I'm not as vested in a movie. It's only two hours out of my life, not six years. And the endings of Six Feet Under and The Shield were both so exquisite in their conclusions. You don't get any more terminal than showing the deaths of a show's characters, either their real ones or their slow, metaphorical ones in a fluorescent-lit cubicle. 

There are striking similarities between Walter White and Vic Mackey. Bryan Cranston and Michael Chiklis are both former sitcom dads gone wrong, breathing life into characters who justify their downward spirals into sin as a Mephistophelian (yet practical) means by which they can provide for and protect their families.  Tony Soprano's delusion, on the other hand, didn't run quite as deep when it came to his own underworld endeavors — this was the life he was raised in, a life in which The Family was ostensibly more important than even his own. 

But as resigned and pragmatic as he was in this life that was chosen for him, Tony Soprano often seemed to Just. Want. Out. He became obsessively attached to the wild ducks that fed in his swimming pool, suffering from severe anxiety when the "goddamn ducks" eventually flew away, leaving him floundering in his existential ennui. Walter White and Vic Mackey, on the other hand, chose their paths and had the chance, on more than one occasion, to retake the righteous one, a path that would lead them back to the stand-up white-collar lives they were supposed to live. Yet, despite the looming consequences, they just kept on wanting in.

I get the sense that Vince Gilligan is going to go the Vic Mackey route tonight. The entire show has revolved around these consequences. It seems like, if we're going to keep to the code, that it would be impossible to pussyfoot around that fact — we're going to know exactly what happens, at least to Walter White. There will be little to no ambiguity.

Anna Gunn (Skyler White) has said the 75-minute finale is going to be "apocalyptic." I wouldn't venture to guess the specifics of what Breaking Bad has in store for us, especially because that's already been done by the rest of the Internet — but I'm 96 percent sure (an even higher percentage than Jesse's last cook) that it's going to be open casket.

Thanks a lot, curmudgeonly commenters. You've ruined science for the rest of us.

Popular Science decided to shut off comments for its online content this week. Its reasoning: a "fractious minority" has the power to skew reader perception, which can then snowball into adverse effects for public policy and, subsequently, scientific funding. Associate editor Dan Nosowitz said the vexing comments simply became "too much to really fight back." 

As someone who works for a site with users who manage to regularly turn the comments section for cute kitten galleries into an anti-Obama diatribe, I can't say I blame Pop Sci for the impulse. But I think it's a mistake to cut off the conversation: Slate points us to a tweet by Gizmodo writer Matt Novak, in which he says that writing on a site without comments is like "whispering in the wilderness."

Go, Gordon.
I made the mistake of mentioning to co-workers the other day that I was listening to The Last Ship, Sting's first album of original songs in 10 years, and was instantly subjected to mocking en masse. Actually, it was more like three or four comments that were simply variations of "I hate Sting," but my persecution complex kicked in and I self-flagellated by listening to Journey for the rest of the morning.

Though Sting the person annoys the crap out of me, I like the chances that Sting the artist takes, and his newest release doesn't disappoint in that regard. (Also, if you listen closely, you'll hear strains of "Be My Girl" in "Ballad of the Great Eastern," which is a cool bonus.) 

My initial reaction was "This album is what would happen if Sting had recorded the Leaving Las Vegas soundtrack on a pirate ship" — but placing it in its correct context, it's appropriately haunting, histrionic, and harrowing. He's been cut to the quick one too many times, this guy, and he's going to tell you all about it. The album, also the score for an upcoming Broadway musical, is based on Sting's life growing up in an English shipbuilding town. 

Everyone give Sting a hug now, because he loves her, but she loves someone else:

Also:

If you want to see my tweets, @WarriorHauswife is where you should go.

Credit: sdfdfdsf

Things of Interest: The Anger Issue

I have a Klout account I don't check very often, but I occasionally log on for the lulz to see which topics I've been labeled "influential" in. 

This week's list:

• Beer

• Fitness
• Cake
• Running
• Crossfit

Yep, Klout is pretty terrible. Except for maybe "beer," I influence absolutely no one on any of those topics, unless no one's had the heart to tell me I've been furiously tweeting about bundts and babkas after taking an occasional Ambien. I hate cake, if you must know (except for ice cream cake). I love pie, though. Especially Briermere Farms pie, which you should try if you ever find yourself on Long Island's East End. And it's on Long Island, not in Long Island. I recommend the raspberry-cherry.

What's also terrible is that I haven't shared enough of my rage online. Especially since angry tweets have been deemed the most influential of all the types of tweets. I struggle regularly between publicly sharing all the feels and not showing my hand, because (as my friend Diane pointed out in her excellent essay about being fired) Hobbes might have been onto something in his assertion that life is nasty, brutish, and short and you should look out for yourself and trust nothing and no one and keep everything close to the chest. 

But, according to those who know social media better than I, I've been remiss. So today I go the rage-sharing route and react to this week's Internet affronts. These are simply excerpts of my umbrage. Expansion pack ----> coming soon!

Let's start with the worst show on TV* that's posing as the best show. 
I rarely base my assessment of an entire TV series on the pilot alone. If I regularly did that, I would never have have gotten sucked into Game of Thrones or Mad Men, whose premiere episodes didn't speak to me in a way that demanded repeat viewing. Portlandia and Orange Is the New Black, on the other hand — you had me at "hello" (said in your best Pacific-Northwest prison accent).

I admit, my expectations for Netflix's House of Cards were high — partly based on what I had heard from friends/those in the know who had seen it, partly because of Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright, partly because of the critical hype. So I plummeted particularly hard and fast to that cold, dead place that is Earth when I watched the first episode last night. 

Not only did I feel that the show wasn't deserving of that hype. I was convinced it just had to be a parody of ... something. Because nothing could purposely be this bad. I scrolled all the way to page 5 of my "House of Cards, is this a joke?!" Google search before I became convinced that it was not, in fact, a joke. Some have given it credit for being a somewhat satirical sendup of the Machiavellian machinations in our nation's capital, complete with camp, but I get the impression that the show takes itself very seriously in its supposedly deep commentary on the DC underworld.

I wasn't put off by the dog mercy killing or the politician-wife power haircuts or the breaking of the fourth wall (a technique that worked here to sometimes amusing, mostly irritating effect). My problem was the hackneyed, awful dialogue, the treacly piano score, the one-dimensional characters, the agonizingly drawn-out direction that reminded me of those excruciating early Seinfeld episodes when it would take forever for the laugh track to kick in, the eye-rolling cliches: the office affairs, the fancy cigarette holders (this is Washington, remember!), the go-getter blogger who just wants to blog and pound wine out of a coffee mug and blog and keep Saltines on her bookshelf and blog and sit criss-cross applesauce on her apartment floor because she can't afford chairs because SHE'S A BLOGGER. Nailed it, producers! 

Robin Wright said she heard from a reliable DC source that the show is 99 percent spot-on. I'm not discounting its accuracy, but I'm also not sure any of the real DC intrigue (or anything of interest at all) has translated to the small screen, because it's hokey and — with the exception of the sumptuous cinematography— just isn't done well. Everything is so earnestly slick that anything of substance David Fincher and crew are trying to relay just slides out of frame. I wish I could give the show more of a chance, but I don't know if I can sit through another episode, even in Hate-Watch Mode. It's one more instance of Brits Do It Best.

Next we segue to the phenomenon known as the midlife crisis. Because it's apparently going to happen. To all of us.
If you're between the ages of 35 and 55, science says at some point you're going to suffer from a definite "dip in well-being" (i.e., the midlife crisis), but no one has any clue why, and you should only feel OK about succumbing to it if your pocketbook can afford it. That the midlife crisis is going to happen doesn't anger me. That this article told me absolutely nothing useful does. 

Shall we continue the choler with these two items that actually just made me really fucking sad?
First, a North Carolina school district decided to ban Ralph Ellison's classic Invisible Man from the district's approved reading list. Even worse than the bizarre 12-page complaint that got this whole thing going was one school board member's assessment that he didn't find "any literary value" in the National Book Award winner. Maybe things aren't totally hopeless here: The board is going to meet again on Wednesday to reconsider the ban. This was only after tons of negative media attention (even from Russia!), but take it or leave it, people.

On the more local front: this brouhaha in Hauppauge, L.I., the next town over from my own. Parents in that school district raised a ruckus at a recent board meeting because 10 children from a nearby homeless shelter have been placed in one of the district's elementary schools. The potentially valid concerns (burgeoning class sizes and the district's apparent lack of transparency) that could have been rationally considered and discussed were nullified by thinly veiled NIMBYism/classism that included such questions such as whether these kids were required to be vaccinated (it's a state law, barring religious exemption), why current students should have to put up with such a "disruptive" learning environment, and whether the "transients" would have to follow the same code of conduct as the other darlings who live in actual houses and never exhibit any behavioral problems students. 

Getting back to the burgeoning class size issue: It's 10 students, meaning there would be maybe one or two extra students per classroom, assuming they're going to be spread out among the different classrooms (if they're all being placed in the same classroom, let me know ASAP — I'll immediately retract all my misplaced outrage). If a dozen new families had moved into The Hamlet (a country-club community in Commack, not in Hauppauge, but I'm not sure of the Hauppauge equivalent) over the summer, would any of these concerned parents be saying boo about this? 

One highly publicized success can't necessarily be simplified and generalized to apply to an entire demographic, but Samantha Garvey's story should at least give everyone pause to consider what the real reservations are about this. Based on many of the Patch and Newsday comments, I know that deep introspection is probably not going to happen, but I'm hopeful enough to think that there will be enough people on the human being side to enable all of the 7-year-olds (not just the ones with a stable roof over their head) to get back to learning their sight words and multiplication tables.

We can wrap it up now by expressing my ire about living in New York, women's struggles in the workplace, and a really dumb comment someone I know made.
There was a little bit of back-and-forth going on this week about living in New York City and its environs. On the one hand, no one can afford to live here and everyone is bitter and sad about it. No, wait: New York is wonderful, bitter and sad people — you just haven't found the right way to live here. (For the record, I agree with many of the points made in both articles. I float somewhere in the middle, unable to afford to live here but not willing to throw in the towel quite yet and head for Wichita.)

What really struck me about Cari Luna's article (the first link) was this:

"But always in the back of my mind lies the thought that we failed. That we could have made it [in New York] if only we'd fought harder to stay, struggled more."

How can women be shoppin' if they're trying so hard all the time to achieve perfection and live up to impossible expectations? Because we keep striving for that. We keep trying to improve the quality of life for ourselves and our families. But it's not going to happen in the current climate. As Tracy Moore points out, "Until childcare is more affordable, until the pay gap is closed, as long as women are doubling the workload by striving and mothering simultaneously while men are not pitching in equally, we're stuck." 

I'd add to that that employers need to start recognizing the dynamics of today's challenging work-life balance and not only tolerate it, but embrace it. That means more recruiting of dedicated workers who actually want to work, and more flexible situations (telecommuting, flex time, job sharing) for those people. I kind of get what Marissa Mayer is saying about her telecommuting ban at Yahoo!, but I think it's a short-sighted effort that will only have short-term benefits. Excellent employees who feel respected and valued will give you 150 percent (or some other significant percentage that's more than 100). The real task should be weeding out the slackers, the hangers-on who abuse company time and resources whether they're in the office or working from their hot tub. 

But looping back to the whole woman thing: We keep hearing women are making inroads in the workforce. That the gender-pay disparity is decreasing. That maybe that whole glass ceiling thing is just a bunch of hoo-ha. 

Then I saw this. 

And realized that awareness alone about the pay gap won't necessarily help close it (women's expectations are so low to begin with that we have to fight that before we can fight the gap itself). 

And remembered the comment I recently found out someone I know made (I have my pipelines) that he resented being edited by "middle-aged moms." I know. We're the worst.

And then I called it a night, because wow. That's a lot of anger for one day. I hope when I tweet this, you'll be duly influenced!

But first, a final thought...
Despite my — and probably most people's — occasional tendency to steep in this anger and frustration, and to brood about the "forever empty" that Louis C.K. poignantly describes in his observations about smartphones, I'm not angry all the time (though my overuse of all caps suggests otherwise). There's another Hobbes whose world view I ultimately subscribe to — one that's realistic, but also focused on the present and appreciative of the simple, pleasant things in life. 

Happy first day of fall.

* I know it's not technically on TV. But I watch it on my TV. So I call it a TV show. Label it as you like.

If you want to see my tweets (angry or otherwise), @WarriorHauswife is where you should go.

Credit: Jenn Gidman; Bill Watterson

Things of Interest: The Idiocy Issue

Somefing's not right here. Lightin' a fire under your ass now.
Start makin' somefing happen.

In 1993, I pitched an article for the first time to a "real" publication. I don't remember what the pitch was, but the publication was Mademoiselle (one more thing you've got on me, haters). 

My pitch was rejected. I indulged the writer's cliché and push-pinned the rejection letter to my bedroom wall — masochistic motivation I thought would somehow elevate me to elusively erudite heights (and perhaps liberate me from a lifetime of lame alliteration). I would amass a huge, EPIC collection of rejection letters. I would shroud myself in their snubs, revel in their rebuffs. I would take all the kicks in the teeth like a (Gid)man.

I didn't pitch or submit anything anywhere ever again until 2013. 

It doesn't really matter why this happened. It happened. It's being remedied now. Partly thanks to the inspiration of this guy, a fellow Ukrainian who hammers nails into wood with his bare hands:

But mostly by just writing stuff and submitting it places. I had my first article published on Salon.com last month, after eight months of "practice" on this blog. I would like to keep doing more of that. If not, I will become the Harper Lee of preachy, meaningless, highly entertaining essays that will change your life if you'll just please read them. If that recluse thing does happen — and if you're nice — I'll grant you an interview in 2053 and reveal why I crapped out so fantastically again. Only to you, though. And only if you print out and present this blog post. Like a coupon.

Even though I'll be concentrating most of my efforts on forcing my ruminations onto the masses, I'd still like to keep the blogging front sufficiently fortified. So from now on (meaning when I feel like it) there will be a weekly "Things of Interest" post. There are lots of interesting things out there. You'll either be interested or you won't. Like dating.

It helped that I recently watched Orange Is the New Black on Netflix for two weeks straight — my basic obsessive M.O. for Shows I Hear Good Things About. For 13 nights in a row, I was bombarded by Regina Spektor lecturing in the opening credits that "taking steps is easy — standing still is hard." Hear it for yourself for self-help reinforcement:

I've got a babushka, and it's tied on TIGHT. It's keeping my head together, no matter how many staggering, stumbling steps I take.

THINGS OF INTEREST (for real now)

This week's theme: idiocy
I've watched a few idiotic things lately, some quite literally. First up: My Idiot Brother, which was dopey and goofy and had so many plot holes and unsympathetic characters that I don't understand why I actually really liked it. It's one of those movies I would watch again, but I have absolutely zero justification to recommend it to anyone else. Paul Rudd movies always seem to have a good heart behind them, is all I can say.

Thanks to the nefariousness of Netflix, I've also been suckered into the BBC series Luther, which is probably the most absurd crime show (or show) I've ever seen. The villains are over-the-top evil (AND insane!), the scenarios are preposterous, and the title character — portrayed in all his eye-twitching glory by Idris Elba of The Wire and The Office — boasts the intelligence, instincts, and invincibility of an impossible law-enforcement superhero. 

I wish I could say all the F-bombs I spewed at my TV after the first episode precluded me from watching again — but Elba is magnificent, as is his supporting crew, especially Ruth Wilson as adversary/soulmate Alice Morgan (a fun recent interview with Wilson in Vulture appears here). The theme song is excellent, too:

I smoothed out all of this recent ridiculousness with a viewing of Searching for Sugar Man, which was idiotic only in the sense that I hadn't seen it earlier. It's also been a few years since I've seen Idiocracy — probably time for a rewatch. 

Related: how your movie-appreciation skills start to suck (or get better) after becoming a parent
Jason McBride's article about how his previously "infallible" cinematic judgment went south after the birth of his son was an interesting read, though I've found the exact opposite has happened in my case. Time, money, and energy (but mostly time) are too precious to squander on the meh movies I used to waste major coin on in my pre-kid days. There's no other way to explain why I willingly went to the theater to see Cold Mountain or Love Actually in 2003, the year before I had my son, except that it was ... the year before I had my son. 

Go, ladies!
Inspirational on the feminist front: LEGO's first female scientist minifig and Diana Nyad, because ... Diana Nyad.

Point/counterpoint of the week
Point: interesting article on talent only being recognized when it's accompanied by success.

Counterpoint (kind of): similarly interesting article on the value of laziness.

If you want more of me on Twitter, @WarriorHauswife is where you should go.