Happy Face / Frowny Face – Sept. Edition

Fall is here, bringing us all many new things to rant and rave about. This month I’m taking a look at everything from The Pick Up Artist to picking up what’s left of pop culture after the VMAs. Let’s get to it!


Happy Face
Mystery– Though it took nearly half the show’s run I finally became hooked on VH1’s The Pick Up Artist where an always oddly dressed pick up expert calling himself Mystery doles out advice to a handful of guys with no game with one leaving the show each week. I sit there riveted by how simple his techniques are and how easily they work for the former know-nothings. My lone gripe with the entire process he’s put his students through is that he’s changed the way some of them dress. I know douchebag is in, but damn it feels bad to see it work. Regardless, the show has taught me a thing or two and I’m looking forward to it coming out on DVD.

New Fall TV - In TV land it’s the most wonderful time of the year, the new fall season. This means two of my favorite shows are back, How I Met Your Mother and House, and I may possibly get a third show to add to that mix with the new drama Dirty Sexy Money. Dirty Sexy Money has Samaire Armstrong in it, an actress who has the rare distinction of having been on both The O.C. and Entourage (two of my personal favs), so her script reading ability is probably pretty good, which means I’m going to give Dirty Sexy Money a shot to make my short list of shows I watch.

Good Cabbies - Normally I’m a subway kinda guy. I like taking my two dollar trips around the city. Sometimes, however, there simply aren’t subway stops where I need them to be (west side anybody?). This is where cabbies come in and recently I’ve had the good fortune of catching a few great ones. Last night was one of those times. After exiting Buddha Bar on Little West 12th street (which is between 9th and 10th ave) I caught a cab as soon as I got to the corner. He proceeded to drive like a pro, meaning slalom style weaving in-between cars and busses, as he worked his way to 42nd and Lexington. It was fantastic. He dropped my off at Grand Central with plenty of time to spare (enough time to hit Zaros before catching my train) and I tipped him well. I remember the reaction two friends of mine had when I took them on their first NYC cab ride. They thought the driver was nuts. In reality the driver we had that night was pretty tame. Last night’s cabbie would have scared the bejesus out of them, but for me the whole ride was, as odd as this may sound, incredibly comforting.


Frowny Face
VMA Nonsense - Britney was terrible, we all know that, the awards were meaningless, and the really sad thing about it all was that when you looked at the faces of the artists in the crowd they seemed confident and excited to the point of being smug, as if they felt they were doing something really big and important by being at the VMAs. I honestly believe today’s most mediocre artists think they have everything in common with the all-time greats. You could see it at the VMAs with that air of “we’re really fantastic” everyone had. It was nausea inducing. I also found it amazing that some of the artists were laughing at the awful Britney Spears performance not even realizing that in five years that could be each and every one of them. That shouldn’t have been humorous to the artists in attendance, it should have been terrifying.

Kanye West - I could handle his ghostwritten rhymes and jacked beats (seriously, who can’t have a hit using a Daft Punk song?) if he would just shut the fuck up. Bitching when you don’t win awards, and bitching that you didn’t get the main stage at the VMA’s, only goes to show us that you really don’t care about the music, you care about the notoriety. To further prove that point you went and said you felt you were "the number one human being in music" after a recent radio show appearance. Listen, Kanye, now that you’ve sold all those albums in your first week (and had an incredible sales drop the week after when Def Jam wasn’t buying albums for you) please just stick to producing songs, or better yet, just stick to wearing dumb looking sunglasses, because with those on fewer and fewer people will take you seriously and Lord knows with the childish way you've been acting nobody should.