If I know my movie-buff friend, Danny, he has already complained about the remake of the perfectly fine 1981 comedy, Arthur, one of the most popular films from that decade. The story, about a happy drunk who stands to lose a wealthy inheritance when he falls for the wrong woman, originally starred Dudley Moore, Liza Minelli, and John Gielgud.
The 2011 remake of Arthur stars Russell Brand, Jennifer Garner, and Helen Mirren. I know it’s crazy, but it’s true.
Danny is what film critics call a “purist.” He clearly doesn’t understand that time moves on, and the original Arthur is now 30 years old! I’m sure his own teenage daughter is as unfamiliar with the late Dudley Moore as he is with forgotten silent film star Francis Lederer. A new generation deserves a new Arthur.
And what is so wrong with Hollywood remaking Arthur 1981 into Arthur 2011? Would we want Hamlet to only be performed once at Stratford-upon-Avon during the time of Shakespeare, never to be appreciated again by future generations? There have been countless interpretations of Hamlet. Just look at this list of well-known actors who have played Hamlet through the years —
Mel Gibson, David Tennant, Richard Burton, Kenneth Branagh, Sir Laurence Olivier, Richard Burbage, Thomas Betterton, Lewis Hallam. Jr., Edwin Booth (John Wilkes Booth’s brother), Asta Nielsen, Ethan Hawke, Kevin Kline, Sir Henry Irving, John Philip Kemble, Sir Ian McKellen, Edmund Kean, Sir John Gielgud, Sarah Bernhardt, Sir Derek Jacobi, Johnston Forbes-Robertson, Campbell Scott, William Charles Macready, Richard Chamberlain, Christopher Plummer, Nicol Williamson, John Barrymore, David Garrick
Russell Brand is not re-doing Arthur. He is recreating the brilliant character developed by the Oscar-nominated writer/director Steve Gordon, who sadly passed away immediately after the release of the film.
Why should Hollywood waste time and energy searching for new ideas, when it can stick with the classics, such as Arthur?
In fact, Hollywood shouldn’t just stop with a Dudley Moore “Arthur” and a Russell Brand “Arthur.” There should be a black “Arthur.” An Asian “Arthur.” An “Arthur” all in Spanish. A “gay” Arthur. An “Arthur” where the roles are reversed and Arthur is a woman. A transexual “Arthur.” A Pixar animated “Arthur” — in 3D Imax — where “Arthur” is a irresponsible racoon who is a glutton with his acorns rather than am alcoholic, in order to keep it G-rated. I think there should be a new big budget “Arthur” produced EVERY 30 years. Ten year old Raymond Ochoa of the children’s TV show “Drake and Josh” will be perfect in thirty years time as the womanizing drunk in the new new Arthur, released in 2041.
Hopefully, in thirty years, science will have perfected a time machine, so Hollywood studios, still hoping to recreate the success of the first “Arthur,” will go back in time to 1951, creating an “Arthur” appropriate for that era, starring Orson Welles, Deborah Kerr, and Spencer Tracy.
Why should Hollywood executives be caught between the moon and New York City every time they need to produce a movie? I applaud the creativity of Hollywood, with their unique ability to be Green and recycle ideas as easily as Ed Begley Jr. does with his paper towels. In the next few years, I hope to see “Arthur” remade as many times as humanly possible!
One of my guilty pleasures on the web is The Atlantic Magazine’s online “Media Diet.” This is not the typical online venue where someone goes to”goof off.” There are no songs about “Friday” here.  The column views itself as a respectable destination to help others overcome the information overload of modern times., with responses from such media heavy-hitters ranging such as Joseph Epstein and Peggy Noonan.
How do other people deal with the torrent of information that pours down on us all? Do they have some secret? Perhaps. We are asking various people who seem well-informed to describe their media diets.
This is the stated mission of the column, but I’m sure most readers come to see what media bigwigs do online, so they can flagellate themselves for being losers laughing at LOL Cats rather than reading the latest update from the New York Review of Books.
If a tech-savvy statistician created a graph analyzing the data from this site, he would conclude that what separates a media industry success story from the common man is his better daily reading list.
Is it my imagination, but does everyone who contributes to this “Media Diet” column only read the other contributors? I’m sad to announce this, but I did not see one mention from any of these columnists about them reading a personal blogger! Although it makes me sad that the editors of Mother Jones and Vanity Fair are not regular readers of Citizen of the Month, I understand that these are busy people. They look for information that matters to them, which doesn’t include caring about my mother returning from Boca Raton.
But don’t any of these media bigwigs HAVE a mother, or at least family members or online friends who don’t work in the media? Doesn’t the editor of Harper’s Magazine ever receive corny email jokes from his Aunt Mildred about “this rabbi from Cleveland who was having an affair with his secretary?” These are part of my media diet. Unfortunately.  And as much as I find these emails annoying, I might even respond to one. “That cracked me up, Aunt Mildred! I love being on your “joke list” so much, please unsubscribe me from this email account and send it to my main, more important “hotmail account” instead, spam_crap@hotmail.com! Love you.”
Does David Brooks of the New York Times consume anything other than “the Weekly Standard, The New Republic, The Atlantic, The New Yorker, The New York Review of Books, The Claremont Review, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, and National Affairs?”
For another example, here is a section of Media Diet: What I Read by Emily Yoffe, a Slate contributor who writes their “Human Guinea Pig†and “Dear Prudence†features. She is a writer I really like.
I look at Real Clear Politics, Politico, The Atlantic (Goldblog first), Politics Daily, Romenesko. I mostly see stuff on The Daily Beast or Huffington Post because someone sent it to me. The columnists I always read are Ruth Marcus, Bret Stephens, David Brooks, Charles Krauthammer, Mark Steyn, Michael Kinsley. (I owe my career to Mike – although please don’t pin the blame on him.) I appreciate the reporting and analysis of Claudia Rosett at Pajamas Media, and Anne Bayefsky at National Review Online.
Should I feel ashamed of my own media diet — which consists of mommybloggers, Facebook updates from overly depressed writers, vicious Twitter fights over whether or not “raisins are disgusting,” and blogs about women accidentally coloring their pubic hair to the color blue?
Are we what we eat, both in what we put into our mouths AND into our minds?
Have you seen the commercial for Pediasure “Sidekicks” for children? Two soccer moms are watching their daughters playing in a soccer game. One of the daughters drinks Pediasure before the game. You know this because she is the superstar scoring goal after goal. The other girls, who don’t drink Pediasure, are sluggish and poor athletes. They are “what they eat.” You know this because the advertisers portray these girls as mutant children shaped like French Fries and frosted donuts.
You ARE what you eat. At least in our consumer society where the aim is to make you insecure about who you are, and what you read (or the music you listen to).
The Atlantic Magazine Media Diet column has made me think about my own daily online diet. I’m not being judgmental about myself (OK, I am a little), but analyzing myself, and maybe prompting myself to adjust how I spend my time online.  Currently, I am trying to write more AND read more books, giving me less time to read YOU. And I like YOU. I really do.  But you don’t pay the bills.
So, how do I juggle all of this? Does it really matter who I read?  During my years online, my struggles with knowing what to do with YOU has bothered me more than how you felt about ME. Am I talking about “branding” again? Perhaps the editors of The Economist also read the personal blogs of their friends, but just don’t say so publicly, wanting to keep a professional image? Perhaps they are on LOL Cats every day and then fake a list for the Atlantic?! Does anyone judge me on what I read, or am I judging myself?
The following is my current “media diet.” It is a typical online day in April 2011. I tried to be honest about my day.  Believe me, I am the first to notice that I spend too time online, and not always in the most productive way.
Feel free to write about your “media diet” on your own blog. I bet it will be eye-opening.
Media Diet
by Neil Kramer
writer of the blog Citizen of the Month
Once upon a time, the first thing I did upon waking up, was to drag myself to the bathroom, eyes still half sleepily shut, and pee, frequently missing the bowl itself.
Those days are long gone, almost quaint in my mind.
Today, the first action of the day is to grab my iphone, which is usually sitting on the pillow next to me, like a loyal lover, or a eager pet puppy, and going online.
The mornings before breakfast, are all about ME. I check my email. I go to my blog to see if I received any more comments, and delete the spam uncaught by Akismet. I go on Facebook to see if there were any responses to my updates or comments. And lastly, I go on Twitter, to see if I got any mentions or DMs.
My only focus on the outside world is that I wish happy birthday to my friends on Facebook! It is almost a habit.
I don’t check the news before breakfast, so if World War III had started, I would be unaware of it. I might make a joke on Facebook to a blogger in St. Louis while I was still in bed, not even realizing that St. Louis had been destroyed the evening before.
It is not until breakfast that I focus on the “real world.” I juice up my laptop and turn to Google News. I find this site ugly in design, but it is still the best place to get a quick glance of what is going on in the world.
I used to be a news junkie, but blogging has changed me. I now feel — and I say this in all seriousness — that I learn more about the human condition and life from reading personal blogs. This might change soon, as my life — and the blogging world — changes.
Breakfast is over. It is now the “work day.” I struggle with an internet habit. I have not been shy about mentioning this on my blog. I am tempted to stay online, particularly on Twitter, and I succumb often. I have tried many different methods to battle this, from using alarms to pulling the plug out of the router. The best thing for my work is to avoid Twitter during the day. Or set an alarm which promptly sends electrical jolts to my testicles if I don’t get offline immediately.
I follow over 3000 people on Twitter. One solution that works well for me in cutting out some of the chaos is the use of Twitter lists. I have two lists, ALWAYS READ and SOMETIMES READ. I try to keep the ALWAYS READ column very short, 150 people, the number associated with Dunbar’s Number.
If I do go on Twitter during the morning, it is usually to scan the ALWAYS READ column, those who I consider closest in friendship. I also respond to those who send messages to me. Sometimes.
The morning is all Twitter, which is dangerous to my work. At some point, I finally get offline to do something constructive. Like I said, I am working on this.
It is not until lunchtime that I read any blog posts. My days of reading hundreds of blogs a day are long gone. I can’t handle it.  I usually go onto my Google Reader (or Feedly, which I love), where I have another ALWAYS READ column. As a creature of habit, this column also contains Dunbar’s number of 150. I rarely get through more than five blog posts during lunch, particularly if they are emotional or well-written. After you read something that touches you or makes you laugh, who wants to skip to another piece? I like to let the writing sit with me as I eat my turkey sandwich.
Who do I read every day? It’s not a big secret, although I feel uncomfortable posting it on a blogroll. It is mostly a collection of people I have connected with throughout the years for one reason or another. Danny and Schmutzie and V-grrrl and Tanis and Jane, and others who you see me talking about more than others. Relationships change and sometimes I stop reading one of these people for a month or so.  You can grow apart. You can get too close. It’s all rather personal to me.
I catch up on most of my blog reading at night or on weekends. In complete honesty, there are about ten of you who I read every single post you write, fifty of you who I read once a week, and others who I catch when I can, usually following a link from Twitter or Facebook.
During the afternoons, I find it much easier to concentrate on my work. Although there are countless examples of me doing the opposite, I try not to go on Twitter. If I do take a break during the afternoon, I tend to reach for Facebook. I am not a Facebook addict, so I find it safer. Some of my closest online friends are on Facebook rather than Twitter. Twitter attracts the loud mouths and those who like to be the center of attention. Twitter is like the cafeteria at NBC in Rockefeller Center, where clever people like to show off to each other. Facebook is taking a trip to small-town USA, where people know everything about you. I find Twitter relaxing. I know that this isn’t the typical view, but this is how I perceive things, based on who I follow. I look at your funny photos and learn about your new jobs and child’s birthday party. I’ve accepted commerce and pimping as an essential part of Twitter. I do not ALLOW it on my Facebook stream.
Each day, around 6PM – 7:30PM, a synapse clicks in my brain telling me that it is “serious news time.” This probably has something to do with me being born before CNN, when the nightly news was an important TV event. When I was a child, one of my daily joys was watching the local daily news with my father. My family was a CBS news family, formed during the era of Walter Cronkite. It is around this time that I indulge in my serious online time. I have four major news/opinion sources in my Google Reader: The New York Times, Slate, Salon, and the Atlantic. If I am not in the mood to read at the moment, I use Read it Later to bookmark the article.
At night, if I am not going out, the internet has replaced television as my main source of “entertainment.” If I am not writing my own blog post, I usually return to my blog reading. I use Commentluv on my blogposts, so I can see the titles of the posts of those who recently commented. I like to go through YOUR posts, one by one, curious what you are saying, or learning about the newcomers to my blog. I don’t always comment back, but it is a ritual I enjoy.
After 8PM, I have no specific online routine.  I like to talk to people on IM, especially Juli, Jennifer, Marinka, or Schmutzie.  We sometimes gossip about some online drama of the day. I then go back to Google Reader to continue with my ALWAYS READ group of 150.  I often return to Twitter until I get burned out or start ranting about some issue.  I’m sometimes online, reading Lifehacker, which gives me a geek thrill, or screenwriting blogs such as that of John August, until I fall asleep, which is why my phone is sitting on my pillow the next morning, where I start all over again.
I have no problem with my early morning Twitter/Facebook/blog rituals, my lunch-time blog reading, or my dinner-time news update. It is the rest of the day that I would like to change.  I want to eliminate a good deal of my time wasting during the work day. I would like to drastically reduce my nighttime online life so I can read more books, or socialize. I’m sure these are issues that all of you deal with on a daily basis, including those media bigshots who write these “Media Diet” columns for the Atlantic. People are people.
Would I be a better person if I consumed more of the quality media diet that these well-known media personalities do? I doubt it. It might help me career wise, but is knowing who got fired at Conde Nast today really more important than which personal blogger bought a new house? The one big difference that is essential to remember is that those who contribute to the Atlantic “Media Diet” column never let their media consumption take over their lives.  They use it to enhance their own product. They are producers before being consumers. They do not read personal blogs or acknowledge Aunt Mildred’s joke emails because it is not related to their work.
This might surprise you, but others come to me seeking advice on life issues, and I am known to be “brilliant” in helping people make decisions. That is odd, isn’t it? It makes me wonder about the personal lives of those who write advice columns. Or even more so, therapists.
It is so much easier to fix the problems of others. The fixer is dispassionate, and approaches the issues with common sense, like a Mr. Spock.  He is not fighting with himself.
Probably my greatest skill as advice-giver is that I don’t belittle your indecisiveness. I might laugh at you, but it is one of recognition, like the klutz guffawing at the clumsy person tripping over his own shoelaces. I am fully aware that you will listen to whatever I say with confidence, nod you head, then immediately do something different. It is the absurdity of this fucked up cat and mouse game that makes me laugh.  It is so human.   You will eventually get it.  Or die trying.
If you ever need advice, come to me. I’m a master advice-giver. Which should tell you a lot about my own personal life.
On March 17th, I wrote down five simple goals. Goal #1 was this: “set up a date for when I am traveling to Los Angeles, and moving my stuff from Sophia’s place.”
++++
“I need a ten minute break from this conversation,” she said over the phone from Los Angeles. I was in New York.
I tried to take a ten minute nap. I put the alarm on my iPhone in order to wake me up, my current favorite alarm — the one that sounds like church bells. But I didn’t fall asleep. The room was too hot; management continues to blast heat up the radiator, no matter what the temperature outside, through mid-April, as if they knew better than Mother Nature. My next door neighbor was cooking pungent Korean food. My legs hung over the edge of the too-short couch like wet laundry on a clothesline in a 1950’s Bronx tenement.
After the brief intermission, I told Sophia that I wanted to move my things by June 15th.
“And where are you going to move everything? There’s 25 boxes of books.”
“It doesn’t matter. I’m going to move it somewhere.”
We took another ten minute break, which continued on for three painful days.
Dick: Hey, Jane, what’s up? I had a tuna sandwich for lunch. What did you have?
Jane:Â I had a yogurt.
++++
Dick: Hey, Jane, what’s up? Did you see what Tom is doing? All he does is put up links to his own blog posts! How crude.
Jane:Â I know! Â What a self-absorbed loser.
++++
Dick: Hey, Jane, what’s up? Did you see that Tom has hired six ghostwriters to put up links all day to his own blog posts, and now he has a million followers?!
Jane: That’s crazy. Most people are just sheep who can’t think for themselves.
++++
Dick: Hey, Jane, what’s up? Did you learn anything from Tom at that seminar on social media?
Jane:Â Read my post.
++++
Dick:Â Hey, Jane, what’s up?
Jane: Read my post. And buy Tom’s new book on social media. And vote for me as one of the top ten most interesting conversationalists online.
++++
Dick:Â Hey, Jane, what’s up?
Jane:Â [YOU HAVE BEEN UNFOLLOWED]
++++
Dick: Read my post. Buy Tom’s book.
Jane:Â [STILL UNFOLLOWED]
++++
Dick:Â Everyone, you MUST READ Jane’s brilliant new earth-shattering blog post right now!
Jane: Thanks, dude! RT @Dick “Everyone, you MUST READ Jane’s brilliant new earth-shattering blog post right now!”
++++
Dick: Read my post. Read Jane’s post. Buy Tom’s book.
Jane: Read my post. Read Dick’s post. Buy Tom’s book.
One of the changes in my life is to start to think big. For example, earlier this week was the Jewish holiday of Purim. While other Jews simply dressed as Queen Esther and ate prune hamentashen for the holiday, I decided to “step it up a notch” and dress as Queen Esther AND make a promotional video for the prune INDUSTRY!
Luckily, I erased that first video and made this one instead — an entry to go to the Mom 2.0 conference in New Orleans next month and be a representative of Sunsweet Growers, one of the sponsors. I wanted to give it a try, and do something new. You have to promise not to laugh.
I’ve seen some of the other entries — confident Moms serving Sunsweet D’Noir Prunes to their grateful families — so I am a long long shot in getting this gig. But like the Mets possibly winning the pennant this season, you gotta believe! I find out tomorrow.
Good luck to the other Queen Esthers vying for the spot!
My track record of getting into useless internet arguments this week exploded today when I was confronted with this sad link from the New York Times, via Kyran‘s Facebook page, which stated that people have stopped using the telephone.
In the last five years, full-fledged adults have seemingly given up the telephone — land line, mobile, voice mail and all. According to Nielsen Media, even on cellphones, voice spending has been trending downward, with text spending expected to surpass it within three years.
OK, fine. We all know the New York Times likes to publish false “controversial” facts just to get you to pay for their subscription. But surely my old blogging pal, Kyran, a fun-loving writer who appreciates old traditions, loves to chat on the phone with her friends and colleagues.
But then I saw her comment on the subject–
Ding-dong, the social phone call is dead. Count me among those who won’t miss it. My mother and sister are about the only people I want to visit with on the telephone.
As if that wasn’t bad enough, most of her friends AGREED with her. I immediately re-posted this on my Facebook page, hoping that my own friends still enjoyed a good one-on-one phone chat. After all, many of my Facebook friends are pals from the old days.
Remember, friends, when we used to talk on the phone for HOURS about our algebra homework? Or about the cute girls in the junior class? Or whether a “time warp” could really exist? Or whether the Mets can win a game this year? Hey, Barry, remember the time we spend three hours on the phone, watching the same Mets game in our own homes at the same time?
Does anyone really think social media does a better job in creating real communication between individuals?
Would Bye, Bye Birdie really be BETTER using social media, rather than the brilliant invention of Alexander Graham Bell?
The downward spiral started in the “Peter Pan” bus returning home from the Berkshires in the beginning of March. It was snowing outside, flakes five times bigger than I had ever seen before. I had just said good-bye to Jenn Mattern from the blog, Breed ‘Em and Weep, her mother, Elaine, and Jenn’s two daughters, after a weekend visit. We were at their favorite local diner, where I had eaten eggs, sausages, and huge country-fresh buttermilk pancakes.
I had a great weekend; it was also a glimpse into the life of another person who I had only known through her words. I knew from the blog that Jenn had split with her husband three years back, and she had some rough spots during that time.   But while I was there, I didn’t focus on the words on the page, but the person, and the reality surrounding her. I heard about the early stages of a relationship she was having with a man. I could sense the anxiety and the excitement when she mentioned it. And there was a lot of love twirling around her all the time, from her mother, who lived nearby, her two daughters, her friends, her two dogs, and her two cats.
It was this love and companionship in her life that was on my mind as the bus slowly made its way through the quaint towns of New England, en route back to the grit of The Port Authority Bus Terminal of New York. I was returning to the apartment in Queens, my mother’s apartment while she was in Florida for the winter. I had been alone for four months.
Before the weekend in Massachusetts, I was feeling pretty good, or at least I thought so. Sure, the place was a mess, like a cliched bachelor pad, with my underwear hanging from the chandelier, and Chinese take-out cartons littering the carpet, but I was managing. My main problem was that the apartment was too quiet at times, forcing me to go on Twitter for conversation. I still talked with Sophia on the phone, but it always turned into a frustrating mis-communication about something.  Now, after a weekend seeing all the energy in another person’s life, I noticed the glaring absence in my own, as if the curtain was ripped aside to reveal the empty theatrical set.
I tried to return to my usual life of writing, blogging, and Twittering, but it seemed stale. Even worse, a waste of time. While others were talking about conferences, marketing, and book promotion, I felt like I was just getting in the way of others.  The more I responded emotionally to someone’s blog post, the more I wanted pick the words off the page and stomp on them with my bare feet, like a bratty child, crushing them into jibberish. I told Bon that one of her social media posts was “bullshit.” In one week, I argued with bloggers such as Tanis, Marinka, Kate, and Karen Maezen Miller.
A few days later, my birthday arrived. While I was honored to have so many nice people wish me a happy birthday on Facebook, it was also overwhelming. There was no way I could personally reply to all the kind messages. I felt a sense of anxiety. I was on edge.
I went to my friend’s house for my birthday — my friend, Rob, who I have known since nursery school. It was great hanging with him and his family. Both of his young sons made me homemade birthday cards. His older son, who had become obsessed with the Titanic after reading a picture book at school, drew a picture of the Titanic on the front of my birthday card. If found this cute, but I was also sensed the symbolism.
For the next few days, I goofed off in my apartment, playing on my iPhone. I decided to download the free version of “Angry Birds,” just to know why this game was so popular.
At first, the “game” seemed idiotic. How many times can you slingshot a bird into a structure of wood and glass, just to make some mocking pigs explode? It seemed inane.
I ended up playing it for several hours. After I reached “Level 11,” I deleted the app forever. It was also having a bad effect on my nerves, and my brain. I was feeling in a vulnerable state, and the angry bird were — making me angry. I wasn’t sleep well. I wrote these surreal blog posts with images of destruction, a type of writing that is unusual for me.
My sixth year of blogging started with a bang. I’m not sure what caused the massive explosion in my bedroom at 3AM. but I was awoken suddenly, my flannel sheets from Target on fire.
I glanced at my iPhone sitting on the other end of the table, and I immediately understood the reason behind the mysterious appearance of this tiny female bird in the crevices of my brain. I had played Angry Birds earlier that day for at least an hour, and the repetitive nature of the birds smashing into glass must have made an impact on my soul. All that death and destruction!
The next night, Sophia called me at 2AM from Los Angeles. She told me to turn on the TV and told me about the massive earthquake in Japan. She suggested that I wake up my friend Rob. His wife was born in Japan, and might want to know what is going on back home.
I was half-asleep, so I said OK, but didn’t make the call. Sophia called again. I told her that I didn’t want to wake them up.  They could find out in the morning.  She insisted that I do it, or she would.
I woke up their family at 2:30AM to tell them about the earthquake. At first, Rob didn’t seem happy that I called so early and woke up the kids, but I think we all quickly saw that this was not a regular earthquake, but something bigger, especially when the tsunami arrived. Luckily, the family in Japan was OK, and Sophia was right about calling them.
I spent the next few days glued to the TV and the internet, like most others, feeling scared and shocked, and a little unsure what to do. I donated some money to the Red Cross. The trouble at the nuclear power plant only added more to the tension.
I can’t put my finger on exactly what happened to me during March. It was a combination of events — visiting Jenn in the Berkshires and meeting her family, arguing with other bloggers online, my birthday, a Titanic birthday card, Angry Birds, and the devastating earthquake in Japan.
I had to change things about the way I was living my life, and I needed to start to do it NOW.
I’m allowed to change my mind. Rather than stop writing on my blog, as I mentioned on my last post, I can USE my writing space as a public record of how I am dealing with these five seemingly simple, but actually extremely difficult, tasks that I placed at the tip of my own feet.
I’m not sure how often I will update this, or whether the ongoing plot will be of interest to anyone other than myself. Be prepared for a very slowly-paced story. Most of the drama is internal. I will not veer from the subject at hand until the dragon is slayed, and the fair maiden trapped in the tower cleverly ties together several of her bras to form a sturdy rope in which I can use to climb to the window and rescue her.
1) I have set up a date for when I am traveling to Los Angeles, and moving my stuff from Sophia’s place.
I have taken no action in this at all. But I expect a phone call FROM Sophia, once she reads my blog, very very soon.
2) Decided in which city I’m going to live.
This is a tough one.  Nothing.
3) Sat across from an available woman — for at least an hour — in real life, and flirted with her.
Jason Mayo invited me to his office St. Patrick’s Day Party today on Facebook. When I looked at the guest list on his Facebook page, I noticed MANY available women had RSVPed. Unfortunately, I had to be home to get an important phone call from someone in Los Angeles at the same time as the party during Pacific Standard Time. Now I know — and you know — that if I really wanted to go to this party to flirt with a woman for at least an hour, I could have devised a plan.  Did I wimp out, fearful of going to a party where I hardly know a person? That’s your call.
4) Made a decision on my next writing project.
No.
5) Exercised for at least three days in a row.
Not yet. BUT, I spend an hour going through the Exercise TV programs they broadcast ON DEMAND with Time Warner Cable. I am going to attempt to do Cardioke (or Kardioke?) with Billy Blanks son, Billy Blanks Jr., a “high energy” exercise which combines dance moves while singing up-tempo Karaoke songs, like those from the Black Eyed Peas. I know it sounds rather ridiculous, and I would off myself if a video of me doing this exercise ever made it onto YouTube, but it looks EXTREMELY exhausting, but not as crazy as that Shredding military dictatorship routine.
Neil Kramer has been writing about his life online since 2005. He has worked for Disney and HBO. Neil lives in NYC. You can contact him at neilochka on yahoo.
