Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

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The king of memetic Twitter comedy is just some guy

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It has been a tumultuous year to be a Twitter power user. The birdsite that unites us all and has yielded endless good things in my life has turned into a hellscape as a certain Elongated Muskrat has taken it over and gutted it for fun and profit. Yet, one thing that has sustained throughout my entire Twitter experience is Dril.

Dril is an acerbic king of single-tweet comedy. Since 2008 he has churned out so many ludicrous tweets that he has achieved a Simpsons-esque sense of ubiquitous omnipotence. Or, in fewer words: it seems like there’s a Dril tweet for everything.

I never put much thought into who is behind the Tweets. Maybe it was a famous comedian ranting incoherently on Twitter as their side gig. Or, maybe it was a collective of individuals, sweating away all day like monkeys at typewriters to churn out a handful of pithy tweet-lengthed absurdities.

Nope. As I learned from this brilliant Ringer write-up from Nate Rogers, Dril is just some guy. A guy whose identity has been widely known for a few years now, and who has even appeared on his own comedy show on Adult Swim! Yet, even with his previously-secret identity revealed, there’s still some question as to how much of Dril is real and how much is just another layer of performance art.

Fiction in a Flash at SmokeLong

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A piece of Flash Fiction from some of my talented colleagues debuted yesterday on SmokeLong, a weekly and quarterly Flash Fiction anthology.

Stephen Gardner’s The Booking of La Gianconda is a noir-ish snapshot from a 1936 jail-house that could easily fit into the fictional universe of Chicago. It’s accompanied by an illustration by Throwaway Horse founding partner Josh Levitas.

Illustration by Josh Levitas - visit smokelong.com for the full version and accompanying fiction.

Here’s about 5% of the the total tale:

“Hey, Glass Eye,” Walters called over to me as I fiddled with the Kodak slide film. At the name, I gritted my teeth hard enough to chip an incisor. Walters never let me forget the war wound. Like I said I’m a camera guy when I’m not riding a bucket and a mop, not even a cop.

(Visit SmokeLong for the full story!)

Flash Fiction doesn’t have a formal definition, but it’s about brevity and efficiency. SmokeLong’s limit is 1,000 words. While other outlets have much shorter word-count requirements, the common element is that good FF should consist of lithe, streamlined language that puts every word to good use.

I asked Josh if his accompanying flash illustration included any self-imposed restrictions: his finished picture was done in a single sitting with limited tweaks or digital post-production – all completed in less than an hour! It’s worth viewing the larger version at SmokeLong to see some detail that’s lost at the smaller size.

Kudos to Stephen and Josh for being featured, and for their evocative 1,000 words and single-hour image!

breaking the painful cycle

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I have mentioned my dermatological struggles in the past on the blog. While the potential disintegration of my epidermis seems to have been staved off at the moment, my skin-care needs are (ridiculously) one of the major worrying factors about my health care and costs.

Yesterday, one of my favorite Twitter friend, @JerseyShoreJen, mentioned she had booked another media appearance from her recent EdOp on Eczema. Being a fellow lifelong battler of it and its fiendish cohorts, I congratulated her and asked her to share her article from the NYT Health Section – “The Painful Cycle of Eczema.”

In the bathroom, I try not to dwell too long at the sight of myself in the mirror before patting my skin dry and slathering it with lotion. I wrap bandages over the raw and weeping patches in the crooks of my elbows — a stopgap, really, since the bandages will soak through in several hours. I take Benadryl to calm the itching, and ibuprofen to temper the swelling and pain, before heading to meetings in an antihistamine haze. I hope no one stares, but they do.

…

I wore long sleeves and pants to school, even on the hottest, most humid days. … When I passed through puberty and still had outbreaks, I viewed my eczema as a character flaw, something I brought on myself for not being perfect.

After I read her story, Jen and I got into rapid-fire exchange on Twitter, gushing over our challenges and successes with our conditions. Though my collection of problems do not manifest as violently as Jen’s, I see so much of myself in her story. I never once wore pants to gym. I’ve ruined pillowcases and sheets when my medications have bleached out their color. When I have an outbreak I worry that people will stare and judge in meetings.

There’s not an immediate happy ending here – Jen and I are both continuing our respective struggles and our treatments. However, the silver lining is the connection that Jen created, and the relief I felt in talking to someone who relates to what I’m going through.

Jen writes at Down The Shore With Jen.

Remainders, 11/10 Edition

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Things my network of friends and blogs shared that made me think twice, at least.

Shared by James Gunn on FB.

(via @brimil. See the end of the post for the finished product. I think this is cooler, personally.)

The INFMETRY DIY Romantic Star Projector

I am totally buying this star projector as Arcati Crisis’s first official stage lighting equipment. Bonus points if I can figure out how to turn it on from my pedal board (via NotCot).

Seth Godin posted the only job interview questions that matter. Seth’s is a “every post is amazing” sort of blog.

An efficient post on how beginners and experts are the same. (via Karl Martino)

A solid and realistic plan for an indie, DIY band to begin promoting themselves via social media. A lot of familiar conversations and steps portrayed here. From How to Run a Band,  fantastic blog.

A brilliant kerning game made its way around our office recently; Kottke posted its sequel – a letter shaping game that simulates typed design.  Also via Kottke, we totally had this 1970s Chevy Nova  when I was a kid. Maybe this is why I am so obsessed with speedometers.

Shared by the artist, Leon Keer, I think it was cooler when they were invisible soldiers.

I thought The three biggest myths about women in tech was an interesting read, partially from a feminist perspective, but also because I have been alerted as recently as today that I rely too much on non-existent meritocracies to promote me and my creative work. (via Ma.tt)

 The handy “Is It Old?” website helps you keep up a supply of freshly caught links by sussing out the dusty ones. I plugged in this week’s popular Drinkify.org and it informed me: “Reall old. How did you miss this? DO NOT SEND. It has been tweeted 1981 times already, and the first time was 4 days ago.” (Via Meg’s Tumblr)

Monday Morning Remainders

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I performed with Filmstar for the first time on Saturday, but you have to wait a day or two to hear about the results and if I’m still feeling conflicted about playing with the band.

First, here are your Monday Morning Remainders – eight blogs I’ve enjoyed or tweets I’ve flagged.

1. Philly (and the internet at large) got up in arms last week about a so-called “Philly Blogger Tax,” which was really just the city’s business privilege license being applied to Bloggers. My virtual friend JoeBeta sussed out a sensible explanation and critique of the policy, from Technically Philly co-founder Sean Blanda.

It’s certainly a horrible waste of resources to pursue blogs with revenue in the hundreds when some companies and individuals owe the city millions in back taxes, forcing the city to do things like offer a tax amnesty to the dead beats.

2. Rocking local blog Phrequency had a flash concert for TJ Kong on the freaking Broad Street Subway. I love TJ Kong and my old promo shots were from the Walnut Street station, so in my opinion this is approximately the best thing ever.

Do not hold your breath waiting for me to do one on the El, though.

3. A Vancouver realtor’s Facebok page gained over 4,000 fans in 12 days. Crazy pyramid scheme for iPads? Nope – good old fashioned content that people give a shit about. (via @morganb.)

4. I’ll just repeat what Torrez said:

Imagesoak is a fantastic application for finding things to read and look at based on the interesting photos and images that accompany them. Nevermind what I just said, just go there.

5. Matthew Leone, bass player for the Chicago based band Madina Lake, sustained life-threatening injuries while trying to defend a stranger from brutal domestic abuse. Sweet Relief, a fund that supports musicians in times of illness, is raising funds to pay for his treatment and rehabilitation. Matthew’s band member and brother has been blogging through the ordeal.

6. Leslie Hunt was one of my favorite recent American Idol Semi-Finalists – she had a real identity and real taste in music, but was quickly kicked to the curb for her quirk. Mpomy.com blogs a video from her new project, District 97

7. Amanda Palmer’s life is so serendipitous. On break from her hectic schedule, she sees a random trio of teens whose photo she feels compelled to take. Almost after she’s gone, one realizes who she is, and catches her to tell her that he’s a big fan. One thing leads to another, and suddenly he’s playing a concert to thousands of internet viewers from her apartment.

8. Amanda’s fiancé is super-famous comic, fiction, and film writer Neil Gaiman. Neil has been in a legal struggle with Todd McFarlane since 2002 regarding unpayed royalties on creator-owned characters he developed for McFarlane’s Spawn. Neil blogs part of the judge’s new decision, which contains delicious text like:

Much as defendant tries to distinguish the two knight Hellspawn, he never explains why, of all the universe of possible Hellspawn incarnations, he introduced two knights from the same century. Not only does this break the Hellspawn “rule” that Malebolgia never returns a Hellspawns to Earth more than once every 400 years (or possibly every 100 years, as suggested in Spawn, No. 9, exh. #1, at 4)…

I hope your Monday is going well. More news (and video) on my weekend as a Filmstar coming up!