Yay! You're My FB Friend! Oh, Wait, Wait, Maybe Not...

I am a reluctant participant of Facebook. A few years ago a friend of mine (we'll call her Kaylee) sent me an invite to sign up for the cult that is Facebook.

As what probably happens to everyone who joins, people start coming out of the woodwork, who seem to earnestly, desperately, want to be FB friends.

While some are people you legitimately know and fall under the category of "Oh, right, Jim, hey, I wondered what happened to him. It would be nice to catch up with him", many are people you had little or nothing in common with at the time, and now they JUST CANNOT WAIT to be your friend! Like that girl you were on the bowling league with 20 years ago, or a co-worker from eight jobs ago, or the cousin of a friend of the guy you went out with (yeah, I can't follow it, either).

But let's get back to Kaylee, that girl who roped into Facebook in the first place. Kaylee and I were friends, as in friends in the real world as opposed to friends in the Facebook world. We regularly exchanged emails, occasionally got together for coffee, and exchanged horror stories about our house renovations. But I'm finding that being friends in Facebook is a fickle, fickle thing: to quote Heidi Klum, "One day you're in, and the next day, you're OUT!"

Kaylee unceremoniously dumped me from Facebook. Yes-she dumped my sorry ass! Apparently she don't want to be friends no mo. And, yes, the irony of the Facebook initiator morphing into the one who unfriended me is not lost on me.

Then I noticed others that dumped me: a friend from the cult college I went to. Yep, he friended me, only to unfriend me. Was it the stories I posted from those liberal rags slate.com or salon? Was it my snarky remarks about, well, everything? Or did he just decide he didn't really like me after all and didn't want anything to do with me? Well, I guess I'll never know, because that's what happens when you get FB dumped. It's a cruel, cruel thing, or a very funny thing, depending on how you look at it. I think you can guess what camp I stand in.

I have to scratch my head over this form of buyer's remorse, Facebook style: let's 1) do a search to find people you know on Facebook, then 2) send a Facebook request, next 3) become friends on Facebook, then, 4) unfriend them. Yes, in retrospect this does make perfect sense--if we were all in the fourth grade again!

My theory on Facebook is that for many people, it's a way to get attention, not really to share noteworthy news, but rather a play to garner sympathy. When you post about being miserable six months after your boyfriend dumps you, or say "I'm a loser and I'll never find a job" you can practically write the posts FB friends are going to write: "oh, GF, you are so smart I just KNOW there's a great job out there" or "Jennie, you need to FORGET about that loser and get out there and find someone else!" Those comments are really helpful, aren't they?

Telling the truth like "well, you did kind of major in anthropology and yeah, it's going to be next to impossible finding a job that doesn't involve a nametag and your saying 'do you want fries with that'", apparently, this is not part of being a good Facebook friend. In fact, that'll probably get you on the fast track to unfriend-ville each and every time.

If I were a really insecure person, I'd be wringing my hands and emailing Kaylee and my college friend Peter (not his real name) or my former co-worker Lulu Belle (obviously not her real name) and everyone else who friended and then unfriended me. What went wrong? Why don't you like me any more? Why did you dump me on Facebook?! I thought we were friends! I thought you liked me! But really, who cares? Be my friend, not be my friend on Facebook. There.

The Order of the Hand Will Rule!

A section of my street is closed due to construction. And using your GPS to get to my house will put you face to face with a big "Road Closed" sign. Your GPS and all of its high tech technology will literally get you nowhere.

So my guests have had to resort to--gasp--actual maps. And it's not going well. Have we gotten so moronic that we can't get anywhere unless some disembodied Stepford Wife on the GPS says in a semi-coo, "turn right onto Main Street".

The whole thing reminds me of a sketch on Saturday Night Live. Will Ferrell and Nancy Walls are Oliver and Diane, the co-hosts (w/ David Alan Grier as Weatherman Tim) of "Wake Up and Smile!", one of those regional Good Morning America knock-offs.

The wheels on this vehicle come off as soon as their teleprompter breaks and they are literally at a loss for words. After a few fumbled exchanges:

Oliver: "The teleprompter on which everything we say appears on...is broken!"
Diane: "Please! Let's get that teleprompter fixed!"

the three of them turn from panic to a variation of Lord of the Flies:

Oliver: "We will live! WE WILL LIVE!!!!!" [cuts to commercial, then back from commercial, the set is on fire, Oliver's shirtless and a hand symbol is painted on his chest]
"The order of the hand will rule us!"
Tim: "But what if the box still refuses to give us words?"
Oliver: "You challenge my authority?!"
Tim: "I smell from your scent that you are weak. I challenge you!"

[a scuffle ensues, Oliver emerges with Tim's severed head]

Oliver: "The weatherman is DEAD! I KILLED the weatherman! His strength is in me!"

Then of course the teleprompter is fixed and there's nothing more awkward than holding your dead co-worker's head by the hair! Oopsie!

While as far as I know, none of my guests have resorted to cannibalism, they've made it a whole lot more difficult than it needs to be.

On Sunday, after giving a guest directions by email, her Pittsburgh contact directions by email, no one could either follow them or bother to get them out and read them. The guest's driver called in a panic, "I'm on 44th Street and it's closed! How do I get to your house?" I gave her directions to complete the 2 minute drive to my house.

Thirty minutes later they still didn't show up. I called them, and the guest, sounding very annoyed, said "We are on your street and there is a big "road closed" sign and don't know where to go." This time, I navigated the aforementioned very put out guest to my house.

Her driver, of course, did not know how to get to the theater for the event they were going to. I drew them a map (literally two turns to get there) and sent them on their way. Fifteen minutes later the guest is back, handing her keys to me.

"Your location is too far away and there are just too many detours," she said. "I'm going to stay with a friend."

Um, okay.

Yesterday I had another guest coming in for the same event and it was Groundhog Day all over again. This time, his GPS directions weren't helping him! This guy, who from what I understand is a world traveler and lives in New York City, is too freaked out to drive his rental car to the same theater (you know, the one that it takes two turns to get to from my house?) so he's got this poor girl carting him around.

Last night, he tells me, they returned around 2:00 in the morning and he couldn't get his key to work! He's in a panic -- what can he do? Should he call me to help him figure out how to work the deadbolt?

Turns out Einstein wasn't even at my house -- he was at one down the street (I suspect some cocktails were involved, no?). He's lucky we don't live in NRA territory, or I suspect trying to use a key to enter a house that doesn't belong to you may be cause for justifiable homicide.

This Sunday the worst direction follower on the planet is coming to my house: my dad. Now, despite the fact that my parents have been coming to this house for well over 15 years and the detour involves going up a street they've traveled for 15 years, how much do you want to bet that they will somehow end up downtown?

My Dad: "44th Street is closed - there's a big "Do not enter" sign there! So we kept going straight and then I saw the Convention Center and knew we'd gone too far!"

Pray for me, people, pray for me!

What "Wii" Really Care About

I've come to the conclusion that we Americans, for the most part, are stupid, selfish, and self-centered. Sure, we respond to a natural disaster halfway around the world with aching hearts and open checkbooks. However, the real elephant in the room is that Japan is on the brink of a meltdown, not just with six dying nuclear reactors, but in every sense of the word.

I'm not suggesting that everyone run the streets in panic, but people, this is the worst nuclear disaster in history, with its effect long-term and far reaching. Am I the only one that's a little panicky about this?

I'm not demeaning the suffering the Japanese people are experiencing now, because of the earthquake and tsunami. But--how about a lifetime of radiation sickness and a generation or two radiation-inducing cancer? How about a country that could be on the brink of economic collapse? Citizens whose reality could be where electricity is a luxury, fleeting in a world of rolling blackouts and power cuts.

The only person I've seen on TV that said out loud all of the things I've been thinking about the power reactor disaster is CNN guest commentator Jim Walsh. The veins nearly popped out of his head when he heard the news that the "Fukushima 50" (my phrase, catchy, huh?) had abandoned the six reactors and the first person I heard talk about the IAEA and its involvement--or non-involvement--in this situation.

Who's the IAEA? The International Atomic Energy Agency is a non-partisan, international organization that promotes, monitors, and oversees all things nuclear. They're the ones that look into whispered rumors about nuclear weaponry and are tasked to look into "mishaps" at nuclear power plants.

If you want to read something truly disturbing, read the news updates provided by the IAEA's web site. Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the private company that runs the Fukushima power plants, has a long and rich history of distorting the truth, covering up the truth, and omitting the truth. Between 2002 and 2005, these reactors were shut down as a result of TEPCO falsifying safety records.

Yet despite TEPCO's extremely spotty safety record and their history of lying about safety, it has been permitted to handle this situation without the direct, on-site involvement of the IAEA. TEPCO/Fukushima reported to the IAEA on March 13th that Reactor #3 was "in a safe, cold shutdown" and that other reactors were "under control". Yet 48 hours later, they were reporting fires, exposed fuel rods, and asked IAEA to send an envoy, which IAEA reported that they have done. Yet at this point, it's a bit like closing the barn door after the animals have escaped: what, realistically, can the IAEA do at this point to help the situation?

With the Fukushima 50 fleeing at approximately 9:00 p.m. EST yesterday, one has to question Fukushima's statements not 48 hours prior. Can a reactor truly be "safe and cold" and less than 48 hours later, be on the brink of a meltdown?

It should be noted that power plants are recognized to have a life capacity of approximately 40 years, when the integrity of certain materials in the plants comes into question. Yet just last month, Japanese regulators granted an extension of ten years for the continued operation of these reactors, which range in age from 36 to 40 years old.

Some reactors cores and spent fuel rod compartments are being cooled using sea water, which CNN expert Walsh reported was a "last ditch effort" to extinguish fires and keep key areas cool. Certainly salty water in a concrete structure is not going to help maintain the integrity of the structure.

But how else can Japan provide electricity for its residents? The country does not have its own supply of natural resources, such as coal, natural gas, or oil. It does not have vast amounts of land that could be used to create a hydroelectric dam. Wind power and solar power are viable sources of electricity, but could not create sufficient power (at least not at the present time) to electrify a country of millions.

The likelihood is that all six of the Fukushima power plants will remain off-line and will have to be de-commissioned. Will the build new reactors (and will the IAEA allow them to do so)? And in the meantime, how will the country survive with limited electrical power? How will this affect manufacturing production?

A new Japan is going to have to emerge from this crisis: one less reliant on electricity, at least until new power plants are built. Energy will have to be diverted to manufacturing facilities and key infrastructure, to help keep commerce going, maintain order in the country, and to avoid going into the next disaster: an economy in a quick and deadly downward spiral. And while Americans feel this sympathy towards the Japanese people now, I predict that this sympathy will quickly turn to anger and frustration when little Billy can't get his new electronic toy or Tommy can't get a new flashy computer. Because it's really all about us, isn't, it?

Secret Paean to DePalma Movie?

Does anyone remember the movie from 1984 called "Body Double"? Written and directed by horror/suspense genre genius Brian DePalma, it's the story of Jake. Jake is an actor and has been toiling in supporting roles for years. Now comes his big break: the lead in a horror movie.

But Jake has a problem, an acute case of claustrophobia. While under ordinary circumstances, he can keep his phobia under control (and under wraps), a major scene in the movie forces him to face his phobia head on: where his vampire character has to climb into (and out of) a coffin.

At the crucial moment, he freezes, paralyzed by his claustrophobia. The director doesn't understand Jake's dilemma and goes into a fury, talking about the time and money that this is costing. The director intimates that he had "better get his act together" or risk getting re-cast, a/k/a his big break.

Jake is having issues at home, too: having caught his girlfriend in bed with someone else, he needs to find another place to live. He quickly finds a new, swanky place to live in the Hollywood Hills by way of a fellow actor, Sam, who befriends him in an acting workshop.

What follows is a hallucinatory journey led by Sam into a world of voyeurism, the pornography industry, and lots of interesting characters and such outrageous gore (a woman getting stabbed to death by a giant drill) that it's difficult to say what's real and what's imagined.

Or - what's staged. Toward the end of the movie, Jake is involved in a footchase with a bunch of gun-toting bad guys when he trips and falls into a large hole. Sam is soon there, offering Jake the handle of a shovel. "Just grab the handle," Sam yells, "I'll pull you up." But Jake has claustrophobia, remember? But if he can't get himself out of this hole, the bad guys will soon find him and kill him.

In this literal do-or-die moment, Jake overcomes his claustrophobia, grabs the handle, and is lifted out of the hole, which morphs into a coffin (Jake's back on the set of his movie), where he lifts the lid of the coffin, says his line, and the pleased director yells "Cut!"

You think that's the end of the movie, but then the camera pans around to show some people on the set, people who really shouldn't be there: his "friend" Sam, porn star Holly Body. You realize that only the beginning and the ending of this movie is "real": the sudden appearance of Sam and his luxury home, his neighbor who stripteases in front of the window, the "murder" of this neighbor, it was all fake. Fake! Merely a set up, a long con if you will, to put Jake in a situation where he had to experience a life-or-death situation that would put him face to face with his claustrophobia.

Why am I mentioning this movie? Yes, why, Julie, other than a trip down memory lane? Because after watching "Black Swan", it seems like the same long con could be taking place to dancer Nina.

This storyline should start to sound familiar: Nina is a dancer, who has toiled away as a member of dance troupe but never given the lead. However, her luck changes when the Company Director awards the lead of Swan Lake to Nina. However, Nina has a problem: while she dances perfectly, she dances mechanically, without passion, without losing control. In order to succeed at Swan Lake, Nina must explore--and embrace--her dark side.

On the day that the announcement is made, a new dancer arrives to the Company, Lily. Lily is everything Nina is not: one might say a yin to Nina's yang. Where Nina is technically perfect, Lily is a free spirit personified, dancing from her heart instead of her head.

What follows is a hallucinatory journey led by Lily into a world of designer drugs, sex, and such outrageous gore (a woman getting stabbed to death by shards of a mirror) that it's difficult to say what's real and what's imagined.

Finally, it is the night of the premiere, but all of these obstacles get placed at her feet. Nina's mother locks Nina in her room, telling her daughter that she's gone ahead and told the Company that Nina cannot perform due to illness. When Nina escapes her room and arrives at the theater, the Company Director tells her she cannot perform, it's too late. But nothing is going to stop Nina, nothing!

In the first act (White Swan), Nina catches Lily in the wings, making out with Nina's co-lead, the Swan Prince. Then, after this co-lead drops her in an uncharacteristic fumble, Lily (conveniently, her understudy) appears in her dressing room and the following exchange occurs:

Lily: A rough start, huh? Must have been pretty humiliating.
Nina: Get out of my room!
Lily: Gee, I'm just worried about the next act. I'm not sure you're feeling up to it.
Nina: Stop. Please stop!
Lily: How about I dance the black swan for you?

How's that for spurring someone on? When Nina appears on stage for Act Two--the Black Swan--the question is whether or not she can free herself of her phobia, her need to be perfect, lose control, and embrace her shadow side?

Well, the answer is yes and no. Nina does dance an incredible, amazing, Black Swan. However, unlike Jake, who was able to face his phobia and triumph, Nina takes the metamorphosis too far, losing control not only of her quest for perfection but her very sanity. She appears to have a total, psychotic break from reality, ending up literally becoming the Black Swan, complete with a suicide at the end.

So was the middle of this movie, like Body Double, just one big long con to get someone to face his or her fears and see his or her full potential? I say yes. It just seems to be too many coincidences for this not to be staged.

Let's review the "conspirators". Her overprotective (to the point of smothering) mother, a former dancer, only wants the triumph and success she never had. She'll stop at nothing to get her daughter the lead, vicariously basking in the glow of Nina's success.

The Company Director, having just retired his last prima ballerina, is eager to begin grooming a new protegee, and while having reservations, thinks Nina may just fit the bill.

Lily, the free spirit, is in a no-win situation: she'll conspire to push Nina toward triumph (may see this as a bit of fun, a departure from the otherwise stuffy and rarefied world of ballet). But Lily is in a position to come out ahead if Nina stumbles, because she's been named the understudy.

Black Swan Darren Aronofsky has stated that he is a fan of Brian DePalma. The question is, is Black Swan his paean to his director idol?