I traveled to Dubai earlier this year, and was astounded by the place. I never did get around to writing about it at the time, but leave it to a financial crisis to get me off my arse. So here’s a column I did for Mediaite about the arguable inevitability of the flashiest Emirate’s troubles.

(This post is in response to John Carney’s Annual Guide to Holiday Romance)

• Avoid any guy who lists “blogger” on his resume. The reasons to do this are too numerous to list.
• Avoid any guy who starts a sentence with “If you Google me…”
• Avoid any guy who quotes Judd Apatow and/or refers to his friends as “my buddies.”
• Avoid any guy who watches Gossip Girl.
• Avoid any guy who crashes the office Christmas party. He’s there to bang secretaries. Unless he’s unemployed, in which case he’s there to shmooze, pound free booze, and then bang secretaries.
• Avoid any guy who is a lawyer. He’s either about to lose his job or desperately wants to, so he can have an excuse to start that baseball card trading business he’s always dreamed of. In the meantime, he will expect you to support him while he “gets back on his feet.”
• Avoid any guy who keeps old Victoria’s Secret catalogues in his bathroom. Find some respectable Internet porn, for chrissakes.
• Avoid any guy who saw “The Road” and liked it. He’ll never commit.
• Avoid any guy who lives on the L train.
• Avoid any guy with more than 500 followers on Twitter. His virtual ego will be inflated to levels his physical existence can’t match.

Read the rest of this entry »

When I’m not ranting about slasher movies or toddlers in stripper heels, I do occasionally do some legitimate sit-in-an-office work (though it still involves writing and futzing around on the Internet, so it’s tough to really call it “work” — somehow that term seems reserved for, well, stuff that sucks). Anyway my new gig is running an excellent and click-worthy blog, The Infrastructurist, which is a daily conversation about how we get around (and how we’ll continue to do so over the next 50 to 100 years). I suggest you bookmark and read it obsessively.

On that note, happy and safe holiday travel!

What does it mean when one of the most famous three-year-olds in the world is toddling around in high heels and designer coats? Nothing good, my friends. Nothing good. Check out my piece in today’s New York Post to read the full rant.

Horror movies are honest. They let you know exactly what they are from the get-go. Slasher flick? Gonna have a guy (usually) who stalks and murders a bunch of teenagers. Zombie film? You’ll have a smattering of undead making a play for any non-zombie life form, while the still living work to outwit them.

These films aren’t too complicated – you get what you get. It’s the rest of film that’s the real horror-shiller. These movies that slide under the radar as adorable romantic comedies or lulling period dramas, and then smack you in the gut with messages and themes so horrifying you can’t even believe we all go on living. Except that Anthony Hopkins was delivering the lines, so somehow it’s ok. Here are the Top 10 Most Terrifying Unintentional Horror Movies, brought to you in this week’s Horror Chick. Feel free to add your own in the comments (The Awl’s comments, that is – I still don’t allow ‘em. Sorry).

I went on Mediabistro’s Morning Media Menu show this AM to talk with the smart and fabulous Jason Boog and Matt Van Hoven about China, infrastructure, and apocalypse porn. To listen, click here.

“The Fourth Kind” is just the kind of joyless tragedy porn that I love to write about — lame, ineffective, and a total victim of its own hubris. Also this one really needed a big fat dose of The Tipping Point (possibly the only time you will ever see me write that phrase, or think it for that matter). Anyway to read this week’s Horror Chick click here. And if you’re certain you’ve been kidnapped by aliens, blame Mark Sanford.

It’s a good question. I get asked it all the time. Actually, what I get all the time is more like, “Ugh. You seriously write about horror movies? How can you WATCH those things – they’re so disgusting/stupid/puerile and clearly you are an inferior excuse for a human being for liking them.” (Ok so people don’t usually say that last part, but it’s implied.)

Well, in honor of Halloween, I did an interview with Mediaite’s Rachel Sklar (who hates horror with a vengeance) trying to explain the appeal. There is much more to say on this topic (and of course I’ll be saying it in the future — I have a blog, after all). But for now, check out our interview, as well as a slideshow of my Top 10 favorite scary flicks.

Which is the perfect segue into this week’s Horror Chick, a discussion of the terribleness of Antichrist. I’d like to give a proper hat tip to Garrett, who is responsible for alerting me to the alternative wonderfulness that is The Gay Bed and Breakfast of Terror (see clip).

No sarcasm. I’m being totally serious. Just read it.