#April2013
This! Is! Mad Men! – The Collaborators
[This! Is! Mad Men! recaps the most recent developments of Don Draper and his lovable gang of sleazeball advertisers. In the spirit of the show, the post itself may very well be drunk. And sexist. Apologies ahead of time.]
One of the secrets of getting good at any game is to learning how to navigate through the rules. Just as a hacker can manipulate an operating system, a true sportsman knows how to bend, ignore, or even break the rules of his given game. In fact, this practice is so prevalent that many sports even develop their own sets of etiquette, terms, and conditions that are implicitly agreed upon.
Life, often compared to a game, certainly has its share of unspoken agreements.
But who’re the people that turn the other way when the rules are broken? Who deals in terms of tacit transactions? Well, it always seems to be The Collaborators.
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This! Is! Mad Men! – The Doorway
[This! Is! Mad Men! recaps the most recent developments of Don Draper and his lovable gang of sleazeball advertisers. In the spirit of the show, the post itself may very well be drunk. And sexist. Apologies ahead of time.]
Oh, Mad Men, how I’ve missed every aspect of your beautiful face, not even excepting the five o’clock shadow and booze-breath and tobacco stains.
AMC must know that we’ve been champing at the bit for more spiritual ruin on Madison Avenue, as they deliver a sixth season premiere guaranteed to sate even the most ravenous of televisional appetites. The Doorway never relents, using absolutely every second of its two-hour running time to remind us why love the characters. And how is this done, you ask? Why, by thrusting them into the midst of existential crises! Duh!
C’mon, let’s take a look at the last episode of Mad Men!
Monday Morning Commute: Teleport Rape Dream
For your sake, I hope you never have to live life as I do – in the mindset of a crotchety old man.
Sometimes, when I’m especially tired or caffeine-deprived, I can’t help but see change as anything but a pain in the ass. I mean, if you’ve been frequenting Omega-Level regularly, you’ll have noticed a number of recent additions. I should be excited. Really. Instead, I find myself grumbling under my breath, waxing nostalgic for the glory days of OL that never existed.
I mean, why shouldn’t I be excited about all the advertisements on the site? Not only do I get to share my thoughts with the world, but I get to help hawk products such as Norwich University, Dragons of Atlantis, and eFax!
Get `em while they’re hot, suckahs!
Moreover, this site is now rife with all sorts of strange characters! There’re sneaks amongst us, vaginas sliding into the fold, and probably a couple of freaks fiendin’ for another teleportation rape-dream! It’s a veritable gathering!
Okay – time to take an Alka Seltzer and plow through this post.
Thissere’s the MONDAY MORNING COMMUTE! You don’t even have to be a cantankerous bastard like me to know that the workweek sucks. As such, I’m going to show you some of the bits of entertainment I’ll be using to survive until the weekend. Your task is to hit up the comments and show off the various ways you’ll be ignoring the overwhelming responsibilities of real life.
Pull your damn pants up and let’s do this!
‘MAD MEN’ Video Game Lets You Handle Don Draper’s Perpetual Crises.
Don Draper is constantly trying to turn that frown upside down these days. Shit has gotten real for the Totem of the American Dream on the show, and usually we just get to watch our heartthrob brood and make bad decisions. Our helplessness is about to be mitigated to an extent with this free video game, which allows us to help him get his shit together.
Hit the jump to check it out.
‘Mad Men’ Season 5 Gets A Poster. I Missed You, Donnie D.
Are you like me, ready to gobble up anything Mad Men related? Then I got a poster for you! Not interested? No harm! No foul! Keep moseying.
Hit the jump to check it out.
Monday Morning Commute: The Mediocre One
Hello there, fellow drone-bees! The workweek is upon us yet again, and we once again find ourselves hiding our true desires behind dead-skin masks. For forty hours a week, even the strongest and most original amongst us assume the personae of the tired and damned. In these times, we are nothing if not the hollow shells we’ve worked so hard to fill during off-hours.
Gatsby is jolted in the middle of the night, awakened by the American nightmare that sees him whimpering ,”Gatz…Minnesota…Dan Cody…”
Draper drinks and screws and sells himself into a life of luxury, and yet cannot shed the skin of Whitman’s despondency.
Kent writes the headlines that Superman inspires, but Kal-El will never get over the fact that he is the last survivor of a doomed lineage.
In spite of our most transcendental aspirations, there will always be forces working to keep us tethered to the material realities. And the most formidable of these forces is the bastard-thief known as the workweek. So there’s any hope of saving ourselves, we’ve only got one option.
We must remove our entertainment-swords from their scabbards and use them to slit the throat of the bastard-thief.
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Welcome to the MONDAY MORNING COMMUTE! I’m going to show you the various bits of entertainment I’ll be using to preserve my spirit during the workweek. Your task, should you feel up to it, is to hit up the comments section and show off the ways you’ll be keeping your heart alive.
Let’s do this!
Televised Days of Christmas: Christmas Comes But Once a Year
[Is there a better way to celebrate the manger-birth of a superpowered messiah-baby than watching television? Hell no! Join Rendar Frankenstein as he navigates Spaceship OL through the Televised Days of Christmas!]
There is something to be said of the idea that human beings need excuses to party.
Think about it – holidays have been celebrated since the advent of the human species. While the pretenses and customs vary from tribe to tribe, most cultures have set aside days specifically for the purpose of cutting loose. Work is momentarily forfeited, and individuals are encouraged to engage in social events so that they can relax, enjoy the kinship of their peers, and contemplate concepts that transcend the corporeal.
It’s basically psychic catharsis.
Again, such is the necessity for relaxation that it has been prescribed by multitudes of societies. Anyone doubting this need only consider the confluence of December-holidays: pagans honor the winter solstice, Christians eagerly anticipate Christmas, Jewish folk rock Hanukkah, and of course the saturnalian Romans go bananas for Saturnalia. These holidays are different, for sure, but the common thread is that all celebrants look forward to shirking responsibilities and spending time with loved ones.
For many, the holiday season serves as the canvas upon which some of life’s most cherished memories are painted.
But what about those individuals who, for one reason or another, are without their families during the holidays? How would you feel if in the time between one Christmas and the next, you divorced your spouse and could no longer see your kids on a daily basis? What if you didn’t want to burden friends with your grievances? In what ways would this alter your attitude about the most wonderful time of the year?
If you’re Don Draper it means that you take a swig of booze, bang your secretary, and woefully declare, “I don’t hate Christmas, I just hate this Christmas.”
AMC Extends Running Time Of ‘Mad Men’, Oh My Draper.
It feels like Mad Men has been off the air for fucking ever, thanks to arguments and slap-fights and contractual wrangling between series creator Matthew Weiner and AMC. The good news is that when the son of a bitch returns, it’ll be at a slightly extended running time.
Awesome.
Friday Brew Review – Crispin Lansdowne
Historically, I probably would’ve said that my all-time favorite Crispin would have to be Glover.
Ya know, the dude that played George McFly and then went fucking apeshit.
But after today, I’m afraid that Willard no longer owns quite as much real estate in my heart as he once did. Sorry dude – I didn’t actually expect this to happen. But the fact of the matter is that I’ve now tried Lansdowne by the folks at Crispin Cider and I’m impressed.
Fuck that, I’m blown away.
I snagged Lansdowne from the shelves of my local beer-dealer because I was lured in by its appearance. I ain’t no liar, and I can admit when visual aesthetics win me over. There’s something elegant, mayhaps even classy, about the 22-ounce container. Maybe it’s the black label or the little tree logo or the use of simple typography – whites and golds, print and script. But if I had to toss money on it, I’d say that it’s the interrelationships, the gropings and moanings in a darkened room bathed in auditory-lubrication, between all of the above that sold me. Looking at the bottle, it looks urbane as hell.
I’ll be damned if I can’t imagine Don Draper taking a rip from a bottle of Lansdowne.
This! Is! Mad Men! – Blowing Smoke
[This! Is! Mad Men! is a recap of the newest developments of Don Draper and his lovable gang of capitalist sleazeballs. Sometimes it’s liveblogged, sometimes not. In the spirit of the show, the post itself will often be sexist and drunk. Apologies ahead of time.]
It’s no secret that Mad Men is filled with flawed characters. From the very first episode, this show has taken the viewers through the ups and downs of some of Madison Avenue’s most promising advertisers. While these trials and tribulations are entertaining in and of themselves, it is more interesting to search for the motivations. What is the impetus that makes [name a character] behave this way? Why are these individuals so incapable of veering away from self destruction?
Tonight, I think Blowing Smoke might have delivered an answer: addiction.
