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A Modest Proposal: Super Bowl Saturday

March 9, 2017

(This is an updated version of this post that also appeared at Vice in January 2018. The earlier one appeared at MensHealth.com.)

The Super Bowl is broken—and not just because the insufferable New England Patriots keep winning it.

No, the Super Bowl has a timing problem. The game starts late (6:40 pm ET), runs late, keeps kids up late—or even worse, sends sports-loving kids to bed without resolution. (What is this, baseball?) And if you throw or attend The Ultimate Super Bowl Party, it involves the kinds of food and drink that could use a relaxing day-after to work through the system.

Instead, Monday morning looms over the Super Bowl like Tom Brady does every year over the poor suckers who make the game from the NFC. Put your hand in the air if you spend most Super Bowl second halves preoccupied by a Monday morning presentation for your boss, or by the simple fact that you’ll need to get up and go to the office, even if you promptly spend the morning in the restroom, revisiting the halftime spread.

Various studies and surveys suggest that somewhere between 10% and 20% of workers either take Monday off or show up late. Global outplacement and executive coaching firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, based in Chicago, has done the math and estimates that as much as $3 billion is lost due to absenteeism and water-cooler analysis of the game and commercials. “If all workers who watch the Super Bowl come in just one hour late or spend one hour discussing the game instead of doing work,” Andrew Challenger, the firm’s vice president, said in response to the survey, “the cost to employers could hit $1.78 billion.” That’s a lot of chicken wings.

There have been several calls, including one in the 2016 Republican presidential race by Ohio Gov. John Kasich, to make Monday a national holiday. And we could do that, but that seems more problem than solution — and would involve the government and your HR department. It might take decades.

The solution is so simple you’re going to wonder why it has taken LII years to do it: Move the Super Bowl to Saturday night.

It would solve the work problem as well as the biggest health issue that the game presents: loss of sleep.

Renowned sleep neurologist W. Christopher Winter, president of Charlottesville Neurology and Sleep Medicine and author of The Sleep Solution says that short of abolishing Daylight Saving Time, moving the Super Bowl up a day is the best thing we can do for America’s sleep.

“Think about this,” he says. “We are essentially gathering up throngs of people, many of whom have made resolutions this year to get more sleep, and broadcasting the most popular event of the year on Sunday night. For many who stayed up late to watch the Grammys—like my kids did—they are getting a back-to-back whammy. And those are kids. I haven’t even mentioned adults and alcohol.”

For kids alone, the consequences are dire: Multiple studies have shown that students are already sleep-deprived enough as it is. When students sleep more, as this very website has reported over and over again, it’s better for their grades, better for their mental health, and even lowers the risk of car accidents.

As for the rest of us, those lost hours of shut-eye are a whammy that can reverberate long after the winning quarterback holds aloft the Vince Lombardi Trophy. Winter says getting to bed late Sunday, even if you sleep in on Monday, starts a cascade of ill consequences.

“When these individuals get into bed at their normal bedtime [Monday], their brains are saying, ‘Why are we in bed so early … we just woke up!’ prompting them to have trouble sleeping and stay up late once again,” Winter says. “This is how a chronic problem like insomnia gets its start.

“I’m certain that I’ll be seeing many of these individuals in my clinic six months from now. ‘I can’t sleep, doc. It all started when my Eagles blew that lead in the Super Bowl.’ ” Winter also helpfully reminds us that the World Health Organization has identified poor sleep as a risk factor for cancer.

And what for, exactly? A Saturday Super Bowl doesn’t screw up anything but a bunch of VIP parties in the host city and force CBS to move “48 Hours” to Friday—or Hulu (CBS already moved “Super Bowl’s Greatest Commercials All-Star Countdown” from Saturday to last Tuesday). It makes the Super Bowl the opening act for a truly awesome party night, a night that makes New Year’s Eve pale in comparison. It makes it a truly Super Saturday.

It also would serve as a modest puncture to the high sanctimoniousness of this Big Game. The two-week interlude between championship games and the Super Bowl is a smug exercise in stretching … out … the … hype … to … out … rage … ous … extremes. It leads to embarrassing stuff like this.

As for the game itself—remember that, The Game, the reason for all this hype?—the move should have little to no effect on the level of play. Anything over seven days of rest provides ample recovery and preparation time, and takes the game out of its normal routines. If anything, the teams should be sharper with one day less off.

Despite this avalanche of reasonableness, I’m sorry to say that you won’t be gathering at 4:30 Saturday to get your Super Bowl pregame going. And for a simple reason: The game remains a pure, swim-in-an-Olympic-sized-poolful-of-money spectacle and success. More than 111 million people watched New England edge Atlanta last year—down just a bit from the record 114 million three years ago. A 30-second spot on this year’s broadcast will run advertisers as much as $5 million. Despite all the talk about the NFL no longer being the dominant entertainment franchise in the United States, the facts say it is.

Being dominant means you can do whatever you want—even schedule your biggest event of the year at a colossally inconvenient time. But it is a dumb mistake with a simple, nearly-cost-free solution. And it would even respect the wishes of TB12 himself.

“Given that Tom Brady sleeps in really expensive pajamas and is very much a fan of quality sleep,” Winter says, “shouldn’t we all be following his lead?”

Actually, we might want to think twice about that, too.
‘I Will Bruise’

February 4, 2025

Something from seven years ago …

—

Living on blood thinners has meant getting comfortable with bruising. Contact causes bruising, and life is a contact sport. That is all true, and I need to avoid activities that will leave me one big bruise.

And yet, a year after the diagnosis and first procedure, and a year that included two additional surgeries that involved poking around my heart, I am oddly at ease. The doctors have addressed what they can address, I am taking my medicines and I’ve reached some clarity on what it is that I need to be vigilant for as I live my life as someone with heart issues. I will bruise.

That, thankfully, has given me space to not be ever-anxious. I am feeling more relaxed about the illness and less afraid that I am going to do something or be some way that is going to cause a big problem. That ease has allowed me to re-engage life and to start pushing.
Why did the Dylan movie land?

January 3, 2025

I caught “A Complete Unknown,” the movie about Bob Dylan’s emergence as a cultural force, and I’m trying to understand how it is landing so heavily in my own house.

My wife, not a Dylanphile at all, has been intrigued for two days now. She has asked me for Spotify playlists that correspond to the scenes in the movie.

It’s not just my house, though I get that the houses I’m talking about are home to people who are older and white, and that its box office isn’t even in the top 5 for the week. That said, some guy friends are going to see it Tuesday and I’ll meet them afterward to discuss, because they want to discuss it — that’s as close to a book group as 60-something men will get.

The farther I get from it, the more brilliant I think Timothée Chalamet was in playing Dylan. He did a wonderful job of playing his cards close to his hand. That’s what Dylan does! He’s a troublemaker, a loki, and his secret is he doesn’t tip his cards. As a poet, as a musician, as a lover. It’s what you love about him and what can make him so frustrating.

And yet, somehow, he maintained his equanimity through it all. He was both the instigator and the commentator.

And most importantly, he brought the goods. Unbelievable song upon unbelievable song, with a healthy dose of discombobulation.

I hope the film gives Bob some joy, and recognition (though the guy has a Nobel prize for literature, I believe, so maybe he doesn’t need any more recognition), and maybe even some encouragement, at age 83, to keep creating. We need all the creative energy we can get.
New Year’s Thoughts

January 2, 2025
I was at the gym on New Year’s Eve and decided to do some step-ups to a box, maybe two feet high.

Left leg went well, then on fifth rep on right leg, I felt a twinge in my back. A click-click in my spine. I know it when it happens, which is about every 9-10 months (if you have back issues, you know the moment of which I type ). I had pinched the nerve in my spinal column and my workout was over. I needed to get home before I found out just how badly I had hurt myself.

Which was “moderately.” I’ve been in a lot of pain, and it had me hunched over when walking for the first 24 hours. It also shortens my gait, and makes it very difficult to find a comfortable position when I sit or recline.

And … as the new year was starting, I wanted to take a moment and make an effort to take something from this experience. To hold it off and examine it. To see the opportunity in the discomfort.

So … what did the pain offer?

It offered me an opportunity to stop. I haven’t done a whole hell of a lot since it happened. I tried to fix a screen door in the garage, but did little more than re-screw what I un-screwed the day before hurting myself. So the door again (mostly) closes.

I read things and sent Happy New Year texts to friends and family.

I laid on the couch with a blanket on my legs and noticed how the sun occasionally cuts through the Jan. 1 clouds and comes through the window into our family room.

I noticed that the angina in my chest is less, because I exercised New Year’s Eve and got a good night’s sleep entering the new year. A bonus of injury on New Year’s Eve is you wake up on New Year’s morn sans hangover.

More broadly, I can see a path into a better year if only I’ll sit sometimes and make better use of my actions. If I’ll set some intentions, not especially big ones, but ones I can accomplish. Ones that will make living better.
- Exercise daily, even if it’s “just” tai chi 3x a week. I’m unapologetically pro-movement. Always.
- Listen more, dissemble less (to myself and others).
- Read a book (or more) a month.
- Rein in our subscriptions. There’s a marketing adage, “Choice is the enemy of conversion.” Similarly, choice is the enemy of attention. The world is overwhelmed with choice. I need to be ruthless about my attention. I’m the only one who will. I have been unsubscribing like a maniac for 30 hours. I feel great!
- Learn to do something new with my hands. Could that be music? Might I borrow a friend’s guitar? Could it be the basics of cooking for myself and (gasp) for Virginia? The world is alive with possibility. I want to — I need to — hold that wriggling fish in my hands.
I am 59 years old. I have a lot to live for, and much I can do. I accept that I will not make a huge difference in this world, but I can do a part. My part.

I want to do that. And deep down, I know where to begin. Right here. Writing this. This is the start.

I take that first painful, hunched, short step. I’m moving. It will get easier. That, I believe.

Into a new year.
My favorite albums of 2024

December 31, 2024

I’ve decided that I’m going to get back to blogging on a regular basis in 2025.

So preemptively, I figured I would list my favorite music of 2024. In a very particular order, my favorite albums of 2024:

Tigers Blood, Waxahatchee. I saw Katie Crutchfield for the first time this year, and I am very grateful. She is among my favorite singer-songwriters. I picked her song “Ruby Falls” as one of my favorites of the millennia. This album is your opportunity to meet her and love her. Don’t miss it. You’ll be the poorer. (Saw where someone compared Crutchfield and MJ Lenderman singing together on “Right Back to It” to a “ragged-ass Gram and Emmylou” and I’m here for it.)

Manning’s Fireworks, MJ Lenderman. My boy crush of 2024. I love guitars, I love sly lyrics, and I love artists who are in on their own joke. So I love MJ Lenderman, and can’t wait to see him in person. The fact he is Katie Crutchfield adjacent (he plays on “Tigers Blood”) is a boon to both of them. Just sayin’. And I’m very hopeful about his next album. It’ll tell us a lot. I’m hopeful.

Woodland Studio, Gillian Welch & David Rawlings. I could listen to “Empty Trainload of Sky” from here till the day I die and not get tired of it. I will die on the hill that “Revelator” is THE country album of the 21st Century. To my nieces and nephews who listen to and love Morgan Wallen, all I can say is, “Listen, people. Listen.” As Maya Angelou counsels, when someone tells you who they are, believe them.

Mahashmashana, Father John Misty. I’ve liked Josh Tillman for a long time, saw him at the Met in Philly when he and Jason Isbell co-headlined a tour before the pandemic, and his recent song “I Guess Time Just Makes Fools of Us All” says it all.

And his World Cafe interview.

Deeper Well, Kacey Musgraves. Loved her debut album Same Trailer Different Park (2013) and a fan since, Slow Burn was awesome, and this is another winner. She reminds me in some ways of Sheryl Crow in the sense that they both seem to have surrounded themselves and collaborate with really great songwriters. And both seem to be on a journey and finding their way, in a good way.

Honorable mention:

Small Changes, Michael Kiwanuka

Only God Was Above Us, Vampire Weekend

Cowboy Carter, Beyonce

Good Together, Lake Street Dive

Leon, Leon Bridges

The Great American Bar Scene, Zach Bryan
I asked ChatGPT to sketch out the Abbott-Sunny crossover episode. It wasn’t bad …

October 5, 2024

I am an artificial intelligence skeptic. That said, I like to see what it does with requests that I think will teach me something about it.

So recently when I heard that Philly-based TV shows Abbott Elementary and It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia had committed to a joint episode, I thought it provided a chance to test AI and see what it could come up with.

So I gave ChatGPT this query …

Please provide a story summary for a crossover episode of ABC’s “Abbott Elementary” and FX’s “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.” The two comedies are both set in Philadelphia. As a crossover episode, there should be at least two subplots that engage the casts of the two shows.

After thinking about 10 seconds, this is what it provided …

Title: “Abbott’s Always Sunny Day”

Summary:

Main Plot (Subplot A – School Fundraiser Chaos)
When Abbott Elementary finds itself in desperate need of new school supplies, Principal Ava decides to team up with local businesses for a school fundraiser. Coincidentally, Charlie, Mac, Dennis, Dee, and Frank of Paddy’s Pub (from It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia) get wind of this and, in their usual fashion, decide it’s a prime opportunity to promote their bar under the guise of “supporting education.”

The crew from It’s Always Sunny shows up at Abbott with outrageous fundraising ideas, which instantly clash with the school’s more structured efforts. Dee tries to pitch a talent show, hoping to show off her acting chops, while Charlie suggests selling Paddy’s mystery cocktails to “liven up” the event. Meanwhile, Dennis and Frank team up with Ava, hoping to turn the fundraiser into a larger spectacle that could gain media attention, with Dennis envisioning himself as the face of the event.

Things go awry when Mac takes it upon himself to run the bake sale, misunderstanding how allergies work, and Dee’s performance ends in disaster. Despite the chaos, Abbott’s teachers like Janine and Barbara attempt to salvage the event, all while navigating the chaotic personalities of the Paddy’s Pub gang.

Subplot B – The Art of Scamming the School
Meanwhile, Gregory and Jacob find themselves entangled in a secondary plot with Charlie and Mac, who have set up an impromptu “business” on school grounds. Charlie believes they can sell what they call “Philadelphia history tours,” offering half-baked and completely incorrect facts about the city. They rope Jacob into the plan, who, being excited about historical education, doesn’t initially realize he’s helping them scam people. Gregory, ever the voice of reason, tries to put a stop to it, but finds himself reluctantly participating, especially when Charlie offers a convoluted (and utterly false) explanation of the Liberty Bell that somehow resonates with the students.

Resolution:
In the end, the fundraiser ends in disaster, with the Paddy’s crew inadvertently causing more harm than good, but Abbott’s teachers manage to raise the necessary funds through sheer persistence and creativity. As a parting gesture, the Paddy’s gang tries to make amends by offering the school a free “pizza day” at the bar, which is immediately and firmly declined by Barbara.

The episode wraps up with the teachers and Paddy’s crew agreeing that they’re better off sticking to their own corners of Philly, with Ava and Frank still somewhat convinced they’ve struck gold with their viral fundraising idea.

This crossover highlights the humor of both shows, with the wholesome chaos of Abbott Elementary meeting the outlandish schemes of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. The two subplots offer ample interaction between the casts, allowing each character’s distinct personality to shine in the mashup.

I think it’s pretty good. Now, situation comedies are among the most patterned kinds of media there is, but it got the need for interplay, for taking elements from both shows to create something different.

I didn’t ask it to write an actual script. I think that would be so bad that it would kill any goodwill I’m offering it here. But this plays to AI’s strengths, as an outliner and synthesizer. I’d probably watch this episode …

Where the AI did fall down was in creating a graphic to go with this crossover episode.

My query was pretty straightforward …

Can you create a horizontal image, at a 4:3 aspect ratio, that melds the casts of Abbott Elementary and It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, in which they are shown at Abbott Elementary School? Perhaps it could be like a cast shot, with them all standing together. Lastly, the image should be cartoonish, like a mural.

It provided this …

I think I recognize Danny DeVito in there, and not anyone else. Calling that a swing and a miss. A request to clarify didn’t get better.
Understanding Growth, Justice and Evil

April 2, 2024

I use the journaling app, Day One, though honestly I’m a very sporadic journaler (and a former journal-ist). One thing D1 does is show you things you wrote on this day in previous years. Here’s an entry from nine years ago, April 2, 2015, where I responded to the following prompt:

What stories, images, and/or words most convey what spiritual growth is or looks like for you?

This is always changing for me. I’m a spiritual bumblebee. I have a restless mind.

Lately I have been listening to the book, Hiroshima, by John Hersey. Beyond the unreal, profligate suffering, what strikes me as I get closer to the end of the book is the ability of people to persevere through profound suffering to reconnect with joy. Of the six people profiled in the book who survived the initial blast, many were able to find themselves on the other side of this tragedy. The woman with the grotesquely broken leg, left for dead, finds joy in a job and works there for 13 years. A doctor who takes care of the thousands of burned and blasted and dying at the local hospital in the aftermath of the blast later sets up his own medical practice and succeeds. He is diagnosed with lung cancer and apparently thinks he has died, only to wake up short a lung. And what he realized out of this was that he did not spend enough attention on his wife and two sons. This moment, not the blast in Hiroshima, is what he identifies as the most important moment in his life, and he set himself upon the task of connecting more deeply with his family. His sons (who become doctors, like the old man) work in his clinic. His wife dies, but he throws himself into his work. It’s a fruitful life, remarkable in what he overcame.

I think too of the fact mentioned in the book that in the aftermath of the blast, and Japan’s surrender, that the people of Hiroshima reached a point where they did not hate the Americans, or the bomber pilot, or Harry Truman. They viewed the event as a natural disaster, unexplainable, something that simply existed and not the agency of a person or people. It’s an interesting way to look at the bad things in life, that when we look beyond blame or cause we can see that the act is simply the sum of a million things.

In the book, Practicing Compassion, Frank Rogers, Jr., tells the story of Azim Khamisa, whose son Tariq was shot to death while working as a pizza delivery person in San Diego in 1995. Azim was consumed by rage, helplessness, despair and vengeance. But over time, he found compassion. Eventually he met his son’s killer and what he saw was a young man whose actions were the sum of disadvantage and that there were victims on both sides of the gun. When his son’s killer Tony Harris was released from prison, Khamisa offered him a job as a counselor at the non-profit he had started in memory of his son.

At work, a story was brought to my attention of a young man, Derek Yates, in Tennessee, whose brother was killed by a drunk driver. He started a non-profit, 1N3, referring to the fact that 1 in 3 of us are impacted by the effects of drunk driving in our lives. The amazing thing was that after his brother was killed, he and his mom had a restorative justice meeting with the driver of the car that killed their brother and son. They made a choice to understand her rather than condemn her. They kept in touch. Nineteen months later, they attended Tish’s parole board hearing and asked the panel to release her. There was an agreement that she would be involved with 1N3, and she has since upheld her end of the deal, and then some.

Those are some of the stories moving me today. Not toward justice, though justice is surely part of it. But stories of people making the choice to see the world around them and to live in it. To understand that the injustice around us is rarely the result of individual evil.
My Oscar 2024 predictions

March 3, 2024
It looks like a very Oppie year.

It’s been a while – like, 4 years – since I felt like I saw enough of the Oscar Best Picture nominees to have an opinion. But this year, I have, and I even saw some of them in theaters. Take that, covid!

That said, here are my thoughts on the Academy Award nominees, ahead of the March 10 show.

Best Picture

It’s Oppenheimer, the last movie I saw among the prime contenders. Even before I saw it, it seemed there wasn’t a strong-enough alternative. Killers of the Flower Moon is good but not great – and at least 80 minutes too long. You could cut an hour of Leo DiCaprio rubbing his head and trying to determine if he was evil (hint, he was) and the movie would proceed very well, indeed. American Fiction is sharp, at-time laugh-out-loud funny with a great cast, but it also feels a bit dated (I think the novel it’s based on is about 20 years old – though, honestly, the problems remain the problems) and not quite an Oscar best picture movie. What an ending! Anatomy of a Fall is very good and … very foreign (I loved the French court scenes! I don’t know I’ve ever seen that little world before). Barbie is fabulous and funny and, well, a movie about a doll. The race was, I thought, Oppie’s to lose.

After seeing it, that was not fair. It’s a great if imperfect movie. Like Killers, you could cut a good chunk out (for Oppenheimer, just 30 minutes) and not hit its dramatic muscle, but it tells such an important story – an Oscar-worthy story – that many of us know little to nothing about. How do we not know more about Los Alamos? About Oppenheimer himself and his misgivings about his creation and his treatment afterward? I began reading American Prometheus, the Oppie biography, beforehand, so maybe I was primed, but it’s all so well done. Cillian Murphy was great, Christopher Nolan’s direction, great. Matt Damon and Robert Downey Jr., both great. The cinematography, great.

I had Oppenheimer penciled in as the winner because I didn’t think any of the others could ascend to the top of the medal podium, but it’s a – full stop – worthy Oscar Best Picture winner.

Best Pictures, ranked

My rankings of the Best Picture nominees, separated by what I have seen and not seen, for what it’s worth:
1. Oppenheimer
2. American Fiction
3. Anatomy of a Fall
4. Barbie
5. Killers of the Flower Moon
6. The Holdovers
7. Maestro
8. Past Lives
9. Poor Things
Haven’t seen:
- The Zone of Interest
Best Actor

Like I said, Murphy was great and a deserving choice. For the silver medal, I think it’s Brad Cooper vs. Jeff Wright, and I’ll tilt to … Cooper, because all that smoking probably took 3 years off his life and he gets extra points for being the animating force behind making the movie. And the sweat, all … that … sweat.

Best Actress

Lily Gladstone, Killers of the Flower Moon. I saw them all, and God, I have no idea how the director Yorgos Lanthimos talked Emma Stone into doing THAT in Poor Things, and Sandra Hüller deserves something for her performance in Anatomy of a Fall – but Gladstone was perfect in managing the quiet strength and ambiguity of the role. You’re watching, going, He’s killing you. You know that, right? And truthfully, the answer is, maybe, maybe not. And she nailed it. And it might be hard to find another role this perfect in the future. Beyond that, how no nomination for Margot Robbie?!? She gets Carey Mulligan’s spot, in my book.

Best Director

I was really taken by Justine Triet’s Anatomy of a Fall (image above). I think she kept it moving and balanced it just about perfectly. And Martin Scorsese is deserving of a lifetime achievement award here, as it’s hard to imagine him summoning this kind of effort again. It’s very good, but again, so, so, so long. So long, in fact, that should he win, he shouldn’t be allowed a speech. You should pay a price for such profligate waste. (On the other hand, my favorite musician Jason Isbell was in the movie and wrote a bunch of songs for his latest Grammy-winning album, Weathervanes, while lolling around on the set. Including one called King of Oklahoma in which he references his wife named – you guessed it – Molly.)

But all of that is window dressing. I think Nolan deserves it as a capstone to a marvelous two decades of movie-making. He should win, and will win.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=0sCWqZCSJIg%3Fsi%3D8PUpIrtez2OBN8WJ

What else?

I know that Robert Downey Jr. is a heavy favorite for Best Supporting Actor, and I can live with it if he gets it, but I’d vote for Sterling Brown for his great turn in American Fiction. I get the hype for Robert De Niro hype, and Ryan Gosling was good in Barbie, but if you give it to him when Robbie and Gerwig weren’t even nominated, the women will (deservedly) tear down the theater. Brown was great/awful/surprising in all the best ways … Regarding Barbie, at the very least, it wins best song for that Billie Eilish tune, right? And maybe a costume and/or production award, too? … I want to find an Oscar for The Holdovers, and I know Da’Vine Joy Randolph has been cleaning up on the awards show circuit, but I think America Ferrera should get it, if just for that speech (see below). Which might lead into … how in the world is Barbie up for Adapted Screenplay?!?! Adapted from what? I thought Gerwig did a genius job of making a movie that was a more cultural moment than a product placement (though, looking at Mattel revenue, it was pretty darn good at that, too). I liked American Fiction a lot, but Barbie was a very clever, fun, pointed script … As far as Best Original Screenplay, I could see Anatomy of a Fall winning here. I really enjoyed The Holdovers, but it’s really the Paul Giamatti Show. Take him out of it, and I’m not sure how much juice it has. (Said as an Alexander Payne true believer.)

https://youtube.com/watch?v=CBqlDWHkdHk%3Fsi%3DL2O1sPuiackyuYiH

That’s it, those are my picks. There were a lot of awesome movies. And I’m planning to see Dune soon, which friends have told me is an early frontrunner for best movie. I’m looking forward to seeing it!

Last year’s results

Just to be honest and up-front, I went and found my picks from last year. Here’s how I did, which I would say was “mixed.”

Best Picture: I said Everything Everywhere … would win; it did.

Best Actress: I said Cate Blanchett; Michelle Yeoh did.

Best Actor: I said Colin Farrell; Brendan Fraser did.

Best Director: I went Kwan and Schienert, and they did.

Best Supporting Actress: I thought Jamie Lee Curtis should but Stephanie Hsu would; Jamie Lee did.

Best Supporting Actor: I thought Ke Huy Quan would win; he did.

Original Screenplay: I thought Banshees would win; it went to Everything Everywhere.

Adapted Screenplay: I thought All Quiet on the Western Front; it went to Women Talking.
‘New year, new you’? Try ‘new year, OLD you’

January 31, 2024
One of our January staples of the decade I worked at Men’s Health magazine was “new year, new you.” It was the idea that the turning of the year was a chance to start something fresh and unprecedented in one’s life. It drove incredible interest (and web traffic), starting essentially on the 26th of December. The fascinating part was that by Jan. 17, all that momentum around good habits (as measured by online engagement) had essentially evaporated. Jan. 19 was Oct. 12 as far as “new you” was concerned.

So, as I look at my own life that could use some more sustainable good habits, I am more drawn to things that I have done before, that I KNOW I can implement, and maybe I should go in that direction. Out with “new year, new you,” in with “new year, old you” – especially given that we’re on the far side of a global pandemic that separated me from a lot of simple, positive habits I had nurtured over time.

So I’m concentrating on resurrecting old habits, not birthing a slew of new ones. Among the candidates are:
- Exercise variety. When I was at Men’s Health, I had access to some really great trainers and my exercise routine included a lot of effective, bodyweight exercise routines that I have lost touch with. I have added a bit of yoga and (in the past year) tai chi, but I still find these more explosive, power-generating bodyweight basics missing from my daily movement patterns. Recently I was listening to the book “Outlive,” by Peter Attia, and I was reminded that I should be doing a lot of these bodyweight basics, and rucking, which has been evangelized by a former colleague, Michael Easter, in his book, The Comfort Crisis. I get out on my bike on weekends (even in winter), have incorporated tai chi and do a pretty pedestrian weights workout, but this is stuff I should be doing all the time. I’m getting back to it.
- Connecting. I’m an extrovert. I like people, like being with them – and the pandemic disrupted my schedule in a pretty profound way. Beyond that, my eyesight has deteriorated in the last few years. I can drive at night, but I sometimes feel compromised. That said, I have lots of friends – Nick, Adam, Potter, Bill, etc. – who I haven’t seen in real life in several years, mostly because traveling, especially driving in the dark, is an issue. (And did I mention I have three grandkids? They eat up a lot of weekend time). Some not-so-old friends are a distance away, some have growing families, some I have no real excuse, I just got used to NOT doing stuff … and it’s become clearer over time that I have paid a price for letting those connections fray. Up until the pandemic, I thought I did a good job on connection, not just with people my age but 10 and even 20 years younger. One of my commitments is to re-connection in 2024 … AND I think I need a little more light in the world to really get after it. (I’m speaking actual physical light, like longer days, not a commentary on the news, which I think everyone should remember that times always seem kinda dark. It’s in our nature, I think.) To those not-so-long-ago friends, you’ve been warned.
- Limiting sugar, especially liquid sugar. I seriously need a return to alcohol-free weeknights. As I get older, alcohol carries a heavier toll. It needs to be either restricted or eliminated. Not easy, but not really negotiable, either. Also, soda and fruit juices are on the chopping block. To my “old you” theory, I’ve done this before. Three consecutive days of abstinence generally puts me in a different behavioral zone where I can extend the good habit. I’ve done it. I can do it again.
- Thinking more. Reading more. Using my brain … more. There’s this word game called Ruzzle on my phone, I play it when I wake up. I play it when I climb into bed at the end of the day. It’s totally just eating up neurons in my head. It provides no knowledge. It is not a challenge – it just appears to be one to my dumb little brain. It’s time to delete it from my phone and read. I have a nice, big backlog. And I could use more recommendations.
Anyway, one month into 2024, I’m looking backward to move forward. I’m curious what new/old things y’all are doing to improve your lives, too?
Adventures in AI: ‘I made up some plausible sounding book titles …’

December 5, 2023

So in my continuing experiments with artificial intelligence, I decided to ask Claude, the chatbot created by AI startup Anthropic, to help me with some holiday gift-giving, specifically for my wife.

I highlighted some of her interests, including her newfound love for pickleball as well as her longtime love – reading. Claude offered up that I should consider buying her a book about pickleball strategy.

Great idea! I thought, and asked,

Is there a book on pickleball strategy that is considered better than others?

Claude then gave me a list of books, with titles, authors and descriptions. It was awesome …

Until I went to Amazon and looked for The Art of Pickleball, Pickleball Psychology and Winning Pickleball by author and came up empty. There were some that were close, but zero matches.

So I went back to Claude and here is our exchange.

Which leaves me asking, what the heck?!?!?

As background, I used Claude because the founder of Anthropic, Dario Amodei, is a former OpenAI employee who left over differences with leadership and has been at the forefront of something called Constitutional AI, which sets out to make safer systems by placing hard and fast rules on what the AI can and can’t do.

I appreciate Claude’s apology but the explanation leaves me flabbergasted and unsettled. It makes it sound as if it answered in total ignorance, but some of the authors do exist, and have even written about pickleball – they just haven’t written the book Claude said they did. How in the world could I receive with confidence Claude’s answer if something really mattered. Should I try to tourniquet a serious injury to my son’s right arm and drive to the hospital or call for an ambulance? Do I always have to ask it if it’s on the up and up?

It’s hard to take AI seriously when it’s fundamentally unserious — when even its most philanthropic executions are deceptive and ignorant. Maybe it’s best to just keep asking it to write stories about peppers in the style of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, or create an image for this post.

But what about ChatGPT?

As a followup, I tried ChatGPT with the same query. It considered, then let me know it was asking Bing search for “best pickleball strategy books” then gave me five recommendations, which actually exist (though with one, it got the subtitle confused with the title). Points to ChatGPT.
What Happened When I Asked ChatGPT to Write a Short Story About a Pepper

October 10, 2023

Like so many other writers/editors, I’ve been playing with ChatGPT. Generally, as I’ve asked it to do very purposeful tasks, I’ve found it to be capable, lacking insight, and vulnerable to enormous gaps of understanding. My advice is, Use it … very, very carefully.

So this morning, I brought in some of the fall harvest from our garden, a bunch of figs, tomatoes and peppers. As I prepared to go to work, my wife Virginia referred to the “plight of the poblano peppers,” which got stuck in my head.

Later in the morning, I prompted ChatGPT with this:

Tell me a short story about the plight of a poblano pepper named Pepe, as if it was a children’s story written by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

And I got this:

Once upon a time, in a quaint little village where magic and realism danced in the air like fireflies at twilight, lived Pepe the Poblano Pepper. Pepe wasn’t an ordinary pepper; he was bestowed with an emerald-green hue that dazzled anyone who looked at him. He grew in the famous garden of Señora Rosalinda, a mystical widow who had the power to converse with the moon and stars.

Pepe was always content, surrounded by fellow vegetables and protected by the wise leaves of a mystical sage plant. But, as is the plight of all poblano peppers, Pepe knew that the day would come when he would be plucked, cooked, and transformed into something entirely different.

However, Pepe harbored a unique wish. He didn’t want to become just any dish, lost and forgotten in the complexity of flavors. He yearned to be part of a meal so unforgettable, it would be spoken about for generations, securing his place in the annals of village lore.

News of Pepe’s extraordinary wish reached the ears of the wise owl Alejandro, the unofficial guardian of the garden. Intrigued, Alejandro approached Señora Rosalinda with an idea.

“Why not use Pepe in your upcoming dish for the village fair? The event is as magical as Pepe himself,” Alejandro suggested.

Señora Rosalinda, already fond of Pepe, nodded in agreement. “Ah, the fair! Where love stories find their beginnings and friendships find their forever homes. Yes, Pepe shall be the star!”

And so, the magical day came. The village fair was a spectacle to behold, a place where reality flirted with the unimaginable. Señora Rosalinda carefully plucked Pepe from his comfortable abode and cooked him into the most enchanting chiles rellenos anyone had ever tasted.

As the villagers bit into the dish, their eyes widened with delight, and their souls experienced a euphoria akin to glimpsing the hidden tapestry of the universe. Pepe’s wish had come true; he was not just part of a dish but an experience, an emotion, a story to be recounted for generations.

Though he had been transformed, the essence of Pepe lived on in the collective memory of the village, whispered in the wind and sung by the river that flowed eternally.

And so, in the magical little village where the boundary between the real and the fantastic was as thin as a whisper, Pepe the Poblano Pepper achieved the immortality he had always wished for, living forever in the hearts and tales of the people.

And they all lived magically ever after.

The end.

I prompted Dall-E, the AI imaging editor, to create an image to accompany the story and this is what it created. A little too much “bad sheriff” vibe, but kinda funny.

It’s not going to take home a Booker Award, but it could turn into a Pixar movie. And compared to when I ask AI to provide a more specific answer or advice, the story actually has some surprises in it.

I mean, this is not a bad place to end most stories.

And so, in the magical little village where the boundary between the real and the fantastic was as thin as a whisper, Pepe the Poblano Pepper achieved the immortality he had always wished for, living forever in the hearts and tales of the people.
Mothers of Stars and Darkness

September 26, 2023

Something from a few years back, getting out of my own tiny head …

—

When she thought about it, she realized she was a reaction to and reflection of her mom, in separate and unequal ways, that she was in many ways a series of responses to where she came from and how.

And being reduced to that, rather than feeling reductive or lessening, it grew her mother from a singular person, honking and gasping for air and the next heartbeat, to something bigger, something cosmic.

Because if she was merely a series of reactions, well, what is the universe but the same thing? And in this small, expansive world, her mom was the Big Bang. She could not exist without this First Mover, even as she looked through her mom’s celestial mantle and saw a succession of starbursts back and back through time. And she could sense that for her children, she too was a garden of stars, setting them on their way.

She became not a collection of flaws and failures but an elemental force, carried forth by the muscular truths of matter and velocity. She was a force and would be far into the future.

This conception of being a birther of constellations, mom to collisions and catastrophes and daybreak and nightfall, it stayed with her deep into sleep that night, tucked up close to her chin like her blanket.

And she felt better.
The Rule of 17 (Months)

August 30, 2023

This is my rule of incompetent executives and it says that, on average, they leave after 17 months on the job.

The arc usually looks like this:

Herb is announced to great fanfare. He comes from a company that you assume knows much more about Doing Stuff Right than your ragtag band. Often Herb left several months earlier, but the email announcement fairly oozes, Herb was key to creating one of the Great Consumer Products of the Decade.

Month 1: Herb arrives. He’s circumspect. Or he glad-hands. He listens a bit, then mentions his time helming the GCPD, then announces he’s going to spend the next several months getting to know the players and the culture.

Month 4: Three months later, you haven’t seen or heard a word about Herb, but an email arrives announcing that he will be leading a big push to re-create a portion of your company.

Month 10: Six months later, you ask how the project is coming. Nobody you know knows anything about it. Herb hired some former associates, they’re playing it very close to the vest. Details are sketchy.

Month 12: Word is getting out that the project is moving very slowly. Herb can’t make a decision, your friends say. The project is over budget and behind schedule.

Month 13: Despite a herculean effort across the company, the project underwhelms at launch. Herb blames the marketing people. Why can’t they get their s— together?!?

Month 15: The promised relaunch, you guessed it, underwhelms.

Month 17: Herb sends an email on a Friday afternoon, around 4 pm. He misses his family, which never left the West Coast, and he’s joining them. The CEO sends a note soon after announcing that the project has been shuttered. Everyone has to trim 15% of their budget, the first of two such belt-tightenings in the next 6 months, to right the listing corporate ship.

Month 20: A colleague sends you a link to news that Herb has signed on with Big Player in the Industry. He’ll be a VP in said company’s new venture. The kids and wife will have a Merry Christmas after all. Your bonus didn’t survive the turmoil.

There is, sadly, a Rule of 17 (Years) for marriages, too. I know the itch supposedly hits (traditionally guys) in Year 7, but about a decade later, there’s a karmic about-face. In my experience, the kids hit high school, they require less minute-to-minute tending and mom, perhaps for the first time since their honeymoon and her work, school and family duties, stops and takes a full accounting of the Mister. And finds it—OK, him—lacking.

The portfolio is disappointing. Personal growth? He’s still wearing a Depeche Mode T-shirt he wore when they moved into their first home together. Growth of waist? Appreciable. While he hits his marks as far as transitting the children, and may actually be quite engaged with them, he’s not all that intimately involved in her interests and her needs.

Sadness turns to regret, then resentment. One night Dad thinks he’s going to watch American Ninja Warrior but is pre-empted by a Discussion of the State of Our Life Together. He is baffled by where all this came from. He awakes the next morning to find himself George Clooney in The Perfect Storm. The sea is roiling and angry. He has no answers. He barely gets the questions. Didn’t I provide? Wait, I was supposed to listen to all of that?? Sure, I looked, but I certainly never made even a half-serious attempt at anything. But, wait, did you? Are you? No, no, no. I know you haven’t, but why do you look so damn serious?!?

Nothing resolves, the boat flips. The first-born’s Move-In Day at college leads quickly to Move-Out Day at home. The daughter at home is torn. Was it me? Did I do something? Mom never seemed that unhappy? Dad’s lost—and surly.

This sounds sexist as I type it, and men mess up more than their fair share of marriages, but the Rule of 17 as it relates to marriage, in my experience, is initiated and motivated by a woman’s evaluation of her situation. Guys at Year 17 tend to be blissfully unaware. Fatally unaware, even. Is that good? Obviously, no. Is it natural? I don’t know. But I do sympathize with the guy who was sailing along, not a care in the world, when the storm of his inattention was brewing.

Stay safe out there, guys. And find some attention for your wives. They’re good people. They deserve it. And there are always consequences.