A freaky fiesta

At midnight tonight, my favorite holiday begins. Here, some tips for throwing a ghoulishly spooktastic shindig that's really something to howl at:

Eat: Potato Ghosts, Creepcake Cupcakes, and lots and lots of candy corn

Drink: Eyeball Highballs and Pina Ghouladas

Watch: The Five Cheesiest 80s Horror Films or the Spike Jonze-Kanye collab ... one of the creepiest things I've ever seen.


Listen: The Zombie Danceparty Mix, Fever Ray's Halloween podcast, Dana's spooky playlist, and of course, Nightmare Revisited (a Nightmare Before Christmas cover album featuring Marilyn Manson, Rodrigo y Gabriela, RJD2, Devotchka, KoRn, and more).

Trick or treat yourself to the best Halloween ever!

Ready, set, type!

November is National Novel Writing Month, and if you register over at nanowrimo.org, you can race the clock with thousands of scribes across the country scrambling to write 50,000 words by November 30th. If you succeed, you'll receive a Winner's Certificate and Web Badge, and join the ranks of Times #1 bestselling author Sara Gruen, who wrote Water for Elephants during the challenge!

Meet Dana

Maaaaaaad props to my BFF Dana, whose carefully-executed inspiration board of a fashion blog is now being recognized for all its (and her) style and beauty by the Free People clothing company. Read the interview, check out her blog, and recognize!

Walt Whitman for Levi's

Is it just me, or have ad campaigns gotten way, way cooler since the effects of the recession clawed their way into the American conscious? I guess the whole involuntary post-death spokes-celeb thing could be conceived as a desecration of Walt's work, but since Levi's were around long before the Whit-man, and this commercial is more or less a piece of art in its own right, I think we can give the complaints a rest. Chris Farley for DirecTV feels far tackier, anyway.

From the Levi's Go Forth campaign (the first is a recording of Whitman reading "America," and the second - which I prefer - is an actor's recording of "Pioneers! O Pioneers"):




Directed by Cary Fukunaga, the man responsible for Sundance favorite Sin Nombre.

Devour those dumplings

Today is the 6th Annual Chef One Dumpling Eating Contest, but more importantly it is the first-ever NYC Dumpling Festival! Noon to five in Sarah D. Roosevelt Park (East Houston and Forsyth), hundreds will gather to consume the cutest of appetizer-sized pocket foods. Dumplings from all corners of the earth - the Chinese bao, the Polish pierogi, the Italian gnocchi - will be celebrated and consumed. I'll be cheering on the competitors with a $5 sample plate in hand.

Klosterf**ck

Man, oh man, first draft of a very exciting screenplay is in the works: The Hold Steady's Craig Finn and Letterman writer Tom Ruprecht are teaming up with one of my favorite authors of our day (that'd be Chuck Klosterman) to bring his 2001 memoir, Fargo Rock City, to the big screen. Fargo is the story of Klosterman's experience growing up in North Dakota as a monster heavy-metal fan. The guy could make Kanye like country music, if he tried. This one's gonna be a dorky teen movie for the ages.

For the french fry connoisseur

Famed French chef Alain Ducasse judges New York's french fries (my guilty pleasure food of choice) for NYmag. Glad to see neighborhood fave Pommes Frites made #2!

It was a monster mix

Props to Flavorwire for sharing their ghoulishly creeptastic Halloween mixtape. Ctrl + left click + save as on each song link, and do your best zombie dance.
They're missing one important tune, however:

Sweet Civil War

That's right, a Civil War reenactment with marshmallows. In Dumbo (where else?) on October 24th. BYO mallows & weapons. For more, go here.

Jonze gets it right

I saw it Saturday - Where the Wild Things Are, that is - after reading Dave Eggers' deftly-handled novelization (which aligned very closely with the screenplay). The film was visually stunning, shot mostly in Australia (in and around Melbourne). Spike Jonze did an incredible job of allowing the viewer into the mindset of a 9 year old child, lending depth, pain and poetry to the adaptation of a much-loved classic. Karen O's score, the voices of James Gandolfini, Lauren Ambrose, and Forest Whitaker, the ever-radiant Catherine Keener, and perhaps most of all, the raw talent of first-time actor Max Records (yes, he's really named Max), set Jonze's creation firmly in that most-difficult-to-enter of worlds: a successful print-to-screen adaptation.
Meet my own Wild Things - pumpkin cupcake monsters with cinnamon buttercream frosting.

C'mon get happy

If you haven't already seen this AmEx commercial, watch it now - I challenge you not to love it. One of the more creative pieces of advertising I've seen in a while.

Weekly wrap-up

Because this has been one hell of a week (TGIF), I figured it calls for a wrap-up of sorts:

* Falcon Heene (a.k.a. Balloon Boy) is safe. He was just hiding in the attic like any normal attention-deprived child.
* Crappy NYC radiators + WTWTA coming out (today's the day, for those who have been living under a rock) = great excuse to wear all the faux fur you can pile on. I know I will.
* Last chance to catch Lizzie Borden: The Show, a gory, period-punk rock musical that pays rollicking, foot-stomping, ear-deafening homage to the notorious New England spinster who was suspected of murdering her father and stepmother. It's a wonderful pre-Halloween good time, and the final two shows take place this Saturday.
* Don't miss Chromeo at the Fillmore tonight - I'll be showing off my best Fancy Footwork.

The golden boys

The topic is no good news, but the collaboration sure is: director Gus Van Sant (Milk, Paranoid Park, Elephant, Good Will Hunting, etc) is pairing up with literary Brat Pack king of 80's coolness and depravity, Bret Easton Ellis, to adapt The Golden Suicides, a Vanity Fair piece on the doomed love story of Theresa Duncan and Jeremy Blake. The outrageous artist couple committed back-to-back suicides in 2007, shocking the press and the New York art world. Van Sant and Ellis could be producing a movie about linoleum tiling, for all I care, and I'd elbow my way into a first screening.

Spidey's a veggie

Out of about 40,000 known spider species, the first vegetarian has been identified! Bagheera kiplingi (named after the panther Bagheera in Rudyard Kipling's 1894 children's classic, The Jungle Book) leaps from thorn to thorn to collect its "prey," the nutrient-rich acacia plant buds, avoiding the ants that live in the plant's hollow thorns. This tropical jumping spider essentially "hunts" these plants - sounds like us human veggies waiting to snag a seat at Angelica Kitchen.

The fun theory

Some Swedes test and prove the theory that making something fun to do can change people's behavior for the better. Let's choose to ignore the fact that this is actually a commercial for Volkswagon (I see their point, but wouldn't the "better behavior" really be walking? Or riding a bike? Perhaps public transportation?) If taking the stairs gave you tuneful toes as well as better calves, who could resist?

A new storm's a-brewin'

For the first time since 1951, a new cloud formation has been discovered and added to the International Cloud Atlas. Clouds of the asperatus variety (which translates as "roughened or agitated waves") are most common in the Plains states and often found the morning or afternoon after a thunderstorm. Who else is feeling a trip to New Mexico?

Jonze-in for some Spike

Excuse the poor titular pun, but I just couldn't help myself. Today is an exciting, nay, a historical day, because it is today that the MoMa launches Spike Jonze: The First 80 Years. The name of the retrospective is appropriately tongue-in-cheek (the guy is what, 40?) and self-aware: Jonze is something of a Gen-X genius. The exhibit is timed to coordinate with the release of the much-anticipated collaboration between Jonze and Maurice Sendak (Where the Wild Things Are, duh), and features clips from the director's commercials, music videos, and full-length films - most notably, the Charlie Kaufman-penned gems Being John Malkovich and Adaptation, not to mention Jackass: The Movie. The guy is a legend, and the tribute is well-deserved. Festivities end October 18th, so make sure you get your ass to the MoMa before it's too late.

Sweet ride

I never learned to drive, but then again there's never been a whip like this on the market to make me want to! Launched at Burning Man and now available in collaboration with Neiman Marcus (huh?) this cupcake car is fully customizable with your favorite topping Since we all know the red velvet craze is sooo last year, I'm guessing the ride of the moment may be lemon cake with lavender frosting (or maybe that's just a recipe I've been wanting to try). Just think: for a mere $25,000, you can drive down the street with that ridiculous little hat on.

Oh! You wild things

Because I don't think I can go a week without blogging about WTWTA (if you don't get the abbreviation you obviously don't share my enthusiasm), here's the latest in Sendak-inspired gear:

Avante-garde boutique Opening Ceremony has created a limited edition collection in collaboration with Spike Jonze that includes, among many other pieces of furry goodness and even some tooth-and-claw Pamela Love jewelry, a furry full-piece Max suit - complete with ears and bushy tail. If $610 is too much to spend on Halloween (what, you were planning on wearing it around the house?), make like this lil' guy and D.I.Y. the cutest costume of all time.

More Spike Jonze news comin' atcha later this week.

Maya's still movin'

Despite false alarms spread by panicky Tweets and started by that reliable source of news, TMZ, Maya Angelou is not dead. She is alive and perfectly well. In celebration of that fact, here's one of my favorite poems:

Phenomenal Woman

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I'm not cute or built to suit a fashion model's size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I'm telling lies.
I say,It's in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It's the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can't touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them
They say they still can't see.
I say,
It's in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Now you understand
Just why my head's not bowed.
I don't shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It's in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need of my care,
'Cause I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Dunst goes Harajuku

Yet another example of why I can't bring myself to like Kirsten Dunst, but am always a fan of the work she does: she stars in pop art king Takashi Murakami's latest project for the Tate Modern (London) exhibit "Pop Life: Art in a Material World." It's a video installation in which the actress, dressed up in all the trappings of Tokyo street style, sings a cover of "Turning Japanese" while dancing through the shopping district of Akihabara. Okay, I'm sure she's still annoying and all puffy-cheeked in the video, but that outfit is freaking awesome. Weird, wild, wonderful ... Halloween can't come soon enough.

In the name of shameless self-promotion

For those Manhattanites looking for something to do tonight at 8pm, come by Kiva Cafe in TriBeCa where I'll be giving a short reading of some of the poetry I wrote during my senior year of college. The food is good, the wine, beer, coffee and tea will be flowing, and you'll have a chance to hear the literary stylings of yours truly!