Josh Wildman

This is what happens when you hang out at Max Fish for too long

                                                                 Before...After

What in the hell kind of honkey hipster dingdongsauce is this?

There is a female white rapper on the rise, y'all! Kreayshawn is an Oakland-based high school dropout who got into the Berkeley Film School on full scholarship. Her mother was in a surf punk band called "The Trash Women" (cool points) and the self-proclaimed Bratz Doll is down with Odd Future, directed some of Lil B's videos, "f*cks with Shakespeare" and says Napolean has "swag." She already has some legitimate street cred - The Hundreds is all over her and Snoop Dogg hit her up on Twitter to get in touch with him.

I can't lie- I am loving the epic 90's West Coast rap beat, but it's coming out of a tiny little hoochie named KREAYSHAWN (as in "Creation") who looks like Amy Winehouse if she worked at Verb cafe in Williamsburg. 

I don't know what to do. I mean, I like her other dance jam and I like that she's from Oakland, but all my weird white guilt washes over me when I listen to her speak. I guess it doesn't matter though, since she kind of totally RULES. 

Here's a verse from some freestyle:


I'm f*cking Krayshawn
I'll run up in your house and I'll kill your mom
And I'll kill your dog
I'll kill your little brother too
But I won't kill your cat
I'll put her in a bag
Take her to my house
Put her on my couch
and let my cat go at her
Cause my cat is a goon
Yeah she's a goon
coming to kill you real soon
Kitty got the chopper and
she don't f*ck with you
She'll put one in your head
 and lay you in the bed


Check out more about Kreayshawn and her "WHITE GIRL MOB" on her website. 

IMPORTANT

Look at what Twitter gave me this morning! 

Click the image above to read more about this complex and riveting scientific endeavor

More Life Tips from Aviva Yael

Instead of having feelings, just shove everything way down there til it physically hurts, then numbs. The key to happiness is to be dead inside.

I should write a self-help book called SUCK IT UP and just tell everyone how to stop being miserable. Every time someone hurts you, no matter how petty or cruel, just pretend it never happened until you actually start to believe it never happened.

It's all about pairing the principles of no regrets and delusions of grandeur that has worked for successful sociopaths, con men, and those with Asperger's* for centuries.

My self help book will encourage people to keep being all pretend-y until they actually live that way in their brains. I think you can do it if you learn to anesthetize all feelings, abdicate remorse like you are King Henry, and carry on with your soul-less self until there is nothing bad left to feel.

Good times.

* remember when Asperberger's was trending on Twitter, except it was spelled #assburgers? God that was such a good day.

Toodles!

Just unfollowed/unfriended absolutely everyone I've ever wanted to. Feels AWESOME. I'm FREE! FACEBOOK AUSCHWITZ! TWITTER GENOCIDE! F U INTERNET!

not one. not one tiny one, even.

Holy Jesus Genius God

Jesse Pearson's new blog makes me want to stop even TRYING to write.


The Keaton family reunites and a grim hoedown of stifling codependency ensues.... The film would end with virtually no resolution, signifying that the Keatons continue in a sort of limbo, an emotional wasteland of repression spiked with occasional violent outbursts that will make The Ice Storm look like a Tyler Perry movie. 
- Family Ties, a film by Lars von Trier

Please read every word.

A Way With Words

Have you guys ever listened to A Way With Words? I've been picking it up again. The last podcast I heard before I forgot about this incredible program was about DF Wallace.* The episode focused on "stem-winding" which was used by The New Yorker to describe his writing style. This show gets me all tizzied up!

The hosts know the answer to EVERYTHING. It's like Car Talk for nerds. Have a burning etymological question? Want to know why some singers don't have accents? Perhaps you'd like to get into a debate about the Oxford Dictionary's acceptance standards for new words like 'refudiate'? Ask the hosts of AWWW... they will answer you in scintillating detail.

Anyhow, here's what's on my noodle after listening to this recent episode about killer Scrabble Words, which you have to listen to if you're into Sunday crosswords.

Words I don't use often that sound as beautiful as their meanings:
- Lithe
- Diaphanous
- Bucolic
- Ephemeral
- Blithe
- Lush 
- Tundra
- Synesthetic
- Languid
- Tranquil
- Prismic
- Baroque
- Azure

Words I use all the time that sound beautiful, but are cliche:
- Harbinger
- Stellar
- Ebullient
- Pretentious
- Intrinsic
- Serene
- Vacillate
- Ominous

Favorite word to say in a British accent: Rhododendrun 

Favorite word to pronounce in any accent: Beezlebub

Words I'd like to see re-enter our national lexicon:
- Opulence
- Apollonian
- Fisticuffs
- Harlequin
- Excoriate (use this to threaten someone physically for full diabolical effect)

Words that should be excoriated (see what I did there?):

- Hella

- Diva

- Casualista (no one actually says this out loud, but I read it in fashion PR junk blast emails)

- Funky

- Serendipitous
- Pastiche

- Hottie

- Cyber

- Cypher

- Ginormous

Anyhow, I am thinking about taking a writing class at UCLA. I can't write fiction, I'm prone to cliches, and I don't know how to tell a story efficiently. To me, the sign of a good writer or lyricist is someone who can illustrate complex situations with detail and relay emotions without being too verbose. I CAN'T DO THAT.

Anyhow, thanks for nerding with me. What are your favorite or most reviled words? Leave em in the comments. I'm curious!

* I never finished Infinite Jest, but sometimes when people ask me if I've read it I lie and say "yes" and pray they don't ask any questions, as I still have no idea how it ends. 

The eyes have it

Rachel Maddow just posted a grim photo of top brass watching the Navy Seals-Osama operation live from the Situation Room last week. Obama and Hillary's faces say it all. 

click the photo twice for close-ups


(For lighter vibes, you can read my round-up of the best #OSAMATWEETS from comedians and indie rockers)

Dream Job

As you know I am currently the Director of Affairs for the International Dimple Relocation Program.

But someday when I am done raising my kids and I'm living in a cabin with my hilarious, brilliant husband, I want to be the editor of a science and nature site... that’s funny. Nothing like that exists right now. Gizmodo is great for tech, Scientific American has fascinating coverage of daily science news, New Scientist has weak headlines but covers some really conceptual and aspirational content that I like. Motherboard comes close and is hands down one of my favorite sites. But no one has fit all the best content together into an entertaining, clever voice for the people, and I’d love to do that some day.

My supergoal is to write a sci-fi fantasy book about botanical warfare, using my limited knowledge of various biomes to create a violent and beautiful, non-human world. It's not pretty in the jungle. Trees are always trying to choke each other out and there are countless entities whose existence relies predominately on infecting trees. The trees are the lions of the forest.

Of course I’m saving all of this for when I’m retired, after I've raised my kids and have nothing to do but read botany books and brush up on how climates effect ecosystems down to the smallest species.

I have no storyline yet, but there will be epic story arcs and relatable struggles so that it can ultimately be made into an animated children's movie. It should be fairly formulaic in terms of a basic good vs evil plot, while making room for the inevitable cruelty and randomness of nature. I don't know how the story will be told yet, but the only thing I know is that this dystopian planet will be saved by various non-human forces, and my underdogs are going to include a righteous army of Banana Slugs.

xx