An excerpt from a Fox News article:

FOXNews.com - Disney World Tells Santa Lookalike to Hit the Road
“They told me I either needed to alter my appearance or I needed to leave the park because I was impersonating Santa Claus. They told us that Santa was considered a Disney character,’ said Worley.

Santa is now a Disney character? Sure, they own The Little Mermaid (sorry, Hans Christian Anderson). But Santa? Surely not.

My friends and I were once denied entry to Disneyland because the boys’ jeans had ripped knees. That was fashionable at the time, but the irony is: they had been saving up for this Disneyland trip and didn’t have money for new clothes. We went back to the car and they ripped their pant legs off and we folded up the remaining so as not to show the stringiness (they didn’t want us wearing cut-offs, either). They looked like dorks, but cleaner cut dorks, and we got in that time. Later that day we saw a number of white kids with ripped jeans and cut-offs. Either the doorkeepers had become too busy to check everyone’s clothes as the day wore on, or being darker-skinned and long-haired made one more subject to scrutiny.

If you’ve been a remote guest on TV before, you’ll already know this stuff. But I thought it was interesting the first time around and figured that some of you might, too.

I was on the Fox News show Heartland with John Kasich tonight.

Here’s what goes into just a minute or two of a show like this:

• The segment producer finds you and makes contact and puts you on the schedule
• One or more segment producers “pre-interview” you, to give you a sense of what the host will ask, and to give the host a sense of how you will answer
• They send a car for you and drive you to the studio
• They do hair and makeup (sometimes this is by request only; for tonight, I did my own, which means I washed my hair and let it dry before I left the house, and also I put on makeup. I took a pic with my cell phone:)
  
• They set you up in a chair and put an earbud in your ear and a mic on your shirt
• They tell you to look into the camera the whole time
• They play the show in your ear, so you can follow along
• They say “ok, you’re on in ___ minutes/seconds”
• The host introduces you and you hear it in one ear
• And you talk to the camera, unable to see the host, no one to play off of, no idea what facial expressions or body language the host is using. For all I know, John was rolling his eyes and twirling his finger by his ear while I said “Manatees are funny!” in the little box behind his head.
• A minute or two later, they say in your ear “Thanks, that was great, have a good evening!”

All that time, all those people, just to make two minutes of television look effortless. It’s amazing.

What’s also interesting is that I get a “performer high” even just from this. It’s not as euphoric as what follows an in-person event or even joining show hosts on set, but it’s still there. I always walk out of the studio feeling happy and connected, which is odd, because TV is not a connective medium; the Television Audience is only in your mind, not in your presence, except for shows filmed before a live audience.

I’m still wondering why they wanted the Sex Drive columnist to talk about internet video (horny manatees!), as it was not a sex-tech segment except by the stretchiest stretch of the imagination. But I’m glad. I do know about other stuff, after all. Sometimes even I forget I have a background in online community development….

I’m scheduled to be on Fox News’ “Heartland with John Kasich” at 5:30 p.m. my time, which is 8:30 p.m. east coast, this Saturday (December 16th). I’ll be in the San Francisco studio so I’m assuming they’re going to remote me into a little box behind John’s head.

I met with the woman who would be my editor at this particular publisher for The Book, if they buy it — see, I dropped Book 3 after spending the past few months researching and starting it, and have decided to move on to The Book instead which is a modified version of what was Book 2, you know how it goes — and we hit it off really well. My action item (heh) is to beef up the content outline and make the chapter headings funnier so she can take it to the editorial board and make a Decision.

I had the following small fancy drink even though it’s probably time to switch to regular coffee and its total lack of calories. Eeeeeeek!

what: soy caramel latte, small
where: peet’s
city: emeryville
progress: established rapport with editor; fleshed out concept

And you know that as soon as I have a signed contract I will be less coy about The Book. In fact, I’ll be soliciting your input, come January. Meanwhile, other changes are in the works, because I have to clear some of the stuff off my schedule in order to make room for this.

And yes, I’m having fun applying picture frame templates in Paint Shop Pro 9 like any newbie, so what?

Nothing is a done deal yet, but I finally talked to an acquisitions editor about a project I am code-naming The Book, and her response was even more encouraging than I expected. I showed her a (very) draft proposal yesterday and need to get her a full outline and “hook” by the end of next week.

I’ve kicked this idea around for a while but yesterday marked the official Beginning of The Book. And this morning marked the first official Drink of The Book:

what: soy peppermint mocha
where: the coffee table
city: los angeles
progress: solicited input from forum

I actually took this photo with my cell phone, but I recently purchased a Nikon d50 SLR with an 18mm-200mm lens. For work. This indulgence is the combined fault of Heather Armstrong, Sharlene McKinnon, Janine Warner, and David LaFontaine, who taught me all about lens envy last month in Calgary.

At about 5:15 p.m. today (thursday) Pacific time, which seems to be around 1:15 a.m. (friday) in England, I’ll be on Up All Night on BBC 5 radio:

BBC - Five Live - Up All Night

God DAMN it. God FUCKING damn it. This is not how this story was supposed to go.

A page with email contact, phone numbers if you have information, and a guest book to leave your well wishes:

Please help us find the Kim Family

Tip Line - (800) 452-7888
If you are not in Oregon please call 503-375-3555 and 503-731-3030

In oregon and california, especially watch: Highways 42, US101, 199, I-5 and other areas between

This story made me cry:

ABC News: Search Continues for James Kim

I know James; we worked together at TechTV. I’m so glad Kati and the kids have been found and are okay — and now I want James back too.

I’m going to look around and see if there’s anything I can do. The family paid for the rescue helicopter themselves, maybe I can send some money or something …

If you have to go to a store in December rather than shop online, you probably need to turn on your air conditioner at least until you get moving; at the very least, roll your windows down. And just in case the store is a bit chilly, take a scarf along — one that coordinates with your tank top and flip-flops.

I love it.

Hey look! Another column! This one’s a profile of some cool folks doing cool things:

Wired News: Animated Porn Makes Moves
Imagine what you could do with erotic entertainment if you weren’t bound by the laws of physics or 18 U.S.C. 2257.

By physics, of course, I mean the limitations of gravity, proportion, body mass. And by 18 U.S.C. 2257, I mean the federal law that requires every node in the pornography network to maintain records on every performer appearing in an adult film, including their real names, addresses and the probable sex of their first born.

At the moment, producers do not need to worry about either of those laws if their performers are computer-generated. And since illustration is the oldest form of pornography NSFW, it strikes me as ironic that despite the photographic and video capabilities of the digital age, drawing might prove to be the foundation of the Next Big Thing in entertainment.

continued at wired.com

You wouldn’t know it, but I think of a story to blog every 10 minutes, at least. OK, maybe once an hour. But because I don’t have a subvocal implant with a direct connection to my Wordpress input screen, I don’t get to share them. And by the time I’m at a computer with a moment to blog I’ve forgotten all my brilliant insights, my horrible puns, and my well-crafted phrases. Ahem.

In fact, right now I’m in the Oakland airport, typing into Notepad, and trying — but failing — to get to the wireless. The new Terminal 2 has beautiful views of the bay, the hills and the city — but its wifi access points must not be fully installed yet because my connectivity never gets better than “very low.” I’m not even getting to an extortion page to enter my credit card and pay $10 for the next hour and fifteen minutes.

Have you ever noticed that airport retail people aren’t given FAQ lists so they can answer questions like “where should I go sit if I want to use the internet?” and “what is the terminal velocity of a fully laden swallow?”

{time passes}

Ta-da! I’m online! Hooray! I can post now!

But … what was I thinking about, earlier, that was interesting enough to blog?

Crap.

OK, that does it. I’ve been lusting after the LG EnV cell phone mainly because I think it will be a good mobile blogging solution. (Oh, groan, did I just use “solution” all naturally, as if it’s not marketese? Sigh. And blogging isn’t even billable…)

Anyway.

I want a phone that I can type on (QWERTY, please), that has a camera, and works with Verizon because that’s the service the boyfriend and I have both been happy with for the past few years (so there). I have yet to hie me to a Verizon store to touch it, though, and I will naturally spend the afternoon typing (blogging?) from every phone, just to make sure. I don’t need it to be a PDA too but have a history of buying more than I need and then outgrowing it.

Any suggestions? I have small fingers so the small keys aren’t a problem, but I don’t like to have to press too hard, as I am a delicate princess. The only reasons I won’t go with the LG are (1) if the keys are so annoying I can’t type with one hand or (2) you overwhelmingly hate it but love another phone with the same capabilities.

You naughty-minded people. The one-hand thing is important because I need to text while I drive. I do, after all, live in Los Angeles. *evil grin*