i have this really cute friend…

In this day and age, pointing out gender-differentiated behavior is a rather dangerous thing to do – it smacks of a misogynistic, patriarchal, pro-glass ceiling perspective that any guy hoping to ever have sex again would be better off simply avoiding altogether. That being said, I simply cannot refrain from sharing at least one small guy vs. girl observation I’ve recently noted. Namely, that girls tend to believe all of their friends are more attractive and all of their enemies less attractive than is actually the case, something guys simply don’t do.

Illustratively: a hunch-backed, toothless wildebeest of a girl would inevitably be described by every one of her friends as “absolutely beautiful,” or, at very least, “really, very cute.” Conversely, a Victoria’s Secret model who had once given that group of friends a dirty look would be dismissed as “honestly, not that attractive; I mean, seriously, what do guys even see in her?” It is my sense that women aren’t actively trying to bend the truth with these statements, but rather that their attractiveness appraisals are simply more highly influenced by personality. Guys, by way of comparison, have no trouble separating personality and looks, hence the frequency of friend descriptions like “who, Joe? Yeah, he’s a good guy, but he’s pretty fuckin’ ugly.”

All of which tends to get us guys in trouble, as women are nearly always in the process of setting single guys up with their single girl friends. Extrapolating cross-gender from our “call a spade a spade” approach, we guys tend to assume that the description of the girls we’re being set up with are largely objective. And, sometimes, they are. But more frequently, we hit the bar, meet the date, and realize that the liquid fortification required to actually kiss the girl goodnight would require a rather significant proportion of the week’s salary.

All of which, I suppose, leads me to this dating advice for fellow men: if the set-up is a close friend of the matchmaker, be wary. Ask for a picture. Or, at very least, buy a flask, and reduce the cost of your necessarily excessive drinking.

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give me your fat, your lazy, your tubby masses…

New York is, from the perspective of the very lazy, truly an ideal city. No place else boasts such a wide array of services catered to those who can’t be bothered to get up out of their easy chairs. Jonesing for a few Big Macs? Don’t worry, because McDonald’s will deliever that fatty-fried “beef” directly to your front door. Out of toilet paper? Call from the john and the corner drug store can get TP into your hand by the time you’re ready to wipe. So perhaps it shouldn’t be overly surpising that it is in this environment that FreshDirect, the largest delivery-based grocery startup since WebVan’s calamitous disintegration, is being launched.

As much as I’d like to prognosticate the firm’s horrible impending failure, I’m actually oddly bullish on the company. I’ve bought my groceries from then for the past three weeks, and it seems to me the company hits the trifecta of requirements for consumer uptake (better quality food, at lower prices, more conveniently provided), all couched within a business model that is based on making rather than losing money on each delivery (leveraging both a rather cleverly technologized warehouse system and a slew of direct-purchase deals with food growers and makers which cut out the pricey distribution tier of middlemen).

FreshDirect’s currently running a “$50 of free groceries for new customers” promotion, so if you live in NYC, you might as well give them a whirl – with the amount we pay for anything in this city, any financial break is a welcome change. Just don’t throw out your Gristedes club card; my positive outlook aside, if these guys don’t build up a customer base quickly, you’ll once again be pushing the cart down the aisles yourself.

Update: Several readers have pointed out that Kozmo is perhaps a better failed dot-com comparison than WebVan, as Kozmo similarly leveraged New Yorkers’ sloth before plummeting out of business. FreshDirect, however, is largely immune to the main problem Kozmo faced: small orders (most Kozmo.com orders were for one or two, relatively inexpensive items). The markup on a single tub of Haagen Dazs isn’t enough to cover the cost of delivery; a cart full of groceries, however, grosses enough to work – hence FreshDirect’s $40 minimum.

Update 2: Several other readers have emailed to say they like to hand-pick fruits and vegetables themselves, something web grocery shopping doesn’t allow. I’d posit, however, that what those readers really mean is that they want their fruits and vegetables to be good – if the quality of the food delivered is high enough (fruit that’s large, mildly under-ripened and completely free of bruises, for example), people are largely just as happy as if they did the picking themselves. Because the FreshDirect warehouse is catered to the food rather than to the shoppers (foods are kept in ideally climate and moisture controlled rooms, and aren’t roughly piled and frequently handled, as in supermarkets), pretty much all of the produce I’ve had delivered is at least as good as what I could hand pick at Food Emporium or even the Amish Market.

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beep beep beep beep beep

While I’ve spent much of my time over the last six months boning up on film knowledge, I must admit I’ve been, until recently, slacking off on following the world of high tech. As a born-and-bred, died-in-the-wool geek, I simply assumed I could step down my daily dork-reading and still have a pretty good sense of the state of the tech industry.

Then, earlier this week, I discovered Ellen Feiss. The subject of one of Apple’s “Switch” ads, Ellen’s “is she stoned?” appeal launched a flurry of activity, from MetaFilter discussions to a slew of fan sites. In short, she’s become something of a web phenomenon. Which, while vaguely amusing, doesn’t perturb me in and of itself. What does bother me is that I’d never heard of Ellen Feiss until this week; yet she’s been a major meme for nearly five months.

Needless to say, I’ve been on Wired and Slashdot every morning since.

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save the date

SantaCon NYC has officially been scheduled for December 14th. While I’ll be living bi-coastally for much of December (and January), I sure as heck will be back for this; a yearly “not-for-profit, nonpolitical, non-religious demented Santa Claus convention” is simply too good to miss.

[For more information about how to participate, in New York or other major cities, head to the home of the inimitable Cacophony Society. You may already be a member!]

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ack!

1. The big, big news: Cyan has selected a first feature. Check out the website for the star-studded details (Adam Golberg, Giovanni Ribisi, Joshua Jackson, Christina Ricci, etc.).

2. As the film begins shooting in a scant two months, I can basically kiss my free time goodbye. I’ll once again be giving up sleeping and going to the bathroom. Every minute counts.

3. None the less, I’ll still be doing my damndest to post here at least quasi-regularly, because, frankly, I still have a large backlog of random crap I’ve been meaning to blog about, and not doing so will slowly drive me nuts.

4. That random backlog includes my ongoing dating escapades. Yes, due to heavy goading from friends, family and longstanding readers, I’ve decided to once again make my love life fair game for blogging. I can’t even begin to imagine the mess this is going to make.

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channeling tony robbins

Yesterday, I headed to NYU’s Stern School of Business to talk to students about entrepreneurship, an odd experience considering that, the tone of this site aside, I don’t actually consider myself experienced or wise enough to have much insight to pass along. I was therefore thrilled to find this comment posted on Cyan Pictures web site by Columbia student Isabel Rosa:

I went to your talk. It was truly inspiring and at the same time realistic, a rare combination. It made me believe for the first time that my business idea is possible. Thank you!

Which pretty much made my day. Her comment won’t be launching me on a nation-wide motivational speaking tour any time soon, but it certainly did remind me how powerful the impact of a simple compliment can be, something I’d apparently forgotten. Must be time to reread the Dale Carnegie.

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