And The Oscar Goes To...

Last night was the first time I ever watched the Academy Awards from beginning to end. When I was younger, I wanted to watch it but I wasn't allowed to see most of the movies that were nominated. Plus it was over way past my bedtime.

I couldn't even stay up for the year Titanic won, and at that time it was the only movie I had ever seen nominated at the Academy Awards. However, Leonardo DiCaprio didn't even show up that year, so I wasn't missing much.

Watching last night, I could not recall another time where I had been so bored. I don't dislike Ellen. The few times I've tuned into her show, I've laughed a little. Her standup is alright. But she was just trying way too hard last night. Did she really need to have Steven Speilberg take a picture of her and Clint Eastwood in order to get some laughs? Did she really have to almost vacuum up Penelope Cruz's beautiful gown for entertainment?

Although if she did, Penelope definitely would have kicked her ass. That would have at least woken us up.

Personally, I thought the three minutes Jerry Seinfeld was on stage presenting an award was much funnier than her entire performance. How come no one asked him?

There seemed to be endless montages of foreign films, music compilations, good editing, deceased actors, and other honorees. They gave countless awards to categories like best sound editing or best art. Really, the best way to watch these are to make sure you're doing something else. Reading a book. Hanging out with friends. Or, best case scenario, look them up online the next day.

It also didn't help that there were no surprises. Everyone who was predicted to win, won. The one moment that almost, almost, made it worth watching was when Martin Scorsese won. He definitely deserved that award. Besides that, everything seemed to go smoothly. This is probably the dream of the coordinators, but we at least want to see someone trip or something. Remember the year Kim Basinger won for Best Supporting Actress? She was in the bathroom when they called her name, so Robin Williams jumped on the stage and started doing something hilarious, as usual. At least that was something for people to talk about the next day. The year after that, they had Basinger present with toilet paper on the bottom of her dress. I'm sure all the third graders watching got a kick out of that.

This year Helen Mirren's earring fell off on her way to the stage. I was on the edge of my seat.

I think what they should do with the Oscars is only show the very beginning, and then the awards real people actually care about: best actor/actress, best supporting actor/actress, best director and best picture. I'm sure for the people in the movie industry, they get all aflutter over best cinematography or best animated short, but the "little people" out here just don't give a damn. They can sit through every category, montage and bad joke, but please spare us the torture.

Creative Advertising

How come every time I see an Abercrombie and Fitch ad the people in it are mostly naked? Being that A&F is a clothing company, the idea is that they use the ads to make you buy the clothes, right? And usually when looking at an advertisement, the person is supposed to think, hey if I buy that, I'll look like that person! So then the intelligent consumer spends more money on more things they don't need (Myself included). If the guy in the A&F ad is naked, then we can spend no money and just be naked for free, and not have to spend $64 on a polo shirt.

Waiting

Let’s go back to a time before digital television and super fast Internet speeds. Back to a time when America Online was the primary Internet service provider. Remember when signing into AOL took enough time that you could go make a sandwich, walk your dog and do some yoga? Remember those awful high pitched screeching noises that would be emitted from your computer that although you hated, you knew there would be a good reward at the end? Hopefully a nice “you’ve got mail” after your warm “welcome.” Remember how long it took for pages to load? How you would watch the blue bar at the bottom corner fill up until you got all your fancy graphics on the page? Remember a time-prepare yourself- before away messages?

Yes, it was a much more simpler time then. A slower time. This time was only about ten years ago. A time when you were online you were there, and when you weren’t online you weren’t there. These days if a page takes more than a second to load I get impatient. I’ll keep myself signed online for days at a time, even if I’m at work, class, or sleeping. We want things fast. We don’t want to wait for our Internet, our web pages, our e-mail. It’s given us shorter attention spans, and significantly disabled our social communication skills. Our commercials have fast cuts, as do our movies. We can’t sit in a classroom for two hours. We don’t want to wait in line. We need the automated voice on the phone to tell us how many minutes it will be before our telephone call is answered. We don’t want to have to wait more than 15 minutes for a table at our favorite restaurant on a crowded Friday night. We have become a culture that’s connected to everyone at all times. There are now hotels that will confiscate your BlackBerry when you check in so that you can have a proper vacation, without constantly checking your adoringly nicknamed CrackBerry (implying that it’s like being addicted to crack…you get the idea).

Technology has done some great things; there is no denying that. I can see my house on Google Earth, how cool is that? Cool, and just a little bit creepy. As are most technological advances.

It’s incredibly cool that I can login to Facebook and get in touch with people I haven’t talked to in years. But it’s a little creepy that they can change their status to let me know exactly where they are and what they’re doing.

It’s cool that now those Helio phones have a GPS so that you can see where all of your friends are at any given time, but it’s also a little creepy that you can see exactly where your friends are at any given time. Hey, at least maybe it’ll keep people from cheating on their significant others.

I wonder how much technology has attributed to our (or at least my) impatience. I think it can claim most of the responsibility.