Jamie’s Brain

I was intially excited when I found out that Austin would be serving as a backdrop to several upcoming reality shows a few months ago - The Real World, an A&E documentary program on the Texas Rollergirls, and something called Welcome to the Neighborhood. Then I read an article about ABC’s decision to cancel Welcome to the Neighborhood. Apparently, some civil rights groups caught wind of the attrocity of a premise this show had. Basically, seven Austin families compete for the chance to live in a mansion. The decision makers are the neighbors on the block of this ‘elite neighborhood’ (Circle C Ranch). These friendly neighbors, all white, apparently made many racist comments while judging the diverse families (which included a black, hispanic, asian, and gay families). The winner was the white gay couple with an adopted black child, and even though the show isn’t airing they still get to move into the house.

ABC claims that the show’s intentions were to see if these neighbors could see past the potential families stereotypes. However, disussions of race and religion in the decision making process are factors that can not be considered even when giving away a house. It is the definition of discriminatory.

How does a show make it all the way to post production before it gets canned? The amount of money lost on this show has got to be substantial. With ABC’s recent success with Desperate Housewives and Lost, this situation could have potentially been a thorn in their side.

I am constantly annoyed by these commercials for esurance. They claim that the selling point for esurance is the fact that you can file a claim 24 hours a day. Whoop-de-doo. Their commercials can be viewed from their website - it says “check out Erin Esurance’s latest adventures here”. When did auto insurance become adventure story material? A horror story, maybe, but it’s no adventure. I’ll take a Geico commercial any day over these.

Everyone in the Austin area is familiar with Betty Blackwell, mostly because of her terribly hilarious television commercial. An extensive internet search did not produce the actual commercial for me to link, but I can tell you that it must have been filmed in 1982. Why can’t lawyers, who make so much money, make better commercials? I can remember another one where a younger male lawyer made a claim that “I may not look like a lawyer, but it helps me sneak up on them”. What is that supposed to mean?

Maybe their advertising is so bad because it somes from an organization such as this. Yikes!

I was feeling nostalgic for this favorite show of mine when I was a kid.

So I’ve been on myspace for quite a long while now, after growing bored with friendster. I’ve always liked their music features, and apparently, I’m not alone. With bands like my beloved NIN and Foo Fighters streaming their new CDs before they went on sale through their myspace profiles, one can say with assurance that myspace has arrived as a music promotional tool. But you can really say that it has arrived when you read this. An indie record label is willing to pay an intern to make friends with their band on myspace. WHAT?!?!? I worked as an unpaid intern before at an ad agency and did much more profit turning work than that.

Well, I guess if I have trouble getting a job in SF, I can turn to that…..

I’m in love with this album.

Due to the fact that I consider myself an ecclectic, unclassifiable type of person, I tend to be attracted to other things similar in nature.

Gorillaz is not your typical band. In fact, they are refered to as the world’s first virtual band. Collaborations come from some opf the industry’s greatest - Danger Mouse, Debbie Harry, and Kid Koala. Check it out.

View the video for my fave song on the album here.