Fotoshop by Adobé from Jesse Rosten on Vimeo.

So this recent episode from The Onion Radio News reduced me to helpless giggles. Enjoy!

UPDATE: On a related note, science journalist Christie Aschwanden alerted me to this 2008 NYT story: Experts Question Placebo Pill for Children. Thanks! Brilliant! You just can’t make this shit up!

CNN tech Writer Amy Gahran talks to CNN about… by BeyondPixBroadcast

And here’s the transcript.

Now that you’ve seen the finished product, here’s the backstory….

My interview was scheduled for 11:40 am. CNN arranged to have a car pick me up at my home in Oakland to drive me across the Bay Bridge to a TV studio in San Francisco. The pickup time was 9:30 am — a bit on the early side, but you never know about bridge traffic, even on a weekend holiday. The driver actually came early, and there was no traffic, so I arrived at the studio around 9:45 am.

I rang the buzzer on the building’s outer door, which was locked. No one answered. Tried again a few minutes later, and nothing. Ten minutes later, still nothing. I verified I had the correct address, but saw no signage indicating a TV studio was in that building.

So I called CNN headquarters to see if they had an on-site contact for the studio. They gave me a number that sent me to the voice mail for their Los Angeles bureau. Not helpful. After three more calls to CNN, I finally learned that this building wasn’t their studio — it’s an independent studio they lease time at (pretty normal for TV).

CNN staff was apparently searching around for an on-site contact, and I was getting a bit nervous at that point. Since a lot of media & CNN people follow me on Twitter, I posted for help there too. But didn’t get much response. Hey, it was a holiday for many…

Nearly an hour after I arrived, someone finally came down to let me inside. I waited in the studio (alone, surprisingly) for a bit. Then around 11am the makeup artist arrived. Shortly after the engineer walked in. Then a second engineer arrived — who, as it turned out, was redundant, so he went home.

cylon CNN

This is who.. er.. what was interviewing me at CNN. I now suspect that the "C" in CNN stands for "Cylon".

The interview itself was pretty quick. But I wasn’t actually talking to Fredricka Whitfield. She was just a disembodied voice in my ear. I was sitting in a chair in front of the CNN backdrop. I snapped a photo of what I was actually talking to (see left).

Once everyone was on site, it all ran smoothly. And that’s my point here — TV people often pull things together at the last minute, but they do manage to pull it all together, on a daily basis, and it works. I just happened to be unfamiliar with their process.

Now I know to expect that unless you’re going to a full-time network studio, people may not show up until the last minute. Which makes sense if a network is leasing studio time — which I gather does not come cheaply.

After my interview, the driver was kind enough to drop me at Dolores Park, in time for the annual Easter celebration of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. Here are my photos. (Note: Some are not safe for work.)

It was a blast! I especially loved the Hunky Jesus competition. (The winner was “Jesus F*cking Christ”, but my favorite was “Son of Godzilla.”) And of course, there were many exultant cries of “He is risen!” and “Ahh… men! Ahh… women! And Ahhheverything in between!”

I only regretted that I was wearing full-on business attire. But at least with the TV studio makeup overload still fairly fresh on my face, I did blend in a bit with this crowd. At least in spirit. I definitely felt like I was playing dress-up.

After the Hunky Jesus competition, I strolled over to Revolution Cafe on 22nd street to enjoy some live jazz…

Revolution Cafe Jazz

Live Jazz at Revolution Cafe, SF, Easter 2011

URGENT FACEBOOK UPDATE: As of today, Facebook staff will be allowed to eat your children and pets. To turn this option off, go to settings, then privacy, then meals. Click the top two boxes to prevent the employees of Facebook from eating your beloved children and pets. (Unless you don’t like your children, in which case… Carry on!). Copy this to your status to warn your friends!!!

I just finished reading a killer classic fiction mashup (literally), Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. It’s a parody of the Jane Austen novel (which I tried to read in college and found unbearably tedious).

I must admit, though: The addition of a Night of the Living Dead-style zombie plague made all the endless fretting and plotting over how to present  oneself as appropriately marriageable in polite society surprisingly entertaining and understandable.

Because the thing is: The strictures of British aristocratic society — particularly how women were held in chattel status, and the ceaseless power plays of verbal indirection — were indeed nightmarish, soul-destroying, and cannibalistic.

Therefore, I don’t think it’s a stretch to consider this book a seminal feminist treatise. (God knows we need more entertaining seminal works of feminism!)

If you read this book (and I recommend it) don’t miss the reader’s discussion guide at the end. It contains 10 questions. Here are a couple of my favorites…

2. “Is Mr. Collins merely too fat and stupid to notice his wife’s gradual transformation into a zombie, or could there be another explanation for his failure to acknowledge the problem? If so, what might that explanation be? How might his occupation (as a pastor) relate to his denial of the obvious, or his decision to hang himself?”

6. “Some critics have suggested that the zombies represent the authors’ views toward marriage — an endless curse that sucks the life out of you and just won’t die. Do you agree?”

So: Discuss….

Google Opt Out Feature Lets Users Protect Privacy By Moving To Remote Village

Thanks much to the West Seattle Blog for bringing this gem to my attention via Twitter in the wee hours of the morning. And kudos to The Onion for such impressive info-graphics! My favorites are the van, barter, and data security fence graphics.

Science definitely needs more rap. Definitely.

Note: This video is part of the second American Chemical Society Nanotation NanoTube Video Contest. You better believe I’m gonna watch the other entries.