David Lynch on Where Ideas Come From

The Atlantic has put up this terrific video interview with director David Lynch, in which he discusses the nature of creativity and how he develops his ideas for films and TV. Enjoy.


Lynch rejects some of the traditional ideas about creative inspiration, particularly that writers should try to "write what they know" and that artists must suffer for their art. He seems to feel that writing and creating is less about having an initial spark of inspiration and more about having the talent and discipline to collect numerous, stray thoughts or ideas into a worthwhile/coherent whole. Anyway, the guy's a genius, and it's just fun to hear him pontificate about bubbles of consciousness and oceans of the transcendent for a few minutes.

[Hat tip, Matthew Yglesias]

My Fan Site is Nicer Than My Blog

A plucky Mahalo Daily fan, the infamous Connected Geek, has built a fan site for yours truly, if you can believe such things...I can honestly say, despite having only one post, it's much prettier than this blog, which was thrown together hastily around one of the 3 basic Blogspot themes many, many years ago.

While we're on the subject of this blog's general aesthetic crapitude...I'm considering moving the site over to crushedbyinertia.com or lonharris.com, both of which I own and neglect. This, and the visual overhaul I'd like to commence along with the move, would require me to actually learn something about how the Internet works. (You know, aside from "don't click on things called goatse" and "if it's the phrase Check this out...OMG! followed by a tinyurl, it's a Rick Roll.") Which is unfortunate, cause I'm kind of squeezed for time as it is.

Thoughts? Does the fact that this page is disorganized and, let's be honest, butt ugly, seriously diminish your desire to read Crushed by Inertia? Don't worry about hurting my feelings...I've had 100,000 YouTube viewers dissect my physique, Howard Stern-style, this month, all while composing sonnets memorializing my latent homosexuality. I can take it.

Go Go Gadget

Before working at Mahalo, I was not particularly gadget-conscious. I'm the sort of guy that thinks to replace his cell phone only when it suffers irreparable physical trauma or dies of its own accord, and not a moment before. (My current cell phone is from the first era of "camera phones," when the notion of taking a picture using your portable phone felt roughly as bleeding-edge futuristic as hovering skateboards and automatically-resizing Nikes.)

However, now that I'm immersed in the world of tech and gadgetry (tonight I went to what is essentially an adult science fair to check out homemade robot tables), I've actually started to lust after new shiny objects of consumer goodness. Such as the new ultra-deluxe 3G JesusPhone announced just yesterday by Captain Turtleneck. The mere fact that I understand the term "3G" is a big plus for me...That's the sort of thing I once assumed was arbitrary, like the naming system for new Terminators. (How do you go from T-1000 to T-X (which looks like T-100)? Shouldn't she be the T-10,000?

Here's the thing about the iPhone (or, if you prefer, the iPhone 2.0)...I will probably use 1/500th of the actual available features. (I frequently hear people complain that the phone is missing things I would never in a million years even think to put on there, sometimes with intimidating acronyms like VPD and SQL.) I basically just want a phone that I can also use to watch YouTube videos while I wait in lines and airports. (I'll consider playing this rumored Cro-Magnon Man Rally game, perhaps.) So my desire for the thing is almost entirely manufactured, a function of living every day in this world of gizmos and gadgets more so than any kind of practical application. It's sort of a new feeling for me...

Kerry Wins an Argument?

John McCain's case for the presidency is so weak, even John Kerry can effectively make the point on television. And that guy sometimes had trouble introducing himself.

This...is...John...Kerry...reporting...for...duty...

In this clip, courtesy of the excellent blog of Oliver Willis, McCain surrogate Lindsay Graham openly admits that, yes, a new Republican Administration would extend and enhance the economic policies of the Bush era. So if you don't ever want to sell your home, retire or get any kind of medical treatment, McCain may be the candidate for you!

From the Files of Police Mod

Brilliant mash-up of "Naked Gun" and "Grand Theft Auto IV." There's really nothing textual I could add that would enhance this.