Youtube is superior to reality

I have just wasted an inordinate amount of time watching Youtube videos. My current favorites:

The Original Magic Bullet

The real highlight here is the part about the muffins, which starts around the 2 minute mark. Wait for Hazel to come lurching into the shot at 2:15, followed by the mixing of blueberry muffins that look exactly like tar.

My other favorite is the whole family of "Windows 7 Launch Party" videos. I have watched all of them, which took about 30 minutes. The best one is still, probably, "The Introductory Video." If you watch the oven timer you can see that this informal gathering took over two hours to shoot. My other favorite might be the "Turn Your Party Into a Movie!" video. The true aficionado will note that the pictures on the screen are not from the right party, but rather from the "Snap, Shake, and Peek!" party, which features old people and apparently an outdoor portion in which everyone hugged each other. There's something mesmerizing about the sheer audacity of this campaign. They want us to have Windows tutorials at our homes, with our multiracial group of friends, for fun! "Gather round, friends, and we'll install printer drivers and anti-viral software!" Also, who on earth actually puts out balloons at a party?

In other news, I just saw a New Zealand band called "Die! Die! Die!" at a club called 59:1. The band was actually pretty good, like a mix between the Blood Brothers and Tokyo Police Club. But the venue was tragic and extremely Munich. For one thing, there was almost nobody there. 10 people, maybe. That is not necessarily a terrible thing. But the whole place seemed like a simulacrum, somehow. Everything was just kind of off. The DJ before played nothing but Foo Fighters, except for one Marcy Playground (!) song. The walls had, predictably, promotional posters, but for bands who had never even played at this venue (i.e. the posters advertised shows elsewhere in Munich). There were also two framed posters right next to the stage, one of Henry Rollins and one of the Ramones (nothing is more punk rock than tasteful frames). Top it off with a few stickers halfheartedly placed on the bathroom wall, and you have the Epcot Center version of a normal venue.