Taking Back Sundays: Why You Won't Find Me Watching Football This Year

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2014/09/nfl-got-ray-rice-tape-april.html?mid=facebook_nymag

Why Starbucks Spells Your Name Wrong

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPbrlNsMTg4[/embed]

Impromptu Trip to the Daily Front Row Fashion Media Awards

This weekend has been an unexpectedly exciting 48 hours!

It all started on Friday night when I got a last minute call from my friend Chris asking if I wanted to attend the Daily Front Row Fashion Media Awards at the new Park Hyatt Hotel.

Chris is the founder of CrowdFlik, a mobile video app that I've been involved with. (Check it out in the Apple Store or Google Play - it's free!) We've been capturing a lot of great mobile footage with the app for testing purposes and to use as example content. Earlier this summer, we filmed Sam Smith's performance at iHeartRadio Theater and were excited to see the app's time synching technology performing well. The app allows users to splice together mobile video from an event and create "fliks" - montages of your favorite crowd-sourced content. Chris & some CrowdFlik team members will be sharing footage and filming elevator pitches at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco this week starting September 8th. You can follow @CrowdFlik and the hashtag #TCDisrupt to see what they're up to.

Anyway - back to the FMAs! It was a pretty surreal experience to suddenly be in the same room with supermodels, actors and fashion industry icons.  I snapped a few not-so-great pics which I've shared below. I was most excited to see Claire Danes since she's my favorite actress and Homeland is the only TV show I really follow.  She spoke about Carrie Matthison during her speech.

[caption id="attachment_407" align="aligncenter" width="519"] Claire Danes[/caption]Another highlight of the show for me was watching Harper's Bazaar Creative Director Stephen Gan present the Social Media Award of the Year to Kate Upton. It was Kate's first public appearance since the photo leak scandal, and she stepped out in public seemingly unfazed/unembarrassed. It was also interesting to hear Stephan Gan talk about how much difficulty he had at first getting Kate featured and accepted in the world of high fashion. He mentioned many editors and talent scouts found her to be "too obvious" or to not have the "right look." Kudos to Kate for being unprecedented both in appearance and in the way she leveraged social media to get her where she wanted to go.

[caption id="attachment_408" align="aligncenter" width="437"] Kate Upton accepting the Social Media of the Year Award.[/caption]

Other speakers included: Christy Turlington, Naomi Campbell & Tom Ford.

[caption id="attachment_409" align="aligncenter" width="565"] Christy Turlington at the FMA's[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_410" align="aligncenter" width="586"] Naomi Campbell at the FMA's[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_411" align="aligncenter" width="596"] Tom Ford at the FMA's[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_412" align="aligncenter" width="527"] Alessandra Ambrosio[/caption]

New Tech: IKEA bookbook™

Loving this satirical marketing for the IKEA 2015 catalogue.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOXQo7nURs0

Stalked by an Ad

A little digital marketing humor...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sagWOUPhJgc

Into the Wild

On September 6, 1992 the body of Christopher Johnson McCandless was discovered in a school bus on the Stampede Trail in Denali National Park, Alaska. Since Jon Krakauer first published a story about his journey in a 1993 issue of Outside Magazine, McCandless has been an extremely polarizing figure - either adored and revered as a brave, honest hero, or utterly despised for his hubris.



 

If you haven't read Into the Wild, do it.  Sean Penn's 2007 film adaptation of the story starring Emile Hirsch is good (mostly because of the Eddie Vedder soundtrack) but for a deeper look at the character of Chris McCandless, the book is a must-read.

Newport, Rhode Island & Big Moves

Here are some photos from my trip to Newport, Rhode Island a couple of weekends ago. Scott and I had a great time exploring the historic town and beaches in the surrounding area.  I am in love with all the colonial architecture and the colors of the houses.



 





One of the big highlights of the weekend for both of us was having a drink at White Horse Taven, the oldest tavern in America. It is just a little out of the way of the main town area, and that may have to do with it not being filled with tourists. The tavern has been open since 1673! It's amazing to see the centuries old flags and handwritten documents they have inside.



The other highlight of the weekend was the realization that we're actually going to live in this amazing place together!

Yep. I'm excited/bittersweet/nostalgic/feeling all of the feelings about announcing that I'm officially moving to Newport at the end of September and leaving NYC, my home for the last 6 years. I created a NYC Bucket List of a bunch of things I want to do before the big move and have been trying to tick off as many of these as possible. If one of these "challenges" sounds fun to you, join me! I would love to see you before I leave.