Free Fitness Tips + Extra Work

My pal and Chief and 3-time (so far) marathoner, Erica, is rebooting her blog Run Like A Girl. And now she has personal trainer Coach Abby offering free fitness tips. Check it out.

And for a really astute account of what it is to be an extra (amazingly from non-career extra Kevin Tor), check out this blog post.

A Walkable NYC = A Liveable NYC

This past weekend I stopped by the Earth Day Green Festival at Grand Central and picked up a brochure about vision42 - a plan to replace traffic all along 42nd Street with pedestrian zones and light rail transit.

This sounds a little bit like Bloomberg's plans for Broadway (read about those here and here).

Granted, I no longer own a car, so I may be biased towards pedestrian-centric city planning, but the thing is: it works. According to this article, "...when planners in Seoul tore down a six-lane highway a few years ago and replaced it with a five-mile-long park, many transportation professionals were surprised to learn that the city’s traffic flow had actually improved, instead of worsening." [via VeryShortList]

Sign the petition for vision42 here.

For more about this kind of stuff, check out these articles from GOOD magazine's latest traffic-centric issue:

• How to overcome the haters of congestion pricing
• Bogotá has the world's modernest bus system
• Learn how to do your own street redesign

And check out today's Recession This!

[Photo by Randy Levine]

Free Earth Day Book at Grist.org

Check out this free book download from Grist.org. Register with Grist for free and get tips on how to live green every day.

Not only will you get the free e-book, but you will also be registered for a free trip to Bonnaroo '09!

And check out Recession This!

[Photo by SouthernPixel]

Design This List

Not that kind of list.

A while back Very Short List featured Listropolis. While it could just be another huge time-suck, quick browsing of today's front page yielded these interesting - yea, even useful - lists:

22 Most Used Free Fonts by Professional Designers (for design geeks)
7 Big-Ass Holes in the Earth (note the placement of the hyphen)
Top 100 Productivity and Lifehack Blogs (of course, it seems kind of counterproductive to sift through 100 blogs to be more productive)

All right, that's only three, and only the first one is (questionably) useful. But if you're in a rut, it might be a good place to jump start something new.

[Photo by Brittney Bush]

Quid Pro Quo

This image is from Lost In Transit collective's photostream on flickr. I found it when I was looking for a quid pro quo image for yesterday's post, but didn't use it, lest people thought it was by the Medium Large guy.

Medium Large

Today, I'd like to tell you about Medium Large, a great web comic strip by Francesco Marciuliano. I first heard about this site from Kevin Tor and think you'll like it too. No really, I'm not just saying that because he linked to NoBuddies yesterday. It's not a quid pro quo; the stuff is funny.

It looks like he's running some classic strips this weekend, so it's the perfect time to catch up! A recent favorite of mine was "Godzilla's DVD Commentary" on April 6.

Periodic Table

Though a geek, I am not enough of a science nerd to know much 'bout chemistry. And yet, the Periodic Table of Elements holds a vague fascination for me. A while ago I came across this series of videos that show what each element does, via science experiments performed by people who sound like Monty Python and have hair like Phil Spector. Although I would like to do the experiments myself, I am A) too lazy and B) reluctant to destroy my kitchen, so these will have to do.

Check out the Gallium Beating Heart. And also check out these WNYC Radiolab shows (this one and I think this one too) that feature the Periodic Table.

[Photo by denn]

For other non-chemical Periodic Tables, check out Mental Floss. And check out today's Recession This!

NoBuddies Episode 9 "Don't Mess with Taxes"

It's the day before taxes and if you don't have yours done by now, what's another 3 minutes or so going to do for you? Take that time and watch our new episode. It's tax-riffic! (This one's a personal favorite of mine, though I couldn't say why...)



Tax Day is upon us and Bill is starting to feel the pressure. Cal does nothing to alleviate it.

Bill - William Franke
Gray - Sean McCormack
Cal - Kevin Tor
Girl - Sue White
Alexis - Catherine Nicora

Directed by William Franke
Written by William Franke & Kevin Tor

Music - "Flow is Special" by rockamic (ccMixter)

Scavengerjo Art on Exhibit at the Central Park Zoo

My wife, Jody, has been asked to exhibit her found-object art at the Central Park Zoo as part of their observation of Earth Week. Jody will be there all this week from 12:00-3:00; it's $10 to get in, but well worth it in my opinion. Plus, you can see monkeys.

Turning Out the Lights

I actually saw a Mythbusters episode* about this a while back, but now here is Concrete Proof from the Internet: It is almost always better to turn out the lights when you leave the room. "Start-up" energy surges are not that huge, certainly not enough to justify leaving the lights on. There are differences between traditional incandescents, fluorescents, and compact fluorescents; read the full skinny here.

As always: don't forget to check out Recession This!

*for the record, I am not as huge a fan of the show as my pal, Kmack.
[Photo by Jago Pauwels]

NoBuddies Episode 8 "Pregnant Girl -- Part 2"

SPOILER ALERT: Watch Episode 7 first before going any further.

The second part of the pregnancy episode. Will Cal do the right thing and be a father to Alexis and his baby? If you've been watching NoBuddies at all, you know the answer is no.



Bill - William Franke
Cal - Kevin Tor
Girl - Sue White
Gray - Sean McCormack
Alexis - Catherine Nicora

Directed by William Franke
Written by Kevin Tor

Music - "Flow is Special" by rockamic (ccMixter)

April Push, Week 2

All right, I know it's only April 2nd, but I started early on my vow to do 5 auditions per week for the month of April.
This week I have done three EPAs (Dorset Theatre Festival, Naked Angels, and Adirondack Theatre Festival) and thought that was going to be the end of it. But then my agent called with a voice over (VO) audition for Grey Goose tomorrow. That brings me to four! Very close. I know I said I would can it with the whole universe thing, but...I am putting it out to the universe to get me another audition before the week is out. (And to book tomorrow's gig. If that's not too much to ask.)

Actually, I think I might call it 4.25 or 4.5, since I am doing a grad student film at Columbia and, in today's class presentation, the professor asked for our head shots.

NoBuddies Episode 7 "Pregnant Girl"

From NoBuddies writer Kevin Tor:
Have you ever had a pregnancy scare? All those emotions. All those evil thoughts. Never attaching a pronoun other than "it" when discussing options. We've all been there. Come with us on a two-part journey. It was so much to present that we needed 2 episodes. Part 2 is coming soon.



Will there be a NewBuddy in the apartment 9 months from now? Gray is pulling for no.

Cal - Kevin Tor
Girl - Sue White
Gray - Sean McCormack
Bill - William Franke
Alexis - Catherine Nicora

Directed by William Franke
Written by Kevin Tor

Music - "Flow is Special" by rockamic (ccMixter)