Super Mario Bros. Beta Testing

In a nondescript Williamsburg warehouse Wednesday night, I put on a moustache and strapped on a harness attached to bungee cords that lifted me into the aurulent light. It was Nintendo Amusement Park beta testing night, and I had signed away my life on a dubious waiver form.

A team of Interactive Telecommunications (parse that) geeks/artists have constructed a Physically Augmented Reality, leveraging mechanical technology to give a player super powers in a three-dimensional obstacle course. See sketches for information on the haptic winch and other details.

Still in rudimentary design, the N.A.P. had no shortage of volunteers willing to chase that fleeting moment of zero gravity or the satisfying crunch of smashing a Goomba. The team set up three different games:

1. The Box: maximize vertical jumps to hit the box and get the mushroom
2. Bob-omb: avoid the Bob-omb by using lateral/spinning motion
3. Goomba: smash the bloody Goomba!

I played all three games (very few played #3 because it had to be reinflated with a high-tech desk fan). Let’s just say it’s harder than it looks: ten minutes in that harness is tougher than an hour at the gym. A course like this would greatly benefit Generation XXL (they should put that in their proposal). I had gotten so good at the Bob-omb game that it went on for an eternity—perhaps fifteen minutes. Everyone kept the game going, thinking I was having a blast. I came close to vomiting. Wired chose that moment to interview me: a panting, sweaty, disgusting, and exhilarated mess.

I wanted back on five minutes later. It ranks as my favorite night of 2006.

Cross bar mechanically adjusts for each player's height.

Human hamster wheel!

Prepping for a trial run (note the beer on the table).

Bob-omb, Luigi, and Dan (head of project)

Goomba! Smash!

Super Mylene looks good in a moustache.

"Crazy Box Guy" Michael taunts Mylene.

Getting locked and loaded

Fuck. Yeah.

My moustache fell off with all the sweat.

Close to vomiting (but full of joy): coincides with Wired interview.

Fatigue. Bruises. Laughter.

Bruises that will heal

Compelling video footage!

I.M. Paid (Apple store opening)

Apple's new store on Fifth Avenue opened Friday evening with much ado about architect Peter Bohlin's 32-foot glass cube entrance, perhaps an ambitious homage to the Louvre's I.M. Pei pyramid (except this is America: we're not celebrating art or culture, but capitalism).

(Photo lifted from Apple e-mail promo)

The queue snaked from the store’s entrance, in front of the FAO Schwartz building on 58^th & Fifth Avenue, to 60^th & Madison shortly after 7 PM. As visitors emerged like red carpet celebrities from the gleaming glass cube, a coterie of Jobsian black-clad employees with Apple badges clapped with gusto, commemorating the birth of the 24-hour/365-day-a-year behemoth. We abandoned the cause and went out for French food instead.

I returned solo the next day. Here I am, caught by apple.com’s time-lapsed camera from the opening (12:00 – 1:00 PM). Click any photo to enlarge (indeed, you should):

I am reading the New Yorker and listening to the Stone Roses.

Descent into the Fourth Circle.

The genius bar

The thronging masses yearning to breathe free

View through the glass cube

FAO Schwartz building

Steve's Ian^* and the Great Glass Elevator (see me in the reflection)

Roof of the glass elevator

The lucky guy, armed with a paltry rag and bottle of Windex, who gets to clean all of this glass.

Foot traffic

Announcing the 1 PM MacBook winner

Bastards.

* Update from NF: the guy in the glasses and boots is named Ian, NF’s friend I met for about 5 seconds at a party last year. My memory’s good, but it does have limits.

Cut Your Hair

Right before I left for London about a year ago, my stylist gave me an Asian mullet.

I drank afternoon tea at Harrod’s with this mullet. I interviewed musicians and a British actress with it. The mullet kept my hair safely away from my hot noodle soup whilst I hung my head forlornly, introducing myself to a West End theater director near Leicester Square. I relished a late-night chow down on Dean Street with Kiwi and BBC comedians—my shaggy mullet fluidly following fits of laughter.

I vowed to never get a mullet again.

This past weekend I made the trip out to Fort Greene to get a haircut. It is not a mullet. It’s not even that short. But I decided to experiment with the idea of short hair, as summer and global warming take hold (click any photo to enlarge).

I just need to don one of my ties and I could be a boy.

Hey Mark, you're spoiling all the paintwork.

The weather is warmer. I’ve unpacked my transitional jackets. Dogs smile and I smile back at them. My bicycle will be fixed soon. I hug my pillow at night and remember no dreams.

Dave and I visited the Guggenheim on Saturday to check out the David Smith exhibit. He snapped surreptitious photos (no small feat) as I sighed softly, circling each sculpture. The security guard on the 3rd floor traced our footsteps as artlessly as James Stewart trailing Kim Novack in Vertigo after hearing the telltale camera click—her senses uniquely attuned to museum miscreants.

For a moment I felt like I was in Europe, contained in white space and natural light, miles away from the frenetic, brunching hipsters of the LES. My heart felt lighter. We watched the small, carefully wrought works grow into larger, developed themes and experiments as we circled round and round, climbing higher and higher.

It is a church of silent sermons. I felt at peace.