# The Gawker Underminer February 14th 2007
Read it on Gawker here
or read the slightly longer version below:
“David Lehre, the young director anointed by the press as an unlikely phenom and a kid on the fast track, is giving a group of actors a piece of unwelcome news. Dressed in swimsuits and T-shirts, they are standing in a park in a Detroit suburb on a fall day so cold that their bare arms and legs look like chicken skin. ‘I want you to be blasted by a power washer,’ Mr Lehre says.”
Off to the side, out of camera range there’s another audience, a pair of preadolescent boys who have stopped to watch the goings-on.
‘If the kids don’t leave, we have a hit show,’ says Scott Vener, Mr Ledhre’s manager and executive producer of this project…
Mr Lehre, 22, has been an Internet phenomenon…a college dropout who still lives with his parents, [he has] a deal with Fox to produce his own half-hour late-night television show.”
NY Times, Sunday February 11, 2007
Hi there, you! Hey Happy Birthday! Did you do anything special? No? Just stayed in and sort of took stock of your life? I know. It’s a milestone! You are 35! You are officially out of the 18-34 age demographic that everyone is looking to! The MySpace generation you are not! Nope! Youre old!
Oh come on I’m just teasing.
You put something up on You Tube! That is so cute!
I mean I hope you aren’t trying to get some sort of TV deal out of it. I am afraid its too late for us. Its sort of like if you aren’t already successful in the entertainment industry by the time you are 34, then you may as well move upstate and open an antique shop and forget your dreams of expressing yourself.
I’m just so glad I decided a long time ago that I wanted something more out of life? I don’t really TRY to mecome successful. Frankly I just invited magic into my life. And that’s basically how I found Viggo, and my passion projects, and my converted barn in Rhinebeck. I just let love, my self-sufficient entertainment career, and realestate happen instead of burning with ambition about it?
Maybe you should try YouTubeSenior. It’s a new site for people over the age of 30 who want to share their old, weird, long format lives with each other.
Yes, the "Fourth Screen" wave is just the same as its always been...all these really young straight white boys making money by farting and stuff. The victim will be turning 35 and putting up his first You Tube clips..."That is so great! You are now in the 35 - 50 demographic which totally will be underserved by the industry!" that kind of thing...
Like Daniel Lehre for example. He is going to be the next Letterman
Don’t make something polemical or complainy like you always do. Smart is stupid.
Here, instead, watch this hilarious video of a baby enjoying his fart! It’s hilarious!
The cyberbullies of TK just cut a deal with Universal to make a full length film. Its Borat meets Jackass meets rape camp. Its going to be groundbreaking. Their first gag is to go to recently jittery Boston with a fake nuclear bomb and watch the entire city freak out!
Then they are going to pretend to infect a sri lankan village with the rhotavirus.
You know what is really hot right now? Cyberbullies!
I know two of them who recently scalped a young violin prodigy with her own hair band.
Their antics are now going to become a major motion picture starring Hugh Dancy and Anna Farris!
Wait what are you saying? Yours speaking so slowly. I need my information now. Can you text it to me?
# The Gawker Underminer Jan 17th 2007
Live from the pages of The Underminer: The Best Friend Who Casually Destroys Your Life, we invited everyone’s favorite frenemy to chime in from time to time on various hot topics. That's right, The Underminer has a column now. But keep trying! You’ll get one someday! You trooper!"
“Instead of VIP seating, they rely on techniques, some from the speak-easy era, like obscure locations, secret (and oft-changed) reservation numbers, and “soft openings” that cater to insiders, to create the perception of exclusivity…small and quiet is back in vogue.” NY TIMES, January 10th 2007
Hi there. Did you read the Sunday Styles article about super secret bars? Wasn’t it hilarious? Can you believe people still GO to Death & Co and The Anchor?
Oh …that was the first time you heard about those places? Well, no that’s cool. I mean in a way it’s almost more hip NOT to know about them at ALL. I mean I know you haven’t really been going out much lately, and I totally respect that. You know who you are. A person who can’t just have one glass of wine.
But I’m not a snob, I mean it’s so great that people get to feel really exclusive and special because they can go somewhere other people can’t go and stand near Chloe’s brother.
But once again the Times has no sense of the times. These places were so old news, like, Saturday. They mention Beatrice Inn, The Waverly Inn, and the upcoming The Inn LW12, which isn’t open till February, but as you know I’m partially clairvoyant? So I’ve been there and let me tell you from my experience it’s just like any other Inn.
Overall, you walk into these places, and there are about 40 people there, and everyone is tired and tired of each other and sick of talking to each other so you sort of sit there alone and listen to the i-pod mix of some dreary guy with a beard. Sort of like that bar you basically never left in Brooklyn before this whole sober trend of yours. See? You’re not missing anything!
My favorite place is right smack dab back where it all started on 42nd street. It doesn’t have a name but it’s a nondescript doorway in the back of the Cold Stone Creamery. You just have to push past the angry girl mopping the floor for minimum wage and walk through the kitchen.
The other day I was at a table there with Salman Rushdie, Carolina Herrera, Lou Reed, Bob Costas, and the cast of Coast of Utopia still in their period garb, and we all suddenly let out this unanimous super exclusive exhale of utter depressed defeat at our lives, our country, our souls. We realized we were so sick of these exclusive spaces so we all grabbed our jackets, cloaks and capelets and went to Astor Place spun that big cube around.
Some other great places: Wachovia Bank Midtown. The manhole cover on 34th and 8th. Graydon Carter’s warm fatty inner thighfold, and “Stomp.” But now I listed them. So forget about it.
I heard about this other place that is kind of amazing and intimate apparently. I don’t know the name. When you leave they beat you on the head with a blunt object so that you get amnesia and don’t remember where it is. I may have been there, but I don’t know. So I can’t really tell you where it is. Sorry!
# The Gawker Underminer Jan 31st
“”On Saturdays at Paradou, a small french restaurant in the meatpacking district,…for 40$ a session, pint-size cooks can learn to make dim sum, sopas and baba ghanouj…”
“…Hanna Mandel, 5, set to mixing yeast pebbles, sea salt and extra virgin olive oil into an artisinal dough, which she topped with mozzarella and a nutty, slightly stinky Gruyere before choosing a vegetable topping. As she kneaded, she talked about her No. 1 food, sushi, declaring, “Seaweed is my favorite part.”
Alyse Mandel, her mother, glanced over her with the pride usually reserved for straight-A report cards, and said, “She’ll try anything.”
“for these children, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and mac and cheese are no longer standard fare.”
New York Times, SundayStyles, January 28, 2007
Atticus! Atticus, sweetie, no. Put down that Encyclopedia on Wine. It’s not yours.
Oh! Hello there! Well isn’t this funny that you are here at Whole Foods too!
Is that Ella? Oh wow she has grown! She is so SOLID, now.
And now you’re here at Whole Foods, looking for nice nutritional alternatives for her right? That’s great. That’s a good project. I’m glad to hear you are finally taking nutrition seriously.
No of course you always have. With your old school Flinstones vitamin-style.
Atticus! It's impolite to just grunt and point. Ask the fishmonger nicely for your tuna steak.
Hm? Yes, we’re just having a light dinner. We were out last night at Per Se enjoying their 500 dollar prix fixe Les Enfants menu. Frankly it’s not as good as Babbo’s Baby Buffet. But Atticus ordered his truffle oil and snap pea puree smiley face-pizza and then suggested a nice Burgundy for us adults! Among other things, he’s sort of a Sommolier-Savant.
But we’re just gonna settle in at home tonight. This morning we went to Quintessence for a light breakfast of roots, brambles and artisinal prunes, and then attended Toddler Alexander Technique. Then up to the MOMA for his Young Directors Workshop. Then we attended a grape juice tasting at Two If By Sea, stopped by ABC Carpet And Home to buy Atticus a mini sushi knife, and a “My First Raclette” kit for him. We’re just wanting to educate him more about foreign cuisine so that he is well prepared for the Kid’s Davos summit meeting next week.
Aw. Look at Ella reaching for the intestinally clogging Jello Brand gelatin. She’s like a little…American. With AMERICAN body. I wonder why she craves such things. Since you are a SAHM you don’t have to worry if the nanny is secretly feeding her Dunkin Donuts like I do!
Well anyway, it’s great that you’re here. It’s a good first step towards nutritional help. Why don’t I walk around with you and find some items to help you make the “shift” for Ella?
Stonyfield Farm's YoKids Squeezers Organic Lowfat Strawberry Yogurt in 8 portable tubes
Kale-dusted Pirate Booty with Mercury-free Ground Chilean Salmon Fish Jaw.
Mama Appalachia’s Millet and Quinoa Waffle squares
And Whole Kids String Cheese made from the Milk of Hormone Free, Constantly Hugged Goats
There. That will come to about 350 dollars. But it’s worth it. I love Whole Kids.
I don’t want to give you false hopes though. Transitioning Ella into a healthy eater is going to be hard, at this late age of 2. I accustomed Atticus’s palate to interesting foods by serving my family spicy and exotic dishes when he was still in the womb. Next time, you should check out the Whole Unborn Fetus section here. It was really helpful.
At this stage, Ella's intestines may be so clogged with goldfish and pudding that a sudden introduction of healthy diet will send her swinging back to junk food. Like Carnie Wilson after her stomach was stapled!
I would suggest putting her on a 10 day Master Cleanse. Just water with lemon, cayenne pepper and Grade B maple syrup. Her belly may become severely distended, her eyes and teeth may lose their shine, and she may slip into a coma, but it will prepare her for a lifetime of good nutrition. Atticus goes on a Master Cleanse twice a year. He loves it. I really think that near starvation brings him closer to children across the globe who are less fortunate. Something Ella could learn. If she survives.
I gotta get going. Be well! Bye!
Atticus! Time to go select chanterelles for our mousseline!