NBC, the former king of comedy who will now do something (anything) for a hit, needs your help to create its next huge hit/spectacular failure! The network is crowdsourcing its next few projects with a new Comedy Playground initiative, which means that you could totally be a part of the next 30 Rock. Or, more likely, the next Sean Saves the World.

In a buzzword-heavy press release distributed Wednesday, NBC touted the program as "a grassroots initiative designed to invest in new cutting-edge comedy through a groundbreaking national campaign." Well, it's pretty exciting. But not quite "cutting-edge" exciting. The Comedy Playground, for all intents and purposes, is a website with nary a jungle gym in sight. And the "grassroots initiative" isn't so much a comedy scouting program as a contest.

Interested parties are invited to submit a (verbal, on-camera) pitch for a new show, five to ten minutes of sample material, and a resume. If enough if the network's people like an idea, it will become one of ten semifinalists in the contest. The semifinalists will receive funding to film a half-hour pilot, which will then be viewed by a panel of people you've heard of, like Amy Poehler, Jason Bateman, Mindy Kaling, and, yeah, Sean Hayes. Two winners will get full broadcast orders for their shows. NBC will then submit the loser pile to the internet masses, who will vote on one more pilot to be turned into a digital series for NBC.

They really do sound like they have good intentions. Although people who are already represented by agents or working in the business are welcome, the FAQ makes clear that those people have to follow the same rules as everyone else. In fact, the site claims, "We assume that most entrants will not have representation." While contest winners may have to relocate to Los Angeles, the Comedy Playground is open to people all over the country. The goals here are noble: inject the industry with some new blood, invite people whose backgrounds may not be in showbiz to give it a shot, and find unexpected new material.

It's that last bit that might actually be a concern. According to the contest's "ideas and misappropriation waiver," entrants must agree to the following:

By entering the Contest and submitting a Submission, Contestants agree to and acknowledge the following: You understand that although you may believe your Submission to be unique and novel, there may be preexisting ideas, concepts, or proposals that are similar to your Submission. You recognize that other persons, including NBC's own employees, may have submitted to NBC or others, or made public, or may in the future originate and submit or make public, similar or identical ideas, concepts, or proposals that NBC may have the right to use, and you understand that you will not be entitled to any compensation because of NBC's use of such similar or identical ideas, concepts, or proposals in any manner. You understand and agree that NBC's use of material containing features or elements similar or identical to those contained in your Submission will not obligate NBC to negotiate with you or entitle you to any compensation if NBC determines that it has an independent legal right to use that other material for any reason (for example, because the features or elements are not new or novel, were not originated by you, or were or may hereafter be independently created and submitted by other persons, including NBC employees).

If you don't think about it too hard, this makes some sense: not every idea is going to be a special and unique snowflake, and the company is covering its ass in case someone comes up with the same totally unoriginal idea that NBC already rushed into production a month earlier. But take a closer look: similar or identical. May in the future originate. The wording, while certainly able to get NBC out of any stupid lawsuits, could also get it out of some much more valid ones. It wouldn't be hard to claim that an NBC employee came up with the same exact pitch for a cool new show as a contest entrant.

Entering the Comedy Playground could be your shot at comedy-writer stardom–or it could just set you up to be the next penniless "inspiration" behind a hit sitcom. The competition opens May 1. May the odds be ever in your favor.

[Image via Getty]

Miles Scott, otherwise known as Batkid, throws the first pitch next to Regular Batman before an opening day game between the San Francisco Giants and the Arizona Diamondbacks on Tuesday in San Francisco. Image via Eric Risberg, Pool/AP.

Equal pay for women: It is an idea that is still ahead of its time, in the United States Senate, in the year of our Lord 2014.

It is an idea that one might have thought would die in the House, the swollen vas deferens of our body politic's general impotence. But no, this was not the work of America's usual itchy inflamed patch. This was killed by the staid, nominally sane denizens of our Senate, who sunk the Paycheck Fairness Act with a procedural vote today.

Not the Senate, but the Senate's Republican caucus, to be precise. The minority party succeeded today in mustering 44 besuited and pantsuited hacks to block an up-or-down vote on whether women should enjoy the same fruits of labor that men enjoy, and whether the law should back women up when they're offered a raw deal by their beneficent job-creating corporate overseers.

44, of course, is not a majority of senators. But in order to see whether a bill can get 51 votes in the Senate, one still has to get the support of 60 senators, because American democracy is perfect, and we are a shining city on a hill, and math is for geeks.

The bill, according to Politico, sought:

to give women workers new tools to combat pay discrimination by allowing workers to compare salaries without threat of employer retaliation, requiring companies to explain pay disparities and permitting those discriminated against to seek monetary damages.

Every Republican voted against it. Angus King, the rockstar independent from Maine, also voted against the bill, saying that it "fails to address the real causes that are driving the wage gap." Because in King's mind, the natural principles of Smithian market capitalism, as certain to him as Newton's laws of gravitation, are more immediate causes of the pay gap. Less immediate to King are businesses' ability to pay women less than men without fear of punishment, and businesses' ability to conceal salary information from workers. Because macroeconomics says, dammit.

Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada) also voted against the bill, his own, when it became clear there weren't enough votes to bring it to a vote. Because this way, he can introduce it later in the Senate's session for a vote on whether to vote on the bill.

You go to modernity with the Senate you have. This is the Senate we have.

"We see this for what it is and it's just another attempt by Democrats to distract from what is a very bad record when it comes to helping women in the economy," Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) told Politico. "That's what this is all about, them trying to get a headline."

Thune, like King, thinks what will help women get better-paying jobs is more deregulation, because then more businesses will make money, and then they will hire more people, and some of those people will be women, and probably they'll make the same as men if we leave it to the market, you know, the really strong market we'll have when we get out of its way, like we had 2002-3 and 2007-9. What could go wrong?

Is it an election-year stunt by Democrats? Yes: Trying to give voters something they see as fair and right and just is probably a pretty good way to campaign for re-election. Identifying the sitting politicians who oppose the fair and the right and the just is politically astute.

The opponents of equal-pay laws don't have any real arguments to make in favor of their alternate proposals, else they would have made them. Instead, they look more and more like the opponents of the 40-hour workweek, the shortened workday, child labor laws, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, the minimum wage, the Occupational Safety and Health Act, and every other meaty chunk of legislation this country's Democrats and Republicans have historically managed to pass in order to incrementally improve everyone's labor conditions over time.

This is now the small-government wing of America's government. They act like bosses. They think like bosses. They empower bosses to be bossier with you.

The only saving grace is that, unlike our actual bosses, we can fire them.

[Photo credit: AP]

A man reportedly threatened and spit on teenage girl Tuesday morning in what the NYPD is calling a hate crime.

The teen, whose name was not released, told WABC the man began berating her with anti-Muslim slurs shortly after she boarded an MTA bus in Flushing.

"He kept [calling me a] 'terrorist' and stuff," the girl said. "He held his fist, and said 'Do you think I'm afraid to hit you? I will kill you.'"

"He kept cursing. 'Oh, you Muslim piece of shit, you're a terrorist,'" she said, adding that he spit on her three times. "He kept spitting."

Passengers on the crowded bus reportedly refused to help. "They were laughing. What if that were your daughter? Wouldn't you stand up for her?" she said. "My body was shivering,"

Police say the suspect is a white, middle-aged man, about five foot seven inches tall. He was last seen getting off the bus near Queens College.

[Image via Shutterstock]

Lifestyle controversialist Ayelet Waldman and novelist Michael Chabon, but mostly Waldman, overshare the decor of their Craftsman bungalow with Remodelista. Pick your favorite line. ("The house was built in 1907 by a physician," Ayelet says. "Someone in the historical society told us he did abortions.")

Condoleezza Rice, known for her cameo on 30 Rock and that time she helped sell the case for the Iraq War and torture, has a new line on her resume: the boardroom of Dropbox. She'll help the cloud startup with "international expansion," which she sure knows a thing or two about.

Businessweek first reported the hire today:

The former secretary of state's consulting firm, RiceHadleyGates, has been advising the startup on management issues for the last year. Now she'll help the company think about such matters as international expansion and privacy, an issue that dogs every cloud company in the age of Edward Snowden and the NSA. "As a country, we are having a great national conversation and debate about exactly how to manage privacy concerns," Rice says about her new position. "I look forward to helping Dropbox navigate it."

Condi's board jump comes shortly after another Silicon Valley stint, acting as a sort of spokesperson for Sheryl Sandberg's "Ban Bossy" pseudo-campaign. But now she'll have actual duties (and actual influence)—Dropbox is a burgeoning company with hundreds of millions of satisfied customers, and the expectation of a nice plump IPO in the not too distant future.

Rice is no doubt one of the best connected women you can add to your business, period. But the former National Security Adviser will be a tough sell in the informed nerd community, and is a downright baffling pick for a company that needs to navigate "privacy concerns" or court the international community. And the news is being greeted with plenty of (deserved) skepticism:

Condoleeza Rice to join Dropbox board? Bold move NSA! Err, I mean bold move Dropbox!

— Miguel de Icaza (@migueldeicaza) April 9, 2014

Adding Condi Rice to the Dropbox board might be the most tone-deaf move by a big Silicon Valley company in as long as I can remember.

— Ed Bott (@edbott) April 9, 2014

Leave Dropbox. Fast. http://t.co/ZFWiGQacpz

— Jan Lehnardt (@janl) April 9, 2014

And so forth.

On the other hand, if you can deadpan WMD talking points before the whole planet, Silicon Valley is easy.

Photo: Getty

Judo is an internationally recognized form of martial arts, but until now it has never been an extremely adorable form of martial arts.

That's because this video of two very cute very small children fighting each other in a Judo competition recently surfaced on YouTube. The two-minute bout is full of pillow-soft takedowns, hugs, and over-exuberant head tosses that may be evidence of a raging sugar addiction.

The referee doesn't call the match, but it's safe to say they're both winners.

[h/t Daily Dot]

Florida authorities are searching for a man who crashed a car into a Orlando day care center earlier today, killing one child and injuring 14 others.

The driver allegedly crashed his Dodge Durango into a Toyota convertible, smashing the smaller car into a KinderCare day care building, before fleeing the scene and abandoning his SUV.

Joel Rosado, and Orlando roofer, told the Sentinel that he was working on the roof of a nearby gas station when he heard a loud screech, then saw the crash.

The Durango hit a small, dark-colored car, he said, which barreled into the daycare, driving well inside the building. The Durango then fled north, Rosado said.

The roofer ran to help, and said he saw the small car's driver emerge from the wreckage. The man, who was middle-aged, said he was physically fine. However, he was visibly shaken and emotional about crashing into the building full of children.

Police found the abandoned Durango after receiving a telephone tip that also identified the driver as 28-year-old Robert Corchado.

According to the Orlando Sentinel, Corchado has a lengthy rap sheet and served three years for a cocaine trafficking conviction. In December, he was arrested for possession of cocaine and heroin and for leaving the scene of an accident involving property damage.

Police say that one child died in the crash, and 14 others experienced injuries ranging from minor to critical. Two were treated at the scene and the others were hospitalized.

Cops are still trying to track Corchado, who they say is definitely on the run and already rented a new SUV at the Orlando International Airport.

"We do know he is trying to flee the area ... We got information he might be trying to catch a flight out of Orlando," a Florida Highway Patrol spokesperson told Reuters.

[image via AP]

A 70-year-old grandmother riding a roller coaster for the first time ended up thoroughly enjoying herself, gleefully laughing her way through the entire minute-long trip.

Dutch grandmother Ria Van den Brand's ride was part of a Vodafone Firsts project, which helps people to try an activity for the first time.

It turns out that Brand's trip to the Formule X ride at the Drievliet amusement park in the Netherlands was actually part of a larger first—flying on a plane, which worked out to be an equally delightful segment.

[h/t 22 Words]

The recent warm weather melted enough snow that it left less than 10% of the United States covered by a blanket of evil white sky death for the first time since November 20. The trend is welcome news for snow haters, but it likely won't last much longer.

As of yesterday, only 9.6% of the United States had a trace of snow on the ground. The last time there was no snow anywhere in the continental United States was September 21 of last year, and that number slowly grew to a seasonal high of 67.4% on February 7.

All four runs of the GFS model yesterday showed some amount of snow falling over the Upper Midwest and the Great Lakes region early next week. It's too early to say how much (if it even happens), but it's a sign that winter isn't quite over yet.

Update: Today's analysis shows that snow cover across the lower 48 is now down to 8.9%.

[Image via NOAA]

Today is the 235th birthday of William Hazlitt, the combative English essayist and journalist, who once wrote an entire essay on the pleasures of hating things. We have a sense you might like it.

"On the Pleasure of Hating" is a refreshing read for those of you inclined to despise, I don't know, cat GIFs, or the American political system, or maybe Gawker itself. Hazlitt sets out for you exactly why thinking everything is terrible can be a worthwhile lens on life.

For example, Hazlitt argues that without anger we would have nothing worth having:

Nature seems (the more we look into it) made up of antipathies: without something to hate, we should lose the very spring of thought and action. Life would turn to a stagnant pool, were it not ruffled by the jarring interests, the unruly passions, of men. The white streak in our own fortunes is brightened (or just rendered visible) by making all around it as dark as possible; so the rainbow paints its form upon the cloud. Is it pride? Is it envy? Is it the force of contrast? Is it weakness or malice? But so it is, that there is a secret affinity, a hankering after, evil in the human mind, and that it takes a perverse, but a fortunate delight in mischief, since it is a never-failing source of satisfaction. Pure good soon grows insipid, wants variety and spirit. Pain is a bittersweet, wants variety and spirit. Love turns, with a little indulgence, to indifference or disgust: hatred alone is immortal. Do we not see this principle at work everywhere?

Totally agreed. This part is also pretty great:

Instead of patriots and friends of freedom, I see nothing but the tyrant and the slave, the people linked with kings to rivet on the chains of despotism and superstition. I see folly join with knavery, and together make up public spirit and public opinions. I see the insolent Tory, the blind Reformer, the coward Whig! If mankind had wished for what is right, they might have had it long ago. The theory is plain enough; but they are prone to mischief, 'to every good work reprobate.' I have seen all that had been done by the mighty yearnings of the spirit and intellect of men, 'of whom the world was not worthy,' and that promised a proud opening to truth and good through the vista of future years, undone by one man, with just glimmering of understanding enough to feel that he was a king, but not to comprehend how he could be king of a free people! I have seen this triumph celebrated by poets, the friends of my youth and the friends of man, but who were carried away by the infuriate tide that, setting in from a throne, bore down every distinction of right reason before it; and I have seen all those who did not join in applauding this insult and outrage on humanity proscribed, hunted down (they and their friends made a bye-word of), so that it has become an understood thing that no one can live by his talents or knowledge who is not ready to prostitute those talents and that knowledge to betray his species, and prey upon his fellow-man....

You may read the rest here. We ask simply that you go out of your way to hate something today in his honor.

[Image via Wikipedia, of an engraving of Hazlitt in 1825.]

It's tough being Whole Foods. Competing fancy grocery chains threaten from one side. Big box stores selling organic food threaten from the other side. "All natural" food will thrive in the most unnatural environments.

Earlier this week, Target announced that it's pushing hard in the "natural" "organic" crapola space—"organic and sustainable products are growing at a 15% to 20% clip" at Target annually. Also this week, Walmart said that it is going to begin selling Wild Oats-branded organic products at all 4,000 of its stores, at prices 25% lower than similar products from competitors.

Neither of those things are good news for Whole Foods, your friendly neighborhood premium-priced organic superstore. Nor is this trend, via the Wall Street Journal:

Even Whole Foods—which pioneered the idea of a grocery chain focused on natural and organic items—is off its game. The company expects same-store sales, a closely watched indicator for retailers, to rise by 5.5% to 6.2% this year, a slowdown from the 7% to 8% growth Whole Foods had long delivered. Its stock is down 11% this year.

Whole Food's fancy grocery store competitors are having a tough time too, even though sales of organic products are climbing steadily. Much of the increased sales are coming from decidedly non-fancy stores like Safeway, Kroger, and the big box stores pushing more organics onto their shelves, rather than from fancier stores attracting huge new numbers of customers. Yes, there is more business to go around. But there is not so much business that Whole Foods will get to rule the world. Sad.

You've gotten what you want, hippies/ foodies/ liberals/ Mark Bittman Facebook fans: organics have hit the mainstream. And they will be used to reap more profits for Walmart, just like everything else. You can't have it all.

[Photo: AP]

Vaccinate your kids. Vaccinate your kids. Vaccinate your kids. Seriously, for the love of all that was touched by Jove and is holy in this world, vaccinate your kids.

The dust has settled, Stephen Colbert is replacing David Letterman, and CBS Late Late Show host Craig Ferguson is staying exactly where he is. Although he'll probably be at least $5 million richer.

The True Scotsman of late night won't be taking over Letterman's seat next year, likely to his dismay. But don't feel too bad. Apparently anticipating this situation, Ferguson's people reportedly put a clause in his contract stipulating that if some shady non-Ferguson character takes over the Late Show, Ferguson would get a consolation payout from CBS. The figures vary: the New York Post is reporting the payout as $5 million, while the New York Daily News puts it closer to $8 million or even $12 million.

Ferguson's contract, which expires in June, actually isn't all that unusual. In the past, NBC has reportedly paid both Conan O'Brien and Letterman not to take over the Tonight Show. And while Ferguson may always be the bridesmaid, at least he gets a sweet bonus for it.

[image via Getty]

Rich: Let's talk about sex, Caity.

Caity: To get to Play through the main entrance, you must walk through the Museum of Sex gift shop, which sells standard museum souvenirs like mugs, postcards, and lotion to arouse your genitals.

Rich: In the window is this:

So that's welcoming or prohibitive depending on your sexual attitude/appetite.

I enjoyed pondering the portmanteaus ("Sliquid" lube, a book called "Sexitecture"), the penis bones, the fertility soaps, and the pristine copy of the December 1989 issue of Playboy with Candice Bergen on the cover being sold for $15 ("The looker speaks from the heart about men, Murphy Brown and movie-set sex").

Caity: The shelves are also stocked with row upon row of pricey dildos. These, customers attempt to turn on and then, as soon as they shiver to life, drop, shrieking with delight. I could have stood in that store all day watching people drop dildos on the ground, but it was time for lunch.

The best restaurant in New York is

Play at the Museum of Sex.

Menu style

À la carte.

Cost, before tip

$50.08

Rich: Unfortunately, at 2:40, lunch (in "the den") was no longer being served. In other words, we got fucked at Play.

Caity: We got Played.

Rich: But! The Nice & Sweet Cafe has sandwiches. I was happy with that because their menu actually evokes sex, as opposed to the Play menu, which does not. There's a lot of fun you could have with a sex museum's restaurant's menu (Vienna sausages, calamari rings, tacos…) that just wasn't being had. Play is not so playful. More like Chore.

Caity: I was also excited for the sex sandwiches (because I love sandwiches), but what I wanted more than anything was the sandwich that was actually a bratwurst (because I really love hot dogs). Unfortunately, they were sold out of almost everything, so all I could have was fish. I hated that metaphor even as it was happening, and I also hated the fish.

Rich: There were two pre-made sandwiches left and two packaged salads. The experience ingeniously mirrored what happens during last call in a disappointingly populated gay bar: Panic mode. Ahhhhhhh, gotta pick something! Uh uh uh!

I wanted the "Bang Me" (a vegan banh mi, which is not on the online menu) and I got the tuna ("Italian Tuna Loin"). There's my metaphor.

The other sandwich was called a "Lox Me Up." Lox strikes again, as underwhelmingly as ever.

Caity: The eleventh plague is lox.

Rich: Ahead of us at the counter was a woman with short brown hair and visible bra straps. She fawned over your glasses. "Where did you get them?!?"

Caity: You said later she was hitting on me. I thought she just loved my glasses.

Rich: I do think she was hitting on you, but give everyone the answer you gave her.

Caity: Ibiza.

Rich: The eyeglass capital of Europe.

Caity: The answer I actually gave her was "[Silence silence silence] Lenscrafters. I couldn't think of a cool lie fast enough. I wish I had said Ibiza."

Rich: I think I squealed out loud. I couldn't hide my joy from the content that was just materializing before my eyes.

Caity: Then the girl taking our order said that she was on the market for some frames too, and although she had not expressed an interest in mine, again I said: "Lenscrafters."

Rich: I'm sure she could find something at Lenscrafters that went with her gently alt septum piercing. She was nice. Her co-worker, an Asian guy with tattoos and blue colored contacts and a lip piercing was also nice, if not present.

Caity: I asked the girl if I could please have a Diet Coke with my meal. She said: "I want to say yes..."—and I believe, in her heart, she did—"...but we don't keep it up here. Let me call the bar [portion of the restaurant, 20 feet away]."

Rich: Bad news, four-eyes.

Caity: "We don't have it, unfortunately, but we do have seltzer water."

They didn't have the thing I asked for but they did have one thing, so, don't anybody go starting a rumor that this restaurant is an empty box with nothing in it. We don't have batteries but we do have crackers.

Rich: Seltzer has bubbles. You like bubbles, right?

Caity: So you know what I told her? "Lenscrafters." (Just kidding. I said, "I'll just have a regular water, please.") You got Champagne even though they had seltzer.

Rich: It was buy one get one. How could I not?

Rich: The salads—one lentil, kale, and ricotta, one quinoa and squash—smelled like burps. But different burps, at least.

After our food arrived (even if you order at the counter, they bring it out to you), I learned that salad is poison to Caity Weaver. It was like watching a cat nibbling at a new brand of cat food, moments before deciding that not eating is preferable. You said that you felt like you should "get something" for eating them.

Caity: When I was little (and a very picky eater), my parents would make me eat as many bites of dinner as my age before I could have dessert. This felt like that.

I disliked the salads less than I thought I would. I loved the cheese.

Rich: Ricotta: always great in a salad.

Caity: I kept forgetting which was lentils and which was quinoa, although they were different colors.

You were very patient. Anne Sullivan in the dining car. Quinoa, Helen, Q U I N O A.

Rich: You had quinoa all over your pinafore, bless your animal heart.

The lox sandwich made LOX seem like the actual best restaurant in New York, and not just one we profiled for a column with that tongue-in-cheek name.

The tuna was a problem. It had anchovies on it. Would you like some fish with your fish? NOT REALLY.

Caity: Fifty percent of the desserts were good. The first, pain au chocolat, was cheating because they get it from an outside restaurant (Balthazar) (delicious). The second was an awful little pyramid shaped cake, and never has the majesty of the pyramids been so demeaned. Lemon olive oil with matcha.

Rich: I liked both. Even the one with your slobber on it.

Caity: I said, "Do you think I could fit this whole pyramid in my mouth?"

And you said, "Probably, but I want to eat it."

And I said, "Would you rather eat it or see something amazing?"

And you said, "The latter, I guess."

Rich: I'm in it for the story. That's my approach to life AND my job. No divide.

Caity: Ladies and gentleman, I got that cake in my mouth. Unhinged my jaw like a snake and popped it in whole. And as the corners of the pyramid were scraped the back of my throat, I knew: I'm giving Rich a great New York memory here.

Rich: It was great. Definitely a highlight.

Caity: Then you said "I would still like to eat it,"

Rich: And so I did.

Caity: I gave you the piece that had been exposed to air rather than my oral cavity. I thought it tasted like a dessert that had been left on the kitchen counter while you were spraying disinfectant.

Rich: I guess I'm just into that.

Caity: The off-putting taste wasn't enough to stop me from eating the cake.

Caity: As if the sex books lining shelves throughout the restaurant weren't enough, there was an actual study session going on in the booth behind us.

Rich: Yeah, bring your laptop to Play and look at porn or don't! Anything goes! Very open-minded sort of place! The type of place where you could read a photo-illustrated sex manual (The Ultimate Sex Book) in front of a half finished sandwich.

Caity: I felt like: I don't come to your classroom and put an entire cake in my mouth. Why do you come to my lunch and do math problems?

Rich: The scene was a real melting pot of races and apparent sexualities (a gay guy said something about Mary when passing our table—he was talking about the Virgin Mother, but STILL).

Really, it was indistinguishable from a coffee shop or Barnes & Noble cafe. It's the Babelandification of sex commerce. There were no ostensible creeps, but sometimes you just want to gawk at a guy who looks like he smells like masturbation and then walk by him to confirm. I saw a woman napping on the couch.

Caity: It was exactly like a Barnes & Noble Cafe except bigger, darker, and with no soda. It reminded me of a dorm common room. Just people sitting around doing whatever. Many did not appear to have ordered food.

Rich: Play was like sex purgatory. A culinary translation of the experience of being trapped between second and third base. Eternal shortstop zone. Wear a cup to protect your blue balls.

Plus that chemical smell.

Caity: Smells like paint, tastes like fish: Play at the Museum of Sex.

Is Everything Okay?

Questions about the Dining Experience

Would you go back?

Caity: No! No.

Rich: No.

Is it a good first date spot?

Caity: No, it is not. Play is one of those restaurants where it's totally unclear if you're supposed to seat yourself or wait to be seated, if you order your food from a waiter or at the bar, and if anyone in the room works there or if they are all just schmoes like you who wandered in searching for seltzer water. The back and forth antsy dance of looking around, slowly sitting down, and wandering back outside to try to find an employee would only compound the awkwardness of a first date. No one looks attractive when they're uncertain.

You also have to walk past a police lineup of dildos to get to the restaurant, which may not be to everyone's taste.

Rich: I think the seating uncertainty just gives you the opportunity to show off how alpha (dom) or beta (sub) you are to a potential sex partner. Do you take charge of a potential challenge and assert yourself, or do you wither?

Also, because it is sex themed, it's a good way of telling a stranger, "Hi, I'm interested in sex." I say yes to first dates at Play.

Is it a good place to have an affair?

Caity: It is not a good place to have an affair, because such a large cross-section of people congregate there: office workers, students, glasses enthusiasts, frowning layabouts. Who knows who you'll bump into? Maybe your partner having an affair of their own.

Rich: I agree with you, but I will say that the bathroom does seem to offer the opportunity for a quickie. There are handles, like those that would be on the side of a trunk, placed high on the wall. They seem like something to hold onto while you are being sexed. I guess that means if you are so inclined, you can go in there with another person. (ALSO a nice option for a first date.)

Is it a good place to bring a doll?

Caity: No. The table is just high enough so that she would not be able to see over the top. It would be pointless to bring her.

Rich: It's a good place to bring a sex doll, if you're the kind who keeps a portable sex doll. I wouldn't expose an innocent child's doll to such tawdriness, though.

There are a bunch of restaurants in the world, including some in New York City. But in a city of over 24,000 restaurants, how do you find the best? You begin your search in places that are already popular: New York's hottest tourist destinations. In The Best Restaurant in New York Is, writers Caity Weaver and Rich Juzwiak attempt to determine the best restaurant in New York. Photos by Caity Weaver and Rich Juzwiak

Previously: The Best Restaurant in New York Is Le Train Bleu inside Bloomingdales; LOX at The Jewish Museum; The American Girl Café

Here's one way to lose your job and be banned from doing that job elsewhere in your city: turn down a threesome with your boss and her boyfriend. That is the story of Carisa Gaylardo, as she tells it in a lawsuit she filed in Manhattan Supreme Court this week.

In her filing, Gaylardo—who was a "probationary" gym teacher at Riverdale/Kingsbridge Academy in the Bronx—alleges that she was let go from her position after turning down an offer to have a threesome with her supervisor Sofia Memos, pictured above, and Memos' boyfriend. Further, she notes that she has been put on a list of people barred from teaching at schools in New York City because the reason given for her termination was that she had inappropriate contact with a student.

Gaylardo says that the latter claim is false, and was concocted be Memos only after Gaylardo spurned her sexual advances. Normally a case like this might be he-said, she-said, but Gaylardo writes in her suit that Memos made advances to her via text message. Come to think of it, propositioning a subordinate for a threesome on a device that leaves a paper trail is an even easier way to lose your job.

[image of Memos via Facebook]

As Florida's rubber-stamp GOP Legislature burns through its wingnut agenda faster than the shards of a 10mm Black Talon slug through a thug's internal organs, the nation's leader in gun-nuttery stands poised to pass a bevy of new laws to liberate handcannon culture from the pistol-prudes.

Here's a list of bills that are under consideration or already done deals. Gunshine State 4 life, baby:

The "More Guns During Riots" Bill

Do you own a gun and not have a concealed carry permit? Have you ever thought, "Gosh, I know the race riots are just around the corner, and I wish there was a way to legally carry my gun around in them without getting a dumb license"? Well, brother, the legislature is thinking of you.

This bill, which will likely sail through the House soon, "would allow people with clean criminal backgrounds to conceal firearms without a permit during emergencies," according to the Tampa Bay Times, "including riots and civil unrest like the 1996 racial disturbances that rocked St. Petersburg — declared by the governor or local officials."

Newspaper ed boards have called it dangerously vague. One county sheriff told the Times it's "the definition of insanity. The bill is crazy. It's absurd." But the NRA says that without it, "weapons left in homes during evacuations could be stolen by looters," which apparently is likelier and scarier to them than unlicensed wahoos going vigilante with their Tauruses and Glocks in the midst of civil mayhem. Or as we in Florida call it, "Saturday night."

The "Pop Tarts" Bill

This probably-soon-to-be law permits public-school students to wear weapons-related shirts and make guns out of things at school without fear of expulsion or suspension—a fear that ran high among NRA types after a 7-year-old pupil in Maryland was reportedly suspended for two days after biting a Pop Tart into the shape of a gun.

"If I point my finger at you you and go bang I can be expelled from school" and put in juvenile detention, says the sponsor of this bill. Well, you can, theoretically, if you do it ominously enough while pulling another kid's hair and throwing your biology-class dissection frog at him.

Florida-based NRA lobbyist Marion Hammer calls it the "Let Kids Be Kids" bill, because kids just wanna make things into guns, and you should let them. You should also permit them to wear your makeup, fake-smoke rolled-up report cards, get mad at the internet, mail faux-mortgage payments to the bank, and pretend their Ritalin is just like your valium and viagra, because hey, kids just love to play adult.

The "Armed Old Folks in Our Schools" Bill

This bill empowers schools in Florida "to appoint former or current law enforcement officers and former or current military officers with state-legislated training to carry firearms on campus."

As with most of these bills, the NRA backs it and the state sheriffs' association hates it. This one might actually face some challenges to passage, maybe, possibly.

What kind of training would these school non-cops have? 40 hours a year of school safety training, 8 hours of school-shooter training, and 4 hours of, like, actual shooting practice, which, shockingly, sounds a lot like the NRA's "arm teachers" recommendations after Sandy Hook.

The goal is to have these fair pistol-packing citizens so well-trained that they'd never, you know, accidentally shoot a kid who's pointing a gun-like Pop Tart at them. Also, these intrepid heroes would need concealed-weapons permits, obviously; I mean, what the hell do you think this is, a riot situation?

The "Make Licensing to Kill Easier" Bill

Getting a concealed weapons permit in Florida is hard. Well, it's not, really, but filing all the paperwork is hard, because you have to actually go someplace to do it. Fortunately, the Legislature has a solution: Expand the number of places you can file your gun-license application and pay your fee, by letting the state's tax collectors take your paperwork.

On one hand, it's kind of scary that there's so much demand for concealed carry permits, and such a large backlog processing these applications, that state legislators (read: the NRA) feel the need to make the process easier in this way.

On the other hand, when it passes, it's kind of hilarious to think of all the anti-tax survivalist types who'll probably saunter into the detested taxman's to get their concealed-carry on.

The "Warning Shots" bill

This bill—which may have been written by the NRA's top lobbyist, or a libertarian and close NRA friend from a Koch-connected lobby group, or both, depending on which bill-backer you believe—expands the state's Stand Your Ground law to offer criminal and civil immunity to anyone who brandishes or fires a gun off in "self-defense."

It was supposedly inspired by Marissa Alexander, an African-American woman who was sent to jail for a long time under the state's mandatory-minimum sentencing laws for gun felons after she fired at her abusive husband and missed. But despite the rhetoric of its supporters, the current bill barely addresses sentencing; it just offers defendants a new way to fight a conviction. So if arrestees like Alexander still get convicted, they're still likely to be screwed by the system.

But hey, the marketing worked. This one's already been passed and awaits Gov. Rick Scott's signature.

On the plus side, you can legally vent your anger at this injustice by shooting into the air. If the police come around, just tell them you felt threatened by... whatever.

[Photo credit: AP]

It's not exactly a secret that street crime is an issue in Brazil (enjoy the World Cup!). For instance, take this video, in which a woman's necklace is ripped off her body while she gives an interview to a Rio news program about the epidemic of people being robbed on the street.

The reporter, bless him, chases after the young boy, who is eventually apprehended by police. The woman seems to have an okay sense of humor about it, and appears to have retained at least a part of her necklace.

Sometimes life imitates the art that is local television news.

[via G1]

When Zach Braff asked the internet for money to produce his follow-up to Garden State (Motto: It will change your life™), he somehow didn't get the same excited reaction as, say, the Veronica Mars reboot.

In fact, there was such a Braff backlash that Kickstarter had to put up a blog post reminding everyone that famous rich person Zach Braff technically has as much right to use the site as any struggling indie creator.

"If you hate me and Garden State... this is not the club for you," Braff said at the time.

But haters be damned, Braff collected $3.1 million in fan money to make Wish I Was Here and then executed step 3 of his plan ("PROFIT)" by selling it to Focus Features at Sundance for another $2.7 million.

Wish I Was Here comes out July 18. Backers didn't get to see "their" film before it was sold, but the thousands(!) of people who paid $100 or more on Kickstarter will receive invitations to an advance screening.

Members of the No Zach Braffs Club—probably the correct club for people who hate Zach Braff and Garden State—get the above trailer as fuel for their continued abhorrence of all things Braff at no charge.

[H/T: The Blemish]

The Atlanta Falcons' plan for a new stadium calls for $200 million in public money, and "for demolishing the city's first black Baptist church, and turning the street named after [Martin Luther] King into a dead-end for stadium VIP parking."