Nic Pizzolatto, the screenwriting auteur behind the bayou noir HBO critical hit True Detective, is described on half of the covers of the new issue of The Hollywood Reporter as a "New Disrupter" (the other nudist ruptor is Jenji Kohan of Orange Is the New Black). He reveals himself, unsurprisingly, as a schmuck:

[T]he first season, he argues, was conceived as a close point-of-view show, wholly told through the eyes and experiences of the two male characters. "You can either accept that about the show or not, but it's not a phony excuse," he says, unable to hide his frustration. He adds that he consulted his friend Callie Khouri on the matter: "When Callie, who wrote Thelma & Louise, thinks that that's stupid criticism, I'm inclined to take her opinion over someone with a Wi-Fi connection."

I suggest—I highly suggest—you imagine Nic Pizzolatto dropping this bit of real talk from atop a (broken?) motorcycle, as he appears on the magazine's cover, or perhaps from inside the cab of this (his?) truck, lips pursed, one hand stretched out toward you and one on the wheel, or perhaps yelling it from inside this starkly lit abandoned insane asylum:

"Don't you know I have feelings, Emily Nussbaum?" per http://t.co/CrJAUryv6d pic.twitter.com/vGUztiPHX7

— Kyle Turner (@TyleKurner) August 6, 2014

Nic Pizzolatto does not do himself any favors in the THR photoshoot, no. But that he casts himself as a brooding, tortured masculine artist should not be particularly surprising to anyone who watched the first season of True Detective, in which brooding, tortured, masculine detectives say things like "We became too self-aware. Nature created an aspect of nature separate from itself. We are creatures that should not exist by natural law."

So on the occasion of Pizzolatto's cover story let's all remind ourselves: True Detective's first season was great despite those lines, not because of them. The show managed to get away with blatant dormroomism thanks to Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey, and the evocative direction of Cary Fukunaga, who gave the show its beautifully "rich, cinematic look." Rust Cohle's third-hand Nietzsche SparkNotes would probably have sounded as irritating as they read if they'd come from the mouth of an actor half as capable, or been spoken outside the context of the show's soft and graceful cinematography.

Given that, we should all be very worried that neither the leads nor Fukunaga are coming back for season two, which isn't set in Louisiana but rather in L.A. Pizzolatto's leather-jacket philosophizing spoken by...Vince Vaughn and Colin Farrell? In Los Angeles? A show about two brooding, masculine detectives in Los Angeles. Talk about disruption.

A Missouri Baptist conference center is seeking a new CEO after its current leader was arrested while allegedly trying to arrange sex with a dog and an unnamed other animal on Craigslist.

Police said Jerry Hill, of Boone County, Mo.'s Windermere Baptist Conference Center, was arrested Tuesday afternoon for attempted unlawful sex with an animal and attempted animal abuse.

The Columbia Tribune reports the investigation started with a Craigslist ad seeking two types of animals—one was a dog, police declined to comment on the other. Investigators responded to the ad, offering up a dog for sex, and Hill was arrested when he showed up to meet them.

"We are concerned for the well-being of Jerry...and we are also concerned with the well-being of Windermere," Windermere chairman of the board Arthur Mallory said, according to Baptist news site Word and Way. "Windermere will continue to function in a good way.... It is a significant piece of God's kingdom's work."

Windermere, a massive facility that includes a water park, spelunking caves, and a paintball course, bills itself as "a dedicated, Christ-like team" providing "a Christian setting in which life changing experiences may occur."

Hill is currently free after paying a $1,000 bond.

[H/T JoeMyGod, Photo: Boone County Sheriff]

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It's gonna be a dark one out there, kiddos. Dark and fulla terrors. Best to stay in, lock up tight, have a glass of wine and just enjoy all the alien and nerd sex, the plastic surgeries, the comedy premieres, and the sweet, sweet laughter of Rebecca Romijn.

At 8/7c. There's Defiance, which I know I always say this but it is fucking great this year; a different kind of nerd might enjoy The Quest, which we love here at MA so far; and if you are not feeling those kinds of things, save your energy for when things get busy in an hour, or kick off your shoes and learn about another of the Secret Societies Of Hollywood on e! (this time it's the secret society in "Pursuit Of Perfection," meaning shocking body mods and plastic surgery, so I guess we're defining "secret society" fairly loosely, at this point).

At 9/8c. it's the busiest hour of the summer so far: You got Dating Naked, an hour of Honey Boo-Boo, Project Runway and Rectify if you are basically normal; Dominion if you are on the Syfy tip with me; and after Don't Be Tardy ("Spring Break Forever, Biermanns") there's an interesting (ish?) new show on Bravo, Extreme Guide To Parenting ("The Indigo Child & The Coddled Toddler"). We'll see about that.

Me, I'll almost certainly be seeing my favorite Houseguest on Big Brother go home, so that sucks basically for me but is great for seemingly everyone else inside or outside the house. On the other hand it's Double Eviction, which I couldn't explain to you if I tried but is basically considered a High Holy Day in our house. Expect a Grouchy, Sleepless, Grumblin' Jacob come the dawn, my friends, even if I find a way to enjoy it with actual enthusiasm after the gut-wrenching ouster about to happen.

Some drink to remember, some drink to forget, some drink to mourn the passing of a dear, dear friend. And some drink because the only thing worse than loving a total prick is losing that total prick before it's time; to make the uncoupling as unconscious as possible is sometimes all we have. Farewell, sweet prince, et illegitimi non carborundum. As you were my everything, so without you I am nothing. Frustra ego sum; ego sum, frustra.

You burnt too brightly, and now ya burnt.

At 10/9c. is the IFC premiere of Garfunkel & Oates, about which you can read more over in our breakdown of today's big premieres; the subjectively off-putting Maggie Gyllenhaal in the Sundance miniseries The Honorable Woman; and there's new episodes of Married and the consistently engaging You're The Worst on FX.

At 11/10c. there's two more premieres (see above): Black Jesus on Adult Swim and 7 Deadly Sins on Showtime, and there's also Watch What Happens: Live with wonderful Daniel Radcliffe and even more wonderful Rebecca Romijn. Two very exciting things! As long as you remember that she always brings her awful fucking husband along. Which, speaking of:

[Images/video of—a by-turns discursive and elucidatory, a perfidious, a mercurial, a pensive, an en dehors and en pressant, a celebratory and filial—Zach Rance courtesy CBS. Never, ever forget.]

Morning After is a new home for television discussion online, brought to you by Gawker. What are you watching tonight? What are we missing out on? Recommendations and discussions down below.

Marilyn Hartman, described by authorities as a "serial stowaway," was arrested by police at Los Angeles International Airport for the second time this week after allegedly trying to sneak onto a flight. Hartman has been arrested by police seven times this year for making similar attempts at SFO.

Hartman, 62, had been arrested by police Wednesday at LAX for trying to hop a free flight, and was given a court order to stay away from airport. According to the San Jose Mercury News, Hartman was released from jail Wednesday after pleading no contest to a misdemeanor trespassing charge.

"It was stupid, and it is something that I don't want to repeat," Hartman told the Press Democrat as she left court yesterday. She also the paper that she is homeless, and feels safer in airports than she does on the streets.

This past Monday, Hartman successfully—after three attempts—bypassed security at San Jose International Airport and boarded a Los Angeles-bound Southwest Airlines flight by pretending to be with a family, the Associated Press reports.

"I've been in some pretty awful situations so I took desperate measures," she told reporters Wednesday.

[Image courtesy San Mateo County Sheriff's Office via San Jose Mercury News]

Today I met a colleague for lunch at The Melt as part of my ongoing review of the grilled cheese chain that secured $10 million in venture capital funding in order to make more grilled cheese. Only afterward did I learn that the simple act of eating jalapeños melted into cheese melted into bread brought me one step closer to Beyoncé Knowles Carter.

According to SF Eater, Beyoncé and Jay-Z frequented a couple fine dining establishments while visiting San Francisco for the final U.S. show of their tour. But the couple also presented their crew with the finest grilled cheese that venture capital can pretend is technology:

Most notably, they went to Tosca Cafe not one, but both nights of their tour, which was a bit of internal synergy, since Jay-Z is an investor in owners April Bloomfield and Ken Friedman's New York restaurant Spotted Pig. According to Inside Scoop, pastas and roast chicken were among their party's favorites. The reportedly troubled couple also showed some familial harmony when it came to dining at Boulevard, where they had seafood and steak with daughter Blue in a semi-private dining room. And they treated their crew of 130 to a catered spread of grilled cheese, salads, and chocolate chip cookies from The Melt at the conclusion of last night's show.

During lunch, my dining companion told me a joke to illustrate the difference between The Melt and American Grilled Cheese, a beloved rival chain. People here, he said, ask each other: "Do you want your grilled cheese boot-strapped or venture-backed?" Consider yourself warned: this is what passes for a joke in San Francisco.

To contact the author of this post, please email nitasha@gawker.com.

[Image via Getty]

Need something cool to do during these dog days of summer? Why not fetch a seat by the TV and join us as we chat about tonight's episode of Project Runway? Sit! Stay! Good job!

The show starts on 9 Eastern on Lifetime, and the chat party happens in the comments below. Here are a few highlights from the one we held here last week:

• According to an informal poll conducted by Lizawithazee, recent fashion trends we hate include rompers on adults, jumpsuits, flowy patterned pants and see-through fashions with attached granny panties. Trends we love include braided hair and high-waisted shorts. Note that there were exactly four respondents to this poll, so by my calculation it has a margin of error of 46.4%
• We added another drinking-game word, courtesy of WIncredulous: "costumey."
• Continuing a trend, the best nicknames we came up with — "J-Pop America Fun Time" and "Carrie On My Wayward Designer" — were for the contestant who wound up getting eliminated. Lay your weary blue-haired head to rest, Carrie. Don't you cry no more.

I've collected a few of my favorite commenter quips from last week here. As for this week: Tonight's challenge will be to create a new look for the future inspired by an event from the designer's past. If I were competing, I'd use the time I accidentally ate cat food as inspiration for a look based on a future in which humans have evolved into giant cats. In fact, Heidi's already designed that look, now that I think about it.

See you cats in the comments!

[Image via Lifetime]

Democratic Senator John Walsh announced today that he is dropping his bid for reelection in Montana amid allegations that he plagiarised a significant portion of his master's thesis at Army War College. The school is set to begin an investigation into the charges next week. In his announcement, Walsh said that accusations of plagiarism have "become a distraction."

"I am ending my campaign so that I can focus on fulfilling the responsibility entrusted to me as your U.S. Senator," Walsh said today. "You deserve someone who will always fight for Montana, and I will."

Walsh, who was appointed to his position in February after Senator Max Baucus' was named the U.S. ambassador to China, also announced that he intends to finish out his term (ending in January of 2015).

With Walsh out, Politico notes, Democrats in Montana are facing a tough race to keep the Senate seat Baucus held since 1978:

Pressure is building in Democratic political circles for Nancy Keenan, a long-time abortion rights activist, to jump into the race, even though sources say she has so far resisted. And at least one other Montana Democrat, former lieutenant governor John Bohlinger, has expressed interest.

Whoever does step in would face Republican Rep. Steve Daines, who is heavily favored to win a seat the GOP has not held since 1913.

Montana Democrats have until Aug. 20 to get a new candidate on the ballot.

[Image via AP]

There have been reports circling of Yelp extorting small businesses for over five years. Those anecdotal stories have never been proven in court. But after the Federal Trade Commission revealed a number of complaints, shareholders are taking the company to court, claiming Yelp artificially inflated the price of stock for its executive's benefit.

The class action lawsuit, being led by investor Joseph Curry, focuses on Yelp's "first-hand" reviews. The suit says Yelp required businesses "to pay to suppress negative reviews," and then lied about the practice.

Algorithms purportedly designed to screen unreliable reviews did not comprehensively do so, and instead, the Company allowed such unreliable reviews to remain prominent while the Company tried to sell services designed to suppress negative reviews or make them go away;

Yelp allegedly made its millions by hiding the fact that some of that money came from extorting businesses with bad reviews. And that lack of transparency allegedly allowed company insiders to earn more than $81.5 million from "insider trading proceeds."

The company's stock price climbed earlier this yeah following a strong financial report released in February. Many company executives then sold off portions of their stock, including CEO Jeremy Stoppelman, who made $8,493,479 from his stock sale. However, it is alleged that by not revealing the true nature of Yelp's business, the stock price was artificially high when the executives sold off their shares. So when the FTC acknowledged the thousands of complaints against the company, shareholders were left owning a tumbling stock.

On or around April 2, 2014, it was publicly disclosed and reported that the Federal Trade Commission had received more than 2,000 complaints about Yelp, many contending that Yelp would solicit businesses to buy advertisements on the Company's website and would retaliate if businesses declined by deleting positive reviews and claiming the deletions were due to an updated "automated algorithm." [...]

During the Class Period, as detailed herein, defendants made false and misleading statements about the strength of the Company's business and prospects and engaged in a scheme to deceive the market. This artificially inflated Yelp's stock price and operated as a fraud or deceit on Class Period purchasers of Yelp common stock. Later, when defendants' prior misrepresentations and fraudulent conduct became apparent to the market, Yelp's stock price fell precipitously, as the prior artificial inflation came out of the stock price over time. As a result of their purchases of Yelp common stock during the Class Period, plaintiff and other members of the Class suffered economic loss, i.e., damages, under the federal securities laws.

In a statement, a Yelp spokesperson tells Valleywag that the company has not been served the lawsuit yet, but "the allegations you describe are without merit and, assuming we are served, we will vigorously contest them."

Below, the full lawsuit, with portions highlighted by Gigaom's Jeff John Roberts:

To contact the author of this post, please email kevin@valleywag.com.

Photo: AP, h/t Gigaom

President Obama announced tonight that he has authorized "targeted" airstrikes and humanitarian drops on Iraq. The airstrikes, Obama says, will be ordered if ISIS launches an attack on Erbil, where U.S. personnel are currently stationed. "When we have the unique capabilities to help avert a massacre, then I think the United States of America cannot turn a blind eye," he said.

"I know many of you are concerned about any military action in Iraq, even limited strikes like these," Obama said. "I will not allow the United States to be dragged into fighting another war in Iraq...American combat troops will not be returning to fight in Iraq."

Humanitarian airdrops were made earlier today. From the Wall Street Journal:

A U.S. official said roughly 70 pallets of water and meals-ready-to-eat were dropped into the mountains were the Yazidis, an ethnically Kurdish religious minority, were taking refuge. Pentagon officials watched video the airdrops, conducted by both C-17 and C-130 cargo planes, recorded from an overhead surveillance plane. The cargo planes were escorted by American fighter jets, officials said.

There were multiple reports earlier today that the air strikes had already begun, but were quickly denied by Rear Adm. John F. Kirby, the Pentagon's press secretary. The Pentagon told the New York Times that "it was possible that allies of the United States, either the Iraqi or Turkish militaries, had conducted the bombing."

The continued attacks led by Sunni militant group ISIS and their targeting of Christians and Yazidis in the country, Obama said, constitute a threat of genocide.

"Today, America is coming to help," Obama said.

[Image via AP]

A man accused of identity theft was in a federal court today after he was exposed as having impersonated Stephen G. Dickerman, a lawyer with an office in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn that has been involved in at least 12 federal cases since 2012. At his arraignment today, the man's lawyer insisted on the charade, telling the judge, "I can clarify that the name of my client is Stephen G. Dickerman."

"The government has really no idea who the defendant is at this point," prosecutor Lan Nguyen said in court today. Not even the man's fiancé is sure who he really is. Owing to the man's unconfirmed identity, the judge denied him bail.

"I don't know who this gentleman is," Judge Ramon E. Reyes Jr. said.

According to the New York Times, the man took advantage of the lapsed law license of the actual Stephen G. Dickerman, a lawyer with a 40-year career. From the American Bar Association Journal:

In 2009, an individual claiming to be Stephen G. Dickerman showed up at the registration office and received a copy of the delinquent notice form, which included the lawyer's Social Security number, date of birth, the law school he attended and his attorney registration number.

In a section of the form allowing for changes in personal information, the man claiming to be the lawyer wrote that his name was "Shlomo G. Dickerman" and listed a new business and home address, the affidavit says. He signed the form and paid a $350 registration fee. When "Shlomo Dickerman" paid his registration fee the next year, he included a letter explaining that he was using the first name "Shlomo" because it was his Hebrew name. The name change was not made, even as "Shlomo" filed subsequent requests, because legal documentation is required.

To assume Dickerman's identity, the Times reports, the fake Dickerman also listed having received a law degree from New York University. The imposter would charge $400 an hour for his services.

"He did not appear, necessarily, to be a good lawyer; he didn't appear to be a non-lawyer," David S. Stone of Stone & Magnanini told the Times.

But the FBI was apparently suspicious early on and began investigating. From the Times:

By the summer, federal authorities had become suspicious. At a seemingly routine hearing in July on a class-action case that the suspect had filed two months earlier, agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation quietly observed the proceedings. One of the agents had already met the real Stephen G. Dickerman, the affidavit says.

Two weeks later, two F.B.I. agents, posing as potential clients, arrived at the Brighton 11th Street address of the suspect.

Taking notes on a legal pad, that man said he would represent the clients for a $10,000 retainer and $400 an hour. He handed over his business card; it read "Shlomo G. Dickerman, JD, LLM, Esq."

According to Sheepshead Bites, authorities raided the fake Dickerman's office earlier this week and none of the other lawyers there have been charged.

Prosecutors suspect, based on the driver's license found on the suspect when he was arrested by police, that the man might be Stephen H. Dickerman, who "appears to be a disbarred attorney with a criminal history," Nguyen said. Stephen H. Dickerman has been convicted twice of grand larceny and spent three years in prison. The prosecution is awaiting results from a fingerprint analysis.

[Image via Sheepshead Bites]

The potential national security threat that not enough people are talking about? Babies. A toddler squeezed through the fence in front of the White House Thursday night, triggering an alarm and sending the Secret Service into lockdown mode.

A toddler got away from his parents and squeezed through the fence at the White House tonight - causing a brief lockdown on the lawn.

— Chris Jansing (@ChrisJansing) August 8, 2014

NBC News reports that neither the baby or the parents were questioned by the Secret Service. "We were going to wait until he learned to talk to question him, but in lieu of that he got a timeout and was sent on way with parents," Secret Service spokesman Edwin Donovan said.

[H/T Uproxx // Image via AP]

Angelito Ribero, dressed as folk saint Gauchito Gil, stands outside the San Cayetano church in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Legend holds that Gil was a 19th century outlaw who robbed the rich to give to the poor. His spirit is believed to perform miracles. Image by Natacha Pisarenko via AP.

It's no longer enough for venture capitalists to give a startup millions of dollars without any promise of return. Now, the New York Times says, app creators must also be "coddled as royalty" by their middle-aged benefactors.

Going straight from the dorm and onto the throne is perhaps the Silicon Valley myth. But the Valley's newest crop of billionaire investors are turning that myth into a mantra.

DealBook describes how investors like Andreessen Horowitz and Founders Fund are pampering their venutre-backed entrepreneurs with everything from "exclusive soirees with business titans and celebrities" to trips "to an island resort by seaplane." It's a playbook lifted straight from Hollywood, where talent agencies nurture artists and turn them into narcissists.

When they became venture capitalists in 2009, Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz sought to treat start-up founders as celebrities. They modeled Andreessen Horowitz after Creative Artists Agency, the Hollywood talent firm. Bucking the industry standard in venture capital, Andreessen Horowitz allocates about 90 percent of the firm's profit to the employees who run a professional network for the entrepreneurs, Mr. Horowitz said.

"What we try to do is make the firm the proxy network for the founder," said Mr. Horowitz, who counts rappers like Kanye West and chief executives like Donald Thompson of McDonald's among his friends. "Instead of being transactional, we go, 'Tell us what you're trying to accomplish in your career and how we can help with that.' It's a long view of talent."

The new investor ethos goes beyond coddling their investments. In some cases, firms are giving up their rights as investors to land a deal:

[Felicis Ventures] said on Tuesday that it would always support its entrepreneurs on company matters, giving up the right to vote against them. The unusual policy — which some in the technology industry see as a gimmick — formalizes what is often an unwritten expectation in Silicon Valley. [...]

"The one thing that we always say internally is our success is predicated on our founders' success," [Felicis Ventures' Aydin Senkut] said. Signing a written promise to always vote with the founders, he added, "makes a really strong statement that we will not block any sale. We will not question the management."

Emphasis added. The pro-entrepreneur shift is partly due to increased competition. In the first half of this year, venture capital funds raised $17.3 billion. That compares to just $7.7 billion raised in the first half of 2013, the Times reports. All that money being pumped into startups means firms are scrambling to get in on hot companies, which is "a sign of an overheated market."

But formalizing that "unwritten expectation" of always backing founders is a dangerous one, especially if an entrepreneur goes off the rails. As Venrock's David Pakman put it, "If you've pledged you'll always vote in favor of what the founder wants to do, you might be voting on the side of a criminal."

To contact the author of this post, please email kevin@valleywag.com.

Photo: AP

Chanan Maister has gone two years without ever seeing his wife Elisheva, the cellist for the band Bulletproof Stockings, perform live.

"It would be really cool to see her perform in front of packed crowds and whatnot, but not being able to doesn't really bother me that much," he told me yesterday in an email a few hours before the band's first-ever club gig, at Arlene's Grocery on the Lower East Side of New York City.

Bulletproof Stockings is an all-female band, and their show at Arlene's, they'd announced earlier this week, was closed to men. The Maisters, like the other members of the band, are observant members of Brooklyn's large Hasidic Jewish community; Elisheva and her bandmates have been playing all-woman gigs in the Hasidic community for more than two years, catering mostly to the hipster-Hasid crowd that's sprung up in Crown Heights.

Chanan hasn't been to any of the gigs—and wasn't going to be at Arlene's Grocery last night—because of kol isha, a modesty principle that says observant Jewish men can't listen to a woman sing. "I guess it was never really an option. I was raised not to listen to women singing, and that's just the way it is," he wrote. And then, wistfully, a couple minutes later: "Would it be too much to ask you for some pictures of the show?"

There would be plenty, as it turned out. "The media vultures are spazzing out, man," the tattooed, rockabilly-pompadoured door guy at Arlene's Grocery told me when I arrived last night. He was being pressed on every side by news cameras, lined up on the sidewalk in front of Arlene's. The line to get inside was spilling out the door and down the ramp, and the bar at the front of the house was packed so tight it was hard to move: Women in long glossy wigs were crammed in next to women in black lipstick, women in tank tops with bra straps showing, women in headscarves and long sleeves next to women in jeans. Metallica's Ride the Lightning was blaring over the speakers. Almost no one was drinking.

"Guys are not liking it," singer/keyboardist Perl Wolfe told the crowd when the band took the stage, all—cello, violin, guitar, drums, and keyboard—dressed in head-to-toe black. This is a bit of an understatement: The announcement that men would not be allowed at the show had hit the Men's Rights anti-feminist wing of the internet hard. "Misandry is real," a wounded-sounding dude wrote on the group's Facebook page. And another: "If you're a man, don't bother... feminist duplicity and driving further inequality is all this group cares for now."

"I think they just really want to hear us live," Wolfe said, shaking her long honey-brown wig away from her face and grinning a little. An approving roar went up from the audience. Drummer Dalia Shusterman started thumping out a heavy beat on the kick-drum, and the scarved and wigged women in the room went crazy.

For the Orthodox women packing out Arlene's, the band's first gig in a secular space felt like a big, big deal. "They're elevating the Creator," a beaming woman named Alona told me. She's a "laughter yoga leader" in Crown Heights. "The Rebbe said the merit of righteous women is what will redeem the world." "The Rebbe" is Menachem Schneerson, the late leader of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement to which the band, and many of the women in the room, belong. Some of them believe Schneerson, who died in 1994, was the Messiah, and that someday he'll return.

A TV camera swept in close; they're filming for a new show on the Oxygen network called "Living Different." Nearby, a lady in a long black skirt grinned and threw double metal horns towards the stage.

"This one's called 'Homeland Call Stomp,'" Wolfe announced. Another cheer. The music is moody and atmospheric, driven by a piano melodies that sounded a bit like Fiona Apple. At times, it got a little repetitive. The Orthodox women in the room seemed to know every word to every song. An hour in, some of the secular women in the room started to look a little sleepy.

Midway through the show, during a song called "Frigid City" a kiss-off to a bad husband and a cold city, the headbanging started. Wigs began whipping towards the stage, along with several heads of dark curls. The floor shook delicately. The band kicked into their version of a nigun, a wordless Hasidic melody, and a mosh pit of sorts opened up—a group of women took each other's hands and started spinning around in a circle, a slightly unholy hora. Two non-Orthodox women nearly got hit in the eye with flying hair and had to step back.

"Go ahead, rock out!" Wolfe shouted from the stage. The audience obliged.

At the end of the set—after an encore of "Frigid City"—Wolfe and Shusterman, who have done most of the band's press, were mobbed with fans. The Oxygen cameras followed their every move, lingering on Wolfe's tall spike heels. The rest of the band quietly packed up and disappeared into the crowd.

A slightly drunk Orthodox woman with a flower in her hair wandered up to the tough-looking lady at the door who'd been taking money and checking wristbands.

"Can we stay for the next band?" she asked.

"Sure, honey," the tough woman said. "It's not going to be only women in here, though."

The Orthodox woman tossed her head. "That's just for men," she said, with a little smirk. "We can listen to anybody."

In June, Antiques Roadshow visited Birmingham, Alabama, my home for the last three years. I don't own a Tiffany lamp or a 19th century Chesterfield sofa. I do, though, have a flatscreen television that's ancient by consumer electronics standards. So that's what I brought to be appraised.

Full disclosure: I'd arranged to have my 2008 Toshiba flatscreen evaluated by a professional Antiques Roadshow-affiliated antiques czar a few weeks in advance. Which is good, both in that I wasn't turned away at the door, and that I didn't have to wait hours in line carting this monstrosity around:

The walk from the car to the convention center floor was bad enough. (Image credit: my wife's iPhone)

The unfortunate soul charged with evaluating my TV was Gary Piattoni. Gary's been in the antiques business for years, splitting his time between electronics, militaria, furniture, and decorative arts. He's sharp, dedicated, and professional, which is why I'm even more astonished and appreciative that he went along with this dumb stunt.

It's not like he didn't have anything better to do. For those who aren't familiar with Antiques Roadshow, it's a massive undertaking, featuring dozens of antiques experts weighing in on thousands of collectibles ranging from the worthless to the well, guess I can retire now. The Birmingham spectacle alone saw multitudes of hopeful hoarders wending their way through hours and hours of convention center lines, some of them toting objects so large they required elaborate contraptions to cart around. And that's just one of the eight shows being taped this summer.

Not surprisingly, given the swell of esoterica, what makes the final televised cut is just a small fraction of total appraisals. Everything gets evaluated though, tiny dreams being crushed or realized at a frenetic pace throughout the weekend. All of it happens in a bullpen area, a wide circle of collapsible tables marked by antique category, staffed by experts like Gary, ready to appraise. The ones you ultimately see aren't necessarily the most expensive items; they're the ones with the most interesting backstories, the most surprising results, the most telegenic owners.

This wasn't the Birmingham show, but the background gives you a sense of the set-up. Also, what a duck! (Image credit: AP/PBS)

That's the area for people with a genuine interest in knowing the histories behind their very old objects. I took my dumb TV somewhere else.

The reason you're not seeing a teeming mass of mahogany in the video above is that it was shot in a separate area for the web team, which was kind enough to both film and edit my Toshiba adventure. Once some crucial decisions were made—wipe off the smudges? nah, that's patina—we were off.

Some words on the appraisal itself. We agreed going in to approach it like one would an actual antique, covering the same ground and asking similar questions. That required a bit of playing dumb, but also who wouldn't want to know if their TV was the very first one? Also, in the heat of the moment, under the lights, I mistakenly said that I had originally paid $600 for it. In retrospect, I think it was closer to $900. Lastly, I was a little thrown by the idea of "connections for Playstation or Xbox;" in my mind I was picturing component cables (which I have plenty of jumbled up in a closet somewhere) but Gary was referring to inputs. We worked it out though!

We'll be taking a closer look at how actual electronics collecting (it exists!) works in the coming weeks. But in the meantime I can say that the Antiques Roadshow experience is one that I can't recommend highly enough, either as a collector or a viewer. Even for a product that doesn't fit in with what's typically on the show, the big reveal at the end gave me genuine flutters of joy and surprise. I can only imagine how magnified those feelings would be for items that have actual backstories—and price tags—worth unearthing.

Most technology ages poorly. Gary helped me confirm that. But a fascination with where objects come from—and how they ended up where they are today—has a timelessness you can't put a price on.

Antiques Roadshow airs Monday nights at 8 on PBS. You won't see me and my Toshiba on there, but that's probably just as well.

There's just something about spiders that makes people want to burn them to death with homemade aerosol flamethrowers, even if their houses nearly burn down in the process. It happened earlier this year in Seattle, causing $60,000 in damage, and now it's occurred again in Wales.

The BBC reports a Bridgend woman called a relative to help get rid of the spider and, perhaps taking a page from the Seattle man's book, they tried to burn it to death. The homeowner "sprayed a spider with an aerosol and then set it alight," according to South Wales Fire and Rescue.

The fire was quickly extinguished and no humans were hurt. The spider's condition was unclear, but it seems unlikely it survived the flaming aerosol attack.

After getting the small blaze under control, South Wales Fire and Rescue posted this safety tip that shouldn't be necessarily, but apparently is:

When attempting to remove spiders from properties, please dont use lit aerosols. #SWControl NR

— SW Fire & Rescue (@SWFireandRescue) August 6, 2014

[H/T UPI, Photo via DaveHax/YouTube]

What's the Gleekwells doing today? Looks like Hambone is explaining to Melissa about how things work. Devices, tablets, casters, what have you: God, Hambone is impressive. And Melissa's so impressed by his prowess! Why, look at her face it's fairly bereft of thought: Touch thing! Melissa seems to be saying. Touch thing and thing then! Very sexy. Very sexy. Or else. Or else.

It's well past midsummer and we're heading into the fall TV season, which means shows'll be ending, starting and returning at a greater and greater speed over the coming weeks. Here's a rundown of today's premieres, as we ramp up toward fall. See you next week, when things are scheduled to get even more intense!

FRIDAY

The Knick (Cinemax, 10/9c.)

Tonight sees the premiere of noted film fella Steven Soderbergh's collaboration with noted human gin drink Clive Owen, chronicling the theatrics of the medical operating theaters of the early 20th century. Some critics like it for some reasons, others don't like it for other reasons, though in some cases, for the same reasons. And, here, you know what? You're always going to have to grapple with that critical muckiness around anything worth wading into; heck, it's even good for you. And that's life, you beautiful little creature.

Jonah From Tonga (HBO, 10/9c.)

If cocaine and brusque doctors aren't so much your speed (speed! like an amphetamine!), you've got options: nestled in the same timeslot is newted Zealander Chris Lilley's brownface-opus, featuring his breakout character Jonah Takalua, famous for his catchphrase "Studying is important!" Lilley's disappeared into dozens of characters over his storied career, from snotty schoolgirl Ja'mie King, to the mysterious, deadly Kar-Annok of Unter Lothbak, to Good King Maplebuck 'pon his Highland Throne. My uncle once disappeared into a character and came out four months later, eleven inches tall. Now he's a tiny detective.

SATURDAY

Outlander (STARZ, 9/8c.)

If you ask me, there's no better time for a show about men in kilts to air than Saturday night. Is that a slam against nerds? Are we not doing that anymore? Hooey on that, I say. You nerds have your Ronald D. Moore TV adaptation of an eight-book time-travel sci/fi fantasy series and your fucking, uh, 1-UP needlepoint patterns, and you got everyone saying "Well played, sir" like we're all fucking bellhops. I'll pummel nerds with words and clobber 'em with a pair of cocked fists I call "Sodom" (you know where to shove it) and "Gomorrah" (you have no idea where to shove it). So look out, Poindexter.

SUNDAY

Shark Week/Shart Week (Discovery/Comedy Central, 8/7c.)

You had it right there in front of you, Comedy Central: Shrek Week.

Hell, anyone could have come out swinging with Shrek Week. UPN could have rocketed back onto the scene with the diamond-studded dynamite that is Shrek Week. You got four Shreks, the musical, Puss In Boots, you run those every day for a week, you give a mil and a half to every network employee from president to janitor, and you kickstart the American economy, right there. You could have saved the middle class but you went with "Shart Week" and it's just a bummer.

WEDNESDAY (8/13)

Legends (TNT, 9/8c.)

Time will tell if by starring in a taut (taut) psychological espionage thriller, Sean Bean has managed to buy himself the "stay alive pretty much no matter what" card he's so desperately desired. Maybe he gets wanged with a pipe right there in the cold open and, like, Ian Somerhalder holds it down for the rest of the series. Did you know Sean Bean gets so into character that whenever he's going to shoot a death scene, he keeps a psychologist on set to convince him he's still alive? It's severely taxing his sanity!!

Heartbreakers (Investigation Discovery, 10/9c.)

Crime! We all hate it. That's why we do The Purge from time to time. You know what we love, though, are the stars of yesteryear. Investigation Discovery's Heartbreakers has these benevolent demi-gods dramatizing tales of true crime, that they may finally be excised from the cultural unconscious after too long tainting it with criminal rot. We will never Purge stars like Kevin Sorbo, who starred as The Rock on White The Rock: The Legendary Journeys, or Christopher Knight, who starred as Seth MacFarlane on Wait, He's Producing Cosmos? That's Kind Of Weird. Is That Weird? We need them for stuff like this.

THURSDAY

Braxton Family Values (WE, 9/8c.)

Over the last three years, we've come to know Toni Braxton's family and their many values: thrift, tact, strong bones, good squat form, frontier justice, moderation in all things (even moderation), ghosts are real and they hate us, punctuality, spirit/pep, birthstones have power, grace, will, John Stewart was the best Green Lantern, three square meals, batteries are magic, and core strength. In this fourth season premiere, they'll finally have to put those to the test when the world reaches peak oil and "family" ain't worth shit compared to clean water and diesel in your tank. Welcome to the road, Braxtons; hope you saved a bullet.

[Image of helpful haircut and delighted simpleton via Shutterstock]

Morning After is a new home for television discussion online, brought to you by Gawker. What are you watching tonight? What are we missing out on? Recommendations and discussions down below, and tune in next week for an all-new Gleekwell adventure.

Last night's premiere of Showtime's Morgan Spurlock-created and -presented documentary series 7 Deadly Sins focused on gluttony. The first of the show's three short profiles featured Heart Attack Grill owner "Doctor Jon" Basso twirling his proverbial mustache at the camera and positioning himself as the bad guy the world needs.

"It's a sacrifice that has to be made," he said. "Somebody has gotta stand here and say, 'Screw it. Wake up, world. You're fat.' No, I'm not going to call you plus-size. I'm not gonna say you're portly. No, you're fat. Lose some weight, or just hurry up and die and be done with it."

To that end, Basso's deliberately "offensive" menu offers fries cooked in lard, a "Butter Fat Shake," and a variety of "Bypass Burgers" including the 9,983-calorie Quadruple Bypass Burger. One man interviewed for the segment ate a Triple Bypass Burger, had an actual triple bypass, and then settled on a single bypass this time around. He laughed jovially as he revealed that.

Two actual heart attacks occurred in Heart Attack Grill, says Basso. He describes these as a "way to get the message out," and says his establishment received "quite a bit of publicity" as a result. "One of the 'nurses' ran back to the kitchen and she says, 'Doctor Jon, someone is having a heart attack.' And I said, 'Business is good!'" he recalls. He refers to Blair River, the one-time Heart Attack Girl spokesman who died in 2011, as a "sacrifice." The episode included no words on John Alleman, the Heart Attack Grill's second spokesman to die.

The method to Basso's madness, or at least the one he wants you to glean when you aren't puzzling over his make-me-rich-by-eating-here-you-disgusting-fat-pigs messaging, can be summed up in his explanation of Heart Attack's policy of letting people who weigh over 350 lbs., eat there for free:

We have a huge electronic cattle scale in the middle of the restaurant. And if you weigh over 350 lbs., you eat absolutely free. They get on that scale, they give a big muscle shot, but then they go home and they go, "Wow, I'm gonna die. I'm a fat freak, and that's why everyone was applauding for me."

So by getting people to eat his food that makes them fat, he's showing that people like food that makes them fat, and also that people are fat.

For all of the self-conscious provocation ("Will the evil Doctor Jon finally make everyone on earth so fat that they can't walk anymore? Maybe. He's trying."), this was the the darkest part of the whole segment:

My daughter's 10 and in four or five years, she's gonna be at the door as a receptionist wearing this slinky little nurse outfit. My greatest hope is that she does run this company and continues with the same message in multiple locations, in different languages.

I'm sitting in an office in Manhattan a few blocks from Central Park. It's a fairly typical workday, filled with emails, trips to the coffee pot, and refreshing my sites. I'm on all the good ones: Twitter, Facebook, you name it.

This morning I'm clicking through my mentions and reading great replies from people from all walks of life who love interacting online. Someone named @NotChadd wants me to "fall into an ocean of aids."

@dogboner Yes, stupid cunt. I'm sure. Fall into an ocean of A.I.D.S.

— Notchad (@NotChadd) August 7, 2014

This seems unkind. A man named Jay Starckey gave me an award, but upon further inspection it seems the "award" Jay wanted to give me may be a fake.

And today's Retarded Fuck of the Day Award goes to: @dogboner for not knowing who @neiltyson is and mocking him. #Congrats

— Jay Starkey (@Platinum_Panda) August 7, 2014

Is this Jay's idea of a cruel joke? I'm not laughing. I'm actually doing the opposite of laughing, which is crying.

Why are people being so mean to me? I suspect it may have something to do with this photo.

Some guy using his laptop on the train like a Dumbass nerd lol pic.twitter.com/4RuSAZfI14

— im literally 12 (@dogboner) July 29, 2014

On July 29th I was leaving work, taking the F to the C (if you're not a New Yorker like me you're probably confused, heh) as I do pretty much every day, when I saw astrophysicist and star of Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey Neil deGrasse Tyson sitting across from me working on his laptop.

Famous people aren't like regular people, they're better. So this was a huge deal.

The only other famous person I've ever seen on the subway was Michael Shannon (Michael Shannon was great in Bug). I saw Michael Moore one time but he was just walking around Chelsea. He was wearing a pair of sweatpants and it was like 90 degrees. I saw Katie Holmes holding some jewelry at a flea market in Williamsburg. Only in New York, baby!

There had been some delays the past couple of days (the MTA is really good) and Neil was talking about it to a fellow passenger, a younger woman, who must not have known who he was. I recognized his voice right away. I started to sweat (more than usual). I sent a text to my friend Jon Hendren, who tweets jokes under the professional handle @fart. "I'm sitting across from Neil deGrasse Tyson on this train lol." I was still underground. Good job, me.

I wanted to say something or get a photo with him but what was I going to say? "Hey, man. I recognize you from various things I've seen. Good job...uh, on the science stuff."

I didn't want to be a fucking goober and ask for a photo, either. I'd probably end up deleting it anyway because I have bad body dysmorphia and I don't like the way I look. So I did what any sane, reasonable person would do and opened the camera app, closed the cover to my phone (Samsung Galaxy Note3), and discreetly snapped a few pics.

He got off a few stops later at Chambers street and I instantly felt a wave of guilt wash over me like he knew I took a picture of him and that's what made him exit the train. Like maybe that would be the last time he ever took the subway because of what I had done.

Anyway, I sent it to my friend Jon first, and then to my girlfriend, and then to Twitter.

The first few replies were from people who got the joke, which was what I expected. I anticipated it would fade away and that would be the end of it.

Soon, however, I started to get replies from two groups of people. People who didn't understand why I took a picture of some random guy on the subway...

@dogboner @projectid urgh really? Tweeting photos of strangers without their permission is not cool in most situations: definitely this one

— Ricky Haggett (@KommanderKlobb) July 29, 2014

....and people who were livid that I had, in their eyes, disrespected one of the greatest scientists of our time by calling him a dumbass nerd. The latter, more colorful, replies were my favorite ones to read.

Instead of taking a second to analyze the post, scores of people took it at face value and began ripping me apart for being a moron (something I don't entirely disagree with). How could you not know who that was. You're a fucking idiot. I would have been kissing his feet. I would have sucked his dick. Et cetera.

The internet is filled with nerds who are desperate to 1) demonstrate their love for science and 2) display their superiority to everyone else. I had provided them all with a chance to do both, at the same time. They were falling over each other to tell me that I am the reason the world is a bad place.

@dogboner you are dumb as fuck. Don't breed. Cunt.

— əɔʎɹd uɐuuəɹq (@ap_Rhys) August 7, 2014

At some point the post was shared on something called "ASAP Science," which is, I guess, the little brother of the hugely popular science fandom page "I Fucking Love Science." That's where the post ended up next. Both had accompanying text similar to "Look at this idiot."

This opened up my joke to a whole new army of nerds ready to loudly and thirstily call me a cunt. The replies increased in number, though luckily most were in meme-form which I've trained my eyes to glaze over by this point.

Are you stupid or what? For people like you this world is becoming a shit @dogboner. Do us a favor and go fuck yourself!

— Eduardo Garrido M. (@Eg_icoc) August 7, 2014

The post was then shared by George Takei, or, rather the "comedians" and/or social media team that writes, aggregates, and submits viral images to Takei's Facebook page. Takei wrote that it was a "cosmic" mistake on my part. Haha. I get it.

This gets a facepalm of "cosmic" proportions. #NdGT #PleaseTellMeHesJoking pic.twitter.com/zPjS5TJ7sj

— George Takei (@GeorgeTakei) August 8, 2014

This morning a copycat Perez Hilton blog I'd never heard of with a stylesheet that looks like a CS major got it from a free template website noted that someone should have CPS take my son away which is pretty funny, I guess. Maybe a bit much.

a huge subculture of people who pride themselves on their superior intellects have been easily fooled & humiliated by a man named @DogBoner

— Degenerate Gandhi (@Bro_Pair) August 7, 2014

As of writing the original post has over 4,000 retweets and something like 7,000 favorites and Neil deGrasse Tyson is still a huge nerd.

Michael Hale is a creator of the wildly popular @dogboner twitter account and has over $73.00 in his checking account.