danapop

Me at a restaurant opening with several of my favorite writer and publicist friends.

Fear of missing out (FOMO) is a real thing. And never has it been more apparent in our culture than right now with the boom of social media. In an instant, our lives are as mundane or as fantastic as we spin them to be. Forbes just featured a great piece on it, you can read here.

We can shape a so-so situation into the most glorious time, making other’s wish they were there. We’ll fill our social calendar out of that fear of missing anything. By choice, I’ve been a hermit lately. And for the first time in a while I recently ventured out to an event–and lo and behold if it wasn’t the same people having the same conversations. Nothing against any of those people, nor their likely enlightening conversation, but man, if I didn’t want to just be at home cooking supper with my husband or out to dinner with my best friend giggling until we both keel over from stomach pains.

I had an epiphany at that event that I was really only there because I didn’t want to be the one that wasn’t. As if I’m so important that anyone would actually give a care if I didn’t show up. I’m seriously not that full of myself, but are we now a society shaping our lives not because we want to be somewhere, but because it’s where we think we ought to be? Why? So, we can check in on Foursquare with our peers and someone can say, “It looks like Dana and Stacy are at the opening of the must-be-seen-at latest restaurant opening or art exhibit. Wow, wish I were there?” So you can post pictures of the it’s-so-amazing-oh-my-gosh-you’re-a-dork-if-you-don’t-know-about-it underground supper club that meets every third Tuesday of months ending in “y” in an airstream trailer that moves to undisclosed locations.

Seriously. I’m not jealous. Isn’t there some famous quote about one of the great joys in life is not only being invited, but having the choice to not show up? I’ll probably find that gem of a saying on Pinterest, while crafting the perfect surprise birthday party theme with the most coveted invite list in town.

Sigh.

Trust me, you’re not missing a thing.

Image: Snooki getting arrested on an episode of MTV’s “Jersey Shore”

My hairdresser once told me a story of him watching television on the couch with his boyfriend and he got annoyed when his man stopped flipping through channels at Oxygen’s “Bad Girls Club.” He responded with something like, “You wouldn’t let these women into our house if they knocked on our door, so why are you letting these women into our house?” Touché.

It’s been said that what you do in the privacy of your own home—when no one is looking and you cannot be found out—that’s the guts of who you are.

I’ve called watching totally dumb television my guilty pleasure. And I have something to confess: I’ve watched marathons of this substance-less crap. Hours of grown women arguing about $50,000 sets of veneers and calling themselves “classy” to valley-girl sounding stylists acting as if they have the cure for non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma and talentless hacks profiting from a sham marriage sponsored by Living Social. Bleh.

I’m now comparing this television drivel to fast food. The equivalent notion of being fully aware that you’re eating garbage, yet continuing to gorge, french fry after french fry. No more. I’ve purged my TiVo. I’m not buying into it any more. Not consuming it. I’m not saying it’s going to be replaced with documentaries on bird migration flight patterns on PBS or anything, but I might curl up with a good book (is anyone else STRUGGLING with Walter Isaacson’s Steve Jobs?), my addictive “The Wire” discs from Netflix and call it a day.

Up next in the proverbial tasteless pop-culture detox? My RSS reader loaded with salacious celebrity gossip, which has become beyond dull and uninspiring. Though, it’ll be tough to part with surisburnbook.tumblr.com.

It’s interesting that once you start the cleaning out process how much of it filters into other areas you might want to give an ol’ scrub to.

Image: Courtesy of NBCUniversal

In the wake of “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” cast member Taylor Armstrong’s estranged husband Russell’s suicide last month, I’ve been thinking a lot about reality TV. In particular, the Bravo network’s programming schedule and not just the season premiere of the series that aired on Monday night that included a thrown together opening segment semi-addressing the elephant in the room.

Reality TV had me back when I was a sophomore in high school with “The Real World” as a sociology experiment about what would happen when Julie from Alabama mixed with openly gay housemate Norman and insanely hot (but not so bright) Eric. I’ve always been fascinated with questions in life like this. Who people actually become in situations outside their comfort level in their everyday world. But, we are now at a point where what we watch on television in 2011 seems beyond a voyeuristic notion of watching what people generally do behind closed doors playing out in front of a camera.

What we’re all watching now is just gross. It feels like that cycle in tabloid journalism right after a celebrity couple dates, marries, and speculation about pregnancies are written about ad nauseam to when the tide abruptly turns to the doom and gloom storyline of when it’s ending and shady details of who’s cheating. Not to belittle the scope of what has happened, but yes, reality TV has reached that shift, where it’s all fun and games until someone winds up dead.

In The New York Times a couple of weeks ago, there was an excellent piece you can read here about Reality TV having its Jenny Jones moment. You might remember that reference when, during the height of talk shows overrunning American television sets, Jenny Jones had a guest on her show that confessed his love to an unsuspecting male friend. Three days after the taping, the recipient of cupid’s unrequited arrow shot and killed his suitor.

What is Bravo executive, Andy Cohen’s role in all this? As someone who knows more about the ins and outs of the television industry than my mother in Kansas, but less than say, my friend who was Bill Maher’s assistant for a spell in Los Angeles, I’m not being cynical to think producers prod and formulate and structure things to happen on any and all of these shows. If not, we’d all end up flipping channels the second one watches someone like me brushing my teeth and walking my dog everyday. It’s boring and no one would tune in, although a couple of weeks ago you might’ve witnessed my dog getting his arse kicked by an off leash pit bull in my neighborhood, but that’s about as scandalous a scenario as I would potentially give a viewer. The truth—I’d never get picked up for a second season.

But boy, the “Housewives,” they bring it seemingly without remorse that these are people’s lives. These now recognizable stars are the same people that likely assume that a stint on reality TV will pull them out of whatever suburban oblivion they are wandering around in to being financially set and it will lead to bigger and better. But, ultimately, it’s costing cast members’ marriages, money, and perhaps even a life. Does the onus rest solely on the show?

At this point, the viewer now has been clued in that your marriage isn’t perfect, you’re about to lose your home to foreclosure, you filed Chapter 11, your husband might be going to prison for fraud, and your son has been arrested for shoplifting a $14 razor from Wal-Mart (sorry, I just lumped a bunch of different people from different “Housewives” franchises, but hopefully you get the gist). We know this reality, yet we still watch the façade of a happy marriage, a picture perfect home, a thriving career, and obedient children that are well-adjusted functioning members of society.

Last week I was at an event with several of the Atlanta housewives cast members. I watched NeNe Leakes’ handler cut in front of me in the bar line because he deemed NeNe’s wine more important than mine. I then watched her gab to her entourage through the entire fashion show while fanning herself in the front row. Someone gave her that sense of entitlement. Who? Was it the viewer? The producers in order to coerce good television out of them?

Either way, it’s reached a fever pitch. And while I love Andy Cohen, I think he’s fun and his aftershow hilarious, he needs to address the reality of what we’re watching on his network versus what is actually reality outside the confines of the show that every viewer is well aware of. Until then, I’m over it.

Our lives are constantly flooded with images, opinions and chatter. I wrote those words in 2008 for the About section of dp before the site launched. Here we are, three years later and it’s more abundant than ever. Social networking sites have multiplied and when you work in the realm of media, particularly as a journalist with online outlets contributing to your mortgage, you’re required to add Facebook, Twitter, Google +, blogrolls and RSS feeds into your reading rotation. But, lately, frankly, I’m bored.

Bored to death of this culture of oversharing. It’s one thing to do with a girlfriend over iChat, or your mom on the telephone, but once it’s out there it’s out there. The fact that you’re in mediation about custody of your kids, that you can’t afford a divorce attorney, that your husband is a royal a-hole and likely sleeping on the couch tonight, the fact that you made an egg salad sandwich and it smells like bad gas, that your newborn son will not stop pooping, or the best (and sadly there’s more than one I’ve read) that you’re in the process of labor and delivery … harsh, I know, but I don’t care. And an aside for all you tweeting and facebooking ladies pushing a watermelon through the size of a walnut, seriously, get off the iPhone. It’s time to put it away. Enjoy the moment!

I don’t want to read about it and I don’t want to write about it. We all have it, these things in our life that we don’t want to do like pulling out the next newborn Pampers post-blowout, these mundane additions to our day that unite us. Yet we all have tribulations in our life that aren’t so trivial like the child support check not arriving for the tenth month in a row, or a boss that is demoralizing to your core. There’s so much bad in the world, this oversharing isn’t helping … it is making it worse. I feel heavy and bogged down with the floodgate of too much information being spewed. What are those posting trying to accomplish? The neighbor will bounce over and change your baby’s pants? That your friends will rally and pay your electric bill because they know you’re struggling for money? What’s the reward in airing the dirty laundry?

Don’t get me wrong, I love the fact that the Internet’s power can connect me to a friend I never thought (but always hoped) I’d reestablish contact with, or that it can raise funds for a charity in about the time it takes to text a friend or crank out a few sentences. There’s a flip side to everything.

Generally I like to write about things like the great meal I just had (Empire State South’s boiled peanut hummus!) or that we’ve booked a trip to beach (I heart you, Siesta Key), or self-deprecating things like I just tried to sausage into a swimsuit that I ordered online and well, it’s awful (Topshop sizing, I loathe you), or work I’ve written that’s just been published (can I get a fist pump?). This coming from the girl who’s written about a family member’s bout with cancer, her husband’s layoff ad nauseam, and baby making details (err some details) but here’s the thing—I bought the domain, and that gives me the right, I think. But, here’s the other thing, I check with the family I’m writing about before my speed demon typing skills get the better of me.

Freedom of speech isn’t such a tricky thing. We are given the right, and as it’s one of the most guarded amendments, it’s worth being a keeper of that privilege. Side note, if I was a little smarter I should’ve become an intellectual property attorney living in some beach town with clients in LA because holy smokes talk about a business that will never go away as long at the Internet exists … but I digress. Life is hard and tough, but it’s also about choices, and once it’s out there your character can dwindle just a bit with everything you say, everything you type. I know who in my newsfeed is going to whine most of the day about their crappy boss and lazy coworkers, who posts things that inspire me, who gives me interesting content from news sources I don’t check on a daily basis; I know all this without one word being spoken, only the written word.

I’ve tried to wrap my head around what is gained with this oversharing—support? Someone on your side? Us versus you mentality? You are not alone (thanks, Michael Jackson)? But why is Facebook the forum? Why not meditation, or church, or book club, or gabbing with friends over sashimi and red wine, or some other supportive community elsewhere? Why more or less strangers that you might’ve met at some networking event, or a friend you knew fifteen years ago from high school but still haven’t seen in the flesh whenever you come back into town? It’s like high school all over again when you can’t fight your own fight and you need a group of people to reiterate what you’re mad about. At the risk of sounding like a complete hypocrite, maybe stop “talking” about the dirty diaper and just change it.

In the meantime, make what you say matter.

I’ve wanted to interview Jim Denevan, the creative genius behind Outstanding in the Field for ages now. His culinary troupe goes beyond just farm to table by literally bringing the table to the farm. With food events criss-crossing America, stops in Europe slated for 2011, and tickets selling out in hours, this is one dining experience that’s a must when in a town near you.

I’m thrilled to finally be able to post my interview with Jim, in which we chat about charming venues, adventurous eaters, and geographical salts.

dp (danapop) I’m fascinated by the Outstanding in the Field concept, what made you initially come up with it?

oitf (outstanding in the field) I worked at a conventional, popular, interesting restaurant in Santa Cruz and we’d go to the farmers market twice a week and meet the farmers there and also my brother is a farmer, so I was very familiar with farms and farming.

We started farmer dinners at the restaurant and the whole menu was organized around one particular farm with the farmer getting to talk about their work. The dinners were really interesting and people wanted to hear what the farmer had to say.

That was an eye-opener, and that was in the late ‘90s. Then in the summer of ‘99 we took the dinner to a farm. It was very exciting, it went very well, but it became less of a struggle as people became more interested in learning about a farm and having a meal on a farm. Basically in the last 3 years I’ve seen that culturally people throughout the country were ready for this experience.

dp What do you think Outstanding in the Field brings to the culinary and dining scene?

oitf I think it’s fun and it’s also stimulating from a culinary perspective. It would be outstanding as in the best we could find throughout the country. We work with some of the better chefs. It mixes up people’s expectations and I think the concept of a conventional restaurant was a little tired. The whole idea of supperclubs and underground restaurants are examples of doing something out of the ordinary and unusual. People want to be a little more adventurous, really.

dp Do you think farm to table is an overused phrase? A trend?

oinf The farm to table is a little buzzy and mushy, where it used to be a little clearer. Now, you can really use that word to describe anything.

You can’t get anymore direct, or literal and real than taking a table right into the farm. That’s the new phrase, table to farm (laughing).

dp How do you select and scout locations for a tour stop? How do you come up with the menu?

oitf First the location has to be charming and beautiful. Really it comes down to the farmer and their story and cultivation of land for food.

There’s orchards, dairy operations, the sea cove ones. Whatever we find along the way we try to include. There are always more people at the table than just the fisherman or the farmer, there’s the winemaker or local cheese maker, beekeepers.

We brought in guest chefs about 5 years ago. I do the first event of the year every year in California and then the theme from that is to bring in another local chef when we travel across the country. Which is interesting in terms of ingredients and venues.

dp You kind of touched on it a bit, but beyond the remoteness, who comes up with the overall look of an event?

oitf I’m the concept guy. The table shouldn’t be seen when the guests arrive. It should be behind a row of trees. It should be in this spectacular site. I get pretty darn obsessive about that. I really like to have it in the most pleasant place it can be on the farm.

dp I know you live in Santa Cruz as a base, what does California (and its state of mind) bring to your life and business?

oitf People are definitely marching to their own drummer at times. I think here they embrace instead of question things. Across the country there’s more farm to table than in the Bay area. I think people are pretty excited throughout the country, I don’t see it as an east coast west coast thing at this point. Things are changing.

dp I hear (and have also seen) that you are quite the artist. How do you balance Outstanding in the Field with your art?

oitf My season for doing art is about November through the middle of March, through the winter. Outstanding in the Field takes places from the first day in May until late October, so it fits in perfectly really.

dp What gadget, spice, product, or technique is getting you excited these days?

oitf As elemental as it is and somewhat boring, I really like salt. I think it’s kind of a fun like wine from a certain place and such. It’s a fun geographic specific thing.

As for a gadget, a chef thinks about the knives first.

In December, James Wolcott wrote an incredible piece for Vanity Fair about the dumbing down of American culture due to the influx of reality television.

That article got me thinking of the Andy Warhol quote; “in the future everyone will be famous for 15 minutes.” So, here we are in 2010, with the MTV, CW, VH1, and E!, lineup of what television executives should be calling 15-minutes-of-fame programming.

The reality in my life is this; I’m the wife of a television and film writer and producer, and I’m about to get on my soapbox about the state of television in America. I’ve come up with this notion … reality TV is the new television “reel”-the new stepping stone for any sort of career in entertainment. Reality TV standouts parlay these vixens, airheads, and otherwise nobodies into other jobs-Kendra Wilkinson, Melissa Rycroft, Kyle Brandt, Lauren Conrad-line them up.

Because what we do know is that Kendra starred on Girls Next Door and it catapulted her into a spin-off show, a husband and a baby; Melissa went from being “blindsided” on The Bachelor’s “After the Rose” ceremony to a gig not just Dancing with the Stars, but as a special correspondent for Entertainment Tonight and 20/20. Go a few years back to when The Real World was in Chicago and Kyle was on it, he then got a reoccurring role on Days of our Lives. And who could forget LC, who starred on Laguna Hills as a mere 17-year-old high school senior, wham bam, now she’s a New York Times bestseller and clothing designer.

It’s as if it’s all a sociology experiment of he who puts themselves out there the most gets a bigger deal, to the nth degree. But, isn’t life kind of like that? He who wows the interviewer, get the job? He who writes the most niche/compelling blog, gets the book deal, then lands at HGTV…hi there Dooce. Or he who competes in a reality cooking show gets a three-show deal on that same network, then a hosting job on NBC this spring … fist pump Guy Fieri and your meal-ticket, Food Network.

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As many Facebookers so eloquently put it-not every brunette looks like Kate Beckinsale. Natch.

A couple of weeks back Facebook decided to make it Doppelgänger week. Grr. I didn’t participate.

Reason? I always get frustrated with these sorts of things because my girlfriends and sisters get compared to really gorgeous celebrities.

Like these:

And, me? Well, here’s who I’ve been told I look like:

So, lemme get this straight … an 8-year old precocious tomboy with the old-lady name of Ramona, a celebrity who often looks as if she just finished sucking on a lemon, and the mousy daughter on Life Goes On.

Awesome.

But, celebrity analysis always wants to put me in a different category (err nationality) all together with these as my top matches.

I give you Lucy Lui and Lisa Ling … um gorge, but I’m not Chinese-American. Although, admittedly I get mistaken for other nationalities often–Chinese being the most common, as well as, anywhere in the Pacific Island region. Post beach vacation I apparently look like a native from Guam.

My twin sister did a fellowship in China several years back and when she showed her flatmates a picture of our family the first response was her friend pointing at me saying, “She one of us.” Screw you Scottish ancestry. You ask, “Am I Chinese?”  “Why yes, yes, I am.” But apparently one with a penchant for tart citrus and 10-speed bicycles.

When I launched danapop I had no idea that there would actually be someone with the name or a similar name. I mean, you do all the searches for domain stuff, you try to come up with something that’s brandable, and reflective of you … and danapop fit and I had no idea about this Dana Poplawski. A.k.a–Dana Pop (as her friends and coworkers, as best as I can gather, like to call her).

In short, I get hit often with email invites to parties and requests to join groups–she sounds like she has a pretty fabulous life, in all honesty. It reminds me of that Friends episode where Monica’s credit card gets stolen and the person who stole it is having a much better time than she is.

It got me thinking–what about those people who have the unfortunate names of someone else.

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Everything old is new again, and so it goes. Maybe it’s the economy, maybe it’s the fact that formulaic “reality” television has run its course as a source of entertainment. But, suddenly, I’m seeing everything in retro with a resurgence in all things mid-twentieth century, and women taking up knitting, sewing and the iconic Potluck supper.

Here are the trends making the retro rounds…
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Drew Barrymore’s sartorial wink and a nod to the Valley of the Dolls at the Golden Globes last week made me realize it’s a good time to talk about that literary gem. I finally got around to reading it recently. Now, I see what all the fuss is about.

Valley of the Dolls is loaded – with sex (and more sex), celebrity, and of course, all those dolls (for those of you who are still wondering – dolls are pills) – all chewed up and spit out by the sacrificial beast of Hollywood. Upton Sinclair, it’s not – nor does it even try to fake it – it’s just true chick-lit all in its delicious glory. All those authors out there with their cotton-candy pink-hued book jacket covers could learn a thing or two from Jacqueline Susann about how to write a timeless piece of fiction. A piece of fiction so great you fly through it over a weekend (preferably a weekend where you’ve stocked up on a couple bottles of wine to compliment the reading – dolls optional).

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Baby it’s cold outside – at our house that usually means one thing…lots o’ television time. With the world in repeats, season endings and such, thought it would be a good time to do a TiVo roundup of sorts of shows worth watching, if you’re not already.

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