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While nursing a cold—one of those nasty strains whose main symptoms seem to clear up quickly enough but don’t disappear entirely—we finally put on the dvds of Mad Men we’d been saving for this sort of emergency. (Yes, we had never seen Mad Men until last week but we know who Jon Hamm is.)

Over the years we have watched and enjoyed The Sopranos, Deadwood, The Wire, and more recently, Game of Thrones, Breaking Bad and Homeland, but we can say in all finality that Mad Men is the bleakest of the lot.

Characters don’t drop dead with anywhere near the frequency they do on our favorite shows, but Man Men is more depressing because it is about people who have arrived at The American Dream and discovered that it is empty. They’re not only living a lie, they create the lie, and they’re too invested in it to escape.

So they dull the pain by smoking, drinking and screwing around but they’ll never be saved. The only way out is the window of their 23rd floor office. We gather many Mad Men viewers yearn for those more innocent times when you could smoke three packs a day, have five martinis at lunch and drink openly and constantly in the office without being lectured about your health (Because they weren’t fully aware of the consequences to your health), plus have multiple affairs and commit casual sexual harassment every ten minutes. One thing about that lifestyle: they died young.

Jon Hamm would’ve been perfectly cast as Jay Gatsby. His character Don Draper is already a Gatsby—a man who erased his past, adopted a new name and invented himself. It’s the Great American Novel in TV form.

Space Invaders: Why you should never, ever use two spaces after a period.

And don’t send us text or email in ALL CAPS because it is the typographic equivalent of yelling and it guarantees that your message will not be read.

David 8 Holding Things

CCL please check your email.

Saffy thanks her vet Dr. Mayem Yao for the consultation. Dr. Mayem runs Pendragon Veterinary Clinic, Rm 203 Amaremca Bldg, 107A Kalayaan Avenue (across from Eunilaine grocery), Diliman, QC. Telephone (02)4363833 for an appointment or visit www.pendragonvet.com.

We had decided to extend the contest for lack of entries until we got this message from the lone contestant.

“Really? But I must confess that I worked around my office hours, family commitments, teaching load, and was late in coming to pick up my love on Friday all to make the deadline.

“I write this because I must respectfully manifest that it truly was a contest. That others didn’t make the finish line because they only thought about joining the race ought not invalidate my effort…”(Read the rest in Comments)

True: he can’t be deprived of the prize because no one else was interested enough to make the deadline. Congratulations, pick up your prize any day after Wednesday 20 June 2012 at the Customer Service counter of National Bookstore at Power Plant Mall, Rockwell, Makati.

With that, The Weekly LitWit Challenge goes on an indefinite break. When lack of interest makes compliance the sole criterion it is time for a reassessment.

* * * * *

The assignment: Write a 7-day diary in the voice of a well-known literary character.

The word count: No word limit, knock yourselves out.

The catch: The literary character you impersonate must not be the first person narrator of the work she/he appears in. So no Holden Caulfield, Humbert Humbert, Nick Carraway, Scout or Bridget Jones. (However, you may write as Phoebe, Lolita, Jay Gatz, Boo Radley or Darcy since they are not the narrators of their novels. Get it?)

The deadline: You must post your 7-day diary in Comments by Friday, 15 June 2012 at 2359.

The prize: This beautiful handmade leather-bound journal by Ciak, and a Sheaffer pen.

The deadline: Post your 7-day diary in Comments by Friday, 15 June 2012 at 2359.

The Weekly LitWit Challenge is brought to you by our friends at National Bookstore.

Thanks to Garden Barn Inc for the Ciak journal. For more information on Ciak journals visit www.gardenbarn.com.ph.

Tom Cruise photo from W. On one hand he overdoes everything; on the other hand he’s never lazy.

Rock of Ages is so awful we could not get up and leave the theatre even as the movie went from cheesy to putrid. It was as if we had been glued to the leatherette with the cold sweat and half-dried vomit of the people from the previous screenings.

And yet we would pay 100% of the ticket price to watch a movie about Guns N’ Roses starring Tom Cruise as Axl Rose and Johnny Depp as Slash. As long as Cruise’s singing is dubbed. Please, cats can sing Paradise City better than that.

Reactions from the audience, of which we comprised 3/7ths.

On the girl ingenue singing Sister Christian
– Nothing beats crazy Alfred Molina singing that while his Asian boy sets off firecrackers in Boogie Nights.

On Alec Baldwin and Russell Brand singing anything
– Alec Baldwin looks embarrassed.
– I’m embarrassed for him.
– Does Russell Brand have other settings besides “Irritating”?

On the boy ingenue
– He looks like John Schneider from The Dukes of Hazzard.
– With the hair of the other guy from The Dukes of Hazzard.
– Aha! He is the spawn of the two guys from The Dukes of Hazzard.

On Bryan Cranston and Catherine Zeta Jones being in the movie
– Aaaaaaa it’s Walter White from Breaking Bad!
– What possessed him to take this role?
– Maybe they expected Mamma Mia-type grosses?
– This movie makes Mamma Mia look brilliant.
– Wait, if Zeta Jones’s character hates rock why is she singing Pat Benatar?

On Mary J. Blige suddenly showing up
Everybody: Mary, what the hell are you doing in this movie!!!

On Tom Cruise and Hey Man
– Contrast in acting styles, the baboon is so relaxed.

On Tom Cruise singing Pour Some Sugar On Me
– Aha Tom revisiting scene of early triumph: dancing to Bob Seger in his underwear.
– That has to be Tom Cruise himself because why would you get dubbed to sound terrible?

Warning: Do not expose pale Scots to tropical climate. Use SPF 50000.

JZ: The thing with having such vocal fans online is that they will turn on you in a second if a character goes someplace they don’t like.

MM: The guy who runs Marvel said this brilliant line: “The readers think Spider-Man is real and the creator isn’t.” And it’s a very good point. When they don’t like something happening in Spider-Man they say, “Kill this guy!” Spider-Man is the one they protect, they don’t care about the human guy who writes him.

I get it, it’s your childhood you’re protecting. I remember at age 29 going to see the Star Wars prequel and being so angry. Cause it’s your childhood and when someone makes a wrong move with something you love, it’s powerful.

I like that, it keeps you on your toes…You can’t screw up, knowing there’s 100,000 people waiting to kill you. It makes you try harder.

JZ: Having worked on some movies, do you also want to direct?

MM: I started directing a film last year. What happened was that I got some private money together to finance this movie. It’s a British superhero movie about four guys who get superpowers, and one of them becomes evil so the others have to stop him. And I heard about Chronicle when I was five days into shooting it and I go, “(Bleeeet).” I even had the same thing with the levitating camera!

The worst thing is that Chronicle is brilliant, one of my favorite movies from the last couple of years, so I would’ve had the lamer version of Chronicle. I had to let it go. But a couple of years from now I’d like to try again. I’m producing quite a few movies now, like Kick-Ass 2, Nemesis, Superior, and I’m trying to find financing to do American Jesus, a book I did a few years back.

Read the rest in our column Emotional Weather Report, today in the Philippine Star.