“Whole Foods Parking Lot” was the splashy debut of Fog and Smog, described on their web site as “a collective of creative culture vultures from The SF Bay Area and Los Angeles… directors, writers, producers, editors, composers, musicians, designers, deejays, and generally enthusiastic creative folks.” The principal performer in the video is DJDave, a.k.a. David Wittman, a Berkeley-bred, LA-based commercial and film composer. Wittman’s main cohorts in the video (and on its production)¹ include Jake “J Pusha” Pushinsky, DJ Spider and George Woolley.

WFPL went viral enough to prompt mainstream media coverage from outlets like The Hollywood Reporter and the Wall Street Journal. Fog and Smog were even hired to make a couple of TV ads for Hyundai. However, Wittman has expressed trepidation about F&S becoming a commercial venture; the group formed as a bunch of extended friends making something for fun, apart from their pre-existing careers in media and entertainment.

They have continued doing so, and have quite successfully produced more fun. If I had known before today about their second music video, “Yoga Girl,” it would probably have had its own spot in this top ten list… but I didn’t, so I’m including it here as a bonus feature. Enjoy!

I dig this lyric so much I wanna see it in text format:

We could hit up Rawvolution or the Urth Caffe,
Have a vegan cookie and talk about your day
Or we could take a walk down by the ocean,
I heard those hip openers release a lot of emotion
It’s all good though, you know, like either way…
You feel like going with me???
(Na, am-a-ste)

At fogandsmog.com or their YouTube channel, you’ll also find their third and fourth music videos. The third, “Berkeley Enough,” also came out in 2011 — but I gotta end this post sometime, and the fourth has gone into the hopper for 2012 list consideration.

• iPaddle — Attachable wooden handle for the iPad; available in table tennis or aquatic conveyance sizes
• iOta — Encyclopedia containing only miniscule specks of information
• iRate — Easily records your angry screeds about local businesses and uploads them to the web
• iKea-fy — Inoffensive but bland interior design generator; assembly required
• iAye — Maritime lingo dictionary and recorded lesson series
• iD — Consolidates all your sensitive personal information into one convenient, easy-to-steal file
• iTalic — Kink-in-the-neck therapy app; skews your entire screen image slightly to the right
• iDeals — Crawls your online and offline user history in order to detect your most deeply-held values, and returns a list of current market prices for the selling out of each. Currently in beta testing limited to the Los Angeles area.
• iDle — Inactivity generator
• iRish — Belligerence inducement app for the chronically meek; Plus edition includes taunts from rowdy Notre Dame fans
• iDog — Full-fledged virtual assistant for the blind; development currently delayed because of system vulnerability to cross-species biting attacks
• iRon — App that overheats your iPhone to the point where it can be used to press a garment
• iCelandic — iPhoto plugin for use on headshots which makes you look more gorgeous and Nordic
• iCon — Mugshot generator for the frequently arrested; Plus Edition includes both front and right-profile angles. Compatibility with iCelandic to come in v. 2.0.
• iVan — Driverless family vehicle controlled via Apple’s iCal schedule application; development currently delayed by pesky Russian accent bug in onboard voice prompts
• iSh — Approximate measurement tool

It’s February 4th, assholes. Do you still actually think the city garbage men are going to pick up your Christmas tree?

Why mention it again, lo these many months later? Yes, I’m afraid so:

At this point, I’ll give these neighbors the minimal benefit of doubting they still think the garbage men are going to pick up their tree. The question, however, remains — what the fuck, you guys?

Maybe they’re colorblind, and can no longer visually detect the tree’s discolored corpse against the neutral tones of the street and the barren weed patch it lies upon. It would be nice if they turned out to be forensic botanists, conducting an experiment to find out how long it takes for a Christmas tree to completely decompose. Unfortunately, that scenario’s pleasantness doesn’t make it any likelier to be true. That leaves only the Ockham’s razor (commonly, “the simplest explanation is usually the correct one”) explanation, which is that they simply don’t give a shit.

As long as I’m tossing out eponymous adages, I think I may have hit upon a new spinoff of Hanlon’s razor (“never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity”). Dig it:

Never attribute to either malice or stupidity that which is adequately explained by apathy.

Whaddya think? I’ve gone back and forth on whether to have the last factor be “laziness” instead of “apathy,” or the compounded “laziness or apathy,” or maybe “indifference.”

Also, if this little semi-invention is worth keeping, then what should it be called? Wood’s razor? I’m tempted to dub it something cheekier (no pun intended), like Wood’s razor burn, or Wood’s disposable razor, or (in the spirit of apathy) Wood’s saying thingy.

Suggestions? Votes? Palin-esque “refudiations?” Put ‘em in the comments!

Let’s see… there have been about ten or twelve garbage pick-ups since New Years, and for some darned reason they’ve ignored your discarded tree every time. Oh wait—I know: it’s because they don’t pick up Christmas trees! They never have! You have to take your own tree to one of the handful of places around town where the city stations a guy with a wood chipper, up through the first weekend of January or whatever. Even I know that, and I haven’t had a Christmas tree for at least five years.

Is this any way to to treat your cherished symbol of Jesus’s birthday, even if it does originate from paganism? The farm-grown Monterey Pine or Douglas Fir that you bought at Target, propped up in your living room, festooned with decorations and enjoyed the festive scent of for the better part of a month? Well, just look at it now: quite literally kicked to the curb. There it lies, denied and disowned, spurned by sanitation workers, peed on by neighborhood dogs, retaining only the capability to incinerate the entire neighborhood should it come in contact with a cigarette butt flicked from the window of a passing car.

Do the right thing, you jagoffs. All of you (the disgraced tannenbaum pictured above is not the only one still curbside around here). Pick up your trees, put them in your cars and take them wherever they need to be taken. If you don’t want them shedding in your car, tough shit—you didn’t let that stop you when you brought them home.

Merry Groundhog Day. Don’t save the trees.