January 2011
22 posts
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Poehler the candystriper →
Ah, memories… Amy Poehler’s only modeling the look, but I was an actual candystriper and wore that exact uniform and my shoulder-length hair in a headband when I was 14-15. I never delivered flowers, which I guess is sort of the iconic and picturesque candystriper image. But I had the plum assignment of running the giftshop, which meant stealing candy and whiling the afternoon with...
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“It was in the morning and I was about to sit down to work and I told myself,...”
– Kevin Hartnett, “My resolution for 2011: Stop blaming the Internet”
I’m old enough to remember a time before the Internet and what Hartnett discovers is true! Procrastinators will procrastinate. The web isn’t the problem, you are.
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“It may not be “polite” to invite someone to show up to a party and...”
– Willa Paskin, “Did Golden Globes Host Ricky Gervais Blow It Last Night?”
Used to be there were only two reasons to watch the Golden Globes 1. Fashion faux pas and 2. Drunk acceptance speeches. From what I saw (before switching to the season premier of Big Love—priorities!),...
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Challenges
thirtydollarproject:fightwithknives:theyearofdifficultreading:
I have read exactly two of these titles and I am extremely upset that I didn’t come up with an idea like this! Good luck!
I’ve read the Byatt, Faulkner, Sterne and Marquez. I got about halfway through the Lessing, but ugh, the ponderous prose and quaint politics! Have read large chunks of Ulysses and know I have a copy of...
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“The character of a creative idea counts for nothing, artistically. It can be...”
– Peter Schjeldahl (on Alexsandr Rodchenko, an unrepentant Stalinist)
My go-to quote for debates over the morality of certain art. I thought of it during the Salem hand-wringing last year and finally decided that while their best work, the track “King Night,” is rigorous and wholehearted,...
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WatchKind of embarrassed to admit that I heard about Clive Tanaka from Jim Derogatis on Sound Opinions this past Saturday. (Someone somewhere is deducting points.) But I love how this isn’t just more of the same furry hypnogogic (catatonic) chillwavy stuff. There’s a real sense of purpose and an absolutely lovely melody that hooks you and never quite lets you go.
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More book challenge stuff
Since committing to a 2011 book challenge the other day I’ve been peering enviously into the windows of other book challenges, fogging them up etc. But not enough to defect or, god forbid, do more than one at once!
So just in case you’re looking for a reason to put that mouse or iPhone down for five seconds for a change and pick up a book, these ones look pretty good:
Back to the...
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2010 record sales →
marathonpacks:
The sales numbers for Pitchfork’s 2010 top 50 albums, as represented by the January 12 Soundscans (some weren’t present, of course). Erykah Badu and Hot Chip I ballparked based on the last charts they appeared on a couple months ago. Otherwise: listicle without commentary!
50 Wavves – King of the Beach (18,563) 49 Wild Nothing – Gemini (8,773) 44 Kylesa – Spiral Shadow...
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2011 book challenge
I used to read maybe 50, 60 books a year. Last year I read 17. So I’m resolving to read at least 24 in 2011. And to keep myself motivated I’m doing a blog sponsored reading challenge—12 books that have been sitting in my “to be read” pile for at least a year. To my shame I had a lot to choose from. But here’s the list—a pretty good mix of fiction and non-,...
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“Over the years, Edward Gorey collected twenty-one fur coats, which he was...”
– A. N. Devers, Paris Review Daily
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Watchkateoplis: MSNBC talks to Rep. Gabrielle Gifford about the death threats, vandalism and harassments.
“Sarah Palin has the crosshairs of a gun sight over our district and when people do that, they’ve gotta realize there are consequences to that action.”
The MSM and Democrats, per usual, will be too cowardly to hoist up Palin’s target map or point out the blood dripping from her fingers....
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Oh yeah!
I ended my Just Three Things blog the other day after an almost two-year run. And while it’s always bittersweet to close the book on a blog—or any long-term project—this is a massive relief. I originally started j3t to complement the Etsy shop I no longer run. But I’ve lost touch with the art & craft-making community (for now) and the format had gotten stifling.
For...
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Watchundomondo: Demdike Stare: Hashshashin Chant (by The Wire Magazine)
A mental (or locked-in syndrome?) patient hallucinates horrors, including herself as a blonde with an unfortunate haircut. Nah, good vid. And catchy song—in the same sense H1N1 is catching. It’s good to be sick like this.
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“Dennis Loy Johnson, head of Melville House Publishing, was one of the publishers...”
– Onnesha Roychoudhuri, “Books after Amazon”
I guess I knew that this kind of persuasion went on and that small publishers are basically earthworms squirming in the shadow of Amazon’s jackboot. But this is one threat away from a lead pipe to the kneecap! I’ve been a very good...
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Kodachrome
If, like me you’re feeling all nostalgic about the demise of Kodachrome film, check out this excellent archive of thousands of glorious, color-clotted slides donated by Charles W. Cushman to Indiana University. Bye-bye afternoon, right?