Monday, June 13, 2011

Books: Mamet as right-wing loon; DFW on cynics, profit-seeking; amazing ipad app from Brit library; ZOMG YA IS SO SCARY

David Mamet has lost his fucking mind like a fucking child.  Sorry, that was my Mamet impression.  He's gone all climate change doesn't exist and big government is bad;  one would think that he's got a poster with a misspelled rant and a racist caricature of Obama on it. (Financial Times, via Metafilter)

NYRB prints a 2006 interview with David Foster Wallace entitled "A Frightening Time in America."   Lot of it has to do with what he describes as an age of extreme cynicism in the U.S. and Europe, with nations of people believing that all is a performance.  Moreover, in the U.S. the celebration of wealth and the act of acquiring it has become the dominating principle, which hey, isn't news, but Christ almighty think back a hundred years where people were talkin' about how money is the root of all evil and all that good shit. (Metafilter).

Oh God, now I really want one of those stupid fucking things:  the British Library has made 1,000 titles out of its 19th Century Collection available as an ipad app.  (Teleread)

Metafilter's Daily Alice does a nice-round up of the WSJ article that described today's YA offerings as horrifying and should therefore be pissed on and buried, I guess, and the responses from YA writers that are kind of like, "Have you ever been a teenager? 'Cause now that shit, that shit's horrifying." 

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

Philadelphia: assault over urine bet, condom-filled acorns, I hate Tom Corbett and his ways, vengeance rap

BREAKING NEWS:  Dude who beat up another dude over a bet regarding the presence of a bottle of urine in the dude's car. Beat-up dude was in hospital four days.  Beating dude now going to jail (ABC).

ALSO:  Judicial complaint filed against judge who brought unwrapped-condom-filled acorns to his bench and then handed them out as, I guess, sort of a romantic gesture?  No, really, that's about the grossest creepiest thing ever.  Also the link to the ABC news story has a picture of acorns with unwrapped condoms spilling out like sofa stuffing

Philly teachers and parents are freaking out over the 3,000 layoff notices that went out to teachers in the Philly school district.  Mayor Nutter is up in Harrisburg begging for money so that our city can educate its youth.  Yeah, I'm sure Gov. Corbett will get right on that. (CBS)

There was a big anti-Marcellus Shale-fracking rally in the state capitol -- only the activists were divided because some wanted to ban fracking on the grounds that the process will poison your water and kill you and everything you treasure, while others were in favor of taxing the companies for the privilege of poisoning the water and killing all of God's creatures (Politics PA).

PA is losing federal unemployment benefits, so the unemployed here are in desperate need of state unemployment funds.  But they're fucking around with it in the capitol, so some unemployed may face a period of zero income (Poconos Record).

Rap Master Maurice will make up a vengeance rap for ya.  It only costs seventeen bucks.  He'll then phone up the object of your ire and RAP YOUR WRATH (he'll also do a friendly rap for a few more bucks -- it's harder to rhyme the love, yo).  Here is an excerpt from his '08 anti-McCain rap:

NOW THIS JOHN MCCAIN SEE HE'S A LUNATIC
HIS DOME IS LIKE A MILKSHAKE YOU SEE HIS HEAD IS THICK
HE WANTS TO KEEP THE USA IN IRAQ
THAT'S ABOUT AS HEALTHY AS A DOUBLE BIG MAC
I'D RATHER CAST MY VOTE FOR MAYOR MCCHEESE
AT LEAST HE DOESN'T HATE THE VIETNAMESE 



Oh Rap Master Maurice, how I love thee, and thus I sing your praises, even tho I ain't sure you're in Philly. (via DailyCandy Philadelphia)

Thursday, June 2, 2011

Books: The New Yorker's fear of vaginas, addiction to romance novels, tweeting Ulysses (why not)

The Awl  has put together a list of first appearances of profanity in The New Yorker.  'Slut' was used in 1974 but the super-duper dirty word VAGINA didn't appear until 1995. Fact.  Make of that what you will. (via Metafilter)

Some stupid psychologist on some stupid Christian website has opined that she is seeing a growing number of women "clinically addicted" to romance novels.  It's the careful usage of 'clinically' that cracks me up.  Anyways, this stirred up the twittersphere, with #romancekills trending big time and one author (Jason Pinter) claiming that King George VI's stutter was caused by remembering sex scenes on the page (The Guardian).

From of the department of No, I'm not really sure why, either:  This Bloomsday, a 'volunteer army' will tweet Joyce's Ulysses.  The whole thing. 140 characters at a time.  Fucking book nerds, man, I don't know.  (WritersWrite)

The National Academies Press is now offering its catalog (4000 titles science science science) as free downloads (Metafilter). More online goodness:  Next fall, Centre Pompidou in France will create the world's largest internet-accessible collection of modern art.  (TeleRead)