Frothy Paradise

People confess: the book I’m most embarassed to have never...

Thu, 31 Jul 2008 07:45:00 -0400

People confess: the book I’m most embarassed to have never read.

I’m so glad someone else shares my dirty little secret, which I will confess in public for the first time: I’ve never read Orwell’s 1984. (The short article connected with the video is here.)

Hm.

Wed, 30 Jul 2008 22:05:00 -0400

Hi, Laura.

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dailybunny: Cat adopts rabbit. Oh my god. Cutest goddamned...

Tue, 29 Jul 2008 23:02:53 -0400

dailybunny:

Cat adopts rabbit.

Oh my god. Cutest goddamned thing EVER.

Well, I finally finished the sweater I had been knitting for my...

Sun, 27 Jul 2008 22:54:53 -0400

Well, I finally finished the sweater I had been knitting for my niece. The only problem is that the sweater is for a newborn and she’s now nine months old. Oh well! Time to start a new sweater, I guess.

Thanks to everyone who sent birthday wishes! I had a great day,...

Sun, 27 Jul 2008 00:24:14 -0400

Thanks to everyone who sent birthday wishes! I had a great day, and it was capped off by seeing Hair at the Delacorte Theater — well worth having to get up early and sit on line for hours. If you can swing it, go.

Laura and Ron watch an ad about some show where a baseball player helps restore Shoeless Joe Jackson's house:

Sun, 27 Jul 2008 00:16:00 -0400

Ron: Oh, yeah, you're so great -- you saved Shoeless Joe Jackson's house. You really want to do Shoeless Joe a favor? Get him in the Hall of Fame.

Me: So, why did they call him Shoeless Joe, anyway?

Ron: Um. Probably because he didn't wear shoes at some point.

florencio: handa: Flickr Photo Download: Bouncy Friends With...

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 15:48:21 -0400

florencio:

handa:

Flickr Photo Download: Bouncy Friends With You (via isabel)

Aw.

Hm. Wonder who it is in my family? (via www.novaksblog.com)

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 15:37:00 -0400

Hm. Wonder who it is in my family? (via www.novaksblog.com)

deplorableword: I can has blimp? It just appeared outside our...

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 12:31:42 -0400

deplorableword:

I can has blimp? It just appeared outside our office

Blimps are the best things EVER.

Mirrors Don’t Lie. Mislead? Oh, Yes.

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 12:28:01 -0400

Mirrors Don’t Lie. Mislead? Oh, Yes.: That settles it — I’m having my bathroom mirror replaced with a photo of Audrey Hepburn.

"I thought that Pierce Brosnan had been dragged to the edge of endurance by North Korean sadists in..."

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 11:16:47 -0400

“I thought that Pierce Brosnan had been dragged to the edge of endurance by North Korean sadists in his final Bond film, “Die Another Day,” but that was a quick tickle with a feather duster compared with the agony of singing Abba’s “S.O.S.” to Meryl Streep through a kitchen window. Somebody, either a cheeky Swede or another North Korean, has deliberately scored the number a tone and a half too high, with visible results: swelling muscles along the jawline, tightened throat, a panicky bulge in the eyes. There is no delicate way of putting this, but anyone watching Brosnan in mid-delivery will conclude that he has recently suffered from a series of complex digestive problems, and that the camera has, with unfortunate timing, caught him at the exact moment when he is finally working them out. What has he done to deserve this?”

- Anthony Lane, review of Mamma Mia!

The Republican Song. I’m not at all sure this is sincere,...

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 21:02:00 -0400

The Republican Song. I’m not at all sure this is sincere, but if it is, it’s priceless. As a friend of mine observed, it certainly was thoughtful of him to post his IQ right there on his baseball cap. (And, uh, why does he use a Union Jack guitar strap?)

The Lesbian Man: A Greek's Crusade to Protect His Island's Name

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 21:15:00 -0400

The Lesbian Man: A Greek's Crusade to Protect His Island's Name :

“‘My wife is a Lesbian, my daughter is a Lesbian and I am a Lesbian,’ Lambrou’s witness began, to laughter from the gallery. ‘Do you hear those people laughing?’ the witness asked the female judge. ‘All of Greece is laughing about it. And now you can imagine how we are treated abroad.’”

I think this guy should probably drop the lawsuit and start praying to St. Jude instead. Talk about lost causes.

From the flap copy: “Politicians tell us constantly that...

Thu, 10 Jul 2008 22:55:40 -0400

From the flap copy: “Politicians tell us constantly that they trust the wisdom of “The American People.” New York Times best-selling author Rick Shenkman explains why we shouldn’t—at least when it comes to politics.

Levees break in New Orleans. Iraq descends into chaos. The housing market teeters on the brink of collapse. Americans of all political stripes are heading into the 2008 election with the sense that something has gone terribly wrong with American politics. But what exactly?

Democrats blame Republicans and Republicans blame Democrats. Greedy corporate executives, rogue journalists, faulty voting machines, irresponsible defense contractors—we blame them, too. The only thing everyone seems to agree on, in fact, is that the American people are entirely blameless.

In Just How Stupid Are We?, best-selling historian and renowned myth-buster Rick Shenkman takes aim at our great national piety: the wisdom of the American people. The hard truth is that American democracy is more direct than ever—but voters are misusing, abusing, and abdicating their political power. Americans are paying less and less attention to politics at a time when they need to pay much more: Television has dumbed politics down to the basest possible level, while the real workings of politics have become vastly more complicated.

Shenkman offers concrete proposals for reforming our institutions—the government, the media, civic organizations, political parties—to make them work better for the American people. But first, Shenkman argues, we must reform ourselves.”

I’ll put this one in my to-read list.

The First Annual "Robbed!" Film Festival

Tue, 08 Jul 2008 23:36:00 -0400

The other day, I was watching the movie Boiler Room, and thought to myself for the 40th time, “Ron Rifkin really should have had the Oscar for this role, or at least a nomination.” So it occurred to me that you could make a pretty good film festival out of movies where the actors were robbed of either nominations or maybe of wins, if they were actually nominated. These are the ones I came up with for the First Annual Robbed! Film Festival (actors who were robbed are in parentheses). There are probably several dozen I’m missing:

Boiler Room (Ron Rifkin)
Two-Lane Blacktop (Warren Oates)
Gods and Monsters (both Ian McKellen and Lynn Redgrave)
A Simple Plan (Billy Bob Thornton)
Being There (Peter Sellers)
Dr. Strangelove (Peter Sellers again)
Crimes and Misdemeanors (Martin Landau)
Citizen Kane (Orson Welles)
The Manchurian Candidate (Angela Lansbury)
A Streetcar Named Desire (Marlon Brando)
Pan’s Labyrinth (Ivana Baquero)
Full Metal Jacket (Vincent d’Onofrio)
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (Brad Dourif)
Mrs. Brown (Judi Dench)
The Station Agent (Patricia Clarkson and Bobby Canavale)
Cutter’s Way (John Heard)

"You have enemies? Good. That means you’ve stood up for something, sometime in your life."

Sun, 06 Jul 2008 17:26:49 -0400

“You have enemies? Good. That means you’ve stood up for something, sometime in your life.”

- Winston Churchill

szymon: Show us your desktop, and we’re tell you who you...

Sun, 06 Jul 2008 16:24:03 -0400

szymon:

Show us your desktop, and we’re tell you who you are

submit your desktop: informationisart.com/desktop
(please reblog me :#)

Joe Cocker, simplified. Ok, because I am 12, I cracked up at...

Fri, 04 Jul 2008 22:04:00 -0400

Joe Cocker, simplified. Ok, because I am 12, I cracked up at “All I need is my butt and I.” That and “Oh hey hen, I’m gonna pat all eggs.” (Nope, those phrases won’t make sense to you until you watch it.)

Best book title EVER. And judging from what little I read of the...

Fri, 04 Jul 2008 15:38:00 -0400

Best book title EVER. And judging from what little I read of the galley, it’s pretty damn funny, too. If you’re in the US, it’s coming to a book store near you in November 2008. (Of course, it won’t get reviewed in the New York Times, unless they manage to use one of their clever circumlocutions, like, “The title of the book, which asks in colorful language whether everything is as bad as it seems….”)

Jesse Helms: Honoring a Fine, Christian Gentleman

Fri, 04 Jul 2008 15:22:00 -0400

Jesse Helms: Honoring a Fine, Christian Gentleman: Jesse Helms died today. For obvious reasons, I will not wish for the sonofabitch to rest in peace. Some of his finer pronouncements are listed at the link above; read them and be glad that the likes of him are dying out.