Reality

In this festive holiday season, sometimes we forget how bad things can be out there. One student of mine reminded me just how much our world needs to change on Monday.

Over the weekend her older sister was shot. She is alive and in the hospital and the man who shot her is in police custody. She was doing nothing wrong, did not know the man who shot her, and was just walking down the street.

My fifth grade student and her older brother, who is in sixth grade, are switching off every day who misses school to babysit their siblings while their mom spends the days in the hospital at her daughter’s bedside.

As an adult who has experienced the loss of a loved one, I still have no idea how to even approach my student. There is no reason that at 10 years old she should be trying to cope with such a tragedy. This student and I aren’t particularly close, but she clearly wanted to talk to someone about it when all I had to was ask her how her weekend was on Monday morning for her to tell me what happened. Her brother refuses to talk to anyone about it, and only refers to it as “the incident on Friday”.

What kind of twisted world do we live in that this is a common occurrence for my students to face?

An Ape Displaced or A Largely Unnecessary Essay on the Morality of Donkey Kong

Donkey Kong's first appearance is that of the aggressor- he kidnaps Jumpman's girlfriend Paula and for no discernable reason ascends a construction site to escape the pursuing beau. However, this plan is absurd- Donkey Kong is, after all, an ape, and his transposition from natural habitat to urban environment leaves him unprepared for long term survival.

Script for a movie presented without comment, starring Noah Yuenkel and David Reed

AWKWARDLY INTENSE

[David and Noah are sitting on the couch. Hold shot from behind for several seconds.]

[Cut to front, then close-up as both turn and speak at once] DAVID&NOAH: Do you have the remote?

DAVID: Wow, that was intensely awkward.

NOAH: [slight pause] Awkwardly intense.

[Closer yet] DAVID [with dawning insistence]: Intensely awkward.

Now cutting to various scenes as the battle escalates

[NOAH walks past DAVID humming wistfully to a musical snow globe.] NOAH: Awkwardly intense.

[NOAH and DAVID flip through old yearbook. Finger point to awkward guy.]

DAVID: [ecstatic] Intensely awkward!

[DAVID squeezes past NOAH in an incredibly narrow hallway] NOAH: [satisfied] Awkwardly intense.

[NOAH turns on a Christmas tree full of ornaments of his face. Pause. He turns it off, leaving himself in darkness.] DAVID: [call from offscreen] Intensely awkward!

[DAVID climbs tree, triumphantly reaches for last branch, which is NOAH’s leg.]

NOAH [perching contentedly]: Awkwardly intense.

[DAVID bites down on a hard old baguette, fails to make a dent. NOAH grabs baguette and aggressively finishes the job. He does not relish what must be done.]

DAVID: You win! [with slight violation] You win.

Script for a movie, presented without comment

IN BED WITH A HONEY

[Slow pan from two pairs of feet up to a guy and a hot girl are wrapped in covers in bed, a foot apart. They stare blankly at each other, moving slightly on occasion, for a minute and a half.]

Naturally.

"Because he spent so much time with professor Oak. If you remember, they were like best buds. Its like, Ash left krabby at the day care FOREVER. So naturally the krabby is at level 60 or something, and it makes sense why he would evolve after one battle."

DREED to !QUOI

I Love You, George Takei

Played out, blah, blah, blah. Just read it.

"Capable psychonauts who think about thinking, about states of mind, about set and setting, can get things done not because they have more will power, more drive, but because they know productivity is a game of cat and mouse versus a childish primal human predilection for pleasure and novelty which can never be excised from the soul, " from Procrastination via You Are Not So Smart

Delayed Introduction

"夢の途中(In the Midst of a Dream) by Shuichi Nakano"

Dear Everybody,

I realize that my addition to the reboot of this blog has been rather lacking, and it can only be attributed to my own personal failings and the accompanying ennui. Alas, this is but a feeble excuse! So, without further ado, I present an update, a preview, and discussions of my current state of affairs.

ONWARD

© Jake Naughton 2010

Transfixed by the firm hand of taxidermy and the gaze of GOD, we look ever onward and upward. From the PACIFICNORTHWEST™.

All, all alike endear’d, grown, ungrown, young or old,

Strong, ample, fair, enduring, capable, rich,

Perennial with the Earth, with Freedom, Law and Love,

   -Walt Whitman, America

Lonesome Cold Weather: New Music!

from Gerda Suzanna Vegt

Dear Noah,

I hear it is unseasonably cold in Wisconsin right now. To help bear the cold, here are a few things to things to listen to that will warm your autumnal spirit. Cheers, to warmer hearts.

Manifest Destiny™

Gladiator versus the Wyoming wilds © Jake Naughton 2010

OH!FAIREST READERS MINE
In the coming days prepare thine eyes and stomachs for an onslaught of hitherto unseen images from the PACIFICNORTHWEST™ archives.

an intro...!quoi

hi i'm khoa.
this is me in summary:

Herald, the intern

"Puppies Dream" from Ray's Writing Blog: http://raymond-teodos-writings.blogspot.com/

Dear Everybody,

My name is Herald, the editorial intern. I'm supposed to write about myself, but I'm not sure why. I've known these cats for quite a while (four years by count, possibly three by theirs) and I'm quite fond of them. Most of them write frequently while I don't. But it can't be that hard, it's just like talking you know? I do that all the time.

These are the things I like. Actually, let me run down the list of things I look at every Sunday morning.

Halloween Books-What makes your list?

The lightening streaks across the sky over Lake Michigan, chased quickly by the growl of thunder. My favorite weather is thunder storms, and as Halloween approaches, it seems fitting that the weather tonight matches the creepy mood of the holiday. As a bibliophile with eyes too big for my wallet, I have always dreamed of owning a bookstore. And in said imaginary bookstore, I have already planned the Halloween "must reads table".

Allison

Sitting at my kitchen table with a bowl of pasta, large glass of milk, iphone, and stack of papers to grade on a Friday night, I thought to my self "self, find a way to procrastinate!" And thus, I decided it was time to write my introduction. While this encompasses most of my life, if you need more detail, read on!

My name is Allison, I am 22, and I am currently residing in the fantastic city of Chicago. Although I originate from Saint Paul, Minnesota, I spent four years at UW-Madison and have now made yet another move. According to that diploma that I spent years working towards, I am a secondary education English teacher. According to my job that I get paid way too little for, I am a 5th grade paraprofessional.

Working at a charter school in one of Chicago's poorest neighborhoods on the west side has taken over my life, and thus most of my posts will probably center somewhere around there. The school day runs from 8 am to 5 pm and I spend it working primarily with a boy who suffered a stroke due to his sickle cell anemia 2 years ago. At age 11 he walks with a cane, suffered some brain damage, and is one of the sweetest children I have had the pleasure to work with.

Interests outside of teaching involves copious amounts of reading when given the time, drinking a lot of coffee, tweeting, and hanging out with my roommate that I have known since age 5 when she asked me to be bus friends on the way to kindergarten.

Happy reading!

Noah

 Howdy, reader- my name is Noah, and I am a husky voiced, handsome twenty-something that enjoys long walks on the beach, candle-lit dinners and altercations with tentacular horrors from beyond the stars.

Here is a picture of me. Please, don’t stare like that- I embarrass easily.

Let's get to know each other.

I live in the fine city of Madison, WI, living out my post-college days as a general-use underling at a factory. It is precisely as interesting as you have already assumed, and I won’t waste your time with the details.

I am, by aspiration, a writer of fictions; by perspiration, a manufacturer of comics; and by leisure, a complete media-vore: literature, comics, music, television, film, videogames and the trapping of the internet. As such, my contributions to this glorious land of Scrabblegories are those of review, preview and examination of whatever is currently catching my eye and devouring my time.

I can already tell we’re going to get along fine.

The Iraq War Logs

So this is literally breaking as I type this, and I know you all aren't as obsessed with media consumption as I am, but something extremely significant is happening right now.

As you may or may not know, Wikileaks has been ramping up to unleash something around 400,000 leaked and previously classified dox on the Iraq war (unsurprisingly, the largest document leak in US military history). Major news outlets around the world including the New York Times, the Guardian, Le Monde, Der Spiegel, Al Jazeera (links after the jump) and others have had complete access to all the documents for 10 weeks under condition of embargo until about 30 minutes ago. Here's the exciting part: simultaneously 5 of the most important news outlets in the world released their in-depth reporting on the information cache. Nothing like this has ever happened before. And everyone has some pretty damning discoveries.

Jake

illustration by MoxyCreative

lede:
Rather than do a lengthy intro, I thought I might just give you a digest of links I tweeted [follow me!] today. Lazy? Yes! But it's emblematic of what I'm interested in and the gist of topics that I'll probably be posting about here.

soundbite:

I currently work as an intern at the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, a journalism non-profit that funds in-depth reporting on under-cover issues around the globe and spend a lot of time on the computer at work.  

+ 

I am a photographer. Find my work at my website, Jake Naughton Photography.

more after the jump

An Introduction: James

Greetings fellow citizens of the internet, my name is James T. Tynion IV, and I am generally pretty awesome. Here is an awesome drawing of me, so you can see for yourself:

(Art by Joe Kuenzle)

REWELCOME TO SCRABBLEGORIES

Picture Unrelated (via chan4chan.com)

Howdy Folks.

If you're reading this, congratulations! You are literate. You're also on the World Famous SETTLERS OF SCRABBLEGORIES, a delightful addition to the already overstuffed blogodrome that we call home.

So here's the story-

Five Great Halloween Movies for People Who Don’t Like Horror

As many of you know, over the course of the last couple of years I have spent a great deal of time working to further my knowledge of the horror genre, particularly in regards to its film presence here in America and across the globe. There are an incredible number of these films, particularly when you broaden the spectrum to include the majority of tense, monster-based Science Fiction films of the 1950 and 60s... And yet a large number of filmgoers can't stand this genre, and do their best to avoid scary movies, but then Halloween comes by and I get the familiar question, "What kinda horror movie won't scare the crap out of me?" And here I am today to oblige an answer.

If you are one of the multitude of people who don’t care at all for blood, gore, screaming, and monsters from another world, and yet you'd like to keep your movie-watching experiences to be season-appropriate, I suggest you take a look at the five films I've listed below. They each certainly count as members of the Horror genre, and yet they lack that visceral terror that renders some trembling with fear long after the final credits have rolled. That doesn't mean these are bad horror films, some of them are simply old, and others hold more of a comedic or adventurous tone. But to this day, these remain among the best the genre has to offer, and I couldn't recommend them enough.

1. The Curse of Frankenstein

With any film adaptation of the original Frankenstein story, the subtleties of the original novel tend to get nixed in favor of clear-cut good and evil. However, the lovely people at Hammer Films decided to take a much different path than their predecessors at Universal by making Baron Frankenstein himself the true villain of the film. Creepy with a touch of camp, with a great performance by Peter Cushing (Grand Moff Tarkin) as Baron Frankenstein and a young Christopher Lee decked out as Frankenstein’s monster himself!

This was quite the scandalous film at the time, but it’s doubtful this film out of the 1950s will send you shaking with fright. And yet the image of perfect villainy in Baron Frankenstein, and the creepy overtones in the film still leave a spooky Halloween movie you can enjoy this October.

Simple Joys

Some times its the simplest things that can brighten up one's day.

Re:re: So Uncomfortable

Sadly, as many things go in education, it is never as simple as "so don't".

The students in question are being stigmatized by their clothing being soiled everyday visibly, as well as the odor coming from them. It is affecting them socially, as other kids don't want to sit by them, work with them, or talk to them at lunch.

And no, I do not have the resources to get them new shirts. I can't afford it, the school can't afford it, and from what I got from the special education teacher, the parents definitely can't afford it. They don't have running water in their home, mom and dad don't work, dad can't read, mom is in and out of the hospital on a weekly basis, and all four of the boys receive almost every service offered by the school.

So maybe in suburban Milwaukee, the worst thing that can happen to you is a teacher labels you a "dirty kid" by discreetly talking to your parents, but in one of the worst neighborhoods in Chicago it is far worse to have to wait days for your food stamps to arrive because you have nothing in your home to eat.

-Previously-
Re: So Uncomfortable
So Uncomfortable

Dreamcats

My love for tmblr has its limits. This is not one of them. 

DREAMCATS....

Listening to Sung Tongs...

New Mexico dreaming...

Amores Perros

Sartorialist or Catorialist?

via Catorialist, male on street, sporting a bronze ball choker

via Sartorialist, male on street, sporting a butterfly

Re: So Uncomfortable

Simple Answer: You don't. 

It seems that if the boys' hygiene aren't bothering the other students and aren't impairing them educationally or socially (as far as you can see), then why does matter if they have stained shirts? I know you probably have the resources to get them new shirts, but I'm not sure you want to be in charge of these kids weekly dirty laundry.  Any action short of that will result in the implication that the parents aren't keeping up their end in the battle of boyhood hygiene. And I think that prospect is what is seriously putting the chill in your bones. 

But if the boys are getting along fine (whether or not they're secretly embarrassed), then let them go along -- no need to add further insult to injury. 

The worst thing in the world for a kid is for your teacher to name you the dirty kid.

-Previously-
So Uncomfortable...

So Uncomfortable...

I need to have the most uncomfortable conversation that you can have with a parent today. How do you talk to a parent about the fact that they are sending their children to school dirty? I am not just talking about a body odor problem, that’s be easier to handle. These 4 brothers are coming to school in the same grossly stained clothing many days in a row. One of these boys is the student that I spend my entire day modifying work for, and it breaks my heart to see him coming to school in filthy clothing every day.

How do you talk to a parent about this??

Internal Matters for Posterity's Sake

So the wheels are turning again and something might just become of this strange little blog. BUT WHAT COULD IT POSSIBLY BE?!

For all of our faithful readers (which are basically just all of us who were already "on staff" so far), I think it is important to peel back the curtains and reveal what's been going on. If only for posterity's sake, so that we might come back to this post months from now and remember when we started to define ourselves. Or so we can trace the origins of the internal disagreements that ripped the blog asunder.

It seems that we've moved back to that special time of year when all of us have been thinking about how we really ought to run a blog together, only it seems that with our group of friends now spread evenly across the country (if evenly is the proper description for a handful of cities on the East Coast and in the Midwest), both Misters Noah J. and Quoctrung Bui have decided to get the ball rolling! How Scandalous!

ITS TIME

OH, Hi Guys...


So its about time to officially rechristen this mammoth boat. 
I was surprised that we managed to update this thing as many times as we have. But now that some of us are out of school, this shouldn't be a problem anymore! Wait...what are we doing here? Some people, like Timmy Wilgrims, believe that a successful blog has to have a precise thematic underpinning in order to be interesting to read. I was thinking about this on my bike ride home, and I wondered what could that theme be? Now that I'm not in school, I could really focus into a very specialized topic and be blog-famous, publish a cheap paperback, and go on tour! Suck it guys...writing is easy--especially in blogform. 


But the question remains, what could it be?

Modern music often strives to contain a narrative, the most popular story being one of love or love lost. However, cannot music explore each and every facet of the human experience, even those that cannot be explained through the telling of a tale? When considered beyond lyrics, music is perhaps the most intuitive medium; if film and visual art are an exploration of the external aspects of the self (with an inherent focus that is centered on the physical features, actions and dialogue of the characters), and the novel an internal medium (with an inherent focus that is centered on the thoughts or feelings of the characters), then music must be striving to reach something even more abstract: the ineffable subjectivity of the listener. While one can usually explain or be convinced of the merits of a certain genre of film or style of novel over another, one's taste in music is much more intimate and often inexplicable. While no piece of art evokes just one emotion, they usually fall into a certain range, whereas two people can listen to the same piece of music and have radically different reactions to it. The emotions evoked from a piece of music depend almost entirely on the subjective experience of the listener; if I love Johnny Cash and someone else doesn't, there is little I can say to make them see why and if I find a song uplifting and someone else finds it depressing, there is little either of us can do to close that gulf. But really, I think that is one of music's inherent strengths. Music is, perhaps, all emotion (to the point that trying to use words to describe it is as absurd as trying to use tap-dance to describe architecture), and it is also something that can affect us deeply and with enduring strength, which should be a key component to any definition of art.

Thus, here is a Top-Ten list of songs about prison. To be considered here, the song must actually deal with prison as an idea or an experience and not just have it in the title. I also strove for diverse range of musical styles and ways of interpreting the idea of prison. Also, the song needs to be good.

Israel

So I have a 12 page paper due Monday morning. Now I know what you're all thinking, you're thinking "Holy cow you'd better get started on that bad boy soon, or else you won't have time to do any studying for your psych exam which is on Monday, that being the same day as your paper's deadline." But the situation is not so dire. You see, we had to write a 6 page early version about a month ago that we would then flesh out for this final paper. At the time, I thought this was irritating, but now I am reaping the benefits of having half of the paper done already.

What does this have to do with the blog? Nothing. But here's the dilemma. Every time I need to write a paper, at least lately, it ends up working like this: I keep on trying to start, but I know that I can write much better. And yet I keep on cranking out these poorly written, awkwardly connected paragraphs. But then, after a while, it starts to flow better, and I go back and redo whatever I wrote during those first twenty or so minutes. So I thought to myself, maybe I just need to warm up. You won't attempt to deadlift three hundred pounds for the first time without warming up, would you? Of course not! You'd stretch your hip flexors a bit, maybe do a couple pull throughs to groove proper hip mechanics, and start with lighter weights first. And for my last post on the blog, the same sort of thing happened (this should have been placed higher up): the first paragraph or two was pretty slow going, but then once the ball got rolling the writing went a lot faster, and I started having some fun with it.

But now that I've written two paragraphs, I'm starting to have some serious doubt. I want you all to understand my concerns, so I'll go back to a sports metaphor. If you wanted to race someone in a 400m dash, it's true, you would warm up first. But you wouldn't do just anything to warm up; you'd have to pursue a sport-specific warm up in addition to your general warm up, as detailed by Thomas Kurz in Stretching Scientifically. That is, I wouldn't prepare for a race by doing a bunch of dips or pushups; I would do some leg swings, or butt kicks, or a quick little warm up jog. Could it be, that by wasting the time of whoever is bored enough to read this, I am committing such an error? Will I go back to my essay and find that I've only warmed up for random rambling with sports metaphors thrown in? Will I be unprepared for discussing United States foreign policy toward Israel? Should I have just made a quick outline, or at least taken some time to decide what it is I'm going to write? This is a serious dilemma. I need to write a two to three page contextual introduction, and yet I have no idea what I'm going to say. Why does this matter? What reasons am I going to give? Are there any sources I should read? Is it a mistake to be sitting here without a single one of my sources handy? This seems likely.

Then again, the first paper was supposed to have said introduction, yet my introduction was one short paragraph before I cut to the chase, and yet a got a good grade. But that is foolish reasoning; it should be much easier to write 2-3 pages of filler than 2-3 pages of meat, and I really should take advantage of this great opportunity for easy writing.

Anyway, it is time to turn again to this paper. Perhaps in the future I will share the results of this experiment with you, dear readers, at least those who are left after Tim ravaged the blog mercilessly with a series of inane, pointless posts.

Castaway, A Poem for Wilson

This is a tribute to my friend Sara, grounded in boring, provincial Paris by the terror of Iceland, while her friends gallivant in Turkey. They left her only a dated pop culture reference, and I thought immediately of this blog that I totally killed.

In the heady dot-com boom I heard
a rumor:
Tom Hanks was giving up the grin;
sending his mother
the FedEx uniform,
kept pressed in the closet
but never far from the chest.

"He's running for president,
or maybe playing one," they told me,
and all I could think of was an island,
scrap in a Hollywood dump.
A coconut tree, a wind machine,
and a painted volleyball,
mute and waiting.

I may have have stolen this blog entry from my other self because I couldn't decide which blog would be less interested in this

As usual in these situations, everyone loses.

K, so there was some music fest or something. There was music, blogging, beer-sweat T-shirts, but mostly blogging.
It was beautiful, probably.

But that was last week! This week, what we care about is stodgy guys discovering Youtube. I just won't let my developing classical music-blogging obsession die.

Here's a composer who pieced together Youtube auditions for his piece into a Powerpoint-ish purple-gradient-tastic 250-person choir. What poor grad student edited this into semi-coherence? We will never know, but his windows on our walls of many lanlord-friendly colors, windows into our souls, we will never forget.




Eric Whitacre has friends! Friends, named Steven Bryant, who tell us the Composing Secrets "They" Don't Want You To Know! But seriously, this guy deserves some Internet fame, because it's clear from his blog that composition is the dismal science.

And by science, I mean, art. And by dismal, I mean, no money.

Interweb comment of the day

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

How I Started Developing a Head Tic...And Then Destroyed It

I just got back from getting my eyes examined. You see, last week I had pain in my right eye, and the nice people at UHS told me that everything looked fine, and that I shouldn't worry about it unless it gets worse. And then I started seeing a spot at night, so I figured that probably counted as getting worse and decided to have it looked at. And after a thorough examination, the doctor concluded that everything looked fine. And thus I conclude another chapter of my body randomly malfunctioning for no apparent reason (though to be fair, he did say it was probably just eigengrau, the stuff you see in darkness when your brain decides it doesn't want to just see blackness and starts making random neurons fire).

Which reminded of this one time my body malfunctioned, and I was actually able to solve the problem. So now it's time for me to share this glorious success story with you all.

Back in maybe January, I noticed that for the past month, about once a week, I would be minding my own business when suddenly my head would just twitch for no reason. I thought to myself, "How odd. I hope this doesn't get worse." But of course it did, and soon enough it progressed to once a day, then repeatedly throughout the day, and I thought to myself, "Great, another mild bodily woe not quite serious enough to actually complain about." However, the many hours I had spent researching anatomy and various physical dysfunctions came in handy. I immediately thought of a picture that was taken of me while I was preparing to race my illustrious roommates down the street to see who wouldn't have to pay for the two pitchers of beer we got at the Great Dane. What struck me about that picture was that my posture was just terrible; I was engaging in forward head carrying to the extreme. A good example of this can be seen below, where rather than resting comfortably on top of the spine, the head hangs forward, stuck in a looking at a computer screen style pose.

Here, have another picture.

Supposedly, for every inch your head is held forward of center, it adds an extra ten pounds of strain on your neck. This seems like a wild exaggeration, and I'm not sure why I added it in.

So I hypothesized that my forward head carrying was the culprit, and put several stretches into action. The first involves lightly retracting your chin/pulling it back. This should be gentle. The woman in the picture used her fingers to assist her, but I wasn't that hardcore. (if any of you are inspired to do any of those, remember to be gentle, and if you do use your hands, use them to pull or push on your head just the slightest amount - this isn't a quadriceps stretch, so don't treat it like one)

The next is basically the same, but you sort of tilt your head forward and look down toward the ground to give those posterior fibers a good but gentle stretch.

Now it's time to start stretching those levator scapulae. Keep your chin retracted, and pull your head or just let it fall forward at about a 45 degree angle.

Lastly, keeping your chin retracted as usual, let it fall to the side.

When I did this last one I felt a great stretch akin to the first time I successfully stretched my hamstrings in the muscle itself, rather than just the tendons. But it wasn't quite that hardcore.

And after I did those stretches, I found that the twitch had went away. It came back the next day, so I stretched again, and it went away again. But, being the aggressive guy that I am, I kept on stretching, and it has not come back.

Now maybe if you're lucky, someday I'll tell you about the time it hurt to raise my left arm to the side once it reached around 90 degrees, but I did this one stretch and the pain went away instantly.

THE END

best anti-virus hardware?

ps-wii?

linkified...

extreme disappointment

after seeing some of the new posts...i've come to the conclusion that we have some posters on this blog that haven't fulfilled their duties for this blog...u know who u r...

until then...

OK CUPID

JRGREENE and I had an interesting discussion about gender and compatibility. Now singles ladies, and single men (I suppose), I want to open the topic up to race, gender, and comptability. There is an interesting website run by OKCupid, called OKTRENDS that tracks the messaging behavior of their users. This makes for an interesting sample to think about how people choose a partner. Lots and lots of great data, pick and choose your favorite and lets talk about them. Mine are:

If you take a look at this series and the interval as men age, it's pretty obvious that men prefer women younger to them, and seem to be ok with women a few years older. But its pretty halarious the youngest possible match for old men is ~30years!

But if we look at women, they seem to be pretty reasonable--but they skew a bit older, but aleast the interval says relatively uniform as they age.

And of course, there is beauty. Which is to say that this chart maps women's overall attractiveness over time.

And it seems like, atleast for women, if you're hot, you stay hot. Now, that means a few things that are interesting to me--overall your attractiveness doesn't change despite your age. If you are in the top quantile of good looking women, you stay there --even compared to women in the same quantile of a younger age! The author says that this sample is taken from responses of available single women positing that your avg 35 year old is probably married and therefore has stopped optimizing her looks. I don't know about that. I would actually be interested to see how a representative sample of married and unmarried women would fare.

Let me know your thoughts, America. I know its taboo to rate people, and I've shied away from it, but I guess in this medium, where you do it annonymously from the comfort of your own home, makes me feel better about it, especially when you get frank results.

Edmund, an entirely irrelevant experience

Citizens of the blogodrome, I hope it goes without saying that of all our honored hosts, the last with whom I would strike discord would be Mr. Dreed.

Nevertheless, I cannot allow certain recent musings to go unchallenged. (Christ, how did people ever get to the point before the 20th century?)

The central issue with Edmund is not whether or not it needs to be entertaining. It's pretty clear that a game by the name of "interactive software" is one in need of having its glasses ripped off and casually torn at the bridge, but also one that might grow up to do some good someday.

My Word! Edmund, an entirely unpleasant experience.

I recently had occasion to sit in a dank, dark room and play one of those "electronically televised games". I say, chaps, a bit balmy on the crumpet, and I had a spot of the blue devils afterward. I hadn't been so befuddled since I caught my friend the broomsquire in a nasty jar with a clergyman's daughter. Unless you want to hear a lot of rubbish, I suggest you cut it to the snuggery.

Gorillaz Return in Stylo

Apparently, I live in a cave under a rock on the moon, because, despite my almost rabid fan-love I somehow missed the fact that the new Gorillaz album, Plastic Beach drops on March 9th. Featuring guests ranging from Mos Def to Lou Reed, I'd say this is something to watch for- well, if you need convincing. At this point, I'd say Gorillaz' legacy is more or less secure.

Interesting to note- despite there being a bit of talk (so said Murdoc, anyhow, back when Demon Days hit) that Gorillaz was going to be a trilogy, I'm not seeing a lot of last-album-buzz around this. Though I suppose hoping for a fourth album before hearing the third is a bit greedy. 

I'll give you my sage opinion as soon as I get my slightly furry hands on it, but until then satisfy your soul with Stylo- see the Noodle-bot (mourn for poor dead Noodle!), guess where the hell Russell is, and goggle with shock at the surprise guest appearance (whoa!). I definitely dig on the track: laid-back synth with a bit of dub and just enough sinister. Judge for yourself:

Stylo [feat. Mos Def and Bobby Womack] by Gorillaz 

Rube Goldberg Machines!

I've never been more than a passing fan of OK Go (last I remember of them was from my freshman year of college). However...I am a HUGE fan of Rube Goldberg machines, and OK Go has compiled one of the most excellent yet.

Part of the appeal is that, despite the continuously escalating complexity and absurdity of the machine itself, it all still has a homemade feel, like if you really had the patience, time and money you could rent a warehouse and make it yourself. There are some parts of the video where the continuity is a little questionable, but I'm all for hoping that it really is one machine as other articles suggest. Judge for yourself and enjoy!

This one's for Erotic Grotesque (David and Noah) --Zola Jesus.

In terms of blog hype, we've got a little gem here in Madison. Zola Jesus is gracing pages of every blogship in this blog-o-verse but just shy of critical mass. Maybe Pitchfork will do it. But now lets get down to music: Zola Jesus is interesting and well done pop. Too electronic to be chamber pop, but you get that vibe from the vocals. It's contemporary, operatic, and minimal, elegant and a little grotesque. Stuff I think David and Noah will like. Well to rub it in she's 20 studying philosophy and french here is releasing an EP this month. Hopefully this will get them out to a show.


On a side note, she's in the front running for actually being Liz's  doppelganger (conditional on her height):

Obviously Liz doesn't wear this much eye shadow. 

But here are some songs!

Nasa's Project M

M is for Murder Moon, (though it also probably stands for "Maybe") and I bet it has absolutely nothing to with the following video:



Ignore the slightly embarrassing enthusiasm of the vid, and think instead about what we got here: sure, Obama's cancelled space for the time being, but hey, maybe we could send robots to the moon. And maybe we could control them from earth. And, hey, maybe we could get this done really, surprisingly quickly for not that much money.

That sounds like some futurism I can get on board with. Or rather, futurism that I can fire at our natural satellite and remotely control.

AWESOME.

More college educated Women than Men===ramifications.

A bunch of articles of note have been released that have tried to address the issue of disproportionate number of college educated men and women. This has been happening for years with women tipping the scale years ago. Now, it's almost 1.5 women for every man in college. That's cool. But it's simply not a quirky statistic that merely highlights how equitable our society has become.

It's an big, interesting, issue with very far reaching consequences. Ironically, every ramification I've seen, and the commentary surrounding women's rise in high education has been negative. Here are some of the things that have change and why they suck for women. To be clear, these discussion is probably most pertinent to the class of society that is college educated, and not gay (obviously for both), and let me reiterate that while big number these observations address few in proportion. But here they are.

Best/worst tech support ever?

Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:32 AM] -- Automatically generated message:
A support specialist will be with you shortly.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:44 AM] -- Automatically generated message:
You are now chatting with support specialist Mxxxxx.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:45 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
Welcome to HP Total Care for Notebooks. My name is Mxxxxx. Please give me a few moments while I review your problem description details.

NOTE: For security reasons, PLEASE DO NOT send credit card information via chat.

[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:48 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
Hello Tim. How are you doing today?
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:48 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
Fine.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:49 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
Tim, for any Hp model there will be an 10 digit serial number and 7 digit product number
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:49 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
we can find the product and serial number on the rear panel of the computer on a white bar coded sticker which is followed by a P/n and a S/n.

[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:51 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
i don't have the laptop with me, but i checked the panel several times, and the s/n is 9 digits: XXX-XXX-XXX. It is a F767NR Compaq Presario, bought in July 2008.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:52 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
You can also find the product and serial number in the help and support window
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:53 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
what is the help and support window?
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:53 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
Click on start, type help and support in the start search and select it from the list

[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:53 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
the laptop is broken, i cant turn it on
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:53 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
Then the help and support window will open and there you will find the serial and product number

[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:56 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
thus, i will not be able to use the help and support window.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:57 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
Let me check if I can pull any data
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:58 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
May I know the model of the notebook?

[Thursday, February 25, 2010 10:58 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
Like I said before, it is a F767NR Compaq Presario, bought in July 2008.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:01 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
May I know the full model name Compaq Presario?
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:01 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
what other information is there?
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:03 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
Like Compaq Presario cq 60 , g60.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:03 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
f767nr is the model number
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:03 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
it is a model from 2008
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:04 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
here is a link to the model: http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/product?product=3682526&lc=en&cc=us&dlc=en〈=en&cc=us
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:04 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
Thank you for the necessary information
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:04 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
May I please, place the chat session on hold for 2-3 minutes while I research on the tool and get you the required information?
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:04 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
sure

[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:11 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
Do you have the proof of purchase?
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:11 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
No, I am getting a copy of my Bestbuy receipt later today.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:12 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
Tim, the serial number would be present on the purchase receipt.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:12 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
I wish I could provide the correct serial number but as per the process policies we are not authorized to reveal such information.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:13 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
I suggest you to check the purchase receipt to find the correct serial number.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:13 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
Okay, but what if the receipt has the same 9-digit serial number on it?
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:14 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
It cannot be possible because a Notebook serial number (2008 model) will be of 10 digits only.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:14 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
If you find 9 digit serial number even on the receipt then please get back to our support, we will escalate the case.

[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:14 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
OK, sounds good.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:16 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
The solution provided should work. However, if the problem persists, please get back to us with the SR id:XXXXX, and we will continue troubleshooting to resolve this issue

[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:16 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
You have been a great customer to assist .Moreover, is there anything else regarding your Notebook I may guide you with?
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:17 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
Is there any thing else that I can help you with?
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:18 AM] -- Tim Williams says:
No, thank you.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:18 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
You are most welcome. It was a pleasure assisting you today. I appreciate the patience you presented while we worked together on this issue. May health and happiness be yours in all seasons?
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:18 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
May the good times and treasures of the present become the golden memories of tomorrow. Wish you lots of love, joy and happiness.
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:18 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
Have a nice dat
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:18 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
*Day
[Thursday, February 25, 2010 11:18 AM] -- Mxxxxx says:
take care

FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS

Friday Night Lights ends this summer. Actually production on the fifth season will end, and yes that means that the series Friday Night Lights will end on it's fifth season. Most people who don't use Ninjavideo or DirectTV haven't even seen the 4th season pilot episode. People who don't like change should not see that season, but let me tell you emphatically, this season is one of the most rewarding story arcs in the entire series.

Now it's time for me to tell you that if you haven't seen Friday Night Lights, you probably should. I don't push TV too often, and even when I do, I can't do it so definitively. In the case of non-comedic scripted television, it just takes too great a time commitment to match its rewards among broad an audience. So disregard me if you want, but know that Friday Night Lights is a good show whether you choose to watch it or not.

wear yo versez @?

Rah-rah-rah-Raaaaaaaandy

http://www.urb.com/2010/02/23/raaaaaaaandy-dave-sitek-annnnnnnngry-wrza/

Rand McNally's Atlas leads the way to the purple dawn

"Brilliant men, beautiful jazz babies, champagne baths, midnight revels, petting parties in the purple dawn, all ending in one terrific smashing climax that makes you gasp."
-From the pitch of the 1924 film Alimony. Image from La Dolce Vita

Why, Keanu, Why?

So I do like to nerd out from time to time and watch anime. That being said, I really enjoy Cowboy Bebop and I recently heard it's being made into a live-action film. Potentially really cool, right? WRONG. Keanu Reeves signed on to play Spike. My friend Natalie thinks it's a brilliant choice considering Keanu cannot act, but can stand quietly and look hip while gazing intently into the camera. This may be true, but I don't think he will do Spike justice. I'm trying to think of a better alternative and I'm also racking my brain for who will play Faye and the other characters (the studio has yet to sign anybody for any roles besides Spike). What do you guys think? Is Keanu a good choice? Who should play Faye?

Why Taylor Swift Offends Little Monsters, Feminists, and Weirdos

Taylor Swift may be catchy as fuck and relatively harmless as far as pop music goes, but her Grammy victory and pop-darling status are ridiculous and undeserved, no matter what McFadden might have to say.

I could probably rag on her a while, and hell, I might even drag in a comparison to Lady Gaga, who despite a slim age divide seems decades more mature than Swift.

Somebody, however, has already done a much, much better job of that. Instead I point you, dear reader, to a superior article. Infographic analysis of Swift's song-writing cliches a definite bonus.

Why Taylor Swift Offends Little Monsters, Feminists, and Weirdos

Hipster puppies!

lola got booted from the kickball team after just showing up every week and drinking

Click here for more poopies

Playing God

Man from clay was pretty impressive, God- a very neat trick, really. For all of our earthly attempts to unseat Your miracles with our scientifical magicks- be it bioengineering, robotics, cloning and AI- none of them quite come close to the divine alchemy inherent in that leap.

Well unless you look at this: Engineered RNA, made sans biological processes and supposedly immortal- as long as it's environment can provide the materials, it'll replicate indefinitely.

“The aim is to create systems that have inventive capabilities, that can develop novel solutions to challenges posed by the environment. But that we don’t have yet,” he said

“What we do have is a self-sustained chemical system that undergoes Darwinian evolution."

 Sounds pretty keen to me.

via Slashdot: "Life-like evolution in a test-tube"

Goethe...as Goethe would have wanted it

For those of you not in the know, a little over two hundred years ago, Goethe, at the ripe old age of twenty four, in order to help himself get over a broken heart, wrote a little book called The Sorrows of Young Werther. Its story of a sensitive young man pained by unrequited love touched the hearts of young men all over Europe, and soon people from all walks of life began dressing as Werther did in the novel, paying visits to Weimar, writing their own poetry, and in general pursuing the Romantic way of life, which Goethe later in life found irritating to no end. But far from being the manifesto of a now gone cultural phenomenon, today Werther is as alive as ever, thanks to modern technology. You see, the novel was actually a series of letters written from Werther to his friend Wilhelm, but the crude technology of the 18th century offered no option other than to publish them all in one great book. Today, however, you can get Werther's letters emailed to you, one per day, and read this literary classic as Goethe would have wanted it. I'm seriously considering it.

Also, the German page says that you can choose to receive his emails according to the dates on the letters, so you might go a couple weeks without hearing from Werther and wonder how he's doing. I don't know if the English one has this option though. The English page also doesn't have a FAQ, so who knows.

The Sorrows of Young Werther
Die Leiden des Jungen Werther

I also just found out that the German one has an option where you can get each letter sent to you as a text message with up to 160 characters. Awesome.

Stare At This For Sixty Seconds

I fucking love these things.

In other Eric Holder-related things

I first posted this suspicious document on Facebook, to no avail. Perhaps the good settlers of Scrabblegories can take up the cause.

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr.: Man, or claymation figure?

MySpace Slummin'

I was listening to this band Memoryhouse, (not to be confused with memory tapes, or memory cassette or a myriad of other absent minded bands out there) when I came across what I thought was Phillip Seymour Hoffman's myspace page.
Geez, I wonder who would be in Phillip Seymour Hoffman's top eight?
My predictions as follows:
1. Peter Saarsgard
2. Maggie Gyllenhaal (they're such a great couple to hang wit)
3. Alan Richman (he's been a huge fan since Die Hard)
4. Animal Collective (mutual bragging rights)
5. Nicholas Cage (actually would be in my top eight--I have a hard time placing myself in others)
6. Ryan Lylard (some not famous guy who means a lot to him)
7. Peter Orszag
8. Eric Holder (he's a big OBAMA fan)

But what do I find to my surprise? Phillip Seymour Hoffman's myspace page isn't Phillip Seymour Hoffman's myspace at all!!!!
It's actually Phillip Seymour Hoffman--the "Acousmatic / Tape music / Pop" band from Loose Angeles, and NEW YORK!
Acousmatic ~ Animal Collective vocals,
Tape music ~ Phillip Glass like "instrumentation" from items I assume are tapes.
Some songs aren't bad, the newer ones with more plays, while the empire state of mind cover is atrocious. But in a funny way, being channeling Phil into Tape music isn't that bad of a go. It right now it sounds like a poor man's Sung Tongs, because a rich man's Sung Tong's is a boring and lonely rank. You can feel the fun, the novelty of creation, in their experimentation-- something that can't be said for other "tape music".

FYI, check them out in Austin if you ever get a chance. They're going to be playing with Truman Peyote.

Can We Have Brahms Without Raisins?

http://www.airandseabattle.com/2010/02/15/can-we-have-brahms-without-raisins/

I was encouraged by the two of you who clicked on my latest attempt at bridging the high and low to ponder, can classical music be blogged? Would anyone care if it were?

Youtube enticements to get you to read this:

Some Thoughts on the Academy Awards

The first few months of any year are typically free from eagerly awaited blockbusters, or critically lauded new releases. A few slip in from time to time, but for the most part, this is the time of year where moviegoers have a little golden man on their minds. Most people would rather go out and rent one of the Oscar-nominated films that they missed in the year before, or even better, go see one of them currently in theaters.

It would be a tremendous overstatement to imply that this is the only reason that James Cameron’s Avatar has dominated movie theaters every weekend since the start of the year, but it certainly contributes a little. Everyone loves it when the industry gives that special stamp to something so blatantly designed purely for entertainment. However, the fact that this is considered a front-runner for the award is more than a little confusing. Certainly, the film beats any other film out of the park in terms of its special effects, but with a budget of more than half a billion dollars, is that really all that surprising? Fellow best picture nominee District 9 had a minimalist budget, and yet there really isn’t anything more convincing about Cameron’s Pandora than there is about Blomkamp’s Johannesburg. It deserves some form of recognition, and many critics groups have awarded it in many disparate categories. The Academy Awards, however, despite all the idiotic decisions they have made over the years, are expected to hold the greatest works of art up, insuring that they persevere long after the initial hype dies away. And I don’t think Avatar makes the cut.

It’s already going to be a strange year at the Oscars. This is the first time in decades where they have upped the number of nominees in the Best Picture category at all, let alone double it. The nomination of The Blind Side for Best Picture should be enough to convince people how ridiculous this is. Think back to all the slow years when the Academy of Arts and Sciences has barely been able to pull five films together. Sure, some films have been overlooked in the past, and there will be plenty more that will be overlooked in the future, but the exclusivity of these awards are part of what makes them a big deal. This is precisely the reason that the Golden Globes are never taken seriously, their system of having two sets of Best Pictures allows a great deal of mediocre material into the race.

I have two hopes in 2010 in regards to the Academy Awards. First, I hope that smarts beat spectacle in the Best Picture race, and that Avatar loses the award to one of the many more worthy films, like The Hurt Locker, Up in the Air, or A Serious Man. Second, I hope they announce that their ten-nominees experiment is over, and that the Oscars can keep whatever dignity and prestige they have left.

Pitchfork: Articles: Who the Hell Are Die Antwoord?

Pitchfork: Articles: Who the Hell Are Die Antwoord?

I...don't know.

Another thing I should have done first...

http://internetarchaeology.tumblr.com/

Do Hacks Dream of Electric Sheep?

Cross-blogging!

The heavens part, and the world is graced...

Film buffs, the most important event in film restoration of our lifetimes -- and probably ever -- is upon us. An hour of additional footage from "Metropolis" -- Fritz Lang's 1927 science fiction classic -- is being streamed live tomorrow afternoon. This is the cinematic equivalent of discovering another play by Shakespeare or another novel by George Eliot.

The problem? The subtitles are only being streamed in German or French. (Tim, this shouldn't be an issue for you, then!) What are the rest of us English-speaking people to do? Well, I, unfortunately, am too busy tomorrow to watch the live stream and will have to wait for the release with English subtitles anyways.

But if you have some time, and have seen Metropolis, my guess is that the footage will speak for itself. If you think you've seen five movies better than Metropolis, you're wrong.