July 2010
7 posts
SlushPile Hell: Another SlushPile Hell contest was... →
Another SlushPile Hell contest was held Thursday on Twitter. And there was much rejoicing.
We asked you to come up with THE WORST SELF-HELP BOOK…EVER (yeah, I know, we did the same thing with children’s books last week—are you surprised?). Too many entries to count this time, and a wealth of…
The Takeaway:
Billions on Intelligence... →
I co-hosted The Takeaway this morning with Todd Zwillich - here’s a link in case you were sleeping. We covered the Washington Post piece co-authored by Dana Priest on the Secret Nation of intelligence contractors, took a look at the disturbing Army suicide numbers from last month, tried to figure out how good parents can raise bad seeds and talked to a marine toxicologist who actually dove...
WatchStephen Colbert as a United Farm Worker? They’re offering all their jobs in the field to any documented American who will take them…..and Colbert is the fourth to sign up. Great interview with Arturo Rodriguez.
Steve Earle, Alison Moorer and Rosanne Cash: Yeah,... →
WatchWhat are your picks for summer reading? Alan Furst wants something he won’t have to write about, Kate Moses wants dessert, Elif Batuman wants romance, Teddy Wayne wants tennis…..and Gary Schteyngart wants romance and dystopia.
June 2010
5 posts
WatchSo, I’m standing on a little bridge in San Simeon, Calif., looking down at the elephant seals flopped out on the beach below and I can’t help but remark that the seals look a lot like guys who have partied a little too hard and are sleeping it off. “Yeah,” says the cute guy next to me, “that’s how I feel.”
Turns out it’s Scott, the bass player for...
“It appears, that I have … entirely by accident … developed a...”
– MANIFESTO
WatchThe Growlers: goth-surf-punk-rockabilly-awesome. I cannot wait until our show with them and guest author Gavin McInnes for our 4th anniversary edition of “Upstairs at the Square” this Thursday, Barnes and Noble Union Square, 7 p.m. FREE.
WatchThe Wall Street Journal reports that Calvin Klein’s Obsession for Men works best for tracking jaguars in Central America……”Obsession for Big Cats?” This video worth it just for the ocelot going crazy for CK.
April 2010
15 posts
Natalie Merchant and "Leave Your Sleep'' at... →
This is a treat. Natalie talks about the poems that changed her life as a new mother and then sings the tunes she composed for a series of nursery rhymes and nonsense that make the most sense of anything you’ve ever heard.
A Scout is Trustworthy, Loyal..... →
Paul Theroux on the Boy Scouts. Who knew?
Words to live by from a Pulitzer winner for music
New York Times, 4/22/10 interview with composer Jennifer Higdon
Ms. Higdon has had her share of detractors, who told her she couldn’t compose because she started so late; that a flute performance major couldn’t be a composer; that she would never make a living; and that she would never get into graduate school. Some male composers have grumbled to her face that she’s only been...
You're a doctor, a woman, you've just won a... →
Memories of Justice John Paul Stevens From His... →
Long, long ago, in another life I rarely mention, I wanted to be a legal historian; to this day, I am the only person I know who had read the four volumes of the John Marshall biography and who is a fan of the 19th Century Justice Joseph Story. But you should read these memories for their telling details -the judge who stayed up late, who sat in a creased black leather chair, who didn’t mind...
mnartists.org | mnLIT Original: "What the... →
here is more ample documentation of Jeff and poem…..
Today's cadeau: a poem by Jeff Johnson →
What the Neurologist Doesn’t Say
This is the end of minutiae and the beginning of a sort of cruise. You won’t quite recognize the climate. Some people find this troubling, but try to roll with it. If you taste brine, if you hear gulls, if the wind comes at you from an unlikely quarter, don’t panic. You’ve always been a landlocked soul— acreages, volts, miles per...
This week’s TIME Financial Toolkit podcast:...
I admit it: I believe in fairy tales, happy endings in movies and that Butler should have won. And I think in some way they still did.
RT @parisreview: Good fiction often takes the banal around us and defamiliarizes it. - Edmund White
Undercover Black Man: Thoughts on theme →
David Mills was a great writer, a newspaperman who turned to TV and contributed to shows such as Homicide, NYPD Blue, The Wire and the soon-to-debut Treme. He died at 48 on the set of Treme in New Orleans. He’s a friend of a friend, so I’ve been on the receiving end of some incredible memorials on FB and twitter and the blog post here is from David’s blog - good writing on good...
March 2010
32 posts
Atwood in the Twittersphere
nybooks:
Margaret Atwood
Margaret Atwood, tweeting aboard the Queen Mary 2, August 2009
A long time ago—less than a year ago in fact, but time goes all stretchy in the Twittersphere, just as it does in those folksongs in which the hero spends a night with the Queen of Faerie and then returns to find that a hundred years have passed and all his friends are dead…. Where was I?
Oh yes. A long time...
The leak in my ceiling returned, the subway is flooded and even the bus leaked. Welcome to Gotham, city of ducks.
Can you explain new health care bill in 10... →
Click on the query above and you’ll be whisked away to the Curious Capitalist page at TIME.com where the TIME Financial Toolkit podcast lives….we asked Kate Pickert, one of their crackerjack health care reporters, to explain it all to us in 10 minutes. And she did. Go ahead, give a listen. You’ll understand the bill, you’ll be a better citizen and you can annoy your...
I am fighting winter not with swords but with daffodils. Take that, March!
RT @ebertchicago: “For every atom belonging to me, as good belongs to you.” Walt Whitman died this day in 1892. http://j.mp/9X02rk
RT @andevers: Suffragettes had matching power rings: http://www.georgianjewelry.com/items/show/12169-scarce-early-20th-c-suffragette-ring
Design Hunting: Two-Story Windows, a New Take on... →
Here is the link to Wendy’s blog Design Hunting…..she always has a good eye
Upstairs at the Square: Care Bears on Fire and... →
Feeling down? Just click on the headline above and you’ll get our show with Care Bears on Fire and Blake Nelson…..if you were ever a 13-year-old girl or had one in your life or read Savvy magazine or the novel “Girl”….this is the show for you.
An avarice for light: The New York Times looks at... →
Sometimes I actually forget that the New York Times did a video of my apartment, part of a profile they did on me for their “Habitat” series in the Real Estate section. My narration of this video would be different these days; four years ago, you can still hear the culture shock in my voice at the move from Minnesota to Manhattan. I treasure that gap, though, and the person who saw New...
RT @parisreview: You always want the detail that you can’t explain. – Robert Lowell http://bit.ly/co2umR
It’s spring! Tulip trees are in bloom in the garden at Jefferson Library in the Village; flats of pansies for sale at greenmarket. #happy
Just saw my crush Oliver Platt on street in NYC, sporting his usual rumpled charm., emphasis on rumpled. Wanted to rebutton his shirt.
RT @RebeccaSkloot: “Care for the sick, serenity for the fearful” - LBJ on Medicare, 1966. http://bit.ly/bfQmla via @stevesilberman
I have one pre-existing condition that remains: I’m a loud-mouthed female…#hcr
RT @GreatDismal: RT @SamSeder: This is weird: it’s almost like Democrats won a huge majority in both houses, plus the Presidency in a ne …
Gosh, I’ll miss being a pre-existing condition …..not #hcr
“To every unsung American who took the time to write out a letter or type out an email, your voice has been heard.”’
RT @poniewozik: #hcr passes. NOW TO IMPOSE THE METRIC SYSTEM.