March 2010
58 posts
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MOON8 →
“Have you ever wondered what Dark Side of the Moon would sound like if Pink Floyd had written it for NES, instead of for a rock band?” (via) Interesting to hear which songs remain affecting, and which ones don’t translate so well.
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Increasing Number Of Parents Opting To Have... →
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“Suicide has an event gravity; eventually everybody’s impressions get...”
– Q&A: David Lipsky | Mark Athitakis’ American Fiction Notes.
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Q&A: David Lipsky | Mark Athitakis’ American... →
From an interview with David Lipsky (via), here’s David Foster Wallace on the philosophical depth of country music:
Because that’s like pretty much all there is, when you’re tired of listening to Green Day on the one college station. And these country musics that are just so—you know, “Baby since you’ve left I can’t live, I’m drinking all the...
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Spying on how we read « Music Machinery →
“With Whispersync data from millions of Kindle readers Amazon can learn not just what we are reading but how we are reading.” Good ideas for Last.fm-style data slicing.
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“You can still compare a coin to the moon—poets have done so in days gone...”
– Pennies to heaven—By Joachim Kalka (Harper’s Magazine). Nice reflection on the death of money made of paper & metal. Better than most “death of” pieces. Also includes a nice discussion of Scrooge McDuck.
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“Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the same number of hours...”
– H. Jackson Brown, Jr., Life’s Little Instruction Book (via).
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“If you are feeling nervous, nervous is good. All right? It makes us stop...”
– Lacrosse coach Trevor Tierney quoted in John McPhee’s “Pioneer”. I like the “stop thinking about things” part—I’ve never been distracted while nervous. Nerves and focus go hand in hand.
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Amazon Filler Item Finder - Get Free Shipping on... →
“Certain items at Amazon.com qualify for free shipping, but sometimes the purchase falls short of the minimum $25 needed to receive the free shipping. Enter the amount you need to see a list of products that qualify for free shipping.” (via)
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Mother :: rogerebert.com :: Reviews →
Apparently Roger Ebert was posted his review of “Mother” while I was watching it. (via). I like this conclusion: “Mother” will have you discussing the plot, not entirely to your satisfaction. I would argue: The stories in movies are complete fictions and can be resolved in any way the director chooses. If he actually cheats or lies, we have a case against him. If not, no...
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Sext by W.H. Auden →
Stumbled across this in Dan Pink’s book, Drive:
You need not see what someone is doing
to know if it is his vocation,
you have only to watch his eyes:
a cook mixing a sauce, a surgeon
making a primary incision,
a clerk completing a bill of lading,
wear the same rapt expression,
forgetting themselves in a function.
How beautiful it is,
that eye-on-the-object look.
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“He keeps saying he’s going to erupt into some unspeakable atrocity such as...”
– Letters of Note: Burroughs has gone insane. Letter from Jack Kerouac re: William Burroughs.
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My Year Of Everything: My Year Of Everything Q&A:... →
Personally and emotionally it surprised me that I could actually stay committed to something so consuming without ruining my life. It’s almost axiomatic that people in the arts have to be willing to jettison their friends, marriages, loves, in order to really push through and break out. That is a hefty quantity of bullshit, and is an excuse for not living a full life and integrating work into...
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Isogloss - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia →
“An isogloss (sometimes called heterogloss) is the geographical boundary of a certain linguistic feature, such as the pronunciation of a vowel, the meaning of a word, or use of some syntactic feature.” (via)
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“The public does not like bad literature. The public likes a certain kind of...”
– G.K. Chesterton. Quote of the Day « The Gentlemen’s Society for the Advancement of Mental Cultivation, Erudition, and Letters.
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Why books on the iPad just might work «... →
“If you’re playing along at home, with the exception of the first, none of these criticisms are really iPad-specific.”
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The Enthusiast - The Atlantic →
“Bill Simmons has set a new and unbeatable standard by writing like a fan—just far better.”
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Wehr in the World: The best uses of my time →
One of the things I wish more people (anyone) would blog about is not just the books, movies, blog posts, or magazine articles they liked, but rather what in their estimation were the best uses of their time. Was it a chapter of a book or a particular article from the New York Times? Beyond just the content they consumed, was it maybe a conversation with a friend?
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A Funkaoshi Production :: India 2010 →
I really loving Ramanan’s posts about his trip to India. Wonderful photos + in-the-moment notes on the iPhone. Great combo.
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When the last recording studio goes, what will go... →
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Marginal Revolution: Why do people ask questions... →
It matters a great deal if people have to write out questions in advance, or during the talk, and a moderator then reads out the question. That mechanism improves question quality and cuts down on the first three motives cited. Yet it is rarely used. In part we wish to experience the contrast between the speaker and the erratic questioners and the resulting drama.
I like the second...
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“What you have to find is your own niche that will allow you to keep feeding and...”
– Interview with Nora Watson in Studs Terkel’s Working.
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Working: The Graphic Novel - Bryan Caplan |... →
Interesting. There’s a graphically-novelized version of Studs Terkel’s book from 1974, Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day and How They Feel About What They Do. Graphic novelizations make me cringe a little, but Harvey Pekar is behind it, so who knows.
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Five tips for writing non-fiction | The Undercover... →
I like #2: “Read people whose ideas or research you understand value.”
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“What people today are beginning to realize is what became obvious to us back...”
– John Perry Barlow, lyricist for The Grateful Dead in Management Secrets of the Grateful Dead - The Atlantic. See also John Perry Barlow in Wired, March 1994.
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Watchnoiseforairports:
Papa Sangre is a forthcoming iPhone game that is audio only. Listen to this “video” above on headphones to get an idea of how awesome this game could be. I’m really looking forward to this one!
Yeah. Things like this are why I’m probably going to end up with a shiny new iPhone in a few months.
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Joanna Newsom, the Changeling - NYTimes.com →
Okay-ish profile, but I like this bit in particular:
In “Sadie,” a ballad with a distinct Appalachian flavor, Newsom sings lines that could speak for thousands of musicians who’ve drawn on the deep well of American folk music: “This is an old song/These are old blues/This is not my tune/But it’s mine to use.”
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Being foreign: The others | The Economist →
An American child psychologist, Alison Gopnik, when reaching for an analogy to illuminate the world as experienced by a baby, compared it to Paris as experienced for the first time by an adult American: a pageant of novelty, colour, excitement. Reverse the analogy and you see that living in a foreign country can evoke many of the emotions of childhood: novelty, surprise, anxiety, relief,...
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Barry White Gets Pissed at the Copywriter During a... →
In which Barry White “cordially invites yo ass” to something or other at Paul Quinn College. Archival outtakes ftw.
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Wired for Books : Author interviews on MP3 →
austinkleon:
Amazing archive of interviews with authors from the 80s and 90s. A must-bookmark.
Woah.