“Andrew Sullivan’s story is inherently implausible. How did an HIV-positive gay Catholic conservative from the poky English town of East Grinstead end up as one of the most powerful writers in America? “Today his blog, the Daily Dish, is regularly named as one of the most influential in America, and in November it reached 23m hits [...]
Archive for April, 2009
Re-Writing the Right? Andrew Sullivan’s “The Daily Dish”
Posted in Blogging, Magazines & Newspapers, Media & Advertising, Politics, Religion, Sex & Gender, Writers & Writing on April 16, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Baseball Burgers on Steroids: West Michigan’s 4-lb Stadium Burger Sells Big
Posted in Baseball, Food & Wine, Sports, U.S. Travel on April 16, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Last week, the West Michigan Whitecaps minor league baseball team sold more than 100 mega-sized burgers on opening night. “It’s made with five patties plus chili, American cheese, nacho cheese, tortilla chips, salsa, lettuce, tomato and sour cream — all piled on an 8-inch bun. “The mammoth meal weighs more than 4 pounds. And, even [...]
R.I.P. – Judith F. Krug (1940-2009)
Posted in Books, Literature, Obituaries, Politics on April 15, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Judith F. Krug, who led the campaign by libraries against efforts to ban books, including helping found Banned Books Week, then fought laws and regulations to limit children’s access to the Internet, died Saturday in Evanston, Ill. She was 69. . . . “As the American Library Association’s official proponent of the First Amendment’s guarantee of [...]
Burger King & Mexico Em-Broiled in “Texican Whopper” Advertising Dispute
Posted in American West, Business, Food & Wine, Media & Advertising, Popular Culture, The Americas on April 14, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Mexico is protesting what it says is a whopper of an insult. “An advertisement for Burger King‘s Texican Whopper burger that has run in Europe shows a small wrestler dressed in a cape resembling a Mexican flag. The wrestler teams up with a lanky American cowboy almost twice his height to illustrate the cross-border blend of flavors. “‘The taste [...]
R.I.P. – Eve Sedgwick (1950-2009)
Posted in Books, Literature, Obama, Sex & Gender, Writers & Writing on April 13, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick died in New York yesterday, at the age of fifty-nine, following a long battle with breast cancer. The literary critic, who taught most recently at the CUNY Graduate Center, is best known for her formative work in the field of queer theory (in the books ‘Between Men’ and ‘Epistemology of the Closet’), including [...]
R.I.P. – Mark “The Bird” Fidrych (1954-2009)
Posted in Baseball, Obituaries, Popular Culture, Sports on April 13, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Mark Fidrych, an eccentric All-Star pitcher nicknamed ‘The Bird’ whose career was shortened by injuries, was found dead Monday in an apparent accident at his farm. He was 54. . . . “The curly-haired right-hander was the American League Rookie of the Year in 1976 when he went 19-9 with a 2.34 ERA and 24 complete [...]
“Look at the Birdie”: New Kurt Vonnegut Short Story Collection to be Published in Fall
Posted in Books, Business, Literature, Writers & Writing on April 13, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Kurt Vonnegut’s longtime publisher, Delacorte Press, has announced it will issue 14 never-before published short stories by the author, who died in 2007, in a new collection, Look at the Birdie, slated for publication in November 2009. . . . “Look at the Birdie will include original Vonnegut illustrations and a foreword by Sidney Offit, a longtime [...]
Senseless Censors: Amazon.com De-Ranks “Adult” Books (Including National Book Award Winners)
Posted in Books, Business, Literature, Popular Culture, Sex & Gender, World Wide Web, Writers & Writing on April 13, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“‘American Psycho’ is Bret Easton Ellis’ story of a sadistic murderer. ‘Unfriendly Fire’ is a well-reviewed empirical analysis of military policy. But it’s ‘Unfriendly Fire’ that does not have a sales rank — which means it would not show up in Amazon’s bestseller lists, even if it sold more copies than the ‘Twilight’ series. In [...]
Easter Bunnies: “Girls Gone Wild” Ad Interrupts Good Friday Service Broadcast
Posted in Media & Advertising, Popular Culture, Religion, Sex & Gender, Television on April 12, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“A Philadelphia cable network’s early morning broadcast of a Good Friday service at the Vatican abruptly changed to something wildly different – a 30-second ‘Girls Gone Wild‘ ad. “Comcast spokesman Jeff Alexander says the 2 a.m. Friday programming glitch was due to a required test of the Emergency Alert System. He says such tests are usually done [...]
101 Last Suppers: Pop Culture Adaptations of da Vinci’s “The Last Supper”
Posted in Art & Artists, Popular Culture, Religion on April 11, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Robert Crumb‘s cover for “The Last Supplement to the Whole Earth Catalog,” from Jeremy Barker’s collection of 100+ pop culture adaptations of Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper. (more @ “Popped Culture,”; via Wired) [Click image for a larger version of the R. Crumb cover.]
Guitar Money: Roy Rogers’ Guitar Sells for $554,500
Posted in American West, Antiques & Folk Art, Collectors & Collecting, Popular Culture, Popular Music on April 11, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“An anonymous bidder acquired the ‘King of Cowboys’ Roy Rogers‘ OM-45 Deluxe Martin guitar at Christie’s on April 3. One of the rarest and considered among many collectors the most coveted Martin guitar, the 1930 instrument was put up for auction by the Roy Rogers-Dale Evans Museum in Branson, Mo., and attracted a winning bid [...]
States of Mind: The U.S. Geography of Personality
Posted in American West, Health & Medicine, Human Behavior, New England on April 11, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
[Living part-time in Brooklyn, New York and part-time in Northampton, a college town in western Massachusetts, I am unsurprised by the findings that the northeastern states are among the most neurotic, as well as among the most open, "openness" reflected by "curiosity, intellect, and creativity at the individual level."] From “The Geography of Personality”: Neuroticism [...]
Signs of a Soft Economy: Vasectomies Rise During Recession
Posted in Economy, Health & Medicine on April 10, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“It is too early to proclaim a bona fide trend in elective sterilization, because no organization regularly tracks the number of vasectomies performed on an annual or even a monthly basis. The most recent comprehensive data come from a study published in The Journal of Urology in 2006, which estimated that about 527,000 vasectomies were [...]
Take the Money & Run: GOP Governors/Presidential Hopefuls Reverse Position on Stimulus Funds
Posted in Current Events, Economy, Politics on April 10, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
["I'm shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!" (Claude Rains in "Casablanca")] “The list of governors threatening to decline federal stimulus money last month read like a list of Republicans considering running for president in 2012: Govs. Mark Sanford, Bobby Jindal and Sarah Palin led the anti-stimulus charge. “But what began [...]
Brevity’s Rainbow: The Staying Power of the American Short Story
Posted in Book Reviews, Books, Literature, Writers & Writing on April 9, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
In Sunday’s New York Times, A.O. Scott writes in praise of the American short story (long my favorite literary form), challenging “the conventional wisdom in American letters . . . that size matters, that the big-game hunters and heavyweight fighters . . . go after the Great American Novel,” and posits this fascinating future for short fiction: [...]
Rise of the New Yiddishists, or: Contemporary Jewish Writers’ “New Sense of Jewish Identity”
Posted in Books, Jewish Life, Literature, Religion, Writers & Writing on April 9, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Thirty years ago the American Jewish fiction of Philip Roth and Saul Bellow was all about Yiddish insults, blonde shiksas, and getting away from the past. Today’s talented crop of young Jewish writers, such as Nathan Englander, Michael Chabon, and Dara Horn, are weaving tales bound in a newfound ethnic pride that has revitalized Jewish literature in [...]
“Defiance”: Seeking A Balanced Legacy for Poland During the Holocaust
Posted in Books, Cinema, Europe, Foreign Travel, International Affairs, Jewish Life, Movie Reviews, Museums & Exhibitions, Politics, Popular Culture, Religion on April 9, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“In “Defiance,” a clunky but well-meaning action film set during World War II and starring Daniel Craig, the Bielski brothers save hundreds of fellow Polish Jews by battling Nazis in the Belarussian forest. Directed by Edward Zwick and based on a true story, the movie, released around New Year’s, tried among other things to counter Hollywood’s usual tales of [...]
Making Book: The Crumpled Press & The Art of Independent Bookmaking in a Digital Age
Posted in Art & Artists, Books, Brooklyn, Business, New York City, Writers & Writing on April 9, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“The Crumpled Press, the brainchild of [Jordan] McIntyre and [Alexander] Bick, publishes work by new authors and sets previously unpublished, notable lectures and articles into proper books — hand-sewn — on culture, politics, self-reflection, and poetry. ‘It’s original, thought-provoking work that might otherwise be tossed aside,’ says Bick, who is pursuing a history PhD at [...]
Not for Prophet Sale: Controversial Mohammed Cartoon For Sale in Limited Edition
Posted in Collectors & Collecting, Europe, Humor, International Affairs, Magazines & Newspapers, Media & Advertising, Middle East, Politics, Popular Culture, Religion on April 8, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Prints of the Danish cartoon depicting Islam‘s Prophet Mohammed as a suicide bomber in 2005 — much to the chagrin of the international Muslim community — will now be sold by the Denmark Free Press Society for $250 each. One thousand copies are to be printed and sold, with each having a designated number and signature by [...]
1st Annual “Walking Tour of New York’s Independent Bookstores” Scheduled for May 2nd
Posted in Books, Brooklyn, Business, DUMBO, Literature, New York City, U.S. Travel, Urban Affairs on April 8, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
On Saturday, May 2nd, “The Millions.com” will lead their first annual ”Walking Tour of New York’s Independent Bookstores.” The 11-stop itinerary begins in the East Village, continues through NoLita and SOHO, crosses the Brooklyn Bridge into DUMBO, and ends after 4 or so hours of walking and book-browsing in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. The complete, 11-stop itinerary includes: [...]
