Sat 28 October 2006 12:22 AM PST I believe in Halloween It's not the greatest video, but, it's a great song, so you might want to check
out The Voluptuous Horror
of Karen Black doing “I Believe in Halloween.”
Incidentally, I do believe in Halloween. I believe it exists. No, really, sincerely,
about Halloween, I believe that Halloween is the only North American holiday
that still means anything.
Halloween is incorruptible, somehow -- maybe because it's about corruption. Christmas, Halloween's seemingly respectable older brother, meant something once. Once it was about good tidings in the middle of our darkest hour -- whether tidings of the changing season or tidings of the arrival of the savior of all mankind, take your pick, it's still good tidings. But now? The gift-giving custom has become bloated beyond recognition, the "holiday season" time frame is stretched thinner than filo dough, and the very notion of Christmas, the very name of it, has become a club that some people use to beat other people over the head with. And, for pity's sake, the heartwarming! The heartwarming! See, if something tries to scare me and fails, I'm merely a little bored. If something tries to warm my heart and fails, sometimes it makes me lose all faith in humanity. (PS: if you want a truly heartwarming Christmas movie, watch Bad Santa. Seriously.) So anyway, I think Halloween still means something. But what does it mean? (read more about) I believe in Halloween Fri 27 October 2006 07:40 AM PST An infinite number of cartoon monkeys write Hamlet I don’t read Wired Magazine very often -- I used to buy the print edition sometimes for the funky layout, and I always liked
the word watch column (first place I saw the term “going postal”), but I always felt it was aimed squarely at all those
technological optimists I’m always arguing with at science fiction conventions. And, nowadays, their vision already seems like
retro-futurism (isn’t wireless the big deal now?) But their six-word story collection is brilliant, so you should read it, if
you haven’t had it recommended to you a million times already. (Two separate mailing lists I’m on both had two people post the
link more or less simultaneously -- it’s popular.) Because I was there, I poked around, and ran into this surprisingly annoying editorial. It’s called “The day
the music died" and his point seems to be that he is deeply, deeply offended by the fact that one of his co-workers has a
collection of 90,000 digitized songs. (read more about) An infinite number of cartoon monkeys write Hamlet Fri 13 October 2006 09:37 AM PST High School of the Damned: Terra Goes to Hell (5) In honor of the Goth House Friday the 13th tradition, a nightmare -- worked into "Terra Goes to Hell." The Afghanistan hill dream is one that I actually had very shortly after the Soviet invasion, probably sometime in 1980. And for the duration of the 80s, I periodically had nightmares about surviving nuclear war. I would always be stuck in a bomb shelter with people I didn't like. Terra's experience, obviously, is somewhat different. Permalink : High School of the Damned: Terra Goes to Hell (5) Fri 13 October 2006 09:37 AM PST Zeitgeist 061013 Say, all you religious types out there who vote Republican? You are being hoodwinked. The former second-in-command of the Office of Faith-Based Initiatives (David Kuo) has a new book (“Tempting Faith”) asserting that Karl Rove calls you “nuts” behind your back. Just thought you should know.
“To link me to George Bush is like linking me to an Oscar” said California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, in a quote which, while funny, is entirely disingenuous. Doesn't anybody remember 2004? It wasn't that long ago. Election year... Republican convention... they nominated George W. Bush... all the famous “moderate” Republicans came out to show support? McCain, Giuliani, and, oh yeah, Schwarzenegger. He commented on it later. Made a joke about his wife being mad at him, “Well, there was no sex for 14 days.” (See, he's a funny guy.)
His radio show is kind of boring, but I like Garrison Keillor’s writing.
Just in case you’re inclined to think the timing of the Mark Foley scandal (you know, the one where Congressional Representative Mark Foley, R-Florida, engaged in inappropriate predatory sexual behavior with underage pages) is some Democratic Party plot, Ken Silverstein of Harper’s says they were approached with the story in May and eventually decided not to run it because, “We decided against publishing the story because we didn't have absolute proof that Foley was, as one editor put it, ‘anything but creepy.’” So, ironically, it was probably an “extra caution around Republicans" deal caused by getting burned on things like The Killian “Rathergate" Memos.
A PI article about adult children living with their parents. The surprising thing is not the article, which is fairly fluffy, or the phenomenon, which is a natural and inevitable consequence of insane housing prices and flat wages. The surprising thing is the comments section, where the PI SoundOff trolls unload with their usual vitriolic nonsense, which boils down to, “since only losers live with their parents, you should do absolutely everything humanly possible to avoid this, even really impractical things such as living in your car, working two or three additional jobs, moving to the midwest and commuting, or dealing drugs on the side.” (Just kidding about the drugs.) And then the subject of the article logs on and says, “Hey, you guys, we’re real people and we have real feelings which you have hurt.” And the trolls say, “Oh boy! Fresh meat!” and continue in the same vein. So, Kate and Jason? I'm sorry your feelings were hurt. Just remember, the real losers are people who spend all their time on the Internet. Bush 41 Warns of “Ghastly” Future Under “Wild Democrats”:
“I would hate to think what Arlen’s life would be like, what Rick’s life would be like, and what my son’s life would be like if we lose control of the Congress," said former President George Bush in a reference to Pennsylvania’s two Republican Senators. “If we have some of these wild Democrats in charge of these committees, it will be a ghastly thing for our country.” "They’d be pushing through all kinds of crazy legislation," he added, “And they would be issuing the subpoenas, dragging people in just to be getting headlines.”
Yes, he hates to think what will happen to all those criminals if their buddies lose control of Congress. Of course, imagining Arlen Specter, Rick Santorum, and George Jr. doing the perp walk puts a smile on my face. But seriously, what is up with that meme Bush Sr. is replicating? As if we can all take it for granted that, no matter how bad the current crop of Republicans in Congress are, if voters replace them with a Democratic majority it will somehow spell the end of civilization as we know it! As if Democrats have never had a Congressional majority before, or something. This sort of hyperbole, in my mind, merely reinforces the idea that Republicans have gone insane. But maybe if you’re already jacked into the right wing group mind, you recognize Mr. Bush’s statement as shorthand for “Democrats are not only soft on communists, I mean terrorists, as we will publicly accuse them of, they are actually secretly in league with Al Qaeda and a Congressional majority is the first step toward turning our country over to foreign powers! Who are really lizards from outer space!” Permalink : Zeitgeist 061013 Wed 04 October 2006 02:29 PM PST Welcome back to the Parlour We have cleared out the cobwebs and moved the things that had piled up on the chairs, so hopefully there's somewhere for you to sit, now. You might note that the main index pages for each month now have short summaries for the longer posts. You might also note that there is more older stuff -- this is me consolidating some of the afterwords and articles from previous years by putting them in the parlour. They are included under original publication date rather than when they were put into the parlour. Also, you might note the addition of a Google search bar in the upper right. Still in the works: indexes by subject. Permalink : Welcome back to the Parlour Wed 04 October 2006 02:06 PM PST Do not feed the trolls, please So old-skool righty William F. Buckley isn't a fan of the Iraq war. Not a big surprise... George Will isn't either. But that's not what this essay is about. This essay is about... Trolls. (No offense meant to any real silicon-based life forms who may or may not exist.) (read more about) Do not feed the trolls, please Wed 04 October 2006 02:05 PM PST Dave Sim: not actually a genius, maybe I just looked again at my one, token, Cerebus collection. I got it Back in the Day, before Sim went completely off the deep end, and he was still the cat's pjs of independent comix publishing. So I felt like I ought, and the one I got, "Women," is the one with the Sandman parody in it. Neil Gaiman recommended the parody -- so I thought, what the heck, it's a place to start. (read more about) Dave Sim: not actually a genius, maybe Wed 04 October 2006 01:36 PM PST Things you can do with trees So, the U.S. House of Representatives decided to prohibit using federal dollars to build new logging roads in the Tongass National Forest in Alaska, ending a program that was losing 96 cents on the dollar.
American taxpayers have been providing a subsidy of $150,000 for every logging job supported in the Tongass.
Rep. Don Young, R-Alaska*, the powerful chairman of the House Transportation Committee, already infamous for the Alaskan "bridges to nowhere" boondoggle*, claimed, "You're trying to put the last remaining -- the last remaining -- few Alaskans that are trying to make a very meager living -- 300 jobs -- and take it away from them, for the environmentalists."
Connelly points out that, in pure "jobs" terms, there are as many as 4,000 related to tourism and recreation in the area, and those jobs benefit from environmental protection.
Young, of course, is scrapping for a fight and he might end up reinstating the logging subsidy, as he has already done once before. But there are a number of issues this brings up, which are relevant to a place like Bellingham.
(read more about) Things you can do with trees Wed 04 October 2006 10:38 AM PST Is our president thinking? The question of whether or not Bush is an idiot comes up a lot, even with smart conservatives who have been secretly -- though not so secretly of late -- afraid that their number one standard-bearer isn't the best advertisement for the intellectual seriousness of their movement. Some people suggest that he's actually quite clever, and that the aw-shucks dunderheadedness is a pose to keep us off our guard. (read more about) Is our president thinking? Wed 04 October 2006 10:23 AM PST Almost nothing about blogging Now, I am the first person to be skeptical of Internet hype. (In fact, I was the first person to be skeptical of Internet hype. In 1996.) But I am also skeptical of USA Today (starting in 1984, when I first read a press release). And honestly, I am extremely skeptical of:
On Aug. 8, Connecticut businessman Ned Lamont defeated U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman in the Democratic primary, a triumph widely credited to the rah-rah racket produced by pro-Lamont armies stationed along the Internet. Indeed, the bloggers had scored big. They had helped vault a local politician to national prominence and cemented the Iraq war as Issue No. 1 in the congressional elections. Not a bad day. But their victory was short-lived. Even before the primary, Lieberman announced that, should he lose, he'd still run in November as an independent. This electoral chutzpah effectively rope-a-doped the bloggers and recharged the senator's fabled Joe-mentum. Lieberman's still the man to beat in the general election.
(read more about) Almost nothing about blogging Wed 04 October 2006 10:13 AM PST In which steam shoots out my ears So MikeK sent me this link, where an insane man shares why he is a bad romantic catch. I think he knew that reading it would make steam shoot out of my ears. The dude on the left implies that, because some statistics might indicate that marriages in which the man is whatever men are and the woman is a "career woman" are more likely to be unhappy and then break up, perhaps men shouldn't marry them. ("Career woman" is defined in this case as university-level (or higher) education, works more than 35 hours a week outside the home and makes more than $30,000 a year. So, writers and freelancers don't count. What a relief.) (read more about) In which steam shoots out my ears Wed 04 October 2006 09:54 AM PST Outrage clearing house (061004) (read more about) Outrage clearing house (061004) Wed 04 October 2006 09:54 AM PST Coolness clearing house (061004) A blog about dresses. Low-tech DIY organization. How to make a pen holder for your Moleskine. Yes, everyone has already seen the brilliant OK Go treadmill video, but since it makes me giddy with happiness I will link to it again. And, this unaired Buffy pilot is fun for all sorts of reasons, one of them being that seeing The Wrong Willow will remind you of just how great Alyson Hannigan really was in the role. I like the "Better know a district" segment on The Colbert Report anyway, but he covered us! Hey! The City of Subdued Excitement right there on national television! Coffee helps your liver. Really, is there anything it can't do? Permalink : Coolness clearing house (061004) Wed 04 October 2006 09:54 AM PST Trivial annoyances and snark clearing house (061004)
Yes, I have an opinion on the crosswords vs. Sudoku smackdown!. My opinion is that crosswords are fun and maybe even enlightening as a brain stretcher, although ultimately they're sort of pointless, unless they prevent Alzheimer's, which they might. Sudoku looks boring. I look at it and think, "oh, I could write a computer program to figure that out." And according to the article, the puzzles themselves are computer generated. There won't be any jokes, surprises, or puns. So I really don't understand the fun.
(read more about) Snark clearing house Wed 04 October 2006 09:54 AM PST Zeitgeist clearing house (061004) Fill in alarmist and armageddonist factoid here
When the Chernobyl nuclear reactor melted down in 1986, scores of people died, many more became ill with acute radiation sickness, and 135,000 people were evacuated. ... The prognosis for Chernobyl and its environs was grim. But surprisingly, Chernobyl’s surrounding flora and fauna have flourished remarkably. In Wormwood Forest: A Natural History of Chernobyl (October 2005, Joseph Henry Press), author Mary Mycio vividly describes an extraordinary – and at times unearthly – new ecosystem that is flourishing in this no-man’s land, where radiation levels are too intense for people to live.
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