March 2009
61 posts
The Times folds the City section
Bummer dudes.
Big Picture: Mexican Drug Wars →
This is no joke.
“He’s always asking: ‘Is that new? I haven’t seen that...”
– Michelle Obama perhaps gave the best quote ever last week to the IHT.
“What Brooks found holds true for the broader world of aspirational consumption....”
– “The Age of Commodified Intelligence” in More Intelligent Life, a followup to their Winter ‘08 article “The Age of Mass Intelligence” (via gregbrown)
[Watching Ethan Hawke in Before Sunset was probably, along with the R-train moment, which happened around that same time, the beginning of my realization that time was really passing, that this thing was really happening. Life began to show itself as more than a series of days, or movies, all in a row, which I might or might not attend. He was gaunt and slightly stooped, but it was his face—rough...
The New Hard Times →
The NYT now has a This American Life-esque video series matching kids of today with their Depression era grandparents for conversations. Check it.
“Srsly, it was like someone compressed henrietta hudson’s into the size of...”
– R gives the best party description of the week.
Sometimes you get a press release that you just...
[ Melissa Joan Hart and mother Paula Hart prepare to celebrate this Mother’s Day with the grand opening of their very own wonderland of treats, SWEETHARTS, which will be located in Sherman Oaks, CA. SWEETHARTS has a nurturing neighborhood feel where children, teens, parents and families can come relax for self-serve frozen yogurt, gelato and various other delights.
SWEETHARTS is the...
[Society doesn’t need newspapers. What we need is journalism. For a century, the imperatives to strengthen journalism and to strengthen newspapers have been so tightly wound as to be indistinguishable. That’s been a fine accident to have, but when that accident stops, as it is stopping before our eyes, we’re going to need lots of other ways to strengthen journalism instead.
When we shift our...
J. Cruel →
This is so awesome.
iDaft →
Unsurprisingly addictive. [via]
[The road novels, documentary books and gangster films of the 1930s depicted the myth of social mobility as a bitter cheat. The era’s screwball comedies viewed it merely as delightfully laughable. But all suggested that the Depression had left a core feature of American ideology in disarray, and thus emphasized the extent to which the traditional American language of personal ambition was...
“At a time when the industry needs all the credibility it can muster, Prada is...”
– Robin Givhan, always an alpha woman, on why fashion mags have lost credibility completely as of late. Holler.
Ken Burns loses financial backing →
OK recession, now I’m pissed.
Storybook Fashion →
These posts, which imagine what a modern day Pippi, Ramona, Mary Lennox would wear, just became my new favorite thing. Please do Eloise next?
Where to Pass the Torch? →
[But here is the question: As Ms. Baker’s generation approaches retirement — women whose commitment to abortion was forged in the pre-Roe v. Wade days — will younger women take their places at the clinics?
“We worry about that a lot,” said Sally Burgess, executive director of the Hope clinic, who is also chairwoman of the National Abortion Federation, the main professional support group for...
Sylvia.
Black Rook in Rainy Weather
On the stiff twig up there
Hunches a wet black rook
Arranging and rearranging its feathers in the rain.
I do not expect a miracle
Or an accident
To set the sight on fire
In my eye, not seek
Any more in the desultory weather some design,
But let spotted leaves fall as they fall,
Without ceremony, or portent.
Although, I admit, I desire,
Occasionally, some...
[How should artists behave? How should we discuss art, build venues to show it in, tell people about it, try and support artists? There is no single answer: each situation demands a different solution. Perhaps, as we are hit daily with dire economic news, what is needed is to remain sensitive to the details, those small elements in the art world that cumulatively exert their own pressures on the...
James Franco sells short story collection →
Please don’t turn out like Jewel.
Please don’t turn out like Jewel.
Thanks.
Zoe Heller Keeps the Faith →
I wrote about Zoe Heller today. I really did love this book. Go and get it.
Also, my brother’s magnanimous comment on the piece.
“It really just made me think of how you stole my copy of franny and zooey.”
