November 2008
79 posts
“The key to being more eloquenter than you were before is to articulate words in...”
– Coleman Miller on the secrets of eloquence (via Seemless Universe).
The IAMER Research Lab: 2009 Internships. →
I wish I’d had this on my CV as a young man.
Donald Barthelme on Thanksgiving.
At last, it is time to speak the truth about Thanksgiving. The truth is this: it is not a really great holiday. Consider the imagery. Dried cornhusks hanging on the door! Terrible wine! Cranberry jelly in little bowls of extremely doubtful provenance which everyone is required to handle with the greatest of care! Consider the participants, the merrymakers. Men and women (also children) who have...
This Recording's comprehensive list of musical... →
Who can take a bunch of alphabetical Wikipedia links, sprinkle it with dew? Cover it with a personal backstory and a miracle or two? Molly Lambert can, Molly Lambert can. Man, I love This Recording.
"I believe the possibility of alien possession is... →
Via Hardland/Heartland.
Speaking of H/H, here is a very entertaining point-counterpoint on their MAEP show this fall, with The Thousandth Word’s Michael Fallon for the prosecution, and Art of This Gallery’s David Petersen for the defense. Though Fallon is my TTW colleague, I actually side up with Petersen a little more closely on this particular case.
"Let's keep Maggie in the Senate." →
George Lois’s borderline-insulting-yet-extremely-compelling advertisement for anti-war Democratic Senator Warren Magnuson’s 1968 re-election campaign.
I’ve been reading George Lois’s memoir $ellebrity lately, which is a cranky, hilarious and fascinating glimpse into the now-vanished world of the old-style, smart-ass, very non-P.C. elite New York liberal.
Whatever happened to "A Day Without Art"? →
From Joy Garnett at NEWSGrist, via Leap into the Void:
Around the era that the first effective therapies for HIV were being developed, so was the internet. This means many artists who died young have few references to their lives and work in cyberspace.
In light of this fact, I thought it would be a good idea to encourage bloggers worldwide post on December 1 as a way to remember an artist or...
WatchA Most Inspiring Encounter! A video by Brennan Vance and Peter McLarnan, featuring your correspondent in the role of “The Colonel.”
See more of Brennan’s work here.
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Thanksgiving camel recipe. →
I have been very excited (and many of my vegetarian colleagues have been horrified) since I’ve discovered a few of the Somali halal butcher shops in my neighborhood sell hilib geyl — camel meat. It’s a little like beef, but slightly tougher.
The above is a recipe that would seem to be more or less authentic, for a whole grilled camel, stuffed with goat, stuffed with chicken,...
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Brian Eno on group-singing. →
From the “This I Believe” series on yesterday’s Weekend Edition Sunday.
The feeling he describes is exactly what I was trying to accomplish with my singalong piece Endless Skyway. So to his list of good group-sing songs I would add Woody Guthrie’s “This Land is Your Land” and “The Sinking of the Reuben James,” as well as that old socialist chesnut...
Jim Norton writes David Plouffe.
James Norton to David Plouffe
12:36 PM (7 minutes ago)
Right now, we’re gearing up for one of the most exciting Christmas seasons in history.
Becca and I are mapping out our Thanksgiving and Christmas travel plans — shopping online for gifts, and working out the kinks in our pumpkin and apple-cranberry pie recipes.
Time is short before we have to drive to Wisconsin and hand out the...
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“How New Wave am I these days? How New Wave would I like to be?”
– Nate, in the midst of an existential crisis. How New Wave are any of us? To what degree of New Wave do we aspire?
Lizard people roundup.
Mediation claims they ran the cleaner campaign.
Luck with a Capital F wonders about the legal implications under intergalactic law.
Metroblogs reminds us they’re all lizard people, anyway.
Above: Is this change we can believe in?
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Selected adjectives from pages 200-201 of the 1983...
undistinguished
miserable
wretched
conventional
glossy
slick
derivative
competent
faceless
treacly
icky
serviceable
“listenable”
hideous
terminal
mediocre
"Homemade Memorials," a site-specific project of... →
“Site-specific” Get it? Internet? Ha ha. My inane commentary aside, I’ve been absolutely dazzled by Triple Canopy, which launched earlier this year. The layout is gorgeous and a pleasure to use.
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Yip Harburg sings his composition "Brother, Can... →
Via NPR’s Weekend Edition Saturday.
St. Paul's latest gift to the culinary lexicon:... →
“Two half-pound hamburgers, three six-ounce steaks, a half-pound of gyro meat and a half-pound of Italian beef, topped with six slices of cheese.” St. Paul is a strange and magical place. Only in the Midwest, dear readers! Via MNSpeak.
Obama's arts platform. →
Good stuff, but I’d like to go a bit further out for a moment and suggest it’s time to bring back some version of the WPA Federal Art Project to put all those artists that threw themselves into making and distributing Obama agit-prop to work. I wrote a little bit about this back in July at The Thousandth Word blog. Whether consciously or or not, artists haven’t been included in...
An introduction to the Minneapolis co-op wars of... →
This astounding piece of forgotten Minneapolis history was first related to me by Mike Gunther, who is himself a fount of astounding, forgotten Minneapolis history. This is the best resource I’ve ever seen online, though I believe there’s at least a few books on the subject. Absolutely amazing. Via Erik Farseth’s Something I Learned Today.
“I don’t understand how everyone hates shaving so much. I love shaving. I...”
– Nate Sturdevant, on the manly arts.
You can use Pinaud Clubman aftershave, too.
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The Original, at Mayslack's. →
As far as I’m concerned, the Holy Trinity of Minneapolis Local Bar Food Cuisine is the Jucy Lucy at Matt’s, the Dago at Dusty’s (that’s a ground sausage in a hamburger format, basically) and the Original [PDF!] garlic roast beef sandwich at Mayslack’s, which Ed Kohler sings the praises of above.
Mayslack’s kills me every time I go in, though. It was founded by...
