« April 2005 | Main | June 2005 »
May 31, 2005
Ebert's Errors, second in a series: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
For years, this has been my go-to example when a certain individual accuses me of being in Ebert's unquestioning thrall. Though he openly admires the play (which I had not seen at the time I first saw the movie), and as much as I admire his line about how "Any medium that can make a star out of Mark Harmon can make heroes of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern", he perceives a huge disconnect in its adaptation that I maintain does not exist. A relatively rare zero-star effort. http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19910315/REVIEWS/103150304/1023Posted by irons at 02:24 PM
Words in 10.4's dictionary, but not in its spellchecker, third in a series: "auteur"
Posted by irons at 02:16 PM
Ebert's Errors, first in a series: The Frighteners
I wholly disagree with Ebert's reviews so infrequently that I'm going to start keeping track. Here he extravagantly maligns Peter Jackson's pre-Hobbit project, which I saw with Laura at the Grand Lake. As terrific as Heavenly Creatures was, and though The Frighteners is a work in a minor key, we left happy and were reassured that the spattery auteur who gave the world Bad Taste and Dead Alive had not entirely gone away. http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19960719/REVIEWS/607190303/1023Posted by irons at 02:16 PM
Hey, "radar.oreilly.com" is a pun
Not being a MASH fan, until I read this odd article in the NYT about Bush's assistant, I didn't remember that the name of Gary Burghoff's Radar character was O'Reilly. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/30/politics/30letter.htmlPosted by irons at 12:28 PM
May 30, 2005
The Neiman-Marcus cookie urban legend created the demand for Neiman-Marcus to begin selling cookies in the first place
http://www.snopes.com/business/consumer/cookie.aspPosted by irons at 07:21 PM
The Portage Bay Cafe in Seattle is pretty darn great for breakfast
I had an omelette with caramelized apple and pork sausage that was one of the better things I've ever eaten involving eggs. http://www.portagebaycafe.com/Posted by irons at 05:10 PM
May 24, 2005
Words in 10.4's dictionary, but not in its spellchecker, second in a series: "emoticon"
Posted by irons at 05:37 PM
Words in 10.4's dictionary, but not in its spellchecker, first in a series: "tortious"
Posted by irons at 11:08 AM
May 16, 2005
Robot child-herders
"Roomba's coming out tonight. Clean up your toys or Roomba will eat them!" http://longtail.typepad.com/the_long_tail/2005/05/robot_childherd.htmlPosted by irons at 11:51 AM
A Keystone Koup attempt in the Oklahoma Senate
"That's why the Democrats refused to go along with it, leaving the building and not answering about 10 hours of quorum calls. The GOP fumed and fussed that the Democrats were refusing to "work," but can you just imagine what the GOP would have done nationwide if Al Gore had gone to the Senate in 1998 and said to Trent Lott, 'Step down, I'm running things now?'" http://friends.macjournals.com/mattd/2005/05/02#a1197Posted by irons at 10:18 AM
May 14, 2005
Mark Pesce sketches an economic model for post-broadcast television production
It's a pleasantly readable PDF, often an oxymoron. [via] http://hyperreal.org/~mpesce/piracyisgood.pdfPosted by irons at 05:00 PM
Tom DeLay's supporters sing "We've Got A Hammer" on NPR
I've never been partial to the song, but what they're doing to it is a crime and a half. Click the "Listen Now" link and skip ahead, if you like, to about 4 minutes in. The performance occupies about 20% of the segment; the reporters and producers clearly knew this was their money shot. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4650739Posted by irons at 10:04 AM
Arrested Development rumored to be renewed for two seasons
From Defamer: "If it's true, great! But we're obligated to put on our skeptic hat for a second. Two seasons? Desperate Housewives, which averages roughly 435 million viewers in the key demographic each week, only got extended for one more season. While we would never put anything this crazy-sounding past a network that makes bastards try to pick out their parents from a small mob of out-of-work actors and builds entire sitcoms around tit puns, this sounds a little extra crazy." http://www.defamer.com/hollywood/tv/shows/arrested-development-gets-two-more-years-of-cancellation-rumors-103461.phpPosted by irons at 10:01 AM
May 12, 2005
Proust's madeleines appear to violate fundamental hygroscopic principles
http://www.slate.com/id/2118443/Posted by irons at 10:09 AM
Jon Carroll, WMPC, flirts with switching
"And here's the other thing: Last week I went into the Apple store in Emeryville. I needed to buy a docking station for my iPod. [...] I was mindful of my changing opinions on the Apple-PC thing when I walked in, because I love my iPod from Apple and I hate my Internet Explorer from Microsoft." http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/03/28/DDG3FBUUAM1.DTLPosted by irons at 10:02 AM
There's a relief pitcher for the Florida Marlins named "Nate Bump"
http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/players/7169Posted by irons at 08:20 AM
Another reason to deport James Sensenbrenner
Thanks to his rider on the most recent Iraq funding bill, introduced in conference, the USA is back in the business of (retroactively) deporting and denying visas to anyone whose uncle once stood in line at a Starbucks next to someone whose name resembles the alias of a suspected terrorist. http://www.slate.com/id/2118522/Posted by irons at 08:07 AM
May 10, 2005
Mike Godwin's blog
The subject matter is worthwhile in its own right, but the blog layout is awesome. http://www.godwinslaw.org/weblog/archive/2005/05/09/will-the-broadcast-flag-rise-againPosted by irons at 06:02 PM
The new SAT writing section can be graded by a one-line Perl script
"Dr. Perelman contacted the College Board and was surprised to learn that on the new SAT essay, students are not penalized for incorrect facts. The official guide for scorers explains: 'Writers may make errors in facts or information that do not affect the quality of their essays. For example, a writer may state 'The American Revolution began in 1842' or '"Anna Karenina," a play by the French author Joseph Conrad, was a very upbeat literary work.'' (Actually, that's 1775; a novel by the Russian Leo Tolstoy; and poor Anna hurls herself under a train.) No matter. 'You are scoring the writing, and not the correctness of facts.'" [via] http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/04/education/04education.htmlPosted by irons at 11:21 AM
Michael Aldrete has advice on importing audiobooks into iTunes
http://aldoblog.com/blog/471Posted by irons at 11:18 AM
May 09, 2005
Bruce Schneier hates the REAL ID act
He points out some of the worst specifics I've heard so far: "The REAL ID Act requires driver's licenses to include a 'common machine-readable technology.' This will, of course, make identity theft easier. Assume that this information will be collected by bars and other businesses, and that it will be resold to companies like ChoicePoint and Acxiom. It actually doesn't matter how well the states and federal government protect the data on driver's licenses, as there will be parallel commercial databases with the same information." http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2005/05/real_id.htmlPosted by irons at 08:11 PM
May 06, 2005
Tom DeLay calls on all Americans to support oral sex
"Think of what we could accomplish if we checked our pride at the door, if collectively we all spent less time taking credit and more time deserving it. If we spent less time ducking responsibility and more time welcoming it. If we spent less time on our soapboxes and more time on our knees." [via] http://press.arrivenet.com/pol/article.php/632956.htmlPosted by irons at 03:28 PM
Broadcast Flag unanimously burned by DC appeals court
"What did you do in the war against the broadcast flag, daddy?" "I posted something to my blog when it was over." http://www.boingboing.net/2005/05/06/vtv_day_we_won_the_b.htmlPosted by irons at 10:21 AM
May 03, 2005
Stephen Colbert gets his Daily Show spinoff
"The Colbert Report", premiering "late third quarter" 2005, from which he will sadly make only rare returns to his old stomping grounds. [via] http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/04/arts/television/04come.html?ex=1272859200&en=b6c08495dff51300&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rssPosted by irons at 03:01 PM
Pat Robertson thinks Muslims should be ineligible for high office in the US
And Lou Sheldon thinks he's on to something. Christ on a crutch. http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/05/robertson-sheldon-muslim-americans-not.htmlPosted by irons at 08:52 AM
May 02, 2005
See, I can't stop wearing t-shirts
I would totally buy one of these "Your failed business model is not my problem..." shirts, if not for that goddamn stupid ellipsis. http://www.giantrobotprinting.com/store/shirts/commies/ccbusinessPosted by irons at 11:10 PM
It's all about the smile on the kid's face
It was several seconds before I even tried to take in the contents of the background. If it's been edited, somebody did a pretty good job with the matting and the lighting, down to the shadow of the sewing machine across his pants. http://www.livejournal.com/users/fantasygoat/46706.htmlPosted by irons at 09:54 PM
May 01, 2005
The NYT gives prominent sci-fi writers an opportunity to vent about how much they dislike Star Wars
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/01/weekinreview/01fount.html?ei=5088&en=0b3dca481acbf589&ex=1272600000&adxnnl=1&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&adxnnlx=1114967166-hwjPOCj84i3hgnQJFYAqwAPosted by irons at 10:15 AM