Friday, April 13, 2007

Friday Blogthing: Sex and the City and Me

This seems to make a lot of sense. I think this actress who played this character turned out to be gay. So maybe I really am a lesbian trapped in a man's body.

You Are Most Like Miranda!

While you've had your fair share of romance, men don't come first
Guys are a distant third to your friends and career.
And this independence *is* attractive to some men, in measured doses.
Remember that if you imagine the best outcome, it might just happen.


Romantic prediction: Someone from your past is waiting to reconnect...

But you'll have to think of him differently, if you want things to work.


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Thursday, April 12, 2007

Imushamed

Well thank god science that's over.

CBS has made the right decision in listening to the clamoring mob and firing washed-up radio talk show host Don Imus for saying what nearly every hip-hop artist spews at 50 words per minute.

And I for one couldn't be happier. It's not that I really care what happens to Imus, or freedom of speech, or racial equality or the hypocrisy of cultural leaders or that the traumatized members of the Rutgers women's basketball team can now begin the process of healing and trying to avoid the fate of becoming crack whores because of the debilitating abuse of an old white geezer.

What I'm most grateful for is that now that our long national nightmare is over -- a nightmare that the mediots dutifully pasted wall-to-wall across the 24-hour news cycle -- we can begin to focus once again on the other important stories of the day.

Stories like:As you can see, we've got a lot to worry about. But at least Don Imus won't be darkening the 9-11 terrestrial AM radio frequencies of irrelevance anymore.

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More Bloch Building pics


In the interest of keeping everyone informed, I wanted to post a link to British design blog dezeen and it's photo feaure on the Steven Holl's Bloch Building.

They don't post any commentary, instead opting to go out on a limb with the press release issued by the Neslon-Atkins Museum of Art, but the images the feature are pretty amazing.

And there's not one mention the words "Butler Building."

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Wednesday, April 11, 2007

The new N-word

I'm not sure whether it's good or bad that I'm just now learning about this Don Imus fiasco.

I have F-Bombs and Dan to thank for cluing me in (interesting how I'm learning about the "news" from bloggers now).

If you're clueless like me, here's the 411: Don Imus is in Dutch with the Blacks because he referred to the Rutgers women's basketball team as "nappy-headed hos". Offended Blacks and the PC Police want him fired for using the racial slur "nappy".

The aforementioned F-Bombs points out that even black people are racists when they use the term "nappy".

Dan throws in with Jason (half)Whitlock who notes that this is much ado about not very much and that "the gangsta rappers and their followers in the athletic world have far bigger platforms to negatively define us than some old white man with a bad radio show."

That's a good point, and one that I've tried to make before.

Personally, I wonder why there is so much fury over Imus' use of the term "nappy," but nobody really cares that he called the women "hoes"?

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Book report: The Judgment of Paris

I don't really have room to complain. I've got a good job, wonderful family, nice house, tons of hipness.

But being this awesome does have its drawbacks.

For one thing, I don't have as much time for free reading as I used to have. That's why it has taken me two months to read the 375 pages of Ross King's The Judgment of Paris, which has been on my reading list since at least last August.

I was interested in this book for the subject matter (French art and the introduction of what became known as Impressionism), but also for the author. I had previously devoured King's Brunelleschi's Dome and was impressed with his ability to bring out the juice of history.

I wasn't disappointed in that regard with The Judgment of Paris. King has an ability to take the potentially dry dates and places of history and weave in the perspective and personality of the historical characters to make the events interesting and meaningful. In this way, for example, he connected the historical dots between the Battle of Puebla in Mexico (which gave us the Cinco de Mayo celebration) with the plight of starving French artists in 1860s Paris.
Le déjeuner sur l'herbe - Édouard Manet
The book chronicles and juxtaposes the lives of two Parsian artists through 1860s and 1870s France -- legend-in-his-own time Ernest Meissonier and legend-in-our-time Édouard Manet -- along with the social, political and cultural events of the time that produced artistic geniuses such as Monet, Degas, Cézanne, Renoir, Pissaro and others.

The account stresses the interrelatedness of events, attitudes and people and the affects of all of these on the course of artistic endeavor. It's not what I would call your typical Sunday afternoon page turner. The stories take an effort by the reader to keep track of names and time lines.

But the effort is paid off in an added interest and understanding of how and why the painters listed above became known as Impressionists (a pejorative term when first coined by Parisian art critics). It also gives a view, through the lens of history, of the fleeting nature of fame and the fickle nature of cultural fashion.

It also speaks to to the universal tendency of one generation to deride the artistic heights of the previous. Just like there was a disco record burning in Caminsky Park, there were calls by some French art critics burn all of Meissonier's work. It's interesting how history repeats itself.

King expounds further in this clip from a book signing courtesy of ForaTV:



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Tuesday, April 10, 2007

YouTube Tuesday: I feel like singing a Beatnik poem

As Dan recently noted at Gone Mild, April is National Poetry Month.

We've featured poetry on YouTube Tuesday before, so this isn't unprecedented. Unfortunately, the poetry pickings on YouTube are kind of slim. There are a couple of good Khalil Gibran joints, lots of poetry of the Def variety, but a lot of it is tough to get through.

But just because poetry is bad, doesn't mean it can't be entertaining. Take this YouTube Tuesday submission for example. This clip, from the 1958 teen B movie High School Confidential, features Phillipa Fallon as a beat poetess. And yes, you're right. That is Jackie Coogan on piano behind her (you may remember him as Uncle Fester).

"Turn your eyes inside and dig the vacuum. Tomorrow... drag."



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Friday, April 06, 2007

Mad world

This is the last time I'm going to post on this issue.



hat tip to Making It Rain

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Somebody needs a Hugg

I thought sleeping on it might give me a different perspective.

I was wrong.

(WARNING: What follows is utter self-indulgent crap, written therapeutically to help me advance through the 5 stages to Acceptance. I apologize in advance.)

There really aren't any words to describe my thoughts toward Bob Huggins. Phrases come to mind. "Punched in the gut," "Kicked in the balls," "Stabbed in the back."

But really, it takes a picture to describe my current attitude:

I know what you're thinking, because I'm thinking the same thing. "It's just a game. Not important in the grand scheme of things."

That's part of what makes this so hard. It isn't important, I mean really important. Isn't it strange how we humans attach so much emotional value to the most trivial and superficial things? The ladies at the office are the same with Grey's Anatomy (shudder).

But, here were are. The day after Bob Huggins nuked the renascent basketball program at K-State I can't help how hellapissed I am.

Sure, I'm pissed at Huggins for being a dirty, rotten, lying, stinking, back-stabbing, deceptive, deceitful, cowardly, conniving, no-integrity, double-crossing, double-dealing treacherous whore.

Absolutely I'm angry for the way he took advantage of the best things about Kansas and K-State supporters and left like a thief in the night.

But the worst part, what I'm most bitter about, is that I took a chance on him in the beginning.

I freakin' defended that guy. When people (mostly on Internet message boards) said he was a lowlife and K-State would live to regret it if they hired him, my response was that everyone deserves a second chance. You just don't know him. Give the guy a break. He's a good guy, just misunderstood. Let him show that he really is a stand up fella.

And up until two day's ago I would have said the same thing. Innocent until proven guilty and all that rot. K-State just a had a great basketball season and they were primed for an even better season next year.

Gawd, I was like Mark Ratner defending Mike Damone. What a chump I was.

Anyway, this whole thing has reminded me of these lyrics from Pink Floyd's Animals:
You gotta be crazy, you gotta have a real need
You've got to sleep on your toes, and when you're on the street
You've got to be able to pick out the easy meat with your eyes closed
And then moving in silently, down wind and out of sight
You've got to strike when the moment is right without thinking.
And after a while, you can work on points for style
Like the club tie, and the firm handshake
A certain look in the eye, and an easy smile
You have to be trusted by the people that you lie to
So that when they turn their backs on you
You'll get the chance to put the knife in.
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Wednesday, April 04, 2007

It takes a Village

While KCMo deals with witches in city hall and murderous east-side gangs, the inner suburbs of Johnson County are now engaged in a destructive turf war.

According to The Star, the Prairie Village city council told Leawood to foxtrot oscar with its preposterous plan to lease a traffic island for the next 99 years.
Two years ago, the Leawood Arts Council had designed a sculpture, called "Porch Lights," specifically for that island, without realizing the land belonged to Prairie Village. When the error was discovered, Leawood requested to lease the island for 99 years. In addition to paying for the sculpture, Leawood would have maintained the property and done additional landscaping. Under the lease, if Prairie Village decided to terminate the lease early, it would have to reimburse Leawood for all costs. If Leawood broke the contract, it would have to restore the island to its original condition.
Can you imagine! The unmitigated gall of some people! The sheer temerity. Just who the hell do these Leawood Arts people think they are? Thank goodness for council members like David Belz, who wasn't willing to kowtow to Prairie Village's southern neighbors.
"I don't like how this has come down," said council member David Belz. "They (Leawood City Council) want 99 or nothing. They didn't do their homework, and now we have to decide whether or not we want a structure there or not."
I say definitely NOT! I'm with Belz. Who needs a stinkin' art project when you've already got a perfectly good weed-infested, crumbling curb patch of dirt.

It's high time some cities learn who really runs things here in Johnson County!

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Tuesday, April 03, 2007

Volunteer opportunity

Tony at TKC tipped me (no homo) to this news item:


In the interest of community service, I would like to hereby humbly volunteer to donate my valuable time to this very worthwhile cause. I know that it will be a sacrifice to spend hours pouring over "adult literature" and documenting abuses at the area porn shops and strip clubs.

It will mean many nights spent away from my family and in the company of drunks and topless dancers, but if it means a better tomorrow for our fair city, I'm willing to accept this burden.

So I'll meet the rest of you at Diamond Joe's Friday night?

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