- On WNYC, the Leonard Lopate Show has recently started posting picks and suggestions from any given week’s guests, asking them questions about what books they’re reading, what music they’re listening to, etc. They also ask, “What’s one thing you’re a fan of that people might not expect?” Teller, the silent half of Penn and Teller, answered, “Novel forms of pancakes and waffles.” I love that I have almost no idea what he means.
- All this time, I had been avoiding the Huffington Post mostly just because it’s a time-sink. Like io9, Metafilter, or Boing Boing, I was only visiting occasionally, and even then only when another blog redirected me there. But, it turns out, there’s a whole bevy of other reasons to avoid it, namely that, although it earns millions of dollars — and even more in its recent merger with AOL — it still doesn’t pay its writers, nor did it even pay for the blogging platform that runs it. Plus, it seems less like an interesting time-sink and more one that just re-purposes what other news blogs have written, with occasional liberal celebrity cameos, for the purpose of aggrandizing the Huffington Post. Maybe that’s unfair. As I said, I don’t spend much time with it, except when others occasionally direct it there. But it would be nice if some of that AOL money went to the people who day by day create the product AOL bought.
- A teenage burglar killed three goldfish because he didn’t want to leave any witnesses behind. In his defense, he may just have been reading The Cat in the Hat one too many times. Then again, reading might not be too high on this brainiac’s agenda. [via]
- I don’t think it will surprise anyone that Donald Rumsfeld is full of shit. This is what I think he himself would call “a known known.”
- And finally, Wolverine or two Bat Men? [via]
radio
Spark plugs
I’m writing this on the train home, having stayed a little late in Manhattan after work to attend a discussion and signing of the new Studio 360 book on creativity. The event, held at a bookstore downtown in Tribeca, was an hour with Julie Burstein, former executive producer of the radio show, and Kurt Andersen, then and current host. They talked about the contents of the book, drawn from years of on-air interviews, played a few clips of those interviews, took a small handful of questions, and then signed copies of the book. All together, it wasn’t much more than an hour; I spent more time (combined, back and forth) on the subway. More time waiting around the bookstore, at whose cafe I grabbed a sandwich for dinner, and more time at Penn Station after, waiting on my train home.
Still, it was a lot of fun. I think this is the third event in the past year (or so) where I’ve seen Andersen, first at a reading for the Neil Gaiman-edited anthology Stories, then at a live recording of Studio 360 (which I think was edited into at least a couple of shows; I’m behind on my listening), and now this. I don’t take advantage of even a small percentage of the things that happen in New York City, but I do love that I can just take a (relatively quick) subway across town and attend free events like this.
I don’t necessarily love the time it adds to my commute, or how late it gets me home. But, with the move of my office coming in April, I am thinking of moving myself, possibly to Queens.
That, though, is another story.
Studio session
Tonight, I attended a live taping of Studio 360, specifically this one, all about the universe and theoretical physics. It was a whole lot of fun.
Although it was certainly not this cold and snowy when I went into the studio.
Otherwise, it was a pretty uneventful day. I finished boxing up the files I didn’t get to on Friday’s clean-up day, and as a group we trekked over to Rockefeller Center for our group holiday photo. Two years ago, it was the tree in the lobby. Last year, it was one of the lions in front of the New York Public Library, a block away. At the rate we’re going, we may very well be taking the photo in another borough come next holiday season!
Of course, we’ll have moved offices by then, by I think my nonexistent point is still no less valid.
Wobegoned
Today — okay, technically yesterday, though I’m time-stamping this — was another clean-up day at the office. I didn’t finish boxing up all the old files I wanted to, but I did throw away a big box of floppy disks and CDs, which at one point contained important manuscript files and are nothing much more than landfill or coasters. There were also a couple of zip disks in there, which I remember at one point being the thing for file storage — my old boss at Penn State loved them — but which I realized I hadn’t actually seen in use for a long, long time. I was amused to discover, then, via Wikipedia that they are still used…”by retro computing enthusiasts.” They went in the trash. Or recycling. Honestly, I handed off the box to our mail room guy and de facto office manager, and I’m not really sure what he did with them.
But they’re out of my hands, no longer collecting dust under the second chair in my cubicle, and nothing I have to bring with me when we move offices in the spring.
After work, I met up with my parents for dinner, and then a live performance of A Prairie Home Companion. It was a lot of fun, if maybe a little shaggy around the edges. (Friday night is the dress rehearsal for the Saturday radio broadcast.) There was a lot of great music, and some really nice poetry, though at this point I may be a little Home Companion‘ed-out, having seen another simulcast of the show just back in October.
Then again, I think I enjoyed the evening a lot more than the couple in front of me, who I think were most amused by the fact that one of the guest musicians, a really talented jazz pianist, was named Dick Hyman. See — even frat boys can find something to giggle about on public radio!
America’s radio sweetheart
Today was pretty similar to yesterday, except the live radio show I went to see was The Sound of Young America, not The Prairie Home Companion. (Given host Jesse Thorn’s noted dislike of PHC, hinted at in a couple of polite jokes at its expense at the top of the show, I find this scheduling coincidence quite amusing.) And instead of meeting my parents for dinner beforehand, I wound up briefly visiting New York’s High Line Park — I still like it, but I think the thrill of its newness is gone — and managing not to have any dinner at all. In fact, I’m writing this while on the train ride home, and I’ve managed to have nothing to eat or drink for about four or five hours. (I passed on the free wine and beer available at the show.) That wasn’t at all my original plan, but when your plan is basically “wander downtown and see what happens,” sometimes that’s what happens.
The show itself was a lot of fun, with guests like Judah Frielander, Amy Sedaris, and John Hodgman, plus pretty much exactly the sort of audience you’d expect at a live public radio show featuring those people. And live comedy and music. There was going to be a meet-up after, at a nearby bar, but I have an MRI at 7 a.m. tomorrow morning. And I’ve had nothing to eat since an apple after lunch, so a beer or two might not be exactly the right thing for me now anyway.
If I had to pick, I’d say I probably enjoyed last night’s show a little more, even if that hurts Jesse Thorn’s feelings or loses me public radio indie cred with the heavily Brooklynite audience tonight. But it’s a narrow margin, and this time I was actually there, not watching on a movie screen.
Now I’m just actually glad to be going home, and have something to eat.
Update: Just after I’d written that — or, rather, written up to the “going home, and…” part — my train arrived at the station, where my father was waiting to pick me up. I had a left-over turkey burger and some mac’n’cheese, and now I’m going to get myself ready for bed. I don’t expect to have a lot to do tomorrow morning, since the MRI mostly entails lying very still and trying to concentrate on anything other than the fact that my arms are kind of pinched at my side*. But it is at the unconscionable hour of 7 a.m. on a Saturday.
* I did request an open MRI, but I also told the woman who made my appointment that it wasn’t a deal-breaker, not if I could get in sooner with a closed one. She said she understood, but she didn’t say if my appointment was either one or the other. I’m hoping it won’t matter, and they’ll have an open one available. Also that it reveals exactly what’s wrong, isn’t serious, outlines a plan of action, and gets me some relief. Oh, and is full of rainbows and magic beams and gumdrops, but I think that much goes without saying, right?