Oh Frabjous Day!

The wonderfully named “Amazon Fulfillment Center” (which sounds like, well, oh my) came through for moi

Woo-Hoo!

Hot Off The Presses!

Literally.

Here, Dear Readers, is the ONE book you simply must buy

You can get it on Amazon here.

Now don’t tarry any longer.

Your Swill Moment of Highbrow Culture

Pah Haiku

I also make pah.
A portrait of the last piece.
I ain’t sharing it.

~ ths

“50 Shades of Grey”: A Dramatic Reading

…by…The Washington Nationals.

This is one for the ages.

A Marine Corps Twitter Friend of Mine Has Written a Book and Found a Stud for the Cover Shot

GAH-RRRRrrroowwwwlllll!!!!!!

…Rex stayed behind the signing table on the floor, slobbered on a red Kong and growled whenever Cpl JT Overland, his current and twelfth handler, nudged it with his foot. Most everyone wanted to pet the big furry dog, but Rex is a working dog still. No hugs from anyone other than his handler. No outside food treats such as peanut butter in the Kong– just the red toy and the loyalty to and from the Marine who works, plays and even sleeps with him. Cpl Overland assured the Marines and their families, “He’s never bitten anyone he wasn’t supposed to–yet.” They watchers laughed, and backed up.

Dogs suffer from PTSD, too. So Rex, the oldest military working dog won’t be deploying again. At ten years old, he’s already served three tours and been injured by an IED he alerted his handler Meagan Levy to but they were unable to get away from it before it exploded. Both received Purple Hearts. But Rex serves still with the Camp Pendleton SRT. He patrols with Cpl Overland on drug interdiction, security for VIPs such as at the Tim McGraw concert, and apprehending suspects who run.

Not much of a publicity hound, eh? Good dog, Rex. The best never let it go to their heads.

(Sounds like it’s going to be a great book, Mike!.)

I Started Reading “The Dragonriders” Series When I Was Pregnant With Ebola

And the “The Crystal Singers”. I am so sad to hear of her passing, for she had such wonderous, accessible, engrossing tales to share.

GOD, they are FANTASTIC!

Science fiction author Anne McCaffrey dies at 85

Writer best known for the ‘worlds of her imagination’ in her ‘Dragonriders of Pern’ novels

Prolific science fiction and fantasy author Anne McCaffrey died Monday at her home in Ireland shortly after suffering a stroke. She was 85.

“The Thread” wreaked havoc on Pern. Scorched crops, laid waste to the land, economy ~ decimated the populace. Everyone watched for signs of the recurring menace when the cycle spun through towards its end.

I think it’s come again, but our defensive dragons are gone.

And so few people left with both courage and imagination.

O.M.G !!!!!!!!!!!!!

Girlfriend has a NEW BOOK COMING OUTTTTTTTT!!!!!!!!

…And Ice Cream Castles In the Air…

“Nobody tells the truth as much as the Times tries to tell the truth. And without the Times, we might as well be the Soviet Union in the old days.”

–Author Gay Talese, in a Vanity Fair interview about the upcoming documentary Page One about The New York Times.

Well, Bingley always has fondly called it “Pravda”.

A Sentence I Thought I’d Never See Written

The blogs were written by not by a gay girl in Damascus, but a middle-aged American man based in Scotland.

Some things are beyond parody.

Top Ten

Favorite British Words.

Lucky sister Ave won’t have to haul herself out of bed like the rest of us who want to see THE wedding.

Your Daily Dash O’Culture

Via our friends at No Pasaran here’s a high-brow film to elevate the discourse around here

Ah, be the ennui!

Now pardon me whilst I gently sip some chablis with my pinky raised and sample these delicious canapes…

In This Run-Up To Valentine’s Day

I thought you, Dear Readers, would appreciate knowing that the True Love Poetry has not faded from this cruel world.

Someone deserves the Noble Prize for verse, methinks.

I Can’t Wait To See Their “21st Century” Edition Of The Bible

I’m sure they’ll remove all mention of God so as not to offend

What is a word worth? According to Publishers Weekly, NewSouth Books’ upcoming edition of Mark Twain’s seminal novel Adventures of Huckleberry Finn will remove all instances of the “n” word—I’ll give you a hint, it’s not nonesuch—present in the text and replace it with slave. The new book will also remove usage of the word Injun. The effort is spearheaded by Twain expert Alan Gribben, who says his PC-ified version is not an attempt to neuter the classic but rather to update it. “Race matters in these books,” Gribben told PW. “It’s a matter of how you express that in the 21st century.”

This may be the only time you will ever here me approvingly quote Pa. Gov. Ed Rendell, but what a freakin’ bunch of wussies we’ve become.

From Our Local Fishwrap ~ Sheer Poetry

…on the front page this very morning.
I almost wept.

Flames serve up freeway fondue
Trailer catches fire, grilling load of cheese

It was nacho ordinary traffic accident…

Sean Dugas, reporter ~ whey to GO, young man!

“If” by Kipling, as Performed by

…Hopper.

If Only I’d Known This Was Out There

I could have gotten a lot more sleep last night

(shamelessly stolen from leeann)

Now, I have to say, I’ve watched schmaybe one episode of Lost prior to last night, so I am of course perfectly versed in the show’s nuances to render decisive judgment on it, so here goes: the writers’ problem (and this shows in this final “church” scene whose stain-glassed windows are decorated with symbols of all the major religions, because, y’know, your actual beliefs don’t really matter but gosh do we respect them) is that they don’t believe in evil people. Oh sure, they believe that people can do bad things, but that in the “end” everyone is all happy and chummy; that, at their core, people are “good.”

And I just don’t buy it.

People are, at their core, nasty self-centered evil little shits.

Update: Hehe, here’s da Vinci’s lesser-known painting “The Lost Supper”

It’s Just One of Those Words

I read this:

While doing some research on the earth’s albedo…

…and instantly felt kinda…naughty.

Quote Of The Day

Sheila posts on a glorious poem by Lorine Niedecker concerning my Dear Mr. Jefferson that opens with this absolutely fantastic verse:

I
My wife is ill!
And I sit
waiting
for a quorum

That, folks, is one of the funniest things I’ve read in a long time.

Read the whole post; there are so many wonderful snippets of The Sage in that meal.

Snappy Dialogue in Local Fishwrap Saves Printing Costs!

Eliminate those pesky English class, Conjunction Junction-type nuisance rules and voilà! LESS ink, even in a story as compelling as this:

Escambia County drug ring shut down

A nearly two-year investigation into 11 men suspected of smuggling cocaine into Escambia County has resulted in the seizure of more than $500,000 in cocaine and cash. Five Pensacola men and six others from Texas and Mississippi are suspected of taking part in the drug ring, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said Monday.

…The investigation started after a confidential source began helping investigators after being arrested June 26, 2008.

Cocaine fell out the source’s pocket while at Escambia County Jail…

More egregious than a typo…set my teeth on edge, it did.

It also explains why this rag is down to about 6 total pages per edition.

Raise a Wee Dram Wi’ Us, Will Ye?

And celebrate Burns Night.

Long life, my Lord, an’ health be yours,
Unskaithed by hunger’d Highland boors;
Lord grant me nae duddie, desperate beggar,
Wi’ dirk, claymore, and rusty trigger,
May twin auld Scotland o’ a life
She likes-as butchers like a knife.

Happy Birth Bardday, old man.

Stanley Fish Reviews Sarah Palin…

…fairly.

And is promptly rabidly attacked in the comments for his unforgivable sin.

A fun read!

The UN “Climate Change” Meeting Starts This Very Morning

…and the Merriam-Webster Word of the Day is?

Nimrod

\NIM-rahd\

noun

Coincidence?

I think not.

Fill In the Blank Pop Quiz

A work published in 1896 has some pretty contemporary sentiments even today. Ending with the following paragraph…

“I have heard from half a dozen head-masters of schools that they find the art of ___-________ is so distasteful to their scholars, and so much above their intellect, and so fatiguing an exercise to the youthful mind, that they feel obliged to abandon the study of it and replace it once more by those easier and pleasanter subjects, Latin and Greek”.

…WHAT does “Studies in the Art of ___-________” pertain to?

(No trickstering, either!)

Pr0n Giovanni

So we went to see Don Giovanni yesterday. As the review had said there were some “interesting” directorial choices in the staging. Oh, the singing was fine for the most part (aside from yet another somewhat reedy tenor) and Daughter and Bride agreed that both Don Giovanni and Leporello were stud muffins.

I guess the one thing I sort of liked about the staging was the cyclical nature, how the tableaux that opens the opera also closed it, showing that even though this particular Don Giovanni is gone there will be another to replace him because the fickle and corrupt fallen nature of Man will always allow it, will always fall prey to one with his charms and devices; indeed, we always want to be enchanted/enticed/ensnared in some way. But the staging itself was very barren, and the characters who were not singing moved in a very slow, stylized way which was…odd to my provincial sensibilities. I must give props to the lighting designer, because one neat aspect with the staging was how the shadows of the characters interacted on the walls in a manner that was somewhat different from how they were interacting on stage yet perhaps more evocative of their true meanings…that was well done.

But what turned me off about the overall experience was the over-the-top gropey lewdness. Hands were constantly on breasts (not mine), under skirts, in pants and crotches, and various sexual acts were pretty graphically simulated on a dining room table next to a casket. I mean, was this really necessary? I don’t think so. It was cringe-inducing and added nothing to the production; in fact it took a lot away.

As did the idiot sitting next to me who kept humming along to several of the melodies. Like I paid good money to come and sit next to him to listen to him. Ass.

It’s That Time Of Year When My Thoughts Naturally Turn To Rakes

So of course we’re going to see Don Giovanni this weekend.

To set the mood we made Daughter watch Amadeus last night.

I’m not so sure about the setting for this particular production, however; anytime a review mentions “odd directorial choices” I get a little nervous…