ForcedPerspective

A digital wonderland (of pudding)

A tale from my youth has been Gutenbergered: The Magic Pudding! I love the pudding's spindly legs.

Early best-of

The materials selectors (aka those who buy the books and whatnot) have released an early best-of-07 list. I'm not ready to discuss my best-ofs until the last seconds of '07, but I'm betting my list won't be the same. Except for Sherman Alexie, of course.

C is for Charming

I'm only up to C and I must share this delightful alphabet book.

Rom en Lyon

From reader John, a photo essay on the Romany in Lyon, France.

Drugs problem: sorted.

I think I've figured out why the UK has a drug problem: this anti-drug ad. It makes me want to take fistfuls of drugs. Although it also makes me want to go rambling. Just like Trainspotting!

Grocery shopping

Looks like somebody's finally (though I think it's not the first such service) doing the obvious thing: putting grocery circulars on line. There are some cool-sounding auxiliary features, too. I don't know how good its knowledge of where you are is; it was pretty close to correct from work.

But daaaaad!

Southwest Custer County, Nebraska, 1892
"Yes, you will play the bass."
"But dad, I can't reach all the notes!"
"Don't 'but dad' me, young man, I paid for it, now you'll play it!"
"Awwww, maaaaaan."

Sherman Alexie gives me a boner

From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian:

"But you should approach each book -- you should approach life -- with the real possibility that you might get a metaphorical boner at any point."
"A metaphorical boner!" I shouted. "What the heck is a metaphorical boner?"
Gordy laughed.
"When I say boner, I really mean joy," he said.
"Then why don't you say joy? You didn't have to say boner. Whenever I think about boners, I get confused."
"Boner is funnier. And more joyful."

Sometimes it's more bookmarks than blog

Lifehacker tells us how to get audio off a DVD.
Eric Saunders tells us how to strip ID tags from an MP3.

Because he's delightful, dammit!

I shall force you to go through Graham Linehan, because he is quite delightful, to take a look at some information about and contents of a gem from Simpsons' writers' past: Army Man magazine.

an abundance of katherines Review

an abundance of katherines, Green. Yes. Differently annoying from looking for alaska, particularly in having to wait most of the book to find out why presented-as-smart kids are misusing a perfectly fine word. Green (or his editor) is docked points for “anyone except whom he'd already been.” Also, the misuse of “theorem” and the misspelling “discreet particle.”

And so many are in Oregon and Utah

As an impressionable youth, I was always horrified and fascinated by the ads in the back of Sunset magazine for various wilderness survival camps and boarding schools for children who had become "defiant." How defiant would you have to be to get sent away? Well, turns out these places are even worse than I thought, according to a GAO report. It turns out that combining parental fears, large sums of money, and nearly no oversight can result in tragedy.

October Reading

Beige, Castellucci (Y)
Good, though not totally amazing-- what I was reading for, as a part of the mock Printz award at my work. It was interesting to read about someone with ex addict punk parents. Three stars.

Invisible enemies : stories of infectious diseases / Jeanette Farrell (Y)
(the 2005 edition with updated content). Very cool book, very good writer, though I did know some of the stuff already, since I am an infectophile. The section on leprosy was quite good. Four stars.

The wall : growing up behind the Iron Curtain / Peter Sís (Y)
Again Sis does a fantastic job combining a great story with great illustrations. I really liked it. Five stars.

Horseradish : bitter truths you can't avoid / Lemony Snicket (Y)
I got a recommendation from a pal, but was let down by the fact that, while amusing, it seems like a Jack Handey retread. Two stars.

Monkey portraits / photographs by Jill Greenberg (Y)
Fun to make your face recognition fight to interpret monkey faces. Great portraits. Four stars.

I'd tell you I love you, but then I'd have to kill you / Ally Carter (Y)
At first thought it was just a (well paced) teen spy school book, but developed much more as the book went on. Well done. Three stars.

Book title of the day

by Thich Nhat Hanh, Nothing to do, nowhere to go : waking up to who you are.
Am I the only one wondering if the solution is to be sedated?