Ready To Friday: Still Friday Edition

Ready To Friday

This post is going to be a bit short and a bit late. The last bit you may have already noticed. The first part you'll just have to trust me on until you can see for yourself (unless I turn out to be wrong, I don't know at this point actually). Not to say that there isn't anything worth checking out this week (there certainly is), but I haven't had time to really expound upon all of it as I would have liked to. So I'll leave some of the interpretation to you this week.

Now it's likely that because of all my finals, I could claim work got in my way from working to my fullest on the news aggregation. But to be honest, and I always try to be honest, the blame lies on playing too much of the Halo: Reach multiplayer beta. Sorry guys, I know that's totally not cool anymore. Though in my honest opinion, this is always good for something.

The Edit

These here are the specific interests and perks of the weekly adventuring. Everything from tunes to articles or almost-lost files can be found below. Hopefully some of it will be recent, whereas some of it will be less so. But all of it I think is worth sharing with you; which is my gamble that you'll like it as much as I did.

• The recently sequenced DNA of the Neanderthal shows that most humans are cavemen. Good day.
• Now if you are feeling creatively drained, or disheartened by that scientific find, dip your eyes into these 45 beautifully designed book covers. Neanderthal made. Neanderthal proud.
• And while we're on that note, you should glance around for a little bit at these band posters over at Abduzeedo. There's enough examples of every kind of design you can think of (typographic, illustrative, modulated) that I positively was choking with awe. I especially liked the Wilco related one, but I may be a bit biased.
• As for other things that fall into the realm of aesthetics, we will now turn to nature with our pupils expanded. Respect should be given to Mike Hollingshead, a storm chaser and a photographer, who travels about and takes fantastic images of the things he witnesses. People like him give us some of the best examples of how powerful nature can get, and how beautiful it becomes when it is at its most devastating.
• In other news, Conan Obrian appeared on a 60 Minutes segment this week to talk about the conflict between himself and NBC and Leno for the first time publicly. I have to say, the man has more class than anyone else working in television right now (though we all know what he wasreally thinking); I really do hope he does well with TBS. You can check out some of the best moments of his interview here, or see the full thing.
• Another notable happening this week, which I'd like to be certain everyone has been covered on (so I'll spare you some of the excessive details) is the attempted Times Square bombing. If you haven't heard, I can't imagine why, but all you need to know right now is that no one was hurt and that the country as we know it is safe. Now other than it just becoming a lot harder for Pakistani's to live in America this doesn't largely change how our country will handle political affairs. But that doesn't mean we can't use this situation to create (widen) the political divide here, right. Right. Succinctly, it seems people like McCain are now less fond of the Miranda Rights when it comes to suspects in terrorist attacks. More severely, Joe Lieberman is calling for those same suspects to be stripped of their US citizenship. Now he neglects to mention how these individuals will be found guilty without old fashioned stuff like evidence and trial by jury, but that's the least of my concern here. As it stands, this is neither the beginning, nor the highest point of political extremism we've seen when faced with adversity. Now I find myself as a pretty level centrist with my priorities and ideals. By the standards of many liberals, I'm a goddamn Birther. But the nutty irresponsibility and shameless political opportunism of our current Republican establishment has to stop.
• Well, either way, nothing is as forehead wrinkling as when Rush Limbaugh said that recent oil spill in the Gulf was an inside job. Really. Does it surprise anyone at this point that this man is still respected by actual human beings? It's maddening. But that's old news.
• Like they do, GOOD provides us with a statistical breakdown of that very oil spill. So get informed. (Not provided: a break down of Rush Limbaugh's insanity.)
  
• By the way guys, this is how you Double Down. Brought to your wardrobe by the Brooks Brothers, I'm especially impressed with the seersucker and madras combo; two of springs most popular fabrics in one sartorial shot. Sign me up.
• And lastly, a few pages from “The Ivy Pictorial Dictionary” by Toshiyuki Kurosu showed up at Ivy Style after changing hands with Esquire's fashion director. So, naturally, I scampered over as fast as my internet connection could take me and… I've already lost you guys, haven't I?

Hearing Things

For my own reasons, I've decided to process the music appreciation of my weekly culture bomb into its own section. Hopefully this means you won't miss out on whatever I feel like highlighting here. But it also means it will be much more obvious when I don't have any musical suggestions.

• I figured this problem would come up. As of the last two weeks, I've been detailing my thoughts on two largely important bands to me who are releasing new stuff in the near future. But with all that to cover, I felt that as soon as a free streaming full album doesn't drop into my lap each week, I'll be at a loss for what to put here until I get into the grove of noticing what's new and/or what's worth listening to.
  
  Worst than that coming true is that it struck the week I didn't have a blessed second to myself to discover something brilliant for you. But I thought again, and it's not that I haven't been listening to music by any means. So I decided what would be best is to share with you what got me through my week. Here's a video of David Byrne's "Psycho Killer" sung live. Why the live version? Other than being my favorite version, David Byrne is also one hell of a style icon. The way he moves, the way his posture is accented by his clothes; I haven't seen someone so comfortable in a suit since the Rat Pack. He's easily one of my favorite musical performers and why I have such a steep appreciation for the a little madness in art. I can see it in almost everything I admire. No one does crazy like David Byrne.

Tumblr that Mattr

Assuming you scour the minimal blog oasis less than I do, here are my picks for the most bizarre, relevant and clever Tumblrs on the web. Satisfaction is not guaranteed.

• This may not count as a Tumblr suggestion so much as a Tumblr buckshot. For those of you are so inclined, here are several different stylish blogs I follow that may deserve to show up on your Google Reader lists. Not all of them life-changing themselves, but they're a nice wall of inspiration for anyone looking to manual broaden their view of dashing things.
• This isn't really a Tumblr suggestion right here either, but more of a tip. As much as I can tolerate a FUCKYEAH every now and then, it's an ever expanding pool of junk and it marks everything within it as forgettable even if the content is decent. If you're out looking for a good Tumblr to follow, it probably won't start with FUCKYEAH. And if you want to start one for yourself, tattoo this on your forearm: THINK HARDER.

English Language of the Week:

This segment is based around my personal love of the modern english language, where, each week, I'll nominate my favorite phrase, sentence or paragraph that I have personally heard spoken in that time.

There's not much to say this week about this find other than how well suited it was to the magnitude of pressure I felt this week. Overheard and not said in my direction, this still managed to move me.

You are the best you've done.

On Your Way Out

Lastly, I'd like to make a short public service announcement.

It has come to my attention that many people I know and respect are still not using Google Reader. To which I have to say: what the fuck? Why are you intentionally wasting your time going to every syndicated website you're interested in individually when you can just have them all in one place? If you actually like spending your life surfing the web with lethargic pacing, that's fine. But if you simply haven't heard of, or gotten around to using Google Reader, do it now. I'm serious. Unlike most things I say here, this will change your life.

With that said, feel free to use your brand new Google Reader page to sync up with RTF if you'd like at my own little space on the web, Definition of a We.

And I'll see you next week, same place, same Friday.


Oh yeah, and Iron Man 2 is pretty good.

-stg