You Better Be Ready To Friday: Hefty Edition

If you weren't ready to Friday last week - I know why that was, and I know who is to blame.

As the story goes, if you're going to post something online, you better double check yourself. I didn't do that last Friday. I thought I did, but instead of going online, in my haste, the catalogue of information was lost to the abyss. By my own standards, I always work with a text file copy, but it wasn't until the weekend was over until I was alerted to the absence of Readiness.

Mea culpa.

Literacy declined. Chaos reigned in the streets. An entire weekend went to waste. In light of what happened, I will hold myself to a higher penalty for failure. Though most of you have likely already lost faith in the process, I assure you quality will come before all else.

Now, if you'll prepare yourselves.



The Edit now has a new face.

The function will remain the same, but for your sake, the random nature of what fills the general information load below has been organized for those who seek to target or avoid certain topics based on your own interests. The general lists of political or style or culture focused subjects now have their own pens to keep them confined to their own kind and out of your hair. The Essential will, hopefully, be curated well enough to contain only what I believe everyone will relish. (Some overlap may occur - I retain the right to add more categories as their necessity is revealed.)

The Essential

• The most important thing to know this week was announced by John Stewart and Stephen Colbert on Thursday night, each by their respective programs. At eleven, John revealed he would be hosting a Rally to Restore Sanity at the Lincoln Memorial on October 30th, 2010. Following this, Stephen Colbert announced his "counter announcement" - that he would be hosting a March to Keep Fear Alive at the same time and same place. I wish more than anything that I could be there to experience this, but alas, I've got shit to do.
• This is actually incredible. I suggest trying to add Weepinbell's face on anything.
• A true thing that happened: IKEA released one hundred house cats into one of their UK stores. Seemingly for no god damned reason.

The Politic

• I'm sure (not sure) that you all have heard (neither read nor seen) about Pastor Terry Jones and his self-proclaimed "International Burn a Koran Day" to be held on 9/11 - apparently just to be a dick. Some have likened the event to the building of a Mosque two and half blocks from Ground Zero. But the only thing more ridiculous than that assertion is the amount coverage this event has actually gotten. I say just let the man burn his dime-a-dozen, mass produced, Barnes & Noble purchased Korans and shut the hell up already. Instead, the event has been cancelled (yay?) in favor of much more stupidity.
• One of the things I've appreciated most about President Obama's politics is how his rational behavior contrasts so strongly with current Republican impotent fury. He always seems willing to discuss relevant matters with a calm, educated approach to get things accomplished, but the vast majority of the right, (or sometimes, 100% of them) during this administration has desired nothing more than to halt any progress they can (no matter the issue), and then place blame on democrats for not getting as much done as they advertised two years ago. All of which is old news. But I bring this up because of the currently heated political conflict over the Bush Tax Cuts has been reduced to whether they should be extended for those making over $250k a year. Some more liberal democrats would prefer all of the tax cuts to be resolved as they were intended, but Obama has made it his position to do what he and his economic advisers believe will aid the economy best. But even this doesn't seem to be good enough for many Republicans, despite glaring contradictions. Yet Obama is holding his ground and demanding that no compromise be made on the terms of raising the taxes on the rich.

The Style

• This guy is my life hero.

The Culture

• MTV Music Awards. Best New Artist. I quit. I quit.
• California tried to ban plastics bags a while back - and that failed. Now Brownsville, Texas is giving it a shot. Good luck?
• You've probably all noticed how great Google Instant is, but there are apparently things about it that are not awesome.

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.

It's always been my opinion that gospel-type music has a lot of failings - but when it's good, it's better than nearly any other kind of musical styling, especially for lifting your mood (even if it doesn't need any more lifting). 

That's why I'm recommending Mavis Staples new album, You Are Not Alone. Not (just) because it's produced by Jeff Tweedy. Instead because it's incredibly powerful and enchanting music, regardless of your creed or bitterness. Unfortunately, I would have recommended you listen to this album in full with a particular link last Friday, but by the time I'm writing this, it has already expired. Luckily, you can still listen to the title track at her website. You can probably find more on Youtube, or something. I dunno, just listen to it somehow, alright? 

But if that somehow doesn't warm you up, or if you just want something more, Royksopp is gearing up to release their new follow-up album to last year's Junior, titled Senior, and it's (still!)available to all, so get on it.

Blog of Our Lives

The blogs are the blood stream of my daily internet experience. They're the bread and butter of my clicks and links. Everything I know* I learned from the sources those bloggers provide. So here, I'll provide you with those sources that I have chosen to wrangle up for your benefit. Quality may rise and fall without warning. (*What do I know?)

• This is what my cook book should look like. I am ashamed.
• This is amusing until you realize that they just add the work "fuck" to regular design advice - which apparently makes it Good Fucking Design Advice.

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.

Let her go and I'll let you live.

Once in my life.

On Your Way Out

So it's been one of those weeks. The kind where, despite everything going well, it didn't go smoothly. And despite being consistent, it was hard all the way through. Here's hoping for better weeks ahead, and better Fridays too.


-stg