December 2010
A list of the "Best Books of 2010" lists →
largeheartedboy.com
Thank you, Largehearted Boy.
“It’s not nostalgia. I dream about [The New York Observer]. I miss it everyday, but it was a bubble in time. The thing you gotta get used to in the media is the fact that you only live in an ever-changing present. And so, nobody remembers yesterday’s newspaper but the editor. So I miss it, but I’d be surprised if anybody else does.”
—
Peter Kaplan, ex-editor of the Observer and, full disclosure, my former boss.
I think even Peter knows that’s not true. Plenty of people miss yesterday’s newspaper—especially the Observer. Perhaps too many. Although his point of living in the “ever-changing present” is well taken.
(via jaketbrooks)
Saw this passed around on Twitter and whatnot with the “nobody remembers yesterday’s newspaper but the editor” quote highlighted with sniveling revelry. But the context here is what is important. I also suspect Peter wasn’t just talking about the media or even the Observer, but the city itself.
“If I were living in NYC in the ’50s, I’d be a modernist painter, in the ’60s I would have been a documentary filmmaker, in the ’70s I would have been in a punk band, in the ’80s I would have made music videos. Today it’s all about having a social-media presence…and that’s just lame.”
—Richard Blakeley (via soupsoup)
November 2010
Here's a survey of writers abt our favorite sort of recent or at least recently reissued LGBT/ish books →
bandofthebes.typepad.com
Next year’s question: What’s the most recent book you read/loved (or maybe hated, but let’s hope not!) that had a cat-loving ‘gay bear’ as one of its heroes?
Bygone Bureau's Best New Blogs of 2010 →
bygonebureau.com
There’s some good stuff in there, and I 100% co-sign Matt’s recommendation of Nick’s Riff City blog AND his assertion that this is one of the best pieces of music writing to come out of 2010.
Reminding myself to read this later.
Already read it. It’s pretty great.
Fast times on Avenue A: The life and death of Superdive →
capitalnewyork.com
Pour one out for Superdive: The keg tap has run out for the Alphabet City party bar. You’ll want to read Sarah Laskow’s report on how it all went down.
Play
Lonesome Valley
The Carter Family
I loved this post about people’s “comfort music” picks; I listen to music for comfort a lot. Sometimes you listen to music to listen but other times you’re listening to blot out consciousness or enhance it or maybe you just want music to make you feel safe and cozy and understood. When my central nervous system feels jangled (like, say, on the eve of a travel-intensive holiday) I listen to the Carter family. Part of the comfort comes from feeling grateful that my problems are in fact so first-world, unlike the problems of “motherless children” who “ask for a piece of bread/and are told to go to bed.” :(
Play
Play
Like Thanksgiving in your ears →
capitalnewyork.com
“Comfort albums!” You guys know what they are. They are the albums you pull out over and over again, year after year. Perhaps they provide a dose of nostalgia or honor a seasonal tradition. Or they are simply personal classics—records that you have to revisit, at least once a year, particularly this time of year, for whatever reason.
We asked some friends to pick theirs! Check out entries from Alex Ross, Maura Johnston, Matthew Perpetua, Seth Colter Walls, Zachary Woolfe, Nick Sylvester, Rich Juzwiak, Evie Nagy, Julianne Escobedo Shepherd, Joe Coscarelli, Cosmo Baker, Nick Catchdubs, Ayres Haxton, Miles Klee, Aaron Lefkove, Brad Nelson, and more.
Tell us about your favorite comfort album. Tag your post with #comfortalbums and we’ll reblog it here. Happy Thanksgiving everyone.
“There’s an old saying in politics that when elephants fight, ants get crushed. Joe Crowley—a physically imposing six-term congressman who has the ear of the House’s second-ranking Democrat, raises enormous sums of cash for his colleagues, and wields considerable influence locally through his role as chairman of the Queens County Democratic Party—isn’t exactly an ant. But when it comes to the endless battle between Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer, he might as well be.”
— Steve Kornacki, obsessively, on Joe Crowley’s House leadership tragedy. This is as good as nerdy political writing gets.
“In an effort to determine what Brett Favre did or did not text Jenn Sterger, the NFL is conducting high-tech forensic work to trace the electronic pathways and transmission of any photos or messages that might have been sent during communication between them, according to a source familiar with the situation.”
—
Trace the electronic pathways is the new trip the light fantastic. (via katiebakes)
Mike Teavee: You don’t understand *anything* about science! First off, there’s a difference between waves and particles! DUH! Second, the amount of power it would take to convert energy into matter would be like nine atomic bombs!
Willy Wonka: MUMBLER! Seriously, I can’t understand a word you’re saying!
rich sommer: the blog: Major clarification. →
richsommer.com
Everyone, everyone, calm down. Pour some whiskey and light up a cigarette because the world is right again.
Hoo boy. Sometimes I forget about the Internet.
What I tweeted:
“I have no idea if there will be a season 5 of MM. I am operating under the assumption that there won’t be, until I hear otherwise.”
What I meant:
I am aware that all parties involved are currently negotiating the next season of Mad Men and beyond. Nothing official has been stated yet as far as a pickup, although it is a safe bet — very safe bet — that the show will return in its usual fashion.
Good to know.
Play
Play
“But there is a universality of limits that even New York is not immune to, and maybe makes worse.”
—All the Young Girls by Mary H.K. Choi.
Patti Smith Reads Letter To Robert Mapplethorpe →
npr.org
Patti Smith made everyone cry at the National Book Awards last night when she read a letter to Robert Mapplethorpe.
#sobbingblogging
