During high school I stumbled onto a paperback of Brendan Gill's Here at the New Yorker. The section on cartoonists was especially interesting and over the years I've tried to think up a cartoon that would sell to The New Yorker without success--although if there's a magazine out there that needs a gag written in sheet music, send 'em my name ( Read more... )

Back when I was a freshman at the UW there was a housing crunch in the dorms--it's traditional at the UW in the fall--so I ended up commuting 2 hours a day each way from home to school. During Winter Quarter things opened up, and I was able to get into Haggett Hall. My roommate was also a freshman, and we got along pretty well. Of course he had ( Read more... )

This week I had one of those birthdays. You know, those ending in a zero or a five followed by cards coming in that say "You're X years old today!" and everyone who hears about it saying "you look good for your age!" Most of those I used to celebrate with are either dead, out-of-state, or are too hammered by the current recession to be able to ( Read more... )

I am sick in bed with the crud and can't focus well enough to read, so I've been watching daytime BBC America (mainly because this afternoon Turner Classic Movies is showing films that would be ennobled as the bottom part of a double bill). The last time this happened I pointed out how vile What Not to Wear was in comparison to Queer Eye for the ( Read more... )

The New York Times had an article about the return of plenary indulgences in the Catholic Church. Not being Catholic, what I first thought of is the question "Can you name a film that could not have been made without Plenary Indulgence?" Sorry, Hank, you're disqualified--you'd figure it out instantly....

I'm doing this entry using a package called MacSpeech Dictate, which allows you to talk into a microphone and have the text entered into whatever program you're using as well as executing voice commands. (It's also pretty damned expensive in the stores, but Craigslist Is My Friend.) So far it seems to work surprisingly well, the main difficulty ( Read more... )

...but if someone from Plastic Logic should make it possible for me to purchase one of their initial units when it hits the market later this year I promise to use the hell out of it and report exactly what I think of it (pluses and minuses) while shouting from the treetops. Just saying...

I was interested enough in the previews for Twilight running at the San Diego Comic Con to ask around and find it was based on a series of books by Stephenie Meyer. I was wondering about doing a review of the film when it came out and if I should read the books first when I ran into a series of posts and wonderful cartoons by Shinga, which made it clear ( Read more... )

There is nothing quite as disappointing as attending a panel where you know more about the subject than all four panelists, outside of attending one where one of the four panelists tries to hide the fact that he's not terribly expert on the subject by making fun of the whole topic. Grumble.

I have a summer cold that seems to have progressed to a sinus infection. This basically means that I have a constant toothache, am on antibiotics that could stand in for footballs, and at the worst moment of pain last night I ended up buying a neti syringe. (Don't ask.) So far things have progressed from three apparent icepicks in the face to ( Read more... )