Mad Men Yourself. Do it. You know you want to.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Friday, July 24, 2009
Through the Past, Darkly
If you ever feel like your job or hobby takes a lot of time/patience, just check out this guy’s photographs. Amazing. I am not sure how he made it all work, but I am grateful that he did.
Athens Soundies
From a group called Athens Soundies comes a charming website filled with video of impromptu music performances around Athens, aka “The Greatest City on Earth.” The videos, which are beautifully shot and only a couple of minutes long, feature local and not-so-local bands playing acoustically on railroad tracks, gas stations, alleys, former cult temples (what?), rooftops, front porches, etc. It’s great to see the random parts of Athens, although I don’t think that you have to be familiar with Athens to appreciate the videos. Make sure to check out Dr. Dog, Wakey! Wakey! and The Empties.
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
No dignity, no doubt
Dignity is a hard thing to define (although Brooks does a pretty good job in his latest Times column), but I feel like it’s something that you instantly recognize in a person. Unfortunately, it seems to be declining in America, particularly in Washington.
Why? Brooks sums up four reasons: “First, there is capitalism. We are all encouraged to become managers of our own brand, to do self-promoting end zone dances to broadcast our own talents. Second, there is the cult of naturalism. We are all encouraged to discard artifice and repression and to instead liberate our own feelings. Third, there is charismatic evangelism with its penchant for public confession. Fourth, there is radical egalitarianism and its hostility to aristocratic manners.”
These all made sense to me, especially the self-promotion bit. But what do we do about it? Brooks suggests that all is not lost because our current head of state is a man who represents dignity across the board. I agree, but how do we restore dignity into our own lives too?
I am going to assume that the answer to that overhwelming question is to drink PBR, listen to interesting music, go on long bike rides and read good books. In which case, I am doing a great job.
Why? Brooks sums up four reasons: “First, there is capitalism. We are all encouraged to become managers of our own brand, to do self-promoting end zone dances to broadcast our own talents. Second, there is the cult of naturalism. We are all encouraged to discard artifice and repression and to instead liberate our own feelings. Third, there is charismatic evangelism with its penchant for public confession. Fourth, there is radical egalitarianism and its hostility to aristocratic manners.”
These all made sense to me, especially the self-promotion bit. But what do we do about it? Brooks suggests that all is not lost because our current head of state is a man who represents dignity across the board. I agree, but how do we restore dignity into our own lives too?
I am going to assume that the answer to that overhwelming question is to drink PBR, listen to interesting music, go on long bike rides and read good books. In which case, I am doing a great job.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Lovely Hideaways
I stumbled upon a great book, Stylish Sheds and Elegant Hideaways: Big Ideas for Small Backyard Destinations, via Apartment Therapy. As my dreams of owning a home get grand and grander, and I realize that any home I get in the next ten years will have to be small or smaller, I love the idea of turning a tiny backyard into a cozy food-eating/art-making/tool-using space.
Check out some other pictures here. A girl can dream...
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Oh, You Pretty Things!
I love this letterpress-esque Brooklyn poster from Three Potato Four. As the site says, it "combines several of our loves - Brooklyn, typography, color, 50's inspired illustrations, and urban signage." What more could you want? It is also part of a city series (so far they just have Brooklyn and Manhattan); here's hoping they do one for Washington!
Three Potato Four also has a great design blog found here.
Monday, June 1, 2009
30 Ways to be a Good Guest
As we all enter barbeque season (two BBQs yesterday! My clothes still smell like a grill!), we are faced with the eternal question: what’s a good dish to bring? Fortunately, Smitten Kitchen comes to the rescue with this handy list of 30 recipes that are perfect for sharing with large groups. So, if you are looking for an alternative to bringing the ol’ twelve pack of PBR (although there’s nothing wrong with that…), check it out. The cole slaw(s) and caramel walnut upside-down banana cake both look particularly sinful.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Best. Night. Ever.
Last night’s Bruce Springsteen show could not have gone any more perfectly. To begin with, we were the 20th people in the pit. Which meant we were in the first, first, first row. Like, elbows resting on the stage. Bruce jumping down, kneeling on the stage and letting us play his guitar. Twice. My glasses dirty from Bruce’s sweat (okay, that part was kind of gross, but whatever). And as if that wasn't enough, Bruce proceeded to take our sign, which read “Obama called, he wants Rosie,” say “By executive request,” and play Rosalita for the final song. And now, apparently, PRESIDENT OBAMA HAS A SIGNED COPY OF OUR SIGN! Can 7 twentysomethings get lucky enough to see the Boss AND give a shout out to Obama? Yes we can.
From the Washington Post:Team Obama was well represented last night when the Boss held up a sign from someone in the audience at the Verizon Center that said: "Obama called, he wants Rosie." That sign now belongs to President Obama. Backstage after the concert, Bruce Springsteen personally autographed the Rosie poster and gave it to White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel to deliver to Obama at the White House, an eyewitness tells the Sleuth.
From Politico:
TOM HOARE, with the play-by-play: 'Bruce just held up a sign from the audience with the Obama sun rising that said 'Obama called, he wants Rosie.' And played 'Rosalita' as the last song. Absolutely brought the house down.'
From Backstreets:
This was, of course, the E Street Band’s first performance in Washington since the election. And while politics is not a key element of the new album or the current tour, compared to some of Bruce’s recent outings, there were plenty of nods to the location and occasion, from the a triumphant “No Surrender” that was audibled early in the set, to Roy’s brief “Hail to the Chief” intro to “Rosalita.” That showstopping number was prompted by a request sign reading: “Obama called, he wants Rosie.” While the Commander in Chief himself did not appear to be in house, White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel was sitting (mostly standing, in fact) in the section right next to the stage, and seemed to be enjoying himself immensely.
Elan, me, Steph, Evvie, Sasha, Blake (Mike not pictured even though he took all of the pictures you see above!)
The heart-stopping, pants-dropping, house-rocking, earth-shaking, booty-quaking, Viagra-taking, love-making - Le-gen-dary E - Street - Band!Thursday, May 14, 2009
Riding on the Para-Success of a Heavy-Handed Metaphor
You may have been forwarded an email that attributes these analogies to high school essays. I think they are actually from a Washington Post humor contest, but, still, there are some great ones in here:
1. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.
2. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.
3. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.
4. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. Coli and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.
5. She had a deep, throaty genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.
6. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.
7. He was as tall as a six-foot, three-inch tree.
8. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife’s infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM machine.
9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn’t.
10. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty Bag filled with vegetable soup.
11. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you’re on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.
12. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.
13. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.
14. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.
15. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan’s teeth.
16. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.
17. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant, and she was the East River.
18. Even in his last years, Granddad had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.
19. Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.
20. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.
21. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from noteating for a while.
22. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe fromstepping on a land mine or something.
23. The ballerina rose gracefully en Pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.
24. It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.
25. He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.
1. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.
2. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.
3. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.
4. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. Coli and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.
5. She had a deep, throaty genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.
6. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.
7. He was as tall as a six-foot, three-inch tree.
8. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife’s infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM machine.
9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn’t.
10. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty Bag filled with vegetable soup.
11. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you’re on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.
12. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.
13. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.
14. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.
15. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan’s teeth.
16. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.
17. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant, and she was the East River.
18. Even in his last years, Granddad had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.
19. Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.
20. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.
21. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from noteating for a while.
22. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe fromstepping on a land mine or something.
23. The ballerina rose gracefully en Pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.
24. It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.
25. He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Freeze That Thought
Posted on Mark Bittman’s NYT blog The Minimalist this week is a great guide to freezing food. There are some obvious points (freezing reduces waste, saves time and money, blah, blah, blah), but the part that breaks down how best to freeze particular foods is very helpful. I particularly like his suggestion of laying out fruits and vegetables on trays and freezing them BEFORE going back and putting them in bags so that they don’t freeze into one shape. And the idea of making batter or dough, freezing that and then baking what you need (as opposed to freezing leftover cookies or bread products) is great too. Why didn’t I ever think of that?!
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Cycle2City
This is my dream. A full service, urban bike commuter station that has secure bike parking, air-conditioned locker rooms, showers, and laundry service for those of us who bike into the office but need a place to magically transform into our office selves. They even have flexible purchase plans (5 days a week, 3 days a week or daily)! Too bad you have to go to Australia to get it. Maybe one day...
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
I've never been prouder to be from Cincy
Calling it "the best local TV news story we've ever seen," DCist links to this clip from WLWT about a 21-year-old guy from Milford who claims to be a superhero in Cincinnati. And better yet, there is apparently some sort of Myspace site called Worldsuperheroregistry.com for folks who have a passion for fighting local crime in a masked sort of way.
If you watch nothing else, make sure to catch the interaction between the "superhero" and the police officer from 1:40-1:53.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Final Nabokov book...finally
According to the Times (via Amber), Vladimir Nabokov's son has decided to publish his father's final unfinished manuscript. Written on 138 index cards (which was apparently the way that Nabokov wrote all of his books), The Original of Laura will be published on November 3rd. When Nabokov died in 1977, he asked that the cards be burned, but his son locked them in a bank vault in Switzerland instead.Defying a father's wishes, Swiss bank vaults, burning of manuscripts...let's hope that The Original of Laura is as interesting as the story behind it!
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Album Review: Dark Was the Night
The folks at the Red Hot Organization somehow managed to get an amazing collection of artists together, including David Byrne, Jose Gonzalez, Feist, Ben Gibbard, Bon Iver, Grizzly Bear, The National, Yeasayer, The Decemberists, Iron & Wine, Sufjan Stevens, Spoon, Arcade Fire, Beirut, My Morning Jacket, The New Pornographers, Yo La Tengo, Stuart Murdoch (from Belle & Sebastian), Cat Power, Andrew Bird, Conor Oberst, Blonde Redhead and Kevin Drew, to form a “dream team” charity album of sorts called Dark Was the Night. I imagine that a lot of planning and back-and-forth file swapping went into their final product, but their hard work pays off. It’s as if you made a really great tape on a day when you were sitting on the floor surrounded by a bunch of your random indie records. Only not only are you dubbing the tape, you’ve also found a way to donate money to raise awareness for HIV and AIDS at the same time.Favorite tracks so far are “Feeling Good” by My Brightest Diamond, “Tightrope” by Yeasayer, “So Far around the Bend” by The National, “Brackett, WI” by Bon Iver, “Happiness” by Riceboy Sleeps and “Lua” by Conor Oberst and Gillian Welch. But there really isn’t a bad one in the bunch. Well, except for the Sufjan song, which, clocking in at a long 10 minutes and 14 seconds, is a little self-important and droning. But overall, it's a really great album for an even better cause.
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
Yoga Adventure
That's me, next to the guy in blue!Reason #26,231 why I love Lululemon: free yoga under the Cherry Blossoms last Saturday morning. Granted, the incredible winds made for more of a “yoga adventure” than the calm, de-stressing yoga that I am used to, but we had fun either way. Afterward, I biked to brunch at Luna in Dupont with the fine ladies that you see below. ::I ordered an enormous amount of food just to make sure that I wasn’t on TOO much of a health kick:: As it turns out, every Lululemon store has weekly free yoga classes; you can check out the schedules here: Logan Circle, Georgetown and Bethesda.
Thursday, April 2, 2009
Where the Wild Things Are
The problem with amazing movie trailers--like this one for the new Spike Jonze adaptation of one of the all-time greatest children's books--is that they make me want to see the movie NOW. October 16th seems so far away...
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
BK Holla Back
After a long week of work, I took the train (yay!) to New York on Friday to visit two of my oldest and best friends, Leah and Julia. Like most trips to New York, it was completely exhausting but really fun.I visited some old standbys:
1. Max Restaurant in the Lower East Side: I try to go here with Leah every time I am in the city. It’s a little Italian place that never disappoints. This time I had this Veal Scaloppini/prosciutto/white wine/spinach/mashed potatoes thing that was absolutely delicious.
2. Redd’s Tavern in Williamsburg. Any bar that has skee ball is okay with me.
And discovered some new favorites:
1. Young Designers Market in Soho: I could have bought something from almost every vendor at this indoor flea-market. The jewelry was simple and stunning, the clothes and accessories were one of a kind and the actual designers themselves were so friendly. Will definitely want to visit again during my next trip!
2. Harefield Road in Williamsburg: fantastic, cheap brunch…tea and mimosa included! Try the French Toast.
3. Mark Bar in Greenpoint: simple, dive bar that serves a mean Gimlet.
4. Le Petit Café in Soho: I don’t know if dining menu is any good, but they have the best soy hot chocolate ever.
3. Mark Bar in Greenpoint: simple, dive bar that serves a mean Gimlet.
4. Le Petit Café in Soho: I don’t know if dining menu is any good, but they have the best soy hot chocolate ever.
5. Veslka in the East Village: Who knew that Ukrainian Soul Food a) existed b) is delicious?
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Bruuuuuuuuce (kind of)
Shout out to Evvie for discovering Hangin' on E Street, a great combination of artists ranging from Tegan and Sara to Wyclef who are covering Bruce Springsteen songs. I love, love, love this quote from Josh Ritter: "If you haven’t found Bruce Springsteen yet, you will find a point in your life when his music will be enormously important to you."
Friday, March 27, 2009
Movie Review: Rachel Getting Married
Last night, when I should have been cleaning my apartment or packing for my NYC weekend, I watched Rachel Getting Married. And although it made for a late Thursday night (post 10:30!), I’m glad that I did. The story of a 20-something’s homecoming trip, it’s one of the more captivating and authentic movies that I have seen in a while. So authentic that it’s actually pretty hard to watch at some points. But the unexpected moments of happiness, coupled with an investment that you make in the characters pretty early on in the movie, make you keep going.I read somewhere that director Jonathan Demme wanted to get all of his favorite people (who didn’t know each other at all) together for this movie. His careful, wise choice of actors comes across on screen. It seems like almost every scene has more than 2 people acting at the same time, but the movie manages to avoid the typical choreography that you see with other movies (e.g. The Family Stone) that feature large groups of people. Somehow, the actors successfully pull off the awkward, angry, emotional, tense, fun moments that we have all faced as we revisit home.
I believe the tagline was “This isn’t your family. But this is your family.” That just sums it up beautifully. Award: Golden Globe
::also, kudos for featuring the lead singer of TV on the Radio, America’s best underground band (according to Howard Wolfson)::
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)