This will be of special interest to Justin Timberlake fans, but it's kind of brilliant even if you've never heard of him. Click here. NSFW by the way, but only a little bit ( Read more... )

I just got back from the funeral procession, and then the funeral, for Jack Layton. ( It was kind of amazing. )

Nothing I could say about Amy Winehouse hasn't been said already, and better than I could say it. But her death put me in mind of Marilyn Hacker's elegy for Janis Joplin, which on re-reading is not any good at all, but does have one stanza that still has something good going on in it, so here is that one stanza:

( From 'Elegy' )

I am supposed to be getting a replacement computer from Spork very soon. I have been in the state of supposed to be getting a replacement computer for some months now. There has already been the ritual grovel at the IT office, and a lengthy discussion of voice recognition software. There has been no communication from the IT office at all, ( Read more... )

So I have been meaning to write up my Deep Thoughts about our trip last month to western Crete, Athens, and Istanbul - thoughts about nationalisms and histories, continuities and discontinuties in uses of the material remains of the past, grilled fish, 19th c. archeology as the ruination of ruins, the spiritual uses of beauty, the ways in which ( Read more... )

So Fishwhistle and I went to hear this concert last Sunday because really who can resist music about modernist architecture? Plus also a really good excuse to visit the Polish Combatants Hall, which was both swampy and glorious. But the second act - Allen Bloor, a.k.a. Knurl - turned out to consist of extremely well-amplified concrete blocks being ( Read more... )

( borrowed from mamadeb but seen all over, here's my album cover )

But just in case anyone else is interested ...

You know how clarinet players fiddle endlessly with their reeds? This takes that obsession one step beyond. Or maybe two.And you all know by now that Joss Whedon has a new series coming up on Fox in September, right? One whose premise is so creepily misogynistic that - well, my hopeful fantasy is ( Read more... )

Nuit Blanche was both better and worse than it was last year. It wasn't a complete surprise, the way it was the first year. But it has become a civic holiday - and of course it has, as it involves staying up all night in the midst of a huge crowd, taking in avant-garde art and spending no money, in the company of beloved friends and attractive ( Read more... )

Herewith a genuine email just received by me:

( oh Spork U., how are you so disfunctional? )