Unfortunate

This is ridiculous. I can't upload anything because my internet connection disconnects every 20 or so minutes. Only for a few seconds but it's enough to interrupt any uploading. I don't know if Cablevision has some kind of bandwidth restriction thing going or what, but it's really annoying. If anyone has advice, please let me know, but I think I am going to be calling the company today.

TV Music

Camera Obscura on Friday Night Lights!!??

Monty Python?

I am not usually one to have anything Monty Python related here, but I just came across this little bit when reading another blog.

Half a bee, philosophically,
must eo ipso facto half not be
But half a bee has got to be,
vis a vis its entity -
D'you see?

But can a bee be said to be
Or not to be an entire bee,
When half the bee is not a bee
Due to some ancient injury

I haven't heard this before, and it's pretty cute so I think maybe it's ok that I posted it.

A Week?

I can't believe it's been a week since I posted. I remember those days when I had something to say every day...

And as a dear dear friend pointed out, I have also promised to put up music last week which I clearly have not done. The only excuse I have is that I've been exploring all kinds of web 2.0 ways of sharing my music and I may have come up with something. I'll try it when I get home from work tonight.

So, do not despair just yet. The earbear will come back.

Readings

A new post from Shalow Auslander, a funny jew.

Read it. And, as a bonus, he mentions Poet's Walk which we from Bard all know and love.

Activity

My blog traffic is down recently, maybe because of my loss in the challenge, maybe because I've gotten boring. I would like to reverse that trend though.

Haven't posted music in a while. Does anyone still not have the new Joanna Newsom album? I've had it for a while and sort of assumed everyone else had too but if anyone doesn't, let me. I like it a lot, maybe even more than her first one. Have some other stuff too, I'll take a look around.

Readings

Ron Silliman writes about Elizabeth Willis (and doesn't she look like Jodie Foster?). I like this poem from No: A Journal of the Arts.

Why No New Planets Are Ejected from the Sun

These our ships are the copies of copies. This x is that, lifting off the dock. We think we’re here because we’re crouching in the umber of syllables, that sun is “killing me,” a flag among flies, our frozen boat in frozen oil. Let’s haunt the beach instead of this history beset with cosmic jelly. At the blind is it morning already? This word has meant so many things, I need a fence to move this gem-like feeling. Or I’m that bus, in hacked-up disquiet, stuck at the light.

1001 Books to Read

So there is a new meme going around, spurred by the publication of 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die.

The list can be found online here, and people have been counting and posting their read books. Since I am at work and don't have much to do at the moment, I counted mine and I got 218 out of the 1001. Which I think is pretty good.

I am sure I missed some, but if anybody is interested in my list for whatever reason, it's in the comments.

NYT Filter

Even if you don't usually read the editorial in the NYT, read this one. It's funny, but also incredibly frightening. Basically, the people in charge of the war in Iraq don't know the difference between the Sunni and Shiite factions.

This is indicative:

To his [Representative Terry Everett, a seven-term Alabama Republican who is vice chairman of the House intelligence subcommittee on technical and tactical intelligence] credit, he asked me to explain the differences. I told him briefly about the schism that developed after the death of the Prophet Muhammad, and how Iraq and Iran are majority Shiite nations while the rest of the Muslim world is mostly Sunni. “Now that you’ve explained it to me,” he replied, “what occurs to me is that it makes what we’re doing over there extremely difficult, not only in Iraq but that whole area.”

Work email

An email I just received, sent out to the entire floor:

"Sorry to bother you gentlemen, but there was a key found in the ladies' room. Thank you"

Get your brains around that one, friends.

Appropriate

A New Yorker cartoon I found.

Creepy...

from.

Death of a filmmaker

Gillo Pontecorvo has died at the age of 86.

If you haven't seen The Battle of Algiers, please do so.

What a strange night of

What a strange night of reminiscing.

Something... funny

From the upcoming book by Simon Rich, son of Times columnist Frank Rich and president of the Harvard Lampoon.

i used 2 B a typical teenage girl, gossiping with my gal friends on the weekends (I luv U guys!) throwing slumber parties (zzzzzzz!) That was B4 i contracted hepatitis C.

Sometimes i ask myself, "Y? Y has the lord 4saken me? R U there God? Have U 4gotten me?" i'm trying 2 B positive, but it's hard when U know that your death is a 4gone conclusion. It's only a matter of time B4 my D4med liver ceases 2 function 4ever.

My innards R swarming w/ 2morous growths & the pain is excruci8ing. i no longer have any will 2 live. 2morrow i'll B sed8ed 4 the oper8ion. Secretly, i hope i don't come 2.

i've decided 2 stop praying. Y should I? i h8 god. He sh@ on me & i h8 him. All i can do now is w8 4 death.

:(

Metafilter filter

Sick, but kind of beautiful.

This is a joke, I hope.

Devendra on North Korea.

And...

I guess, I've missed out on this piece of brilliance.

Feeling down?

This will help!

Oh well

There goes my $10. It's alright though, i didn't really think I was going to make it all the way anyhow. But I'll try to keep on posting regardless.

Renovations

Right now I am at my mom's apartment, I guess our old apartment, helping her move stuff out of the rooms because they are going to be repainted. Basically this means throwing out most of what had collected in there over the years, as well as some of the furniture which is now unnecessary since my brother and I don't live here anymore.
I found some funny things from a while back. A t-shirt that I got graduating from 6th grade with the signatures of my classmates on it. A mix tape I was working on for a girl I had a crush sophomore year of high school. Some of it I wanted to keep but a lot I just got rid of. Feels a little strange, I think.

Gotta remember to post today.

Gotta remember to post today.

Ted Berrigan

Postcard

THE SENDER OF THIS
POSTCARD IS SECRETLY
(STILL) UNSURE OF YOUR WORTH
AS (EITHER) A FRIEND OR A
HUMAN BEING. YOU COCKSUCKER.

Anecdote

Someone once asked Sidney Morgenbesser "Why is there something rather than nothing?"

Morgenbesser's reply: "Even if there was nothing you'd still be complaining."

Also..

Um, what the fuck?

Anyone?

Anyone else want to leave me some lists in comments?

iPod list 2

Songs about you:

You and I Are a Gang of Losers
You Can Make Him Like You
You Crash
You Look Ready
You Me
You Pay No Mind
You're a Nightmare
You're Not Blind
You're the Driver and I'm in the Backseat
Your Flickering Eyelids
Your Heart is so Loud
Your Shitty Record Wont Mix Itself
Your Sister's Clothes
Yours to Keep

Hmm.

iPod list...

Songs on my iPod about me:

I am Drinking Again
I Can Wait
I Confess
I Dream the Sand
I Feel Like Going Home
I Feel Space
I Fell Deep
I Found a Reason
I Gotcha
I Had a Guitar (Bjarton and I)
I Have Decided
I Lay Awake
I Like Your Style
I Love You
I Miss That Band
I No Longer Wish To
I Quit
I Refuse to Die
I Saw Her in the Anti-War Demonstration
I Should Have Known Better
I Spy
I Take It Back
I Win
I'd Like to Be
I'll Never Belong
I'll Read You a Story
I'm an Angel Telling Lies
I'm Getting Back Into Getting Back Into You
I'm Sorry I Sang on Your Hands That Have Been in the Grave

Even in alphabetical order, I like the story that these tell.

Oh Weird

I was just talking about Trigger Happy TV with Ben, and here it is.

Sam Lipsyte on Houellebecq

This is a good essay on travelling with Michel Houellebecq, one of the 'bad boys' of French literature, written by Sam Lipsyte. If you've read either of them, or heard about them, or whatever, check it out.

Don't let the fact that it's in The Believer discourage you. Though an understandable impulse, they sometimes actually publish good writing.

Cable

I am supposed to have cable and internet installed at my house today. I am hoping everything goes smoothly because tonight is the premiere of Lost. So pretty damn important.

Also that means that I will be able to download and post on own bandwidth rather than stealing someone else's.

Ha!

Mark Foley has been framed! This explains it.

Open Bar Tomorrow

At Beauty Bar 6-8, Tuesday Oct. 3. It is a book release party for 20 Something Essays by 20 Something Writers.


Everybody who's a name in publishing will be there. Like Jill Quint, the person to know at Random House.

Show

I watched a lot of Nip/Tuck today. So trashy, but kind of addictive.