Friday, April 30, 2010

The Pope, NYC Style

Although I think creator Tim Minchin is a Brit.
For Friviality Friday.
Oh, did I mention NSFW?

Question O' Teh Day

Should we send every Republican politician to prison?
Alex Pareene, who used to be a shining star at Wonkette before he took his shiny ass over to Salon, answers that question. But no others. It's enough.

When There's Nothing Left To Say

because you're afraid to say anything with any meaning, significance or just plain accuracy, you can always do what Time Magazine does, print a bunch of lists.
I like the Most Uninfluential because I always had sort of a soft spot for Joel Stein who gets paid handsomely, I'm sure, for being sort of amusing.

Thursday, April 29, 2010

Poem O' Teh Day

Probably the best I've received so far this month, and the month is almost over tomorrow.

Sharks in the Rivers
 by Ada Limón

        We'll say unbelievable things
to each other in the early morning—
 
our blue coming up from our roots,
our water rising in our extraordinary limbs.
 
All night I dreamt of bonfires and burn piles
and ghosts of men, and spirits
behind those birds of flame.
 
I cannot tell anymore when a door opens or closes,
I can only hear the frame saying, Walk through.
 
It is a short walkway—
into another bedroom.
 
Consider the handle. Consider the key.
 
I say to a friend, how scared I am of sharks.
 
How I thought I saw them in the creek
across from my street.
 
I once watched for them, holding a bundle
of rattlesnake grass in my hand,
shaking like a weak-leaf girl.
 
She sends me an article from a recent National Geographic that says,
 
Sharks bite fewer people each year than
New Yorkers do, according to Health Department records.
 
Then she sends me on my way. Into the City of Sharks.
 
Through another doorway, I walk to the East River saying,
 
Sharks are people too.
Sharks are people too.
Sharks are people too.
 
I write all the things I need on the bottom
of my tennis shoes. I say, Let's walk together.
 
The sun behind me is like a fire.
Tiny flames in the river's ripples.
 
I say something to God, but he's not a living thing,
so I say it to the river, I say,
 
I want to walk through this doorway
But without all those ghosts on the edge,
I want them to stay here.
I want them to go on without me.
 

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

I'll Never Eat

at any of the world's 50 best restaurants, but never mind, I have the French Laundry cookbook, and actually prepared something from it once. Can't remember what.

Britain's Got Talent

I Know Knot-Ing

Today I open up Google as usual and what to my wondering eyes should appear but instructions for a Sheepshank Knot. It looks really useful.
I don't know from knots. I didn't learn to tie my shoes properly until my frustrated husband taught me early in our marriage. And I distinctly remember faking it on the way home from kindergarten, stopping in the middle of the road and pretending to tie my shoes because I knew a girl walking behind me, who I didn't like, hadn't yet learned. And neither had I.
All of which brings us to the Tankerman's Tangle Knot, which I'm going to teach you right here, right now. I've been using it my whole life, but I didn't know until recently what it was called. Or that it was called anything.
Ready?
Okay, the Tankerman's Tangle Knot:If you can't tie it right, tie it a lot.
There.