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Tuesday, October 31, 2006
farkleberries Links du Jour 163: The Death of the Pink Flamingo Edition 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 

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Monday, October 30, 2006
Ellen Burstyn Halloween Booksigning in Chicago 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 
Renowned actor Ellen Burstyn ("Chris McNeil" in "The Exorcist," "Requiem for a Dream," "Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood") will be signing copies of her autobiography, "Lessons in Becoming Myself," at Chicago's Swedish American Museum Center (5211 N. Clark Street, in the Andersonville neghborhood) tonight at 7:30pm, and tomorrow (Halloween!) at 12:30pm at Borders, 150 N. State Street, Chicago. [via ChicagoIST]

Ellen Burstyn on IMDb




Sunday, October 29, 2006
Plonk Revisited 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 
Back in June, I had posted something along the lines of: any wine advertised on a bus stop poster is plonk [as in, unacceptable for all but medicinal tippling]. A commenter mentioned their understanding that "plonk" was a generic slang term for wine; now, the excellent food blog Slashfood splits the difference, defining "plonk" as a red or white you can purchase for under $10 [a bottle] - word.




Friday, October 27, 2006
The Unbearable Strangeness of Spam, Part 32 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 
There's strange spam, and then there's strange spam. From the morning inbox - no attachments, no HTML links, no obvious sales pitches - which makes me worry about some insidious embedded code worming its way into my machine. Still you've got to love the ending, with its pseudo-blues cadence and a line cribbed from "Big Bad Leroy Brown."
From: XXXXXX
To: XXXXXX
Subject: his escheat at escheat

Possible Interpretation: You cannot explain what some people like. The value of ANYTHING is determined by the agreement of only two people. If you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen. Don't burn your bridges before they're crossed. Sometimes abbreviated GIGO. Noblesse oblige. A coward dies a thousand times before his death. The valiant never taste of death but once. Make hay while the sun shines.
There shallow Draughts intoxicate the Brain, Speak of the devil and he shall appear. Possible Interpretation: Do not rush into what you do not know. The coat makes the man. He that lives too fast, goes to his grave too soon. Laughter is the shortest distance between two people. Man with four balls can't walk. Going the whole nine yards. Man with four balls can't walk. Meaner than a junk-yard dog.
Maybe it's terrorist code. Maybe its purpose is to kill slowly through an overdose of deadly clichés.




Thursday, October 26, 2006
farkleberries Links du Jour 162: The Tweak Me Elmo Edition 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 




Wednesday, October 25, 2006
farkleberries Links du Jour 161: The Snake Nut Can Edition 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 




Tuesday, October 24, 2006
farkleberries Links du Jour 160: The Día de la Vegemite Edition 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 




Monday, October 23, 2006
Banish Your Monday Blues With "Bob" 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 


Weird Al Yankovic's absurdist palindromic Zen.




Thursday, October 19, 2006
Cubs Fandom Need Not End With Death 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 
From NBC-5 Chicago:
Diehard Cubs fans can now spend an eternity with their team. Starting next season, several major league teams, including the Cubbies, will allow their team logo to be put on caskets and urns of the dearly departed. Gives more credence to the claim, "Once a Cubs fan, always a Cubs fan!"
Well, at least the urns' occupants might stick around long enough to eventually witness a Cubs World Series win. How does the old song go? "In heaven there is no beer...that's why we drink it here..."




Wednesday, October 18, 2006
Moo-La 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 
Have you seen ING's new "Cash Cow" pop-up ads for their "Orange Savings Accounts"? I admit, they're cute and catchy Flash animations, but perhaps ING should reconsider the imagery. When I think "cash cow," I think milking the cow for all it's worth - don't you?

Do you think of a cow eating money? Your money, or perhaps someone else's? And how and where exactly does the money emerge, pray tell?





Fear This, Comma? 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 
Get Your War On

Sad that the mordant Get Your War On still needs to be on.

In other news, ChicagoIST reports [Iggy?] and The Stooges are in Chicago at Albini's place, recording their first album in 33 years.




Friday, October 13, 2006
Friday Random Ten: The Shake Shake Shake, Shake Your Lulav Edition 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 
This is an etrog.
  1. The Sweet - "Lost Angels"
  2. Ben Folds Five - "She Don't Use Jelly"
  3. Philip Glass - "Cloudscape"
  4. Dave Brubeck Quartet - "Slow and Easy, a.k.a. Lawless"
  5. The Smashing Pumpkins - "Beautiful"
  6. Sisters of Mercy - "Floorshow"
  7. Danger Doom - "Bada Bing"
  8. 311 - "Can't Fade Me"
  9. Amon Tobin - "Yasawas"
  10. Cee-Lo Green - "Bad Mutha"
So, last night I was at the Evanstonians' for a very enjoyable Sukkot celebration and dinner. Fortunately dinner was indoors, as the Chicago area received an early taste of winter yesterday - temps hovered in the upper 30's with brisk winds, necessitating a breaking-out of gloves, coats, and ushanka. Then we four brave souls (ha!) repaired to the sukkah in the back yard for a brief ceremony, after which the etrog was gently returned to its box in the fridge for one more evening of joyful reverence; a memory of summer's nourishment as we reap the old year's harvest.




Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Kentucky Fried Weird 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 
Have you seen this news story from - of all places - Kentucky? A couple was arrested for breaking into an elementary school to steal...urine:
[WAVE-3 TV Louisville] ARGILLITE, Ky. -- An eastern Kentucky couple is charged with going to an elementary school and trying to get a urine specimen from a nephew to use in a drug test. Authorities said Nick Kintigos, 37, and his wife, Teresa, 38, went to a school to solicit a clean urine sample to Nick Kintigos could take a drug test...Scott Brown, communications supervisor with Greenup County 911, said Nick Kintigos needed a clean urine sample from a nephew at the school to use for a drug test where he works. Brown said he was unsure where Kintigos was employed. Nick Kintigos allegedly took the boy into a restroom at the school, but the boy was unable to produce any urine, Brown said. Two other boys walked into the restroom while Kintigos was there and he asked them for urine, Brown said. The boys left the restroom and told a teacher what happened, he said.
That's pretty sorry behavior, but there must be more to this story than it appears. There was no one else these two knew that would have a clean urine sample to offer?




farkleberries Links du Jour 159 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 




Friday, October 06, 2006
Friday Random Ten: The Foley's Foggier Bottom* Edition 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 
Try your hand...ahem, that didn't quite...come out right...at the Foley IM Generator - pop up a brand spanking new Foleyism with every click. [via Pandagon]
  1. Solid Steel Players - "Les Fingres"
  2. Slade - "Run Run Away"
  3. Sublime - "Get Out!"
  4. T.Rex - "Bang a Gong (Get It On)"
  5. Tori Amos - "Your Cloud"
  6. Dick Hyman - "On The Bumpy Road To Love"
  7. Jimmy Eat World - "Nothingwrong"
  8. The Honorary Title - "Everything I Once Had"
  9. Lou Reed - "The Kids"
  10. Jazz Juice - "Marra Bossa"
For those of you saying "yeah, right, I'm sure those are 'random song titles'!" - why, actually, yes; yes they are. Which is probably more a function of my strange taste in music than of any sort of strange synchronicity. Go figure.

* For those not familiar with the area, Foggy Bottom is a historic neighborhood in Washington, D.C.




Thursday, October 05, 2006
A Dire Stew 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 
Is it just me, or is this set of headlines from CNN tonight a particularly dire stew of sex, death, and violence? Good gravy, it's bad. [Look closely - click on the image for a larger version]

But - not a mention of, say, gas prices, health care, illegal immigration, global warming, the avian "superflu," midterm elections (unless you count the Dennis Hastert "apology" as an election story), Middle East violence - or the war in Iraq. Or any of those other niggling little problems that have kept us awake at night for years.

100506-cnn-headlines




Wednesday, October 04, 2006
After the Storm 
 
by Lenka Reznicek [permalink] 
uchicago-storm-1

How crazy is the weather lately? Monday night, we had a cracker of a storm blow through Chicago - mind you, we had actual tornadoes about a week and a half ago, but that's another story - winds clocked at over 75 miles per hour. The damage wasn't bad on the North Side where we live, but around Hyde Park and the southwest part of town it was another story completely. Old trees, solid and hale specimens two to three feet across were snapped like matchsticks across roads and walkways.

The photo above was taken outside Judd Hall at the University of Chicago this morning, and the one below about one-half mile away in Jackson Park near the Museum of Science and Industry. [Click on images to grab 1280x960 versions on Flickr] The weather folks report this was the worst Chicago storm in the past five years, but judging from the size of the felled trees this might be the worst storm in decades or longer, at least on the South Side; I've observed that weather tends to be much more extreme on the South Side than the North, overall.

jackson-park-storm-3