Extra, Extra, Read All About It!

-- Nas actually kicks a decent verse on the "Why" remix. (recycling a couplet from a track on a long-ago great album for the hook and title of a new single doesn't count. Recycling is good for the planet, not your career, kid).

-- Speaking of fruits, This new Apple is hot. Holler at your G5 processor! I wonder if it weighs a million pounds.

-- Speaking of hot, the yearly Labor Day weekend Law and Order marathon is just 5 days away! This Monday, kids. Nurse your hangovers with Lennie and the crew. God, I hope it's Angie Harmon season. Or Serena for that matter.

-- Speaking of Law and Order, this is so off the hizzle dizzle. I wish I had thought of it and commissioned the project.

-- Still speaking of marathons, hold those eyes rolls, kids. 90210 marathon this Saturday on FX starting at 7 a.m., kicking off, I believe with the episode in which Brandon and Dylan meet for the first time. I love the Valerie years, but I think I prefer the Brenda years.



added to the quarterwit city final edition:

THIS IS SO OFFSIDES

via Hashim via Jay

Best Headline Ever

Dawson Up Creek. Leave it to the Brits. They are so wily.

IN OTHER NEWS:

The fad that is sweeping political office-holders the nation over: being gay. In response to this new trend, New Jersey Governor James McGreevy was quoted as lisping, "Poseurs!"

I knew there were reasons other than those musical, artistic and aesthetic to revile Kid Rock. I just couldn't pinpoint them until now.

Dude, whatever. We all already know that golf is, in so many ways, the gayest sport, ever. We don't need a special tournament.

This is not newsworthy. Add a photo of Lindsay Lohan testing the new magnet and America might care.

USDA Approved 100% Blog Beef

THIS POST HAS BEEN UPDATED

What's good, kids? Blog beef is highly recommended over watching coverage of crusty old fucks nominate Junior for another term.

Beef 1. If you didn't see this here already, you slept. Because it's gone.

Beef 2. Check out the Jay Smooth-Debra Dickerson beef. No one shuts 'em down like Jay-- he just drops 'bows and they end up looking inarticulate and groundless.

Speaking of highly recommended, does anyone know where Cocaine Blunts went? I know he was talking about re-design, but he didn't need to go shut a site down, did he?!?!

Speaking of being shut down, I opened a car door very forcefully into my face on Friday afternoon. It pretty much upended my weekend plans. So, instead of camping and wilding out, I was laid up on the couch with a mild concussion, trying to make sense of Beverly Hills 90210 and Law and Order: SVU. When my wits returned to me on Sunday I watched The Manchurian Candidate, the o.g. one, which I hadn't seen. It was incredible.

Speaking of incredible, I also viewed A Streetcar Named Desire. Vivien Leigh might be my favorite of all time. Blanche is kind of a next level Scarlett, I think. Stories/plays/movies like this, where very little happens, are the best. But I'm just waiting until they Manchurian-Candidate-ify it and re-make it with Ashton Kutcher as Stanley and Brittany Murphy and Julia Roberts as Stella and Blanche respectively. Ew...

The Heat

Or should I say, the hotness...

If you are interested in logging into here to check your email, let me know. I have some invites, with your name on them.

For real.

Gold Teeth Same Day

Not that Jacob. This was actually a store in downtown Savannah, Georgia, where we stayed for two nights on the way to Miami. Bling!

Anyway, the quarterwit is back from an incredible trip. I always have a lot of trouble returning to blogging after a long hiatus, so to assuage my apprehension, I'm just going to leave you with some thoughts raised by the 2004 Olympics, which I've had no choice but to become interested in.

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Phelps,



If you are going to groom your son to be an olympian, you're going to want to go ahead and invest in some orthidonture, some craniofacial surgery, something. You know he's going to be doing interviews!

Sincerely,
the quarterwit

So, playing volleyball in a bikini on a beach is an Olympic sport?


Seems fine.

On the other hand, I must not have gotten the memo that badminton is a legitimate sport. I kind of thought it was invented to be played either drunk at barbecues or because you don't have a pump for your soccerball and the badminton set from Toys R Us is just kind of what's around.

Trip to Miami Rates 9.837

Greetings from Miami. It is 7:20 a.m. and already the air is so damp and thick that you can barely breathe it in. That said, if I were staying another day, I would combat the climate by lazing around a ritzy hotel pool I'd snuck into, ordering umbrella drinks and signing a made-up name. But no, it's time to start the 20 hour and 47 minute drive back up north. So, before I jump onto 95 N, I'll leave you with the following:

This bear knows how to party and can kick it with me anytime. Plus, he knows that Busch stinks. Wolf it, wolf it!

This whole ish of Bush's campaign advisor resigning due to a sexual misconduct scandal from a long time ago is the kind of thing that, if it happened to a democrat, I would say it's something that happened and was "resolved" years ago but is being dredged up and blown out of proportion due to a vast right-wing conspiracy. However, because it is happening to someone in the Bush camp, and has the potential to be damaging to the re-election campaign, I find the whole issue wholly satisfying. Keep dredging, kids!

So, yeah, it's time to get in the car.

Hasta soon,
the quarterwit

Ten and Two

What's good, kids. the quarterwit is off on a ten-ish day road trip from glorious New Haven all the cotdamn way down to Miami, Florida by way of Savannah, Georgia and a few other places. Ah...banyan trees, mangoes and mojitos...

Expect periodic updates and little else. I'll tell you all about gas prices and American trends when I get back. If you know any place I should be stopping between here and there, don't hesitate to let me know.

Enjoy August and stay gold.

Boston: So Hood it's Ridiculous

I was in Boston yesterday. I will write more about it later.

The City Nearish New Haven That is Not New York

nomah someone hit a homah

At oh-dark-thirty tomorrow morning, I am leaving on a day trip to Boston.

Stories about the aquarium to come soon.

Casey Jones vs. Detective Stabler

Have Elias Koteas (left) and Christopher Meloni (right) ever been seen together?

H-E-Double Hockey Sticks

This is kind of disappointing as I'd hoped I'd score a little more devious and evil than this. Oh well. Second level is better than no level at all. I think it was the true/false "A pimp is a good thing to be" question that got me.

The Dante's Inferno Test has banished you to the Second Level of Hell!
Here is how you matched up against all the levels:

Level	Score
Purgatory (Repenting Believers)	Very Low
Level 1 - Limbo (Virtuous Non-Believers)	Low
Level 2 (Lustful)	Very High
Level 3 (Gluttonous)	Very High
Level 4 (Prodigal and Avaricious)	Moderate
Level 5 (Wrathful and Gloomy)	Moderate
Level 6 - The City of Dis (Heretics)	Very High
Level 7 (Violent)	High
Level 8- the Malebolge (Fraudulent, Malicious, Panderers)	Very High
Level 9 - Cocytus (Treacherous)	Moderate

Second Level of Hell

You have come to a place mute of all light, where the wind bellows as the sea does in a tempest. This is the realm where the lustful spend eternity. Here, sinners are blown around endlessly by the unforgiving winds of unquenchable desire as punishment for their transgressions. The infernal hurricane that never rests hurtles the spirits onward in its rapine, whirling them round, and smiting, it molests them. You have betrayed reason at the behest of your appetite for pleasure, and so here you are doomed to remain. Cleopatra and Helen of Troy are two that share in your fate.

Take the Dante's Divine Comedy Inferno Test

Bracelets, Bush, and Brie as the New Black

This whole "Live Strong" bracelet thing has swept the nation. The first I heard of it was when I went out to breakfast on Sunday morning with a friend. This particular cafe serves every VW-driving, running sneaker-wearing 20-something in New Haven's Yuppiedom. So, when we arrived there was a bit of a wait. We amused ourselves by walking across the street and perusing the window display at the Church of Scientology.

Thoroughly amused and creeped out, we walked back to the restaurant to take our table, deciding that it was probably owned by Scientologists who use their cafe as a way to connect with locals and then drag them into the cult. We were pretty satisfied with ourselves and our little theory when we sat down at the table. Our server came to take our order and had a scar running OVER HIS HEAD from one temple to the other. When we saw this it was immediately obvious that he had been lobotomized by Tom Cruise-loving sickos who had brainwashed him and were enslaving him as a brunch waiter. And then I noticed his bracelet. Yellow and plastic, it read "Live Strong." This slogan is the kind of quasi-spiritual, self-helpesque saying that I would associate maybe not with a religion, but with an organization with vague religious affiliations, like AA, or, say, a cult. A few other servers had the bracelet as well and I was prepared to call WTNH and blow this local mind control thing wide open.

I got up the nerve to ask the server about the bracelet. Turns out, it's from Lance Armstrong's organization, Live Strong.

Oh. Okay.

So it's for cancer survivors, I assumed.

Since Sunday I've seen no less than a dozen people I see in my everyday life-- acquaintances, barflys, coffeeshop baristas*, sporting these on formerly naked wrists. Now, they can't ALL be cancer survivors. So, what is it, like, "we support cancer survivors?" I mean, doesn't that go without saying? This is a fad I just don't get.

Turns out, I'm a fucking idiot and a horrible person. I just read this copy from the Foundation's website:

Wear Yellow. Live Strong.

Lance knows that yellow is more than just the color of the leader’s jersey in the Tour de France. It's a symbol of hope, courage and perseverance—whether you're on the bike or in the oncology ward.

As a tribute to Lance’s inspirational fight against cancer, yellow wristbands engraved with his mantra, Live Strong, will be sold in an effort to raise $5,000,000 for the Lance Armstrong Foundation (LAF).

Note to self: Research before posting. And I'm off to order a bracelet.


Bush and Brie as the New Black

Hilarity. Check this message from the White House West. Starring Will Farrell.

Speaking of hilarious, this is a bumper sticker I have to get.

Speaking more of hilarity, Brie is the new black. Growing up, New Haven's local Brie was referred to as CheeseLady. To her face. But the name is a source of derision no more. There is a new Brie in town and she has taken back the name. Reading her blog, you'll see what all she can accomplish with her name. New words, including:

- Brieography
- Brieorganize
- Briedom (as in "let Briedom ring")

Incredible.

*I can't believe I just used the word "barista."

Sharon Stone Drops Knowledge and Other Things We Don't Speak Of

"That's what you get for having George Bush as president."

- Yeah, Sharon Stone is, in addition to being a fine actress, very astute politically. Who knew?

(source)

- Speaking of astute, nothing makes me feel more superior than a scathingly acerbic review of a shit movie. See Slate.com's review of The Village. M. Night Shyamalan's 2002 movie Signs was one of the most insipid pieces of trash I've caught on TBS on a Saturday afternoon, so I really wasn't surprised to hear that The Village was garbage.

- Speaking of movies, I love Scrubs and, call me predictable (I loved Lost in Translation and they seem to be of the same sad-sweet, self-conscious ilk), but, I really want to see Garden State.

- Speaking of sweet, hipsters and fashion vics beware: this dude is rocking two pairs of jeans.

(via Brie)

- Speaking of rocking, Milo is coming to New Haven tomorrow. From Europe. Holla.

Put Me Down As Livid

thanks, jerk

My webmaster at hypnotic (this dude) deleted my blog without warning.

I'm more than a little aggravated.

Goodbye archives!

Goodbye other blog I needed for work!

Thanks, dude!

p.s. sorry to air personal grievances here. but they are blog-related, so figure it's legit.

Angela Davis and Kathleen Cleaver

meaning business 1967-present

I just re-read parts of Soledad Brother: The Prison Letters of George Jackson and it got me thinking more about Angela Davis, so I decided to read a book I'd picked up a long time ago, but never really gotten around to-- Morning Breaks: The Trial of Angela Davis, published in 1975 and re-released in 1999. I'll write more about it later after I've thought about it, but for now what all this Angela Davis talk reminds me of is my favorite Kathleen Cleaver story.

Davis came to speak at Columbia when I was a student there in 2000. She gave a great lecture, but unfortunately I had to leave early. I was walking out of the law school building where the lecture was taking place and saw none other than Kathleen Cleaver walk into the building. After you've seen a photo of someone in a miniskirt holding a shotgun, you never really forget what they look like, so I recognized her immediately.

She was coming to attend the lecture, but she had arrived late and wanted to enter through a back entrance, so as not to interrupt or detract attention from Davis' speech.

She asked the security guard if there was a back entrance she could use. The security guard thought she was being uppity, requesting special treatment. She responded by sucking her teeth and saying, "Girl, you got to go in the front door like everyone else."

I'd be scared shitless of speaking to Kathleen Cleaver like this. She is quite an imposing figure-- you don't even have to know her history to recognize this. I picture her climbing on the security desk boot first, grabbing by the security guard by the collar and growling "Don't you even know who I am??"

But she just smiled sheepishly, muttered "okay," and walked in the front entrance like everyone else.

Truly revolutionary.