Thought for Food

Can’t you just tell by the look of him that he’s a...

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 18:41:00 -0400

Can’t you just tell by the look of him that he’s a total asshole?

That’s Giuliani’s son, Andrew, a Duke student who was kicked off the golf team in February. According to WNYC, he was ranked 12th out of 13 team members. His best finish in a match (er … golf game? meet? whatever) was 36th. His coach says he acted like a jerk to his team mates, sped out of the parking lot after practice, and played rough in a friendly game of football.

But young Andrew has dreams of going pro, and he’s not going to take this like a gentleman. He’s taking it like a Giuliani.

mattlehrer: Two hundred thousand Germans and one candidate for...

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 18:23:00 -0400

mattlehrer:

Two hundred thousand Germans and one candidate for President

Twice as much as expected. Unglaublich. What a fantastic publicity extravaganza (“stunt” does not do this justice.)

McCain, not to be outdone, shows that he knows some German, too: schadenfreude.

This is where it hurts.

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 16:24:05 -0400

This is where it hurts.

Today I’m thinking about Deutschland, the country of my...

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 16:12:00 -0400

Today I’m thinking about Deutschland, the country of my birth and where I spent most of my 17th year, trying to get a depressed Brit who shared my room from cutting herself, shocking a tiny rural village with these crazy little things called Rollerblades, developing an acute taste for pork products, and setting a social pace that continues more or less unabated to this day.

That year, I discovered the profound joys of shallow pop music (no one does it better than Germans), including this classic, “99 Luftballons.”

Ihrer Willkommen.

"Giving them a bracelet isn’t as special as spending an evening together."

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 14:30:15 -0400

“Giving them a bracelet isn’t as special as spending an evening together.”

- A 35-year-old bride explains why she invited her attendees to a Botox-and-chemical-peel party.

I can’t wait ‘til me and my crew start spending quality time in the aesthetician’s office.

An Australian man's dare went horribly wrong when he tried to play chicken with cars on a freeway wearing only his underwear.

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 14:04:50 -0400

An Australian man's dare went horribly wrong when he tried to play chicken with cars on a freeway wearing only his underwear.: Underwear chicken dares: do they ever go right?

The Great Black Hope graces Germany; "Zeit" gets weak in the knees

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 13:52:00 -0400

The Great Black Hope graces Germany; "Zeit" gets weak in the knees:

Breathless German journalists live-blog Obama’s visit:

15:00 Uhr: dpa sticht mit der Meldung hervor, Steinmeier habe Obama mit den Worten “Wie geht’s” begrüßt. Die Süddeutsche weiß mehr - demnach habe Obama einfach “Hallo” gesagt. Gelächelt hat er jedenfalls…

The NYT “Caucus” blogger, slightly more immune to the Obamojo through repeated exposure, translates:

DPA [the German news agency] reports that Steinmeier greeted Obama with the words: ‘How’s it going?’ The daily Suddeutsche goes further, reporting that Obama then replied, ‘Hello.’

This translation misses the crucial final detail: “He smiled, in any case.”

Let this be a warning: music purchased online may not be yours, forever

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 13:04:47 -0400

Let this be a warning: music purchased online may not be yours, forever:

Marshall Kirkpatrick writes:

The rise and fall of the Yahoo! Music Store will make for an interesting story some day, but for now the [Digital Rights Management] story is particularly important.

Yahoo! now encourages customers to burn their music files to CDs. That may not be a terribly onerous requirement, but the point is that when you purchased a license for songs, everyone really meant it when they said this might not last forever.

He concludes:

We think this is an instructive tale about technology, rights to user data and DRM - which is sure to rear its head again if content industries are unable to find more effective monetization strategies.

So sue me. I lied. (Buy me!)

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 12:25:00 -0400

So sue me. I lied. (Buy me!)

[Last one, then back to work, I swear!] I just have to say: I...

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 12:18:24 -0400

[Last one, then back to work, I swear!] I just have to say: I think Jessica’s the only person I know (in addition to the adorably coy model) who could pull of these shorts.

For my rompah lovahs! The auction ends in 28 hrs, and...

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 12:16:31 -0400

For my rompah lovahs! The auction ends in 28 hrs, and it’s still only $9.99.

Or perhaps this full-length one?

Just what I don’t need: I’ve stumbled upon an...

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 12:14:00 -0400

Just what I don’t need: I’ve stumbled upon an awesome ebay store, Time’s Up Vintage. Based out of Amsterdam, of course. (All good things come from A’dam, including the elephant [tattoo] that’s always got my back.)

Love the subtly sexy dress above, and the festive skirt below, and this sunny, easy dress. And plenty more besides….

Guess who just got offered a FREE TICKET to the SPRINGSTEEN show...

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 10:29:00 -0400

Guess who just got offered a FREE TICKET to the SPRINGSTEEN show at Giants Stadium!

Hint: IT’S ME!!!!!!!

No sketchy Craigslist ad required.

Thanks, Katie, you done made my month!

“China Presses Hush Money on Grieving Parents”...

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 10:07:00 -0400

“China Presses Hush Money on Grieving Parents” (NYT)

After his daughter died when her high school collapsed in the May 12th earthquake, Yu Tingyun began organizing other grieving parents. He was looking for answers about the construction of the school. What he got was a police interrogation and a pay-off:

In exchange for his silence and for affirming that the ruling Communist Party “mobilized society to help us,” he would get a cash payment and a pension.

Why did McCain cancel his planned trip to New Orleans —...

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 09:52:00 -0400

Why did McCain cancel his planned trip to New Orleans — and his visit to an offshore oil rig?*

Sure, the weather forecast isn’t sunny — it’s partially cloudy with a 20% chance of thunderstorms, and there’s a hurricane in a neighboring state — but the real reason seems to be that oil spills do not make for good photo ops.

An oil tanker and barge collided on the Mississippi yesterday, leaking hundreds of thousands of gallons of heavy fuel oil. The NYT reports that “the accident had nothing to do with the safety of oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico,” but it sure doesn’t look good when your planned message is about the environmental safety of offshore drilling.

*Lord knows he needs the press coverage. Later today, his opponent, a mere American presidential candidate, is expected to draw a crowd of 100,000 in Berlin — frankly astounding and, I am certain, unprecedented.

I could also be into this one.

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 19:18:15 -0400

I could also be into this one.

Hint hint hint HINT!!! My bday is (slowly) approaching….

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 19:17:16 -0400

Hint hint hint HINT!!! My bday is (slowly) approaching….

Edwards, Nunn on Obama's Veep List

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 17:50:00 -0400

Edwards, Nunn on Obama's Veep List:

This Time story, the second most e-mailed, was published last Thursday.

Dudes is dumb. Dudes’ dicks is double dumb.

What 72% of Americans don't know (and what 84% do know)

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 17:06:00 -0400

I took the Pew News IQ Quiz. Got three questions wrong. Scored a 76%, compared to the national average of 50%.

One of the questions that I got wrong was this… (See if you know the answer, and no peaking below!)

Since the start of military action in Iraq, about how many U.S. military personnel have been killed?

Around 2,000

Around 3,000

Around 4,000

Around 5,000

**********************************************

I guessed around 3,000. I guessed too low. It’s around 4,000. How’d you do?

After you complete the quiz, you can look at a question-by-question breakdown of how you compare to the rest of the population. This was the question that most people got wrong — 72%, to be exact. Viewed demographically — no college vs. college grad and across age groups — the rate of incorrect answers was quite consistent. The only marked difference is that men got it right 10% more often than women.

I find this very interesting. It is almost as though the deaths in Iraq have become a blur. I remember well when the death toll reached 2,000. I remember that some newspapers printed thumbnails of every fallen soldier.

Since then, it’s dropped off my radar. And not just mine. What I’d like to find out is if most people also underestimated the number of American lives lost to the war.

Not surprisingly, the question that most people got right — a whopping 84% — is:

What is the name of the talk show host who has campaigned for Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama?

So it looks like we can all agree on our priorities, even if they are wrong.

California is doing its part to mitigate rising temperatures in...

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 16:30:43 -0400

California is doing its part to mitigate rising temperatures in the Artic … without even trying:

Robert Stone of the University of Colorado, Boulder, and colleagues report that wildfire smoke that reaches the Arctic has the net effect of cooling the surface by reducing the amount of sunlight that makes it through.

From Discovery News.