1. Morgan Spurlock’s new film Where in the World is Osama Bin Laden recently debuted at the Sundance Film festival. I probably won’t be able to see it for some time since films like this don’t come to a theater near me in Muncie, Indiana. So, I’ll have to wait for the DVD. Until then here’s a taste:
2. Eric Weiner’s book The Geography of Bliss. Weiner a former NPR correspondent banished to report from the world’s most depressing places visits the happiest places on Earth. I’m all about chasing an idea from culture to culture and trying to make sense of it. It’s a bold move looking for something as abstract…
Let’s retire the use of “gate” as a suffix to signify a scandal. It’s overdone, uncreative, and annoys the crap out of me. This morning on the news they talked about “boot-gate,” which is about Tom Brady, the New England Patriots QB who was seen in New York wearing a walking cast. The original gate of course was Watergate, which is the name of the hotel that Nixon’s flunkies broke into and eventually led to his impeachment. Tom Brady’s boot has nothing to do with paper shredding, hotels, the President, or a scandal. Hell, it’s two weeks until the Superbowl.
Let’s stop the madness before some famous person scandalously hops a gate, steals a gate, or is hit with a gate and we are subjected…
American Apparel, operator of the largest garment factory in the USA, is known for its controversial, racy ads. Now they are venturing into the controversial world of politics. Their new ad takes immigration head on.
In a new series of ads, American Apparel is moving in a political direction. The cause is immigration reform, and the ads say in part that the status quo “amounts to an apartheid system” and should be overhauled to create a legal path for undocumented workers to gain citizenship in the United States.
I don’t feel educated enough to praise or criticize AA’s stance in the complex immigration debate. But I do think that if more clothing companies and/or brands would not try to distance themselves from…
Wall Street Journal reporter Hannah Karp email interviewed me while researching her story The Stay-at-Home vacation. The article is about people who are concerned about their carbon footprint choosing not to fly, even if it means missing a siblings wedding or dream vacation. I take a slightly different stance:
That’s misguided, says Kelsey Timmerman, a 28-year-old Muncie, Ind., scuba-diving instructor and author. If he’d never been to the Great Barrier Reef, he wouldn’t care as much that it is dying from rising ocean temperatures. Decisions he makes as a consumer and a voter offset emissions resulting from his travels, says Mr. Timmerman, who visited Bangladesh, Cambodia and China last year. “Travel helps us care more about our world.”
I’ve heard rumblings of this debate, but had no idea…
It’s my first conversation with my editor at Wiley and he’s giving me lots of great ideas of how to structure the book and, in general, the direction I should take it. He’s scanning through the chapters, which are named “My (insert article of clothing.”
Ms. Nakamachi, a folklore and history graduate student at Kanagawa University outside Tokyo, has spent more than six years trying to establish the Japanese origin of the fortune cookie…
6 years!? Researching the fortune cookie!? Is the world a better place? Does anyone really care about the fortune cookie – that much? I’m really not sure if I can think of a less worthwhile topic to research for 6 years. One month – maybe. A year – that’s pushing it. 6 years – no way.
Get your online fortune cookie (more fortune, less cookie) HERE. Share ’em if you like….
In all honesty, I think you are most excellent. To be truthful, I have not doubt that you are legal sellers. I’m not lying when I say that I’m intrigued by your low priced, quality products. If you could supple me with more information about your outstanding products, I would be forever in your debt.
Your friend,
Kelsey
It will be interesting to see what happens. I’ve never responded to SPAM before. I’ll keep you posted….
