Archive for September 2005

Friday 30 September 2005

dark at heart

excerpt:

bill bennett, a prominent conservative republican, says skin color is a risk factor in crime.
according to bill, mo darker be mo guilty.
but wait, it gets better: bill also says that if you abort the pregnancies of dark people, the crime rate will go down.
yay bill, conservative republican.
thankfully george bush, leader of the gop, has [...]

more spaceneedl | more Community & Culture

Four people

By cpkpdx | Community & Culture ~ Law & Politics ~ Life and Society ~ Portland ~ War & Peace

excerpt:

I took my children to a candlelight vigil for peace last weekend, timed to coincide with many other peace rallies around the country. These intelligent, questioning people wanted to know what difference four people would make. Of course they know that war is not a good thing. Of course they know that this folly in [...]

more cpkpdx | more Community & Culture ∞ Law & Politics ∞ Life and Society ∞ Portland ∞ War & Peace

Thursday 29 September 2005

Woman Removes Windows^tm and Finds Herself.

By ejohnlove | Science & Tech

excerpt:

A review of “The Dumbing Down of Programming” by Ellen Ullman.

more ejohnlove | more Science & Tech

Fun With Conspiracy Theories

By Gonzo | Health & Fitness ~ Law & Politics

excerpt:

You know that scene in all those movies when the bad guy is finally cornered, either literally or figuratively, and knowing that he faces the public humiliation of getting arrested and tried for his crimes, he chooses, rather, to shove a gun into his mouth and pulls the trigger?

Somehow, reading about all the scandals the Bush administration is mired in, from the Downing Street Memo and Katrina incompetence and cronyism, to Mr. Rove and the Plame investigation, Delay’s indictment, and the investigation of Frist’s stock sale, I keep thinking about those suicide scenes. And, while I of course am not hoping for a Republican blood bath, the situation has led to me to the development of a rather fun conspiracy theory.

more Gonzo | more Health & Fitness ∞ Law & Politics

Wednesday 28 September 2005

Drug-Free Green Grass Flashback

By Gonzo | Community & Culture ~ Design & Style ~ Finance & Trade

excerpt:

Time Machine by Tom Haney

In light of today’s news, that the U.S. $10 bill is getting a face lift, I thought I’d link back to a post I wrote back when the new $50 bill was released.
Greener Grass Department
And, just for the heck of it, because I’ve got nothing else in the hopper at [...]

more Gonzo | more Community & Culture ∞ Design & Style ∞ Finance & Trade

FlossQuotes

And where we are met with cynicism and doubt and fear and those who tell us that we can't, we will respond with that timeless creed that sums up the spirit of the American people in three simple words — yes, we can.
– Barack Obama

Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings - Naturally
If anyone's been paying attention, I listen to a wide variety of music, only a fraction of which I've reviewed here at Transcendental Floss. I tend to go through phases when I'll be stuck on a particular artist or genre, really immersing in it for a few weeks at a time, and what I find so interesting and exciting is that during each phase I have this experience where I feel like there's no better music than what I'm listening to right then and there. Well, I've just discovered Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings and I can say with complete confidence that this is the best music I have ever heard. Seriously, this is magical stuff. Brooklyn, New York's Daptones Records have managed to produce record after record of fine R&B/soul/funk music using vintage musical equipment and analog recording techniques in the ultimate homage to the legendary Motown and Stax catalogs. The Dap-Kings, serving as the Daptone house band, are the modern day equivalent of Stax's Booker T & The MGs, laying down the tastiest grooves, sweetest guitar riffs, and of course the horns that make this music so electrifying. Sharon Jones is the quintessential soul singer, able to capture moments of tenderness just as easily as moments of gritty passion. Enjoy!
— Gonzo

Van Morrison - His Band & The Street Choir
As much as I love the 1991 movie The Commitments, Van Morrison, some 40 years earlier, had already proven that the Irish have plenty of soul. Perhaps my favorite album of his, His Band & The Street Choir could easily be said to share some DNA with the music of Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings (soulful crooning, grooves, horns, etc.), yet with a decidedly unique twist that is all Van The Man. This music simply makes me feel good on a deep, deep level. What's so great about Van Morrison is that he's covered such a variety of genres, from soul to blues to country to jazz to celtic to a kind of meditative, almost new age sound that is all his own, and so as I move from phase to phase of musical immersion he's very often right there with me.
— Gonzo

Be Kind Rewind
I was not prepared to love this movie nearly as much as I did. While I've liked a lot of Jack Black's work, he's a guy with limited range who I can easily see wearing out his schtick. However, teamed with a very sweet and funny turn by Mos Def, an equally sweet Danny Glover, and under the direction of the mad genius of Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, The Science of Sleep), Black's occasionally formulaic performance does nothing to keep this film from achieving success as a comedy and a bittersweet slice of life in Passaic, New Jersey. I was surprised over and over again how Gondry unapologetically went sentimental, eschewing so much of the cynicism that passes as gritty realism these days, which is music to my unapoligetically sentimental ears. I laughed. I cried. I learned that Mos Def is by far the best artist to crossover from music to acting that I've seen in a long, long time.
— Gonzo

Franny & Zooey - J.D. Salinger
I work at a university where I supervise a team of student employees. One employee, in painfully embarrassing hindsight, reminds me an awful lot of me, but before this hindsight came into focus he was a big, fat pain in my ass. Relentlessly sarcastic and arrogant, yet brilliant, this guy pushed my patience to the limit. Then, one day, I saw him sitting under a tree on campus reading Franny & Zooey and it hit me like a lightning bolt. I know this kid. I WAS this kid. So, I stopped to talk to him about the book and about Salinger in general. He'd read The Catcher in the Rye first, then moved on to Nine Stories, which, with the story A Perfect Day For Bananafish, introduces the reader to the inimitable Glass family. Franny & Zooey, then, becomes the natural next choice, with Raise High The Roofbeam, Carpenter & Seymour: An Introduction to follow, and this was exactly the same sequence that I followed 20+ years earlier. Ever since, while we're not buddy-buddy, there's been a new-found understanding between us, a sense that I'd been his shoes, that we shared some interests. Oh, and I went back and re-read Catcher, Nine Stories, and am currently falling in love all over again with Franny & Zooey.
— Gonzo

Lick your chops and chip through the nuggets of past Floss Aid recommendations.
— floss aid

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Archive for September 2005

Friday 30 September 2005

dark at heart

Four people

Thursday 29 September 2005

Woman Removes Windows^tm and Finds Herself.

Fun With Conspiracy Theories

Wednesday 28 September 2005

Drug-Free Green Grass Flashback

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