Love(l)y

A site called theatre VOICE are making a big deal over a new CD called Essential Shakespeare. They currently have samples. The actors featured include Sir Larry, Sir Ian and, er, some other people.

Sensible Advice

Via Fark comes a number of flu related tips from MSN, including this:

During flu season, never let anyone lick your keyboard.

Outside of flu season keyboard licking must be fine, I guess.

But I Digress

Some say that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results (some say that it was Einstein who first said it still others Benjamin Franklin[1], but plenty are saying it without caring too much about that).

Anyway, that form of insanity can be pretty funny, too.

[1] Footnote to a parenthetical comment, I really know how to structure my posts, huh? What I wanted to add, though, was that there must be some theory about how Einstein and Churchill said everything that Wilde didn't, it almost always turns out to be someone elses bon mot, but because those three are known for saying quotable things they tend to get attributed eventually. Apparently it's called the "Rule of the Lesser Attribution" which says "acclaim and reputation tend to be allocated to people unevenly". Curiously, I found this because I was reminded, in writing this, of something called Stigler's law of eponymy which states that no scientific discovery is named after its original discoverer, Planck's Constant, for example, wasn't actually found by Planck.

Peyote. It's Good For You.

Sort of. I'm not sure if the Guardian's headline to the piece, Peyote Not Harmful to American Indians, is a hedging of bets, but it seems that the occasional hallucinogen isn't bad for you and, in fact, can be beneficial. Bill Hicks would be so happy.

A Cheap Laugh Is Still A Laugh

Today Fametracker posted an article on Notes from the Esquire Editorial Meeting At Which Jessica Biel Was Named "Sexiest Woman Alive". I probably laughed way too loudly at this bit:

2: What about Elizabethtown? That's a big deal movie. Cameron Crowe directing. And it stars that hot, willowy, dewy-lipped blonde.

3: Orlando Bloom?

2: No, the other one. Kirsten Dunst.

Free Books

I didn't notice this before, but Chris Mitchell of Spike Magazine has a great online resource in his blog Free New Books.

Recent finds have included Douglas Adams's Meaning of Liff, the complete works of George Orwell and a whole mess of Sci Fi. I'm trying to avoid finishing this post with "check it out", but, er check it out...

An Unplayhouse?

James Howard Kunstler finds a rather Kafkaesque note.

Boondocks Animated

Need I say much more? Oh, ok:

Huey Freeman has a dream. The 10-year-old hero of Boondocks—a new animated series based on the popular comic strip—fantasizes about walking into a ritzy white man's garden party and inciting a riot by speaking truth to power. Stuff like "Jesus was black, Ronald Reagan was the devil, and the government lied about 9-11." Huey's reverie is interrupted by his own granddad, who slaps him awake shouting, "How many times I told you, you better not even dream of telling white folks the truth. . . . I'm gonna go find a white man and lie to him right now!"

Nine Bob Note

50 Cent shows how real and down with people he is.

"What KANYE WEST was saying, I don't know where that came from."

Update: The ever perceptive Steve Gilliard has a good look at this and the history of it. Seems Fiddy has nothing to offer but thuggery and cynicism.

The Beatings Will Continue Until Morale Improves

So, it was a long weekend, what with Monday off and Tuesday being bank-holiday. But worry not. The knob gags interspersed with curiously naive social comment will continue as soon as I get through that massive backlog of other peoples blogs.