insaneneko

I care almost nothing about sports, but I do listen to a weekly sports podcast (I'm a podcast whore) and had heard about Dallas Braden of the Oakland A's getting upset at A-Rod of the Yankees over some supposed breach of etiquette by crossing the pitcher's mound last week. This week the same podcast pointed out a hilarious graphic with the pitcher's mound called "Bradenia" as an "autonomous region of Oakland Athletica," "Monarch: King Dallas I," "Population: 1," "Visa Requirements: Not Being A-Rod." XDXD;;

I also liked the tidbit that the guy who makes the graphics is a British dude who'd gotten addicted to baseball watching it on MBL online while avoiding his ex-girlfriend with whom he still lived with in Germany.

I tend not to take care of my car. As long as it runs I'm good, so I don't get it washed very often. This past Sunday I noticed lots of bird poop on the hood when I filled the gas tank, so I got it washed at a fundraising car wash. I took my mom out to a very mediocre dinner with an awesome view* for Mother's Day, but it resulted in a HUGE bird poop right on my hood again. I only got to appreciate a clean car for, like, a couple of hours! And since bird poop isn't good for the finish I suppose I'll have to get it washed again. GAR

* I knew that it wasn't a great restaurant but I'd read online that if you asked for the lanai it had a great view of the sunset, so I decided to go with that instead of going for a really tasty place. The food (Japanese) was worse than I'd expected. I...could've done better, especially considering the price. But the view! The view! It was on the far end of Waikiki, right on the beach. So you could see the curve of Waikiki beach and the rest of the south coast of Oahu from the lanai. The sound of the ocean was soothing, the sunset was lovely, the twinkling of the lights on the airplanes taking off and landing in the twilight was delightful, and the lights of the hotels and the rest of the island as it got darker was A++. Too bad the night ended in discovering the bird poop. :P

I got pretty pissed off listening to NPR's American Readers, Waiting Impatiently For 'The Girl' about people who really wanted to read the third book in Stieg Larsson's very popular Millennium Trilogy that isn't due to be published in the US until May. When they found out it was already out in English in the UK they either ordered it via Amazon UK or got their local bookstore to import it. The local bookstores were asked to stop importing copies because it is apparently against copyright law. Someone from the trilogy's US publisher said, "'What I would say to readers is, I would encourage them to shop at their local bookseller here in the United States or their online bookseller in the United States, where no laws are being broken and you are supporting the continuing discovery of world literature.'" What an ass! If it is illegal to import books from overseas, then the law should be changed! The guy goes on to pompously say, "'If there is a fourth book — and we know that there are 200 pages of a fourth book somewhere — I can assure you that we will consider, if we ever have the opportunity to publish it, we will consider publishing it simultaneously with our U.K. partner.'" Thanks for deigning to "consider" such an idea because if you don't you'll just lose more business as people order from overseas! These kinds of restrictive attitudes when any number of foreign booksellers are just a search and mouse click away seem to be part of why some of these older industries aren't doing so well now.

I loved NPR's All Things Considered April Fool's Day segment, CD Collection Of NPR Funding Credits Is A 'True Gem,' about a 20-CD collection of NPR fundraising announcements. I wonder how many takes they did to get people to say it all without laughing to death?

Before hitting the grocery store yesterday I wandered over to the bookstore to peruse some cookbooks for a dinner recipe idea. I ended up at Mustard-roasted fish from Barefoot Contessa Back to Basics, which looked so simple but so tasty. Bought all the ingredients (including two more bottles of mustard! I have so many different types of mustard in my frig...), including the rather expensive crème fraîche. It turned out wonderfully, but now I have half a tub of crème fraîche I need to use up. Been looking for another easy recipe, but haven't hit one that makes me want to try it out. I did enjoy reading the NYT article on it from 2001 Spooning Up a Cloud that I came across during my search. I may end up making the lemon chicken recipe at the end of the article, even though I only have skinless boneless thighs to use (I prefer skinned boned thighs because they taste better).

Okay, Colin Firth's interview about A Single Man on Fresh Air is worth listening to JUST to hear him talk in dry understatement about the day he had to film the phone call he gets that his lover has died in a car accident. He mentions something that happens that day that he found "not conducive to tragedy." His tone oh-so perfect. XD;

During another Fresh Air interview I think I've finally found a comedian I find extremely funny: Aziz Ansari. He's an Indian-American from South Carolina and I loved every single one of the jokes they played from his stand-up special on Comedy Central. I want to watch his DVD now.

I liked the google ad that aired during the Superbowl. So simple, so sweet. I did not watch the Superbowl, but I heard about the general crappy quality of the ads afterwards. This one got a thumbs up.

Hilarious parody on Marketplace, What else can airlines charge us for? Oxygen? Using the bathroom? Help by the flight attendant? How about all of the above!

Research on the basis of the "time flies when you're having fun" concept

What can I add to my spaghetti? at Metafilter has some interesting (and easy) ideas

Banks come up with new fees for credit card customers reinforces the buyer beware rule.

Heard a breathtakingly snobby report on the ails of the champagne market in a down economy where they talked to ONE "wine expert" and ONE random French person who declared champagne king and other sparkling wines, including--especially?--prosecco, as cheap wanna-be's that should never be substituted for the "real thing." I'd hoped obnoxious and blatant wine snobbery had died years ago, but I guess not.

For about half the globe New Year's Eve have be a blue moon because it will be the second full moon in December. For the other half (Asia, etc), January will have a blue moon since the full moon will occur on New Year's Day.

Speaking of astronomical events, check out the awesome International Year of Astronomy Prints by Simon Page. I know that it's the end of the year of astronomy already, but those posters are classic and gorgeous! I so want one.

Romeo and Juliet as remembered by people who read it in high school sounds hilarious! Too bad it's playing in New York....

I don't watch movies much anymore, but I love reading media criticism and meta on movies and the industry. The Cobra by Tad Friend from The New Yorker is about marketing movies via a profile of one particular marketer at a rather off-beat studio.

A fabulous 4-part series on Charles Darwin by BBC Radio 4's In Our Time, available for listening to here. I love the background on the man and his times, the analysis and the commentary of his work.

Some RyoKai loveliness from leviosa8 here and here.

Wanting to post yet not having the time and energy to post has been rather stressful. Usually I can at least keep up with the flist, but that kind of went out the window as well. Thanks, RL, for throwing me lots of crap *at once*! XP I give up on "catching up" already.

My eyes and head feel fuzzy...I was already sleep-deprived, and yet I stayed up *really frickin late* randomly rereading books I haven't touched in ages. So much love for Many Waters by Madeleine L'Engle.

NPR's newest installment of IN CHARACTER about Jo from Little Women made me happy to know that I wasn't the only female in the world that didn't love love love that book when I read it. XD;

In an interview with a columnist from the NYT Magazine on On the Media, they talked about internet cafes in Japan. It was really odd hearing the booths called "media immersion pods" and talked about like it was totally freaky since I adore the privacy and comfort (and fast internet access) of those things when I go to Japan. But what really bothered me was the notion that people who inhabit "spaces in [their] head" is threatening and wrong to society.