It's hard to explain just how odd I find this

Like wow.


Oh, Amazon (US)? Can you give us a list of Statistically Improbable Phrases?

conapt building, consultation lounge, kidney balm, moratorium owner, precog ability, empathy box, prudence organization, mood organ, many inertials, parked ship, poop sheet, harness bull, laser tube, false animal, psi field, brain unit, three stigmata, silver triangle, roof field, electric sheep, tomb world, androids dream, high castle

Another book that has the phrase "kidney balm" as a Statistically Improbable Phrase is Inner Hygiene: Constipation and the Pursuit of Health in Modern Society by James C. Whorton, a work that the Canadian Journal of Gastroenterology called "Very thought provoking."

PKD would be so proud!

The Big Cheese

The other day I posted a poem by Canadian "cheese poet" James McIntyre. I had come across the poem while poking through a book (US,UK). I had no idea that McIntyre was being passed around the web at the moment, and am delighted to find myself hip-deep in the zeitgeist.

I would like to give special note to Book Trout, who actually was able to find a photograph of the aforementioned Mammoth Cheese:



As a means of celebration, I present McIntyre's sequel, where he dreams of ... Even more cheese!

Prophecy of a Ten Ton Cheese

In presenting this delicate, dainty morsel to the imagination of the people, I believed that it could be realized. I viewed the machine that turned and raised the mammoth cheese, and saw the powerful machine invented by James Ireland at the West Oxford companies factory to turn the great and fine cheese he was making there. This company with but little assistance could produce a ten ton cheese.

Who hath prophetic vision sees
In future times a ten ton cheese,
Several companies could join
To furnish curd for great combine
More honor far than making gun
Of mighty size and many a ton.

Machine it could be made with ease
That could turn this monster cheese,
The greatest honour to our land
Would be this orb of finest brand,
Three hundred curd they would need squeeze
For to make this mammoth cheese.

So British lands could confederate
Three hundred provinces in one state,
When all in harmony agrees
To be pressed in one like this cheese,
Then one skillful hand could acquire
Power to move British empire.

But various curds must be combined
And each factory their curd must grind,
To blend harmonious in one
This great cheese of mighty span,
And uniform in quality
A glorious reality.

But it will need a powerful press
This cheese queen to caress,
And a large extent of charms
Hoop will encircle in its arms,
And we do not now despair,
But we shall see it at world's fair.

And view the people all agog, so
Excited o'er it in Chicago,
To seek fresh conquests queen of cheese
She may sail across the seas,
Where she would meet reception grand
From the warm hearts in old England.

Buying the New Yorker 1976 - page 10

Guadeloupe and Martinique are "Overseas Departments" of France, meaning that they have most of the same rights as ordinary Department (not as much autonomy as an American State, but more inherent rights than Puerto Rico, Guam and Washington DC). So technically, yes, this is France. But come on, who goes to the Caribbean so that they can pretend they are in France? If the place were really ugly, it would be a good campaign strategy, but it is not, so this is really preposterous.

Here is the official website of the Martinique Tourism Authority. They've wised up.

Unfortunately, the four hour flight is gone too. I can't find any direct flights from New York, they all have stopovers. The shortest trip I could find was from Newark to Guadeloupe via San Juan coming in at 6 hours and 20 minutes. To contrast, a non-stop flight from NYC to Paris is 7 hours.

You know what would be fun? You can go to Paris and pretend you're in France!

How about this astonishingly dull new layout?

I'm planning on doing a little tweaking to the looks of the ol' site, so I've switched over to a blander layout while I experiment.

Great moments in dairy related poetry

James McIntyre (1828-1906) was a Scottish-born Canadian poet who wrote extensively on the subject of cheese.

Enjoy one of his more popular poems on the subject of cheese:

Ode on the Mammoth Cheese

We have seen the Queen of cheese,
Laying quietly at your ease,
Gently fanned by evening breeze --
Thy fair form no flies dare seize.

All gaily dressed soon you'll go
To the great Provincial Show,
To be admired by many a beau
In the city of Toronto.

Cows numerous as a swarm of bees --
Or as the leaves upon the trees --
It did require to make thee please,
And stand unrivalled Queen of Cheese.

May you not receive a scar as
We have heard that Mr. Harris
Intends to send you off as far as
The great World's show at Paris.

Of the youth -- beware of these --
For some of them might rudely squeeze
And bite your cheek; then songs or glees
We could not sing o' Queen of Cheese.

We'rt thou suspended from baloon,
You'd cast a shade, even at noon;
Folks would think it was the moon
About to fall and crush them soon.

Buying the New Yorker 1976 - page 9

I like the horrific atmospheric haze that pervades this ad. You can't breathe it, it burns your skin. Heck, it's melting the buildings and dissolving the sun. No worries about the ecosystem here.



So how is this "The American Answer?" From what I can gather, the Cadillac Seville was an attempt to match the popularity of high-end European models like the BMW and Mercedes-Benz.

Just a quick word to my Google Overlords

This thing that you did to add the autosave to the post composition interface?

It is really not laid out well.

Think harder and fix it.

Buying the New Yorker 1976 - page 7

Bonwit Teller is another big department store that has now gone out of business. Apparently a Bonwit Teller gets blown up at the beginning of one of the Die Hard films.

That's all I got unless I start making fun of the outfit, and I promised myself I wouldn't do that.

......


OK, Fine. Maybe a little.

"This is the ceremonial robe you'll live in -- at home or at play."

I can't. I have no idea how to make this any more absurd than it already is.

Great moments in Norwegian popular culture

This is a remix of the theme to the most popular Norwegian film of all time.

Oh No!

Look at what the folks watching our house went and did with poor defenseless Bob and Stan!



(The philistines went and switched the helmets back!)

+++++

Bonus: My wife is on the phone with one of the people who did this -- "No, he blogs about the potatoes. He takes pictures of them looking at things."

I'm back

Normal blogging will resume shortly.

Gone dark

I'm off for an adventure! Back in a little while!

Quick posting

Dexy's Midnight Runners go shopping at Brooks Brothers, 1985:

Quick posting

Baseball, The sport of witty repartee:

Quick posting

Don Imus doesn't translate well.

Quick posting

Lawyerbear! He is a bear and a Lawyer!

Quick posting

Harry Stephen Keeler tries to collaborate with Edna St. Vincent Millay. And fails. Mostly.

Quick posting

Hoverboy!

Quick posting

Baseball, the sport of camaraderie:

Listening to the World - Albania

I have, in the past, spent a bit of time listening to Top Albania Radio, as it is the first country that generally shows up on the lists of World Internet Radio stations. I Like TAR, as it has quite a lot of local talent on hand - If I am reading their Playlist correctly, 9 artists on the top 20 are Albanian. Listening for a few days off and on I can say that the local stuff is as good if not better than the stuff on American radio at the moment (though I can chalk some of the betterness to my inability to understand any of the lyrics). There was some stuff in English, but the only thing I was able to recognize was Matisyahu doing "King Without a Crown" (US UK). I don't know all that much about Albania's religious demographic, but I find this a little fascinating.

My gosh do I want this.

I love typewriters and I love waffles.


Chris Diminio has other ideas for typewriters besides this one.

Unfortunate Baseball News Headline of the Season (so far)

"Royals To Get A Taste Of Angels' Colon"

Self-reflection is, in some cases, horrific

Those of you who are astonishingly desperate for things to listen to will have noticed that my Pandora account has slowly accumulated different stations as I tinker around with the settings.

My most recent "station" came from an idea that I had: If I start loading in all the songs that I have quoted lyrics from in blog posts, perhaps I will get a glimpse at the sort of music that my subconscious mind enjoys, as that is the sort of thing that pops into my mind anyway.

The process of creating a station requires a song to begin with, so I went with the most recent song lyric that ended up as a post title: "The Streets of Where I'm From" by The Old 97's (US UK). I then added songs as I found them (useless trivia/potential insight: "No Rain" by Blind Melon is apparently the only song I've quoted twice!)

And what did I end up with?

A mixture of 50's era pop Christmas music and speed metal.

I'm still tinkering with it.

Buying the New Yorker 1976 - page 5

I'm not certain, but I think this is Lauren Hutton.



Charles Revson was the founder of Revlon. "CHR" are Revson's initials and "Ultima II" was the name of his 257-foot yacht. At first, one might suspect Revson of being a bit egotistical, but, as this ad appears one year after Revson's death, one infers that the self reference is a sort of homage.

Revson's biography is sadly out of print, but the author has very kindly posted what seems like a healthy chunk of it online here. Enjoy a sample paragraph:

Revson bought the Ultima II in the summer of 1967 from D. K. Ludwig, the secretive billionaire shipbuilder, and then went about a major overhaul and total redecoration. The Burma teak decking alone, hand-laid in Naples, cost $125,000. Also: three new electric generators; two new evaporators (to desalinate 10,000 tons of water a day); radar with a fifty-mile range; forty- eight sterling silver place settings from England, forty-eight gold-plated settings from France; two movie projectors for nightly movies; engraved, gold- lettered Cartier stationery, with the blue, green, and white "R" flag flowing in the wind, at $1.75 or so for each sheet and envelope (about what it costs to manufacture a 750-page telephone book), fine wood paneled walls . . . Ask for a typewriter at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington and the front desk will not even be able to arrange to have one rented to you. Ask for it aboard the Ultima II and the response was, simply, "Will you require carbon paper, sir?" Sniffle imperceptibly at lunch and Kleenex would be waiting by your deck chair when you went to take the afternoon sun. You wish pizza? Sweet and sour pork? Lobster Newburg? Filet mignon? Fresh-squeezed juice in your Dom Perignon? Chief steward Wu would positively run to bring what you desired. And not out of fear, either, but pride. He would watch you take your first cup of coffee and, if it met with your pleasure, deliver every cup that followed precisely that way.

Revson was obviously just plain folk.

If only internet buzz were possible in the early seventies

A concept poster for a film that was on deck at Hammer Films but ultimately never made. And yes, that was the real honest to God working title: