Saturday

August 20, 2011

This year, I decided to do Fantasy Football. It seems a smidge less engaging than Fantasy Baseball, as baseball is on the daily. But as this is my first attempt at a football team, we'll see how it goes.

Already, the Chaoyang Lions have traded for Oakland's Janikowski as a kicker, more out of "I like that guy" than "Christ, he's 497 years old."

I also traded for the Detroit Lions defense. Call me a sentimentalist, or a sucker.

Wednesday

August 17, 2011

From the AP: "In this photo provided by Zhaohui Tang, former Washington Gov. Gary Locke, who is the first Chinese-American ambassador to China, orders coffee at Seattle Tacoma International Airport on Aug. 12, 2011. Zhaohui Tang, a businessman who snapped a photo of Locke carrying his own backpack and ordering his own coffee at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport says he’s surprised by the big, admiring response the picture generated among Chinese citizens not used to such frugality."



Monday

August 8, 2011

I dreamt that I was having a drink with Bob Geldof at the Japanese whiskey bar above the Chaoyang Theater. The Chinese acrobats came in, in costume, midway through a conversation that seemed very vague and simultaneously deep--Bob was trying to get through to me about something but I was apparently being thick. I went to the men's room. Gordie Howe was using the urinal next to mine dressed in full retro Red Wings uniform and skates. I said hi and he hit me. [then I woke up and put this in my dream journal]

Sunday

August 7, 2011

After a rewatch of The Wire, I thought I'd go further back into cop soap opera history, decided to rewatch the first season of Hill Street Blues (1981-87). Season 1 got 21 Emmy nods and took home 8. Renko, the cracker with a southern drawl (but apparently from New Jersey?) was shot and in a coma in the first episode. This was a ground-breaking cop show that took us inside the precinct and inside the politics. In any TV history timeline, it's a necessary forefather to Homicide (also dated now) and The Wire. Some good acting and writing. A lot of crap writing and acting (especially Faye , the captain's ex-wife [on both accounts]).

Hey, and let's be careful out there.

Saturday

August 6, 2011

Cyrus Console, Brief Under Water (Burning Deck, 2008).

Terse. Tense. Vigorous writing.

I have a feeling that Cyrus was appropriating Nirvana rather than Leadbelly on page 50: "Don't you lie to me. Tell me where did you sleep last night."

Notwithstanding, very tight.

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Thursday

August 4, 2011


My workmate Petros was going around quoting snippets from the great Ali canon. This one stuck with me:

Last night I had a dream, When I got to Africa,
I had one hell of a rumble.
I had to beat Tarzan’s behind first,
For claiming to be King of the Jungle.
For this fight, I’ve wrestled with alligators,
I’ve tussled with a whale.
I done handcuffed lightning
And throw thunder in jail.
You know I’m bad.
just last week, I murdered a rock,
Injured a stone, Hospitalized a brick.
I’m so mean, I make medicine sick.
I’m so fast, man,
I can run through a hurricane and don't get wet.
When George Foreman meets me,
He’ll pay his debt.
I can drown the drink of water, and kill a dead tree.
Wait till you see Muhammad Ali.

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Wednesday

August 3, 2011


Ai Weiwei back on the internet

Tuesday

August 2, 2011


So in the Fantastic Four, no. 4 (Marvel, 1961) the Submariner gets reintroduced after a long hiatus from the Marvel Universe by winding up an amnesiac Bowery bum in a flophouse. After a shave and a haircut (given by the Human Torch), the Submariner is pissed to see his old underwater domain destroyed by atomic bomb testing. He vows revenge against all humans. An anti-hero is born. Invisible Girl reluctantly agrees to marry him in exchange for not killing all of humanity, but her reluctance angers him more. A Human Torch tornado factors in, and we are all saved . . . for now.

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