Spirited Away : Cosplay

The World is Terrifying : the Lion’s Mane Jellyfish

The Lion’s Mane Jellyfish is the largest jellyfish in the world.

That’s How I Knew This Story Would Break My Heart : Aimee Mann

I drew a picture of you
You and your anchor tattoo
And saw the face that I knew
Covered in shame
You drew a bird that was here
A kind of sweet chanticleer
But with a terrible fear
That the cage couldn’t tame

That’s how I knew this story would break my heart
When you wrote it
That’s how I knew this story would break my heart

So, like a ghost in the snow
I’m getting ready to go
‘Cause baby, that’s all I know –
How to open the door
And though the exit is crude
It saves me coming unglued
For when you’re not in the mood
For the gloves and the canvas floor

That’s how I knew this story would break my heart
When you wrote it
That’s how I knew this story would break my heart

That’s how I knew this story would break my heart
When you wrote it
That’s how I knew this story would break my heart

The Pornification of the Food Network

“Without negotiation or hint of pretense, Sara Moulton and John T. Edge went at it. Moulton’s food swoon was well practiced, a controlled, quiet rapture, while Edge’s bliss was more jubilant and rakish, as though each bite were another visceral hit in a lifelong succession of thrills. They ate standing up, straight from the serving dish. They ate without speaking, without napkins, without stopping. When they gobbled the apple pie, it was as if the serpent had never slithered down that ancient tree.”

–Frederick Kaufman

via

Atlas Shrugged / Critics Shrug

David B. Hart has written my favorite cinematic castigation of the year.

Some highlights:

“What really puts both Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead in a class of their own is how sublimely awful they are. I know one shouldn’t expect much from a writer who thought Mickey Spillane a greater artist than Shakespeare. Even so, the cardboard characters, the ludicrous dialogue, the bloated perorations, the predictable plotting, the lunatic repetitiousness and banality, the shockingly syrupy romance—it all goes to create a uniquely nauseating effect: at once mephitic and cloying, at once sulfur and cotton candy.”

and

“Where Rand’s fiction is concerned, I suppose aesthetic and ideological revulsion are not really separable. What made her novels not just risibly clumsy, but truly shrill and hideous, was the exorbitantly trashy philosophy behind them. Taken solely as a storyteller, she had many of the skills of the proficient pulp writer. Her overwrought plots, her comically patent villains, her panting, fiery, fierce yet quiescent heroines—all of that would be quite at home in lushly bad romance fiction. Had she not mistaken herself for a deep thinker, she might have done well enough, producing books that filled out that vital niche between Forever Amber and Valley of the Dolls. Sadly, though, her ambitions would not let her rest there.”

A Lesson on Virginity : Selah Saterstrom

“Willie called his daughters into the dining room. He picked up a dining room table chair and threw it into a closed window. The window shattered. He said, ‘That’s a lesson about virginity. Do you understand?’ to which they replied, ‘Yes sir.’”

-Selah Saterstrom, The Pink Institution

Hipster Cat

Ladies and Gentlement Your 2011 Pulitzer Prize Winner for Poetry

“Poems are even better than tweets.”

-Kay Ryan

Tina Fey’s Prayer for her Daughter

First, Lord: No tattoos. May neither Chinese symbol for truth nor Winnie-the-Pooh holding the FSU logo stain her tender haunches.

May she be Beautiful but not Damaged, for it’s the Damage that draws the creepy soccer coach’s eye, not the Beauty.

When the Crystal Meth is offered, May she remember the parents who cut her grapes in half And stick with Beer.

Guide her, protect her
When crossing the street, stepping onto boats, swimming in the ocean, swimming in pools, walking near pools, standing on the subway platform, crossing 86th Street, stepping off of boats, using mall restrooms, getting on and off escalators, driving on country roads while arguing, leaning on large windows, walking in parking lots, riding Ferris wheels, roller-coasters, log flumes, or anything called “Hell Drop,” “Tower of Torture,” or “The Death Spiral Rock ‘N Zero G Roll featuring Aerosmith,” and standing on any kind of balcony ever, anywhere, at any age.

Lead her away from Acting but not all the way to Finance. Something where she can make her own hours but still feel intellectually fulfilled and get outside sometimes And not have to wear high heels.

What would that be, Lord? Architecture? Midwifery? Golf course design? I’m asking You, because if I knew, I’d be doing it, Youdammit.

May she play the Drums to the fiery rhythm of her Own Heart with the sinewy strength of her Own Arms, so she need Not Lie With Drummers.

Grant her a Rough Patch from twelve to seventeen. Let her draw horses and be interested in Barbies for much too long, For childhood is short – a Tiger Flower blooming Magenta for one day – And adulthood is long and dry-humping in cars will wait.

O Lord, break the Internet forever, That she may be spared the misspelled invective of her peers And the online marketing campaign for Rape Hostel V: Girls Just Wanna Get Stabbed.

And when she one day turns on me and calls me a Bitch in front of Hollister, Give me the strength, Lord, to yank her directly into a cab in front of her friends, For I will not have that Shit. I will not have it.

And should she choose to be a Mother one day, be my eyes, Lord, that I may see her, lying on a blanket on the floor at 4:50 A.M., all-at-once exhausted, bored, and in love with the little creature whose poop is leaking up its back.

“My mother did this for me once,” she will realize as she cleans feces off her baby’s neck. “My mother did this for me.” And the delayed gratitude will wash over her as it does each generation and she will make a Mental Note to call me. And she will forget. But I’ll know, because I peeped it with Your God eyes.

Amen.

Pudding vs The Emptiness