June 23, 2005
Badass of the Day: Daniel M'Mburugu
Wired.com's "Furthermore" sidebar tells the story of the 73-year-old Kenyan farmer who, when attacked by a leopard, pulled out the cat's tounge with his bare hands! "A voice, which must have come from God, whispered to me to drop the panga (machete) and thrust my hand in its wide open mouth. I obeyed," he said. "It let out a blood-curdling snarl that made the birds stop chirping."
June 19, 2005
Kansas City here I come
Just a note to let the Memphilterati know that once again, in what seems like a constant search for the Treasure of the Sierra Madre almighty dollar, my family will be moving once again. My stint across the lake from the City that Care Forgot is winding down, and it is likely that I will go for more days at a time than usual without checking in on Memphilter, so buyer beware.
While I am not looking forward to moving the ~18,000 lbs. of the Samuelad Library, Furnishings, and Junque Collection; I am looking forward to living in a city with professional baseball once more, albeit an American League team and the third worst team in baseball as it stands.
As soon as I get some of the move behind me, I'll update everyone with our new contact info.
June 13, 2005
Thinking Inside the Box
You might think that one's becoming a regular reader of a weblog dedicated to Wal-Mart's big box urbanism would be an indictment of just how pathetic one's life had become. While I prefer the illusion that my life is not pathetic, I must admit to becoming a regular reader of theboxtank. I just want to be clear about this: I am not a fan of Wal-Mart. For me, my quasi-hatred for Wal-Mart has nothing to do with the way it treats it workers, the way it cleans the clocks of mom-and-pops, or the way it drives business straight to the lowest wage economies. To be sure, these are problems to be investigated by those whose social consciences trump my suburban indifference. But I hate them for what a bunch of people presumably love about them: the--in my view--lousy shopping experience: dirty, cart-infested parking lots; tight aisles; poor service; crappy display; and the fact that they practically frisk paying customers on their way out (and have legitimized the practice for much of big box retail). Having said that, theboxtank shows me how Wal-Mart sells prOn in China. Apparently, Chinese porn is safer than many American rap lyrics. But the real genius of theboxtank happens at theboxtanklab, where mostly Wal-Mart-related infoporn rules the roost. I mean, any site that can make me imagine the population of Omaha condensed into a square mile deserves a little memphilter shoutout.
June 11, 2005
Meanwhile, in Space...
Sunset on Mars.
June 10, 2005
The Memphis Gay Gulag
Embarassingly enough, it took this MeFi post to alert Memphilter (meaning, me) to the case of 16-year-old Zach, a Memphian whose coming out to his parents resulted in getting tossed into the Refuge, a straight reeducation camp right here in the Bluff City affiliated with John Smid's Love in Action. (There's lots more good information in the MeFi link above, so I'll stop copping those links.) When word got out on the internets, a protest was organized by local filmmaker and general provacateur Morgan Fox. Updates on the protest are here.
To the protesters: keep up the good work, y'all!
June 09, 2005
Busy Being Born
This past weekend I saw the Bob Dylan show which is part of a tour Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson are doing of minor league baseball stadiums across the country. Willie was, as always, Willie--happy, entertaining, and enthusiastic (although of the few times I have seen him over the last ten years I have to say he might have finally slowed down just a step). Dylan, of course, was the great unknown factor, and he turned in a hell of a performance: foreboding, enigmatic, and yet strangely giving for a man who has become so reclusive. He reinterpreted his early work to the point that on some songs people in the stands would openly debate what he was playing (see the Savannah setlist here). And he ended the show with the most blistering rendition of All Along the Watchtower I have ever heard live outside of a Neil Young show.
A baby boomer that I saw the show with made an interesting observation that Bob Dylan makes the same song twenty times until he finally gets it right. It's an interesting lens through which to look at his career. Like Neil Young, whose path he has often crossed, Dylan continually retools and reinvents himself, trying to find exactly the right song at exactly the right moment. And like Neil, he has had both extraordinary hits and misses. In two recent interviews, one on CBS and one on NPR, Dylan comes across as a man who is finally comprehending the immenseness of his legacy and who, in typical fashion, is still trying to reshape it decades after it began.
June 07, 2005
Pot Wars: Return of the Redeye
I was gonna make it "Pot Wars: The Hempire Strikes Back" or "Pot Wars: Attack of the Pot Clones". Actually, none of those brilliant titles apply because the Hempire is not striking but taking the strike. A couple Republicans and Democrats make strange bedfellows in the effort to protect state rights, but this has been in the making ever since John Hashcroft became the Attorney General. Regardless how the Supreme Court vote here was split between Democrats and Republicans, this whole case was pushed onto them by the Bush Administration. Chalk up another win for the Bush Administration: Hooray for Fascism!
June 03, 2005
Danger!
What are the odds that you will die from choking on your own vomit? According to the National Safety Council, about 1 in 10,095. (via Presurfer)
Posted by 