…has been fired by the Astros.
(which I love) but the short version is that I hate baseball with a passion.Every now and then, the topic of those weird dot illustrations that the WSJ uses comes up in my circle of friends. They actually do have a name: hedcuts. We’ve speculated from time to time whether the WSJ has a Photoshop filter to do this, or if they’re done by hand.
Interestingly, one of the WSJ staffers who actually does the hedcuts has a blog with examples of some of her work. Even more interestingly, she’s writing about a Spanish artist who she believes is ripping off her work.
Things I did not expect to hear last night:
“Damn, Dwight, you clean up well.”
(Thank you, Katie.)
The NYT on the wing crisis; the price of chicken wings has increased to the point where boneless skinless chicken breast is actually cheaper. Thus the popularity of “boneless wings”. (Edited to add: yes, this is on FARK, but those who know me know of my fondness for wings, and understand why I couldn’t pass this up.)
Speaking of the NYT, does this story about the West Memphis Three seem somewhat incomplete? Literally, it feels like there’s an entire second page missing.
It seems even more so when compared to this story about Carly Simon and her lawsuit against Starbucks, which is frankly loaded with too much information. (I don’t need to know about her ringtones or her photo album, thankyouverymuch.)
This is truly weird. The Chicago Cubs have filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
To answer the next question:
The Baltimore Orioles were sold in a bankruptcy auction in 1993 after owner Eli Jacobs filed for Chapter 11. The same happened to the Seattle Pilots after the 1969 season. The new owners moved the team to Milwaukee and changed the name to the Brewers.
I have a feeling we’ve seen the end of the Jim Zorn era in Washington. When you lose to Detroit and Carolina, that’s a bad sign. Likewise, I’m thinking we’ve seen the end of the Wade Phillips and Tony Romo era in Dallas; the Cowboys struggled to beat the hapless Chiefs, and lost the opener in the PleasureDome. Jerry Jones isn’t going to put up with that when he has to sell tickets to the billion dollar monstrosity.
In other news, Cleveland is off the loser list after a titanic offensive battle against Buffalo, leaving us with only four NFL teams that still have a chance to go 0-16:
Tennessee
Kansas City
Tampa
St. Louis
Unrelated to art, but I wanted to throw up this Statesman link.
Many of the people who read this blog (including the owner) know Josh from the old Austin BBS days, and wish him the best of luck.
Edited to add: I forgot that I also wanted to link to this LAT piece about Tim Powers and On Stranger Tides, which will apparently be the basis for the next Pirates of the Caribbean movie (if there is one). Powers came to a couple of Armadillocons, and has always been nothing but kind to the Nova Express gang; if anyone deserves huge Hollywood money, he’s on the short list.
I was doing these back in the pre-blog email days, and a couple of people have griped that I haven’t done one in a while. Well, that’s because until now there hasn’t been much art news to report. Now, though, I have a chance to see how many buttons I can push with one blog entry.
First up, the LAT reports on a Frank Lloyd Wright drawing which is currently featured in a local exhibition. The drawing? A “cottage studio” designed for…Ayn Rand. (A pretty nifty design, I think.)
By way of Balko, we learn of a couple on a quest: to photograph every Sizzler in America. And they’re planning to publish a book of the photos, too.
(The comments at Balko’s site are amusing, too, especially #24: “No. This is not art. End of discussion.” Since art is “any human activity that doesn’t grow out of either of our species two basic instincts: survival and reproduction“, (or then again, maybe it isn’t) the commenter is clearly wrong.)
(Hi, Mike!)
I stumbled across this article at ESPN totally by accident, and it brings back fond memories. Not as much of UT football, but of the Houston Oilers of the late 70’s. (“Can you hear the blocking, the rambling and the roar? As he glides along the sidelines, by the hashmarks in the score…” Yes, I remember the lyrics somewhat differently.) But even if you were not an Oiler or UT fan, you have to admit Earl Campbell put a heck of a hit on Michael Downs.
This has been well covered elsewhere, but I’m sad to see Gourmet is closing. They’ve had a long tradition of highly literary food writing; check out the Endless Feasts
The problem is, I don’t think there’s a market any more for literary food writing. Cooks Illustrated is a better cooking magazine (though that tweedy little bow-tied jackass gets on my nerves), but sometimes I want a deeper consideration of food, along the lines of Wallace (even though I disagee with much of that essay) or Laura Shapiro.
And as other people pointed out; they killed Gourmet, and kept Your Prom?
(Edited to add: the TLB-TJ comments in the NYT.)
We came very close to a situation without precedent this weekend. Had Cleveland and Cincinnati played to a tie, Cleveland still would have had a chance to go without a win this season. Because of the rules of the loser update, Cleveland would have had to come off this list in accordance with the prophecy (since they would not technically be able to go 0-16). Sadly, this situation was averted. (I have family in the area around Cleveland, so their 0-4 start brings me no joy.) Miami brings me joy as well; yes, they won and are now off the list, but they beat Buffalo.
That being said, NFL teams that still have a chance to go 0-16:
Cleveland
Tennessee
Kansas City
Carolina (bye week)
Tampa
St. Louis
So let it be written. So let it be done.
Edited to add: Our great and good friend Lawrence points out this tidbit by way of Sports Illustrated: Washington went up against the (0-0) Giants in their first game, the (0-1) Rams in their second, the (0-2) Lions in their third, (0-3) Tampa Bay in their fourth, and will be facing (0-3) Carolina next week, followed by (currently 0-4) Kansas City.
Lawrence also points out that if you just try to cut and paste from the SI site, you get some not so amusing results, so I’ve paraphrased above.