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Dignity, thy name is Rick Astley

I love Rick Astley even more after reading his thoughts on Rickrolling in this LA Times interview.

“Listen, I just think it’s bizarre and funny. My main consideration is that my daughter doesn’t get embarrassed about it.”

The thing is, I actually really enjoy "Never Gonna Give You Up", and honestly, I'd rather watch its video than most of the things people link to on the web. So there.

David Chang in the New Yorker

The profile of David Chang in the latest New Yorker (not online, sadly) is brilliant & scary all at once--I wonder if Chang is as manically miserable as the profile makes him out to be? He's certainly an incredible chef; our meal at Ssäm Bar last year was one of the more memorable eating experiences I've had.

The article's filled with great quotes, but here's one of my favorites:

"I'm so sick and tired of how awesome it is to work at Google or fucking Apple or one of those tech companies," he says. "Why can't it be awesome to work for a food company? Why can't we create an environment where people are trying to push each other to do great things, and we're not trying to steal from anybody, we're trying to be good to our farmers and run an honorable business, if there is such a thing anymore?"

Joel on standards

From Joel on Software: Martian Headsets:

If you’ve ever visited the ultra-orthodox Jewish communities of Jerusalem, all of whom agree in complete and utter adherence to every iota of Jewish law, you will discover that despite general agreement on what constitutes kosher food, that you will not find a rabbi from one ultra-orthodox community who is willing to eat at the home of a rabbi from a different ultra-orthodox community. And the web designers are discovering what the Jews of Mea Shearim have known for decades: just because you all agree to follow one book doesn’t ensure compatibility, because the laws are so complex and complicated and convoluted that it’s almost impossible to understand them all well enough to avoid traps and landmines, and you’re safer just asking for the fruit plate.

This made my morning, and it's only one of many fantastic quotes.

Fire Eagle and Movable Type

Having had a longstanding interest in geo-location--and, well, its intersections with blogging and online identity--I'm really excited about Yahoo!'s new Fire Eagle service.

I'm also really excited that we now have Fire Eagle for Movable Type plugin connecting an MT profile to a Fire Eagle account. This makes an MT profile location-aware and, just like Fire Eagle itself, opens the door to tons of other interesting features that the plugin provides: adding a map of your current location to your blog; tracking changes to your location in your Action Stream; &c.

I've written more about Fire Eagle for Movable Type on sixapart.com.

Listening, lately

In addition to Nicole Atkins...

• 

  Distortion

  Magnetic Fields
  The Magnetic Fields' Distortion is, as advertised, full of lovely, noisy distortion. Aside from that, it's a nice set of pop songs, as usual; my favorites are "California Girls" and "The Nun's Litany."
• Now that I've had more time to digest 8 Diagrams, I've settled on "Stick Me For My Riches" as my favorite track on the album. A great intro, and another amazing verse from Method Man.
• I've loved Maxi Geil! & Playcolt for a couple of years, and I bought their Strange Sensation album sometime last November--but I hadn't really listened to it until this week, when I ran across this post on Fluxblog. And indeed, "Your Best Won't Be Enough" is a killer song.

Nicole Atkins, Neptune City

Neptune City

Nicole Atkins

My album of the week: Nicole Atkins's Neptune City, which has accompanied me all of this week on my various commutes to work. I love it all--it's like listening to ABBA and the Pretenders at the same time, or something.

I have a lot of favorites, though the one I keep coming back to today is "Neptune City" itself.

It's the maudlin in me, I guess; the ones that clings to nostalgia: "Maybe if I paid attention / I could learn to love the landscape I was born to." Anyway, it's a gorgeous song, as is the album.

Poochie!

Anthony Bourdain, in a wonderful rant about the Food Network:

There's last year's Great Hope, Guy Fieri, who reminds me of the "Poochie" character in the classic Simpson's episode where it is decided that Itchy and Scratchy need a "hip, in-your-face, pro-active" new sidekick to bring in a younger demographic.

"Bad company makes bad wine!"

Campfire

And, as a final something for 2007: Wu-Tang Clan's "Campfire" (listen), track one from 8 Diagrams.

A very sobering and (dare-I-say) mature kung-fu sample; an incredibly spooky sample of the Persuasions' cover of Curtis Mayfield's "Gypsy Woman"; and an absolutely killer verse from Method Man to get it started.

Not a bad start to an album that's growing on me very quickly.

Favorites of 2007

Favorite books:

Special Topics in Calamity Physics

Some of these were published in 2006, but when reading I'm always behind by at least a year, I figure--so I think it's safe to say that these were my favorite books that I read in 2007 (hey, they all start with "M"!):

• Michael Chabon, The Yiddish Policeman's Union
• Mark Helprin, Freddy and Fredericka
• Marisha Pessl, Special Topics in Calamity Physics
• Michael Ruhlman, Reach of a Chef

Favorite songs:

The following twelve songs are my personal favorites for 2007: they're the songs I most enjoyed and that, out of sheer narcissism, I suppose I'd classify as "best", whatever that means. More than anything else, they're the songs I'd like to listen to most, right now.

Some notes:

• R. Kelly makes an appearance on three out of twelve tracks: it was the year of R. Kelly, after all!
• There's no Ghostface or Wu-Tang, because I just bought Big Doe Rehab and 8 Diagrams last week and haven't had nearly enough time to digest them. This makes me sort of sad, but I guess gives me license to include them next year.

Siobhan Donaghy - Ghosts

In alphabetical (essentially unordered) order:

• Celebration, "Evergreen" (listen)
• Ciara, "Promise (Remix) feat. R. Kelly" (listen)
• The Fiery Furnaces, "Restorative Beer" (listen)
• M.I.A., "Paper Planes" (listen)
• Of Montreal, "Bunny Ain't No Kind of Rider" (listen)
• R. Kelly, "I'm a Flirt feat. T.I. & T. Pain" (listen)
• Richard Hawley, "Lady Solitude" (listen)
• Rihanna, "Umbrella feat. Jay-Z" (listen)
• Robin Thicke, "Got 2 Be Down feat. Faith Evans" (listen)
• Siobhan Donaghy, "Goldfish" (listen)
• Spoon, "Black Like Me" (listen)
• Swizz Beatz, "It's Me Bitches (Remix) feat. Lil Wayne, R. Kelly, and Jadakiss" (listen)

Something really sad

I love this quote (among others) from a 1996 interview with David Foster Wallace:

And I know that when I started this book I wanted--I had very vague and not very ambitious...ambitions, and one was I wanted to do something really sad. I'd done comedy before, I wanted to do just something really sad and I wanted to do something about what was sad about America.

Which "this book", i.e. Infinite Jest, definitely is, i.e. sad, and which reminds me--again--that I really want to re-read it. One of these days, I guess.

(via Jason and Daring Fireball)