Gatsby anticipation is in the house. We’ve got a ticket for this evening’s 7 pm screening and great are the expectations. Meanwhile, the spin-off industry rumbles on and no (precious) stone is left unturned as it seeks to cash in on the film of the book. F. Scott Fitzgerald was a customer of Tiffany, the [...]
Archive for November, 2012
iTunes 11: Up Next
Show me the money! So said Jerry Maguire in 1996. And show me the music, I say. It’s nice to know what’s upcoming and if I don’t like what the latest iTunes update has in mind, I can now move something more suitable to the head of the queue thanks to the Up Next feature via the “hamburger” icon. Like.
Send to KindleThe Fairytale Of New York nightmare
Oh, no! The Fairytale Of New York, the Christmas song by The Pogues and Kirsty MacColl, is back in the charts 25 years after its release. According to the NME: The Pogues’ ‘Fairytale Of New York’ bookies favourite for Christmas Number One. The terrifying thing about this song is that unimaginative radio DJs have been playing it ad nauseam for a quarter of a century and any emotional value that it had has been erased through overexposure. For those who hate the tacky side of Christmas, life has become even more horrid.
The nightmarish lachrymosity of Fairytale is discussed with passion at Mumsnet. “Hate it. Crappy cliches about drunken Irish people in prison singing songs from the auld country and gambling. Crappy video, crappy singing, crappy message,” writes SuePurblybiltbyElves. “And the boys of the NYPD choir still singing Galway Bay…”
Send to KindleSexy dictator satire produces red faces at the People’s Daily
“No doubt, few would seriously describe Kim Jong-Un as sexy, much less as the world’s sexiest man. Nor would many people equate People’s Daily with sexiness. But if there’s one place in the world willing — or, at least, desiring — to believe that a foreign publication would praise him in such a way, it’s [...]
Ham Sandwich time travel
The first written usage in English of “sandwich” appeared in the diary of Edward Gibbon referring to “bits of cold meat” as a “Sandwich”. It was named after John Montagu, an 18th-century English aristocrat of whom it is said that he ordered his valet to bring him meat tucked between two pieces of bread, and [...]
Keep the UN and its agencies away from the internet
On Monday, 3 December, representatives of the world’s governments will meet in Dubai to update a key agreement with a UN agency called the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). Press reports suggest that the Russian Federation, Iran, China, Zimbabwe and other notorious champions of totalitarianism want control of key internet systems passed the ITU. “Member states [...]
Carved ducks
In Cockney rhyming slang, the expression “to duck and dive” means “to skive”. Example: “Not going into work today, mate. I’m duckin’ and divin’”. Which brings us nicely to Old English, where dūce, meaning “diver”, is a derivative of the verb dūcan, to bend down low as if to get under something, because of the [...]
Gary Clark, Jr. ain’t buyin’ you a diamond ring thang
Meant to post this last Saturday seeing that Gary Clark Jr. is from Austin, Texas, which was the setting for the penultimate Formula 1 race of the season. Clark is the real neo-blues deal and his buzzing-bee guitar sound combined with a suave vocal style suggest great things to come. “Well I ain’t got no [...]
Macmillan Dictionary: “exiting print is a moment of liberation”
Back at the beginning of this month, the Macmillan publishing company announced that it would no longer make paper dictionaries. In a blog post titled Stop the presses — the end of the printed dictionary, Michael Rundell, the editor-in-chief of the famed Macmillan Dictionary, made the case thus: “Thirty years ago, the arrival of corpus [...]
Punishing the adulterer Petraeus
This is a tricky one for Western jurists (and journalists) because they are divided as to whether adultery is a crime or a sin or a lifestyle choice. From a Shariah point of view, it’s simple: He should be stoned to death. Well, that’s what the Taliban say, and they have form in these matters [...]
Black humour and deep insight from the Black Swan
“No, I don’t use Facebook. I absolutely don’t want to stay in touch with everybody in my past. I really believe in falling out of touch with people.” So says Tina Brown in a wide-ranging talk with New York Magazine. While Facebook can be a huge waste of time and a narcissistic indulgence, it can [...]
How to parse a tweet
“A rose is a rose is a rose is a rose,” said Gertrude Stein, but a tweet is much more than a text-based message of up to 140 characters. This is what a lot of Brits are about to learn now that Lord McAlpine’s team of technical and legal experts has set to work. Background: [...]
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