I love love

WE'RE CARVING A PUMPKIN! IT'S SO ADORABLE!

Brett Favre

Headline from the front page of NYTimes.com:

Here Goes Nothing
Brett Favre, freethinking huckleberry in the N.F.L., tries to make something happen one last time.

What does "freethinking huckleberry" mean in this context?

Also, exciting about the Phillies, eh? I rarely wish I was back in Philadelphia, but that would have been pretty sweet to take part of. Has Ryan Howard ever run faster in his entire career than when he was the first to tackle Brad Lidge and Carlos Ruiz?

"But surely a black man couldn’t become president of the United States?"

I'd like to think of this recent NYTimes Op-Ed Column discussion as a bookend with DMX's prior interview with XXL magazine:

Rebranding the U.S. with Obama

By Nicholas D. Kristof

The other day I had a conversation with a Beijing friend and I mentioned that Barack Obama was leading in the presidential race:

She: Obama? But he’s the black man, isn’t he?

Me: Yes, exactly.

She: But surely a black man couldn’t become president of the United States?

Me: It looks as if he’ll be elected.

She: But president? That’s such an important job! In America, I thought blacks were janitors and laborers.

Me: No, blacks have all kinds of jobs.

She: What do white people think about that, about getting a black president? Are they upset? Are they angry?

Me: No, of course not! If Obama is elected, it’ll be because white people voted for him.

[Long pause.]

She: Really? Unbelievable! What an amazing country!

***

Kristof then rationalizes his friend's perspective by reminding us "that the one thing countless millions of people around the world 'know' about the United States is that it is controlled by a cabal of white bankers and Jews who use police with fire hoses to repress blacks. To them, Mr. Obama’s rise triggers severe cognitive dissonance."

So they're familiar with the Civil Rights struggles of the 1960s (even if some details regarding Jewish involvement are off) but they haven't heard of the great successes of African-Americans over the past forty years? What an oddly selective memory. The ascendancy of Oprah alone would be hard to miss, I would think.

CB I Hate Perfume

I've been wearing CB I Hate Perfume for months now and I love it more than I ever expected to. I never really enjoyed perfume before (not to mention that my profession frowns on it) but what I wasn't enjoying was the headache inducing, synthetic smelling scents. The perfumer, Christopher Brosius, sums it up far better than I ever could in his manifesto explaining why he hates perfume.
They're very unusual scents, my favorite is called Winter, 1972, and it's described as a field of untouched new fallen snow, hand knit woolen mittens covered with frost, a hint of frozen forest & sleeping earth. It smells exactly like that. I would never have imagined I'd want to smell like cold dirt but I do. I love it. They're very personal, intimate scents; they don't accost everyone around you and leave headaches in their wake. And there is certainly something for everyone, the scents range from the smell of tomato vines (another favorite) to the absolutely spot on scent of burning maple leaves.
If there weren't enough reasons for me to love this line already, he has a scent called In The Library. Described as English Novel taken from a Signed First Edition of one of my very favorite novels, Russian & Moroccan leather bindings, worn cloth and a hint of wood polish, it is very nearly the scent I've been looking for. Unfortunately, it's slightly too sweet for me, more vanilla and pipe tobacco. Having experienced so many of Christopher Brosius's scents and finding almost all of them very accurate I can only imagine that that favorite novel of his smells like that. His gallery in Brooklyn sells many more accords (single note fragrances) than the website and among them is one called English Novel. I can only hope that a trip back East is in the works for me so I can stop by and smell what is possibly the scent of my dreams. Of course, if I should be feeling particularly flush anytime soon (or not so soon) he does custom scents.
HOWEVER, (this is surely a novel by now) the real reason I need you all to know about this line is that I think everyone would love it but not enough people are familar with it. This fact was confirmed by me when I did a Facebook search to see how many people had it listed on their page and the answer came back as two; me and the perfumer himself.

Less Cowbell Please

Come on Rays, that sketch aired almost a decade ago. It's like the team is owned by Michael Scott.

My Quest

It has become my personal mission to find a perfume that smells like books. I've been trying everything people tell me (and by people, I mean internet reviews) smells like paper and it's been very frustrating. Apparently, I am the only one with this desire.



I'll keep you all posted since I know you're just chomping at the bit to see how this works out.

Subterranean Homesick Blues

It really grates me when people call Bob Dylan's "Subterranean Homesick Blues" "a forerunner of rap and hip-hop." It's a fine song, and I know some rappers have in fact been influenced by Dylan's style, but it's rather ignorant to say a white folk singer was doing rap before anyone else was. I'm sure the long (and largely African-American) traditions of blues, jazz, and soul had a little to do with the development of hip hop, after all. Not to mention the longer tradition of poetry in general.

The Distinguished Alumni of Central High School

Reverend Jeremiah Wright went to my high school! Barack Obama and I are now separated by two degrees. Here's hoping he closes the gap and gives me a cabinet seat. Secretary of Veterans Affairs would be fine.

First order of business: Put the apostrophe back in the department. I bet the Secretary of Education gives him shit about that all the time.

Palin Porn

Hustler: Political discourse we can all get behind.