Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal is pretty great today.
At 9:03 This Morning I Wished So Desperately For a Bunch of East Coast Dudes in Suits to Fly Out Here to California and Beat Us Senseless
This is the Pinstripe Executive Hoodie from Betabrand. It represents, according to the site, the “bleeding edge of business casual.” 100% Merino wool on the outside, 100% Atlas Shrugged on the inside. Perfect for a late night of strategizing and foosball.
Also great for:
- Libertarian cookouts
- Firing people via text message
- Convincing her that SHE gave YOU herpes
- Showing your dad and stepmom around the Ferry Building
- Instagram sesh down at the beach
My Favorite Version
A couple of weeks ago, my friend Merlin posted a video of a 10,000-member choir singing the “Ode to Joy” section of Beethoven’s Symphony Number Nine.
It’s pretty nice, and impressive even that they got everyone to sing the right notes at the same time.
But some of us prefer a slightly pared-down version, you know? One with a little more raw, spare power. One that compels the listener to actively fill in the gaps.
Here’s my favorite performance of the work. Sadly the performer is lost to history—there’s no credit for the ring tone on my daughter’s “Soony”-brand toy cell phone.
1,056 plays
Things That Make You Feel Old
When you really have to scroll in those date-of-birth dropdowns.
Often better than the emoji: the description.
Oh you’d better believe I’ll “Add to Favorites.”
At the coffee shop,
I was going to tell a lady that she looked a lot like Madeleine Albright. But then I realized that the only time it would be good to look like Madeleine Albright would be if you were, in fact, Madeleine Albright. Otherwise, yeesh. So I stayed quiet.
Pretty proud of myself.
Literalville
The Economist’s Johnson blog points out a cheap rhetorical trick used by both Rush Limbaugh and John Stewart (and me, when I’m fighting with my wife).
On Limbaugh:
He will refuse to consider pragmatic factors or otherwise treat human language the way most of us do most of the time. He is just too passionate about facts, literal meaning. No post-modern “everyone has their own truth, man” for this truth-seeker. The problem is when the light of literal truth falls on Mr Limbaugh himself. …
The standard excuse people like Mr Limbaugh make in these circumstances can be encapsulated in a word: “entertainer”.
And, regarding Stewart:
when Tucker Carlson, one of the hosts, challenged him by asking why Mr Stewart had failed to be tough in an interview with John Kerry, the 2004 Democratic presidential nominee, Mr Stewart retreated: “If you wanna compare your show to a comedy show, you’re more than welcome”. Apparently being the King of Comedyville is not unlike being the Mayor of Literalville: You get to sit around saying you’re the only person concerned with truth, but any criticism of your own courageous truth-telling can be flicked away. Nice work if you can get it.
Bonus points for mentioning the Cretan’s Paradox.
