Shared posts

12 Aug 04:37

blueeyedmenace: The walking dead// Rick Grimes dad jokes





















blueeyedmenace:

The walking dead// Rick Grimes dad jokes

06 Aug 23:42

XCOM: The Board Game Is The Board Game Of XCOM

by Graham Smith

So many little pieces!

It’s been almost two years since XCOM: Enemy Unknown, and even with the Enemy Within expansion in between that’s too long a time to live without a new XCOM game to play. We can therefore justifiably lust over the just-announced XCOM board game coming from Fantasy Flight. It’s called XCOM: The Board Game, it requires a digital companion app to play, and it’s due out before the end of the year.

Cor, look at all the little cardboard pieces in the image above. I could roll around in those all day.

… [visit site to read more]

06 Aug 00:01

The New York Times Just Discovered We Serve Breakfast In Australia, And They Are Losing Their Shit

by Steph Harmon

At this point, the only thing more predictable than a New York Times trend piece that’s equal parts out of touch and condescending is the backlash that follows,” wrote Flavorwire in 2013. Flaccid trend-spotting articles are in the paper’s DNA, and we love to hate them.

It happened with the man bun surge of 2012, the normcore movement that didn’t need to be named, and, most recently, the return of the monocle – which brought forth not only international ridicule, but a trend piece from the New York Times about New York Times trend pieces.

But this week’s article is particularly special, because this week’s article is about us.

Australian Cafes Arrive In New York‘ reads the triumphant headline from Oliver Strand, who has uncovered a new phenomenon in his city: cafes named after bits of Melbourne which manage to serve coffee AND breakfast AT ONCE.

“New York is a city of immigrants and their unofficial embassies offering a taste of home: the French bistro, the English pub, the California juice bar,” he begins. “Add to that list the Australian cafe.”

GUYS, there is, apparently, a foodie scene outside of New York City, and The Times is ON IT. http://t.co/Zy6lsmfibi

— The Times Is On It (@NYTOnIt) July 29, 2014

Confused? So is the journalist.

“At first glance,” he writes somewhat suspiciously, “an Australian cafe may seem like an American coffee shop, with colorful idioms: brekkie (breakfast), a piccolo (a cortado), a flat white (a small latte) and “no worries” (you’re welcome).”

That’s where the trouble begins:

reprehensible

“But it functions differently,” he continues, “and differs from the dozen or so Australian coffee bars in New York, which offer the coffee but not the full experience.”

For instance, there is the way they work: “The cafes offer table service, with a waiter bringing your drink.”

Also, there is the way they feel: “A sunny disposition so genuine it could disarm the most brusque New Yorker.” One of three entire people interviewed for this piece, an Australian, agrees: “It’s breakfast,” he reminds us. “It’s not serious; it’s meant to be fun.”

And speaking of fun, there’s a new dance in town, and it’s called The Avocado Smash. “Sometimes called an avocado toast (and in the United States often associated with California), it’s comfort food for any time of the day,” Strand writes, with audible awe. “You smash half a ripe avocado onto a thick piece of multigrain toast, season it with salt, pepper and chile flakes, then give it a splash of olive oil and a squeeze of lemon.”

Wondering what inspires such culinary adventurism? Well it appears to have something to do with surfing.  “You wake up, go down to the beach, have a swim, then go have some coffee and poached eggs and toast,” says one cafe owner. “I surfed every day of my life until I came to New York,” says another.

And then the article ends, with what is possibly the most obvious quote about New York City ever to be published in its hallowed newspaper: “You don’t have surfing here. But you have a lot of other opportunities that make up for it.”

-

in melbourne everybody is so nice in cafes uhuh and if you believe that I’ve got a fleet of trams here to sell you

— adam brereton (@adambrereton) July 31, 2014

@therevmountain in australia everyone goes surfing and then has a coffee and poached eggs at a super friendly cafe

— adam brereton (@adambrereton) July 31, 2014

@therevmountain australians love to smash avocados while we drink our flat whites (small lattes)

— adam brereton (@adambrereton) July 31, 2014

@therevmountain i smash literally hundreds a day and sometimes i don’t even eat a single one

— adam brereton (@adambrereton) July 31, 2014

-

Delicious-looking feature image by Katherine Lim, under a Creative Commons license on Flickr

31 Jul 02:25

Welcome to the Land of Pain!

Welcome to the Land of Pain!

Submitted by: Unknown

29 Jul 03:41

The Digital Fob Watch

by Warren Ellis

There was a day when, to learn the time, people would take a fob watch from a pocket and read it.  Then came the wristwatch.  Just a small turn of the wrist and a flick of the eye to learn the time.  Many of us today take out our phones, as we once did a fob watch, to learn the time and the information pushed to us by digital services.  The promise of the smartwatch is that with a small turn of the wrist we would once again learn the time and also gain that extra information with a flick of the eye.  Taking out our phones, or leaving them on the table in front of us to scan, during conversations, is considered rude.  The promise of the smartwatch is that we claim ambient awareness of the digital space while remaining fully engaged in the physical space.  We maintain the social contract of the conversation.

But I am 46 years old, and I am here to tell you that there was a time when looking at your wristwatch during a conversation was considered bloody rude.  Hell, it arguably cost George HW Bush an election.  Am I the only one who remembers “oh, is there somewhere else you have to be?” or “oh, am I keeping you?” or “did you know it’s rude to look at your watch while having a bloody conversation with someone?”

Smartwatches may well prove to be useful.  But never pretend that you have technologically solved the social world.

Also, I still want a fob chain for my iPhone, while I’m waiting for Oculus Monocle.

 

Reading: AMERICAN SMOKE, Iain Sinclair

 

29 Jul 02:58

Neil deGrasse Tyson's Three Little Words to a Creationist Saying We Should Stop Searching for Extraterrestrial Life

16 Jul 23:46

Tom Waits in 8-bit

by The Eyeball Kid
The strangest Waits covers/adaptations I've ever heard: TOMW8S - the Donkey Kong Variations by Buddy Peace.   TOMW8S - 'Donkey Kong Variations' by Buddy Peace
16 Jul 23:45

David Bowie’s Enchanting Isolated Vocal Track for “Ziggy Stardust”

by Maria Popova

Because Ziggy didn’t always play guitar.

In June of 1972, David Bowie released his fifth studio record, The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars — the album that gave birth to his legendary alter ego, the fictional rock star Ziggy Stardust, who catapulted Bowie into superstardom and went on to become one of the twentieth century’s greatest pop-culture cults.

This mesmerizing isolated vocal track for the album’s title song reveals as much the intimate beauty of Bowie’s imperfect voice as it does the enormous role instrumentation and performance play in creating the overall effect of the song’s enchantment and exhilaration:

Complement with Bowie’s 75 must-read books, his answers to the famous Proust Questionnaire, his narration of the pioneering Soviet children’s symphony “Peter and the Wolf,” and the full story of Ziggy Stardust, then treat yourself to astronaut Chris Hadfield’s magnificent cover of Bowie’s “Space Oddity” aboard the International Space Station.

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11 Jul 00:35

invocationwithin:loosetoon: Early 70’s behind the scenes of...



















invocationwithin:loosetoon:

Early 70’s behind the scenes of Sesame Street with the Muppets.

10 Jul 05:48

Celebrate 50 Years Of The American Version Of Doctor Who

by Rob Bricken

Remember that great list of American actors who could have played the Doctor during the last half-century? Sam Vestey was so inspired he cut footage from the actors' various works to make an American Doctor Who highlight reel, if you will, and the results are a fascinating what-if.

Read more...








07 Jul 23:00

Kickstarter of the Day: Potato Salad Kickstarter Raises Much Much More Than Expected

Kickstarter of the Day: Potato Salad Kickstarter Raises Much Much More Than Expected

Zack Danger Brown asked for just $10 on Kickstarter so he might accomplish his dream: "Basically I'm just making potato salad."

The Kickstarter has since gone viral and so far has raised more than $9,000!

Update: The Kickstarter has now raised over $40,000!

Submitted by: (via Kickstarter)

07 Jul 22:33

This Dad Discovers a Surefire Way to Stop His Daughter From Crying

02 Jul 21:19

Starz Picked up the American Gods TV Show, and Bryan Fuller Is Co-Showrunning - EVERYTHING IS GOOD AND RIGHT WITH THE WORLD FOREVER AND EVER AMEN.

by Rebecca Pahle

american gods

Here’s where we left the American Gods TV show: HBO was going to do it but then didn’t, because reasons. FremantleMedia picked up the slack and started developing their own version, but with no network attached.

And here’s where are are now: Starz just picked up American Gods. Neil Gaiman will executive produce along with Bryan Fuller (Pushing Daisies, Hannibal) and Michael Green (Kings, Heroes), who are showrunning. Fuller will write the pilot.

Everything is beautiful and nothing hurts.

Starz Managing Director Carmi Zlotnik promises “a series that honors the book and does right by the fans and viewers,” but of course he would say that. I’m more interested in what Gaiman, who wrote the book American Gods, has to say. And here he is:

“When you create something like American Gods, which attracts fans and obsessives and people who tattoo quotes from it on themselves or each other, and who all, tattooed or not, just care about it deeply, it’s really important to pick your team carefully: you don’t want to let the fans down, or the people who care and have been casting it online since the dawn of recorded history. What I love most about the team who I trust to take it out to the world, is that they are the same kind of fanatics that American Gods has attracted since the start. I haven’t actually checked Bryan Fuller or Michael Green for quote tattoos, but I would not be surprised if they have them. The people at Fremantle are the kinds of people who have copies of American Gods in the bottom of their backpacks after going around the world, and who press them on their friends. And the team at Starz have been quite certain that they wanted to give Shadow, Wednesday and Laura a home since they first heard that the book was out there.I can’t wait to see what they do to bring the story to the widest possible audience able to cope with it.”

“Neil Gaiman has created the holiest of holy toy boxes with American Gods and filled it with all manner of magical thing, born of new gods and old,” adds Fuller. “Michael Green and I are thrilled to crack this toy box wide open and unleash the fantastical titans of heaven and earth and Neil’s vividly prolific imagination.”

There is literally nothing about this that I don’t like. American Gods is a great book. Starz made Spartacus, so I am all about that. Green has extensive TV experience, ranging from Kings to Heroes to Smallville and the upcoming Gotham, and yeah, that record isn’t spotless, but: Bryan Fuller. I would lay down my life for Bryan Fuller. I would submit to cannibalism for Bryan Fuller. Really, the only thing I can say is:

high pitched screaming

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25 Jun 10:27

Review: Ugg-Tect

by paul@pretend-money.com (Paul)

Paul: A thing you should definitely know about Ugg-Tect is that, the very first time we started playing it, Brendan almost immediately began whacking himself over the head with a large club, really pounding at his own skull with a very singular sort of determination. He was going at it full speed, full strength, and looking at me with a particular sort of sadness in his eyes.

It’s important that I add that Brendan wasn’t wearing any sort of protection when he did this. Yes, the club was only inflatable, I will concede this, but I’m not sure this mattered much given the intensity of his self-inflicted blows. He was grunting one thing over and over again, one thing in the language of Ugg-Tect, and that was “Ignore me.”

Put yourself in my position for a moment. There is a man standing in front of you who is hammering away at his own head with an enormous inflatable weapon, grunting with great insistence that you ignore him. What do you do?

Read More

24 Jun 02:34

Nick Offerman Is An All-Powerful Narrator In This Meta Western Comedy

by Lauren Davis

In Stranger Than Fiction, Will Ferrell finds his life controlled by a narrator he hears in his head. In the short film The Gunfighter, an Old West gunslinger also finds himself pursued by a voice (belonging to Parks & Rec's Nick Offerman). The bigger problem? Everyone else can hear it, too.

Read more...








21 Jun 10:17

PCHH B-B-B-BONUS-S-S CONTENT: My Favorite First Lines

                 

image

So on this week’s episode of Pop Culture Happy Hour, we devoted a segment to “First Impressions.” I took it as an excuse to bloviate about one of my favorite topics, “First Lines of Novels and Short Stories and What They Do and How They Do It.”

I, as is my wont, as the show’s resident grind, overprepared. The show’s a discussion, not a lecture, thank God, and I only got around to name-checking three or four of these. But there’s lots to say on this. And back when I taught writing, and the earth was new, and icthyosaurs swam the turbid seas, I prepared a sheet sort of like this for students.

These are just some of my favorites. You got yours. Don’t bogart them, give ‘em up already.

———————–

First lines can outfit your reader with important information for the journey ahead with remarkable efficiency.

  • Call me Ishmael” – Herman Melville’s Moby Dick. (Introduces a layer of doubt in the FIRST TWO GODDAMN WORDS, and in the third, if you know your Bible, provides you with a hefty does of foreshadowing – basically gives away the ending.)
  • “It was a bright, cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen”. – George Orwell’s 1984. (We are in a militaristic setting.)
  • “As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from a sleep of uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect.” – Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis (This is all of the explanation Kafka provides for the huge, abiding weirdness at the story’s core – this flat assertion in the first sentence. That’s all you’re getting. Deal with it.)
  • “Doomed planet. Desperate scientists. Last hope. Kindly couple.” - Grant Morrison, All-Star Superman. (Ok, it’s a comic, but that right there? Is a familiar origin story ruthlessly distilled into four perfect nouns, modified by four perfect adjectives.)

But sometimes efficiency isn’t the goal. Sometimes it’s about making sure your reader packed everything for their trip. Like, EVERYTHING.

  • “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way - in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only. ” – Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities (The air kind of goes out of the sentence there at the end, but really, how could it not?)
  • “It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents, except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the house-tops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness.”—Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, Paul Clifford (The most-mocked opening line in English literature, the inspiration for a contest of worst first lines, and you can see why: Wait, you’re saying the night was DARK? I see. Got it. Thanks, guy. I love how he doubles back on himself “this happened! Except when it didn’t, on the streets (did I mention we’re in a city? Which is why I said streets not roads? I didn’t? Well, that.)”

But first lines can supply your readers with clues to what’s coming without being so damn showy about it.

  • “Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself.” - Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway. (The fact that the author feels compelled to note that Mrs. D wants to buy the flowers herself suggests its not the usual order of things (ie, that she usually has someone else do it for her, and that perhaps she’s been dissatisfied with that person’s job in the past) and suggests there’s some flower-worthy event coming up.
  • “Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of lather on which a mirror and razor lay crossed.” – James Joyce, Ulysses. (Hunh. “Lay crossed.” Wonder if there’s gonna be, like, a lot of Catholic stuff comin’ up.)

Showiness is good, too. You can always attempt to charm and intrigue your audience, effectively daring them to stop reading.

  • “A screaming comes across the sky.” – Thomas Pynchon, Gravity’s Rainbow.
  • “It was the day my grandmother exploded.” - Iain M Banks, The Crow Road. (If you can put the book down after that, you are some sort of monstrous automaton with a transponder where your heart should be. I mean, yeah, it’s a gimmick of an opening line, but come on.)
  • “124 was spiteful.” —Toni Morrison, Beloved
  • “It was a pleasure to burn.” —Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451
  • "In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.” – JRR Tolkien, The Hobbit (This came to Tolkien as he was grading papers – he scribbled it down distractedly, knowing he’d come back to it later. Note how it’s got “children’s story” coded into its very structure and syntax and rhythm.)
  • “You are about to begin reading Italo Calvino’s new novel, If on a winter’s night a traveler.” —Italo Calvino, If on a winter’s night a traveler

You can use a first line to bait the hook by presenting a dilemma the reader (hopefully) needs to see get resolved.

  • “It was the afternoon of my eighty-first birthday, and I was in bed with my catamite when Ali announced that the archbishop had come to see me.” – Anthony Burgess, Earthly Powers
  • “You are not the kind of guy who would be at a place like this at this time of the morning.” – Jay McInerney, Bright Lights, Big City
  • “Every summer Lin Kong returned to Goose Village to divorce his wife, Shuyu.” – Ha Jin, Waiting
  • By our second day at Camp Crescendo, the girls in my Brownie troop had decided to kick the asses of each and every girl in Brownie Troop 909.” – ZZ Packer, Brownies
  • “It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn’t know what I was doing in New York.” – Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar
  •  “Midway upon the journey of this life, I found myself within a dark forest, for the straightforward pathway had been lost.” – Dante’s The Inferno.

You can also turn the focus on you, and not your characters, to let them know they’re in sure hands. Assert your authority by opening with a pithy, world-weary observation. Look how smart you are!

  • “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karennina
  • “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.” – Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
  • 'The past is a foreign country, they do things differently there.’ - L.P. Hartley, The Go-Between. (Lookit: I have never read The Go-Between. You have never read The Go-Between. But we both know this killer line. You think writing a book is your ticket to immortality? Shyeah. A killer line. That’s what does it.)

Maybe you want to be a little more circumspect, but give your reader a sense of the tone – how you/your narrator FEEL toward the events you’re about to spend a chunk of time relating to them.

  • “The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new.” – Samuel Beckett, Murphy (Maybe my favorite sentence ever. Showy as hell, but give it up for the guy.)
  • “All this happened, more or less.” – Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five
  • “Mr. and Mrs. Dursley ,of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say they were perfectly normal, thank you very much.” – JK Rowling Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
  • “Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun.” – Douglas Adams, The Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
  • “A green hunting cap squeezed the top of the fleshy balloon of a head.” - John Kennedy Toole, A Confederacy of Dunces
  • “The first great act of love I ever witnessed was Split Lip bathing his handicapped daughter.” – George Saunders, Isabelle
  • “We were fractious and overpaid.” – Joshua Ferris, Then We Came to the End
  • “During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher.” – E.A. Poe, The Fall of the House of Usher
  • “There was a boy named Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.” – CS Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

Be funny. (If you’re good at it.)

  • “Understand that your cat is a whore and can’t help you.” – Lorrie Moore, Self-Help
  • “America, said Horace, the office temp, was a run-down and demented pimp.” – The Ask, Sam Lipsyte

Maybe you want to introduce your reader to the character, as a way of saying, “This is the voice that’s going to be living inside your head for the rest of the story/novel. Just, you know, know that.”

  • “If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you’ll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all, before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.” JD Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
  • “First, try to be something, anything, else.” – Lorrie Moore, How To Be A Writer
  • “True! –nervous –very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad?” – EA Poe, The Tell-Tale Heart (There’s the whole story, right there.)
  • “You don’t know about me, without you have read a book by the name of ‘The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,’ but that ain’t no matter.” – Mark Twain, The Adventuers of Huckleberry Finn

Maybe you want to state right up front that this isn’t one a them precious, airless short stories where some drunk divorced middle-aged white guy has a mild epiphany in a trailer park looking out at a garden gnome or whatever. No, this is a NOVEL. A novel with SWEEP and SCOPE. About the human goddamn CONDITION.

  • “Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendia was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.”- Gabriel Garcia Marquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude.

Or screw it, and just dazzle ‘em with language.

  • “Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins.” – Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita
  • “'When your mama was the geek, my dreamlets,’ Papa would say, 'she made the nipping off of noggins such a crystal mystery that the hens themselves yearned toward her, waltzing around her, hypnotized with longing.’” - Geek Love, Katherine Dunne
  • “The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.”—William Gibson, Neuromancer
18 Jun 09:33

Danger Mouse Reboot Gets 52-Episode Order, Horrible Histories Writer

by Brendon Connelly

It’s been in the works for a while but the official announcement dropped overnight. Danger Mouse is being rebooted by Ireland’s Boulder Media, and Horrible HistoriesBen Ward is on board to write the scripts.

We don’t know – yet – who will be providing the voices, but that’s already some serious talent behind the camera… er, drawing boa… er… computer.

Some things will be updated, of course, and DM’s new eyepatch is going to be more Google Glass than Arrr! Me Hearties.

The original Cosgrove Hall series ran for about ten years and was, quite regularly, brilliant. When a nostalgia weekend on CITV led to some repeats a year or so ago, Danger Mouse gave the channel its highest ever ratings.

Fraggle Rock and Knightmare did very well too, you know. I’m just saying.

A run of 52 new Danger Mouse episodes, eleven minutes apiece, will screen on CBBC from next year.

Danger Mouse Reboot Gets 52-Episode Order, Horrible Histories Writer

09 Jun 22:51

loveneverdidrunsmooth: kitsunehaku: koolaidicecubes: Wait...





loveneverdidrunsmooth:

kitsunehaku:

koolaidicecubes:

Wait what

Hold on a second what

PLOT TWIST. I did not see that coming.

Bless the Maker and His water.
Bless the coming and going of Him.
May His passage cleanse the world.
May He keep the world for His people. 

23 May 01:46

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14 May 09:50

The famously overconfident Sherlock Holmes getting everything hilariously wrong

by Joey White

It’s almost unbelievable that Sherlock Holmes’ guesswork is as good as it is, which is why Pete Holmes wondered what it might be like if Sherlock Holmes were off his game sometimes…

(brief NSFW language)

13 May 04:33

The First Trailer for Constantine Looks AMAZING

by Robert T. Gonzalez

The First Trailer for Constantine Looks AMAZING

NBC just unveiled the first official trailer for Constantine, and holy crap is it fantastic.

Read more...








13 May 03:00

The Good Listener: Can I Ruin My Wedding By Playing The Wrong Song?

The Good Listener: Can I Ruin My Wedding By Playing The Wrong Song?

We get a lot of mail at NPR Music, and alongside the flyer for a maid service that disappeared into a massive pile of papers is a slew of smart questions about how music fits into our lives — and, this week, thoughts on when to deviate from traditional wedding-reception music.

Sing it with us: i i

Sing it with us: "I hope I cut myself shaving tomorrow. I hope it bleeds all day long..."

Sergey Galushko/iStockphoto.com

Sarah Butcher writes via Facebook: "At our recent wedding, my husband and I tried very hard to take all of your music advice. But we still somehow ended up having a first dance to Lee Hazlewood and Nancy Sinatra's 'Jackson' and ended the night by leading a singalong to The Mountain Goats' No Children.' Clearly, our marriage is doomed. Care to ruminate on situationally appropriate and inappropriate music for weddings — and advice on how to break the rules?"

I'm on the record as believing that weddings are for guests as much as the betrothed — that they're not the place for you to showcase your eclectic musical tastes, that they're for dancing, and so on. This is one of a long list of standard suggestions I give when asked for wedding advice, alongside "Skimp on flowers," "Don't skimp on photography," and "Don't actually get married." (But I kid!)

But this question is different, in several ways. For one, when you say "inappropriate wedding music," you're not talking about inadvertently inappropriate wedding music, a topic NPR Music tackled at great and uproarious length a few years back. It's one thing to blissfully sway along to "Every Breath You Take" because no one could be bothered to consult a lyric sheet before playing it. It's another entirely to decide that, to hell with it, you're going to play... wait, really? You played The Mountain Goats' "No Children" at your wedding? For those who don't know the song, let me recite the first few lines. I'm doing this entirely from memory, people:

I hope that our few remaining friends give up on trying to save us

I hope we come up with a failsafe plot to piss off the dumb few that forgave us

I hope the fences we mended fall down beneath their own weight

And I hope we hang on past the last exit

I hope it's already too late

YouTube

All of which leads, of course, to a chorus of, "I hope you die! I hope we both die!" This is, no lie, one of my favorite songs of all time, but at a wedding? At least you played it at the end of the night — after, I'm guessing, all but the rowdiest and most fatalistic diehards remained.

But that leads me to the second way that your question deviates from the usual issues surrounding "appropriateness" of wedding music. If you were leading a singalong rather than playing a dark song strictly for your own benefit and/or amusement — if it's a song most people there knew, and it was fun and cathartic moment for everyone — then what's the harm? When you write about "advice on how to break the rules," I think you've already hit upon the formula: It's fine to break the rules if it's a moment that people genuinely enjoy, and if it's a moment that's true to who you are.

Yes, weddings are for the guests — they're a party in which you're the entertainment. But if you and your guests love The Mountain Goats and loved the moment, then you did right by them, right by yourselves, and right by the reality of how many marriages end. Truthfully, though, I like your odds.

Got a music-related question you want answered? Leave it in the comments, drop us an email at allsongs@npr.org or tweet @allsongs.

Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.
06 May 04:46

Joel McHale Doesn't Hold Back at the 2014 White House Correspondents' Dinner

06 May 01:21

Did You Download 250 GBs of Music by the Crash Test Dummies? by Lucas Gardner

Dear Sir or Madam:

This is a warning from your Internet Service Provider. Your IP address has been used to download and/or share copyrighted content, and accordingly your internet service is at risk of being suspended. We are obliged to remind you that the downloading and/or distribution of exclusively owned or licensed content infringes copyright.

We’ve been notified that in the past month, you have downloaded 250 GBs of music by Canadian alternative folk-rock band the Crash Test Dummies. We thought maybe it was an error on our end, but we looked into it further and confirmed that you did indeed download 250 GBs of music by the Crash Test Dummies, creators of the 1993 hit single “Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm.” We did some research and it turns out the Crash Test Dummies’ entire catalog of music, even including side projects by the band’s members, should just barely weigh in at 1 GB, leading us to assume you either found and downloaded 249 GBs of unreleased music by the Crash Test Dummies (???), or downloaded their entire discography 250 times? We are baffled and fascinated. We have a few questions:

  • Did you think you were downloading something else?
  • Is it safe to assume that you, having downloaded over 200 GBs of Crash Test Dummies, only listen to Crash Test Dummies?
  • If you like Crash Test Dummies enough to download over 200 GBs of their music, shouldn’t you be buying it?
  • Can you give us just a general idea of what your personal life is like?
  • So was hearing “Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm” for the first time the greatest moment of your life? We bet.
  • Are you one of the Crash Test Dummies’ parents?
  • So, like, should we check out the Crash Test Dummies?
  • Is there some kind of ironic resurgence of Crash Test Dummies going on? We are all in our mid-40s here.
  • We’re wondering what you must look like and we literally can’t picture it. Can you respond to this email with an attached picture of yourself?
  • Would you maybe want us to send you some recommendations for other good music or are you good with the Crash Test Dummies?
  • Seriously why do you have 250 GBs of music by Canadian alternative folk-rock band the Crash Test Dummies in your possession?
  • What are the file sizes on these mp3s you’re downloading? Like 6 GB each?
  • In cases of extreme copyright infringement, the accused’s hard drive may be seized by the proper authority. If that were to happen, would they find even more Crash Test Dummies?
  • Is owning 250 GBs of Crash Test Dummies music something you openly tell people about or do you try to keep it on the down low?
  • Who do you think about at night before you fall asleep?
  • Do the Crash Test Dummies still tour and if not how are you dealing with that?
  • Say hypothetically you were forced to choose your favorite Crash Test Dummies’ song, and whichever one you pick, all the other ones disappear forever—would you lose your shit or what?
  • What is your favorite Crash Test Dummies lyric that isn’t“Mmm mmm mmm mmm/Mmm mmm mmm mmm/Mmm?”
  • We absolutely don’t want to get too pushy or throw around accusations or anything, but you’re not going to… kill the Crash Test Dummies are you?
  • Wait, did you maybe catch some sort of computer virus that automatically downloaded 250 GBs of music by the Crash Test Dummies onto your hard drive? Do you even know that it’s on there?
  • Again, any details about your personal life would really intrigue us. Marital status, hobbies (besides listening to the Crash Test Dummies), etc.

We remind you once more that we will terminate your internet service if piracy of copyrighted content is traced to your IP again in the future. We don’t anticipate this being a problem because we assume 250 GBs of Crash Test Dummies has to be all of it, right?

We apologize if this letter reads as judgmental.

24 Apr 02:10

Ballot papers by the balls

by Piers Kelly

In the wake of the lost votes saga in WA and the unexpected rise of micro-parties and donkey voters as a political force, much attention has been given to electoral processes.  It is in this context that a couple of eminent members of the legal establishment have sent me a copy of the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 – SECT 213. It makes for hilarious reading. Under the heading ‘Determination of the order of names’ is a beautifully convoluted piece of surreal beat poetry explaining how the order of candidates on a ballot paper should be decided.

Here’s a snippet:

 This goes on for nineteen paragraphs covering two whole pages. Gather the family around the fireplace and recite the whole thing here. If you’ve spotted any other such literary masterpieces, please send them our way.

22 Apr 10:36

NRO

'DISPATCHING DRONE TO TARGET COORDINATES.' 'Wait, crap, wrong button. Oh jeez.'