Saturday, January 04, 2003

THIS, MY FRIENDS, is an unretouched, un-Photoshopped snapshot of the south entrance to Northgate from behind a car windshield during today’s torrential downpour, which helped cause a half-dozen or more crashes along an I-5 that got backed up for about seven miles. But unlike most of our rainstorms, this one did its thang then went away, leaving sunny skies and 54-degree temps (warm enough to melt snow in the mountains, leading to big flood potentialities in the lowlands.)

posted by clark 11:08 PM

Friday, January 03, 2003

SEVERAL OTHERS have had the same idea we expressed here a few weeks back, calling for men to valiantly employ their manhood in the service of peace. F'rinstance, a couple dozen Floridians have joined a "Men for Peace" contingent, organized (natch) by two women, and posed in a nude tableau for pro-peace photos.

MONIKER MADNESS DEPT.: Reader Terry Hickman has a suggestion for our recent rename-the-USA query: Corporatia.

posted by clark 11:27 AM

Thursday, January 02, 2003

A LOYAL READER going by the moniker The Raven asked me to pass this tidbit on to y'all:

Hi Clark:

I propose to rename the USA to "Anglosaxland," basing on the following reason:

As everyone knows, our "great" leader Richard Cheney told, after GOP "won" the election, that finally this is the land of Anglo-Saxons, and therefore the stolen election was not stolen at all.

BTW, this very Cheney is Norman by origin, descendant of those who conquered these very Anglosaxons in 11th century. Please submit your ideas on how to rename the USA in connection with this, to theraven@linkeseite.zzn.com.

The Raven

I haven't heard of the statement from which the above correspondent is quoting. I have, of course, heard of the Norman conquests that temporarily drove the proto-Brits into northwestern France (and of The Norman Conquests, Alan Ayckbourn's too-clever-for-its-own-good '70s play about a hapless Brit middle-class philanderer).

The title of Michael Moore's movie The Big One came from his facetious suggestion of that as a new name for the nation. I've heard other suggestions in recent years, such as "The Home Office" and "Home of the Whopper" (not to mention the ol' standby "Amerikkka").

None of these fully express (and perhaps no one name can express) my vision of Usonia (a name derived from Frank Lloyd Wright) as a big polyglot mongrel mishmosh of ethnic, lingual, religious, and subcultural cliques, all under the increasingly heavy thumb of the corporate overlords and their wholly-owned politicians. If you've got an idea, let me and the Raven know.

posted by clark 12:35 PM

Wednesday, January 01, 2003

A WISCONSIN COLLEGE's list of banished words for 2003 include the far-overdue-for-banishment "Must-See TV," "Extreme," "Branding" (referring to the advertising/PR practice, not the fetish), "Homeland Security," "Undisclosed Secret Location," and, yes, "Weapons of Mass Destruction." The only phrase on the list I personally don't think has been overdone yet: "As Per."

posted by clark 9:51 PM

THE NEW YEAR'S FIREWORKS at the Space Needle were particularly lavish this year, lasting nearly 10 minutes and involving a clever variety of colors and effects. God knows we could use a big bang to put the past year (the past two, actually) behind us.

posted by clark 9:36 PM

ONE OF 2002'S LESSER but still troublesome tragedies was the ongoing attempt by the corporate bullies to shut down Inernet radio. One of the casualties was Seattle's own AntennaRadio.com, which streamed a dozen or more weekly shows in different, exotic and rare genres.

The good news: Otis Fodder (sometimes billed as Otis F. Odder), who curated Antenna's cool-n'-strange show Friendly Persuasion, has resurfaced with a new project, 365 Days. For the next year, he promises to post one audio file each day from his personal archive of collected sound strangeness. Each file will be on the site for one week. Expect to have your mind proverbially blown away daily.

posted by clark 3:05 PM

Tuesday, December 31, 2002

THE BIG O-THREE: Like you, we have many dreams and hopes for Ought-Three. We’d like to think no year could be more awful than Ought-Two, but the pro-war politicians keep promising otherwise.

Still, we must hope. Our first hope, natch, is that the purveyors of Armageddon Lite (in this and other countries) be thwarted from their dark dream. We’ve other dreams as well. In our ideal Ought-Three:

• The architects who design ugly, inhospitable office buildings would have to move their own offices into them, instead of hogging all the remaining funky old buildings for themselves.

• Some bigshot economist will realize you can’t maintain a national economy that depends on consumer spending if you systematically decimate the spending power of all non-zillionaires.

• Corporate de-consolidation will begin naturally, without the need for legislation, as unweildy conglomerates (particularly in the media) continue their steady march toward fiscal collapse.

• Indie films will cover topics other than the supposedly wacky lives of indie filmmakers.

• Kazaa and QuarkXPress finally come out for Mac OS X.

• Looney Tunes finally come out on DVD.

• Somebody figures out that if “freedom” is what makes this country distinguishable from the alleged bad guys, then our people should have more freedoms, not fewer.

• City Hall figures out that the answer to every problem is not necessarily a subsidized construction project.

• G.W. Bush finally doesn’t get something he wants. Like a war, for instance.

posted by clark 11:18 AM

JUNK FOOD OF THE WEEK: Carbo-loaders on the go may soon have a new alternative to Cup Noodle. Very Italiano is a line of frozen pasta lunches in single-serving microwaveable cups; intended, according to the Rome-based company’s press kit, for “young hedonistic people between 18 and 34 years of age, in search of little daily pleasures and little food gratifications, showing a predilection for savoury snacks and a greater responsiveness to new products.” They also claim the nine varieties need no stirring or mixing, due to new technology that keeps the sauce from separating. US distribution is just getting underway, but prospective retail outlets will be offered vending machines that dispense the cups, hot or cold, complete with a napkin and plastic fork. Info: VeryItaliano.It.

posted by clark 11:13 AM

Monday, December 30, 2002

BRIT RESEARCHERS now claim that political protesting may be good for your health. And goodness knows there'll be plenty of such healthy opportunities in the near future.

posted by clark 9:59 PM

FOR SEEMINGLY EVER, the right-wing sleaze machine has dismissed liberals and progressives as naysayers, doomsdayers, and what Spiro Agnew called "nattering nabobs of negativism." Commentator Jeff Madrick opts to disagree. He claims the politicians who claim there are inevitable limits to what we can do for our people and our land, who dismiss as unviable any attempts to improve the lot of the nonrich, are the real pessimists. Those of us who believe this nation must and can do better are the real optimists.

In this regard, the spring print MISC will be all about the "Positive/Negative and Other Opposites." We've interviewed a self-help promoter about thinking your way to a better life. We're going to interview an author-editor who wants leftists to focus more on promoting positive solutions, rather than settling for protesting and complaining. A metaphysical expert's tentatively slated to write a piece about the "love based reality" vs. the "fear based reality."

As usual, your contributions are also most welcome. Email your ideas now.

And the winter print MISC is just a few pages from completion and should be in subscribers' mailboxes and at select retail outlets any week now.

One thing we've learned from the five-month stretch it took to make this "quarterly": Yr. humble editor can no longer do the whole job. So we could really use more artists, designers, ad sellers and biz-side folks, not just writers. Wanna help out: Contact the email addy above.

posted by clark 3:24 PM

ARCHIVES:

• Past weblog entries.
• 2002, 2001, 2000, 1999, 1998, 1997, 1996, 1995, and 1986-94 columns.
• Reviews of literature & art, nonfiction & culture criticism, movies & videos, and music & noise.
• Longer articles and essays.
• Some slightly weird little fiction pieces.
• X-Word crossword puzzles, now with on-screen solving.
• Cyber Stuff, links to cool and/or useful sites.
• A listing of many Things I Like (and a few things I hate).
• The origin and future of MISCmedia.