"How does it make him feel, I wonder, to see porn put to such use? Laughing, he says, "I feel a bit exploited.""

10/11/02 - Gallery of advertising art from 'Rewind at the V & A'.

10/11/02 - PopCult magazines's Bottom 5 lists:

"Movie Critics Who Will Shill for Anything • Does anyone really believe their newspaper-ad quotes?

Unnecessary Guidebooks For Complete Idiots • There are a few thousand of those how-to books for idiots. Here are the most idiotic.

Sport Utility Vehicles That Are Neither Sporty Nor Utilitarian • Got a bad case of penis-envy and $50,000 to drop? Here are the trucks for you!

Crappy Movies That HBO Won't Stop Repeating • "It's Not TV. It's a Bunch of Bad Movies From the '80s.""

Out of about 200 books I have read precisely four; 'The Van', 'Nice Work', 'Empire of the Sun' and 'The White Hotel' to be exact. It's a pretty poor ratio. 

9/11/02 - Eatmail.tv utilises "connected opinion-formers... the 1,000 coolest people on the internet" says the Grauniad.  I am registered with eatmail.tv. Therefore, I am one of the 1000 coolest people on the internet. 

I suspect I'm in the low 900's. 

9/11/02 - Shameless account of how product placement leads to censorship: [Warning: NYT registration] 

"For one episode of 'Seinfeld,' the writers had written a scene where a small candy falls into the cavity of a patient in the operating room, and they needed a brand. I pitched it to three different candy companies, and said, basically, 'The first to jump on this gets into ''Seinfeld.'' ' Well, Junior Mints jumped in. Once the script was finished, the company had to sign off on every mention of the product in the episode to make sure that it didn't disparage the brand. We did request one change: in the original script, Kramer goes to the doctor and offers him some Junior Mints; the doctor refuses, saying something like, 'Those things will kill you.' We said we couldn't sign off on that. The writers changed it, and in the final draft, when Kramer offers the doctor some mints, he replies, 'Oh, yes, those are so refreshing.' Big difference. Now everybody associates Junior Mints with 'Seinfeld.' You couldn't write that kind of commercial."

9/11/02 - Woo hoo, 'Tallahassee' arrived this morning. Four day delivery time from Berkeley, CA. courtesy of Absolutely Kosher records.

Some critics are prepared to wrisk the rath of Mountain Goats fans:

"Tallahassee, the new release by the acoustic guru John Darnielle's Mountain Goats, consists of 14 virtually undistinguishable tracks of whiny, self-important ramblings. From the opening title track to the seemingly endless closer, "Alpha Rats Nest," this record begs to be turned off."

9/11/02 - For the chemist who's a Luddite at heart: a wooden periodic table. (via Jejune)

9/11/02 - A fan with taste. [Warning: naked lady bits] (via The Modern Age)

9/11/02 - If the ham is £210 how much is the whole pig? [Stupid frames. Click SPANISH HAMS]

9/11/02 - The Albuquerque Tribune on the New Mexico constitutional amendments: 

"It is flat-out ridiculous, not to mention unconstitutional, for the New Mexico Constitution to establish the voting age at 21 - which it does - when the U.S. Constitution fixes it at 18. 

And it's embarrassing that the New Mexico Constitution still forbids "idiots" and "insane persons" from voting. Those words are poorly defined and, arguably, could apply to every public official, editorial page editor and motorist in New Mexico."

In Florida it's good news for pigs, bad news for humans.