Morning Coffee
13 Scientific truths that do not make any sense at all. Frustrated by the state of the stock market? Perhaps trained rats could do a better job. Biology Today, a…
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Scott Carrier
After hitchhiking from Salt Lake City to NPR’s national office, Scott Carrier became a unique radio producer, interviewing schizophrenics and amnesiacs. Here is a This American Life episode dedicated to…
Politics, Art, and “Paradox”
“Vision of art.” “King for a day.” “Looking for that last big idea.” These are just a few of the smashed together words and phrases that make up John Wilkes…
THE LONELY VOICE, a Column About Short Stories: “Around the Dear Ruin”
One of the great stories of my adopted city, San Francisco, is without a doubt “Around the Dear Ruin” by Gina Berriault. It also might be one of the saddest…
Splinter Generation Event in Echo Park
If you’re in Echo Park, Los Angeles, this Saturday, May 9th at 7pm, and you want to see the kind of art and music today’s young’uns are making, check out…
Action Cook Book
Len Deighton’s Action Cook Book—the long-lost 1965 gem by (yes) the airport-novel writer, which I pressed upon the public a few years ago in the Village Voice and on NPR…
Furniture for Black People, and White People
Red House Furniture homepage. More from the Annals of Advertising.
Music Samples
The much-hyped, long-awaited debut album Manners by electro band Passion Pit has finally leaked. You can only keep such stuff away from Internet-savvy people so long. If you haven’t heard…
Morning Coffee
The best science magazine in the world, on the importance of research, alarmacy toward new technology, and the effect of social networking sites on the plasticity of our brains. Speaking…
When You’ve Only Got Four Books Left
“Bathetic self-deception, and unfulfilled dreams–a lament to passing time, and life not working out quite as one had hoped–have been the defining themes of almost all Ishiguro’s work. They are,…