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sidewalk shoes is a blog about food, and a little about reading, and some sewing, and [the blogger] might even knit something.
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if it's hip, it's here brings you architecture, art, fashion, web design, and shopping links galore. Globally and locally.
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via times online:
Can everyone be an Einstein?
There is one important link between musical improvisation and the “Aha!” moment that saved Wag Dodge’s life. Improvisation was found to be accompanied by “a dissociated pattern of activity in the prefrontal cortex”. The prefrontal cortex is to the brain what a conductor is to an orchestra. It pulls the whole show together. In humans it is a third of the whole brain, compared with around 5% in dogs and cats. If you want to find where the thing you call “me” is located, the prefrontal cortex would be a good place to start.
The point about that “dissociated pattern” is that it echoes the loosening of connections that precedes the “Aha!” moment. Insight and creativity, perhaps even genius, do seem to be linked to a brain that can disorganise itself and freewheel, making new and unexpected connections. As Nancy Andreasen puts it, the creative act may “begin with a process during which associative links run wild, creating new connections, many of which might seem strange or implausible. The disorganised mental state may persist for many hours, while words, images and ideas collide. Eventually order emerges, and with it the creative product”.
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via nytimes:
gather round, city folk. here's a story...
Like a lot of people, I came to New York in the first place to tell stories. That is what has forever driven the migration of expressive folk to this place, where the nerves cross and tangle, a place that, with luck, will amplify your talent. It doesn’t matter if you dance, act or sing. People pay attention to what emanates from New York. Have something to say or sell? Then insinuate yourself into the giant, pulsing, signal-sending brain that is the city.
book review - "alphabet juice"
Marginalized as a humorist (like Mencken) because he knows how to write funny, Blount is also a superb reporter who possesses an imaginative intellect (also like Mencken). Disdaining those scholars who think the relation between words and their meanings is arbitrary, he argues that “all language, at some level, is body language.” Beyond the clearly imitative words, like the onomatopoeic “boom,” “poof” and “gong,” Blount zeroes in on the expressive words that “somehow sensuously evoke the essence of the word: ‘queasy’ or ‘rickety’ or ‘zest’ or ‘sluggish’ or ‘vim,’ ”he writes. “If you were a cave person earnestly trying to communicate how you felt digestively, you might without benefit of any verbal tradition come up with something close to ‘nausea.’ ”
Feeling “ ‘polyurethane foam’ . . . running around in my mind’s ear and mouth is like watching otters play in the water,” he says.
(read the first chapter here.)
lose the blackberry? yes he can, maybe
“How about that?” Mr. Obama replied to a friend’s congratulatory e-mail message on the night of his victory.
But before he arrives at the White House, he will probably be forced to sign off. In addition to concerns about e-mail security, he faces the Presidential Records Act, which puts his correspondence in the official record and ultimately up for public review, and the threat of subpoenas. A decision has not been made on whether he could become the first e-mailing president, but aides said that seemed doubtful.
across us, big rallies for same-sex marriage
“It’s not ‘Yes we can,’ ” said Tom Ammiano, a San Francisco city supervisor, referring to President-elect Barack Obama’s campaign mantra. “It’s ‘Yes we will.’ ”
in hard times, no more fancy pants
“There’s a shift to get away from glitz,” Ms. Kaufman said. “I’m almost starting to feel that luxury is a dirty word.”
It is no secret that consumers are cutting back, anxious about jobs, plummeting home values and shrinking retirement savings. But that belt-tightening seems to have also prompted a reconsideration of what is acceptable consumerism even for those relatively unaffected by the economic cataclysm.
congo's riches, looted by renegade troops
The exploitation of this mountain is emblematic of the failure to right this sprawling African nation after many years of tyranny and war, and of the deadly role the country’s immense natural wealth has played in its misery.
Despite a costly effort to unite the nation’s many militias into a single national army, plus billions of dollars spent on international peacekeepers and an election in 2006 that brought democracy to Congo for the first time in four decades, the government is unable or unwilling to force these fighters — who wear government army uniforms and collect government paychecks — to leave the mountain.
a seafood snob ponders the future of fish
Nearly one-third of the world’s wild-caught fish are reduced to fish meal and fed to farmed fish and cattle and pigs. Aquaculture alone consumes an estimated 53 percent of the world’s fish meal and 87 percent of its fish oil. (To make matters worse, as much as a quarter of the total wild catch is thrown back — dead — as “bycatch.”)
i feel obligated to refer to this, even though it categorically does not apply to me:
some see big problem with wisconsin drinking
Technically speaking, the sale is between the bartender and the parent or legal guardian, who then gives the drink to the minor. The bartender has the discretion to decide whether the minor can drink in the establishment.
Before he owned Wile-e’s, Mr. Whaley said there were some cases where he had to say no to a parent. “I’ve had situations where a parent was going to buy drinks for a kid who looked 8 or 10 years old,” he said, “and I had to say, ‘That’s a no-go.’ ”
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Comparisons between nutmeg intoxication and MDMA have been made, however this remains speculative...A user will not experience a peak until approximately six hours after ingestion, and effects can linger for up to three days afterwards.
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via huffington post:
rahm emanuel roasts stephen colbert
"Dana Perino is here, what an honor to be roasted by the spokesman for the president. Dana Perino, wonderful to see you. I always knew Scott McClellan would hatch into something beautiful. When you crawled out of the McClellan cocoon, did you have to devour the shell for nutrients or is he still lurking around someplace? ... I loved it when you told Helen Thomas that the 'Mission Accomplished' banner should have read, 'Mission Accomplished For These Sailors Who Are On This Ship On Their Mission.' I certainly hope you had a banner for that explanation. Do you get sore the next day after shoveling it that hard? I kid, I kid, but no, Dana, you are the one person who I don't mind slamming me on this entire podium, because I know for the last year and a half you haven't meant anything you've said." /colbert
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via daytrotter:
A Week With Bonnie Prince Billy's "Lie Down In The Light"
In the mid-nineties, the big rags were ready and willing to do their part to promote Palace and get more records sold. Then the coverage disappeared, which I discovered was due to him not sending out review copies anymore, giving the proverbial finger to friendly critics and their privileged status of getting free music and advising others what to think about it ahead of time. I remember him saying in an interview that critics could seek out his music if they deemed it worthy, just like everyone else had to.
related: bonnie prince billy's 2006 daytrotter session
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reefer - s/t (2008)
Their self-titled mini album (previously entitled The Life Narcotic) contains six sun-dripped songs and three interludes, plus remixes from Dntel and Flying Lotus. The album was composed on the Maui coastline in Makena, and was finished soon after in Los Angeles at Daddy Kev’s studio, the Echo Chamber. Reefer is very much influenced by the beautiful tropical surroundings, the sounds of the ocean, and being far away from their regular daily routines. Not predictably sunny in tone, the minor-key arrangements and Thorburn’s playful wordplay conjures up images of something more sinister than cheeseburgers in paradise. Kev’s subtle, controlled production fits each songs mood nicely and draws from Hawaiian pop influences. Initially considered to be a one-off project, Reefer hopes to make another album when they meet again in a new exotic tropical location. /jive
jose gonzalez - live at park avenue (ep)
i saw jose live at the terrace a couple summers ago and it was great. his calm, assertive, wholly professional (if only for the purposes of the show) aura extended to the entire crowd. i found myself talking to strangers calmly, sipping strongbow, and sitting on some steps, wholly enjoying the entire atmosphere for a number of hours. in this live recording, polite, yet enthusiastic, applause squeezes its way in between songs that sound as though they were taken straight from gonzalez's studio recordings. the nine tracks on this album are performed mostly solo, but you can hear a couple backing instrumentalists at times, as well. this ep, recorded in orlando, florida on march 1, 2008, exhibits about what it might sound like at one of his shows, but there is something otherworldly (certainly unrecordable) that is simply imperceptible about all live performances, and jose gonzalez is no exception. nonetheless, live at park avenue is a great recording of essentially flawless guitar technicality, and a nice appetite whetter after countless spins of his dry full-lengths. dehydrated mango is dry and delicious; sometimes it's just nice to have a textural change.
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