A Call to Re-Occupy Your Parents' Basements

Kanye West, reasserting his importance in the political arena.

Today I make my voice heard. For today I write as a disenfranchised member of the Millennial generation! I will not, however, take to the streets. No; rather, I call on those who have - and in doing so embarrassed a generation with your braying of trite Guevarra-isms and paradoxical admiration of Guy Fawkes (do you want to blow up Parliament or endow it with more power?) - to retreat and take on a more manageable foe.

One Year Blogiversary: An Exercise in Neglect

Today marks one year since I started this blog. I have decided that if I ever want to get this thing off the ground I will have to do one of two things:

Write more, or, hire Vladimir Putin's publicist.

In the spirit of celebration, I post for you a retrospective of the finest Putin setup shots, starting with yesterday's "discovery" of Grecian urns. Please enjoy.

"Ugly" And Other Things You Can't Say In Ten Years

Notoriously ugly painter, Odd Nerdrum, in one of his many ugly self portraits, in his breathtakingly ugly figurative style.
(Note: my favorite self portrait of Mr. Nerdrum is not even safe for thinking about at work.)

Last week, the fine people at New York Magazine brought a critical issue to the forefront. Surprisingly, it had nothing to do with the sexual habits of Sarah Palin's children, nor even the last outfit Michelle Obama wore to that function that made her simultaneously down-to-earth and glamorous. No, it was the heretofore unseen sufferings of... The Homely:

Conscience of a Liar

Paul Krugman accepting the Nobel Prize in Economics, 2008.

Paul Krugman is showing himself to be disingenuous again:

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/07/19/the-glenn-beck-debeers-connection/

How does this account for investors outside of the U.S. buying up bullion (not to mention private and central banks) in significant volume? Is one to assume that the debt crises taking hold of the Portuguese, Irish, Italian, Greek and Spanish economies have less of an effect on the price of gold than Glenn Beck? Not to mention the inflationary consequences of tripling the money supply since 2000. If people are forced by law to deal in fiat currency, it should not seem unnatural that they hedge against their paper with commodities, especially in times of irresponsible monetary management.

And, on a less relevant note De Beers did not create the demand for diamonds with a clever ad campaign. Louis XIV effectively replaced the pearl with the diamond as the world's most sought-after precious stone when he commissioned the French Blue in the 1670's. What De Beers DID do was make an already desirable commodity more accessible by dramatically increasing the supply, for better or for worse.

Less relevant still is that Krugman looks embarrassing in tails. It's as if Dopey decided to go white tie.

Men of the World Demand Equivalent to Fascinator; Mexico Answers

The Royal Wedding has come and gone, and while it was more or less inconsequential to the men of the world, it has introduced the word "fascinator" into the global lexicon. A fascinator can be defined as a sarcastically small hat, generally garnished with plumage of sorts. It is known to be almost always unflattering unless you are a beautiful Englishwoman of means or a dog.

A Conspiracy Against Franciacorta!

I think I beat Jesse Ventura to this one.

About a year and a half ago, I was wandering through the sparkling wines section of Astor Wines, like you do, when I stumbled upon a wine I'd never seen. Looking down at the bottle, I mouthed the words "Ferghettina Franciacorta." Unfamiliar with either of these words, I wondered which was the producer and which was the name of the wine itself. I looked to the neck of the bottle and took note of the very familiar ribbon indicating Italy's highest wine designation, DOCG. This shocked me; as the son of Italian immigrants, and someone who has been helping his father make wine (including champagne-method sparklers) since age 7, I could not believe I was at that moment discovering an Italian sparkler I'd never so much as read about! I immediately brought the bottle to the register, projecting a poorly-feigned air of confidence as I made my purchase.

Recession-Proof Business Plan: Coming to a Late-Night Infomercial Near You...

Amazing things happen when you are bored at work. I came across the below website while Google imaging a picture of a hot dog to send to a co-worker. Context will not save me here, but, for about two months, there was this recurring smell of hot dogs in our area; I guess this was my way of exploring creative ways to complain about it. We never actually identified the source of the phantom stench, but, I always suspected (and still do) that it was the hoggish secretary around the corner - affectionately referred to as "Wench" - who consumes a steady diet of weight loss supplements, pop chips and overripe fruit. (We suspect the latter is for purposes of clandestinely catching a mid-day buzz.)