Eve Tushnet
lyrics by Tony Kushner; link via AC: Read more
lyrics by Tony Kushner; link via AC: Read more
from Maia Szalavitz: …So, what determines which children will fall among the lucky 25% who can successfully resist the marshmallow? Is it an inherited genetic advantage that produces greater impulse control? Is delaying gratification a learned behavior? Or could children be making conscious choices about this specific task based on similar prior experiences — involving adults who promise better rewards later — of whether waiting really pays off? Researchers led by Celeste Kidd at the University of Rochester devised a... Read more
Radley Balko with a must-read roundup post. Balko is such a hero. Read more
The second terrific horror flick I saw over the weekend is Resolution. Again, the underlying idea is sharp and simple: Michael gets an email containing a video of his estranged best friend Chris, who’s now living in the middle of nowhere doing meth and shooting at birds. He decides to make one last attempt to get Chris into rehab. When Chris refuses, Michael shrugs, tasers him, and chains him to the wall of his hideous meth-addict hell-cabin. They’re going to... Read more
One of the many great things about October is the scary movie festivals. Over the weekend I got to see two excellent flicks from the DC Spooky Movie Festival at the AFI Theater in Silver Spring. Both were immensely sad as well as frightening, and heartbreaking horror shows may be my favorite kind. Chained is directed by Jennifer Lynch (Boxing Helena) and it has a very simple core: A serial killer kidnaps a woman and her nine-year-old son, kills the... Read more
The applied sciences, anyway. Here are some of my favorite performances by Debi Thomas, who skated at the Olympics while also pre-med at Stanford. She went on to become Dr. Debi Thomas, a surgeon. First her 1986 Nationals free skate, which she choreographed herself. Her arms are a little stiff in the front half and she can’t hold her final jump, but once she loosens up she’s very elegant and playful. She won here. Here’s the same program at 1986... Read more
“Everything’s permitted here, you see. I suppose one could say with the theology instructor that if God does not exist then everything is permitted; but here it doesn’t matter if God exists or if he doesn’t, since one is free to do everything. The result of making use of this freedom is that the one freedom one does not have is that of knowing what is going on.” –it’s a Japanese surrealist satire of Communism; check out Helen Rittelmeyer’s review... Read more
[link removed; look it up!] Got that in with forty minutes left in his feast day! Looks awful at this size though, sorry. Anyway this is Goya and yes, the subject was one of the Borgias. Every family’s got its embarrassing relative…. Read more
I listen to an album, at AmCon. Read more
I was reading John Cheese’s latest column, “5 Pieces of Advice Every Adult Wishes They Got as a Teenager,” and it got me thinking about the subject of advice more generally. I usually tell people I’m against advice, but manifestly that isn’t true: I give it and even, very very occasionally and when I have no other choice, take it. But I do think the most common kind of advice is irrelevant advice. Advice can be irrelevant for a lot... Read more
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In