Sheep Meadow, NYC

Angry Birds Scores

This is crack rock.

David Simon:

There are about 749 different shows, dramas and comedies, on television right now. Seven hundred and forty-eight of them are about the America that I inhabit, that you inhabit, that most of the viewing public, I guess, inhabits. There was only one about the other America. And it was arguing, passionately, about a place where, let’s face it, the economic rules don’t apply in the same way. Half of the adult black males in my city are unemployed. That’s not an economic model that actually works.

Via Guernica

Brady!

Cultural Crapitude

My last post was about the death of a medium, a mode of commerce and an experience. As I inch a tad closer to my own death today in turning 32, I present to you evidence that American culture is also on deathwatch. If you've never seen this, I challenge you to complete it. 1:45 feels like one hour, 45 minutes.

The thing is that this isn't even funny. It's really sad and irresponsible. What?

Disruption and Death

Leslie and I were in the city last night, and we passed the moribund Borders on 2nd Ave. I didn't want to go in, but I'm glad we did. After the shock wore off, I started snapping pictures. Leslie didn't understand my fascination, so I explained.

Growing up in the 80s and being a young adult in the 90s, record and book stores are lodged deep in my memory. They were a huge part of my experience. If you lived in Maryland, you can't forget Kemp Mill:



Maryland also had a handful of decent used records stores, one of which I worked at right before going to college.

I didn't start really loving books until my sophomore year at UMCP (this would have been around 1998), and by that time Borders and B&N were already well-established and pushing out smaller bookstores (iTunes wasn't launched until 2001, FWIW). In fact, before too long B&N took over the UMCP Student Union book store. This was very controversial at the time, and I recall discussions about Starbucks in the libraries (did this happen? I'm unsure).

So with the death of Borders, I reckon it's comeuppance. Later I'll be finishing up some Oscar Wilde on my Kindle. And while that device is really incredible, for kids being born now there is a vastly diminishing chance to have the experience of digging through racks at a record store or tilting one's head at 45 degrees to read the titles on the spines. Perhaps not even at a massive chain. I guess the opportunity won't go away completely, but it'll be much more rare.

Yay, cloud? I guess it's bittersweet.

Short video walk-through of Borders:

Kicking it off with the Dardenne Brothers.

Found two Dardenne movies on Netflix streaming yesterday. Will surely fire up one of them later today.