Parenthetical

I found this HuffPo column, What If We Treated Doctors The Way We Treat Teachers?, pretty compelling (in a preaching to the choir sort of way, of course). It begins with: We must begin to hold all physicians accountable, regardless of specialization, to certain quantifiable measures of health, namely cholesterol levels, blood pressure, weight, and [...]

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From Awful Library Books: Runaway Bride Returns! This librarian is not a bunhead shusher. She’s a hottie in black knee-high boots who gets married in Vegas and ditches her new husband the morning after. Ooh, steamy! But clearly the craziest part is how she advocates against Dewey: “No Dewey decimal system?” It was what labeled [...]

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Ladies and gentlemen, I just listened to two of the most hilarious interviews with children’s authors ever in the world. Please, if you know what’s good for you, watch: Maurice Sendak on the Colbert Report and then listen to: Jack Gantos on Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me.

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This video combines two of my favorite things: children reading library books and “Party in the USA.”

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If you are like me and a great many of my friends, you are currently obsessing over Downton Abbey. (That’s the PBS link, because that’s where Americans can watch streaming episodes, but of course it’s a BBC show.) It’s a soap opera that makes you feel smart! It’s a BBC show that doesn’t look like [...]

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This is the most beautiful piece of art I’ve seen in a long time: Tyree Callahan’s chromatic typewriter. Unfortunately there doesn’t seem to be a video, so I can’t see how it works. The sense I get is that it didn’t type the watercolor in the picture. But even so, the whole thing reminds me [...]

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This post by fantasy author Jim C. Hines is excellent. (Also brave.) Click through for more like this.

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Aren’t Guy Laramee’s sculptures beautiful? As usual, I found his artist’s statement to be almost impenetrably pretentious, but I do love the idea of books — the representation of knowledge, particularly older knowledge — eroding into ancient landscapes.

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I’m spending my day watching Lord of the Rings, extended editions (or as far as I get, anyway). There will no doubt be some Chinese food at some point. I’ve never had a traditional Jewish Christmas — I’m looking at this as an opportunity to explore my heritage. The folks behind Jewsmas would like a [...]

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You know what? I apologize. There was not nearly enough Krampus in that last post. The internet is all about Krampus this year (for the obvious reason that he’s awesome), so allow me to further Krampus up your day. Anthony Bourdain made a Krampus video. It’s a pretty good overview of the story, in case [...]

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