An old gimmick, but done pretty well here.
Think of this handy chart the next time you hear about the trillion-dollar stimulus package.
Newspaper Death Watch: Bad timing in Detroit edition
The future marches on for Detroit journalism.
Oh, man — talk about bad timing and the face-palm of missed opportunities. Just check out the devastating start to a story in the New York Times called “Detroit’s Daily Papers Are Now Not So Daily“:
Maybe once a year, a city has a news day as heavy as the one that just hit Detroit: The White House forced out the chairman of General Motors, word leaked that the administration wanted Chrysler to hitch its fortunes to Fiat, and Michigan State University’s men’s basketball team reached the Final Four, which will be held in Detroit.
All of this news would have landed on hundreds of thousands of Motor City doorsteps and driveways on Monday morning, in the form of The Detroit Free Press and The Detroit News.
Would have, that is, except that Monday — of all days — was the long-planned first day of the newspapers’ new strategy for surviving the economic crisis by ending home delivery on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Saturdays. Instead, on those days, they are directing readers to their Web sites and offering a truncated print version at stores, newsstands and street boxes.
Read the story. There are people who will really miss the loss of a physical newspaper. But the Times does a good job of finding several different constituencies: there’s a woman who doesn’t have time to stop at the store for the new “abbreviated version,” as well as a retired woman who says she wants the physical product no matter what. And they also find a retired man who is ready to move online to find his news.
The papers’ servers crashed Monday, too, unable to keep up with huge demand for their “e-editions.” Maybe that bodes well?
Cheese of the Week: England Moroccan Spice Cheese
Picked up this baby at my local Sobey’s, where I couldn’t turn down the dark orange colour, the under-$4 price tag or the promise of exotic spice. You can’t really tell unless you look at that photo closely, but for what you pay, you don’t get very much cheese at all. This was a 100-gram tiny little slice of cheese. So I hoped that it would be good — nay, great!
As you can tell by the label, this is a generically wrapped cheese, and there was very little in the way of extraneous information. Basically, what you see is what I got. So I can’t tell you what, precisely, was was the England Moroccan spice in the cheese.
In fact, even the term “moroccan spice” is misleading, since it probably refers to a mixture (up to 100(!), according to some websites) of spices known as Ras el hanout — a mixture that’s kept secret by the people doing the mixing.
I seriously doubt that there would be 100 spices in this cheese, though — it probably just has some of the common ones.
Although you can see a bit of oilyness on the surface of the cheese, the texture was more mushy-crumbly.
We paired it with some Triscuit “thin crisps” because that’s all we had around the house (it ain’t Cracker of the Week, you know!) and because we weren’t real fans of the “thin crisp” flavour, which was vaguely Parmesan-like, or texture, which was similar to a mini-Wheat. Yeah, imagine Parmesan-frosted mini-Wheats, and you’re on the right ugh-track.
We also sampled the cheese with a nice red wine — and we’re seriously discussing a Wine of the Week, so stay tuned.
Surprisingly, the bland dry flavour of the Triscuit thin crisps was exactly what this England Moroccan Spice Cheese needed. Although there was a hint of heat if you let the cheese linger in the back of your throat, this was far from a spicy cheese. In fact, the flavour was disappointingly less-than-intense.
Apparently, the “England” in the title refers to the cheddar-like cheese base that was used here. It’s got the texture and tartness of a nicely aged cheddar, but the Moroccan spice adds a slight bite and some complex flavours on your tongue.
We spent most of the tasting discussing how familiar yet unplaceable the flavour was. Since Ras el-hanout can contain many spices — including common ones like paprika, cumin, tumeric, cardamom and cinammon — I’m not surprised that we felt like the taste kept dangling on the tips of our tongues.
If you’re making up a cheese platter for friends, this woud be an eye-catching one to add. There are little bits of what look like hot pepper seeds (like in the shakers at a pizza place) in the cheese, and it’s got a distinctive colour. But unless your friends are true bland-mouths who want to “congratulate” themsevles on sampling something “exotic” this cheese has to be rated a taste disappointment. It’s edible, but not nearly intense or flavourful enough.
Sorry, Morocco — but I think this cheese sells you short. You must have more to offer than this limp flavour.
…
UPDATE: Saturday, April 4, 2009: Although I stand by this original review of the cheese I ate, last night Amy I went to a wine-and-cheese party at a friend’s place, where we were served this exact same cheese. Except it wasn’t. It was the same “brand” from the same store, same style, same price, etc. But it wasn’t the same cheese at all. It was softer, more yielding to the tongue. But when it got there, it was spicier, more intense, and more flavourful. A much better cheese.
My baby clouded leopard weighs 0.29 pounds
This is like the antidote to Amy’s find from the other week, Fuck You Penguin. Unlike the anonymous author of that blog, I can’t stay mad at cute animals. Just look at this to-die-for baby clouded leopard:
It’s just one of two that were recently discovered at the National Zoo’s Conservation and Research Center and featured on the absurdly cute ZooBorns blog. (See the video here, if you dare.)
ZooBorns says it features “The newest and cutest exotic animal babies from zoos and aquariums around the world!”
Colin — a hat-tip to you for showing me this. You owe me an insulin injection, though. (Kids — don’t make fun of diabetes.)
Horribly, awfully (cute and) disturbing
This is a movie trailer for the anime version of a manga series called “Cat Shit One.” According to the post on BoingBoing from whence I lifted the trailer, the comic was was released in America under the name “Apocalypse: Meow.” Now it’ll be a movie, coming in 2010.
Somehow, the use of cute cartoon animals just yanks me out of the “war movie” mode and really drives home the sheer brutality of war. And, because I can’t understand a word of Japanese, I think it puts the senselessness of such brutal conflict into stark relief.
Despite how it manages to look and feel like so many other war movies I’ve seen (and enjoyed) none of my paradigms fit.
I can’t help but imagine that this is how human agression would look to, say, a fully rational alien race. Utterly incomprehensible.
Earth hour
Lots was made in the media about the number of cities and countries that had signed on to support Earth Hour. Even Las Vegas got in on the show.
I want to know how much power was actually saved from flipping that switch for an hour…
Make your own font — the very, very hard way
This guy (as an art project, natch) decided to make his own typeface by strapping a GPS monitor to his bike and riding through Tokyo, outlining letters.
He also made a video about it:
Urbanized Typeface PV (Complete ver) from yang02 on Vimeo.
(from Wired)
Mom was wrong: Video games can improve vision
Oh good, maybe all those hours playing Doom were actually good for me.
Remember when your mom told you that you shouldn’t sit so close to the TV, or you’d ruin your eyes? Did you ever think to tell her that correlation does not imply causation? Did you ever point out that maybe you sat close to the TV because your vision was already bad?
No? Well, now you can throw this study in her face. According to researchers at Rochester University in New York and Goldschleger Eye Research Institute and Tel Aviv University, playing the right video games can actually make your eyesight better. At least by one narrow measure.
According to an article on the website LiveScience:
Video games with lots of action, such as the shoot-’em-up variety, can improve your vision…. Players became up to 58 percent better at perceiving fine contrast differences in the tests.
“If you are driving at dusk with light fog it could make the difference between seeing the car in front of you or not seeing it,” study leader Daphne Bavelier [said].
That’s important because most people didn’t think perception of contrast even could be improved.
(via Slashdot)
Smoked beer that tastes like “liquid ham”
In Manitoba, you can’t smoke in bars anymore (thank God, in my opinion), but a certain class of people believe that drinking and smoking just go together and should never have been split asunder. Well of course smoking goes with drinking — if you smoke!
I always say that if smoking goes so well with drinking, how come you never see anyone drinking the bottles of beer with cigarette butts in them? (Okay, I’ve never said that, but now that I’ve thought it up, I’ll be sure to remember to say it next time the conversation goes that way.)
Bavarians, though, have managed to put smoking and beer together in a bottle that I can certainly agree with: Smoked Beer.
From a review in The Atlantic:
Only one beer tastes like smoked sausage. Bavaria’s Schlenkerla is the granddaddy of the smoked beers, a rare but esteemed style that uses malt dried over an open flame (it’s called rauchbier in German). The result is a dominating smoky flavor: think liquid ham.
Interesting, tell me more! From the Schlenkerla website, on their smoked beer page:
Its smoky flavor is being achieved by exposing the malt to the intense, aromatic smoke of burning beech-wood logs at the Schlenkerla-maltings. After mixing it with premium-class hops in the brew, it matures in 700 year old cellars, deep down in the hills of Bamberg, into a mellow, magnificent-tasting beer ….
The connoisseur drinks it slowly with relish, but steadily and purposefully. He knows, that the second “Seidla” (half-liter) tastes better than the first, and the third even better than the second. He drinks during the morning pint and during the afternoon break. He drinks it in the evenings, drinks it alone and with company, especially with company, as “Aecht Schlenkerla Rauchbier” makes one talkative and exuberant. It brings together the local with the stranger, as it is common in Franconia to share your table with others.
Even if the brew tastes somewhat strange at the first swallow, do not stop, because soon you will realize that your thirst will not decrease and your pleasure will visibly increase.
That is written on the coasters, and the coasters are right!
OH MY DEAR GOD WHY HAVE I NEVER HEARD OF THIS MAGICAL BEER BEFORE?!?!
I am so requesting this at the Liquor Mart. I will pay any price.
…
UPDATE: They say it’s available at the LCBO, so I should be able to get some to Manitoba! A 5L “partykeg” is about €30 in Germany; I wonder what the Canadian price is.
…
UPDATE 2: It’s $3.25 for a 500mL bottle. Pretty reasonable!
Stock market crisis? Bring out the Marx!
I have some thoughts on Communism. First of all, it can never hope to match capitalism’s clever harnessing of human greed. Secondly, though, it’s never really been tried absent a deporable totalitarian government, and so it gets a bad rap.
People don’t recognize that. They think “communism” and they immediately think of the top-down power structure of Stalin, Mao and Castro.
But communism’s an economic system, not a political system. It’s communism vs. capitalism, and democracy vs. totalitarianism. There’s no good reason that a communist economic system couldn’t flourish under a democratic political system — and I’d love to see it tried.
I’ve been thinking a bit about communism because it seems like capitalism is out of vogue, lately — at least the runaway, laissez-faire capitalism that has run amok the past, oh, eight years or so. It has everyone dusting off their Das Kapitals.
It’s been a while since I read mine, mind you, but luckily Christopher Hitchens has decided to take a survey of the current Marx landscape.
His essay, in the current issue of The Atlantic, is titled “The Revenge of Karl Marx” and tantalizingly promises to cover “What the author of Das Kapital reveals about the current economic crisis.”
I can’t say it goes quite that far, but it’s an interesting read, and it does cover — with quite a bit of breadth — both the limits and the possibilities of Marxist study in today’s economy.
Short version? Marxism is in no danger of replacing capitalism anytime soon. Caveat, as Hitchens puts it: “who was predicting even 30 years ago that Russia and China would today be turbocharged capitalist systems, however discrepant in type? And the present crisis was actually triggered by a “subprime” attempt to transform low-income people into property owners, albeit indebted ones.”
The Force is strong with this one
Slick moves from Darth Vader, as cobbled onto a hula-girl dashboard decoration.
(From Boing Boing, which really is a directory of wonderful things)
Aw, he was just trying to do the right thing
From the Manitoba Driver’s Handbook:
When an emergency vehicle (ambulance, fire or police), sounding an alarm and flashing lights, is approaching from any direction you must yield right-of-way by
- immediately moving clear of an intersection if you are stopped for a red light or stop sign. If blocking the path of an emergency vehicle, you must proceed through a red light or stop sign with caution, to clear the way
- driving as closely as possible to the right curb or edge of roadway; and
- remaining stopped at the edge of the road until the emergency
But one man probably wishes he hadn’t. Turning off a street to make way for the fire truck behind him, he rounded the corner only to be creamed by an ambulance that was rushing to the same call.
Sigh. Life.
Another cool video
by Amy Breen
This time from Passion Pit, a Cambridge, Massachusetts group whose EP Chunk of Change is getting loads of attention from critics and mp3 blogs.
The video is also stop-motion, but uses actual objects and photos to get the effect. It’s a different feel from the Fleet Foxes video, and equally as cool.
I love videos like these. The standard band-plays-while-other-stuff-happens formula can be really interesting (see here) but for the most part is just tired. Videos that don’t actually feature the band (or feature them very little) are usually my favourites.
As an aside, this song was released as a single on the label Neon Gold, that puts out songs exclusively on vinyl (if vinyl never goes out of style, books won’t either). I bring it up because the guy behind Neon Gold used to write Good Weather for Airstrikes, one of Grant’s most-loved music blogs, who is saddened all the time by its demise.
Cool stop-motion video
by Amy Breen
I love me some Fleet Foxes. And some stop-motion. So this is the perfect video for me!
Forget it, Jake. It’s Chinatown.
Great movie, Chinatown. Too bad about the sequel. I stumbled across some of the real history of the real California Chinatowns when I was looking for a vintage bank vault picture to go with Keith’s post about the safety of banks, below.
Although the Roman Polanski-directed film, starring Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway, was set in Los Angeles, I happened to find period pictures from the San Francisco Chief of Police at about the same time as the movie was set (it was set in the 1930s, but inspired by real events of 1910-20-ish).
The picture I found came from an archival collection held at The Bancroft Library, at the University of California, Berkeley. It’s the “Jesse Brown Cook Scrapbooks Documenting San Francisco History and Law Enforcement” — Jesse Brown being the police chief of San Francisco in the very early 20th century. He had an amazing desire to keep accurate photographic records — evident in the approximately 8,000 photos that are in the collection (several down volumes) plus what they describe as “ephemera” — newspaper clippings, etc.
Here, for example, are the real cops of Chinatown.
It’s thrilling to come across pictures like this next one, too, which I just know I’ve seen somewhere in a movie.
It’s the pumping station at Fort Mason, according to the data, and since Chinatown is all about water, I thought it might be from there, but I couldn’t seem to find it in any of the online lists of filming locations. I’ll have to watch Chinatown again, I guess!
I just spend an hour looking through tons of pictures in that collection, and I was totally engrossed, yet haven’t even scratched the surface. It’s unfortunately difficult to browse from one picture to another, but I saw lot of pictures documenting the Great Quake of ’06, and the resulting fire, as well as the rebuilding of important municipal buildings.
There are also mug shots, and various street scenes. Sticking with the Chinatown theme, though, check out this collection of “Chinese opium smokers in there [sic] dens in China Town in 1889.” (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11)
And here’s the Queen of the China Town celebration, 1915. Really cool stuff.
