Feeling Superior.

Hey, I've got a great idea. A great lakes idea. Let's drive all the way up to Lake Superior. I've never seen Lake Superior, and I've lived in Madison for 22 years. I've barely gone north of Wausau. Never seen the North Woods. Fall foliage is peaking up there. We can drive the whole way up in one day, take these officially scenic routes -- 2 and then 13. We'll check out Ashland and Bayfield -- and then drive the whole damned way back. All in one day!

Terse.

Curse?

McCain.

Chicane?

Killer:

"Spiller!"

Ugly?

America?

Pentacle.

Pentagon?

Rubes.

Boobs.

Pissy.

Chessy.

Foley.

Folly.

"You do not create terrorism by fighting terrorism."

Said President Bush today. "If that ever becomes the mind-set of the policymakers in Washington, it means we'll go back to the old days of waiting to be attacked -- and then respond."

I caught a glimpse of this on the TV -- I was in that restaurant and didn't hear the audio -- and I was stunned by how rejuvenated the President looked. Reading the text now, I'm thinking these congressional victories have transformed him.

The restaurant where I had a very late lunch alone...

... looks so lonely in the photographs.







ADDED: That ketchup and mustard, it's ironic, right? No one actually needs to squirt such mass quantities of ketchup and -- especially -- mustard on their food. Paired up like that, those two bottles symbolize the couples that should be sitting at the tables but are not. The designer of this retro restaurant -- he is taunting me!

Yes, it was a tad ridiculous to pay $8 million for it...

... but now it isn't even it anymore. You've just constructed a replica of it... and therefore: a monument to your folly.

It was a delicate undertaking, one that required rubberized protective jumpsuits, long tables of medical equipment and more than 224 gallons of formaldehyde. The goal: to replace the decaying tiger shark that floats in one of Mr. Hirst’s best-known works of Conceptual art, “The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living.”...

[A]s a result of inadequate preservation efforts, time was not kind to the original, which slowly decomposed until its form changed, its skin grew deeply wrinkled, and the solution in the tank turned murky....

Mr. Hirst acknowledges that once the shark is replaced, art historians will argue that the piece cannot be considered the same artwork.

Yes, exactly.

“It’s a big dilemma,’’ he said. “Artists and conservators have different opinions about what’s important: the original artwork or the original intention. I come from a Conceptual art background, so I think it should be the intention. It’s the same piece. But the jury will be out for a long time to come.’’

People have often asked me how I could go from art school to law school, art being so far removed from law, so very unlike it. But, no, it's not, is it? Original intention. What a wonderful phrase for finessing your interpretation! And may I suggest to Mr. Hirst the notion of a living artwork? Now, that could get you everything you ever want.

It's 1962, Barbie is dressed for a specific event.

What is it? (There is an official correct answer.)





ADDED: There's also the "official" Althouse blog answer (I've decided).

Distinguished Lecture Series?

Laurie David? It's nice to tell people to use reuseable shopping bags and drive hybrid cars and things like that, but why is the university presenting this as a distinguished lecture? Are there no scholars around to do lectures anymore? Or is Hollywood the source of distinction these days?

"They can crack down on the parties all they want, but it's not going to stop us."

Underage drinking in Madison. The quote is from a 19-year-old UW student. I think a lot of the ugliness described in the article is caused by the too-high drinking age. It's ridiculous that college students aren't allowed to go to a bar or drink at parties, but the dangerous, excessive drinking is another matter entirely.

"We're back to America. We're a melting pot... I love it."

That's the line the "Survivor" editors chose to feature as the segregated teams were integrated in the third episode of the season. So much for the big publicity stunt that got me. It was like some gruesome oversized octopus that slithers its tentacles around your torso and attaches its suckers all over. Speaking of suckers...

Blah! Of course, the pro-integration message is a good one -- it's thoroughly well-scrubbed and wholesome -- but the occasion for saying it was manufactured and the quote itself was extracted from raw footage that no doubt included a lot of grousing and teasing and who knows what. Plus, it came from Parvati, who annoyed the hell out of me last night as she talked to the camera, confessing her scheme of manipulating all the guys on her team with her laughably unsubtle flirting... or as they say over on Television Without Pity, "swooning over the three slabs of hetero manmeat."

Indeed, the fuss about racial difference is over. It never amounted to much, and surely, if anything ugly happened, judicious editing would have kept it from us viewers. And now we can see that it's sex difference that really dominates, not just with Parvati's embarrassing flirting, but with the total capitulation of all the women in the physical challenge. The game consisted of walking in knee-deep water while carrying a 15-pound bag. You could drop out, but only by handing off your bag to one of your teammates. The women all caved right in and left the men holding the bags. Despite the entertainment value of roped-together slabs of hetero manmeat trudging through water, it was pretty disturbing to see the physical disparity depicted so obviously face-slammingly.