"Visit Tatooine, before it's swallowed by the Sahara."

"Ever since they finished the part of the movie shot in 2003, sand dunes have surrounded the film set from every side. They should not have allowed this to happen," says Tahar Karya, who used to drive George Lucas around the dunes.

"Tunisia is a very beautiful and safe country.... I advise the whole world to come visit Tunisia. Tunisia is a country of security, comfort, and stability ... Besides, in Tunisia there are more than 300 days of sunlight. This is a country where life is good!"

"Microagressions, particularly those of a racialized nature, are... 'the brief and everyday slights, insults, indignities, and denigrating messages..."

"... sent to (visible minorities) by well-intentioned (members of an ethnic majority in a society) who are unaware of the hidden messages being communicated."

They include, in Japan’s case, verbal cues (such as “You speak such good Japanese!” — after saying only a sentence or two — or “How long will you be in Japan?” regardless of whether a non-Japanese (NJ) might have lived the preponderance of their life here), nonverbal cues (people espying NJ and clutching their purse more tightly, or leaving the only empty train seat next to them), or environmental cues (media caricatures of NJ with exaggerated noses or excessive skin coloration, McDonald’s “Mr. James” mascot....).

"I felt as if my presence had been rejected....I wanted to erase my life."

Said Kazushi Suganum, who is working to help those who are, as he was, hikikomori.

"If I was editor, I would get people after Obama. I voted for the guy, but he’s a disaster as a president."

"And a disaster most through his Justice Department and muzzling the press. Succeeding. And nobody’s — there’s no [Harrison] Salisbury, [David] Halberstam to bust ass in Washington anymore. That Washington bureau is a wimpy place right now and has been since Obama’s election, or since 9/11 actually."

Says Gay Talese, who was a NYT reporter in the 1960s and who wrote "The Kingdom and the Power: Behind the Scenes at The New York Times: The Institution That Influences the World."

At the Tibetan Café...

... you can talk about anything you want.

"Mystery - a blonde angel without an identity."

"Greece riveted" by the "blonde angel" found amongst the (non-blond) Roma.

"Texas is not America... It’s in America, but it’s not America."

"National polls don’t mean anything. Democrats haven’t won a statewide office in Texas since 1994. There are no Peter Kings in Texas."

Quote from Matt Mackowiak whom the NYT identifies as "a Republican political consultant in Austin and the former spokesman for... Kay Bailey Hutchison," in an article titled "Texans Stick With Cruz Despite Defeat in Washington."

Matt Mackowiak is most likely...
	A Republican political consultant, but not a Republican.
	A Republican who understands the limits of being a Texan Republican outside of Texas.
	A political consultant who wants to be consulted by liberal media & uses "Republican" as a gimmick.
	A Republican that you can find in Austin, which is in Texas, but it’s not Texas.
pollcode.com free polls

You think: "What a good-hearted, mellow person I am," I think: "Inside the Madison cocoon."

"There should be a packaged microwavable snack for women called Hot Handbags."

I said in the comments to the post about the lady named Joy who collects expensive handbags and doesn't know what to say to her "good friend" who "wears" "fake" — i.e., knockoff — bags. I was responding to rhhardin who said "Pockets would be simpler."

To flesh out your understanding, here's Jim Gaffingan, explaining Hot Pockets:



Googling "hot pockets," I came up with a Hollywood report from 3 days ago: "Kate Upton and Snoop Dogg's New Hot Pockets Video Arrives Fully Baked (Video)." Who knew "hot pockets" was something new and trendy? Ever stumble into some weird accidental fashionableness like that?

"I love to buy designer handbags. Every time I do, a good friend shows up wearing a new fake bag."

"She tells me she bought it in another state or some other crazy story. She is lying to my face and insulting my intelligence. What should I say?," a woman named Joy asks the NYT etiquette columnist Philip Galanes.

Here's my answer, written before reading what the Times guy said:

What should you say? Try speaking like a human being. One doesn't wear a bag, one carries a bag. She's not wearing her new fake bag any more than she's wearing her old fake friend, which is you, Joy, you fake old bag. Think about what makes less sense, her calling her bag Louis Vuitton, or you calling yourself Joy.

And here's what Galanes said:

I’d go with “Nice bag!” But I tend to feel sorry for people who tell (harmless) whoppers. If she felt better about herself, she probably wouldn’t need status items to prop herself up. (Not that there’s anything wrong with your bag collection.) If she really is a good friend, conspiring in a silly lie seems like a lesser evil than dueling over her insult to your intelligence. Or you could give her one of your authentic bags, so she learns the difference.

Who gave the better answer to Joy?
	Althouse, because it's funny to kick Joy in the ass.
	Althouse, because Joy is a joyless snob.
	Althouse, champion of the less-well-off.
	Galanes, because he's actually oriented to helping Joy progress in dealing with relationships.
	Galanes, because he's got a column in the NYT and it's about etiquette not jackassery.
	Galanes, because he gets paid and that money comes in part from ads for expensive handbags.
pollcode.com free polls

Racial fashion... deaf fashion... blind fashion... deaf music....

As long as I've started on the topic of fashion this morning, here are Tom & Lorenzo on last Thursday's finale on "Project Runway," where [SPOILER ALERT] finally, after 12 seasons, a black person has won. Here's how Tom & Lorenzo dealt with the racial element:

Anyway, major congratulations to Dom, not just for winning, but for being the first black winner in the show’s 12-season history. The reason this is notable is because typically, the fashion world has a distinct problem recognizing black (and especially African-American) designers and styles. We’re gonna leave that there, though. Dom doesn’t deserve to be designated a standard-bearer by us or anyone else. It’s enough for us to note it, but the deeper congratulations are for a job well done....

And — because, I guess "enough" is never enough:

Wearing evening gowns on the street, in daytime...

... because you have no evening affairs to attend — who does? — and you like the clothes.

A trend, spotted by Bill Cunningham, in Paris. It's not Parisians who are doing it. It's people from China and Russia who are busting loose.

The iconic foods of the states — one per state — ranked in order of greatness.

From #1 — Illinois (Chicago-style pizza) to #52 — Ohio (Cincinnati-style chili).

52?! It's coming in after #51, "Being hit by a car."

Whatever virtue this bad-tasting Z-grade atrocity once contained derived from its exemplification of a set of certain cherished American fables—immigrant ingenuity, the cultural melting pot, old things combining into new things—and has now been totally swamped and consumed by different and infinitely uglier American realities: the commodification of culture; the transmutation of authentic artifacts of human life into hollow corporate brand divisions; the willingness of Americans to slop any horrible goddamn thing into their fucking mouths if it claims to contain some byproduct of a cow and comes buried beneath a pyramid of shredded, waxy, safety-cone-orange "cheese."

Hey! I had some, back in '09. See:



Via Throwing Things, to which I also owe thanks for sending me to this page where you're asked to vote to rank "Pennsylvania's Top 10 Endangered Artifacts," including the wig of Thaddeus Stevens.

What are law students doing to protect themselves from the horror of a law school exam that lawprofs could easily write following the advice I am giving in this post?

Do law professors realize how much law students are relying on Wikipedia for summaries and insights into the cases we are assigning? In the old days, students spent a lot of money on commercial outlines, stuff like this. I've never looked at any of those books, not as a student and not as a teacher, though over the years, I've had many students ask me to recommend one.

"Even When the GOP Loses, It Wins/Think the Senate deal is a resounding defeat for Republicans? Think again."

 That is the headline of an editorial in The Nation.

[I]n the war of ideas, the Senate deal is but a stalemate, one made almost entirely on conservative terms. The GOP now goes into budget talks with sequestration as the new baseline, primed to demand longer-term cuts in Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. And they still hold the gun of a US default to the nation’s head in the next debt ceiling showdown.

Surrender? Any more “victories” like this and Democrats will end up paying tribute into the GOP’s coffers.

I'm surprised to read this, because I thought what I was observing — to the extent that I did not avert my eyes — was the liberal media doing the Democratic Party's work of declaring victory.* I'm interested in seeing The Nation peel off from that strategy. It's all propaganda of one kind or another, but the strategies of propaganda interest me. It's boring when they all do the same thing, which is the  main reason I had my own personal shutdown during the shutdown.

Key line: "The GOP may be bearing the brunt of the public’s rage, but anger is also directed at Washington and government generally." The Democratic Party and its supporters in the media mostly had the strategy of blaming the GOP. Get people mad and then: Be mad at those guys. But stirring up anger is a problem:

1. There are a lot of people like me who turn away and refuse to listen when someone is directing us to be angry. Those ugly people over there are going to solve their problem whether I monitor their argument or not.

2. Then you have the kind of people who actually do take direction to the point where they become inflamed with anger. Do these hotheaded folks pay attention to the details of why these nasty people as opposed to those nasty people were more responsible for the thing they were induced to feel angry about?

Examine that key line again: "The GOP may be bearing the brunt of the public’s rage, but anger is also directed at Washington and government generally." There are 2 clauses, and if the second clause is the stronger proposition — which is likely — then the GOP came out ahead.
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* Yesterday, I almost ended my personal shutdown to do a post based on the old saying "Declare victory and get out." Do you know the origin of that phrase?

"Introducing Half-Chewed Cole Haan Wingtip by the emerging canine artist, Jack."

"This unique presentation of a meticulously destroyed dress shoe is the first of its kind by Jack."

The piece features absent toe and vamp portions of the shoe, removed through a secret chewing process, known only by the artist, with razor-like precision but requiring brute strength. The shoe has been severed painstakingly from the upper fine-grain leather through the inner lining to the bottom sole. Half-Chewed exhibits only the finest craftsmanship, as is characteristic of works by Jack. For the performance aspect of the piece, the artist ingested the dissected portion of the shoe. In a post-modern twist on interdisciplinary performance art, there was no audience for his act of passion.

The work has been interpreted by contemporary art critics as a statement on class in the wake of the American recession, a painful and complex subject for the modern American dog. Due to the nature of the artist's process, the collector who places the winning bid will no doubt hear gasps of "How in the hell?," "Oh my God," and "Was he using a chainsaw?" upon displaying the piece.

An eBay offering that sold for $378, brought to my attention by lemondog in yesterday's Blue Collar Café.