What I Have Today

I can tell you that it's Emily Dickinson's birthday today and that I did not go for a hike over the weekend, due to shopping and projects and snowing. I said this: 

And Emily said this: 

There's a certain Slant of light

There's a certain Slant of light,
Winter Afternoons—
That oppresses, like the Heft
Of Cathedral Tunes—

Heavenly Hurt, it gives us—
We can find no scar,
But internal difference,
Where the Meanings, are—

None may teach it—Any—
'Tis the Seal Despair—
An imperial affliction
Sent us of the Air—

When it comes, the Landscape listens—
Shadows—hold their breath—
When it goes, 'tis like the Distance
On the look of Death—

Friday Unrelated Information

1. This is pretty much the best scathing restaurant review I've read, of Guy Fieri's new restaurant in Times Square, full of utterances like: 

Mr. Fieri not only serves truly horrible-tasting food, an awkward origami of clashing aleatory flavors, but he serves this punishing food emulsified with a bombastic recasting of deep-fried American myth.

 and

When they come, the fries are a sticky supernatural orange simulacrum of a former potato, fried to paralysis.

2. The Rifftrax live Birdemic screening didn't disappoint. I leave you with "slpnls":

Shock And Terror...And Awesome

I think if you've been reading for a while you know that I love Mystery Science Theater 3000. I saw the final seasons on TV in high school and then rediscovered it online, along with Rifftrax (a new venture with Mike and the voices of Servo and Crow riffing current movies as a voiceover track).

Well, the Rifftrax crew is riffing the 2010 "hit" Birdemic: Shock And Terror live and broadcast to theaters tonight, and I'm going. Check out the official trailer (yes, the official trailer) to see what I have in store for me, and then imagine the possibilites for riffing:



That's all for now, though. I gotta go, I hear a mountain lion! 

Friday Unrelated Information

1. I'm going to see this little guy tonight:
Yes, he's sitting in a pot, and he looks so unsure about it, he needs a hug from his auntie.

2. How about a little MST3K for Friday? I feel like Gypsy all the time when I deal with people:

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Let's just say, hypothetically, that you are going on a date for the first time in 4.5 years. What do you do? How do you act? Fortunately, Mystery Science Theater 3000 has found us this educational film, "What to Do On a Date."


"How about a weenie roast?" "Nick, NO!"

2. Related but not as funny, this essay about a first dance could have been written by me, down to the dress I was so convinced I had to have and the inevitable disappointment:
I cried because I’d believed with all my being that once I put on eyeshadow and a turquoise dress, I’d turn into a heroine of any of the slumber-party movies I’d watched. [...] I cried because at that moment, in a gymnasium decorated with crepe paper so that the gifted kids could feel not just smart but glamorous, I began to understand that not everything would come easy to me, and that some forms of failure could be intangible, inexpressible, and nonetheless undeniable. I cried because I wanted to be seen, and because nobody was ready or willing to see me.

3. And unrelated: Happy birthday to our friend W.A. Mozart.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Stephen Hawking is turning 70 soon and so is giving interviews. In one with the New Scientist, he was asked, "What do you think most about during the day?" and answered, "Women. They are a complete mystery."

I know it's just a soundbite, and I know we're supposed to think he's being a charming old man, but I have to think of Carl Sagan making the argument to include women in The Explorers Club:
But we presumably are adults, with a special responsibility for interacting with all humans on this planet.

Maybe we can think of each other as human adults first, and then genders second? You've done way more complicated things, Dr. Hawking.


2. I bet you were just thinking, "How come there isn't a Tumblr for Mystery Science Theater ephemera?" Well, there is. And it's called F** Yeah MST3K. And it's full of gems like this:

Friday Unrelated Information

1b. I'm happy to report that the "Yoga for the Winter Blues" video was really helpful. I got farther into a backbend than I ever have before (which is still not very far) and realized that if I can do that, I can easily survive onerous meetings or a weather inversion.

1b. I've turned into one of those sports people. I think I get why they run marathons now.

2. Happy birthday to Jane Austen and Arthur C. Clarke today.

3. Here's another MST3K Christmas song, because it's absurd and because Christmas is next weekend:


"Hey, you keep Christmas in your way and let me keep it in mine."