Square Pegs

Yes, it’s hard to believe, but if she were still alive, Ayn Rand would be facing the big 1-0-0. Yet to us, she’ll always remain young and idealistic. Cult-like followers aside, we remain baffled by the continued popularity of Rand. Oh sure, we get the whole rite of passage thing — we did it ourself. But it’s sort of like leaping off your garage roof during your superhero phase…you get over it. Hopefully before you actual take flight. Still, far be it for us to miss a celebration. Considering the Last Romantic, Ayn Rand, at 100

We realize we beat up on our local paper, but, in all fairness, we read it regularly and feel it’s our right and responsibility. And, again to be fair, we beat up on news outlets we don’t consume regularly. All’s fair when it comes to making fun of the press. As part of our regular routine, we read the Los Angeles Times Book Review section from cover to cover*. Then, for fun, we look at the local bestsellers. If we were the type to do those charts and graphs, we’d see there is no correlation between the reviews and charts.

If you are the type who craves constant mental stimulation, well, probably you should stop reading this. We’re not going to get much deeper than the surface here. Why? Because we’re talking about Stupid Human Tricks — or, why sometimes it’s better not to sue. One inevitable drawback of the right to sue is the fact that people take advantage of this privilege. This is why we must have ridiculous notices on commercials, etc. telling us not to try this at home. You wonder who would, then realize it is the nature of our species to do things other animals

As it turns out, the novel will not die a lonely death. Its cousins, the motion picture and the pop single, are on life support as well. As with fiction, these arts forms are simply unable to compete in the modern world. Yes, this clearly explains their omnipresence. Today we present a theory: when someone proclaims the death of something, it really means the death of how they like things. Does this lessen our fascination with the subject? Of course not. We remain awestruck by the time and energy put into these stories. Is the blockbuster the end of cinema?

What with one thing and the other, we ended up in a situation where we were joking about the mother’s (non-existent) blog with a nurse. What was supposed to be facetious became uncomfortable when the nurse asked how often the mother updated her blog. See, it wasn’t that the ICU nurse was curious about the blog — it was that she assumed the mother was posting hourly*. Talk about lowering expectations. If anything, blogs are proof that the written word is alive and well. Also that our most profound desire to express our deepest thoughts also coincides with such events

Is it us, or do a lot of this week’s new ideas seem off? Normally, we can get excited about something over the course of seven days. Nothing’s grabbing us. See, we like the idea of making book awards more of an event, more prominent, more…well, popular, but somehow using the People’s Choice Awards as a model doesn’t quite work for us. Maybe this is one of those concepts that needs to gestate in our brain for a few days. However, we are working with our new positive attitude this week (hmm, coincidence? Possibly not.), and will say that we

We love science — especially when it tries to explain art. And only a man would come up with a cockamamie (ha!) reason for why a statue seems to be less-than-endowed. Yeah, he was scared. Sure. And the moon is made of blue cheese. Anyone ever heard of anatomically correct? Was David scared stiff of Goliath?

Okay, so we don’t have a poetic mind. Sue us. We know we can’t do this article on the London Library justice, and we’re not going to try. You can read it for yourself. It will do your heart some good. Literary culture as we have known it and understood it since scribes were writing on papyrus is not the bonus of civilisation but intrinsic to civilisation itself, and the printed book, mysteriously, is the form that turns out to be irreplaceable. In the great libraries or the bookshelf at home, knowledge roots itself and imagination flowers. The availability of

Though it will not come as a surprise to anyone here, it seems that living with a writer is not easy. Honestly, sometimes the husband wants to talk when it’s quite clear we’re thinking. Oh sure, it looks like napping, but as long as one brain cell is pulsing, we will deny the charge. We will say, however, that every review we read about Living With a Writer gives us pause. First off, we know a lot of writers and very few are able to indulge their inner helpless child. Maybe it’s because so many of the writers we know

Now, don’t get us wrong, we like having far too much information. If we’re overwhwelmed by a subject, we’re happy (generally, because this means we’re so busy “researching” that we’re not “working”). But, let’s be honest — it’s hard enough getting people to put alt attributes on images. How can anyone expect articles filled with context-driven messages? And what happens when someone goes overboard and every conjunction has a context menu? Yes, the web can be used to provide endless avenues of discovery, but, maybe it’s the print reader in us or our natural crankiness, but there’s a point where