Listicles' presentation was certainly well organized, or at least well enumerated, and for bookish types like us a welcome invitation to be who we are. But at the end, we still felt somehow like we'd missed a lot, or like maybe there really wasn't as much there as we thought when we clicked the link. |
While we generally look back fondly at Hollywood's Golden Era, Karloff has a point: maybe this is where it all began to end, the public purchasing a wretch of a revived corpse that comes to destroy both creator and creation. Maybe the medium is the monstrosity. |
We're not sure what any of this means, but it sure was tasty. Postmodernism in a snack-cake is perhaps the most honest kind, if odd agglomerations of artificial flavors, artificial colors, and simple sugars could be considered acts of speech. In the end, it's a celebration of schlock, and who can disagree with that? |
When America had but a handful of ways to determine what was popular, all the manipulation that went on behind the scenes could be easily elided. Now it is the story, a mythological tale of how myths get made, buzzing in your pocket 24/7/365, folly integrating self and hype. The underworld has become us. |
Part self-help, part literary analysis, Bigtail's approach was both approachable and and anarchic, a spot of dangerous fun in the otherwise dreary and rule-bound world of academia. But in the end, we were still left with a feeling that the whole thing was maybe a scam, if not totally lobotomized. |
Kudos to Gruber-Meyer for not going full-on VR with this one, but also brava for adding the high-touch visual approach to a classic late 19th and early 20th century tradition. The social slights and friendly buffoonery never felt so down-home. |
Whiskerface, a colleage of Cheesysox at the Center for Stevens Studies at Jar, Tennessee, had at least few compunctions about plying her attendees with food. Or, at least, with fried confections. There was definitely nothing metaphorical about the pounds we put on. |
If Whiskerface's presentation left us full and fat, Tipsypuss's just left us ‘faced. But if that's what it takes to survive this political era, pass the bottle, please. |
Life-Hacking Literature: Kindle-ing your iPad and Bringing Fire to the Amazon, or Reading as a Memes to Survive the End of History
Shelley Winters' Frankenstein: The New New Prometheus and the Golden Fleece of 20th Century American Entertainment
Howling at the Moonpies: Ginsberg, Zappa, and the Rise of the Sugar Rushcake Southern Vortex Sutra
U-Rip-a-Deez: The Top 40, Hades, Texting, and Me, a Memoir of Media Convergence
The Randle Handle: Gaining Control of Mental Health via Applied McMurphy-ism, a "Let's Do It!" Checklist
A Room with a Viewmaster: The Comedy of Manners as Personal 3-D Slideshow
13 Ways of Looking at a Cronut: Food Metaphors in Wallace Stevens as a Key to Contemporary Cuisine, a Tasting Party 
Lordy, Jim: Conrad, Comey and the Critique of Corporatism Turned Covert Power, a Deposition and Drinking Game