Headlines from December 21, 2012
- Schwarzenegger bicycles Venice Beach just to inhale stray smoke, and other notes on weed in California.
- Overview of “sea change” taking place globally toward gay marriage.
- In case this applies to your late-December plans somehow: Is he cute or is he British? #tmn
- The most downloaded album this year was “L’apogee.” French consumer trends of 2012.
- Engineer behind music-recommendation software explains how it does and doesn’t work.
- Music critic Alex Ross’s annual holiday traditional: listening to “the ‘Messiah’ on Crack.” #audio
- Photographer documents South Africa’s “train churches.”
- Selected quotes from victims and saviors in this Christmas season’s 2,803 cases of baby Jesuses stolen and/or vandalized.
- Photos from around the world of people watching television.
- TMN asks thinkers, writers, and more to address “The Year That Was and Wasn’t.” #longreads
- Miranda Popkey on everything you need to know about football’s outdated “icing the kicker” strategy. #tmn
- Seinfeld wears hard soles onstage nowadays, and other details from his joke-writing process.
- Mike Nichols and Elaine May give first joint interview since breaking up 51 years ago.
- UPS delivered 28,000,000 packages yesterday, its biggest day on the calendar.
- Wanting and liking are governed by separate circuits in the brain; thus you can get extreme wanting without a corresponding increase in pleasure.
- Consequences of indulgence turned into tabloid/monster-movie deaths. #tmn #photography
- Doctor diagnoses injuries experienced by burglars in Home Alone.
- For those who might be keeping score, we just passed the 333rd consecutive month of global temperatures above the 20th-century average.
- One in eight Americans believed the world would end today.
- Portraits of people preparing for the Mayan doomsday, and/or the end of civilization. #photography
- Chart shows dates when the world was predicted to end by various prognosticators.
- The Times goes big and interactive on the Stevens Pass avalanche at Tunnel Creek.
- See also: Outside’s accounting of the elite skiiers’ disaster.
- Semi-automatics sold out at many Wal-Marts; Wal-Mart will keep selling them, but Dick’s Sporting Goods has stopped.
- The problem of gun violence is not complex; the solution is very simple; we just need courage. #opinions
- Discovery Channel cans Ted Nugent and his gun show.
- Bret Easton Ellis lengthily explains his Twitter problems while apologizing to Kathryn Bigelow.
- Toobin on how the second amendment never gave individuals a right to own or carry weapons until the NRA came along.
- See also: Adam Gopnik on the science behind gun control.
- How one shotgun-loving West Texas girl learned to hate handguns and assault weapons for their ease of criminal use.
- Brief assessment of contemporary liberals’ central vice: thinking everyone can be taken care of.
- Using meritocratic arguments to reassign marginal products. See also: Primary vice assessed for contemporary conservatives.
- Video of eagle snatching child found to be an elaborate hoax.
- Hollywood height chart shows many actors you may not have realized were short.
- The xx covers Wham!‘s festive classic, “Last Christmas.” #video
- TMN-endorsed holiday shopping: Sympathy for the Deviled Eggs, an e-book of our greatest holiday hits.
- Related: Leslie Harpold’s oldie-but-goodie guide on how to write a thank-you note.