The Morning News

Thursday, November 5, 2009

Currently: The ultimate lunchtime entertainment for map nerds in need of brain-teasing: A Cloud of Atlases. http://tmne.ws/14294
about 7 hours ago
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January 28, 2002

Fudge!

I’ve been recently re-reading David Sedaris’s Me Talk Pretty One Day, a book that my friend Dmitri gave me in Italy two years ago and had me laughing out loud – crying even – on a crowded beach, lots of Italian hunks and hunk-esses disturbed by the barking American.

It all started with this story: ‘You Can’t Kill The Rooster.’ If you haven’t read it, do so now and be careful: it’s hilarious.

Incidentally, here’s a great interview with Sedaris.

Q: You work very hard. S: And I get a reward. I get to go on a book tour. And 200 people are going to stand in line and they’re going to tell me how much they love me. That’s not work. That’s great. I don’t believe it. You can’t let it affect you. But it’s just fun. And people will tell you whatever you want to know. Like you’ll say: Are those your real breasts? [Laughs] And they’ll answer any question.
Also, from a Playboy interview with Sedaris:

[My sister] Amy and I did a play this winter in New York, and Amy’s character is sort of an Amish woman, but we don’t say Amish. She’s a Squeamish woman. She lives in this pre-industrial community and she leaves and goes out into the world for the first time. At one point, she’s in a doctor’s office. Never been to a doctor’s office. And we see this screen, the doctor’s screen. And Amy comes from behind the screen and hands the doctor a cup. And the doctor says, ‘Oh, Liz, I’m sorry. When I said for you to go to the bathroom, I meant for you to urinate.’ And I laughed out loud when I wrote that, just the image of somebody defecating into a little paper cup.

TODAY’S FEATURE

Cloud of Atlases

Maps without legends may not be immediately informative, but determining what they represent is extremely fun. If you’re into that kind of thing, THE EDITORS have a game for you.

OUR MAN IN BOSTON

The Party Line

Number-one bestselling New York Times author Glenn Beck brandishes a new money rake.

INFINITE SUMMER

Dracula

Sponsored by TMN, the online book club reads the vampire novel that sired them all.
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