Here's some interesting thoughts on the Hobbit. Makes some interesting points about Tolkein's original version of the story and the later (post-LOTR) material he wrote. I must admit that I haven't read any of the "Unfinished Tales" so I maybe shouldn't just be assuming that this take on the stories is valid. But it seems like it is and I'm gonna run with it cos it's an interesting take. I like this idea that the original version has maybe a bit of an edge over the later (retconned) stories because it doesn't insist that everything has to have a deeper meaning. It's just a story about some dwarves and a hobbit who go to fight a dragon with some crazy old wizard. There's no grand overarching strategy in the war against Mordor. Not that there's anything wrong with that. But I agree with the Punkadiddle take that not everything needs to be fraught with meaning.
And, just to go completely leftfield on y'all, I think that's one of the more annoying things about Tebowmania -- the insistence that everything means something. It can't just be a guy playing football, it's all got to signify, to tell us important stuff about important stuff. Yeah, right, whatever. Two words: Kordell. Stewart. Next time someone gets on ESPN to bloviate for five minutes about the massive cultural significance about the unconventional successes of Kordell Stewart, let me know.

Following up on recent topics. Contractor work is done and house is almost restored to order. Happy with the work done and that it's done. Hey, hey, Tampa is now tied for the wildcard. Two games left to see who gets into the playoffs. Go Rays!

And, in unrelated but perhaps even more exciting news there's a new Daniel Pinkwater novel coming out soon. If that wasn't enough, it's being serialized online for freefreefree. Another chapter every Monday. I'm really enjoying it so far. I don't read as much as I'd like to (it's so easy for me to get distracted and lose focus) so it's nice to have this coming out serially.

For reasons longer-to-explain than they are interesting, there's been an ongoing series of posts over on Sullivan's blog at the Atlantic dealing with Calvin and Hobbes and the similarities (if any) between the comic strip and the movie Fight Club. I know... that's old news in internets time but Sullivan follows his own calendar. Some of the stuff written or linked over there has been interestingly meta but too much of it has gotten kinda grad student/lit crit mad. And way too much of it has, to my way of thinking, missed the point and focused on the question of whether Hobbes is "real" or "just a stuffed tiger." So I was pleased to see a post that quoted Watterson on "the so called 'gimmick' of [the] strip." And I'm not just saying that because Watterson's statement supports the way I always saw the strip. Well, maybe I am a little bit but it's always nice when one's personal interpretation of a work is defended by the author. I'm sorta surprised that these arguments about realness are still going on 5+ years after Watterson laid it out. I guess authorial intent really is off the table. But anyway, even if you don't care about any of the meta-analysis, the Sully post includes one of my fave early C&H strips.

Was geeked to see this (on boing²) the other day: Destroy All Movies, a big whonkin' guide to "movies with punks in them."
Perhaps you're wondering why I'm so geeked about this. Well, I just watched Repo Man last month. (and it gets funnier every single time!) Back in the 80s I used track of movie appearances by Lee Ving (of Fear) as a sure sign of cheeseball cinema brilliancy. And, yes, I do believe I recognize that cover art on the book, from the ridiculously bad punxploitation flick Class of 1984. I should probably google that and make sure I'm not mis-remembering but, hey, no guts no glory. I have no idea how many other people constitute the target market for this book but I'm totally in. Expect I'll be ordering a copy before the week is out.

and yet, I blame society...

Excellent piece by Anthony Bourdain with thoughts on Harvey Pekar. The Cleveland/Pekar/American Splendor episode of No Reservations was excellent, altho I was a bit suprised that Bourdain singled it out as his fave episode they've ever done. I have not read enough of Pekar's work over the years. I should correct that. Speaking of Bourdain, here's he is being interviewed by Jay Rayner. I've read middling reviews of Medium Raw but I'm sure I'll get around to reading it eventually. Bourdain's coming back to the area this fall, but we'll probably skip that. Altho his talk that we saw at DPAC was a lot of fun I kinda don't feel the need to see him again in another big fancy concert hall. If it was gonna be a different format or something, I'd be more interested.

Here's an interesting piece by Bill Bryson about stuff. It's an excerpt from his new book At Home which seems to be Bryson wanders around his house and writes about the stuff he finds there. I'm assuming the book goes into some actual detail about, say, why forks have four tines. As opposed to just saying "oh well, no one knows... hey, look at that cruet." I'm kind of a sucker for books and articles like this -- history of the pencil or salt or whatever. It occured to me at some point that Schott's Miscellany was sort of the real life version of Strange Facts Known By Few.

I've been trying to keep up with the fracas going on between Macmillan and Amazon. I mean, mostly it's just a couple of big business fighting it out which, right, why should I care. Here's a good overview from Charlie Stross. Also the expected witty and insightful ranting from John Scalzi. I've been thinking about why my sympathies pretty much immediately went to the Macmillan side. I mean, I use Amazon all the time and am generally pretty pleased with the overall experience of shopping there. It wasn't until I read John August's take that things snapped into focus. Amazon's strategy of de-listing all books published by Macmillan in both electronic and print forms is, in fact, a dick move. It's such a dick move, in fact, that it almost renders the merits of their stance moot. I kinda don't care whether the Amazon case has merits because they way they handled it was so classless and petty and just, well, dickish. It's not like I'm gonna start boycotting Amazon but I am planning to spend more time researching my buying options in the future and not just use them as a 1-stop all purpose shopping location.

Weather update. Surprisingly, there was still snow on the ground this morning. Well, honestly, it was more a crunchy mix of ice & snow. But still better than soggy grass and mud.

Hey, hey... new Anthony Bourdain book next summer. That should be fun.

Enjoy this while you can as I'm sure it'll get pulled down sooner rather than later. It's "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer Mambo" by the Billy May Orchestra with footage from the classic Rankin-Bass show. In the words of Esquivel, feliz navidad, baby.

This morning I did probably my last radio show before the holidays. I mean, there's always a chance of emergency subbing but I'm not planning to do the show next Thursday (Xmas Eve). So this was my chance to bust out the holiday jams. But because we're 8 days out from Xmas, I didn't wanna roll with 2 full hours of Xmas music. So I did a regular playlisst show except that 12 of my 15 non-playlist tracks were seasonal faves. Well, some of my faves anyway (Dino, the Roches, Cool John Ferguson, Acid Xmas). And I'm rather ridiculously pleased with how well it all hung together. My only regret is that I forgot to bring my copy of "Christmas in Hollis."

In other holiday news, here's an excellent interview with the Rifftrax crew in which they discuss their least favorite Christmas movies.

From the Dept. of Greedy Acquisitiveness Dept., here's the latest thing I wantwantwant: the Fat Duck Cookbook. This is a smaller version of the Big Fat Duck Cookbook which was Beard-nominated. I don't tend to go for cookbooks that are mostly full of recipes I'll never make. But I love Dave McKean and the smaller version apparently retains most of his art from the original and even has a new McKean cover. Plus it'll keep my Harold McGee and Hervé This books company on the shelf.