Roundup

Written by Edward Champion

Posted on June 2, 2008
Filed Under Roundup

While real gamers blow shit up in a first-person shooter that taps serious system resources or carjack hapless NPCs in Grand Theft Auto 4, Steven Spielberg has decided to offer the world a bunch of cutesy goddam animals for a video game he has “created,” which also appears to be something of a Jenga ripoff. If you ask me, this ridiculous game looks as fun as watching a Care Bears DVD through the shaky fog of a Saturday morning hangover. I’d beseech a dentist to perform a root canal on me rather than play a cowardly and ridiculous video game called Boom Blox.
I have not yet seen the Lost season finale because I cannot stream the damn episode through the ABC website through a wi-fi connection. Now this is something that I can do with NBC’s The Office website, which doesn’t have a ridiculous interface that loads within your browser window. And I can’t download a torrent until I have DSL. The moral of the story? Learn to design a website right. Also, don’t move while a “major television event” has aired and everybody and his mother wants to ask you what you thought about it.
Wendy Cope would like to take your poet laureate plaudit and stick it where the sun don’t shine. Never mind that this would make Cope the first female poet laureate in the UK. She don’t want it! Here is a list of honors that Wendy Cope does desire: professional dominatrix, leader of a world empire, short-order cook, and five-star general. But don’t make her a poet laureate! Just don’t! Cope will kick your ass if you even dare let loose the “luh” from your lips!
Here’s a helpful hint to publishing executives: if you say you’re “at the tipping point,” a term that very few outside of burnouts in the marketing department take seriously, then chances are that you don’t know what you’re talking about. What is a tipping point these days but a confession that you don’t really have a business plan and you never really had one to begin with?
So McSweeney’s is now applying its twee bullshit to poetry. I’m with Shane. I don’t give a damn either. But this stunt just makes them look silly.
Jeff VanderMeer has uncovered a science fiction tribute to the infamous game that comes with Windows. Or he has something of possible substance to say.
Now wait a minute. It’s Bill Clinton who’s calling other people “sleazy,” “dishonest,” “slimy” and a “scumbag?”
Paul DiFilippo on J.G. Ballard.
Another reason to love Peter Greenaway: the man wants to project genitalia onto “The Last Supper” in an effort to link “8,000 years of art and 112 years of cinema.” Greenaway also has plans to have cows take a dump upon the Mona Lisa in an effort to unite “8,000 years of art and two years of agriculture.”
Ian McEwan unveiled an excerpt of his unfinished novel at the Hay literary festival, only to discover that he had unintentionally taken a bit from Douglas Adams.
Who the hell do you think you are, Julie Buff? Waiting around for an editor? Yeah, it sucks. But you keep writing material and you keep sending things in. Do you know how many emails I’ve sent in the last month to editors that have gone unanswered? Probably around twenty. Do you think I let this stop me? So I feel your pain. But if you want to be a writer, you sit on your ass and write. You produce and you keep sending things out. If you don’t want to wait six months, then you send a note to the editor that you’re submitting the piece elsewhere. And you keep on doing this until you get published on a regular basis, or on some level that you feel is acceptable. And you don’t let anybody stop you. (via Slushpile)
And, sweet Jesus, Sissy Spacek recorded a song protesting John and Yoko’s Two Virgins cover. Really, celebrities, if you’re going to record any protest songs along these lines, direct your energies to vapid musicians like Sting and Michael Bolton. These are the people you should sing about. These are the people who should be banned from every known recording studio in the world. (via Hey Dullblog)

Comments

4 Responses to “Roundup”

Steven Augustine on June 3rd, 2008 7:25 am

“…direct your energies to vapid musicians like Sting and Michael Bolton. These are the people you should sing about.”

Sting was actually pretty cool (between Quadrophenia and Every Breath), and who knows how *uncool* Lennon would have become, had he lived? “Starting Over” was surely an ominous indication of possible things to come.
Kevin on June 3rd, 2008 7:07 pm

Carjacking? GTA IV is all about the cabs, yo. They cut hours off the leveling.
DrMabuse on June 3rd, 2008 7:18 pm

Alas, Kevin, not having a console, I’m waiting for the PC version!
Darby Dixon III on June 4th, 2008 1:10 am

Boom Blox actually is ridiculously fun. I’ll vouch for it.