Friday, April 6, 2012

Best of the Week #54

Happy Friday to you all! This week was exponentially better than last – I’m still not running, but SpeedyKate and I signed a lease on an apartment!!! The relief of knowing that I now don’t have to spend all my lovely April nights and weekends apartment-hunting is HUGE…so yay! (I would post a picture…but this is the internet and so then again, maybe not.)


My most popular post this week was Cherry Cupcakes with Cherry Frosting.




This Best of the Week list of links is low on substance and high on silliness...oh well, I assume you don't mind!


This Tumblr is hilarious: "Texts from Hillary Clinton." I have no idea why Hillary wears dark sunglasses on a cargo plane...

I can’t believe this is real: Floating Cinema
  • This incredible floating cinema is located off Kudu Island in Thailand, originally built for the Film On The Rocks Festival earlier this year. At nightfall, guests are whisked away by a speedboat to arrive on a glowing raft in the middle of Nai Pi Lae Lagoon. 


I love this re-cap: “I Re-Watched Titanic So You Don’t Have To. You’re Welcome.” 
  • Here's the thing about Titanic, and the reason 15-year-old girls love it so much: James Cameron is a 15-year-old girl. All of the characters are either 15-year-old girls in disguise ("Parents just don't understand!" "Waaah, make the boat go faster!" "I know we literally met 20 minutes ago, but I love you with a suicidal fervor!"), or the kind of goofy caricatures that 15-year-old girls would write if we let 15-year-old girls write our blockbuster screenplays. 
  • Then Theoden, King of Rohan, drives the boat into this big iceberg
  • You know who are the only people that think the world owes them a round of applause? Fifteen-year-old girls and billionaire directors who own submarines. I rest my case.
"7 Things You Might Not Have Known About 'The Hunger Games.'


I have felt this way all along: 


"13 Simple Steps to Get You Through a Rough Day." I particularly enjoy #2 and #5. 





To those of you who write/read/like words: "Desperately Seeking Synonyms."
  • I hope I don't over-do this: Writers sometimes forget that the primary role of nouns is to paint a clear picture, and they pile up abstractions and leave us clueless as to the people, places, things or ideas they are writing about. 
  • And maybe on a good day manage this: The best writers combine killer nouns and adjectives, and they can make dawn — or any other sky — surprising. In “Bad Land,” a book about the settling and the abandonment of the Great Plains, the travel writer Jonathan Raban describes a lightning storm moving in from the west:“One could see it coming for an hour before it hit: the distant artillery flashes on a sky of deep episcopal purple.”That deep episcopal purple isn’t just original, it’s precise and carries rich associations.
If this whole "career path" I have going doesn't work out, I want to work for Serious Eats. "What Happens When You Order Every Mix-In at Cold Stone Creamery?"

  • I watched eagerly as the first few toppings—marshmallows, graham crackers, and M&Ms—were placed in the bowl. But it all grew more comical as they piled on. It was hard not to giggle when she put a full piece of spongecake with cherry topping in the mix; I laughed audibly when she added a full cookie's worth of cookie dough and a massive golf-ball-sized glob of peanut butter. Surprisingly, she did it all professionally—no laughs, no comments, no giggles. She also seemed to have no problem handling what became a massive mound of ice cream and toppings. I guess they have a good training program at Cold Stone.
And to follow that up, "Animals Talking in All Caps."



THEY OPENED A COLDSTONE CREAMERY OVER BY THE MALL! HALF OFF QUARTS ALL WEEK!
I’M VEGAN.
IS THAT LIKE … AN ALLERGY?
AN ALLERGY TO CRUELTY, YES.
WHATEVER. SOUNDS TO ME LIKE YOU’RE ALLERGIC TO DELICIOUSNESS. COOOOOOOLDSTOOOOOOONE CREAMERY, BOYYYYYYYYYYY! GET WITH IT!

And this exists: a truck with a 12,000 lb Idaho potato in back. Why? Who knows?



Hope everyone has a wonderful holiday weekend! I have Easter brunch plans involving these waffles, matzo brie (a bit of holiday confusion there, but just go with it), and this rhubarb crisp