AP Exam Spoiler Alert

Last year, some goof got a bunch of Facebookers to write WE ARE SPARTA! on their free-responses. This year's theme, according to a new Facebook group, is "Why so serious?" The idea is to write the phrase in your response booklet, then cross it out so it can't be considered part of your actual response. I do not condone this behavior (but I did get a chuckle out of it at last year's reading).

Spelling matterz

Let this be a lesson to future criminals: If you plan a crime, make sure you spell "POLICE" correctly on your fake police vehicle. 

Some inexpensive spring break staycation ideas

Best bang for your buck can be found at Calvin College this weekend: It's there biannual Festival of Faith and Music. For just $20, you can take in The Hold Steady, arguably the best bar band in America. Lead man Craig Finn discusses the role of faith in songwriting in this GR Press interview. 

In addition, Princeton's Dr. Cornel West will speak on Friday night - just $10 to hear one of the most brilliant men on the planet. If you can't make his speech, check out his books Race Matters or Democracy Matters. 

Column of the Day: Terribly Punny

From the "I Wish I'd Written It" category, Joseph Tartakovsky's guest op-ed in the NY Times is right up my alley. Get ready to groan.

Column of the Week: "And the Pursuit of Happiness"

Sometimes an essay is more effective if it doesn't look like an essay. Maria Kalman's piece, published this week in the NY Times, is brilliant in color and content.

Goodbye Delaware, hello economic recovery!

So goes the Republican economic recovery plan, as imagined by Nate Silver of fivethirtyeight.com. (Warning: Not suitable for persons who want tax cuts for the wealthy or those without a sense of humor.)

If you think a ban on smoking is bad. . .

. . . don't spit in Dubai. 

This week in Wordle

Wordle allows users to create word clouds by pasting a document, a URL, or an RSS feed. Here's what this week's posts look like, Wordle-style

Spectrum's cardiac unit is on stand-by

If having a heart attack is on your summer itinerary, the West Michigan Whitecaps are ready to help. For $20, you get a 4-pound burger that includes:

five beef patties, five slices of cheese, nearly a cup of chili and liberal doses of salsa and corn chips, all on an 8-inch sesame-seed bun.

Where the Wild Things Are - The Trailer

The classic Maurice Sendak book comes to the big screen this October, directed by Spike Jonze, with an adapted screenplay by Dave Eggers (What is the What). The music in this clip is "Wake Up" off of Arcade Fire's brilliant CD, Funeral. Enjoy.

Coming soon to a CD near you

Ben Folds' next project is a collection of his songs sung a capella by university groups from around the country. Here's a taste:

So long, George

Former Detroit Tiger George Kell, Hall of Famer and longtime TV play-by-play man, died today at age 86. Tiger fans will remember his Arkansas drawl: "Joo-lie" for July, "Sin-si-nat-tuh" for Cincinnati, and so many more. I remember walking along the concourse of Tiger Stadium as a kid when a man tapped me on the shoulder and said, "S'cuse me, son." It was Kell and team president Jim Campbell, moving through the crowd before the start of a game.

Mt. Redoubt responds to Gov. Jindal

You may recall Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal's response after President Obama's speech to Congress last month. In it, he condemned the wasteful spending in the stimulus bill, including a whole bunch of moolah to monitor a volcano in Alaska. This week, the volcano responded, big time.

Set the TiVo: Gandolf as King Lear!

Sir Ian McKellen plays the man "more sinned against than sinning" this Wednesday night on Great Performances. A preview can be found here.

Booth bites the bullet

Another sign of the times: Booth Newspapers announced the consolidation of three Michigan newspapers (which will publish only three times a week) and the closing of The Ann Arbor News. In addition, The Press is reducing wages. It's only a matter of time before we read about shutdowns of papers in Muskegon, Grand Haven, and Jackson - and we'll read about it on the Internet.

Life in an echo chamber

While the shutdown of one major newspaper after another might simply be a sign of the times, Nicholas Kristof explores the danger of reading only information that suits our personal preference in "The Daily Me": 

The decline of traditional news media will accelerate the rise of The Daily Me, and we’ll be irritated less by what we read and find our wisdom confirmed more often. The danger is that this self-selected “news” acts as a narcotic, lulling us into a self-confident stupor through which we will perceive in blacks and whites a world that typically unfolds in grays.

Another one bites the dust

Last month, The Rocky Mountain News left Denver with one major newspaper. Today, The Seattle Post-Intelligencer published its last edition. Tomorrow, it becomes an online-only news source, with just 20 staffers (down from over 160). Which Michigan paper will be the first to fold? According to a report yesterday on Michigan Radio, three papers - The Flint Journal, The Saginaw News, and The Bay City Times - might reduce publication to three days a week.

Meanwhile, The Grand Rapids Press has dropped "Get Fuzzy" from its comics page. Now there's a reason to cancel a subscription.

Introducing the Lit Lounge PODCAST!

To download the podcast, go here: Download this episode (right click and save)

otherwise, just click below and let me know what you think.


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Haven't they suffered enough?

Jay Leno to do a free show for Detroit's unemployed.

Feel the Illinoize - Sufjan's in the remix

Tipped off to this by Paste: Sufjan's "Feel the Illinoise" mashed up with Outkast, Pete Rock, and others. Download it here - free. 

Best reporting of the week

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

CNBC Gives Financial Advice

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Joke of the Day

Don't make Barack angry. . .

How to make your parents go nuts this weekend

Go here. Turn up the computer speakers. Type. 

Study break with Kutiman

Our 2nd trimester is, at long last, over, and the Lit Loungers have a hard-earned day off tomorrow. Celebrate their three-day weekend with this audio/video mashup from Kutiman:

Make Manny's Money! In just 300+ years!

It would take me over 300 years at my current salary to make what Manny Ramirez will pull in this year with the L.A. Dodgers. Meanwhile, he'll "earn" my salary every .48 games. Yeah, this recession is tough on everybody. If you'd like to compare your meager earnings to Manny's, visit this page on ESPN.

A message for Congressmen Ehlers and Hoekstra

Congressmen,

You are two of Michigan's representatives who have not added their names as co-sponsors of the Clean Water Protection Act, but I encourage you to do so today. Yes, I know, it's not going to please everybody (especially Consumers Energy, who contributes to your campaigns), but it will guarantee clean water in Appalachia for residents affected by mountain top removal.

(Mountain top removal, you may recall, is the incredibly cool way to get that "clean" coal from the mountains by blowing them to smithereens! As a result, all sorts of sludge is dumped into fresh waterways throughout Appalachia. The flora and fauna will return - in about 10,000 years.)

Congressman Ehlers, I tried to meet with you last summer about this issue, but your handlers in Washington DC explained that it was already too risky for you to co-sponsor a weaker bill, one that merely stops coal companies from further destruction, but doesn't require them to clean up the mess they've made.

I spent a week in West Virginia, listening to stories of real people who are really suffering because of our willingness to look the other way so more coal can be shipped around the globe. Once you see the beauty of this area, and the devastation caused by mountain top removal, you can't help but try to stop the destruction.

Unless, of course, it isn't in your political interest to do so. It should be.

Sincerely,

Jeff Larsen

p.s. Since the chance of Rep. Ehlers or Rep. Hoekstra reading this is slim to none, I encourage you to contact them.

A Tale of Two Hurlers

Last year, John Odom, a minor-league pitcher, gained notoriety for the first player to be traded for ten bats. At first, he played along with the deal and endured the chants of "Bat Man" and "Bat Boy" when coming to the mound. That didn't last long. He quit before the end of the season, and when his former manager tried contacting Odom in January to play ball this year, Odom didn't pick up his call.

Odom had died in November from an accidental overdose.

Matt McCarthy, on the other hand, left the minors and graduated from Yale and Harvard on the way to becoming a doctor. His memoir, Odd Man Out, depicts his year "playing with racist, steroids-taking teammates, pitching for a profane, unbalanced manager and observing obscene behavior and speech that in some ways reinforce the popular image of wild professional ballplayers." 

But, in the recent tradition of other "creative nonfiction" writers, it seems his story doesn't quite check out. Fortunately, a number of sports writers have noticed McCarthy's errors before Oprah made him her next Book of the Month selection.

About those crayons in my classroom. . .

Before my beloved Axis of Evil thinks about returing my ballpoint pens and taking away my crayons, they should look at Christian Faur's artwork. All crayons. Cool.