She lost me at the end of the interview, however, with this WTF nugget (italics mine):
The world is being taken over by the technological memes, and if we don’t understand what’s happening we are not going to be able to cope with it. The stress on a human brain, the way our kids’ brains are torn in 10 bits at once doing multitasking, the pressures to take drugs to stay awake so you can process more memes all day . . .
Um, no. I’m pretty sure I don’t know anyone who’s that unbalanced. If I did, my recommendation would be to turn it off. Turn it all off.
Of the twenty science fiction novels io9 believes will change your life, I’ve only read four (The Dispossessed, Consider Phlebas, Cryptonomicon, and Perdido Street Station) but I agree that they are worthy candidates. To this list I wish to add two more titles:
While craving chicken fried steak at RO’s Outpost. . . .
In the time I’ve given myself between writing “The End” and starting the final edit of my manuscript an interesting idea’s popped up (and demands to be taken seriously). All I’ll reveal right now: sci-fi author; con-man; 1970s Southern California.
If I were forced to choose one single dish to eat for the rest of my life it’d be phở.
Record producer Teo Macero died. He’s best known for producing Miles Davis in the late ’60s, early ’70s. Bitches Brew is essential listening.
I’m all about getting people to read. The idea behind Dailylit (sending books in installments via e-mail or RSS feed), however, strikes me as depressingly sterile. Where’s the love . . . the intimacy? (Link via the Guardian).
Quote of the day, courtesy of The Quotations Page and Kurt Vonnegut: “There is a tragic flaw in our precious Constitution, and I don’t know what can be done to fix it. This is it: Only nut cases want to be president.”
The Times has a wonderful article on Toumani Diabaté whose new album, The Mandé Variations (recorded in two hours and consisting of eight one-take, no-overdub instrumentals), comes out 25 February. Having recently seen Diabaté in concert I can assure you he lives up to the hype.
As hereditary musicians, our knowledge has been passed from father to son for 700 years, each one playing a little differently, moving the music on. My grandfather played differently from my father and he introduced the idea of playing solos. I have grown up in a different time, with rock music. I have a different groove.
A different groove? Yeah, well he does name the Scorpions as an influence.
LAVON, Tex. — Once little more than a speed trap 25 miles northeast of Dallas, this town started to boom about a year ago, as turreted stone castlettes and modest brick bungalows began springing up in what had been wheat fields. . . . Land values soared, the population hit 2,500, and by November, the city was finally flush enough to afford a full-time police department. But that was when the knocking stopped.
For many of us, however, the word Lavon will always spring to mind the word lake, joining in a sort-of portmanteau that tripped off the tongue when as teenagers we searched for places to party: lakelavon.
The early ’80s . . . subdivisions yet to encroach on much of North Texas. Cheap beer, skunk weed, and car stereos blasting Rush.