The Adventures of Accordion Guy in the 21st Century

A journalist friend of mine once described Time magazine’s approach as one of “sustained obviousness”. It’s an approach that helps it sell magazines and get online eyeballs, but one that also favors writers who specialize in crafting link-bait-y, sound-bitey phrases rather than more rounded, well-read ones. Hence their recent goof-up in their recent article, These Are the 100 Most-Read Female Writers in College Classes, where they listed Evelyn Waugh.

Evelyn — pronounced EVE-uh-linn — Waugh was a man. Lots of people make this mistake, which was used to great effect in this scene from Lost in Translation:

…and Time magazine contributor David Johnson (who wrote the article) can at least take a little comfort in knowing that even an erudite publication, the Times Literary Supplement, referred to him as “Miss Waugh”. Not to be too charitable, I must point out that this is before Waugh became well-known. Johnson may also be surprised that Waugh’s first wife was a woman named Evelyn. (I understand Waugh’s experience, having had an all-too-short dalliance with a girl who went by “Joey”.)

Time has since corrected the goof-up, even noting it at the bottom of the article. I think we should all pinky-swear not to tell them about Alice Cooper, so we can have a hilarious article about the top women in rock.

Bonus literary supplement: Sir John Gielgud reads Brideshead Revisited

With the possible exception of Graham Greene, it doesn’t get more well-written, stoically English, and Catholic guilt-trippy than Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited. Here’s an abridged version read by Sir John Gielgud — enjoy!

This is coming to Tampa in May:

Here’s a photo that might give you a better idea of its scale:

Click the photo to see it at full size.

How ’bout one more photo for an even better idea of the kind of water slide I’m talkin’ about?

Slide the City is a thousand foot-long urban water slide event that’s been touring the country last year and is scheduled to come to Accordion Bay in May.

Tampa’s flat geography makes it a jogger’s and cyclist’s paradise, but terrible for a slip-and slide ride. You might be wondering where in the city you could possibly set up a giant “slip ‘n’ slide”, but the organizers seem to have found a pretty good solution: the bridge on North Avenue that crosses the Hillsborough River. Here a Google Street Maps photo of the area (North Boulevard and West Palm):

Click the photo to see the Google Street View.

The area’s not too far from downtown Tampa and still relatively undeveloped (it’s near the historic Armature Works building, in an area I like to call “Tampa waiting to happen”), which makes it possible for both lots of parking and a block party to be set up.

“This is the first bridge slide we’ve ever done,” says Slide the City creator Spencer Hunn. “We Utah boys love to sled and ski, so I would think it would be fun to be able to sled in Tampa for the first time ever.”

There’s a catch: At least 4,000 tickets to the event need to be pre-sold to make it financially viable. The “early bird” prices, which are valid through April 8 are:

• $10 for a single slide
• $25 for two hours of unlimited sliding
• $45 for four hours of unlimited sliding

Later, prices will be $20 for a single ride and $45 to $65 for unlimited rides. You can register at slidethecity.com.

Who want to join Anitra and me?

Also acceptable: hemale washroom.

Also worth reading: The U.S. has Gone F&*%ing Mad.

Of course, the term “cognitive dissonance” presupposes cognition.

Two follow-ups to yesterday’s article, Naked no-name molly-dropping model home-ruining Florida Man!:

1. With Facebook’s help, Jacksonville Police ID’d him in an hour

He didn’t have any ID on him, and gave a number of names when asked — Chance, Cecil, Randolph, and Three — so the police posted his photo and asked for the public’s help in identifying him. They got his name within an hour:

2. It turns out that “damaged the property” was indeed a euphemism

The initial report kept things a little vague by simply stating that he “damaged the property” of the model home he broke into. It turns out that he peed into one of the bathtubs, which by Florida Man standards, and considering that he was trippin’ on ten hits of Molly, is pretty tame.

If you’ve ever been annoyed by someone at a concert who insists on making a video recording of the entire damned show, blocking your view, and forcing you to view the event through their screen, you’ll love Marky Ramone’s Smartphone Swatter!