Day 511: The Un-Shut-Uppable Streisand Effect

originally published May 25, 2013 Earlier this week, I wrote a piece on the historical tradition of censorship in the city of Boston. If you don’t feel like following the link and adding an extra two thousand words to your reading plate, I’ll catch you up. Due to its Puritan background and molasses-slow crawl from its beginnings […]

Day 510: Big Rocks & Big Eats

originally published May 24, 2013 As my fingers sloppily dance over my keyboard this morning, I reach the conclusion that I am suffering from an outlandish hangover. To be fair, my mind is luminously clear and my body is enduring only the normal aches and pains of an average 38-year-old in my shape (which falls […]

Day 509: If She Looks Like A Pig, Sounds Like A Pig And Eats Like A Pig…

originally published May 23, 2013 Next time someone calls you pig-headed, you’d best confirm whether they’re referring to your stubborn nature or likening you to a seventeenth-century mythical medical mystery. Remember that Seinfeld episode when Kramer was convinced he’d seen a pig-boy in the hospital? It turns out that was actually a folklore reference to […]

Day 508: Erecting The Erasable – Worst Architecture Part 1

originally published May 22, 2013 I enjoy writing about architecture. Not because I can pretend to know anything the subject, but because it gives me the chance to look at pictures. Letting my mind swim wildly through architecture books or drift free-form through a webpage filled with balustrades, mascarons and elaborate quartrefoils is an act […]

Day 507: Saving The Souls Of All Bostonians

originally published May 21, 2013 I’ve never been one to target the masses with swift aplomb and savvy scribing. Possibly because I still use expressions like ‘swift aplomb’ – the masses aren’t really into that. But had fate plunked me down in a simpler, less outspoken, less internet-y time, I would have known the secret […]

Day 506: Zzzzzzzzz……

originally published May 20, 2013 One would assume that an activity one has been performing since the first day of one’s life should, at some point, become perfected. I have been practicing my sleeping skills for over 38 years now, and it turns out I’ve been doing it all wrong. How could that be? How […]

Day 505: Superman’s Spectrum of Weakness

originally published May 19, 2013 Not being a scholar of Superman, I would like to know what challenges he faced before kryptonite came along. Bullets do nothing to the guy, a bridge could fall on him and he’d just dust it off, and I don’t think he ever has to get his cholesterol levels checked. […]

Day 504: Slappin’ A Big Ol’ Wet One On The Page

originally published May 18, 2013 Rather than compose an elegant piece of lyrical prose about the subject of kissing, I think I’ll just rattle off a bunch of trivia using my old trusty friend, the bullet-point list. Is it laziness? Sleepiness? An unanticipated delay in the drugs taking effect? Maybe a little of all three, […]

Day 503: The -EXPLETIVE DELETED- Hays Code

originally published May 17, 2013 Having recently wrapped up my film studies degree, and now poised in that no-doubt brief window between finishing classes and discovering how this degree will make me an instant multi-gazillionaire, I find myself thrilled to be facing a film-related topic. Every student in a film studies class should eventually learn […]

Day 502: Coco Chanel… The Nazi?

originally published May 16, 2013 As a middle-class white North American shlub, blindly stumbling in the direction of forty, and choosing a day’s wardrobe based on wrinkle content, embedded bulldog hairs and whether or not I have to leave the house and (ugh) interact with people, I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about […]