- Buy a “mega jug” (their words) of soda with your meal, and KFC will donate money to diabetes research. That’s irony coming full circle.
- The US State Department reportedly lobbied against a minimum wage increase in Haiti on behalf of textile corporations. That’s just scummy. [via]
- Fuckin’ A: profanity at the New Yorker. [via]
- China used prisoners in lucrative internet gaming work. [via]
- And finally, Jonathan Coulton on Snuggies and Business Models. The Planet Money podcast is worth listening to, if you haven’t already.
Month: June 2011
Sunday
I gave the dog a bath today.
Or at least, I did the best I could with a bucket of warm water, the garden hose, and a bottle of pet shampoo. Tucker seemed to genuinely enjoy the brushing that followed the bath, removing a lot of shed fur, and he seemed more or less resigned to getting wet initially, but he was not pleased by the bath itself. But he looks and smells a lot better now, so I think it was definitely worth it.
Other than that, I spent the day mostly like yesterday, only more Sundayish than Saturdayesque. I did the Sunday crossword, which was kind of blah. I read some Kaleidotrope slush again, thinking idly about looking for a slush reader to do it instead of me — even though, quite honestly, I don’t know that I’m at that level, and I wouldn’t know what sort of guidelines to offer a reader. (I reject a lot more than I accept, but usually not because it’s completely off the mark from what I want.) And I watched a couple of episodes of The Killing. It’s an okay show; I like that it’s slow and deliberate, although that’s in danger of becoming boring, a show left spinning its wheels, piling on the shocking but not at all game-changing twists each week. Still, I’m enjoying it.
That was Sunday, such as it was.
Song of the day
The Tony Awards are tonight, so why not one something from one of the only nominated musicals I’ve seen, Anything Goes? Here’s “You’re the Top,” sung by Sutton Foster and Colin Donnell.
Rainy day
I thought I might give the dog a much needed bath this afternoon, out in the backyard, but the weather had different ideas in mind. (I suspect the dog and the weather may be in cahoots on this.) It rained on and off all day, and the sun never really peeked out from behind the clouds. Maybe tomorrow, although given the forecast probably not until later in the week.
Instead, I spent the day not doing a whole lot. Reading a little Kaleidotrope slush, watching a little Blackadder, getting a new propane tank for the grill, watching Apollo 13. (I’ve been reading Mary Roach’s Packing for Mars lately, and it put me in the mood to see it again.) That sort of thing. This evening I watched Jaws of Satan online with friends, making fun of what is a pretty lousy and justifiably forgotten horror movie. There’s a halfway decent movie lurking in it somewhere — or at least a quarter-way decent rip-off of Jaws — but it’s bogged down by lousy effects, worse writing, and terrible pacing. It’s notable mainly for being the film debut of Christina Applegate.
And that was Saturday.
Song of the day
“Everybody Wants to Rule the World” by Tears for Fears