music | puppet wrangling

Tuesday various

I am not a Pennsylvanian barber. Just so you know.
Well, it’s no Donald Glover for Spider-Man, but I don’t see how George Takei could do any worse.
What if your favorite album was a book? A neat concept, if you ignore the sort of crappy slideshow presentation…and pretend the misspelling in Never Mind the Bollocks was intentional. [via]
Bristol Palinâ€™s Nonprofit Paid Her Seven Times What It Spent On Actual Teen Pregnancy Prevention. I wish I could say I was remotely surprised. [via]
And finally, the world’s most expensive hot dog. I probably won’t be eating this — even though this place apparently is just a 15-minute walk away from my office — and I’m naturally a little disgusted by the excess of it. But I’m at least impressed they didn’t cheat, like a lot of “most expensive” chefs seem to, with gold plates or silverware or something else to artificially inflate the price. Well of course something’s expensive if it’s coated in diamonds. The parts you can’t eat shouldn’t count. [via]
This did, of course, also make me think of Heather.

Montana GOP Rep. Defends Drunk Driving. Yep, that’s sure what it sounds like he’s doing.
Inexplicably famous Perez Hilton is writing a children’s book. I don’t usually like to toss around phrases like “end times,” but… [via]
Even Billy Joel doesn’t want to read his own memoir! Okay, that’s unfair. I actually do like Joel, or at least much of his music — I think I’m obligated to as a Long Islander — but I don’t think I’d want to read his memoir even if he hadn’t canceled it.
Though I do find it weird to think that he’s been “retired” from writing new music for almost twenty years now. [via]
This really puts things in geographical perspective: European cities overlaid on a map of the U.S. at an identical latitude (and the other way around).
And finally, It’s not a crime to be poor. Yet. [via]

“The government is always going to go after the guy with the most money, regardless of culpability…” The Forfeiture Racket is a lot worse than you might think. I don’t have a lot of sympathy for convicted criminals who lose their property, particularly property used in the commission of a crime. And my first thought, when I read about an accused large-scale meth dealer who might lose his beloved comic book collection (the link that led me to the one above), was well, good, if he’s convicted, he probably should lose his property. But forfeiture laws go way beyond that, down all sorts of crazy, corruption-filled paths.
But yes, by all means, let us cut funding to poison control. [via]
Oh that Chris Brown…still a class act.
Okay, I’ve got to admit, this is a pretty neat zombie T-shirt.
And finally, I’m no copyright expert, but I think inscribing a passage from James Joyce into the genome of a synthetic microbe is covered by fair use. The Joyce estate, apparently, does not agree. [via]

Roger Ebert on The Green Hornet:

Casting about for something to praise, I recalled that I heard a strange and unique sound for the first time, a high-pitched whooshing scream, but I don’t think Gondry can claim it, because it came from the hand dryers in the nearby men’s room.
At first I thought it was like that urban legend about the ghost on the set of Three Men and a Baby, but apparently this one’s true: Han Solo does appear in many, if not all, episodes of Firefly.
If you’re wondering, Mal shot first.
Alex Beam of the Boston Globe wonders — or maybe wondered back in November when I first saw this link — are new translations necessary? It’s an interesting question, but there’s no mention of instances when newer translations get things right, or make necessary corrections, or significantly change our understanding of a text. Proust’s famous novel is better translated as In Search of Lost Time, for instance, and newer translations of Camus’ The Stranger have called into question earlier readings of its famous opening lines.
So, short answer? Yeah, I think they’re still necessary. [via]
Speaking of translations, the surprisingly intriguing story of why Uncle Scrooge McDuck is called “Dagobert” in Germany. [via]
And finally….

The Justice League, re-imagined as a 1977 punk rock movie, based on an art challenge posed by Warren Ellis and by the exceptionally talented Annie Wu.

The real real Ghostbusters?
You know what you need to do with the endearingly low-key, sleeper-hit of a musical? Turn it into a big-budget Broadway spectacle.
“Kazran, trust me, it’s this or go to your room and design a new kind of screwdriver.” The sonic screwdriver for the Nintendo Wii. That seals it, I’m buying one.
Remember that Udo Kier interview I linked to last week? Here’s audio of his absolute best line.
And finally, octopuses or octopi? [via]