http://blogs.kitschmag.com/fire Just another kitsch-ka-blogs weblog Sun, 04 Jan 2009 06:27:20 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en You say “paranoid technophobic Luddite” like it’s a bad thing… The other day I went into a Blockbuster with only one intention: to rent and enjoy the timeless satire Soapdish. When I couldn’t find it in the “alphabetized” comedy section, I went to consult the clerk, mistress of all ... http://blogs.kitschmag.com/fire/2009/01/04/no-soapdish-no-thanks/ This came to my attention today by way of The Daily Beast, my favorite news-digest site since Chris Buckley (that's William F. Buckley's son, by the way) used it as a forum to endorse Barack Obama. Johnathan Martin of politico writes that conservative leaders are planning a top-secret evil genius ... http://blogs.kitschmag.com/fire/2008/10/29/and-this-is-who-theyre-grooming/ Sarah Palin tried to ban books because she is the Chupacabra. In the acclaimed documentary 30 Days of Night, vampires cross the Bering Strait into Alaska to take advantage of the polar winter's month of darkness. Some claim that this stirring portrayal of Josh Hartnett’s struggle to save his ... http://blogs.kitschmag.com/fire/2008/10/24/this-just-in/ Last night I went to a special live broadcast of Rachel Maddow’s Air America show at the State Theater, and it was grand. It was relaxing, just like listening to the radio, except we were treated to all the artless and fascinating gestures one never gets to see, like Maddow ... http://blogs.kitschmag.com/fire/2008/09/13/does-rachel-maddow-have-a-girlfriend/ The Internet is amazing. I have discovered astonishing things. Were you aware that, in thirty-one films over the past twenty-five years, Tom Cruise has died only twice? Unless you count Interview with the Vampire, where he plays the living dead. And it's not as if his characters take no physical ... http://blogs.kitschmag.com/fire/2008/04/03/i-can-eat-planets/ Aren’t we all just a little sick, by now, of The Vagina Monologues? I’m old enough to remember when they first came out in 1996. I remember seeing pictures of Eve Ensler performing them, as the show first began to gain momentum and popularity. I was in awe of her—I ... http://blogs.kitschmag.com/fire/2008/03/11/admit-it/ This is the stuff that Joyce Carol Oates' stories are made on: your son visits the zoo and a tiger rips his throat out. In case you somehow missed the media frenzy, this past Christmas day a 250-pound Siberian tiger (regally named “Tatiana”) leaped the 12-foot wall of her ... http://blogs.kitschmag.com/fire/2008/02/21/rip-tatiana/ In a forum like this, there's a certain pressure to be current. I should be obsessively analyzing the latest round of primaries, or yucking it up over Super Bowl ads. But I just don't think it's fair that the accident of my birth should prevent me from responding to ... http://blogs.kitschmag.com/fire/2008/02/07/disposable-pocket/ (a.k.a. Why Rowling’s “Outing” is a Literary Crime.) Umberto Eco wrote that authors should die when their novels are complete, so as not to “trouble the path of the text”—advice Harry Potter's J.K. Rowling has clearly chosen to ignore. Not only has she thus far refused to die, but last October ... http://blogs.kitschmag.com/fire/2008/01/30/playing-quidditch-for-the-other-team-why-rowling%e2%80%99s-%e2%80%9couting%e2%80%9d-is-a-literary-crime/