Friday, April 3, 2009

failblog: win


So, I finally got around to checking out failblog, a site I read about in Slate here and more recently, here.


The site is just a chronicle of mundane to epic failures, from inflatable dartboards or flyers for "litercy" seminars. For the sake of categorization, there are a lot of confusing packaging and unfortunate product names, creative English translations, indictments of poor parenting and unintentional phallic imagery on the site. Some post videos that could double on America's Funniest Home Videos (with ER ending its run, perhaps Uncle Jessie could take over Bob Saget's old, old job): this sleepwalking dog is adorable (I'm sure he recovered fully) and I must've seen 10 surveillance videos in which people apparently forgot to put their vehicles in Park.

But I'm ashamed to admit that it was this video that literally caused me to fall out of my desk chair. It's horrible to laugh at the victim of the finale, but he acquits himself nicely by refusing to let this incident pass without comment.

The site has some Wins, too, choosing to highlight the odd positive moment or victory in a sea of faildom, but the Slate article gets it right: schadenfreude is the main event because it's just too satisfying. Enjoy the failure!

Wednesday, April 1, 2009

the biggety bailout

The best thing I've read to date about the financial crisis: the reliably foul-mouthed malcontent and gonzo journalist, Matt Taibbi. Long but rewarding - and appropriately frightening.

And yes, this is a weak return to my erstwhile blog after a long period of absence. But 1) I had to start somewhere and 2) I've been busy over the past couple of months completing my comprehensive exams and producing essays that will feed into my doctoral dissertation. What have you accomplished in the same interval? That's what I thought....