November 2011 Archives
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Can't Pulp This
Introducing The Morning News Editions
There you are, post-Black Friday competitive shopping, convalescing in St. Moritz. The doctors are pleased with your progress, though you wish you had something to transport your mind far away,...
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In the Movies
As Time Goes By
In the past 20 years, movies and the quotes they’ve sprinkled across American pop culture have occupied a shrinking proportion of our social mindshare. It’s time to mark and celebrate the death of the movie catchphrase.
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#OccupyWallStreet
The Luxe Love Life of Veronica van der Vöorhies
When hard times hit a notable—and note-taking—member of Manhattan’s 1%, she seeks out comfort in warm arms, big and strong, at New York’s Zuccotti Park.
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New Series
TMN vs. Explodingdog
We’ve worked with Sam before. Back in 2003, we published his “Stupid Dreams.” Sam’s m.o. is to transform one of his followers’ suggested...
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The Brakes
Etiquette
The bike lane. It is ours. Not yours. Do not double-park in it. Do not wheel groceries in it. Do not set up art projects in it. You are making...
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Anatomy of a Scene
Standup Comity
If a person tells a joke in a forest and doesn’t get a laugh—that’s how you know he or she’s a true comic. A report from the 2011 International Society for Humor Studies Conference, where so-called experts of comedy submit themselves to professionals to be critiqued.
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Wild Turkeys
Happy Misgivings
Thanksgiving is an American holiday, but that doesn’t mean it’s not celebrated elsewhere. And each of those celebrations—in Liberia, in Leiden, in the South Pacific—give us fresh reasons to be grateful for our own messed-up version.
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Fieldwork
Supply and Demand
We asked you to show us how close the recession is to your doorstep. Here’s our latest entry. (Send in yours.) Name: Miranda Everitt Location: Two...
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Sound Advice
Pie Is Not a Gel (and Other Thanksgiving Tips)
As a result, sometimes stuff gets cold, or burnt. We usually eat at least an hour later than planned. We make conversational beelines toward politics and religion. At least one...
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Roundtables
Home for the Holiday Tech Support
When the annual trip home becomes a customer-service visit to “fix the internet,” sometimes even bourbon can’t save the day. We gathered a half-dozen of our favorite tech writers and editors to help anticipate the headaches of 2011.
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The Rooster Approacheth
Your Favorite Three Books of the Year
All year long, we keep track of the books we think will be great candidates for the tournament—books we loved, books we talked about, books we heard discussed...
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My Contemporary British TV Detectives
The Adventure of the Detective’s Dressing Gown
I realize I sound like a J. Peterman catalog for pseudo-Prousts. The truth is, I’ll never own this robe. Mostly I don’t have the balls....
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Gallery
Honey Bunny
There’s something subversive about Marc Dennis’s new paintings, and it’s not just all the guns and kittens.
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Notes From #WallStreet
The Revolution Will Be Streamed
I haven’t watched television since 1971, when I took LSD for the first time. A few nights after my “trip,” I visited the park opposite my house,...
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Our Battles, Ourselves
Fight Night
The recent Pacquiao-Márquez match was full of lust, anger, calculation, sport—the same as what’s occurring across America, in Zuccotti Park, in Congress, in every household with a bullet-skulled parent. Boxing is the sport of the now, and its lessons will be useful tonight.
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Letters From Occupied Wall Street
Tiny Money
For two months, critics of Occupy Wall Street have complained that the group has no recognizable demands, no plan for reforms. But that’s not the point. They don’t want to reform the system. They want a new one.
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Fieldwork
Busted
We asked you to show us how close the recession is to your doorstep. Here’s our latest entry. (Send in yours.) Name: K Hall Location: Across...
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Birnbaum V.
Nicole Krauss
A chat between our man in Boston and the writer Nicole Krauss about her latest book, in which her latest book is barely discussed.
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Personal Essays
Our National Posters
People say you can never go home again. But you can go back on vacation. Notes on the specific tragedy that occurs when, revisiting the great national parks of your childhood, you realize all your memories of the wild derive from gift shops.
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Gallery
Travels With My Aunt
During the Great Arab Revolt in 1937, as British rule in Palestine was attacked and mass Jewish immigration continued, Pearl Chertok voyaged abroad with her camera.
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The Brakes
The Breakdown
Picture cyclists as Italians who can tell you that Genoans are more annoying than Fiorentini and folks in Palermo are pazzo, but at least we’re not Greek. If...
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Haters Gonna Hate
This Is Not a George Plimpton Interview
Every artist deals with critics differently—Richard Ford spitting on Colson Whitehead, for example. But the rule is to avoid direct contact. Not for John Warner, debut novelist, who decided to seek out the man behind his worst review.
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Eurozonia
Bunga Bunga Boing
Throughout this crisis, nothing has convinced me that massive cuts to government spending (instead of say, raising taxes, or just making sure people and companies pay their taxes) is a...
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Fieldwork
Welcome to the Jungle
We asked you to show us how close the recession is to your doorstep. Here’s your latest entry. Name: Kari Hartmann Location: About 20 steps from...
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Taking Stock
What I Didn’t Write About When I Wrote About Quitting Facebook
The emergence of the Social Media Exile essay has been swift and smug. A language expert dissects a genre while also being seduced by its allure.
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Contest
You Be the Judge
To be considered, tell us in 100 words or less why you should be a judge in the 2012 ToB, and email your entry by midnight EST on Wednesday, Nov. 16, to talk...
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Late Night Sports Radio
Better in the Dark
Even as a kid I noticed that the radio announcers—Jack Buck and former coach Hank Stram—were several leagues superior to their counterparts on TV. Buck and...
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Dispatches
The Demands of Cold Blood
When a crime reporter is told an outlandish account, his first obligation is to establish the facts. But when the story turns out to be a conspiracy, it can knock his sense of duty until it cracks.
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New York's Roadside Attractions
Merchant House Museum
While researching my historic destinations, one place that came up in every conversation was the Merchant House Museum in Manhattan’s East Village. The home was built in 1832 and...
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Crushes on Strangers
Just My Imagination
A short list of people I’ve had a crush on since starting this column: the bagger at Whole Foods with the body of a lumberjack, dark reddish hair...
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Gallery
The Atari Orgablet 2600
From the Kindle Fire to the iPad 2, the market is flooded with tablets. But only one can deliver a constant orgasm directly to its user.
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Diversions
They Don’t Love You Like I Love You
Here we go again. We’ve altered (or removed entirely) the legends from each of the below maps. Try guessing what each means using only clues contained within them...
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Personal Essays
Hard Up
When you’re feeling perky as a teenager but the doctor says your prostate is basically a Chinchorro mummy, a little erectile dysfunction can be suffered on the path to wellness. Oh, but the sex drive…
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Sound Advice
Ornithology
Naturally, I have to procrastinate first, but at least I’m procrastinating intelligently (or so I tell myself) by reviewing Anne Lamott’s sublime Bird by Bird: Some...
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The Sports Page
The Procreant Urge
Ted Williams’s last game for the Red Sox was almost a flop. But it provided fuel for one of the best sports essays of all time—until the author started tinkering. On baseball, The Simpsons, and the creative impulse to never stop.
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The Brakes
There Will Be Blood
Wreck no. 1 was in Central Park. I plowed into a guy who looked like Jesus, if Jesus not only had a beard and flowing locks, but also rode a Bianchi...
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The Biblioracle
America, You Are the Biblioracle
Today, from 2-3:00 p.m., the Biblioracle will use his magical powers to recommend the next book you’ll love. Prior to that, a call-to-arms to save the plight of reading and an announcement about the 2012 Tournament of Books reader-judge contest.
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Fieldwork
Recovery in a Cup
We asked you to show us how close the recession is to your doorstep. Here’s a sign of hope in North Carolina: Name: Rosecrans Baldwin ...
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Personal Essays
The Man Who Loved to Have Coffee With Women
From playing with childhood friends to sharing tips with other new parents, the author concedes he just gets along better with girls.