Category Archives: Blogging

Hitchens and Fry and Blasphemy, Oh My!

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Hitchens LetusprayChristopher Hitchens and Stephen Fry, together again for the first time!!!

I love both of these tubby old coots as writers and currently loathe them both as human beings (isn't that always the way with the ones we once loved?), so I was delighted to find, on the Guardian Culture Vulture blog/dumping ground, their blasphemy debate from last year at the Hay Festival. No transcript available, of course, because that would be uncharacteristically bloggy, but here's the MP3. Right click, save, savour. If I'm being uncharacteristically ambitious, I may actually write a transcript, but at 78 minutes running time, don't be holding your breath!

One of the most talked-about events at last year's Stephen Fry, Bright Middleaged ThingGuardian Hay Festival was the Blasphemy Debate, chaired by Joan Bakewell and inspired by the Incitement to Religious Hatred Bill, which had been announced in the Queen's Speech the previous month. The speakers at the debate were the actor and writer Stephen Fry and the journalist Christopher Hitchens, and their frequently heated discussion covered issues of freedom of speech, religious tolerance, multiculturalism and orthodoxy…

Reported in raincoaster: Reported in Gawker

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Kurt Said Plagiarism Might Be Everywhere

READ MORE: forbes, new york times

20060508steveforbes.jpgFrom “Forbes May Seek Investment From Outside,” by Andrew Ross Sorkin, NYT, today:

Malcolm’s son Steve took over in 1990 and has used the magazine as a launching pad to seek political office, failing to win the Republican nomination for president in 1996 and 2000. Besides his brand of untrammeled free-market politics, he has adopted an antiabortion stance, advocates a flat-tax system and is skeptical toward the United Nations.

From “Forbes Goes Outside Family for Funds,” by Jason Nisse, London Independent, yesterday:

Steve, Malcolm’s son, took over in 1990 and has used the magazine as a launchpad for his political ambitions, twice failing to win the Republican nomination for presidential candidate in 1996 and 2000. His brand of right-wing, free-market politics includes an anti-abortion stance, and advocating a flat-tax system and an anti-United Nations foreign policy.

Forbes May Seek Investment From Outside [NYT]
Forbes Goes Outside Family for Funds [Independent]
Related: Generation Xerox [NYM]

Welcome to the Blogroll: The Generator Blog

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Ninja!

and raincoaster luvs them right back. I grabbed this little ninjargasmic beauty from the Generator Blog, which we came to via Fark, and which we may never leave. A small sampling of the contents:

emo haiku generator, eg

sitting here in pain
I can do nothing but frown
I cry about dad!

business plan generator

random monster generator

etc etc.

Streaming Eagle Cam 3.0: Swartz Bay

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Well, the original eagle cam is done for the year; no hatching eggs means a lot of disappointed readers (and not a few conspiracy theorists, I might add) so the Hornby Island team has found a new nest, with chicks, near the Swartz Bay ferry terminal on Vancouver Island. FYI This is the ferry that takes people to Vancouver from Victoria…only it's not really very close to Victoria…it's complicated.

Anyway, the link is the same: Streaming Eagle Cam Swartz Bay this time.

And here's a pair of Peregrine Falcons in Harrisburg, with chicks.

And my previous posts on eagles:

Streaming Eagle Cam RIP

Streaming Eagle Cam 2.0 Baby Eagles in Colorado

Eagle Chick on Santa Cruz Island, California

and

My Original article on the Eagle Cam; perhaps these new eagles are the ones Christi and I spotted in the story here.

Harry Potter and the Titles of Doom

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Emo Harry PotterThe Harry Potter that never was…yet.

Cap'n Wacky lists Titles of Harry Potter Fanfics We'd Rather Not Read. Grabbed via the unusually good today BoingBoing.

I think I like the last one best. But, really, replace "Harry Potter" with "Aragorn" and I think I not only read them, I was asked to proof and edit them. Sigh. Good times, good times.

Actually, everyone I know who writes fanfic writes absolutely 18+ V,VNSFW stuff, so perhaps its' best they don't tackle Potter. So to speak.

Harry Potter and the Uneventful Year When No One Tried to Kill Him

Harry Potter and the New Love Interest Who Happens to Have the Same Name as the 15-Year-Old Girl Writing this Fanfic

Harry Potter and the New Love Interest Who Happens to Have the Same Name as the 15-Year-Old Boy Writing this Fanfic

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Sucrets

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Kidney Stone

Harry Potter and the Uncomforatble Oversexualization of Minors

Harry Potter and the Socerer are Stoned

Harry Potter and the Burning Sensation

Harry Potter and the Camping Weekend With Ron That Will Never Be Spoken Of Again

Harry Potter and the Summer Internship

Harry Potter and the E Street Band

Harry Potter and the Things You Have to do to Get By in Prison

Harry Potter and the It Was All Only A Dream

Harry Potter and the Chamber Pot of Secrets

Harry Potter and the Prisoner Detainees of Azerbaijan

Harry Potter and the Wand of Franchise Extension

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood, the Quadroon, and the Octaroon

Harold and His Big Purple Crayon of Adolescent Yearning

Hal Pot and the Intellectuals of Cambodia

Harry Putter's Magic Golf Game in 21 Weeks

Hairy Potter and the Bears of San Francisco

Harry Potter Fanfic Notes

Harry Potter and the shameless Tom Clancy Crossover

Harry Potter and the 2000 Election

Harry Potter and the HufflePuff Orgy

Harry Potter and the Weapons of Magic Destruction

Harry Potter and the Order of the Pizza

Hermione Granger and the Cryptofascist Misogynist Conspiracy of Hogwarts

Harry Potter and the Bizarro Harry Potter

Harry Potter and the Lil Bratz

Harry Potter and the Street Fighter II Tournament

Harry Potter and the King of Pop

Harry Potter and the Birth of Christ

Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stones in His Mouth

Harry Potter and the Jews and Crusaders

Harry Potter the Geopolitical Realities of the Post-Nuclear Age

Harry Potter and Whoever Alan Rickman's Character is are Totally Doing It

Harry Potter and the Cusp of Manhood

Harry Potter and the Gauntlet of Mucous

Harry Potter and Ma$e feat. Lil' Jon and The Ruff Ryders

Harry Potter and the Insidious Compact Disc Root Kit Installation

Harry Potter and the Gargoyle of Reacharounds

Harry Potter and the Sandwich of Crotchmeat

Harry Potter and the Website of Jokes

Harry Potter and the Incredibly Long Run-On Sentence That ALmost Makes It Look As If The First Three Paragraphs Of The Story Are Actually More Like The First Three Sentences And Then Hermione Says Harry That Dragon Is Attacking You and Ron Is In Danger So Harry Potter Reaches Into His Magic Bag And Removes A Magic Card That He Says Makeus Enlargitus and The Creature On The Card Which Is A Griffin With The Body Of A Zebra But Claws Of A Lion Comes Out Of It And When It (The Dragon) s Defeated Harry Says It Was Voldemort and Hermione Says How Do You Know And Harry Says I Just Know and Ron Goes Gulp!

Harry Potter and the Hendersons

Harry Potter and the Titles of Harry Potter Fanfic We'd Rather Not Read

How about ANY OF THEM?

Harry Potter and the Gang Fan art