One Good Thing From The White House Press Correspondents Dinner

The whole affair is a bit sordid, and no one (seriously no one, not ever) will ever top Stephen Colbert's masterful showing.  But President Obama did get to have some fun...



You have to admire the sense of humor, and just how meta this all is.  I enjoyed it at least.

(via kottke)

Me Thinks The Gentlemen Doth Protest Too Much

I was going to just let Brad Paisley and LL Cool J's tragic mistake of a song slide into oblivion, but then Colbert went and did this...

The Colbert Report
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Plus, who doesn't love Alan Cumming (watch more BBC if you need to think about that, he crushes the Masterpiece opening segment every time)?

(via SE)

Handling Hecklers

Hecklers exist in pretty much every sport, many of them are pretty tame while others are nasty and extreme and are an ugly part of sports.  Most players manage to shrug most of it off and go about their business (see Robinson, Jackie for easily the best known and heroic example) while others occasionally lose their cool (often with good reason, sometimes without).

Tony Gwynn Jr. has a great response, that instantly wins the support of most other fans in the area...



This video from YouTube user Rockpile Ranter is from June of 2011 but just popped up on my radar on Deadspin via Big League Stew in a piece on recent, less subtle, reactions to baseball heckling.

Recent Reading

I have a back log of New Yorker's currently that has grown to an embarrassing length.  I'm picking my way through them though (this isn't like an overwhelming number of unreade entries in a feed reader where you can and should declare bankruptcy) and hoo boy was the March 18, 2013 issue a good one.

Jill Lepore took a hard and unsettling look at the US's legal history and behavior in the Guantanamo era (sorry, subscription only).

David Owen wrote about the Floridan aquifer and its sinkholes and springs and the rough go of it that the aquifer has had of late.  If you ever went on a glass bottom boat ride at Wakulla Springs treasure the memory (I know I will), the water isn't clear enough for them to bother running the glass bottom boats any longer (sorry, subscription only).

Jane Kramer did a great book review on Consider the Fork: A History of How We Cook and Eat by Bee Wilson and took a look at the evolution of how we eat as humans.  This one is available for everyone to read, and read it you should.

The whole issue is worth looking at if you have it sitting around.

History of Rap Part IV - They Just Keep Getting Better

This is easily my favorite installment...



Also I was amused at how many of the people in the audience seemed to not know the song or what was going on at the end.

Thank you Jimmy & Justin & the interwebs, thank you very much.

A Smashing Beginning

The universe is a big and complicated place, we're glad it's here but most of us don't understand much about it at all.  The scientists who study the universe know a bit more about it but not as much as they'd like, which is why they're so intent on smashing atoms together.  Here's a great three minutes on the origins of the universe and the importance of particle accelerators...



This video is part of the TedEd project which has a lot of promise but isn't something I've spent much time checking out.

(via Crave)

The Danes Make Butter Look Good

Very good in fact...



...and I'm off to the grocery store.

(via FR)

The Republican Yada Yada Yada Strategy

Pretty much the Yada Yada Yada strategy is to just make stuff up and avoid any truths that are detrimental to your case; so pretty much everything that Republican politicians do and say these days.  Rand Paul took it to pretty historic level while giving a talk at Howard University the other day...

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
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I yelled less well put together and polite things at the radio when I heard the standard NPR story on the event, so I figured I'd let Jon take this one.

(via TPM)

You're Gonna Need A Bigger Boat

That line never gets old, just like videos of sharks surprising kayakers never get old...



I can't tell if dude managed to land the fish or not.

(via LS)

Play Ball

How 'bout them Nats?