Tin Speaker » The Imaginary New Yorker

The Surowieckipedia – Rough times

hornblower — Sat, 10 Dec 2011 21:12:02 +0000

James wasn’t always the alpha male he would become. After an early growth spurt in elementary school, the rest of the school caught up to him, and by the eighth grade he was shorter than most of his classmates — including Little Petey, who was now going by the name Angry Pete aka Gorilla Man aka Wolf Murderson aka The White Gobstopper aka Hurt Bodiez. The evening of the eighth grade dinner dance, Angry Pete and his band of ne’er-do-wells accosted James and his date Young Susie outside of the gymnasium.

- AYO IT’S ME ANGRY PETE, Y’ALL!

- Hello Angry Pete, how do you do?

- NOT TOO GOOD, I GOT VIENNA SAUSAGES IN MY EARS AND NOSTRILS!

- I’m sorry, Angry Pete, I don’t see any …

- CALL ME HURT BODIEZ!

- Sorry, Hurt Bodies, I …

- WITH A Z, FOOL!

- Listen, Hurt Bodiez, I don’t …

- THAT’S BETTER! HA, HA!

- I don’t really know what you want from me.

- I WANT YOUR GIRL, JIMMY! YOUNG SUSIE IS GONNA BE MY DATE TONIGHT! YOU CAN HAVE THESE VIENNA SAUSAGES THO DAWG!

- What? Now, listen, I don’t think … that’s not something …

- You know what, James, it’s actually okay.

Young Susie took off her begonia corsage and gave it to James.

- I’d actually rather go with Hurt Bodiez. I thought it was pretty mean what you did to him back in elementary school, and I feel like you haven’t really grown up. And also your wiener is pretty small. I can tell.

- But, Young Susie! We were to be a spectacle upon the dance floor! I got my hat blocked!

- I’m sorry, James. Maybe if you hadn’t insisted on wearing those checked pants, things could have been different between us.

At that moment, James felt worse than he had ever felt before, except for the time when he was caught peeing in his fifth-grade teacher’s gas tank. He decided then that he would no longer let the Angry Petes of the world dictate his life to him. He decided then that one day the world would know his name and his deeds, courtesy of some crazy person’s blog. He decided then to become a professional bodybuilder

James Surowiecki wonders how many banks will become insolvent.

hornblower — Thu, 07 May 2009 15:26:41 +0000

I’m thinking four… Okay, maybe not four. Maybe just three. Actually… Hmm. All of a sudden, I’m really not sure. Let’s start at the beginning. All right, Bank of America, definitely, right? They’re just a bunch of wild men over there. Okay, so that’s one. Citigroup — that bank’s gone way down in hole. Can’t even pay to name a subway station after its own ballpark. Two. How about TD Bank? There’s no way it can stay afloat giving away all those lollipops. And do you know what Regis and Kelly charge to be on those billboards? Stacks and stacks. So that’s three, right there. All right, how about Ted’s Bank, down on South Cherry Street in East Northport? Those arson charges aren’t helping his business any. I mean, I always stayed away from Ted, but some people didn’t see past his preacher/banker-next-door veneer. Pray for those people. What else? Deutsche Bank only has € 2,202 trillion in assets, so count them out. Sorry, Donny. What’s that? Nothing to do with Deutsche Bank? Hmm. And € 2.202 trillion is actually kind of a lot? All right, the count remains at four. Let’s turn our lens to JPMorgan Chase & Co. Hmm, 228.452 employees, $2,30 trillion in assets, 200+ years in business… looks like trouble to me. I’ll put it on the Danger List — not quite insolvent yet, but getting there. I guess that concludes my wondering about how many banks will become insolvent. I should probably go find out what insolvent means. I failed the shit out of AP Chemistry. Meantime, I’d advise everyone to invest their money in the Surowieckipedia. Get on board now and reap great rewards later, guaranteed. Guaranteed.

(Original post here.)

George Packer quotes Irving Kristol on populism.

hornblower — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 18:10:28 +0000

“Populism? Gay.”
-Irving Kristol

(Actual post here)

James Surowiecki looks at the new unemployment numbers.

hornblower — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 17:13:29 +0000

Whoa! Hoppity hoppity boom boom! Chooparoo chooparee! Fraggledy smaggledy whizzerino! Gadfly pudding! Tse tse whiz-bang! Jerk chicken in a pita! I haven’t seen numbers this high since I weighed Marlon Brando! Too soon. Since I weighed William Howard Taft! Too late. Since I weighed Orson Welles! Just right. Man, these numbers are so high they make Whitney Houston look like a proponent of the sXe scene! They’re so high Mt. Everest was like, Hey, unemployment numbers, you’re getting a little big for your britches, why don’t you just cool it a little bit, you big old goofy mofos! Man! Talk about high numbers! Those are pretty bad! Prettyyyyyyy, prettyyyyyyyy bad. Mmm mmm.

(Actual post here)

Sasha Frere-Jones offers a chance to hear Catchdubs, Jubilee, and Ayres in action.

hornblower — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 06:57:41 +0000

Ha, ha, ha, okay, this isn’t actually going to be an imaginary New Yorker blog post, I just wanted to call attention to the ridiculousness of that sentence’s appearance on the Web site of the New Yorker. Love him or hate him (I do both, passionately (?)), Sasha Frere-Jones does bring the New Yorker to places it has not been wont to visit in the past, e.g. Megasoid at the New Yorker Dance Party, profile of Flying Lotus (Steven Ellison).

The thing about the title of this post is that there’s no way whoever set that as the snippet would ever jump at “a chance to hear Catchdubs, Jubilee, and Ayres in action.” I’m not sure what it is exactly about this sentence is it that makes me picture some clueless Comp Lit major copy editor just picking a random line from SFJ’s post and hoping it sounds hip, but I think it’s the “in action” part, and also the fact the Nick Catchdubs just has a funny name in general, and especially so when surrounded by the estimable George Packer “[finding] out Ulysses S. Grant enjoyed spanking” (actually that one’s pretty damn weird, too) and the News Desk discussing “the NATO Summit and Germany’s First Man.”

Incidentally, for most of the weekend the line was something like “Sasha Frere-Jones recommends going to Studio B tonight,” which made sense on Friday, but then became very misleading.

Actual post here.

Or, read my thoughts on the night!

UPDATE!! Looks like someone over at the New Yorker is an avid follower of yours truly, because there was a change this morning. The blogroll now reads “Sasha Frere-Jones recommends mixes by Catchdubs, Trouble & Bass.” You’re welcome, New Yorker. I’m glad to have protected you from unspeakable embarrassment. Now give me a job.

Hilton Als just can’t stop watching Helen Mirren in “Prime Suspect”

hornblower — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 18:33:01 +0000

I’m writing this on my iPhone. I’ve been in this room for 36 hours and I don’t see an exit. I don’t know how I got here or where I am, and I don’t know who put me in here. This room, it’s so white. So clean. I can’t breathe, it’s so white in here. Everything except for the television. That goddamn television. Forever playing the same goddamn thing. I’ve been watching Series 4 of Prime Suspect the whole 36 hours, but I don’t see a DVD player anywhere. Someone is out there controlling this, and it’s scaring the hell out of me.

And now Helen Mirren seems to be talking directly to me, except not even really to me in the way that most people talk to each other, no, she’s talking through me, Hilton Als, the theatre critic, just skipping that part like it’s nothing, like she couldn’t even be bothered with him, and instead she’s talking to the eternal soul inside me and I can understand her words but they don’t make sense to me, Hilton Als, and I can only assume they make sense to my eternal soul but I can’t be sure and it’s like they, Helen Mirren and my soul, are having this private conversation that I can hear but I’m totally excluded from it as if they were speaking Afrikaans or something and it’s driving me crazy because I can’t do anything but watch and sit or stand and weep. I haven’t been this distraught since I found out that I don’t have a Wikipedia page. If anyone is even reading this, first please try to get me out of here, but if you can’t. at least write me a Wikipedia page. At least a few sentences. I just want a Wikipedia page. I’ve earned it. Please. It doesn’t have to be fancy, like Helen Mirren’s. I’m not even asking for something like Lahr’s. Just a nice-sized, sensible Wikipedia page.

God damn this white room. All white. Except for those goddamn black curtains. There aren’t even any window, just terrible curtains.

(Actual post here)

The Surowieckipedia — Formative years

hornblower — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 03:47:50 +0000

James began what was to become a lifelong love affair with coconut macaroons when he was seven years old, in the cafeteria of his grammar school, the Westinville Monster School. His classmate Little Petey approached him with a proposition: Little Petey would share his coconut macaroons with James in exchange for a portion of James’s Vienna sausages. James was (quite understandably) attached to his Vienna sausages, but also intrigued by the Little Petey’s pastries. Large for his age, James quickly sized up the aptly named Little Petey and acted boldly. He accepted Little Petey’s coconut macaroon offering, but when Little Petey reached for a Vienna sausage, James snatched them back and removed several pink weiners from the can. “Dost thou enjoy the Vienna sausages, scurvied goat? Perhaps thou wouldst enjoy them in thine ears!” He twisted a sausage into each of Little Petey’s ears. “And, if thou didst find those weiners pleasant in thy respective external auditory meatuses, perhaps thy nostrils might enjoy as well the slippery texture and pleasant aroma!” He twisted a sausage into each of Little Petey’s nostrils. “Ha, ha!”

James realized that he had wasted four of his prized Vienna sausages, and maybe he could have just traded those for the coconut macaroons. But there was no turning back now. He cried out for all his classmates to hear: “Let it be known to all that James hast vanquished Little Petey and taken a very nice bounty of coconut macaroons, and that all who wouldst think to challenge James may indeed find himself or herself the recipient of some very unpleasant Vienna sausage-related humiliations.” With that, James took the rest of the coconut macaroons from a tearful Little Petey and strode out of the cafeteria and into his future, growing brighter with each passing moment.

James Surowiecki will not be watching Jerry Seinfeld’s new TV show

hornblower — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 21:01:30 +0000

I’m sorry, Jerry, but, much as I loved Bee Movie, I don’t have time for film and television anymore. I’m far too busy working on the project that has become my lifeblood — the Surowieckipedia. For decades, people have asked me questions about myself — how I’m doing, where I’m from, where I went to university, et cetera. I’ve come to realize that, with the Surowieckipedia, these questions will become obsolete, and people will never need to ask me them again; I plan to use the extra time working on the Surowieckipedia.

Excerpt: James enjoys blackberry jam, but only sometimes. He finds that too-frequent ingestion can cause the sensation of having a hundred mad dancers in one’s belly. Not unpleasant, but something for which a measure of preparation is necessary. He will frequently indulge in strawberry jam, as an alternative. Also, he enjoys the music group ‘Genesis’ quite a lot.

(Actual post here)

Evan Osnos discovers China’s definition of “Western food”

hornblower — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 03:45:08 +0000

Spaghetti.

(Actual post here)

Nick Paumgarten knows why New York smells like maple syrup

hornblower — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 08:10:11 +0000

I often stroll the windy canyons of Park Avenue with scarf tight, hands jammed in pockets, and winter cap secure, leaving only my nose exposed to the New York air. This, naturally, leads me to dwell upon the scents I encounter during my flâneur, and, of late, I have noticed a preponderance of maple in the air. After some measure of investigation with my contacts within the New York Public Library and City Hall, I was unable to make any headway; it appeared I’d have to take it upon myself to solve this riddle, which at this point was keeping me up long nights, to the endless chagrin of my wife.

One evening after supper, I pulled on a battered pair of Asics and headed off to the Reservoir for a quick jog to clear my mind. After two loops, I decided to take off on a new path through the woods, having tried and failed to put some distance between myself and the sixtysomething in yellow Lycra who always seems to be running precisely when I am, and at the same speed, too. I took off into the depths of the greenery and after just a few minutes found myself in a clearing of uncommon aura. The air seemed subtly heavier, the grass strangely springier, than normal. And the maple smell, heretofore an olfactory undercurrent, permeated the clearing, hanging as heavily as if a fog of condensed maple syrup had rolled in and taken up residence.

At this point evening had given way to night, and the waxing moon shone through the clearing to reveal a circle of robed and hooded figures across the way. They seemed to be encircling a large, black cauldron, from which rose a thick plume of smoke, glistening grey in the moonlight. I broke off my jog, approaching the group carefully, curiously. As I neared the enigmatic assemblage, I heard a twig snap under my cross-trainers, and felt for an instant some measure of sympathy for Fenimore Cooper in the face of Twain’s withering criticisms — indeed, dry twigs do appear underfoot at the most inopportune moments! Seven heads in seven hoods turned toward me as the cauldron hissed. The tallest was the leader, and he spoke for the group.
–Nothing happening here, gentle sir. Be on your way.

And I’m not ashamed to say that’s just what I did. So long, minions of Jemima! But the trip was nothing if not successful. I had finally found the source of the vexing smell, and I returned home eager to share with the world my discovery, and seek another mystery to conquer. I find myself compelled by the thrill of the hunt, the rapture of the Eureka moment. This space will now read as a mystery serial of sorts, chronicling episodes of my newfound vocation. Wish me luck.

(Actual post here)

And this is weird, but here‘s an article Nick Paumgarten wrote in November of 2005 on the very same subject.