10 non-work-related items that I found fun or interesting

Renault: the car for men who don’t worry about their penises via Boing Boing by Cory Doctorow
This 1970 Renault ad attempts to entice customers who don’t worry if their car makes them feel inadequate in the penis department. I’m inordinately fond of the phrase “fancy-price fantasy wagon,” I must say.
Renault (1970)

via Arts and Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Getting old takes getting used to – loss of appetite, constant urinating – but Jerry Lewis is adjusting. “I keep my fly open all day”...more

Overrated
Authors, critics, and editors on “great books” that aren't all that great.
This item from Slate was quoted in a number of different blogs.

via Arts and Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Brandishing scads of data, Robert Pape argues that suicide terrorism is not motivated by Islam. But what’s motivating Pape?...more

Information Wants to Be Expensive via Big Think by Dominic Basulto
Stewart Brand’s famous maxim, “Information Wants to be Free”, has been, for more than 25 years, one of the most popular rallying cries of the Digital Age. These words have been famously twisted, adapted and re-interpreted to mean, “Everything on the Internet should be free”. Little remembered ... Read More

via Arts and Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
He was among the greatest talkers of his - or any - time, but Oscar Wilde meticulously revised his written prose, never quite sure how subversive he wanted to be...more

WARNING: If you don’t “do cute” then this definitely not for you.
Rescued seal pup released back to the sea via Lighter Footstep by Shea Gunther
Peewee the Northern Fur Seal is lucky he found his way to the Island Wildlife Natural Care Centre on Salt Spring Island, British Columbia. When he first was brought in he was starving and sick. When they shot this video (see link below) of him being released, he was a healthy pup who couldn't be happier to see the ocean.
Watch video

via Arts and Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
In 1725, a feral boy stumbled out of the woods and posed a challenge to Europe’s secular intelligentsia: What separates man from animals?...more

How “Try a Little Tenderness” went from forgettable love-song to soulful classic via Boing Boing by Cory Doctorow
On The Awl, an engrossing musical history of “Try a Little Tenderness”, which started life in 1932 as a schmaltzy, vacuous love-song recorded by Ray Noble and his Orchestra. Gradually, over the decades, new singers reinterpreted it, gradually giving it soul in dribs and drabs, leading up to the classic Otis Redding recording (and the regrettable Jay-Z reinterpretation).
Read it all

via Arts and Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
St. Augustine’s eccentricities were said to be the result of “a mind steeped too long in too few books”. Of whom can that be said today?...more

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