¡Feliz Cumpleaños! Infanta Elena, Duques de Lugo

Divorce can be a very uplifting time - the elation of kicking his cheating ass to the curb, for instance, I always find very invigorating - but too often people focus on the negative aspects of it; my humble suggestion, Your Royal Highness, is to do your utmost to find the good in your current situation, heal, and then move on.

It doesn't matter what your parents think, and as for the impact divorce will have on your children, believe me when I tell you that a miserable marriage is way worse than a single mother any day. Believe me... I know whereof I speak. Believe me. (Or did I say that already?)

I'll get you started on your quest for the silver lining; consider it a birthday present... In the olden days a Princess - even a royal Princess - who couldn't play nice either got shunted off to a nunnery or else they locked her up in a drafty castle until she died of consumption; thank your lucky stars you live in 2007.

Now you try...
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Song Of The Year: "You Know I'm No Good" by Amy Winehouse

Musically, 2007 has been a great year for Amy Winehouse; personally...? Not so much.

Nevertheless, ever since the moment I heard it You Know I'm No Good has not left my iPod; I've already posted it, as we say, on the other side (namely, at Self-Loathario) so I thought why not post it here too, as part of my big year-end celebration? And since there's no one here but me and the cat, and she didn't say anything, that's what I did.
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Hottie Of The Year: Jake Gyllenhaal

Born on this day in 1980 - obviously a very good year - Jake Gyllenhaal is not only Hottie of the Year for this year, but last year, next year, any old year he wants really.

(Any suggestions for female Hottie of the Year should be left as comments here as quickly as possible; a winner will be announced before in one week. Unless, of course, I get no input - in which case I'll be forced to choose one on my own, and that may not go well.)
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"Dirrty" by Christina Aguilera

Way, way, WAY back in the olden days - I'm talking ten years ago now - Britney Spears was the perky little all-American girl everyone loved and Christina Aguilera was an over-the-top skank who seemed well on her way to dying with a needle in her arm and a dick in her mouth...

My, how times have changed; now it's Britney who's on suicide watch, weaning her kids on Mountain Dew, and generally doing her utmost to win White Trash Mother of the Year while Christina's found herself a nice Jewish boy, got married, and found herself in a family way - and in that order! So retro!

To celebrate both her birthday and her burgeoning waistline, here's a reminder of Mrs. Bratman's past, present, and future hotness...

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A Public Service Announcement

Which of us has not borne this terrible stigma at one time or another in our life?

Watch this video and learn how to protect yourself; until there's a cure, this is our best line of defense.
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1888: A Year In Review

Of all the years I have reviewed so far for the feature A Year in Review, 1888 is probably the one which holds the most fascination for me. The height of the late Victorian period is an age which is rich in the kinds of characters and events especially favoured for coverage by the Pop Culture Institute; many of their lives and works (for good or ill) resonate with us still.

From the diminutive Queen who towered over the era to which she gave her name to the five humble streetwalkers - Mary Ann Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes, and Mary Jane Kelly - who found themselves butchered by Jack the Ripper; and from Annie Besant who organized a strike by match girls in London to Susan B. Anthony and her agitating for women's rights in Washington, DC, it was a time when women (in the West, at least, and whether they agreed with the tenets of feminism or not) were about to embark upon their arduous journey to equality. Brazil, on the other hand, was just getting around to abolishing slavery.

The year in which the National Geographic Society was formed was first and foremost an age of science and exploration; while Thomas Edison was scratching his head over how to invent sound film, Louis Le Prince was filming his motion picture Roundhay Garden Scene - all 2 seconds of it; for his soundtrack he could have used Handel's Israel in Egypt, which was the first classical music recorded - in the style of the day - on a wax cylinder.

George Eastman meanwhile had patented his new Kodak camera, complete with a new innovation - roll film - which would revolutionize photography, overnight making everyone the potential subject of a portrait; for the budding landscape artist, perhaps a photo of the newly opened Washington Monument would suffice. Or, should you find yourself on the other side of the world, you might catch an early glimpse of a remarkable dolphin named Pelorus Jack in New Zealand's Cook Strait.

Today, whenever inordinate amounts of snow fall on Manhattan, it's bound to be compared to the Great Blizzard of '88, which killed 400 along the Eastern Seaboard in March; references to Vincent van Gogh's missing ear (which he gave to a prostitute named Rachel for safe-keeping) also date from December of this year.

Known as the Year of Three Emperors, Germany's Wilhelm I, Friedrich III, and Wilhelm II all shared the throne in 1888; in presidential politics Grover Cleveland won the popular vote but lost the Electoral College to Benjamin Harrison during a hotly disputed election. That other American pastime - baseball - added to its own body of lore with the publication of Casey at the Bat.

Knute Rockne, Anita Loos, Max Steiner, Irving Berlin, Jim Thorpe Raymond Chandler, T. E. Lawrence, T. S. Eliot, Eugene O'Neill, Robert Moses and Fernando Pessoa were among those born; poets Edward Lear and Matthew Arnold were among those who died.

The last surviving documented person born in 1888 was Adelina Domingues who died at the age of 114 in August 2002; no word on whether or not she used Mum deodorant, the first commercially available product to combat body odour, which was invented in Philadelphia the year she was born.
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1888: Abso-tively, Posi-lutely The Penultimate Mini-Milestone

Well, another mini-milestone has arrived, and thank goodness it's almost the last one; what started out as a clever idea quickly grew tiresome, like a Steven Seagal movie, or having children. The very last mini-milestone will occur at post number 1969 probably just before Christmas.

There isn't much to say in this one except the usual: how grateful I am to my readers and for what little input I manage to drag out of them. Efforts to build a community around this site are ongoing, and as such will be forthcoming in fits and starts whenever I can manage to wrestle a little energy from my ageing carcass and something resembling cogent thought from my overworked brain.

In the meantime, please enjoy, comment, make suggestions, and tell your friends.

~ MSM
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I Can't Seem To Help Myself

Gradually I am coming to understand why I keep fucking this up; as a happy accident, as I am coming to understand what I'm doing wrong, I am also coming to understand how to fix it. All of which amounts to a lot of coming and a lot of understanding, even for me.

Naturally, I've done it again, embedded a video and locked myself out of the blog. And since every time previously the only way to fix it was to write some stupid explanation afterwards, renouncing the blogosphere forever as the murderer of dreams, etc. etc. that's what I'm doing now, to whit:

Everything hates me; boo-fucking hoo.

That oughta do it. What I'm really doing, though, I haven't the faintest idea. The morally neutral and non-sentient circuitry of my computer isn't responding to my histrionics even in the remotest way, but is simply doing an end run around some minor glitch in its code which my posting this would seem to encourage.

Please be patient; a bigger problem is brewing on the home front. I renamed my Music folder, and now iTunes can't find anything to play; I renamed the folder (back to Music), but it still can't seem to find it. Unless... I also renamed my external hard drive; if I change its name back... Yes! There's my iTunes! I did something right!

(Honestly, I shouldn't even be allowed to own a computer.)

Here then, is to the Pop Culture Institute: Long May She Snark!

~ MSM
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It's Doing It Again

Once again Blogspot has forgotten how to play nice with my computer; it hangs when I try to blog using Firefox, and crashes when I use Safari.  I reinstalled Firefox and restarted, which is all I had to do to fix the problem last time, only this time the solution is proving more elusive.

Same story...  Yada yada can't publish anything new yada yada kick the fucking thing down the alley yada yada total shit yada yada step on their necks.

Honestly, it's all getting very dull.

~ MSM

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Beyond The Comfort Zone

It was months ago when I discovered where my comfort zone was as a writer, and on that day I could have easily hunkered down in that sweet spot and written from there for the rest of my life. But no... Comfort's not good enough for me; I have to work from a place where it sometimes takes five hours of reading and 10+ rewrites to produce a single 100-word post.

Having spent the greater part of five hours committing literary seppuku in order to write both the DiMaggio and Mishima posts below as if by cesarean section, I can safely say that I am officially out of control. The worst of it is, I'm still not pleased with either one; in both cases I feel I've failed to knock them out of the park. Typically, though, it's the pieces I'm less than pleased with that get the most praise from readers - wherein I can virtually predict how much acclaim something will earn by how chuffed with myself I am for having written it - which is the only reason I would ever publish anything with which I was less than utterly satisfied.

Every year it's the same thing; the run-up to my birthday elicits such a panoply of conflicting impulses I scarcely know what to do except hang on for dear life until it passes. What it generally comes down to is, on the one hand, a kind of exasperation that I could be this old and still not established in my career and, on the other hand, a kind of relief that I'm not in the same position, only ten years older. This quandary typically manifests itself in one of two ways: either as writer's block, or a condition I like to call 'writer's frenzy' which, as you might expect, is the opposite.

At least this blog makes me feel like I'm actually doing something about that nebulous beast I'm fond of calling my career; to whit, I've just received an early birthday present - a request to reprint a very popular piece I recently published entitled RIP Norman Mailer. This singular honour, as much as the two new blogrolls to which I've been added, tells me that I must be on my way. That the request came from someone with those three magic letters after his name - P, H, and D - is either icing on the lily or gilding the cake; I can't decide which right now, what with all the frenzy.

As for that comfort zone of mine... It's a nice place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there. Once, while engaging in a mental tug-of-war with a fellow commenter at Joe.My.God, I was referred to by my opponent as a "brain shark"; whether he meant it as a compliment or not is irrelevant, because I took it as such. My brain, like a shark, cannot stop moving or it will die.

Really, it's as simple as that.

~ MSM
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BAFTA Pays Tribute To Billy Connolly

Billy Connolly isn't a comedian, nor is he an actor; he's nothing less than a philosopher who chooses to express himself through stand up comedy, folk music, and/or the inhabitation of disparate (not to mention occasionally desperate) characters.

Here he is, squirming in the hot seat at a tribute to him and his career at BAFTA, hosted by Mr. Genial himself, Michael Parkinson. In attendance are his good lady wife, Pamela Stephenson, colleagues from the ridiculous (Eddie Izzard) to the sublime (Dame Judi Dench), and providing the rebuttal no less than Saint Bob himself.

As usual, I'm showing the first part only; if you wish to watch on, simply click on the screen and start searching!
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Now Showing: "The Last Duet on Earth"

During my frequent nocturnal intoxicated ramblings throughout the Web, I often come across crazy-ass shit; witness, Exhibit A - the above video. From the immense imagination of Graham Annable of Oregon, it's The Last Duet on Earth.

Seriously, though, what's not to love? From its pertinent social message to its surprise twist ending, I enjoyed every frame; plus, zombies and banjo music somehow just seem to go hand in hand, don't they?
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The Glitch Is Back

Whatever the problem is, it wasn't with the U2 video (as related in the post below) but resides within Blogspot itself; the post published below seems to have awakened the problem.

Therefore, I must regretfully announce that publication of the Pop Culture Institute will be halted, effective immediately until such time as Blogspot gets it shit together.

~ MSM

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Wednesday, Bloody Wednesday

Earlier today, as some of you may know, I posted a video of U2's classic Sunday, Bloody Sunday; this being the anniversary of the day in question, I thought it would be a nice way to commemorate the occasion. Boy was I wrong.

The Anglo-Irish War had nothing on the bullshit that video put me though. (I am, of course, exaggerating; posting the video had no death toll, although it came close.)

As usual, of course, Mr. Gagne saved the day when I was ready to delete the whole fucking thing and start over. Not only did he manage to calm me down (without a Taser - take note VPD) but he also managed to fix the problem faster than James Herriot could fix a spaniel.

Still, when you think about how many hundreds of videos I've posted on here, this is the first one that's given me trouble, a perspective Mr. Gagne was only too willing to shoe-horn in between my numerous interruptions and bouts of operatic melodrama. In other words, just another day at the office for the Pop Culture Institute.

Having spent six hours grappling with the problem has left me without the energy to publish any more today. I'm taking the evening off and I'll be back here tomorrow as usual.

~ MSM
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HAPPY 60TH ANNIVERSARY!

It couldn't have come at a better time; the people of Britain - still reeling from the devastation of World War II, facing a winter of severe cold and the privation brought on by rationing - lined the streets to see their beautiful future Queen married to a handsome naval officer.

It was sixty years ago today Her Royal Highness The Princess Elizabeth married the newly-created Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, at a ceremony in Westminster Abbey (which, thankfully, had been spared the recent ravages of the Luftwaffe).

Following their marriage the Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh took as their London residence Clarence House, and set about the task at hand: begetting the son and heir. One week shy of their first anniversary, in November 1948, hundreds of guns across the country and around the Commonwealth boomed their appropriate greetings for the new Prince Charles.

Earlier this year the Royal Mint released a special double portrait £5 coin - only the fifth time in history they've done so - in honour of the royal milestone; only last week, in the lead-up to today's anniversary celebration, Buckingham Palace released some 60 fun facts about the blessed event of six decades ago. And finally, last evening The Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall hosted an intimate dinner party for the Queen, her consort, and 25 very special guests in Clarence House; the home which has always held so many dear memories for them now holding even more.

Today's occasion - the celebration of their diamond anniversary - was remarkably low-key, at Her Majesty's behest; there were no parades or street parties, no fireworks or pageants. Just a church service, the opening of a new pedestrian walkway, and the unveiling of a plaque. Highlighting yet again that theirs , though a love match of the highest order, always was and always will be a working relationship.
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Check Out Spain's Hottest Ringtone

More than half a million people in Spain and Latin America have downloaded a ringtone of an actor playing King Juan Carlos telling Hugo Chávez to shut up; mugs and t-shirts are also available, and websites (as is their wont) have been springing up as well.

Diplomats have been labouring mightily to defuse the potential rift between Spain and Venezuela, while the public, it seems, can't get enough. The incident has put the King's already-high approval rating even higher, coming as it did hot on the heels of a nationalist visit to the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla.

It hasn't been all good news for the Royal Family, though, as late last week it was announced that His Majesty's oldest child Infanta Elena and her husband Jaime de Marichalar, Duke of Lugo would henceforth be living apart.

(Muchos gracias to my Spanish-Canadian correspondent, Javier Mainar, for the heads-up on the story; sorry I couldn't find the link to the ringtone. If you can, let me know; I'd love to get it for mine. ~ MSM)

[S O U R C E]
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1777: A Year in Review

Unlike previous Years in Review, 1777 actually has some pretty important stuff going on, including of course, the American Revolution.

I was startled to learn, though, that 1777 was also the year that Vermont declared its independence, functioning as a separate country until 1791. So that makes California, Texas, and Vermont that were all republics before states; the mind boggles...

Meanwhile, the first pueblo in sunny Alta California - San Jose - was founded.

1777 is also the year the last native speaker of Cornish, Dolly Pentreath, died.

The second edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica was published, and it's still probably more accurate than Wikipedia; also, the Irish developed a code for duelling, called the code duello, appropriately enough.

Okay, so 1777 is pretty much all about the American Revolution; the real point is, thanks to the research I did for this point, my head is now satiated with the names of many obscure people I had never heard of before today. Good times...
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Mini-milestone: 1777

Lately, I tend to view these milestone posts rather as one might a box of chocolates; over the previous 15 days (since the last mini-milestone - 111 posts in 15 days, whew!) I've managed to collect an interesting assortment of blog-related occurrences, each of which has added some unique flavour or texture to the overall experience.

One was the discovery (quite by accident) that I have been added to yet another blogroll; I thank you for that Bear Schmear: Tales From the Blogoqueer, who generally leaves comments at Joe.My.God as "richeyrich". I haven't had a great deal of time to peruse his site, but I'm definitely getting caught up on my workload here, so I may have a spare hour or two to do just that next week.

My various experiments with viral marketing have proven highly successful on two separate occasions: first, a link left in the comments at Joe.My.God to one of my earlier posts - Oscar Night Bum Fight - was briefly my most popular entry page, due entirely to traffic from Haloscan; a second attempt was equally successful, linking to one of my better recent pieces, RIP Norman Mailer. All told, I have Joe.My.God to thank for at least half of my traffic whenever I am able to comment extensively over there.

The majority of my traffic still comes from the American Northeast, which suits me just fine, although European traffic is up recently, due to my more-extensive-than-usual coverage of royal news (thank you House of Bourbon!). I still don't have the quantity of comments I'd like, but my hits (and more importantly, reads) are trending upwards very nicely. I am still on the lookout for a UK blog from which I can hope to entice a few more readers.

Phase Two of the viral marketing campaign is about to begin, with my own reintroduction into Vancouver's spoken word/open mike circuit; simply informing people about the blog and/or sending them links which I felt were pertinent to them seems to be driving a considerable amount of new traffic to the site. Likewise, there is now a Pop Culture Institute group on Facebook - open to all, naturally - and I've recently begun adding content to that as well, in the hopes that it will eventually serve as portal to and from the blog.

Otherwise, what feels like the glacial pace of progress is gradually moving various other ideas forward; additionally, I've begun reprinting articles from Pop Culture Institute at Self-Loathario, whenever I feel they'd be more appropriate over there.

All told there are 43 days left in the year, during which time I plan to publish 231 posts - which is just a smidge over 5 per day and, like Jake Gyllenhaal, utterly do-able. The next mini-milestone is at 1888; see you there when I see you there!

~ MSM
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Duke & Duchess of Lugo To Separate

Infanta Elena - eldest daughter of King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia of Spain - married since 1995 to Jaime de Marichalar, announced that she and her banker husband are separating. Her Royal Highness moved out of their home, taking their two children Felipe and Victoria with her.

Known as the Duke and Duchess of Lugo (to which title de Marichalar was elevated prior to his royal marriage), it's been reported that the Duke will retain his title, even if they should divorce. So far, the Zarzuela Palace has quashed rumours that their separation would lead to divorce.

[S O U R C E]
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Jack Danyells Speaks Out On Writers Strike

In addition to being beautiful, YouTuber extraordinaire Jack Danyells is also smart, which believe you me is a powerful combination when it comes to entertainment. For anyone with a beauty/brains fetish, this will seem like porn. I know it provokes more than my thoughts.

Here our intrepid hottie proposes bringing the writers' strike to YouTube, striking a blow for us New Media types everywhere. You heard me, Mainstream Media, it's on! There's a new MSM in town.

I'm with you Jack! I've got your back! Do I ever...

(Unfortunately, I've been unable to make a video reply as I've just locked out my YouTube stagehands. ~ MSM)

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