Quick Update

Like Greaseball with his illegitimate children, I've been negligent in maintaining this "web log" lately. This is because I still have no power flowing through to my residential building. I realize the irony of this, considering my profession. Since I'm on a trade floor and my screen is visible to all, this update shall be minimalist and photoless, in complete betrayal of this newsletter's banner slogan.

/"Peace out"

[subsequent update: I was in Austin this weekend, escaping the blackout and performing some due diligence for my bar ranking list. And yes it was awesome, and everybody got laid. So there will be a top ten list put up this week once power is restored. I'm not promising anything, but the #1 slot may shock you (or it may not; I still haven't decided the top 2, given my new information).

Unlike Gaul, this list will be divided in two parts: block #10-3 and then a longer breakdown of #1 vs #2.]

Just a Bad Few Days in the Land of Pemulis

Lehman Brothers goes under, the Dow drops 500 points, a hurricane ravages my hometown and David Foster Wallace is dead.

The Peemster is..very sad.

POTUS Intrade Update

For those of you Obamatons following the political betting markets, I've got some bad news for you. As the poster for the Joe Piscopo vehicle above would hint, the oddsmakers have the race at a dead heat (as of 5pm September 10; this site updates continuously).

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So if you're a betting man (and if you're reading this newsletter, you're probably both), I'd lay some money down on Obama, at least as a hedge against the higher taxes you will inevitably pay under his reign. Plus I think the nation's enthusiasm over the stripper/teacher from Varsity Blues* will wane considerably after she forgoes the comfort of the teleprompter in a one-on-one debate contra Biden.

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And as always, be on the lookout for that October Surprise, one of my favorite election phenomena.

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* [Editor's update: I'm very disappointed in the internet for not having a better picture than this. (Per commenter complaint, the last hyperlink I posted was a busted link) And I've tried every permutation of stripper, teacher, varsity, blues, tonie, perensky, sarah palin, "Miss Davis, will you go to the prom with me", and vpilf that I could think of in my search toolbar. You'll just have to buy the movie, which is fantastic anyway.]

Commenters of the World Unite!

Arise Commentariat!

A revolution has begun here in Pemula. No longer shall commenting be restricted to elitist bourgeois registered blog users. Now the teeming, mongoloid masses may post anonymously.

Have a quip about intrade-implied Presidential death spreads? Think Blake Lively is hotter than Lily Van der Woodsen?* Say so now under the aegis on anonymity, free from the reprisals of the Pemulan state apparatus.

Commentariat, you have nothing to lose but your chains!

*you are a gey if you think this

Texas School of Business

Watching the new iteration of 90210, I saw an ad for the institution represented by the fine logo above. That's some impressive piggybacking.

If Red McCombs were dead, he'd be rolling around in his grave right now.

Special Guest Music Review: Chinese Democracy by Guns 'N Roses

[Editor's note: TBW colleague Tonian gave me permission to reprint his April 1, 2008 review for our periodical. This in honor of the end of the Beijing Olympic Games--in the hope that China may one day throw off the yolk of soft communist authortarianism, and in some hopeful future, bear the horse collar of minarchist anarchocapitalism]

It is a hackneyed joke in the music industry that democracy will ultimately prevail in China before Guns ‘N Roses’ Chinese Democracy gets released. A decade-long feud between Axl Rose and lead guitarist Slash along with many changes in the band’s creative direction, have conspired to delay the album’s release until Fall 2008, seventeen years after the GNR hit Use Your Illusion II.* However, as with all post-industrial musical projects of great import, leaked tracks have percolated through the fiber optic ether, and a painstakingly compiled and verified copy of the final cut has been hustled and smuggled through the back hallways of the McCombs GSB itself…

And so, after several rounds of negotiated barter with Bostonian 2nd year Dan Sarles (let’s just say the words “Carlton Fisk home run ball” entered into the discussion) I managed to procure one such copy, aptly described by my regionally-handicapped friend as “wicked awesome.” That a Princeton-educated English major like Dan could not, through fog of sheer joy, overcome his primal New England urge toward misplaced adjectives in describing Democracy should have indicated to me how “wicked awesome” this album indeed was.

In the 1987 Cary Elwes vehicle The Princess Bride, Sicilian mastermind and villain Vizzini confronts virtuoso swordsman and protagonist, Westley, with his claim to genius:

Vizzini: I can't compete with you physically, and you're no match for my brains.

Westley: You're that smart?

Vizzini: Let me put it this way. Have you ever heard of Plato, Aristotle, Socrates?

Westley: Yes.

Vizzini: Morons!

Guns ‘N Roses can comfortably make an analogous claim to its own superlative brilliance with its as-yet publicly released magnum opus, Chinese Democracy. Democracy can’t be fairly compared to other GNR albums or to those of its lesser peers—Ten by Pearl Jam or Nevermind by Nirvana—karaoke tyros by comparison. Instead, musical historians 100 years hence will inevitably compare Democracy to Beethoven’s Ninth, The Beatles’ Yesterday, or Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen. If ever there were a compendium to fulfill the promise of Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure—that perfect music will slay the demonic triumverate of poverty, war, and pollution—it will be Democracy, or it will be nothing. When the physicists overseeing the CERN particle accelerator finally isolate the Higgs Boson, they will find its subatomic spin resonates to the discordant melody of track 2’s heavy metal cover of “Eleanor Rigby”.

Some Democracy highlights, track by track:

December Snow: A melancholy dirge reflecting on loneliness and lost love in winter, the track tops out the album at 15 minutes, 37 seconds. The only “sequel” song in the GNR library.

Eleanor Rigby: Continues in the tradition of “cover as superior to original” begun by “Live and Let Die” and “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door.” Rumored have caused the McCartney-Mills divorce after Mills realized that her husband had been topped.

Don’t Cry (second redux): GNR’s Pynchonian third take on its 1991 original; Dave Grohl makes a guest appearance on the drums.

Internecine Conflict: An angry refrain directed at the futility and folly of mankind’s wars-“what’s so ‘nice’ about internecine conflict anyway?”

The Return of Slash: The most vindictive track in the album, it mostly takes Use Your Illusion II’s expletive-laden “Get in the Ring” and subs in the word “Slash” for every reference to Bob Guccioni. Apparently Slash’s commitment to new band Velvet Revolver precluded a cameo, prompting this relentless musical tirade.

Sweet Child of Mine (redux): Perhaps the best song of the decade, it’s like the opposite of “Hey There, Delilah” by Plain White T’s.

Long review short: you must buy Chinese Democracy at or before its release date. Mortgage your house, liquidate your stocks, pillage the ATM—do whatever you can to acquire this album—the apotheosis of the audible. If this were a movie, it would be Citizen Kane; if this were a book, it would be Ulysses; if this were a general, it would be Rommel, Kublai Khan, Hannibal and all the other bad guy military prodigies that have so terrified the civilized people of history, all rolled into one. It’s wicked awesome.

So on that note, I’m retiring my station here at the TBW—hope you’ve enjoyed all the needlessly convoluted prose. Good night, and good luck.

*Let’s just all agree to forget 1994’s Spaghetti Incident, GNR’s Rocky V

My favorite Shakespearean Play

has always been Merchant of Venice.

I demand my pound of flesh!