Bold-Faced Blogs

Let's say you didn't spend the past couple days trawling some of the city's bolder-faced blogs. You might have missed this:

Welcome to Phillyville has a plan for the Eakins masterwork that Thomas Jefferson Hospital has agreed to sell: Have the Philadelphia Museum of Art buy it, forget the underground annex it's hired Frank Gehry to design, and have Gehry do something where it counts more - the waterfront. Phillyville writes: "Let him build a brilliant anchor that will shine along the Delaware."

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The City Paper's Clog buys The Absolutely Worst Places to Live In merica so we don't have to, and mines the Philly parts. Not pretty. Not a very good book, either, Cloggers sniff. From the book: "It's virtually impossible to leave New York, drive to Philly, and not begin immediately wondering, 'Where'd everything go?' Philadelphia feels slightly off, as if there exists some collective desire to remain second-rate." The Clog: "Of course there's a sports-themed timeline at the end. I'm starting wish we had gutted Santa Claus instead of chucking ice. Just descended onto the awful turf at Veteran's Stadium and tore into his flesh, you know? And then we'd all bellow into the night sky together, blood streaming down our cheeks and fists. Really make a statement."

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Philebrity is both repulsed by and attracted to the Chestnut Hill mommies who the New York Times wrote about - those gals who reward themselves with a little me-tini after a hard day or week of working inside the home. Phileb's not so high on the Times piece, however.

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Phawker is both repulsed by and attracted to WXPN-FM. Jon Valania writes: "Now, setting aside for a moment the swelling ranks of Sketchers-clad True Believers, most people I know have a love-hate relationship with WXPN. Sure they always listen, but, you know: Too much hairy-legged lesbian folk, too much precious-but-dull singer-songwriter fare, too much…well insert your personal gripe here, and then zip it. Because THOSE DAYS ARE OVER. In recent years, WXPN has been broadcasting at a level of quality, diversity and listenability second only to, say, KCRW in Santa Monica. It's time to $%^can the jaded hipster sniping and give it up: We now have, in the heart of our beloved city, a real-deal alternative community station run by the people and for the people. So the next time you go to reach for your sarcasm why don't you reach for your wallet instead — and give to 'til it hurts. It's the least you could do."

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Vance Lehmkuhl, the online honcho at that other paper in the Inquirer building, understands that the Daily News is not the Washington Post. But he doesn't think he'd do something as baldly bad as the Post did, rinsing its language in an Internet article about Bush and Rumsfeld, then pretending it didn't happen. He wrote sent an online best-practices letter to Romenesko.

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The 700 Level - and, frankly, about everyone else in town but me - writes something sexy about Allen Iverson. Maybe two people in the whole world know if it''s actually true. But it's blogworthy. Take a moment to read it. We'll be having a smoke now.

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Clark Deleon nailed one. He asked how many of his students at Montgomery County Community College were registered to vote. Only 6 of 60 students. Clark was dumbfounded. So he assigned them to write on the following subject: "Since March of 2003 more than 2.800 American men and women have died in Iraq trying to bring democracy to that country. Tell those dead Americans why you chose not to vote this year."

We don't have space to get into the entire letter a 19-year-old young woman from Telford wrote back. But it's strong. It begins:

"I don't vote because I don't pay attention. I decide not to learn about the candidates and what they stand for. I skip over the political news articles and dismiss the signs scattered along the roadside. Whenever I try to take the easy way out by asking others about the candidates I get biased opinions. I don't want to vote for someone simply because others told me to. I believe a half-hearted attempt is worse than no attempt at all.

"I say that I can never make a difference. The greatest lie I have ever spoken. ..."

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And today's photo? It made the rounds, too. Best I can tell, "Burke" from BCO did it. But we've added a little something at the suggestion of Mrs. Blinq, who teaches America's children. Yes, Chucky.

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Hi Dan:

I am put off by the hairy legged-lesbian bit, but otherwise think Phawker hit the nail on the head about 'XPN.  I have been listening for 26 years (!!!) and also have a healthy love-hate relationship.

I'm not familiar with KCRW, but will give it a listen, but can say without hesitation that of the many non-jazz and non-classical stations that I webstream into my home stereo, 'XPN is far and away the best for away from the commercial radio mainstram music.

Thanks for that, Shaun. KCRW is great - I stream Morning Becomes Eclectric whenever I can. As for the hairy legged bit - I'm with you. 

I turned on to XPN a few years ago. I like the diversity. Folk follows jazz follows funk follows rock, etc. Friday Funk is a main pleasure during the drive home.
Speaking of Clark DeLeon, out of the many journalism courses I've taken his 101 was the best. Learned more from that one class 30 years ago than I learned in the rest. Always liked his columns in the Inky, too. Wish he was still writing them.

" too much precious-but-dull singer-songwriter fare"


I think of it as just another Whiney Crybaby Guy With A Guitar. 

How's that for a genre?

Last week, thay averaged 3 WCGWG's per hour. Sad that I did the math but painting ain't rocket science.

Not a real complaint though,  'XPN is still my default radio station.