touch me, feel me
Don’t know what this says about online shopping, but people who held a coffee mug for as little as thirty seconds were much more likely to pay more for it.
The study, detailed in the August 2008 issue of the journal Judgment and Decision Making, found that on average, people who held the mug for longer bid more for it – $3.91 to $2.44 in the case of the open auction and $3.07 to $2.24 in the closed. In fact, people who held the mug for 30 seconds bid more than the retail price four out of seven times.
“The amazing part of this study is that people can become almost immediately attached to something as insignificant as a mug,” said study leader James Wolf, who began the work while he was a graduate student at Ohio State. “By simply touching the mug and feeling it in their hands, many people begin to feel like the mug is, in fact, their mug. Once they begin to feel it is theirs, they are willing to go to greater lengths to keep it.”
Is it possible
I feel homesick for a place where I only spent 38 days? This morning I was taking my morning walk in my sandals instead of my usual tennis shoes. I thought about heading into the long climb from Pietà into Floriana, with parkland (and beyond that, a marina) to one side and the Ta’Braxia Cemetery to the other, in these very sandals. I often find myself thinking about my time in Malta.
Clan du Néon
Le blog Clan du Néon (via twitter.com/brunokruse)
Great Moments
in Presidential Speeches (The Late Show with David Letterman).
Clusterflock Book Club
It does exactly what it says on the tin. I propose a book club, to meet periodically and mull over a specific book. It goes like this:
We decide on a book, buy, loan or steal the book or pick it off our salubriously furnished bookshelves and re-read it, set a date for a couple or few weeks hence, put the date in our little iCals or Moleskine diaries, and get together and jive about the book on the proposed date. Sort of what we do already about shit, but you know, organised.
I got the idea to do this when Deron played Santa a few weeks ago and sent four of us copies of Clusterflocker Daryl Scroggins‘ book, This Is Not The Way We Came In, free gratis and for nothing. So the first book I would like the First Inaugural Clusterflock Book Club meeting to discuss, is Daryl’s. If you would like to participate, you can buy the book at Ravenna Press. I reckon a couple of weeks from now would be the time to do it. So, if you want to hop aboard the CFBC streetcar, and you don’t have a copy of This Is Not The Way We Came In, that means you’ll have to order it, like today, probably.
So. Suggestions please, regarding medium for our book club. I have already suggested a possible Skype conference, but last I looked, Skype only facilitated five people on any given conference call. Still, I think that would be fun. Any interesting technocratic ideas are welcome. Otherwise, we can conduct the conversation in the comments – our native home – but it’s not always the most real-timey way of doing things.
So, Sheila. You have been remarkably quiet: what do you think of the Clusterflock Book Club idea?
Oh, you guys
Thank you for your going away gift. It was unexpected and truly appreciated. I’m grateful for all the support you’ve all given me, both in your encouragement and in your examples as people who are living life on your own terms. Though tomorrow I’m flying solo, I know I have good friends along for the trip.
Also,
I can’t remember his name. I couldn’t even three seconds after he said it, so I don’t really blame me. I will call him Mike, though, because surely that makes sense.
Mike is from Austria, a place where people live to work; where sidelong glances are foreign and strange; where neighbors know each other through misdirected post and not morning smiles.
Mike is opinionated. And we agree.
He was here only to audition. And I slept through it and did not think good thoughts, only maybe I dreamed some. I do not know.
Mike likes the Red Hot Chili Peppers. And can’t believe we say sauerkraut. And likes to say Shit! sometimes. And I think maybe one beer is enough for Mike.
But we ate well, and I think I am very lucky to have taken Mike or at least invited him. Because even though I do not know his name, and I have forgotten his hometown, Mike and I made something inside of me. Better than a car crash because no one was hurt.
Shit.
Bruce Springsteen, This Land is Your Land
If you can get past the earnestness of the introduction, I really like this version of the song.
Amy
I know you’re tired
of reading my rhapsodies about the music of Micah P Hinson, and the dare I wanted to make–for you to hie on over to Amazon and download “Throw the Stone” (2 minutes of finger-picked guitar, violin, banjo and the forlornest voice since Leonard Cohen)–is a dare I can’t make because Micah P Hinson and the Red Empire Orchestra is not yet available for download. But if you want to give him a try, in the least expensive way possible, you can get 29:30 of “The Baby & the Satellite” for 99 cents. This isn’t the best introduction to MPH, since it’s more or less a demo of a ‘suite’ of songs, first recorded, I think, in 2004. But some of the songs within the suite are quite good, and it’s certainly value for your dollar. Eh?
poop song
Everybody now!
We’re going mainstream!
The relevant bit starts at about 40 seconds in.
I spent a week there one day
Frenchman Lluis Colet set a Guiness record by speaking for 124 consecutive hours.
Colet began speaking at Perpignan’s railway station on Monday by reciting the works of famous authors or using some of his own writing. He also spoke profusely about Dali, a painter he admires, and Catalan culture.
Large crowds turned out in support of Colet, who received a rapturous applause at the end of his speech.
“This is a big day for me and I dedicate this record to all those who defend Catalan language and culture,” he said, his voice fainter after five days of nonstop talking.
Colet had set the record once before in 2004 when he spoke for 48 straight hours.
I feel silly telling you this
I masturbated to your picture nearly everyday. I bit my hand when I felt like screaming and I wanted to know your name every time I came.
“It’ll Tickle Yore Innards”
dear clusterflock
What did your parents do right?
Bacon Explosion
Kathy gave me an upright, gas-fired smoker for Christmas.
I seasoned the smoker according to the directions and then, for my first attempt, smoked a whole cut-up chicken, some boneless country-style pork ribs, and a seven pound beef brisket.
It all ate pretty good. I got a little carried away with the brisket’s dry rub. Zippy brisket.
I can’t wait for the weather to moderate a little so I can smoke the hell out of something, anything, else.
My brother-in-law asked me to try this recipe.
dick
Nut allergies are a Yuppie invention?
Joel Stein argues nut allergies are mostly a result of a Yuppie mass hysteria (via ToB):
If you don’t think allergic reactions can be caused by mass hysteria, then you don’t know about the uncontrollable dancing that gripped thousands of Europeans between the 14th and 18th centuries, or that the South Korean government recently issued a consumer safety alert saying that electric fans can asphyxiate you if left running overnight, after news reports of several deaths. You, in short, have never looked up “mass hysteria” on Wikipedia.
Since food allergies kill about as many people as lightning strikes each year, we probably don’t need to ban peanuts from schools or put warnings on every product saying it was “made in a factory that also has a break room where a guy named Dave often sneaks in a King Size Snickers despite this ‘diet’ he says he’s on.”
When I talked to Christakis, he made it clear that — unlike me — he doesn’t think peanut allergies represent a mass hysteria. That’s because scientists believe in rigorous study and proof, while opinion columnists believe in saying something outrageous to get attention.
But we did agree that it is strange how peanut allergies are only an issue in rich, lefty communities.
“We don’t see this problem much in African American or poor communities. So there’s something going on here. We don’t see them in Ecuador and Guatemala,” Christakis said.
Well, it looks like we got ourselves a reader.
List of books purchased in this last week:
- Marks and Meaning, version zero by Dave Gray
- Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell
- This Is Not the Way We Came In by Daryl Scroggins
- Martha and Hanwell by Zadie Smith
- Mosefolket by Cooper Esteban
What’s on your queue?
Nirvana bassist’s Rock Band 2 experience
Krist Novoselic (who looks older than I imagined) tells an amusing ancedote (via):
More recently, while walking through a one-stop shopping center, I encountered the Rock Band 2 video game. It was set up on display for customers to try.
I know about Rock Band, because Nirvana has some songs on it. I had never tried the game before, so I gave it a go. I worked through the menu and found the song “In Bloom.” I picked up the little guitar-shaped controller and hit the stage. I knew the bass line to the song, of course, but I couldn’t quite master this new, different way of playing it.
The game reminded me of Space Invaders. I tried to hit the notes cascading down the screen, but could barely keep up.
Meanwhile, this kid was watching me fumble with the game. I became self-conscious and took the controller off. I handed it to him, and he proceeded to jam on the song—and was really good! He had no idea that I was the musician he was emulating on the game, and I didn’t tell him.
Life goes on: I walked away to buy some paint supplies, groceries, and other items from the store.
Obama’s People
In December and early January, the photographer Nadav Kander shot 52 portraits of Barack Obama’s top advisers, aides, and members of his incoming administration. Kander and the Times Magazine’s director of photography, Kathy Ryan, discuss putting those portrait sessions together and what happened behind the scenes.
Perhaps more interesting than I thought it would be. I really enjoyed this. Seeing the different approach each subject took presenting themselves.
(via kottke)
Psychiatrist Knits Anatomically Correct Woolly Brain
The frontal cortex is cream and pale green, the visual cortex a mix of blue, purple and turquoise while the hippocampus is made up of baby pink wool.
(Via Telegraph)
new york pantsless subway ride
Rick Warren’s inspirations
(via sullivan)
