Short Takes
September 10, 2010
Bobble Bottles: The Ultimate Endorsement
A longtime friend of this site has had a stroke — mild, blessedly — and is in rehab. She reports: “This city has the most heavily chlorinated water I have ever tasted. At home, I have a big Britta system — here, I basically had to abstain. My sister ordered me a Bobble Water Bottle. Now water tastes just great. The Bobble is cheap, and the filters are cheap too. One of the best Butler recommendations ever!"
August 24, 2010
Are you 17-30? Know someone who is? A gift certificate awaits…
My friends at The Book Report Network are thinking about creating a book website for the college/twentysomething demographic, so they’ve created a survey for 17-to-30 year-olds. If you still dwell in this demo, would you weigh in? If these years are behind you, please share this with 17-30 year-olds you know. Those who complete the survey are eligible to win one of 100 $25 gift cards to the bookstore of their choice. The CO-20 Survey is open until October 15. To take the survey, click here.
August 16, 2010
Things That Make You Go Hmmm: Jonathan Franzen’s ‘Freedom’
Jonathan Franzen was just on the cover of Time Magazine. Now he gets a rave review in The New York Times from the impossible-to-please Michiko Kakutani. So I clicked into Amazon to buy it. "This book will be released on August 31." Ditto Barnes & Noble. [I had hoped to give this book to my wife, the Franzen Fan, for our vacation — out of the country, ending August 31st. And the book business wonders why, etc….] Here, for the more patient among you, the buying info. To pre-order the book from Amazon, click here. To pre-order the Kindle edition, click here.
August 15, 2010
The Beauty Part: ‘Into the Mystic’
Our friend Ron Fried — he wrote Christmas in Paris, 2002 — has a knack for unearthing musical truffles. Like: this melt-the-hardest-heart cover of a Van Morrison classic by Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová, who, a few years back, starred in a small gem of a film called Once.
