Realised I never linked to the Rives talks on TED. Which is a bit stupid, since they're pretty much the most amazing thing posted from TED. Like, evah, y'know? If Rives was in charge of the internet, "you could email dead people. They would not email you back, but you'd get an automated reply. Their name in your inbox. It's all you wanted anyway." Got you interested?
I've been meaning to recommend this since forever. Just the kind of thing where I felt I should have it sandwiched in between two deep, meaningful posts discussing existential matters. Since I'm a bit low on that, I figured I'd just run with it now.
From the internet version of the hipster magazine McSweeney's, the link to a very funny piece by otherwise quite obnoxious comedian Michael Ian Black:
Over on Russell Davies' blog(s), you'll find loads of good ideas - and just now a terrific video - about how to be interesting. Go read it, often. Whenever I read something there on that subject, though, I think of a particular sketch, that seems to me the standard against which all ideas about 'being interesting' should be measured. I finally stumbled across it on YouTube: The great Peter Cook, with John Cleese, belting out "interesting facts". You'd think "Did you know you have 4 miles of tubing in your stomach" was an interesting conversation starter, wouldn't you? There's a lesson there somewhere about the relation between 'interestingness' and the other person's 'interestedness'. I'm just laughing too hard to find it.
If nothing else, watch it for a) John Cleese having to duck behind his newspaper trying not to laugh, and b) "Without your intestines, you wouldn't be able to digest. Then you'd look a bit of a fool, wouldn't you?"
One of the reasons I went looking for this was the rather startling discovery of a 2004 poll by Radio Times on the most popular British Comedy sketches of all time. Startling, because shows like Little Britain, Goodness Gracious Me and (aargh) Harry Enfield beat out Peter Cook, who had his first entry in 7th place - the One Leg too Few sketch with Dudley Moore. Python's Dead Parrot was first. I'm fine with that. And the Silly Walks, impossible and unthinkable without Cook's Beyond the Fringe, at 6. I realize Cook might be a bit dated, but Harry Enfield? The Horror!
See, I had to go and ruin it. After two perfectly respectable posts I can't resist this short clip of Carl Lewis absolutely destroying the national anthem. Remember Marvin Gaye's version, the smoothest national anthem in any country ever? Well, this is pretty much the exact opposite. Highlight: the ESPN announcer's ad-lib - through tears: "...written by Francis Scott OFF-Key..."
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