How To Toast Bread

Bryce Chartwell shows the people how to toast bread.

A friend sent me this video. His media studies professor used it as an example of narcissism. If I had to make toast for Bryce Chartwell I would be afraid to mess up the toast! What if I don't do it the right way? This video makes me want to eat toast in the opposite way: over a rough fire, scarf it down, and get my shirt dirty. If it is satire, this video is hilarious. I think it's satire and a good example of consumerism. We don't just want toast. We want the perfect toast. And we are satisfied with the illusion that spreading the butter in an East to West direction and making sure the butter is only one micron thick will achieve satisfaction beyond the basic needs of food and shelter into the meta-realm of desire where toast takes on an entirely different meaning. It ain't toast anymore. It reminds me of people who order specially bottled water at restaurants to feel like the water, in all of its neat packaging is more than just water, it is beyond water. Of course, the structure of desire is such that we are never satisfied. We want more. And more. Capitalism takes advantage of our desire and runs with it. Long live the toast. The toast is dead.

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Video Repost: "Blah Blah Blah" Supercut by Alex Brown

Creator: Alex Brown
"Blah Blah Blah" Supercut

A supercut of movie Blahs. (...and 1 from TV)
Hollywood scriptwriting at it's best. Try to guess all the movies.
All the clips used in this video fall under fair use for parody.

Here is my list as they occur in the supercut. 

Reservoir Dogs (1992)
Al Pacino in Glengarry Glen Ross (1992) 
Owen Wilson in Wedding Crashers (2005)
Cruel Intentions (1999)
Charlize Theron in Monster (1993)
Ed Harris in Glengarry Glen Ross (1992)
Matt Damon in The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999)
Richard Dreyfus in Tin Men (1987)
8 Mile (2002)
Cars (2006)
Dinner for Schmucks (2010)
Iron Giant (1999) 
Chev Chelios in Crank (2006)
Vanessa Redgrave in Deep Impact (1998)
A Jon Favreau movie that I cannot identify.
Magnolia (1999)
A girl with princess hat and wand saying blah blah blah (Maybe it's Mara Wilson?)
Bruce Willis in Die Hard (1988
Inside Man (2006)
Unknown movie (Can you help me to identify it?)
Finding Nemo (2003)
A John Cusack movie that I cannot identify.
When Harry Met Sally (1989)
True Lies (1994)
Christopher Walken in Balls of Fury (2007) 
An episode from the First Season of Star Trek on television
Inception (2010)

Repost: People applauding commuters in Port Authority

Repost Link from Youtube

No, Lady Gaga Is Not Friends with Marxist Philosopher Slavoj Žižek - Entertainment - The Atlantic Wire

I just had to post this on the blog:

No, Lady Gaga Is Not Friends with Marxist Philosopher Slavoj Žižek - Entertainment - The Atlantic Wire

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Video Repost: Jacques Derrida in 1 Minute

By putting emphasis on Derrida as a literary theorist, I must say this bloke does a pretty damn good job of expounding on Deconstruction in a nutshell. 


P.S.: The last ten-second analysis of Lord of the Rings in both structuralist / deconstructive terms is entertaining.

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floatingsheep: The Easter Bunny vs. the Fat Man

     Repost: I thought this recent infographic from floatingsheep, a website dedicated to creating cool, relevant graphs and charts based on user data from Twitter and other sources, is appropriate for the day: floatingsheep: The Easter Bunny vs. the Fat Man: "In our ongoing effort to map mythical holiday creatures, we decided to compare references to the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus. The bottom line the bunny is a bust." 

     To read the map correctly, every red circle indicates that more references were made to Santa Claus in that geographical area than mentions made about the Easter Bunny. As mentioned above, the Fat Man is a clear winner.

     What do you notice? What do you wonder about this infographic? Leave a comment below.

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Notice from Stones of Erasmus: Hey, Faithful Readers!

People ask me all the time how many people read my blog, and I tell them as many as the number of people who pass it on.

Please take a few moments and think of folks in your creative circle who like good writing and pass on stones of erasmus, dammit!

You may be wondering,
How do I pass on your content, Greig?

Use the share feature on top of this post to send to your favorite social networking site! Like Facebook or Twitter!

Or simply copy and paste the following URL:

http://www.stonesoferasmus.com

and send to your friends telling them how much you like the blog.

Or copy and paste this simple message:

Hey!

I've been reading stones of erasmus and I thought you would really like this stuff! It's so much fun to read! And interesting.

http://www.stonesoferasmus.com

Peace,

Your Name

It's simple as that!

Sincerely,

Greig

http://www.stonesoferasmus.com/

P.S. Don't be a spammer. Pass it on to peeps one at a time or use the BCC field when sending it.

P.S.S. Send this subscription link to have the blog sent to your email address:

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Repost: Why We're All Glad English Carries Gender Type Information

Photo by JW on Unsplash

A repost from NPR by Jessica Love of a story about grammar - when gender sometimes matters in language.

---

When gender sometimes matters in grammar (and why grammar examples are fun). This is the funniest grammar story since the panda in the bar.

Last year, arriving late to a departmental Christmas party, I was immediately greeted by a waifish 10-year-old with pale skin, delicate features, neatly braided long brown hair, and a stuffed clown fish.The girl solemnly informed me that her stuffed animal was dying of diphtheria. “Oh no!” I cried in mock horror. “Is your fish contagious?” Perhaps fearing I would launch into a speech about how young ladies should be careful around contagious fish, a fellow graduate student quickly interjected, He’s sure the fish isn’t contagious. I asked him that same question.” And that is how I learned that the strange girl with the delicate features and the long braid was in fact a boy. How deftly pronominal information is delivered, and gleaned, by fluent speakers! How different the entire situation would have been were I a speaker of Hawaiian or Persian, where gender isn’t marked at all!

by Jessica Love, Excerpt from I ♥ Pronouns

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Repost from Kurt Vonnegut: Liberal Crap I Don't Want to Hear Anymore

To commemorate Easter Sunday, I am posting a Vonnegut interview. On September 13, 2005, Jon Stewart interviewed Kurt Vonnegut on The Daily Show. I still laugh at the interview and think it is brilliant. I think they should have let Vonnegut read out his, "liberal crap I don't want to hear anymore," so I will republish it here along with the clip from the Daily Show interview.*
     It's too bad Vonnegut is dead; I saw him as a contemporary Mark Twain. If someone were to ask me who was the funniest and most insouciant writer in America, I would have to say, Vonnegut. Lewis Nordan is pretty goddamn funny too, as well as David Sedaris. But, I think Vonnegut tops them all.

Give us this day our daily bread. Oh sure.
Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.
Nobody better trespass against me. I'll tell you that. I'll cut you a new you-know-what. 

Blessed are the meek.
Blessed are the merciful. You mean we can't use torture?
Blessed are the peacemakers. Jane Fonda?
Love your enemies - Arabs? 

Ye cannot serve God and Mammon. The hell I can't! Look at the Reverand Pat Robertson. And He is as happy as a pig in s**t. 

*Comedy Central scrubbed the video. If you want to watch the clip, you'll have to pony up some cash to watch it.

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