Author Archives: shaun

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What you have with a restaurant that you visit once or twice is a transaction. What you have with a restaurant that you visit over and over is a relationship.

The fashionable script for today’s food maven doesn’t encourage that sort of bonding, especially not in a city with New York’s ambition and inexhaustible variety. Here you’re supposed to dash to the new Andrew Carmellini brasserie before anybody else gets there; be the first to taste ABC Cocina’s guacamole; advertise an opinion about the Massaman curry at Uncle Boons while others are still puzzling over the fugitive apostrophe. Snap a photo. Tweet it. Then move on. There’s always something else. Always virgin ground.

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– http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/18/dining/frank-bruni-former-restaurant-critic-on-the-joys-of-repeat-visits.html?pagewanted=1&ref=todayspaper

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An argument in southern Russia over philosopher Immanuel Kant, the author of “Critique of Pure Reason,” devolved into pure mayhem when one debater shot the other.

A police spokeswoman in Rostov-on Don, Viktoria Safarova, said two men in their 20s were discussing Kant as they stood in line to buy beer at a small store on Sunday. The discussion deteriorated into a fistfight and one participant pulled out a small nonlethal pistol and fired repeatedly.

The victim was hospitalized with injuries that were not life-threatening. Neither person was identified.

It was not clear which of Kant’s ideas may have triggered the violence.

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– http://m.apnews.com/ap/db_268786/contentdetail.htm?contentguid=jXkDndmC

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They may be the most pampered chickens on the planet.

On certain days, a truck pulls up alongside their quiet, spacious coop on an Amish farm here and delivers a feast that seems tailored to a flock of two-legged aristocrats. Before long, the rust-colored birds are pecking away at vegetable peelings and day-old bread from some of Manhattan’s most elegant restaurants, like Per Se, Daniel, Gramercy Tavern, the Modern and David Burke Townhouse.

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– http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/17/dining/in-pursuit-of-tastier-chickens-a-strict-diet-of-four-star-scraps.html?pagewanted=1&_r=0&ref=todayspaper

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“In 2010, Lufthansa worked with the Fraunhofer Institute for Building Physics IBP to answer a variety of questions concerning inflight dining, among them, why passengers were ordering tomato juice onboard at an exaggerated clip. Fraunhofer’s scientists found that perceptions of saltiness and sweetness drop by as much as 30 percent onboard, due largely to the fact that our odor receptors (taste being largely a function of smell) are compromised in the bone-dry environment of an airplane cabin. This might make the salty-sweet punch of tomato juice more attractive to people who wouldn’t touch the stuff on the ground, but the impact on more subtle foods like seafood, chicken, and pasta can be devastating.”

– http://roadsandkingdoms.com/2013/the-fare-up-there/

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““Bro” once meant something specific: a self-absorbed young white guy in board shorts with a taste for cheap beer. But it’s become a shorthand for the sort of privileged ignorance that thrives in groups dominated by wealthy, white, straight men. “Bro” is convenient because describing a professional or social dynamic as “overly white, straight, and male” seems both too politically charged and too general; instead, “bro” conjures a particular type of dude who operates socially by excluding those who are different. And, crucially, a bro in isolation is barely a bro at all — he needs his peers to reinforce his beliefs and laugh at his jokes. That’s why the key to de-broing our culture just might be the straight white guys who aren’t bros.”

– http://nymag.com/thecut/2013/09/how-do-you-change-a-bro-dominated-culture.html

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The popular incumbent anchor, Seth Meyers, is making his own exit in February to spend four nights a week hosting the “Late Night” show on NBC (for which Mr. Michaels is also the executive producer). So a question looming over the new season has been: Who will replace Mr. Meyers and inherit the chair that has provided an almost guaranteed ride to the next level of stardom? (Other recent occupants: Amy Poehler, Tina Fey and Jimmy Fallon.)

In an interview in his longtime office at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in Manhattan, Mr. Michaels revealed his plan for the segment’s future: Starting with the “SNL” season premiere on Sept. 28, Mr. Meyers will be joined at the “Update” desk by Cecily Strong, who emerged as a rising star last year, her first season on the show.

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– http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/16/business/media/saturday-night-live-setting-its-new-cast.html?ref=todayspaper

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“EACH time I hear someone say, “Do the math,” I grit my teeth. Invariably a reference to something mundane like addition or multiplication, the phrase reinforces how little awareness there is about the breadth and scope of the subject, how so many people identify mathematics with just one element: arithmetic. Imagine, if you will, using, “Do the lit” as an exhortation to spell correctly.”

– http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/16/opinion/how-to-fall-in-love-with-math.html?ref=todayspaper

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“The analogy to intellectual property, although imperfect, should be clear. Ethanol credits, like patents and copyrights, are property. Unlike traditional forms of property (say, in land or chattels), they are property rights created by statute out of thin air in order to incentivize creation of a public good. More renewable fuels in the case of ethanol credits, more creative works and inventions in the case of IP. Creating new property rights can be a very healthy exercise and it’s generally preferable to government production of the public good. As the ethanol credits mess show us, though, getting right the design of the new property right is crucial, yet something regulators are bound to screw up for all the reasons that Hayek and Buchanan and Tullock pointed out. As I mentioned, the analogy is not perfect. Government requires that refiners buy ethanol credits, while there’s no such law about IP. And yet, if you think about software and process patents, it plausible to make a case that there might as well be a requirement. Given how broadly these patents are interpreted, you might find that you have to pay tribute to a patent holder to be in a particular line of business. This is why we have patent trolls.”

– http://jerrybrito.com/2013/09/15/ethanol-credits-intellectual-propoerty/

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“In April 1964, Gail Brown was a 22-year-old Chicago elementary teacher who needed a new car. Like a lot of young people, the brand new Ford Mustang caught her eye. After trading a 1958 Chevy for $400 and borrowing the rest from her parents, she bought a Skylight Blue convertible with a 260 cubic inch V8 on April 15. 1P What’s truly notable about this story is that date. Gail managed to snag her car two days before it officially went on sale on April 17, making her the world’s first owner of a production Ford Mustang ever sold to anyone.”

– http://jalopnik.com/see-the-first-ford-mustang-die-and-come-back-to-life-1302423465

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