Deutsche Welle
I was born more than twenty years after the Berlin Wall went up and for my entire childhood there had always been an East and West Germany and that was that… until it wasn’t. I vividly recall watching in awe the televised scenes of Germans climbing on the wall and chipping pieces away with hammers — by 1991 I was old enough to understand the ramifications of what I watched. There are few moments in my living history as indelible as that.
All that said, it blows my mind that from now to that day in ’91 is longer than the Wall stood. Just… wow.
Vulture and GQ
I read a few reactions to these free-wheeling interviews before I actually read them. Holy cow, Quincy Jones is amazing — by “amazing” I mean genius, crazy, arrogant, misogynist, gifted, unbelievably talented, old school, irreverent, and did I mention crazy? And it doesn’t look like he’s slowing down.
Time
Fern and I have tickets to go to see Black Panther on opening night. Her whole family is going with us, and it’s going to be great, and not just because it’s going to be a great superhero movie, but because it’s a giant-budget major motion picture that’s written by, directed by, and casts almost exclusively blacks. That matters for a lot of reasons, and this article does a good job of explaining exactly why.
Podcast
Regardless of what you think about Trump, everyone can agree that his presidency has been far from conventional in just about every way. This podcast featuring Roman Mars (from the amazing 99% Invisible podcast) and Constitutional Law Professor Elizabeth Joh explores the machinations of the Trump administration through the lens of Constitutional law. Far from being partisan or droll, each episode exposes the new Constitutional ground we’re plowing.
iTunes podcast: link
NBC (first season on Netflix)
This is the type of show you want to tell everyone about. It’s painfully funny (really, you’ll be sore from laughing), whip-smart, and incredibly imaginative. If you haven’t seen it yet, please go to Netflix and start the first season — the second season finale just aired a couple weeks ago, and it’s been renewed for a third season. If you like well-written, funny shows you will not be disappointed.
