“I want to author things that both restructure worlds and make living people feel stuff.” So wrote the late David Foster Wallace to his editor during the composition of the mammoth novel Infinite Jest. Part mission statement, part expression of his dissatisfaction with what he viewed as ...

On July 6th, 2005, The Observer officially launched the Media Mob under editor Tom Scocca with a post that attempted—and failed—to introduce an awkward portmanteau word we thought would capture large media companies' incursions into the then-still novel medium of blogs. We called it (shudder) bl...

Jon Krasinski's film adaptation of David Foster Wallace's short story collection Brief Interviews with Hideous Men has finally premiered at Sundance. Much of the coverage is embarrassingly thin, but there were at least a couple of reviews worth checking out. Overall, the tone is positive. CinemaBlen...

Home _____Pain & Pleasure: The Lobster Reconsidered Recently I read about George, a 140 year-old lobster that did not wind up on somebody's dinner plate. Instead, he was returned to the ocean at Kennebunkport, Maine. Lobster age is calculated by weight and this one weighed 20 pounds. George woul...

Reflecting on the way she was treated by old and new media: ADDED QUOTE: "The grizzly rises up in me, hearin' things like that." AND: I'm told she says "The mama grizzly rises up in me, hearin' things like that." I'll take your word for it, rather than listen again. I also see, from Gawker, that the...

The Sundance Institute has announced the first half of the line-up for the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. Included in the first press release are the films in competition in the Drama and Documentary segments. 3,661 feature-length films were submitted this year, which is 37 more films than last year. ...

Freewheeling Spirit links to an article about one of my favorite beers, Dogfish. When I was visiting She Says in D.C. this summer, it was what I drank, although I can just cross the border into Wisconsin to find some. I wish by age 39 my achievements had included building a giant beer barrel out of ...

Perhaps this happened to David Foster Wallace. Perhaps he died of happiness.I read with great interest David Foster Wallace: The Weasel, Twelve Monkeys and The Shrub. Just as I read a number of David Foster Wallace things recently. I don't know why his death was especially frightening and sad, but i...

Spirituality Column #100October 7, 2008Current! in Carmel (IN) newspaperCurrent! in Westfield (IN) newspaper What We Choose to Believe By Bob Walters Acclaimed postmodern writer David Foster Wallace, the recently deceased author of Infinite Jest, once said, “The only thing that is capital T True i...

This is where the waters meet the sky. If you look really hard you can see buildings and seashore below, the Atlantic Ocean meeting Fort Lauderdale. But from above, it's the horizon that's truly sensational. I have the window seat and the African American mother to my left is teaching her three year...