It was a long, tedious week at a conference, but at least I got to see some friends and got home in time to get you a fresh dose of Unrequired Reading! Enjoy!<\/p>\n
Air travel sucks<\/a>. My flight out to Portland this week was less full than most of my recent flights, but the redeye flight home was 100% packed.<\/p>\n * * *<\/p>\n If you read only one story about the incredibly messed-up divorce of the owners of the L.A. Dodgers, make it this one<\/a>.<\/p>\n * * *<\/p>\n Tolstoy’s death: the O.J. chase of its day<\/a>.<\/p>\n * * *<\/p>\n They’ve done so much work on Ground Zero in the past decade that they’re just now<\/em> discovering a 200+-year-old ship buried in the muck below it<\/a>? I guess it’s progress.<\/p>\n * * *<\/p>\n The Y gets its schwerve on<\/a>.<\/p>\n * * *<\/p>\n I think his logo should incorporate a raincoat-element<\/a>.<\/p>\n * * *<\/p>\n I think it looks more like a sculpture by Jeff Koons’ studio<\/a>.<\/p>\n * * *<\/p>\n The Price Is Wrong, bitch<\/a>!<\/p>\n * * *<\/p>\n Ban the (box office) bomb<\/a>!<\/p>\n * * *<\/p>\n This week’s installment ends with a couple of tributes to Harvey Pekar, whose importance in the comics pantheon can’t be overstated. The first is by Eric Reynolds<\/a> of Fantagraphics, the second is by Anthony Bourdain<\/a>, and the best-and-last is by Tom Spurgeon<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It was a long, tedious week at a conference, but at least I got to see some friends and got home in time to get you a fresh dose of Unrequired Reading! Enjoy!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[632,26,46,32,5],"tags":[1021,1082,1078,1081,717,1079,1080,925,174],"class_list":["post-5434","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-baseball","category-comics","category-design","category-sports","category-travel","tag-anthony-bourdain","tag-eric-reynolds","tag-frank-mccourt","tag-harvey-pekar","tag-james-fallows","tag-jamie-mccourt","tag-sylvester-stallone","tag-tolstoy","tag-tom-spurgeon"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4C7K-1pE","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4788,"url":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/unrequired-reading-jan-1-2010","url_meta":{"origin":5434,"position":0},"title":"Unrequired Reading: Jan. 1, 2010","author":"Gil","date":"January 1, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Happy new year! Here's some links for you! Just click \"more\"! It's the worst gadgets of the decade! * * * It's the worst movie of the decade! * * * My boss calls it the Flatrion Building: flay-tree-on. * * * Awesomest convict ever. * * * \"Zarkov, tell\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Architecture"","block_context":{"text":"Architecture","link":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/architecture"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1547,"url":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/unrequired-reading-june-15-2007","url_meta":{"origin":5434,"position":1},"title":"Unrequired Reading: June 15, 2007","author":"Gil","date":"June 15, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Odds and ends, dear readers! Ed Koch is pissed at the New York Times. * * * Foreign money's gotta go somewhere. * * * Turbulence blows. * * * The Sopranos as a reflection of U.S. foreign policy? * * * Well, my slideshow happens to be a doctor.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Art"","block_context":{"text":"Art","link":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/art"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3021,"url":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/unrequired-reading-dec-12-2008","url_meta":{"origin":5434,"position":2},"title":"Unrequired Reading: Dec. 12, 2008","author":"Gil","date":"December 12, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Boy, I was just not feeling the bloggitry yesterday. I'll make up for it with some great Unrequired Reading links! Just click \"more\"! And you wondered why I never do karaoke! * * * Khoi Vinh's girlfriend took a trip to the Drew Friedmanizer to get him an awesome birthday\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Big Business"","block_context":{"text":"Big Business","link":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/big-business"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5392,"url":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/unrequired-reading-june-18-2010-2","url_meta":{"origin":5434,"position":3},"title":"Unrequired Reading: June 18, 2010","author":"Gil","date":"June 18, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"I'm crazy-stressed with work (you'd laugh if you saw the work-calendar I put together for this month), but here's some Unrequired Reading action for you, dear readers! I'm clearly working at the wrong magazine. * * * The NYTimes: It's always been like that. * * * I can't read\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Architecture"","block_context":{"text":"Architecture","link":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/architecture"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5796,"url":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/unrequired-reading-dec-10-2010","url_meta":{"origin":5434,"position":4},"title":"Unrequired Reading: Dec. 10, 2010","author":"Gil","date":"December 10, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Everybody ready for the weekend? I know I am was, but then I got this lousy headcold. Grr! Now enjoy some links! So, um, Phil Collins has world's largest private collection of Alamo memorabilia? * * * I guess this means Gutfest '89 never took place, either. (Why, yes, my\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Fashion"","block_context":{"text":"Fashion","link":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/fashion"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3956,"url":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/unrequired-reading-may-22-2009","url_meta":{"origin":5434,"position":5},"title":"Unrequired Reading: May 22, 2009","author":"Gil","date":"May 22, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Memorial day weekend! I may be filled with sadness, guilt, rage and oversolicitousness because of my dog's grievous wounds, but that's no reason you shouldn't have some links to get you through the weekend. Just click \"more\"! I can't make this up: the passenger next to me on last night's\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "0-fer"","block_context":{"text":"0-fer","link":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/literature\/0-fer"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5434","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5434"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5434\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5437,"href":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5434\/revisions\/5437"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}