If you could invite any three people, living or dead, to a dinner party, who would it be? goes the old cliche. Until recently, my hypothetical dinner table had one empty seat (the other two being occupied by Richard Feynman and Benjamin Franklin). But, judging from my latest read, the last little place setting card will read "Dorothy Parker". She's best known for her satiric light verse ("Men seldom make passes/At girls who wear glasses"), but she did great short stories as well. And literary criticism. Did she invent sarcasm? Probably not, but the case could be made the she invented modern sarcasm. She was way ahead of her times. Dig this, from a review she wrote in 1927:

The professor starts right off with "No matter what may one's nationality, sex, age, philosophy, or religion, everyone wishes either to become or to remain happy." Well, there's no arguing that one. The author has us there. There is the place for getting out the pencil, underscoring the lines, and setting "how true", followed by several carefully executed exclamation points, in the margin. It is regrettable that the book did not come out during the season when white violets were in bloom, for there is the very spot to press one.

Love it.

We just got back from a live gig of original music, yes, original music, in Singapore, at The Substation. And it was really good. It was a listening room type of thing, and was packed to the gills too, leaving us to sit on the floor. Our uncomfortable seating arrangement drove us out before it might have, but we saw about ten songs by couple of bands.

Tomorrow is for WOMAD, which I'm excited about...

Elvis has left the building. If you know me, you know I've been a rabid Elvis Costello fan for years (I used to run this web page). Well, I recently procured an advance copy of his latest album, North. And wow, it really lacks goodness. He's trying to do some slow neo-classical lounge music thing or something. The word "godawful" springs to mind. It's not that I hate all his experiments. The Juliet Letters is my desert-island disk, and I really like Painted From Memory. But holy cow, he is going to be savaged by critics and fans alike with this new stuff.

Wireless world. During a crosstown taxi ride I encountered today's Something New -- on-demand taxi TV! A little console in the back, where I could bring up news, sports, city guides, or, much to my driver's chagrin, music videos (on MTV Asia, again). Probably not many sixty-year-old Chinese men like the White Stripes. I kept the volume low.

Most of my heroes don't appear on no stamps. But they appear on MTV Asia, occasionally. We just caught Public Enemy's "Fight The Power" video, which was partially censored, but lots of things we didn't expect slipped through. MTV is often a whole lot better out here than back Stateside -- there are hints of what MTV used to be, back when we and it were cool.

We're surprised sometimes here, like the other day with The Secretary, which was apparently not edited either (according to Marjorie, who saw it in the States).

Maybe we'll go pop in "Do The Right Thing" now.

I forgot to mention that many of the animals in the zoo were feeling friendly as well. We saw some mouse deer (mice deer?) and a couple of some kind of monkey getting the freak on, always good for a giggle (we're so immature). Also saw some mild territory dispute amongst the lions with some territorial spraying for good measure. Mark also really appreciated the naked mole rat exhibit. They're pretty strange little animals; they have colonies sortof like ants and bees with a queen mole rat who is the only breeder. I love the zoo.