SND BLOG AND FONT HAIKUS

So, lately I've been working to help get the big SND Update blog off the ground. We went live over the weekend and traffic has been pretty good so far. A recent post:

In honor of the premiere of the movie Helvetica at SXSW, the folks over at Extensis held a little contest where people could send in haikus about fonts. Some gems:

A couple on Helvetica ...

Dear Helvetica,
Wish I had your style and class
Regards, Arial

Helevetica sits,
watching you try the new fonts.
It knows you'll be back.

you are a default
i change you to futura
but you haunt me still


This one's funny for Web nerds ...

font: normal 2em
Helvetica,sans-serif;
color: #f00;


A couple on other fonts ...

morning press run:
the Bodoni extra bold
glistening blackly

Egg-shaped and awkward,
and you have no descenders.
I hate you, Hobo.

comic sans is on
taped-up public bathroom signs
for patrons only.


My favorite, also on Comic Sans ...

Hey guys! LOL!
I forward jokes! And cat pics!
I heart MSN.

You can read all the entries over at the Extensis blog

LUCK OF THE IRISH

BOSTON -- So I'm in Boston for the big SND spring board meeting over the weekend. The spring board meeting is always held in the city where the fall workshop will take place. So the fact that this year's meeting fell on the same weekend as St. Patrick's Day was ... fortuitous. I spent a good chunk of Saturday night at an Irish pub by the hotel. Good times. But I mistakenly thought that St. Patrick's Day ended, you know, at the end of St. Patrick's Day. Not so. Lenz and I met up with Claire and Bill Sunday morning and went to a parade pre-party in Southie. Awesome. Then we took in the parade. Not gonna lie: I love Boston. And Boston on St. Patrick's Day? Even better. If you have the means, I highly recommend a trip. It's so choice.

Anyhoo, I'll try and get some photos up of the workshop site soon. Marlatt, out.

NOTES FROM THE TIVO'D EPISODE OF GILMORE GIRLS THAT I JUST WATCHED (NOT THAT I WATCH GILMORE GIRLS)

A) Once again we see the 101 Coffee Shop as Hollywood location. Except this time it was playing a roadside diner off I-85 in Virginia or North Carolina. Again. Awesome. I (heart) L.A.

B) The Gilmore Girls rate the newspapers:

RORY: "I'm setting up interviews at different newspapers. The Seattle Times, the Detroit Free Press, San Francisco Chronicle..."
EMILY: "Well, I'm not sure about the Seattle paper, and the Chronicle is dreadful but the Detroit paper is quite reputable."
LORELAI: "Know what else are reputable papers? The New York Times, the Boston Globe, the Hartford Courant..."

Nice.

DEPAUW TO DELTA ZETA: RELEASE THE HOUNDS!

In the words of Stephen Colbert, I Called It! Well, okay. Not "in print." But still. President Bottoms announced Monday that DePauw would sever ties with DZ after the spring semester. The New York Times has a story too. The story has received nearly 200 comments on IndyStar.com. My favorite of these comments are the ones suggesting Bottoms revoked the sorority's charter not because of the bad publicty, not because of the poor judgement shown by the national organization, but because ... the University wants the building.

It's as if Bottoms is Mr. Burns, biding his time for these lovely women to make one false move ... and then BAM! The University would finally have the half-acre across from Marv's that they've been craving for so long. Egg-cellent.

People have alternately suggested that the DePauw DZ house is "in the middle of campus" and "right at the entrance to campus." Please. I could name half a dozen Greek houses one could say are "in the middle of campus." DZ ain't one. And everybody knows the "campus entrance" is a joke. If the University wanted some offices, they should have kicked off Phi Psi. That room over the driveway would make a great President's Office. Or perhaps they should have given Sigma Chi its walking papers. That way they could expand the Administration Building right into SigChi's backyard. Meanwhile, SAE better watch its back: The Center for Contemporary Media is going to need a multimedia wing at some point.

The thing is, the University WILL end up owning that property, and hence all the conspiracy theorys will be proven correct. But I ask you: What the hell else is supposed to happen to it? If it's not a dorm, what could it be? Greencastle can only support so many funeral homes.

Meanwhile, DZ officials - while refusing to reverse their decisions - are clearly doing nothing but dealing (poorly) with this situation. Early Monday, nothing on the Delta Zeta Web site worked properly. Now the entire site has been devoted to lashing out at DePauw and it's students and faculty. Good call, DZ. Erase any record that your organization was about more than this incident. Their PR person is clearly in over their head.

Also, kudos to The DePauw for getting the news online before the paper came out. Nice work. There's a ton of DZ-related stuff on the site now ... and the forums are pretty active as well.

IN OTHER NEWS: Radar weighs in on Wendy's new Flavor Dipped Chicken Sandwich.

FINALLY: This is completely unrelated I swear:

ANDY BARKER CONTROLS THE UNIVERSE

So NBC has posted the first few episodes of the new Andy Richter comedy, Andy Barker, P.I. I had high hopes for this show. It's produced by Conan O'Brien and costars Arrested Development's Tony Hale (Buster). But the first two episodes ... had their moments ... but kinda felt more like something Conan and Andy got together to do to amuse themselves. I'm hoping it gets better but really, even if it doesn't, it's about a bajillion times better than The Winner. That show's the worst. Ever.

Anyway ... the Andy Barker show got me craving a little of Richter's last show, Andy Richter Controls the Universe. You can watch the pilot on YouTube:

Part One


Part Two


Part Three


And if you are bored, another episode is on there too: Part 1, Part 2.

BEST QUOTE FROM SUNDAY'SEPISODE OF THE SIMPSONS

MARGE: "You woke up early?"
HOMER: "Eh, stumbled home at dawn. Same diff."

COLBERT ON THE NEW AT& T

It's the T-1000 of corporations.