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Culturally Speaking #26

By Sarah Stodola

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"Hell-Heaven," a short story by Jhumpa Lahiri appearing in the May 24 edition of the New Yorker, turned out to be an understatedly overwhelming story. It started just like all New Yorker stories start - uneventfully.  I thought I would get bored and quit.  But by the second long page, I couldn't put it down, which rarely happens to me when reading short stories.

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They are trying to ban junk food advertising in the European Union.

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My friend Stephanie (aka Stiff) has a new website. It's very cultural in it's own special drunken way...

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This reveals that thing on the part of the New York Times, integrity, that newspapers so desperately chase after.

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Number of black U.S. Senators since Reformation: 2.

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According to this essay, there are some very simple reasons for the disparity between America and Europe when it comes to arts and culture.

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The existence of the Internet makes it much easier to compare news coverage in Britain vs. in the United States. You always hear that if you go to London you will find things in the papers that are missing from the US dailies (it seems that they go to extremes both in the direction of highbrow and lowbrow). The war in Iraq, for instance, has received different, and some would say more brutally honest, coverage in London. This isn't something I have proof of, but I suspect proof wouldn't be too difficult to obtain.

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Coffee and Cigarettes is a movie worth seeing. There were a couple of moments that didn't strike quite the right chord. But there were also a lot of completely original, completely moving and funny moments. The scene with Bill Murray and the guys in Wu Tang Clan would have stolen the show if it weren't for the final vignette.

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I used to be an AT&T Wireless costumer.  They were terrible to me.  I was so happy when they  went away.  Now they are haunting me.  Please beware.

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Starting to spread the word...Me Three Print Edition is in the works...

Click here for the last Culturally Speaking.

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Sarah Stodola is the Managing Editor of Me Three.  She can be contacted here.

© 2004 Me Three