The Weekender | February 21st - 23rd

The Weekender

The Weekender is your guide and open thread for the weekend, presented by the fine folks at Viva The Matadors. Things to quote, read, look, watch, and listen to for the weekend. Let's do this.

Let's read James Thurber and The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. There's actually something really interesting in Wisconsin and it involves ice and things completely frozen over. Jimmy Fallon might have a little something and The Snarky Puppy entertains your ears.

Quote

James Thurber (via GoodReads):

"Boys are beyond the range of anybody's sure understanding, at least when they are between the ages of 18 months and 90 years."

"I loathe the expression "What makes him tick." It is the American mind, looking for simple and singular solutions, that uses the foolish expression. A person not only ticks, he also chimes and strikes the hour, falls and breaks and has to be put together again, and sometimes stops like an electric clock in a thunderstorm. "

Read

You probably know the story about The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, especially because there is a new movie with an updated "take" on the original short story by James Thurber, but here’s the original story, in its entirety (via Vanity Fair). I know what you might be thinking, but this really isn’t all that bad and it’s really a fantastic short story that obviously holds up over time. We are sometimes trapped in a life and sometimes our escapes are ridiculous, you know, sorta like writing about a university’s athletic teams for the past handful of years. We all have escapes and this is a beautifully written one.

"We’re going through!" The Commander’s voice was like thin ice breaking. He wore his full-dress uniform, with the heavily braided white cap pulled down rakishly over one cold gray eye. "We can’t make it, sir. It’s spoiling for a hurricane, if you ask me." "I’m not asking you, Lieutenant Berg," said the Commander. "Throw on the power lights! Rev her up to 8,500! We’re going through!" The pounding of the cylinders increased: ta-pocketa-pocketa-pocketa-pocketa-pocketa. The Commander stared at the ice forming on the pilot window. He walked over and twisted a row of complicated dials. "Switch on No. 8 auxiliary!" he shouted. "Switch on No. 8 auxiliary!" repeated Lieutenant Berg. "Full strength in No. 3 turret!" shouted the Commander. "Full strength in No. 3 turret!" The crew, bending to their various tasks in the huge, hurtling eight-engined Navy hydroplane, looked at each other and grinned. "The Old Man’ll get us through," they said to one another. "The Old Man ain’t afraid of Hell!" . . .

"Not so fast! You’re driving too fast!" said Mrs. Mitty. "What are you driving so fast for?"

Look

A Frozen Walk to Island Ice Caves (via The Atlantic):

For the first time in five years, Lake Superior, the world's largest freshwater lake, has frozen enough to allow visitors from northern Wisconsin to walk across the lake to the ice caves of the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore. According to Reuters, officials declared the trek "low risk" about a month ago, and nearly 35,000 people have made the mile-long hike since then. According to the NOAA, the Great Lakes have reached their broadest ice coverage in 20 years, at 88 percent -- with Lake Superior at about 95 percent. Over the weekend, Reuters photographer Eric Miller trekked out on the ice, capturing these images. Update: Photographer Paul Johnson was kind enough to share a few of his nighttime ice cave photos as well, numbers 16-18 below.

Watch

So, yeah, I think Jimmy Fallon might have a little something. Make sure and stick around to the end.

Listen

Snarky Puppy is a jazz fusion sort of band that’s originally from Denton and it’s happy music, or at least I think it is happy music, and it’s every sort of instrument that you could imagine all mashed into one song. It’s almost like the Polyphonic Spree in that there’s a ton of people in the band, up to 40, and it all just sounds terrific.