Cumpleaños Feliz

So life has its novelistic side, does it? Indeed it does! -- Mario Vargas Llosa

Mothers are great. Mine reminded me this morning that today is Mario Vargas Llosa's birthday.

Here's a pretty good interview with him and here's a better one.

Here are his observations on producing television.

To the left is a poster from his 1990 bid for president. Doesn't that font look like Helvetica?

No, no, no

Charlotte Allen, please go away! Some miserable excerpts from her Washington Post discussion of her miserable op-ed below:

Washington: Why did you write this piece?

Charlotte Allen: Totally for fun.

West Lafayette, Ind.: Your idea of fun is to paint a (horribly inaccurate) picture of your sex as stupid?

Charlotte Allen: How about an accurate picture?

Make it stop!

Go Obama!

(click to enlarge)

Thanks (Again)

Dear readers, I know I already did a thank you post. But I'd just like to say that I think it's really lovely that you've not just checked in and commented but have also linked, status messaged, forwarded, bookmarked, RSS fed and (best of all) read posts aloud to your roommates (because that's what roommates are for). Hooray and thanks! Before I wrap it up for this evening, two stories in the NYT regarding earlier posts: Some smart replies to Caitlin Flanagan's op-ed and a very tough review of "Widows" at 59E59 sent my way by Leah ...