Hey there, and thanks for coming to The Cipher. On to the blogs.
-Lauren
Fascists Are Pathetic
Roth writes about Minneapolis.
Fuck The Fourth-Down Bluff
Drew’s divisional round Jamboroo.
CBS News Is The Trump Administration’s New Laundromat
Albert on a bad blog.
One Thing We Liked On The Internet Today
How To Survive A Lord Of The Rings Marathon
My wife and I make a point of watching all three Lord Of The Rings movies in a row each year. For the past two years, we've turned it into sort of an event, with our friends coming over to join in. It's fun. If you want to do it, here are some tips.
Get started early. This should be obvious, because these movies are long as hell and there are three of them. If you haven't pushed play on The Fellowship Of The Ring by 9 a.m., you’re kind of fucked.
You need lots of food. Plan a menu for the day with snacks, at least one substantial main dish, and plenty of sweetie treaties. It's best if you time out the serving of each dish, because presenting people with a new fun thing to eat every hour or so is a good way to maintain momentum. Have a particularly good dessert set aside for the last hour of Return Of The King, because everyone is going to be dragging by then.
Have every possible drink you can think of—coffee, tea, juice, Prosecco, beer, wine, some sort of signature cocktail, etc. Again, you need to keep people's energy and enthusiasm up, and nothing gets someone perked up quite like being offered a fun new cocktail.
If you have access to surround sound or a projector screen, use 'em.
Make sure there is a variety of comfortable seating that people can rotate in and out of.
Don't worry too much about paying attention to the movies. The point is to just get a bunch of people in a room together and have fun. Let people talk, make jokes, nap, and get up as frequently as they'd like. Everyone will naturally understand when it's time to Lock In for the Battle of Helm's Deep.
Let everyone you invite know that they are free to drop in and out of the party whenever they want. You'll be surprised at how many end up staying for the whole 9-hour runtime, though.
If anyone says that Aragorn is chopped, kick them the fuck out of your house.
-Tom Ley
Traffic Jam!
Sometimes, when I’m in the office, I hear a bunch of cars start honking from the street below. Then I look down and see something really stupid, like these trucks blocking the road. For maybe 15 minutes, the line of cars behind this scene got longer and longer. Finally, it cleared up. But I guarantee it’ll happen again soon.
-Lauren