August 29-September 3, 2011
The Idler is celebrating our first year!
Revisiting her first “Rounding Third” column lets Angela Vasquez-Giroux touch on one of her favorite subjects, Detroit Tigers first baseman Miguel Cabrera (who should have been AL MVP in 2010). Read “Rounding Third: year one”
Gavin Craig’s favorite part of The Idler is the surprises, and to try to make his own contribution, he serves up a bit of lore about how The Idler got started, and Ayn Rand’s unexpected contribution. (Surprise! You thought he was going to write about video games.) Read “Diary of a Casual Gamer: year one”
Serge Gainsbourg was an ugly man, but he had a talented, eclectic, and shockingly good-looking daughter. Mike Vincent watches Charlotte Gainsbourg’s films and listens to her music in “Family tree” (Beck has a cameo, but it’s not a flattering one.)
Kevin Mattison observes that The Idler is at its best when it’s weirdest, and he traks his own course off the beaten path in “The Cinephiles: year one”
Mike Vincent is a chatty man, and he looks back on a year of sound and talking in “Dysphonia: year one”
The Idler is the kind of site that would be nothing without our readers, so we asked a few of them what they enjoyed most from our first year. Check out the results in “Year One: Readers’ picks”
Rosemary Van Deuren comes full circle, starting and ending with John Waters, with some really outstanding interviews in the middle. Like a pie. Some kind of deeply weird, wonderful John Waters/interview pie. Read “Flipside: year one”
Kate Sloan looks back at her first year of writing, how she’s branched out a bit from just words and drawings, and outlines a scenario in which she might just have to fight you. Read “Drawn and Paneled: year one”
Wayne Barlowe is a living legend in the world of science fiction painting and creature art, and his work has appeared everywhere from the covers of Time and Newsweek to the film Avatar. Rosemary Van Deuren interviews him in “Wayne Barlowe”
Sometimes it’s not enough to watch a movie. Sometimes you have to watch somebody watching a movie, especially when those somebodies are a hapless janitor and two robots and the movies are some of the worst movies ever made. Daniel J. Hogan celebrates the wealth of Mystery Science Theater 3000 episodes available on Netflix in “Movie sign with Mystery Science Theater 3000”
Pumps, TV, and tattoos, Ana Holguin looks back at what made the first year of “PopHeart” so great in “PopHeart: year one”
Exactly one year after The Idler‘s first post, the editors share some of their favorite pieces. Not in any particular order of course, or with any particular methodology. In fact, I’m sure there’s some really great stuff we left off, but it’s a good place to get started. (Man, I’m going to go take a nap. This all just smacks of effort.) Read “Year One: Editors’ picks”
Lindsey Malta looks back at the evidence of a vibe (or several). Read “Thoughtcicles: year one”
As is only appropriate, the writer of our first column gets us started. Jill Kolongowski looks forward, back, and gives a tip of the hat to the Idler column that gave her a new direction. Read “The F-Word: year one”
Rounding Third: year one
I need to start this off by saying (writing) that when Gavin Craig approached me (instant messenged me) about this idea — starting a web-zine stocked with writers drawn from our group of quirky, nerdish pals and their quirky, nerdish pals — my biggest worry was making sure I was producing content as interesting, and … Continue reading
Diary of a Casual Gamer: year one
Sometimes, it’s possible to be too clever. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that it’s possible to be too fond of what one views as one’s own cleverness. As an example, let me put forward the column “Diary of a Casual Gamer,” for which as much as I enjoy the title, and … Continue reading
The Cinephiles: year one
1. What was your first column? Coming off of my own blog, Four Inches of Dirty Water (A clumsy Robert Altman reference), which mostly consisted of pretty straightforward film reviews, I think I was still struggling a bit to find my voice. My first piece for The Idler — “It’s the unanswered questions that haunt … Continue reading
Dysphonia: year one
1. What was your first column? My first column was not as much a column as a diatribe against the writer Neal Pollack. I’m not sure that my style has mellowed, but I think the first column stinks: clunky, short, and sort of pointless really. I don’t know if it is the best first thing … Continue reading
Year One: Readers’ picks
As part of the celebration of our first year, we reached out to some Idler readers and asked them to share their favorite pieces from the site. — Suzanne Fischer: Duck decoys, lost laptops, and a necklace to grieve with: Teal Amthor Shaffer’s post “Souvenirs” is a bittersweet exploration of the emotional power we invest … Continue reading
Flipside: year one
1. What was your first column? My first column for The Idler was “The passions of John Waters”, about Waters’ 2010 memoir Role Models. The nice thing about writing nonfiction articles is that you’re not usually forced to revisit them. It’s easier to plow ahead onto the next piece, unlike novel-writing, where the length and … Continue reading
Drawn and Paneled: year one
When I was first asked to write for The Idler I was crushed that I couldn’t do it. I had just accepted a job in Boston and had three weeks to leave my position at the Michigan House of Representatives, fly to Boston, apartment hunt, fly back to Michigan, pack, and drive to the Eastern … Continue reading
PopHeart: year one
1. What was your first column? My first column was “Bad (so bad that it’s good?) romance.” It discussed the ways in which I feel I should be more sophisticated, refined, adult and all the ways that I feel I don’t meet those expectations. I have to say that those issues are still a part … Continue reading
Year One: Editors’ picks
The editors of The Idler are a shadowy, self-effacing crew. But to help celebrate the site’s birthday, they put together a list (in no particular order) of some of their favorite pieces from The Idler‘s most frequent columnists. It’s been an amazing first year, and they claim to be very much looking forward to the … Continue reading
