A Genius In Praise of Himself

[Grabs his laptop and opens to an image of the cover of Portishead's 1998 album "Roseland NYC Live," featuring a sea of string players.] Seeing this album cover did so much for me. This picture inspired me. I saw it years back, but on my first album I couldn't afford real strings. So after I won those Grammys, the first thing I did was run to Jon Brion, and then I ran and got a string section. Hip-hop never had strings that lush with drums that hard. But Portishead had that. And they sounded hip-hop, and people vibed to that. I said, "OK, what if we do that and I drop my poetry shit on top of it?" [Quoting "Anchorman"] "Drink it in San Diego, it goes down smooth."

- Kanye West, 2007

College Graduation in 60 Days.

"In February, the economy lost a net 36,000 jobs, which is leagues better than the 726,000 lost in February a year earlier but points in the wrong direction all the same. Were the economy to magically start generating jobs at a healthy clip - say 200,000 a month - it would still take 3 1/2 years to return to where we were, never mind the jobs we need for new entrants to the workforce."

Kiviat, Barbara. "How to Create a Job." time 29 Mar. 2010: 20. Print.

01886

Finally something positive from the place where I grew up. Congrats WATA.

Beijing. August 2009.

The Soviet Experiment

"The feasts were marked by huge consumption of food and alcohol, toasts, singing, and fistfights that helped alleviate the petty hostilities and tensions of village life."

Suny, Ronald. "The Imperial Legacy." The Soviet Experiment. New York: Oxford University Press, 1998. 10. Print.

Hot Dry Noodles

Craving my favorite food from China so bad right now. Best breakfast of all time.