TODAY on ManiaTV!

So Anne Coulter sitting across aisle from me on train

My friend is traveling with me. he doesnt notice who she is so I send him a text message that says "Ann Coulter Nazi".

I forget about it and about a minute later it hits his blackberry and he looks up at me and quizzically says out loud "Ann Coulter Nazi??"

Next time you peel an orange, for God's sake, be CLEVER about it!

photos from San Francisco, LA, and Urban Outfitters.

My babies! My books! Be free! (well, not entirely!). Thanks to everyone who has sent me photos of Subversive books and cards in store windows far and wide. And also to those friends (who shall remain nameless) for calling me, giggling, to say that they'd put a copy in every window at Urban Outfitters (I can't condone this behavior, but it did crack me up). You know books, they never write home or call like they say they will so it's nice to see that they're out there having fun. Kiss them for me (then please adopt one!).

Here's a note from my best friend Denise, in Chicago, who was with her daughter at the time:

Yesterday I took Emma to the mall and had to shield her eyes from this foul-mouthed greeting card line that was in the window of urban outfitters when we walked by!

and a hilarious comment from Katherine Shaughnessey's mom, who saw the book in Ohio:

"...all this work for something so naughty!"

A short performance from the cast and crew of Subversive Cross Stitch.

People don't kill people, art kills people. Giant inflatable artwork takes off in Britain. Video here!

The fucking short version of The Big Lebowski, recut to show only the moments when someone says "Fuck". Apparently, this happens some 281 times in the film. It is pretty funny, it really takes the bite right out of the word.

The most famous story of an F-word euphemism concerns Norman Mailer. When "The Naked and the Dead" was published in 1948, he was forced to render it as fug. When Dorothy Parker met Mailer at a party, she said, "So you're the young man who can't spell fuck?"

Looks like Garth over at Extreme Craft is gettin' hitched this fall -- anyone have any good ideas for subversive cross stitch wedding phrases? If you send me a really good one that I end up using I'll send you a pack of Subversive Cross Stitch greeting cards! Remember, short and sweet = not much stitching. (this is a blog-only contest, just to see if anyone's listening... testing, 1,2,3.)

I like the knit lite, I like to boogie, on the disco a - yiiiiiiy, oh yeah, oh - I love the knit lite, I like to boogie...

Sorry, dork attack. But aren't these cool? New ways to annoy your spouse with late-night crafting - bring it ON!

(I wonder if Donna Summer knits).

Joshua Prince-Ramus: This is one of those amazing things that really gets me psyched. Inside the mind of an architect -- first he explains the thoughts behind the Seattle Public Library, which is fascinating - but it gets better. About 9 1/2 minutes in, he demonstrates how the new Dallas Theatre Center will unfold (quite literally). The entire 20 minutes is incredible if you've got the time; the final project in Louisville is just mind-blowing.

Funny story from a Subversive stitcher:

Hi there! Just wanted to tell you a little story: I finished my WTF? pattern for my friend (also named Julie) and got a kitschy gold frame at CVS, then headed over to the post office. As I was packaging it up, an older man peered over and said: "OOhh, is that a baby's initials?" eek! Hehe. I didn't have the heart to tell him what it actually stood for, as he didn't seem the type to find it funny.
Thought you might enjoy this tidbit. :)
Thanks for your fabulous ideas!
~Rotem.

Oh my God - stop the presses. If you missed Amy Sedaris on The Colbert Report, you've GOT to see this video - click on the Amy Sedaris video (duh) which should still be on the front page. Watch until the end, when they "tumble" along with Strangers co-star (and strong man, apparently) Paul Dinello.

Check out the amazing papercuts of Peter Callesen. All cut from a single sheet. This one's called "Birds trying to escape their drawing". Super impressive.

I used to do some papercutting - I even sold greeting cards to Ken Knight. But mine looks amazingly amateur in comparison:

Alexander Calder's Circus. A movie by Carlos Vilardebo, in four parts: one two, three, four, [YouTube]. Calder developed his own one-man circus, with tiny performers made of "cork, wire, wood, yarn, paper, string, and cloth," carefully engineered to walk tightropes, dance, tame lions, lift weights, and engage in gymnastics and acrobatics in and above the ring. Acting as omniscient ringmaster, Calder would manipulate the wire performers while his wife wound circus music on the gramophone in the background.

I think I remember reading long ago that he did this early in his career, in the salons of Paris in the 1930s - for Gertrud Stein and all that crazy-cool bunch. In fact, I just found this reference:

Alexander Calder worked in a ground-floor studio on rue Cels (14th), in 1927. It was here that Calder created his miniature circus. Spectators, who sat on Calder's bed included Jean Cocteau, Fernand Léger and Joan Miro. His circus was soon known throughout Paris, but almost no one recognized the full promise of Calder's figures and delicately balanced models. In 1928, Calder visited Mondrian's studio and began his own abstract painting. Today Calder's circus is on permanent display in the Whitney Museum in New York City.

In 1929, Alexander and his wife took a studio at Villa Brune (14th) at number 7. The building consisted of eight studios which could be reached by going through the back door and continuing for twenty yards into a garden surrounded by ateliers. Calder, who was forever creating gadgets, gave a circus show of his animals, which helped pay the rent. He recalled, "I had rigged up doors with a string and I could even open my front door from the bathtub without moving a hand".

In 1931, Calder and his wife took the top-floor apartment in a three-story house on rue de la Colonie (13th). Calder began to make "a number of things that went round and round" and his friend Marcel Duchamp suggested that they be called mobiles (something that moves). He spent the rest of his life between Paris and New York.

Can you IMAGINE being the freakin' CREATOR of the mobile? And what an amazing group of friends -- what a time to be alive and so creative.