Month: July 2006

  • Merrill Markoe

    An old-fashioned version of this whole desert-island charade would have had author, television writer, and occasional standup comic Merrill Markoe bringing along her “collected works of Robert Benchley,” because “his silly rage at minutiae combined with great word usage is both a comfort and a reminder to have perspective.” But nowadays, the people who play…

  • Scotland

    Linda Hempel writes from Edinburgh, Scotland: “After an exhausting day of golf at St. Andrews, walking across that enormous bridge at the 17th, this vacant crypt at the ruins of the local cathedral was irresistible so I decided to take a break to read my favorite publication, The Rake.” Author(s) and Location: Linda Hempel

  • The Shriek of Silence

    “Our work is a subjective observation of sound,” said David Berg. As a scientist of sorts for the Acoustics and Audio Group at Orfield Laboratories in Minneapolis, Berg listens for a living. For instance, if you ever wondered what noise a cell phone’s seemingly silent display makes, he has the wherewithal to tell you. Not…

  • Who Needs the Brooklyn Bridge?

    People sell all kinds of oddities on Craigslist, but if you’re looking for really weird stuff you might want to sign up for an email list generated by the University of Minnesota. That’s how Ben Awes, Bob Ganser, and Christian Dean, who together make up the architecture firm Citydeskstudio, found their skyway. “We signed up…

  • Last of the Boys

    Billed as an “American comedy,” Steven Dietz’s eerie, densely packed play premiered last fall at the esteemed Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago. Last of the Boys contends with the specter of the Vietnam War and takes place in a present-day trailer park that, appropriately, sits on a toxic dump site; there, a vet is still wrestling…

  • Grand Italian Ice Café

    Not quite ice cream but more than a snow cone, Italian ices are smooth concoctions flavored with purees of fruits like mango and strawberry. At the new Grand Italian Ice Café, the only thing better than a root beer ice is a root beer ice with a giant scoop of custard added to it—creating what…