“The quality of sandwiches offered to police during this summer’s riots has emerged as one of the top complaints from frontline officers involved in tackling the disorder, a report has revealed…. Officers complained in ‘vast numbers’ about the choice of sandwich fillings from the catering teams, saying tuna, chicken and egg sandwiches which have a ‘limited shelf life’ left them exposed to the risk of food poisoning and were ‘disgusting after sitting around in a warm van’.”

Every time the Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close trailer plays in the theater I have an equally incredible bad reaction. It’s like I’m on a tiny bus and I’m allergic to peanuts and everyone is eating peanuts all around me and the bus is bound for somewhere I didn’t want to go and maybe the driver is dead from all the peanuts and the bus is going off the road. In Delaware. I have had three of these rage-crying fits now, no joke, and I’m not sure I can keep going to the movie theaters until this thing is released and no longer being teased. The manipulation cuts like a knife! And this new trailer is actually more upsetting. (Mostly because it has bad voice-over.) Basically yes: “It looks like someone went and used 9/11 as a set-up to remake Pay It Forward.” The book was criticized in some quarters (some loved it, of course!) on those same terms, and I’m pretty sure its evolution at the hands of the writer who brought you Forrest Gump (and also a couple decent movies) is not going to improve matters. BUT IT’S OSCAR SEASON, so it SMELLS LIKE OSCAR. (Or Oskar, as the main character is called.) OSKAR SEASON! But this will at least go down in history as, somehow, the first time Tom Hanks and Sandra Bullock have worked together. (Though he doesn’t get that much screen time DUE TO THE 9/11.) Hard to believe, right? I will let you try to prove me wrong, America’s Sweethearts, but the emotional exploitation is off the charts. Seems like Green Mile made a baby with Old Yeller and then the director decided to fly a plane into it.

I was once walking across 31st Street between 6th and 7th when I heard someone shout at a slow-moving pedestrian ahead of him, in the deeply impatient and grievously inconvenienced tone that is the foundation of the New York City accent, “Lady, ya gotta move!” To my everlasting horror, I suddenly realized that the words were, in fact, coming from my own mouth. There’s something very frightening about that loss of control when your inner monologue is given voice. Anyway, things are even worse now. And that lady really did need to move. I mean, come on, it’s a goddamn sidewalk. Walk already.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OO5SY3HlcSo

“His demons have been dancing across the national stage for nearly two decades, since he emerged on Capitol Hill as the tantrum-prone enfant terrible of the mid-1990s Republican revolution. They’ve done the jitterbug, tango and gavotte, and at this late date can’t have too many new moves left or much more leg to show.”
 — Frank Bruni says that the public’s familiarity with New Gingrich will play to his favor in his primary race against boring ol’ Mitt Romney. As scary as this is (and, man, look at the face on that female newt after she chases off an unwanted dance partner in her fishtank), I think Bruni’s right that it is actually better for people who would rather not have a Republican president. I am one of those people, and I think boring ol’ Mitt Romney would have a better chance of beating Obama. Also, here’s the Pointer Sisters.

I actually don’t have a problem with this. Hospitals get badly-needed blood, and donors get free alcohol, which gets them drunk more quickly because they have less blood in them. It’s the very definition of win-win! Maybe I’m missing something: “A BOOZE company has been slammed after it was caught bribing students to give blood in return for free ALCOHOL. Cash-strapped teens flocked to a temporary blood bank in order to get their hands on free Turbo shandy — a potent mix of four per cent alcoholic lemonade and lager.” Oh, right, the shandy part is what seems objectionable.

Isn’t “Occupy Our Homes,” taking place today, the very heart of all the current messay political movements, where left and right can come together? After all, it kicks that sweet spot composed of libertarian anti-tax legal technicalities and loopholes, a conservative “get off my land” American ethos, and the liberal and leftist anti-corporate, anti-big-bank-bullies vision of freedom. Plus, it’s got an actual “real America” vibe — not just for “coastal elites”! (Coastal elites are renters, and no one cares about them when they get evicted due to someone else’s foreclosure. Though New Yorkers can take the 3 train to Brownsville at 1 p.m. today! “Bring housewarming gifts and food to share!”) From Fayetteville to St. Louis to Southgate, this is perhaps something you could get behind.

“A weak dollar is the best thing for American rock ’n’ roll.”
 — Bill Zysblat of music management firm RZO productions discusses the impact of foreign exchange rates on artist tours. “After the 2008 global financial crisis, rock bands and their managers are paying closer attention to obscure concerns like currency rates and economic trends when inking contracts with foreign concert promoters.”

Did Jane Austen die of arsenic poisoning? Was Pablo Neruda given a lethal injection by agents of general Augusto Pinochet? Who put that funny looking shirt on Ronnie Devoe?

“Bears are a symbol that not all of New Jersey has been paved over by subdivisions and strip malls. A lot of people living in bear country oppose the hunt, but it’s hard to sell condos to people from Brooklyn if bears are going through the neighborhood.”
 — Jeff Tittel, director of the New Jersey Sierra Club, discusses the state’s annual black bear hunt, which runs through Saturday.

Jon Methven is the author of This Is Your Captain Speaking, due out in 2012 by Simon & Schuster. He can be reached here, or follow him on Twitter @jonmethven.