Not Quite So New!
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"A rollicking ride of intellectual discovery and emotional growth... unlike his buzzer skills, his comic timing never fails"
-- The Wall Street Journal
"Pulls you in like a good sports story"
-- The New York Times Book Review
"Endearingly frank... jubilant... lighthearted and fast-paced"
-- New York Newsday
"A surprisingly touching memoir"
-- Entertainment Weekly
"Hugely funny"
-- Mental Floss
"Like Jeopardy! itself, it covers a lot of ground and in snappy and informative fashion"
-- Associated Press
"Down to earth and entertaining, even for non- Jeopardy! fans"
-- The New York Daily News
"A very funny writer... the book works like gangbusters."
-- Ken Jennings, 74-time Jeopardy! winner, holder of numerous other Jeopardy! records
"Effortlessly funny and informative... tender, human, and very wise... A must for anyone who loves Jeopardy!, or has ever seen it, or is breathing."
-- Joss Whedon, creator, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
"I haven't seen Jeopardy! since I was a kid, and yet I was charmed and amused by Bob Harris's fascinating and surprisingly suspenseful book. Through sheer force of personality, he takes this brainy TV show and makes it funny and easy to relate to."
-- Ira Glass, creator and host, This American Life
"Eccentric, energetic, and engaging"
-- Publishers Weekly
"The perfect gift for any Jeopardy! fan... I was thoroughly entertained"
-- USA Today, "Pop Candy"
"Surprisingly compelling... a funny and in-depth look at what it takes to win"
-- Long Island Press
"Wise, honest, and very funny... I wish I'd written it. Then again, I wish I'd won $127,000 and his-and-hers Camaros on Jeopardy!, too."
-- Jeff Greenstein, writer/producer, Desperate Housewives, Will & Grace, Friends
"Cleverly executed... solid entertainment"
-- Kirkus Reviews
"Answer: A hilarious, engaging and highly entertaining book. Question: What is Prisoner of Trebekistan? (All right... that was sort of a lame Jeopardy! joke. But what can I say? It's a great book.)"
-- Paul Feig, creator of Freaks and Geeks, author of Superstud and Kick Me
"A surprisingly intimate, entertaining book."
-- Orson Scott Card, author of Ender's Game
" Prisoner of Trebekistan is funny, enlightening -- and just might help you win a million bucks on Jeopardy!"
-- A. J. Jacobs, author of The Know-It-All
"If you don't buy this book -- this funny, learned, charming, and surprisingly moving book -- I will make it burst into flames in your hands."
-- Arthur Phillips, author of Prague and The Egyptologist
"A keeper for anyone who's even remotely a fan of Jeopardy!"
-- TVSquad.com
"If you enjoy... self-aware, geeky good humor, this could actually be your favorite book of the year."
-- The Stranger
"Highly entertaining... laugh-out-loud, absurdist funny... hilarious"
-- Akron Beacon-Journal
"Hilarious... a true treat for all Jeopardy! fans."
-- Strand Bookstore
"Everything you'd hope for... surprisingly compelling... deftly woven together... this sweet, fascinating book is a great read."
-- Book-blog.com
"If super-intelligent space aliens invaded our planet and demanded to interview one member of our species to ascertain whether or not we human beings were logical, bright, kind, and entertaining enough to be allowed to continue, I would nominate, with all my powers of persuasion, Bob Harris."
-- Emo Philips, comedian
"A masterful job of describing the feel of Jeopardy! in the heat of battle... I knew that Bob was a great guy and a fantastic Jeopardy! player. Now I've found that he's also a wonderful writer. I think I'm starting to hate him."
-- Brad Rutter, top money-winner in Jeopardy! history
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“Revelatory... wryly funny about some very serious subjects... Harris's sly wit and infectious curiosity make understanding world chaos fascinating... witty, horrific, and necessary.”
— Boston Globe
“Only Bob could make a user’s guide to our increasingly hostile world this absorbing, this breezy, and—ultimately—this hopeful.”
— Ken Jennings, author of Brainiac: Adventures in the Curious, Competitive, Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs
"Brave... irreverent... charges into the thick of the globe's myriad simmering wars... hilariously relaxed."
— New York Observer
“Fascinating, enlightening, and surprisingly: NOT TOTALLY DEPRESSING. A gimlet-eyed look at the world we endure that’s also suitable for enjoying with a gimlet.”
— John Hodgman, author of The Areas of My Expertise
and correspondent for The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
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Main
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Pudu
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Friday, 07 September 2007 |
Unbelievable week of sport ahead, personally, given the teams I cheer for. Whatever sport you look at -- even Aussie Rules footy played with alpacas -- it's PUDUBALL on!
Baseball is in its stretch run, and the Indians are 11-1 since the very day they figured out what to do with their batting order. They've also found a damn nice second baseman and second hitter in Cabrera. And they're even in town this weekend. The NFL begins its season this week, and the Browns will suck less this year. That's no small thing. The Rugby World Cup kicks in France, despite a last-minute media boycott. The host team will surprise, I think. But I'm picking New Zealand over the Boks in the final. Aussie Rules enters its postseason, with my two favorite teams, the Swans and Weagles, both in good form. (Yes, I normally back Sydney teams, but a close buddy from Perth is now living in the US, and he's an unhealthy influence.) Even the Arses are kicking arses, despite losing Thierry Henry to Barcelona this year. Not playing this weekend, though, and thank goodness. My DVR would explode. Oh -- and the cricket Twenty20 World Cup starts in Johannesburg on Tuesday. (Go Oz! Like there's any doubt.) I could plotz. It's like a big sweaty harmonic convergence or something. It'll be weeks before I ever catch up with it all, but hey. Small world, too much fun here. PS -- almost forgot: Australia's popular NRL starts its postseason this weekend, too. (Btw, NRL team names are to die for. Who wouldn't cheer for the Parramatta Eels, the South Sydney Rabbitohs, or the Manly Sea Eagles?) Thing is, I don't have a huge allegiance to any of these cross-country wrestling teams yet. I've watched a couple of Gold Coast games, curious to see how Mat Rogers from the Waratahs makes the transition to league, and I generally cheer for the Roosters, since I have happy memories of Aussie Stadium. Eh. Guess I'll cheer for the upstart Rabbitohs this week, despite Russell Crowe's looming presence and an offense which seems lately to consist of punching people in the face. Somehow "Go 'Tohs" should have more of a ring, though. |
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Stuff I like
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Thursday, 06 September 2007 |
My buddy Scott Bateman has a deliciously deadpan sense of humor that just kills me. Lately, he has been having a straight-faced field day animating (and, in a truer sense, reanimating) offbeat bits of found audio.
One of his latest is this reinterpretation of "Magic Oranges From Spain," an ancient audio clip promoting the Iberian citrus crop, wherein the world "oranges" seems to take on entirely new meanings.
Scott sometimes re-uses various images from previous cartoons -- including, in one of this one's early scenes, me, from the Trebekistan clip to your right. So suddenly, I'm enjoying the clip, and then there I am, too, next to the giant nude man with the Magic Oranges. Odd, I must say. Wasn't in my DayPlanner, but that's life in the big city, I guess.
This is a bit like when somebody sent me that clip of a guy giving out Free Hugs in Australia, and I turned out to be in it, an event I barely remembered. Only, well, giant nude subway guy doesn't get a hug. Even despite having Magic Oranges from Spain.
Lots more of Scott's bent genius here. Don't miss Andrew WK's advice for the unbalanced Japanese guy who the plays the GHEE-tar here. |
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Bush
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Tuesday, 04 September 2007 |
If you didn't catch this in the NY Times over the weekend, author Robert Draper recently received unprecedented access to Bush, six full hours of private interviews. In the Times' preview of Dead Certain, Draper's resulting book, Bush displays the depth of his genuine desire to improve the lot of humanity.
 Will Bush work to improve global conditions of hunger, homelessness, and military tension, like certain other ex-presidents you could name? Um... no:
First, Mr. Bush said, “I’ll give some speeches, just to replenish the ol’ coffers.” With assets that have been estimated as high as nearly $21 million, Mr. Bush added, “I don’t know what my dad gets — it’s more than 50-75” thousand dollars a speech, and “Clinton’s making a lot of money.”
Then he said, “We’ll have a nice place in Dallas,” where he will be running what he called “a fantastic Freedom Institute” promoting democracy around the world. But he added, “I can just envision getting in the car, getting bored, going down to the ranch.”
Small enough? There's more. Asked about the disbanding of the Iraqi army, one of the key mistakes of 2003, Bush took no responsibility for even knowing what had happened:
Mr. Bush acknowledged one major failing of the early occupation of Iraq when he said of disbanding the Saddam Hussein-era military, “The policy was to keep the army intact; didn’t happen.”
But when Mr. Draper pointed out that Mr. Bush’s former Iraq administrator, L. Paul Bremer III, had gone ahead and forced the army’s dissolution and then asked Mr. Bush how he reacted to that, Mr. Bush said, “Yeah, I can’t remember, I’m sure I said, ‘This is the policy, what happened?’ ” But, he added, “Again, Hadley’s got notes on all of this stuff,” referring to Stephen J. Hadley, his national security adviser.
Yeah, well, that catastrophic decision that helped create the lasting insurgency... I dunno, one of my guys has some files...
The rest will be in Draper's book Dead Certain, released today. |
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Environment
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Tuesday, 04 September 2007 |
Taken with my crappy cell camera while waiting at a stoplight over the weekend. And keep in mind that I just came back from Iceland.
I knew it was crazy hot, but thermometers are often off by at least a few degrees, of course. I had to check when I got home -- and yup, it was 110 in much of the Valley, 112 in Woodland Hills. Somebody driving through across the Malibu hills could experience a 30-degree jump in about twenty minutes.
We get heat waves like this from time to time. But not usually during football season. This is new.
And certainly a heck of a welcome back from Iceland. Kinda like the last time I came home from a long trip, arriving on the night of the Hollywood fires after two months in the Caribbean.
Sweet home, Los Angeles...
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Travel
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Friday, 31 August 2007 |
Wonderful waterfall called Gullfoss -- for a sense of scale, spot the teeny specks of humanity along the left edge.
But there's no railing or protective fence. Just a small reminder rope. Apparently tort law has yet to reach Iceland.
So some people wander a little close to the edge. I thought for a moment that I might even see an accidental human sacrifice.
Same level of non-security around Geysir, the giant geyser after which all other geysirs are named. (Actually, Geysir hasn't geysed much in many years, so most people hang out around its little brother, which blows a crowd-pleasing 35 feet in the air every 3 or 4 minutes. Pretty remarkable.)
You can get pretty much right up to the edge here, too; a half-dozen tourists get scalded around here each week, in fact. Not my idea of a great souvenir, but hey. Got close enough myself (after checking the wind direction!) to get this pic -- not of the explosion, since I'd seen geysers before, but of the millisecond just prior, as surface tension creates an enormous four-foot superbubble.
Talk about a cliffhanger. More shortly.
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Pudu
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Friday, 31 August 2007 |
This week's timid animalito es este pudú, que está haciendo autostop, as they call it en Chile:
I was wondering how pudus get back and forth to work at the zoos. Pudus don't like to drive.
And if you watch the video, turning the world sideways is a natural pudu form of defense. |
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Travel
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Thursday, 30 August 2007 |
Back in the US, but I'll be posting Iceland stuff now and again for a while. Seriously wonderful.
First stop: Thingvellir ("assembly field"), the inland stretch of land where the Althing, the world's oldest parliament, began convening outdoors over 1000 years ago. The air was so clear that the horizon was almost limitless. Except for the few small buildings, this is probably much as it looked in A.D. 930.
Stunning place. UNESCO World Heritage Site as of 2004. (There are 851 on earth; they're the real 1000 Places To See Before You Die. Well, 851, anyway. For me, this was 41 down, 810 to go. Ulp.)
The traditional meeting spot was near the end of this huge ravine with 120-foot walls. Scientists later realized that this is actually where the edges of the North American and European plates are slowly separating. Cool, huh? On the left, football is called "soccer," tectonically speaking.
Next stop: what appears briefly to be a possible human sacrifice.
More shortly.
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Travel
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Thursday, 30 August 2007 |
Tom has posted another This Modern World cartoon from the archives, again featuring yours truly as Sparky the penguin.
A little dated, of course -- given the current state of the planet, when was the last time anybody had time to focus on the WTO? -- but possibly fun nonetheless. |
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General horror
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Thursday, 30 August 2007 |
Apparently Greek real estate developers take a somewhat aggressive approach to the free market.
More than 60 dead. $1.5 billion in damage. Freakin' Olympia damn near went up.
Not that the Olympia should be particularly important to, y'know, Greek real estate values. It's only a World Heritage Site and all.
Sometimes you watch the news and just feel helpless and horrified. (OK, most of the time.) Visiting Greece was one of the most wonderful trips of my life. My friend Leslie and I went to the 2004 Olympics in Athens, and we couldn't have been more both impressed by not just the genuine friendliness of our hosts, but their surprising (and widely unanticipated) organization and efficiency. Which, given this last week, seems not to have lasted much past the closing ceremonies.
Olympia itself was an incredible place. (So was everywhere else we went.) Even the ancient stone finish line is still there.
(Come on, I had to. Wouldn't you?)
And I was only there for a couple of weeks. Imagine living your whole life like this, among some of the greatest treasures of antiquity, and then seeing half the place threatened with destruction.
I cannot imagine what ordinary Greeks must be feeling right now.
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Site updates
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Thursday, 30 August 2007 |
They're this site's two millionth visitor:
And they win... well, nothing, really. But a hearty hej anyway.
Two million visits in like four years is nothing, actually. Kos gets that every four or five days, I think. But you go to web with the site you have.
Btw, the level of detail stored about visitors weirds me out. Grabbing OS and browser info makes sense, since it helps designers optimize appearance and stuff. But SiteMeter just extracts the wee tip of the iceberg. Webmaster Colin knows way more than I do, but suffice it to say that as we watch the web, the web watches us. Many hosts store a slew of surprisingly detailed info on their servers, whether or not the sites use it or alert you or whatever. Just how things are.
But for all its shortcomings, the Intertubes also make the whole world more accessible. So finding our overnight Malmite brought back some nice memories. The bridge to Copenhagen at sunset, for example.
Mysig dag! Thanks for dropping in. And 1,999,999 thanks for the other visits, too.
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Media
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Sunday, 26 August 2007 |
Hey, Tom Tomorrow just YouTubed an old This Modern World cartoon, created back in the early go-go (until-crash-crash) days of the Interweb.
I started doing the voice of Sparky shortly after Tom and I met in person for the first time. He'd done my old radio show on several occasions, but it wasn't until we hung out face-to-face while covering the 2000 GOP convention in Philadelphia that he thought I sounded exactly like a mildly pissed-off left-wing penguin.
The fact that I took this as a high compliment tells you a lot about where my head was at back then.
Anywho, it's a little dated, but not badly. We clearly had no sense of just how much more surreal the lunacy in Washington would soon become. Sigh.
PS As you see, the cartoons were produced by Flickerlab, who have gone on to become an excellent and successful commercial animation studio. We might cooking something fun for next year. More if/when it happens. |
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General Incompetence
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Saturday, 25 August 2007 |
And that future is pretty darn grim. From the Miss Teen USA contest, possibly the greatest beauty pageant answer ever given:
That's South Carolina's winner. |
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