Jeez, some people. After trying to get my attention with the standard means - waving her arms, throwing her monitor at me noggin - a Department Lemur compatriot finally walked over, ripped off my headphones and said, "You know, scientists have proven that classical music exudes a beneficial effect on your thought processes, whereas that Electronica crap you listen to while you write actually impedes your thinking." Can you freaking believe it? Now, they want to take away my Moby, my Global Underground compilations, my Kraft-verk. It's bad enough they lock me in the crawlspace over the weekend - brrr! - but now they want to take my disco away! Forget it, man! The kids will have their say!
 

Tacky, tacky, tacky. Mail, mail, mail. Not since Rosie O'Donnell befriended Madonna have two such innocuous elements come together to make something really scary - yet oddly alluring. Tackymail is the chocolate and peanut oil of the web, combining bizarre postcard art (tasty) with cheeky commentary (tastier still) and wrapping the whole thing into an e-mail ready enchilada (check please!). Just look at these babies: the static disco scene, the bronzed, screaming infant, the guy with his ass on fire. Sure, some of the postcards are kinda cool - the card featuring Milan's typewriter-shaped Hotel La Serra stands out - but by and large, these missives should only be sent to people you know extremely well - perhaps people who owe you large sums of money who don't dare respond to this war on their senses. I don't know what it's like where you live, but here in Las Vegas, there are limits.
 

Today it may seem like a bad dream, but there was a time not all that long ago that the cold, crypto-facist poster art now on display at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum covered every lightpost and storefront in Europe. Graphic Design in the Mechanical Age makes no bones about the political statements made (there are shills for Communism and Nazism, and a lone declaration for the New Deal), concentrating instead on the clean lines, geometric forms and vibrant color of the artwork. It's hard to believe that some of this art was designed to lift people's spirits, but such were the times. More than mere propaganda, this art is the visual embodiment of ritualized order drawn from chaos.
 

Here, if anything, is solid proof of the internet's value as a research tool. Never in my most lucid moments did I ever imagine I'd spend several hours reading up on puppets and puppetry, but that's the web for you - it knows what you want well before you do. The Puppetry Home Page links to every craftsman and practitioner there is - from Henson on down - covering every form of the medium from ventriloquism to Audio-Animatronics. Learn the history of puppetry, how to build your own, almost every secret needed to animate a block of wood. Cut your strings and jump in. Do it for Se–or Wences, rest his soul.
 

Googie architecture ranks very, very high on the list of Things The Passenger Loves More Than Other Things. One look at Chris Jepsen's splendid page devoted to the subject should tell you why, if you have any hep in you at all. You must love those stylized starbursts, those boomerang-shaped awnings, those floating saucers. You must. If you don't, there's a page of Tiki-style architecture on the premises - a close cousin of Googie - with links to prominent Tiki sites. If only we could live in the future promised by this wild burst of late-1950s modernism, instead of the all-digital, glass facade lifestyle we're going to be driving into in the next millennium. Oh sure, it'll get us there - but unlike Googie, it ain't no ride.

Feeling much more intelligent now, thank you very much. Whoever said techno music kills brain cells owes me a big, fat apology. Now, how was I gonna end this thing?