sunday short stack

"Chance is always powerful. Let your hook be always cast. In the pool where you least expect it, will be a fish." - Ovid

• Between the UCLA digital photo archive, Google's Life archive, and NYPL's digital gallery, the past has never been so accessible.
• Do you have a seasonal reading pattern? (My only pattern is shorter and shorter books as I try to make it to 52.)
• Gabriel Garcia Marquez is working on a new novel.
• David Foster Wallace's undergraduate honors thesis in philosophy is dissected.
• Swink is back.
• What is the worst band in the world, according to Google?
• The Indie Music Alphabet (via @largeheartedboy)
  
• The Guardian considers the fine art of literary rejection letters.
  
• LAist has two visit-worthy features: a guide to independent music stores and a history of Griffith Park.
• Stream new 50 Foot Wave.
• Jon Stewart rocks.
  
• Forbes tracks the number of layoffs since November 1 at America's 500 largest public companies. Current total = 176,331.
• Just in time perhaps, The New York Times profiles Dharma Punx.
• And while we're at it, let Obama smoke in the White House.
• Which Obama commemorative gift came from the DNC?
  
• Fun with literary feuds: Darin Strauss vs. the bloggers, Jonathan Safran Foer vs. the multitudes
• Jim Groom asks: "Why is an 'empowering feminist doctrine' always accompanied by a 'dark and violent side' in popular culture?"