Brendan I. Koerner's Blog, page 141

The Stability of Suicide

It’s a bright, gorgeous morning here at Harlem headquarters, which obviously means it’s the perfect time to revisit one of Microkhan’s favorite topics: suicide.

The graph above shows the suicide rate in the United States between 1950 and 2005. As you can see, it’s been remarkably stable over the years, despite increasing awareness of mental-health issues and suicide prevention tactics. There have been intermittent increases, such as in 1975, but they could hardly qualify as spikes. (One research

“…With No One Else in Sight”

The great downside of music’s move toward digitization is the end of liner notes, the record industry’s equivalent of YouTube’s “Related Videos” feature. Microkhan fondly recalls discovering Donny Hathaway via the notes from The Chronic; half the hooks on that album were copped from the great-and-troubled legend of Chicago soul.

Nowadays, alas, you have to be motivated to use The Google when struck by a sample. So it went for years with Smif-n-Wessun’s “We Came Up (Crystal Stair),” which opens a

Countdown to Paper

As of yesterday, we’ve got one month to go ’til Microkhan’s labor o’ love, Now the Hell Will Start, hits shelves in paperback form. To celebrate this joyous occasion, we’ll be doing a sorta DVD-extras thing from now ’til May 26th. Every day, Microkhan will scoop up some NtHWS-related material off the cutting-room floor, and post here for parties interested in such disparate topics as headhunting, British colonialism, the Depression-era South, scientific racism, Assamese politics, opium addiction

Colombo Couture

A new, government-approved t-shirt hits Sri Lanka’s capital. Tamils seem highly unamused; read the article’s, um, “impassioned” comments at your own risk.

Daytona for Squabs

The winner of the 2009 Mercedes Classic will not, in fact, walk away with a shiny new car. But there are genuine riches at stake in this competition, to be held in the pigeon-racing mecca that is central Oklahoma. By Microkhan’s count, in fact, a sweep of all events could bring a pigeon owner $109,500—more than enough to buy a nicely loaded CLS-class coupe, or score upon score of the very finest racing birds.

Like most top-tier races worldwide, the Mercedes Classic is a “one loft” sort of compet

Alone in Samoa

Microkhan has often wondered what happens to criminals who, upon completing their prison sentences, are deported to their countries of origin—countries they may well have left when they were just a few days old. A New Zealand broadcaster caught up with one such deportee in Samoa, who says that the experience is (to say the least) mighty rough:

It was Faamausil’s former California gangster life which bought him a prison sentence and then deportation in shackles back to his birth country Samoa - a

“Your Highness Learns Fast”

There are few films less deserving of a big-budget remake than Red Sonja. It plays more like a sword-and-sorcery spoof than a genuine adventure, due in large part to the most awful dialogue this side of Mortal Kombat: Annihilation—as well as the craven addition of a Short Round-style sidekick. If memory serves, Red Sonja was actually supposed to be another Conan film. But having realized what a hash they’d made, its producers wisely chose to saddle Brigitte Nielsen with the infamy.

Can the dude

Medieval Monkeys

Microkhan has a longstanding fascination with non-human primates, and so was intrigued to stumble upon the homepage of Kenneth Gouwens, a history professor at UConn. One of Gouwen’s specialties seems tailor-made for us: “Distinctions drawn between humans and simians in the Renaissance and in our own era.”

Alas, Microkhan wasn’t able to locate any of Gouwens’ work on this particular subject. But in the process of poking around The Tubes, we did stumble upon an equally delectable prize: The Aberde

The Migingo Spat

To the untrained eye, Migingo Island appears to be no great shakes. It covers just a half-acre’s worth of Lake Victoria, and it’s covered with the tin shacks of fishermen. Yet Kenya and Uganda both covet the ramshackle rock, leading to a border row that threatens to lead to outright war. Ugandan marines overtook the island in late February, an act that has led to nationalist rioting in the slums of Nairobi. Now Rwanda’s president is trying to intervene and prevent further turmoil.

Ugandan and Ke

“Too Bad He’s a Killer”

Microkhan recently opined that it’s best to avoid serial killers who fancy themselves musicians. To our great consternation, alas, the teenage girls of West Java seem to be disregarding this sage advice. They have apparently gone somewhat ga-ga over Verry Idam Henyasyah, a.k.a. “Ryan,” a condemned murderer who’s become an object of myriad schoolgirl crushes.

In an all-white high school uniform, Eca, who refused to give her real name, said, “Initially, I just wanted to see what a person like Ryan