In which I maintain a blog.

latimes:

So long, plastic grocery bags?

The Los Angeles City Council voted for an ordinance banning plastic bags Tuesday, making L.A. the largest city to possibly forbid grocers from providing anything other than paper bags (at 10 cents a pop).

Plenty of people have voiced their disapproval of the ban, including one bag-totting Target customer in Eagle Rock:

“I’m going to forget to bring my bag, and I’m not going to want to pay, so Target will probably lose some of my business,” the Highland Park resident said. “Then I’ll be putting even more things back.”

But the inconvenience may be worth it for the greater good, as Karin Klein writes in her account of the bag-less lifestyle (with a bit of a learning curve):

Truth is, though, it can be a pain. Sometimes, you just crave a flimsy wisp of plastic with built-in handles to carry out the trash, or to hold some messy item that should not see the inside of a backpack. The reality is that life without plastic bags is entirely doable and a lot better for the environment, but it does require some adjusting.

Read more on the possible ban, which would begin in 2014, here.

Photo: Kevork Djansezian / Getty Images

latimes:

laughingsquid:

This Was First, A Website Collecting the First Posts of Popular Websites

Time to feel a bit old if you remember Reddit’s first-ever post, or LiveJournal’s initial “this is a test,” entry!

nprfreshair:

Mitch Hurwitz, who worked on The Golden Girls before creating Arrested Development, tells Terry Gross about how the pressure of a writers’ room can lead to great jokes:

I remember Jim Vallely, as I said, one of the executive producers of Arrested, I remember being in a room with him [on Golden Girls] and there was a scene where Blanche was opening up birthday presents, and Jimmy yelled out, It’s a blouse! And everybody looked at Jimmy and he took a second, ‘You said you wanted something crotch-less!’ I remember saying to him, ‘Did you know you were going to say the crotch-less thing?’ And he said, ‘No, I had no idea, I just painted myself into a corner.’ And I love that. I think that’s such an important part of comedy. We do it all the time on Arrested, just paint ourselves into corners and try to get out. It’s all about constraints.

npr:

Hey, brother. Did you catch Arrested Development creator Mitch Hurwitz on Fresh Air yesterday? Anticipation for the fourth season on Netflix was hyped to a fever pitch before its May 26 release—did it live up to your expectations?

Read and listen to a portion of the Fresh Air interview here.

nprfreshair:

Arrested Development creator Mitch Hurwitz on the deeper truths of the show:

What is honest in the show is there are family dynamics. The family speaks in code, family has its own mythology. In many ways, your family wants you to be what they think you are. My father said to me recently, ‘Hey, I didn’t know you could write longhand.’ Or, ‘I didn’t know you knew how to write in handwriting.’ [And I said] ‘Of course I do. I’m a grown man.’ ‘Oh, I didn’t know you knew how.’ ‘I think you’re thinking of when I was 8.’ ‘You definitely couldn’t [then]. I’ll show you cards. …’ And there’s something fun about how your family won’t let you change, in a way, and the push and pull of like, ‘No, I’m a different person!’ And of course, they’re kind of right.

explore-blog:

Lapham’s Quarterly presents the worst jobs in history on a cartesian graph of treacherous/tedious and difficult/disgusting. In the unfortunate case that yours is a contemporary addition, here’s how to find fulfilling work and do what you love.

explore-blog:

Oprah at Harvard