Ever wonder where the phrase “worth his salt” came from? How about “spill the beans”? At The Smithsonian Magazine, Lisa Bramen traces the origins of food-related idioms. (via.)
Going Bananas Over a Piece of Cake
The AOL Layoff Carnage
At The Awl, a former AOL freelancer reports on the layoff carnage there in the wake of the HuffPo acquisition.
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Beer-Hall Brute
Alright, time to fess up – who keeps buying all these Mein Kampfs? This piece from The Daily Beast takes a look at Hitler’s 800-page tome and questions why people continue to buy it despite the fact that “it might be dull as one of those many lunchtime monologues that bored Frau Goebbels cross-eyed.”
Highly Recommended
Some kind soul has put the title story from Alvin Levin’s under-appreciated collection Love Is Like Park Avenue online for all to enjoy. That means you.
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Author Late Night
Where did the authors on late night TV go? They’re all on Craig Ferguson’s The Late Late Show. At Esquire, Sean Manning pays tribute to Ferguson’s literary tastes by talking to some of the authors who appeared on his show, including Neil Gaiman, Salman Rushdie, Sloane Crosley, and more.
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Street Preachers and Tacos
“Even if I bought cars in department store parking lots, and even if I followed small children down wooded paths, I still knew better than to accept tuna fish from strangers in national parks.” At The Hairpin, Jami Attenberg writes about meeting a street preacher in Moab. For more Attenberg, read her not-quite-a-restaurant review of Café de La Esquina at The Morning News.
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