Displaced

My former employer is on a roll this year producing products that strain the boundaries of their Things No One Really Needs (…Except Maybe If You Have Too Much Time On Your Hands and Lots of Disposable Income) category. They’ve done well filling out that category in the past with their $500 margarita machine and the infamous Electric Vacuum Marinator, both genius ideas that I’m sure will someday achieve the success they deserve in the general marketplace. I’m totally holding my breath for that. I’m a little blue, but I’m hanging in there.

This season, Williams-Sonoma and their sibling, Pottery Barn, are in a dead heat for the top useless spot. WS blew into first place last month with a $300 see-through toaster.

Ever since I saw it, I can hardly imagine a kitchen without one. Why just this morning, a piece of priceless toast was burned to a crisp in my kitchen. Imagine: the tragedy might have been averted had I had the foresight to buy the Magimix Vision Toaster the instant the catalog arrived. Well, that and if someone had been paying attention to the toast in the first place. I think the market here is not really, “People Who Burn Toast,” but, “People Who Still Burn Toast While Standing Over the Toaster Waiting for The Aforementioned Toast,” since you really need to be hanging out right there watching your transparent toaster to avert a sooty conflagration. If you had that kind of loitering time, you probably would’ve been able to avoid burning your breakfast bread in your old toaster too because you could have smelled it going up in smoke, but who’s keeping track of those silly details, right? It’s a glass toaster for Pete’s sake! What’s not to love?

If you needed any other incentive than its obvious excellence and indispensability, the suggested retail on this wonder machine is $350, so you’re actually saving $50 if you buy it from WS instead of, um, well, traveling to Belgium to pick one up from the factory, since no one else in the States seems to carry them. So you’re actually saving, like, $1000 if you factor in the airfare.

Anyway, bravo Williams-Sonoma: you have definitively put to bed that old adage, “A watched toast never boils.” Apparently it does, my friends, apparently it does.

I was so ready to just hand over the blue ribbon to Williams-Sonoma not halfway through 2010 but then, lo and behold, WS’s sister company, Pottery Barn, upped the ante in their most recent catalog with the…wait for it… yes, it’s a giant abacus.
retailing for only $249!! Can you believe it? What luck. Just what I’ve always wanted.

If anything, this is catering to an even smaller market than the magic toaster: “People who need to do a lot of math but can’t. And who can’t work a calculator. And are blind.” Well, huzzah, Pottery Barn for finding a tiny need and filling it with a giant solution.

The abacus is an impressive two feet by four feet which means you’re going to have to do some serious rearranging of your Math Room to make it feel at home, but if something’s worth doing, it’s worth doing right. And on a bizarrely outsized scale. That’s all I’m saying.

So now the pressure’s on West Elm, the third brand arm of the Williams-Sonoma empire. What’s it going to be, West Elm? A collection of 1000 tiny egg-shaped figurines? A life-size map of Istanbul for your living room? A live elk? Your pals have set a high standard: for the low, low price of $600 I can see my toast and do basic addition and subtraction visible to a sizable audience. The gauntlet is down.

2010 is shaping up to be a big year in retail people. Hang onto your hats.

It’s my own personal winter tradition: every year I pick a pair of new boots and fixate on them. Mind you, I already have plenty of boots. It’s not need-based, it’s want-based and man have I wanted some of them badly.

Last year, I was on about these insulated Uma boots from Salomon (different pattern last year, but you get the idea). Toasty Christmas present for Emma.

This year, I set my sights on these Kenneth Coles. They fit with my pregnancy fashion plan: no mumus, no maternity-only clothes if I can possibly help it, lots of black, and cool footwear. My concession to schlepping another person (albeit a small one and internally) around with me all the time is that high heels may have to (mostly) take a back seat, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to wear trainers every day.

Welcome to this year’s boot pick.

Sadly and inexplicably, these are only available through Eileen Fisher and Garnet Hill, both of which companies were sold out for the last several weeks. But lo and behold, a Christmas miracle: earlier this week, more arrived on the Eileen Fisher site, so you too can have these super-comfortable mid-calf, buckled boots for gallivanting about in the winter. You’re welcome. Happy holidays!

In the spirit of the holidays, let’s start our Tuesday with a little shopping, shall we? Minor shopping. $1.99 App Store shopping to be exact.

Last week, my brother’s company released an excellent iPhone game called Categuru and you should run right over to your phone (or pull it out of your pocket or your purse or your dog’s mouth or whatever) and buy it. At the very least, you need to try the free lite version.

Here’s the deal, per their web site: “Categuru is a new original word and trivia game. You are given five words, and your goal is to figure out what category they belong to. The catch is that you get the words one letter at a time. The fewer letters you use, and the faster you solve, the more points you get.”

So if the screen displays “GHTMS” (vertically, not horizontally like that) and the next slide reveals “RAIAA”, you might guess “sharks” as the category. As in great white, hammerhead, tiger, mako and…I can’t remember that last one. Salmon?

It’s brilliant and addictive and you should try it. And I’m not just saying that ’cause he’s my brother. Really.

The tour included business and theater in London (humid, grey), a wedding in Switzerland (formal), a couple of sweltering days in Milan, holiday with family in Venice, a little down time in Zurich, a lot of time in flight, a couple days on trains, and short trips on trams and boats. That’s a lot of different climates and even more transitions from flats to hotels and back and forth between countries.

Across all that, there were a few things that stood out as being incredibly handy to have and made the trip’s insane logistics so much easier to manage.

The Best Bag Ever (especially on the road): Marghera Convertible

I, like most of you, have spent an undisclosed portion of my adult life seeking the perfect bag. Luckily for both of us, I’ve found it. Aside from its excellent green-ness which works for day and night, the features I love the most are its ability to switch from a handled bag to a shoulder bag (it folds over) and to contain my laptop without betraying its presence.

To be fair, that laptop is a Mac Air (which, incidentally, I love like my unconceived children), so its weight doesn’t put a strain on the bag’s leather shoulder strap and its unusually slim form allows it to slide horizontally into a bag like this that wouldn’t accommodate either its Apple bretheren or any other standard size laptops. Don’t look at this as a draback though: this is your opportunity to justify both a new computer and a new bag.

When not housing your ‘puter, the capacity is generous enough to hold small purchases in addition to the usual wallet, iPhone, keys and assorted cousins. Two flat outside pockets are exactly the size of your airline ticket and one small one inside will hold your passport.

Where to get it: Sundance Catalog. Currently on sale for $250.

iPhone

R talked me into an iPhone the day before we left the country, mainly so I could make international calls and send text messages in Europe without buying a just-for-international phone with a different phone number everybody then has to remember. I was ambivalent. Did I really want to get worked up about something so many people are already worked up about? Wouldn’t it be more fair to the coolness marketplace to get worked up about something more obscure? And wouldn’t I look cooler if I did that second one instead?

Also, I liked my little Blackberry Pearl and the consistency of Verizon. Why move to something bigger with AT&T’s terrible coverage?

Because it’s pocket-sized awesomeness, that’s why.

Really, though, the main thing was having a phone and text messaging which meant we could split up for the afternoon and still coordinate keys, dinner, and so on. I don’t know what we’d have done without it.

Where to get it: Apple.

iPhone App: Hi Converter

It converts things. Correction: it converts EVERYTHING. Do you want to know how many hectares are in a bunder? How many ngarns are in a square angstrom? Did you know there was such a thing as a square light year? The area converter can help. When you’re done there, the distance converter will turn your miles into gnat’s eyes (.00000007761). You can do electric current and digital image resolution conversions in your spare time.

Aside from its clear entertainment value, it will also convert your euros into dollars based on today’s exchange rate, your size at Bloomingdale’s into your size at Harrod’s, and 40 Celsius into a more comprehensibly crispy 104 Fahrenheit.

Where to get it: App Store.

iPhone App: Collins Italian-English Dictionary

Since I speak German and a chunk of Spanish and can get by in French, I’ve been arrogantly cruising around Europe for quite a while without having to feel like a complete tourist. Those days came to a jarring end at the Italian border. Enter the iPhone (again).

Of all the dictionaries I tried, the $25 Collins was the best. It covers a lot of ground: direct translations, peripheral usage, colloquialisms and common (or, in the best cases, not at all common) phrases.

$25 is a lot for an app and I know no one wants to pay more than 99 cents, but the frustration of looking up a word and finding no results repeatedly on other apps gets old fast. You spent $1200 to get to Italy, you can spare another $25 to pull up with, “L’ho gettato nel water,” to explain the whereabouts of your passport/hairbrush/traveler’s checks. (Translates to, “I threw it in the toilet,” by the way.)

Where to get it: App Store

Hideo Wakamatsu 20″ Viewer Trolley

The day after we got back from Barcelona in June, I biked over to the Hideo Wakamatsu store to check out superlight international carry-on sized luggage. I biked home with a silver 6.5 lb., 20″ Viewer Trolley hanging from my handlebars.

Why the post-trip rush? Because you have to seize the moment when your shoulder still hurts from schlepping a non-rolling bag and your ego still smarts from looking like a hands-full-of-stuff schmuck, and solve your problem.

My problem is that we have a bunch of stuff – some of it heavy – that I won’t check. R’s 35mm camera, my jewelry, things I’ll want on the plane (sweater, megaphone, another sweater, snacks) and essential clothing (an extra T-shirt and undies, plus whatever we would die without if they lost our luggage, like a swimsuit if we’re going to be beach or my dress for the wedding we’re attending). That pile of stuff always ends up being more than I want to carry in a shoulder bag, but I don’t want to drag around an actual suitcase with all the rest of my non-essential stuff too. (Besides, most American 22″ roll-on suitcases are too heavy, once packed, to meet international flight restrictions.) What to do? Until last month, I chose “suffer” rather than add another suitcase to the mix.

That was the wrong choice. The Viewer kicks ass. It’s super light for getting in and out of bins, and its four wheels allow you to roll it next to you with your computer bag on top. It’s like walking a very quiet, rectangular pet. Your hands are free, your shoulder is relaxed, and you look like the seasoned traveler you actually are.

Quick warning: the lovely matte finish on the bag will mark, so brace yourself for that before you check it (if you ever decide you need to, that is). I haven’t checked it yet myself, so I’ve no idea how well it holds up to airline abuse, but it’s done beautifully inside planes, trams, and trains.

Where to get it: Currently out of stock at the eponymous shop but available – albeit inaccurately described as having two wheels and not four – at Flight 001.

Business Class

Traveling in business class (or above) is the way to go. I know there is no one (except possibly this jerk) who is in favor of the turn that air travel has taken in the last ten years. These days, the coach cabin on a long-haul flight looks more and more like the back of a Central American chicken truck. Between the the addition of bad things (longer lines and delays, ineffective security, fees for everything) and the elimination of good things (space, food, customer service), there’s pretty much nothing positive to say about flying except that you will get where you’re going not dead (mostly).

R travels for work, which rots but has a significant up side: he accumulates crazy numbers of miles and little stacks of upgrade certificates. We use the former to get me where he’s already going and the latter to get us there, occasionally, in business class. I don’t need warmed nuts and real china, but the quiet and the space bring the airborne experience back from the brink of catatonia into the land of, “I might not maim someone first thing when I get off the plane.”

Where to get it: Get a job where you a.) travel a lot (our way), b.) make a lot of money or c.) can commit a lot of untraceable financial fraud.

First there was the anticipation. Then there was the packing. After that, there was the coverage. Now, at last, here is The Guide to Barcelona (according to me).

As with the other guides on this site, I don’t pretend to cover everything. These are my personal highlights and low lights of what’s out there. I hope it’s the supplement you were looking for to narrow down, expand or otherwise warp your itinerary. Enjoy!

A quick note on travel guides: I was a Let’s Go girl when I lived abroad. Then they got a little newsprinty and I cut over to Lonely Planet, but they’re not as selective as I’d like (I know what they include or omit constitutes an opinion but they don’t narrow it down a lot), so I went looking for a new, more opinionated and organized guide for this trip to Spain. My new best friend is the Top 10 series by DK Publishing: excellent photography, small enough to carry around, removable map included, and content divided by area and category. Sweet.

What You Should Do

Sagrada Familia

Let’s just get it out of the way: yes, you should probably go and see Sagrada Familia, Gaudi’s unfinished monster cathedral. You’re going to see it whether I say you should or not, so I’ll get behind your effort. I can’t stand Gaudi and the Modernista style, but the cathedral does have sort of a Guinness Book of World Records appeal, given how long they’ve been building it (128 years and counting). In my view, that’s on a par with the world’s largest ball of twine, but, truth be told, if I were within walking distance of that twine ball, I’d probably go see that too. Seriously though, it is impressively large and unique, so man up, get over your horror of tile work and head over there. I wouldn’t walk to the top of the spire though – punishing trip, I hear.

Unless you’re a fan, Sagrada Familia will also relieve you of any responsibility to go out of your way to catch Parc Guell, or the apartment building La Pedrera, other highly recommended Gaudi constructions. You’ll probably pass some Modernista work on your way to other places you’re going anyway, so no need to plan special outings.

Palau de la Musica Catalana

Surprisingly, given that it’s also in the Modernista style, the Palau de la Musica Catalana makes the top of my list. Maybe that’s because I love me some stained glass and the concert hall has a one-ton inverted stained glass bell in the center of the ceiling. Also, unlike Sagrada Familia’s endless ramblings, the palau has a tight, efficient design with a purpose: a concert hall with the best possible acoustics for one of the first co-ed professional choirs. All the sculptures and tiles and columns and iron work fooforah support that objective. Mad props. It’s an amazing thing. Oh – and they got the whole thing built in a mindboggling three years. Take that, Gaudi.

To see inside, you have to book a tour (in the right language, mind you) or attend a concert. Tour’s just under an hour and they run regularly in English, but the tours book up and the Palau’s web site is not helpful, so it might be a good bet to wander by on your way elsewhere, buy a ticket at the box office for another day so you know you’re sorted.

Eat fideuà, olives, and jamon iberico

See notes on fideuà and restaurant recommendations here.

If you don’t like olives, as I didn’t before my first trip to Spain, this is the place to learn. You don’t have to go out of your way to find them – they’ll be served before almost any meal at a restaurant – but you may want to track down a grocery store to bring some back with you after you’ve had them. Most likely the ones you’ll be served are manzanilla olives, native to Spain, or manzanillas stuffed with – don’t gag: they’re not the same as the ones you pick off your pizza – anchovies.

Jamón ibérico is a must. It’s cured ham from pigs fed exclusively on acorns. Which sounds boring for the piggy but is salty and tasty for you. You don’t have to buy one of the entire legs, hoof included, that you see at the grocery store to gnaw your way through before you get to customs (or smuggle it in a tennis racket case as someone who shall remain nameless told me she did); the cheap stuff in sandwiches from bodegas will be stringy and unsatisfying, and the $95/lb. offerings are a little rich for some of us. Start with ordering some at a proper restaurant one afternoon and see how you like it.

Picasso Museu

Picasso was a misogynistic jerk, we all know that, but the man could paint. And draw and collage and pot, which is a welcome expansion of the usual, “Look at my naked cubist ladies!” museum repertoire. Barcelona was something of a hometown for Picasso, and the Picasso Museum was willed an excellent collection of his early and student work: drawings for larger works, small oil paintings on wood, notebooks full of pencil sketches and so on. Of course they have large, important works as well, but the most appealing part for me was seeing the early classical grounding that allowed for Picasso’s later evolution into groundbreaking styles. The artist in progress and so on. The museum is housed in a city castle, which makes for a charming but also somewhat disorganized and labyrinthine experience.

Head across the alleyway from the gift shop to the Textil Café for a coffee or lunch before or afterwards. It’s half-filled with tourists and the service is painfully slow, but it’s in a pretty, sheltered courtyard and their food is quite good.

Montjuic and related activities

Barcelona, in case you haven’t noticed, is ringed by mountains which provides a handy opportunity to take funiculars up the sides of them or, if you’re deranged, bike up them. Montjuic is one of said mountains, the least suicidal one to bike, and home to, among other things, the Fundacio Joan Miro (a museum dedicated to, er, Miro), the imposing Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, the Olympic stadium (built for the 1936 Olympics, used in 1992) and a warren of very lovely parks with, sometimes, views across the city. The funicular to the top is part of the metro system, so heading up and making an afternoon of it isn’t nearly as complicated as the map looks like it will be. Definitely hit the Miro, wander the gardens, skip the stadium, if you’re up for it take on the National Museum and then meander downhill via escalator, stairs and paths among the fountains and gardens that will land you in the Placa d’Espanya where you can check out…

The Barcelona Pavilion

The Barcelona Pavilion is a “house” by Mies van der Rohe built of steel, glass and marble for the king’s reception at the 1929 World Exposition. They tore down the original, thought better of that bad decision and reconstructed it in the ’80s. If you have any interest in architecture or design, you have to go. It’s small and costs about $7 to get in, but it’s worth half an hour just to be inside those straight lines. We ended up here after a long, long day, happy to discover it was open until 8PM and intrigued that the brochure clearly labeled “English” was just as clearly written in French. I assume this was in keeping with one of van der Rohe’s less well-known utopian plans for future society. (Architectural info + bad photos here. Better photos here, especially here.)

What You Could Do (specialty)

These are some “if these are your kind of thing” recommendations.

Formatgeria La Seu

The artisanal cheese movement has yet to catch on in Spain, so it’s a rarity to find a place so focused on and willing to discuss cheese. It’s not that Spaniards aren’t making cheese in huts on the sides of mountains and meadows, it’s that Spain isn’t flooded with the wine-pairing classes and Whole Foods’ marketing and retired bankers going into goat-rearing that America and France have. Formatgeria La Seu has been chipping away at that for several years now. The shop is central (if tiny), the proprietress is Scottish so you can ask questions freely, and the cheese is phenomenal. Follow her lead and buy whatever she tells you to: she knows whereof she speaks since she goes out into the countryside to find and collect the best cheeses herself. If you have a spare Saturday afternoon, you can even swing by and take a class. (Hours: 10-2, 5-8)

Get yourself some espadrilles

I know. I don’t wear ’em either. But these are some kickin’ kicks. Handmade on the premises, the espadrilles at La Manual Alpargatera come in everything from the traditional flats to crimson gladiator wedges. I bought two pairs and love them like my future children. Who will also, presumably, provide little in the way of arch support.

Liquor

Some restaurants, especially the ones on the water that serve that day’s fresh catch, drop off bottles of clear liquor and shot glasses at your table after you’ve finished eating. Have some. It’s a digestif made out of fruit and gasoline. You’ll like it, especially if you’ve just had half a bottle of wine with dinner. In fact, you’ll like it so much that you’ll swing by the grocery the next day and buy a bottle for $7 to bring home with you. The stuff is terrible but highly addictive.

Vincon

Vincon is a design shop a few blocks north of Placa de Catalunya and worth a visit, if only to buy a few gifts and wish you had that much money to spend on a minimalist bassinet your baby’s going to outgrow in 20 minutes. The place is huge and offers everything from rubber handbags molded to look like roosting hens to high-end kitchenware to Pantone luggage.

Sant Felip Neri Square

Round behind Barcelona Cathedral in the Born neighborhood is a tiny square with a small café outside a wildly expensive hotel. There’s a lovely tree, a fountain, it’s off the beaten path and the café con leche is perfect. While you bask in the afternoon sun, you can think sad thoughts about the bullet holes in the church wall across from you. Location here.

What You Could Do

Tibidabo

We didn’t re-visit Tibidabo this time, but it’s worth a trip after you’ve been up Montjuic, that is, which is a nicer mountain. Tibidabo does have better views though, given that it’s much, much higher. Drive, if you have access to wheels, and you can stop at various points on the way up or down the hill to take photos. Otherwise, public transport will get you there and you can visit the highly impressive Temple de Sagrat Cor church, wander the park, sample the amusement rides which have inexplicably been installed next to the cathedral and generally take in the sun and altitude. (Panorama preview here.)

Museu d’Historia de la Ciutat

The History of the City Museum is not gripping and was, for me, a little tedious, but it does allow you to go underground and view excavated Roman ruins still laid out as they were found. Streets, laundries, wineries and so on lie under suspended pathways beneath modern Barcelona. If you – or your kid – are into archeology, you’ll like it here. (Their web site is spectacularly unhelpful. Check your guide book.)

Museu d’Art Contemporani & Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona

MACBA/CCCB. If you’re an artist, you should hit MACBA, but if you’re not, you, like us, will think that the focus on modern art of 30 years ago feels more archival than interesting. What was cutting edge video collage in 1973 does not feel like classic art now: it feels, sadly, expired. I’m all for a white building though, and the current exhibition of “what we’ve got in the basement” won’t go on forever. (Photo to the left is Lawrence Weiner’s, Some Objects of Desire, 2004.)

What You Can Totally Miss

La Rambla

I think all the guide books are high when they recommend La Rambla as a must-see in Barcelona. It is distinctly an “avoid it if at all possible” on my list, crammed as it is with foreigners, pickpockets and the worst of the worst of tourist-pandering shops and restaurants. If you want the rambla experience (trees, cafes, shops), get off the subway at Placa de Catalunya and walk north on Passeig de Gràcia or Rambla Catalunya.

Corte Inglés

Again with the crack-smoking by the guide book editors, Corte Inglés, the biggest department store in Barcelona, is a mess. Yeah, it has a little bit of everything, but it also has mostly nothing. If you want the clothes, go to the shops themselves: Mexx, Kookai and Desigual all have stores elsewhere in the city with better selections than the sub-boutiques crammed into Corte Inglés. The whole Corte Inglés experience was like going to a pointless WalMart masquerading as a Macy’s. (One exception: the basement of the location in Placa de Catalunya has a comprehensive drugstore for buying only-sold-in-Europe products, and a fully stocked grocery store.)

Anything Olympics-related.

Unless, of course, you’re a future Olympian. In which case, you might have a word with them about using the track for a couple of laps.

Camper shoes

I don’t understand the appeal of Campers. They’re wide, unflattering and not even a little bit chic. I thought maybe I’d missed their point because I had only seen the styles they export to the United States. Turns out they export all their styles to the United States and they cost just as much in the city that spawned them as they do in the States. Still stumped.

Maybe this is the missing piece in all the protests and negotiations.

T-shirt available here.

Don’t argue with me, just get one.

It’s a knitted coffee cup sleeve. It keeps your fingers cool, your latte hot and your sense of social righteousness toasty.

You say you don’t need one. You say it’s silly. You make smart alecky remarks when you see mine, but secretly you are filled with envy and wish you had one of your own.

There’s no need to be sad and twisted inside: just go get one. It’s a little, happy sweater for your Starbucks and it will make you happy and sweatery too.

Here’s me. I am an efficient grocery shopper. I have a life. I have places to be. I am buying groceries with a plan and would like to continue on with the rest of my life as soon as possible. I believe that the people in line behind me would prefer to move on with their lives too.

Here’s you. You are a dawdler. You have no place to be. You are creating purpose in your life by taking way too long to do things that do not take long to do. You are holding up other people’s lives.

Here’s me. I was a waitress. I worked at a store. I believe that waiters and checkout girls are people too. I swipe my credit card while the girl swipes my stuff. I bag my stuff while she gets my receipt. We are a well-oiled machine. We are buddies.

Here’s you. You stand perfectly still. In line and while the girl rings up your groceries into a pile, you stand perfectly still. You do not look for your credit card before she is done because you are standing perfectly still. Instead of bagging your own groceries in the bag that you brought, you stand perfectly still while the girl waits on you like you are a princess.

I have news for you: you are not a princess and life is not a straight line of one event following another. You have a tiny negative effect on the world around you because you are so passive and not helpful. You should stop that because it makes us not like you. Also, it will very slowly make you not an interesting person. So stop it.

OK. Now let’s all move on with our day. Have a nice afternoon.

I need these things. I do. Really.

• First, I will buy a Soo-Per Cap which I will wear while I go shopping. I might buy a back-up Soo-Per Cap in case things get tricky and I lose the first one.
• I’ll round out the outfit with this excellent T-shirt. “Everything you like I liked five years ago.” Boo-yah.
• Then, I will get a ZÜCA Pro, the most fantastic piece of roll-on luggage, to carry around my loot. When I am overwhelmed with self-satisfaction at my purchase, I will sit on my new luggage’s little built-in seat platform.
• When I’m back from my hat-centric outing, I’ll print the photos on the Epson Artisan 800. Then I’ll scan the print-outs and fax them to myself. Because I can.

The winner of the Bookseller/Diagram Prize for Oddest Book Title of the Year has come out and I can’t wait to lay down $1,139 for it. Yes, it’s “The 2009-2014 World Outlook for 60-Milligram Containers of Fromage Frais”.

I’m hoping the outlook is good, because I do love fromage frais.

Other titles I will be tracking down:

• “Waterproofing Your Child”
• “The Large Sieve and Its Applications”
• “Strip and Knit With Style”
• “Proceedings of the Second International Symposium on Nude Mice”
• “How to Avoid Huge Ships”

If you want to experience the full force of the Bookseller/Diagram Prize, you can get the lists, photos included, in this lovely volume. Which I already own. Naturally.