Conversation Piece XXVI

A weekly series.

Daily Edit: Conversation Piece

Enjoy our Sunday series, Conversation Piece, a NUVO-curated digest of things on the Internet we think you’ll want to talk about.

Fa la la la la. While the majority of Christmas songs are unbearable, Sam Anderson raises an unexpected defense in The New York Times Magazine for Dan Fogelber’s ‘80s ballad “Same Old Lang Syne”, dubbing it “something of a Raymond Carver story crossed with ‘Escape (The Pina Colada Song)’ crossed with T.S. Eliot’s ‘Four Quartets’.” What, in this kitschy tune about old lovers reconnecting in a grocery store, awakens Anderson’s holiday spirit? Find out, here.

Bartender, I’ll have another. For many, a drink with dinner is second nature. But high-proof alcohol and food are not intuitive partners, and thus, restaurant bartenders are increasingly concocting low alcohol by volume cocktails which pair more pleasingly with meals than would a couple Manhattans. In any case, surely, you want to remember what you ate. Learn more here.

How you feeling, Saskatoon? The Conference Board of Canada’s City Health Monitor, which studies the physical and socioeconomic health of Canadian metropolises based on factors like access to healthcare and perceived rates of work and life stress, has concluded its 2016 survey with the finding that Saskatoon is Canada’s healthiest city. So, what’s our unhealthiest city? Find out.

Alice Munro, the movie. In this essay, Oscar-winning Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar discusses the complexities of adapting Canadian author Alice Munro’s bitterly dramatic short stories “Chance”, “Soon”, and “Silence”, into his film Julieta: three stories. How does one translate a tale into a new medium, and a new culture as well? Read more, here.

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