Required Reading

• Enjoyed this piece by Alexandra Willis on Serena. 
• I'm already looking forward to 2012.
• "Schiavone is my pick for Sportsman of the Year: just like an Italian, to paraphrase Sean Connery in The Untouchables, she brings a knife to a gun fight. With her creative, expressive brand of all-court play, the 5-foot-5½ Schiavone is the artistic underdog whose rage against stylistic homogeny became the sport's most gratifying plotline of 2010."
• I go with unlucky, but what do I know.
• Can someone PLEASE get Hannah Wilks, a.k.a. Gauloises, a paying job where she is allowed to write about tennis?  PLEASE.  Or at least commission her for a 300-page scourge on the Twilight phenomenon.  Lord knows I've already read at least 280 pages worth of that.
• Todd Spiker writes the only WTA Year-End review that you need to read.  Seriously, I feel completely inadequate now.
• Nice history lesson in this Bodo piece. 
• Non-Required Reading:  Something tells me that if you're under the age 30 you don't really understand why the original TRON was a big fucking deal.  Here's an attempt to explain it.  
• Non-Required Reading:  My kid sister lives in Tokyo.  She eats.  She blogs about it.  Here's how you do Thanksgiving in Tokyo.
• Non-Required Reading: I will never understand slash-fic.
• Non-Required Listening: First, go here and download Girl Talk's "All Day" for free.  Then listen to it all the way through and try keep your mind from exploding.  Then go here, click play, sit back, throw a dumb grin on your face, and marvel.  This is the most joyous piece of music I've heard in years.