The Sh*t L*st

As paradoxical, even ass-backwards, as it may seem, I am proud to announce a new friend to the Shit List : daibatsu. daibatsu and I first met in the early days of eharmony in an online match gone horribly wrong. He has a short list of enemies, but a long memory and a healthy sense of outrage that's growing steadily more unhealthy every day. Need to know more? See his Friendster profile.

In the spirit of the occasion, instead of spewing out the usual portion of bilious rancor, I'd thought I'd mention some things I'm rather fond of : specifically, a few typefaces. I've been keen on the following fonts lately:

Garamond | sample
This is the workhorse of my documenting formatting. I still haven't found anything better for a real, solid Henry James-dense piece of text. Times Roman makes me sick to my stomach. I have noticed that this is a common typeface in books that include a colophon.

Optima | sample
This, I discovered a few years ago after hours of research, is the typeface used on the Vietnam War Memorial. (Do you know how hard it is to identify a typeface you just sort of come across at random?) Maya Lin is a genius. (The Vietnam War Memorial is also one of the most inspired uses of right-justification that I've ever seen.)

Century Gothic | sample
A thin, minimalist sort of font. Great capitalized for elegant headings. Notice the small 't' has no serifing whatsoever. Every once in a while, poor people in South America (or San Bernadino) will start flocking to a bit of ad-copy done in Century Gothic for a chance to witness a lowercase 't' with the hope of grace, salvation, and good luck in the following week's lottery.

Frutigar Linotype | sample
Just started using this one recently. Emboldened, it has a nice hefty frame -- hearty and robust -- for a heading, or even better, a subheading. The default font for MS Pocket Reader

Arial | sample
A bit commonplace, but it has the versatility and dark good looks of a Johnny Depp, combined with the solid work ethic and reliability of a Jerry Rice. When you don't know what the hell to use, you could do a lot worse than to use Arial.