When Bill Elek, Paste's Events Manager and Southeastern Sales guy, was asked to contribute his favorite festive bit of whatever for our December/January Paste 7, he didn't hesitate in making his selection: "My mom's lasagna." The rest of us weren't so sure, though. Whose mom doesn't have a go-to comfort food recipe she whips out every holiday? And how incredible could a pan of layered meat and cheese and pasta really be, anyway?

But then he showed us the photos. And then he uttered the words "fifteen pounds." And "recipe under lock and key." And "last year, my wife went up to Philly five days early to help with the sauce." And our hearts melted like big blobs of mozzarella.

This wall-mounted bookshelf hides behind a stack of books. Since it clips inside the bottom book, you can't even see the shelf from beneath. It’s a stylish and practical way to display your favorite reads.

$10.50, Umbra.com

Here we are at the Phoenix club. Little did I know that Toronto had such talented whistlers. During the song "El Gatillo," Martin's whistle melody is matched with a wild chorus.

Ah yes...waiting in line at the border immigration. Things go smoothly and soon we are outta there and crossing the St Lawrence river into lovely Montreal. Love this town and love Quebec City as well. Lots of fond memories in the province of Quebec.

Earlier this week, deputy editor and Gator alum Jason Killingsworth issued a fatwa of sorts on the legions of Alabama Crimson Tide fans with his blog post, "10 Best Songs to Listen to While the Gators Spank Alabama in the 2008 SEC Championship."  Shortly thereafter, our inboxes filled up with messages from Tide supporters around the blogosphere. The best message came from Tony at AlabamaGameday.net who wanted to craft his own 10-song Bama playlist. So, in the interest of fairness, we told him we'd post it via "Alabama vs Florida - the 2008 SEC Championship Playlist."

Currently listening to: I Believe in You, Your Magic is Real by YACHT

Hello from Seattle! So the last few days have been tiring and busy, a lot of driving. We played four nights ago in Paris at a beautiful Theatre called Marigny. Paris is a beautiful city; we got to walk around a bit. We saw the Eiffel Tower up close, which was amazing. The show went very well. The next morning we drove four hours to Dijon for our second to last show in Europe with Mercury Rev. Great show as well, though Dijon was a somewhat strange town.

First came Edgar Allan Poe. Then, after a long interval indeed, came the double-whammy of The Wire and Michael Phelps. And now, in a sign of its possible ascendance from the depths of the cultural abyss, the fair city of Baltimore has given us the girlish rapper Rye Rye, who in her short life has already become muse to Blaqstarr and protégée to M.I.A., and whose sassy rhymes are reason enough to get excited about 2009.

Here are four reasons to get on the bandwagon now:

How do you combat the cold on a Sunday morning in Boston? Go to a crêperie.

Last night, ABC served up two back-to-back episodes of Samantha Who? Weirdly (or perhaps normally, in the case of 30-minute sitcoms) the two episodes didn't really tie together, though that didn't stop them from moving the Owen-Sam relationship along to its final resting place. Thank the heavens.

Another deliberately structured episode this week, as Miguel and Dexter’s relationship has devolved into a nasty rivalry more quickly than anticipated. It’s a treat and a relief for the show to revert back to the mode it’s in now, a breakneck, almost giddy series of suspense cues and constricting subplots that surged through the entire episode.