When I was at Jossip, I wrote about an anecdote Malcolm Gladwell told at the Moth Gala last November, which was later rebroadcasted on This American Life. In the story, Gladwell boasts about getting absurd phrases like "raises new and troubling questions" and "perverse and often baffling" into the Washington Post. At the time, being self-serious and high-minded &mdash I do after all listen to This American Life &mdash I wondered whether there wasn't something "perverse and often baffling" about one of the most successful journalists of our time making lite deception sound so endearing . Some people agreed with me, or at least wondered how a Canuck like Gladwell ended up on This American Life. Gladwell is back, not to defend himself for the charges of being Canadian, but to explain the story on his own blog:

Malcom Gladwell was on precious radio program This American Life recently, telling some stories of his earliest days of "real" journalism at the Washington Post. He apparently had a bet with a colleague to determine which of them could be the first to insert a couple amusing phrases into the venerable paper. First was "new and troubling questions," which is surely already a journalistic cliche. Following that was the more amusing "perverse and often baffling"—a harder fit, but Gladwell managed it. Of course, Gladwell, easily one of the most charming one-trick ponies in media, has been dining out on this story for a dozen years. Despite that, it upset Jossip very very much, as it raises new and troubling questions about the state of respectable journalism. Audio clip attached.

Gladwell is known for his book The Tipping Point, which made him into a journo-celebrity and provided the world's marketers and executives a trendy new cliché.

In the Tipping Point, middle-brow about town Malcolm Gladwell cites rather convincing evidence that Blues Clues, that maddeningly simple television show featuring an azure canine, taught kids more about life than Sesame Street. Sesame Street he claims, en bref, was too complicated for the psyche's of tiny tots. He's wrong and here's why.First there's the little matter of reading test scores in American students which have been plummeting since the seventies and markedly since the aughts. But that is due to an entire range of factors. The real answer is both deeper and less scientifically supported. It is accurate that children may follow the oversimplified primary-colored repetitive plots of Blues Clues. But is that what life is all about? Based on not only the above clip of Sesame Street animation set to music Philip Glass composed specifically for the show but this clip, featuring Judy Collins singing "Bring in the Clowns" while clowns execute turned-in pirouettes in the background from The Muppet Show and my life experience, the answer is no. Both of the earlier shows taught an invaluable life lesson: Much of what is beautiful is rare and hard to comprehend. What makes it beautiful does not make sense. "What the fuck?" (albeit expressed in milder toddlerspeak) is often the prelude to the discovery of the sublime. Also, life never makes much more sense than it does when you're three and watching a bunch of clowns dance to a sad song. You just learn to see the beauty in it.

Last night at Capitale, The Moth celebrated ten years of storytelling. Media polymath Kurt Andersen, Jewy comedian Andy Borowitz, Irish actor Gabriel Byrne, potter Jonathan Adler and Lili Taylor all sat at one table in the front. Harper's figurehead Lewis Lapham didn't show. The main event: The New Yorker's Adam Gopnik would engage in heated storytelling duel with co-worker Malcolm Gladwell. Real estate mini-mogul Adam Gordon sat at the same table as Garrison Keillor, who was there to receive the first-ever Moth Award Honoring the Art of the Raconteur. Keillor looks like Dwight Schrute from "The Office" and is much funnier in person than on his overly precious show. Also he spat chevre on my hands and I haven't washed them since. Nikola Tamindzic was there, drawn like a shutterbug to an event.

Crazy-haired New Yorker thinkbot Malcolm Gladwell, after an absence of 305 days, has returned to his blog, if only to post the second-worst thing a blogger ever can: OMG LOL sorry no updatez!!11! (At least there were no cat pictures. Oh my God, does Malcolm Gladwell even have a cat???) His failure to multitask is duly noted, and also he is done with his book. Hmm. Well, yeah. What the hell did any of you do over the last 305 days anyway? Didn't write any bestsellers, did ya. [Gladwell]

Spotted at the Savoy, at Prince and Crosby, at a corner table: New Yorker scribe and pop sociologist Malcolm Gladwell. Hair no longer in trademark frizz, but cut down rather short—a few curls still evident, though. Wearing shorts and... navy blue Crocs. Now that's one shoe that's 100 percent beyond the tipping point. Also! It has now been 222 days since his last blog post.

It has now been 193 days since Malcolm Gladwell's last blog post. [Gladwell]

175 days ago, Malcolm Gladwell published his most recent blog post! [Gladwell]

152 days ago, New Yorker writer Malcolm Gladwell gave up blogging. Five weeks and three days ago, Spy founder Kurt Andersen gave up blogging. But former Page Sixer and current Clinton litigant Jared Paul Stern is back on the horse! He wins blog thunderdome! A round of applause, everyone.

• Byron "Barney" Calame's term as Times ombudsman will not be that paper's last. No word yet on a successor, but we understand that this guy is not in the running. [WWD]
  

Tucked away in the middle of this Washingtonian profile of New Yorker scribe Malcolm Gladwell (who is wrong on Enron, according to various sources) is this anecdote from Slate editor/former roommate Jake Weisberg:

• Ravelston, the company through which Conrad Black controlled Hollinger International, plead out to fraud. [Guardian]
  

From the befroed Blink author's all-too-frequently updated blog:

Over on his blog, deep thinker/afro-joke-goes here New Yorker scribe Malcolm Gladwell ponders the recent Michael Richards imbroglio and comes up with a few simple ways to determine the racism level of public outbursts. Gladwell boils it down to three factors:

This morning we asked you to help us identify the mystery journalist who had the effrontery to start his own website in the early days of the Internet. While the general consensus remains fixated on Andrew Sullivan, there are a few other ideas out there. We present them after the jump.

Okay, so that Kinsley piece: We'll start you off with the "blind item" in question:

Last time we checked, writers got paid shit, and no one was reading anything besides US Weekly. Nevertheless, the honorable folks over at The Moth have set up a reading series so successful that they've managed to parlay it into a national tour, a mentoring program, and a functional charity. Their annual Moth Ball fundraiser is able to draw the likes of Moby, Malcolm Gladwell, Darren Aronofsky, and a guy who looks like Lex Luthor, not to mention our own Nikola Tamindzic, and Gabriel Delahaye. Journey through our action-packed photo gallery, then step after the jump to discover who prevailed when Gabe met Jonathan Ames on the manly field of arm-wrestling.

We'll have some incredible video coverage of last evening's Halloween Parade sometime around lunch; until then we want you to enjoy this photo from last night's celebration. That's right, it's frequent comment-executee Brian Van dressed as New Yorker scribe Malcolm Gladwell. (Looks like that subscription to New York paid off!) Nice work, Brian: If you'd like to comment on this post, we suggest you do it soon: We're banning you in twenty minutes.

Tom Scocca's Observer profile of Malcolm Gladwell is a fairly even-handed assessment of the New Yorker writer: He's got a unique style and he often tackles his subjects from an unusual angle, but his recent tendency toward the Socratic method and his reductive, show-you-the-architecture tics grow grating. Still, being the shallow types that we are, we found this anecdote more interesting: