Banana Nutrament has an MP3 of David Bowie and Arcade Fire singing "Wake Up" together. Bowie vocals on one of my favorite songs of the last year...cool. I'm going to see Arcade Fire on Central Park Summerstage Thursday evening. It will be my first Central Park concert.

How efficient is the Red Cross? Is there a better charity to donate to when crises like Hurricane Katrina strike? It's the most linked to charity for donating to the Hurricane Katrina relief effort, but someone expressed reservations about how efficiently the Red Cross channeled those funds to aiding victims. I don't know the answer, but I found this evaluation in which the Red Cross online earned a four star rating (out of four). Not sure how objective or accurate this evaluation is, though I was hoping more knowledgeable folks had already done the legwork on this. The president and CEO, Marsha Evans, does indeed make a really generous salary ($450K a year, according to this site), though overall program expenses seem reasonable at around 5.6% of revenues.

The new iPod Nano is cool (the ROKR is not), most people agree, but while I love my iPod(s), I really hope the quality control on this new edition is better than that on previous editions. I don't know anyone who's purchased an iPod who hasn't had to bring it in for repairs at some point. Ironically, my most reliable is my first one, the first generation iPod. My other iPod, the Shuffle, is temperamental, like a crazy girlfriend.

Stream the new Sigur Ros CD Takk

Yet another Godfather novel on tap for next year. Sounds like this one weaves the Corleone saga with the Kennedy assassination.

Xbox 360 has a launch date: Nov. 22

Gillette unveils yet another razor, the successor to the Mach 3: Fusion. This baby has an enhanced indicator lubristrip, 5 blades, and a precision trimmer blade for side burns and shaping your goatee.

Heather Havrilesky rates the fall television comedies. Those that rate well on her scale are Ricky Gervais's HBO series "Extras," Chris Rock's UPN series "Everybody Hates Chris," and, to a lesser degree, NBC's "My Name is Earl" and Fox's "Kitchen Confidential." "Extras" premieres Sunday, Sept 25, at 10:30pm. That's the one I'll be tuning into for sure, along with every other fanatical devotee of "The Office."

Red Sox outfielder Gape Kapler ruptures his Achilles tendon running around second base after a teammate hit a home run

Canon jumps into the HDV camcorder fray this week with the XL H1. It will cost $8999 and ship in November. Cool looking camcorder, but surprisingly, Canon won't offer 24P or 720P recording, only 1080i in HDV mode. Whether or not they believe 24P is useful or not, it's clear many users do, and the user is king. Panasonic will offer that in their HVX200, and they'll take market share because of it.