Breaking News: Lebron Will NOT Be a Knick

As the Lebron James watch continues, the Solipsist would like to officially declare the New York Knicks out of the running for his services.

(Disclaimer: The Solipsist has received a cease-and-desist order, requiring him to stop speaking for the New York Knicks. We have decided, however, to file that cease-and-desist order with similar orders we have received from the New York Mets, the New York Jets, MENSA, and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. End of Disclaimer)

After careful consideration, we have decided that, much as we would love to see King James in a Knicks uniform, we think it better for all concerned if he stayed away from Madison Square Garden. We fear that, if the Knicks somehow manage to lure James to what has become something of a laughingstock organization, they would in short order, like a six-year-old with a shiny Christmas present, break him. No one wants to see that happen.

One caveat: James must sign with no one BUT Cleveland. Simply put, it's the right thing to do. The man is from Cleveland (well, Akron, but close enough), and he should stick around and bring that team the championship they have long desired. Let's face it, the man is going to make gazillions of dollars anywhere he goes, and in this day and age the fame and marketing opportunities are as great in Cleveland as in New York or anywhere else. He has no need to leave, and he would send a sweet message to the jaded sports fans of the world if he chose lucrative loyalty over larcenous leaving.

And if he signs with Chicago or Miami, we hope his shooting touch becomes that of Shaquille O'Neal when heaving free throws.

(Image from NBA.com)

Rachael Ray: An Expose (That's "Expo-ZAY"--We Don't Know How to Make an Accent Mark)

In the background, the TV was for some reason tuned to the Travel Channel. We paid little attention, focusing instead on our internet-based cinammon research. Happening to glance up at just the right moment, though, we realized that a massive fraud was being perpetrated on an unsuspecting public, and we wasted no time--we poured ourselves a cup of coffee, drank the cup of coffee, had a bowl of non-racist cereal, petted a cat, had another cup of coffee, showered, did some gardening, spent a few minutes trying to remember what it was we were supposed to be doing, remembered, and sat down to write today's post.

America's Sweetheart, Rachael "Oh-I'm-So-Cool-I-Spell-'Rachael'-With-An-Extra-'A'" Ray, has a show called "$40 a Day with Rachael Ray." On this program, Rachael ships out to various cities across the US where she must subsist on--wait for it--forty dollars.

Now, we can see how this show might prove useful for travelers on a budget.

(Digression: A Dartmouth study determined that the show was exactly 20% more useful than "$50 a Day with Robert Goulet" but only half as useful as "$20 a Day with Kid n' Play." EOD.)

But the show is only as useful as its host is honest. In short: Because Rachael Ray is a big fat liar and cheat, this show is worthless.

Look, we know this probably comes as a shock to those Sloppists who worship at the shrine of Rachael. But we have proof! In the episode playing today, she managed to eke out a day in Vermont only by having an appetizer for dinner. Unacceptable! When the Solipsist vacations in the culinary mecca that is Burlington, VT, he will not--NOT!--confine his gustatory endeavours to appetizers and amuse bouches. He will have meals! (Oh, and WOS'll probably want to have something to eat, too.)

Do a better job, Rachael. Solipsist Nation is watching.

The Handwriting Won't Be on the Wall--Or Anywhere Else

As you read this blog, constantly bedazzled by its trenchant wit and penetrating analysis, you should know something about Your-Not-So-Humble Correspondent: We have dreadful handwriting (see our signature on this page). Scarcely a day goes by that we do not find ourselves called upon to decipher our boardwork for a group of bewildered students. So we read with great interest an essay by Anne Trubek entitled "Handwriting Is History."

As the title suggests, Trubek argues that the glory days of cursive are long past--and good riddance: Why focus on handwriting instruction when the ubiquity of computers and word-processing software renders unnecessary the ability to form an upper-case cursive 'N'? In terms of the speed with which a writer can transfer information from mind to page, handwriting comes in a distant second compared to typing; educators would do better to take the time in 3rd grade to train kids on the latest version of Microsoft Word than on the Palmer Method.

But what happens when handwriting disappears? On the one hand, student writing will be judged more for the quality of the ideas than the content of the characters. As Trubek notes, researchers have found that identical student essays receive higher grades when typed than when handwritten--especially if the handwriting is "messy." We admit to this weakness in our own grading: Not that we intentionally grade sloppily written papers more harshly than their typed or neatly printed counterparts, but we do find ourselves making major effort to remain impartial when struggling with a work of limited legibility.

On the other hand, something will undeniably be lost when students no longer master the art of the handwritten word--because it is, indeed, an art: Cursive, like many another artistic endeavor, is a product of the individual: Handwriting experts exist for the simple reason that people's identities--and certain aspects of their personalities--can be divined through close analysis of the idiosyncrasies of their handwriting. When handwriting no longer matters, some small means of a person's individual expression will disappear. Doubtless, the human mind will continue to develop through whatever neural pathways are stimulated by the act of computer-aided composition. But we will miss the small hints of personality we now discern in the looping, slanting, often frustrating but endlessly fascinating examples of individually, idiosyncratically printed prose.

Immaturity

"Re-imagined comic book heroine Wonder Woman

The re-imagined comic book heroine Wonder Woman is shown in this undated publicity photo released to Reuters June 30, 2010. The DC Comics Comic book super heroine has traded in her spangled hot pants for urban leggings and upped her street smarts in a 21st century make-over for the 69 year-old character."

Commentary: Heh, heh. . . . They said 69.

Conjunction Junction, What's Your Dysfunction?

We administered an exam in our Grammar and Style class this morning. The results were. . . disheartening.

Now, we should mention that we allow students to refer to notes, books, tarot cards--whatever. we figure that the important is not so much whether the students have memorized everything but whether they can apply the information they've learned. So, y'know, the questions themselves should be relatively easy.

The first question--material we went over on the first day of the class--asked students to name the eight parts of speech and to give an example of each. A frustratingly small percentage of the class bothered to read the instructions, and thus gave only the parts of speech with no examples. One student, however, who did give examples answered as follows:

1. Adjective . Example: Beautifully (Well, wrong, but we could see where she was going.)
2. Preposition. No example given.
3. Verb. Example: Run (OK.)
4. Noun. Example: [Student gave her own name] (Hey, we're on a roll!)
5. Adverb. Example: Fastly (Yeah, OK, we know. But we gave her credit for at least having the general idea.)
6. Pronoun. Example: She (Good.)
7. Interjection: Example: Sadly (Huh? Well, maybe, as in: "Sadly, you failed the test." OK, no.)
And. . . .
8. Conjunction.
Example: Baseball.

?!?

"On your hamburger, would you like ketchup baseball mustard?"

"You're going to be in a lot of trouble baseball you don't do your homework!"

Thank God we let them use notes.

Yummers

Two words: Planter's Smoky Bacon Peanuts. What will they think of next? God bless America!

(WOS: Hey, give me those! Get your own damn bag!)

Leave the Polical Commentary to the Professionals--And Us Amateur Professionals

In all the hoopla over the US's sudden, dramatic, and--let's face it--not wholly unexpected exit from the World Cup, we forgot to mention the most trenchant piece of commentary on the whole affair. The night before the Ghana match, ESPN correspondent Jeremy Schaap noted that former President Bill Clinton would attend the match and that the team had received a phone call from President Obama wishing them luck. Schaap then commented--in a true "Does-he-write-his-own-copy?" moment--that the cheering for Team USA was "bipartisan."

Uhhh. . . .

Not only was Schaap wrong on the face of it, Clinton and Obama both being Democrats; he was also, in fact, wrong in his analysis: Our own research has turned up the fact that former Vice-President and Scion of Darkness Dick Cheney has several thousand riding on Uruguay.

And as long as we're on the topic: What has happened to our Research and Audio-Visual Departments? We've heard nary a peep from them for days, now. (And you can see what happens when we have to conduct our own research!) Why hast thou forsaken us?!?