Today, I observed Bank Transfer Day. To show my solidarity with the rest of the 99%, I withdrew my dozens of dollars from a big, sleazy multinational bank and gave it all to some guy named Eddie.
Huh? I was supposed to what?
Um. . . Gotta run!
Saturday, November 5, 2011
Friday, November 4, 2011
Slow News Day
I've heard of slow news day, but this is ridiculous On the front page--THE FRONT PAGE--of today's New York Times appears a story about Ryan Fitzpatrick, the quarterback for the suddenly resurgent Buffalo Bills. Now, the fact that the Bills have a winning record is certainly newsworthy, but front-page newsworthy? And that's not even why Mr. Fitzpatrick made the front page. Is he having a record-setting season? No. Is he making some sort of inspiring comeback from a career-threatening injury? Nope. Is he dying? Not so far as we know.
No, what makes Ryan Fitzpatrick worthy of front-page attention in the nation's newspaper of record is the fact that he wears his wedding ring during games. ("For Bills' Quarterback, Losing (Wedding Ring) Is Not an Option") That's it. Now, in this day and age, when a typical quarterback story likely revolves around dogfighting or Roethlisbergerian sexual improprieties, one find a certain charm in the story of this apparently uxorious athlete. But still! This story would seem pretty irrelevant on the sports pages on a Sunday gameday--how little must be going on in the world for this to make the front-page (albeit below the fold)? It's not even about a New York team! (Where is Buffalo, anyway?)
Let's see what other stories got buried inside the paper to make room for this story of a football player's accessorizing:
"U.S. Report Accuses China and Russia of Internet Spying" (Page 4)
"Israel Faces Questions About News Reports of Eyeing Iran Strike" (Page 10)
"Petition Drive Challenges Medical Marijuana Ban in Rural California County" (Page 15)
"Couple Donate $150 Million to Fight Poverty in Developing Nations" (B6)
Clearly, all less important than the fact that Ryan Fitzpatrick risks jamming his finger for the sake of confirming his undying devotion to (or perhaps fear of) his wife.
No, what makes Ryan Fitzpatrick worthy of front-page attention in the nation's newspaper of record is the fact that he wears his wedding ring during games. ("For Bills' Quarterback, Losing (Wedding Ring) Is Not an Option") That's it. Now, in this day and age, when a typical quarterback story likely revolves around dogfighting or Roethlisbergerian sexual improprieties, one find a certain charm in the story of this apparently uxorious athlete. But still! This story would seem pretty irrelevant on the sports pages on a Sunday gameday--how little must be going on in the world for this to make the front-page (albeit below the fold)? It's not even about a New York team! (Where is Buffalo, anyway?)
Let's see what other stories got buried inside the paper to make room for this story of a football player's accessorizing:
"U.S. Report Accuses China and Russia of Internet Spying" (Page 4)
"Israel Faces Questions About News Reports of Eyeing Iran Strike" (Page 10)
"Petition Drive Challenges Medical Marijuana Ban in Rural California County" (Page 15)
"Couple Donate $150 Million to Fight Poverty in Developing Nations" (B6)
Clearly, all less important than the fact that Ryan Fitzpatrick risks jamming his finger for the sake of confirming his undying devotion to (or perhaps fear of) his wife.
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Thursday Trendwatch
Here are the top-trending topics on Yahoo! as of 4:33 PM PST:
10. KELLY SLATER: Mr. Slater just solidified his claim to being the world's greatest surfer at a tournament at Ocean Beach in northern California. Or, to put this in a language that I imagine surf afficionados would understand: The dude totally walrused the droogie out past the whipwam!
9. ANDROID TABLETS: For when your robot has a headache.
8. DEPRESSION: Nice to see that depression has made it back onto the trends list. For a long time, depression couldn't get arrested on Yahoo! It was all Restless Leg Syndrome this and Seasonal Affective Disorder that, but you can never go wrong with the classics. Depression is the Bob Dylan of mental disorders, and it's nice to see it getting the recognition it deserves.
7. POLICE SLAM OAKLAND MAYOR: That'll teach the Honorable Jean Quan to make fun of Sting's sweater.
6. BLAKE LIVELY: I've never been exactly clear on who this person is: Apparently, she's in "Gossip Girl" and "Green Lantern," so I'm assuming she's some sort of Asperger's kid who can only appear in things that begin with the letter 'G.'
5. DANCING WITH THE STARS: This completes this week's "DWTS" appearance on Thursday Trendwatch.
4. KATE GOSSELIN: The former mother of 8 (she had to return them to the studio when the show was cancelled) has bounced back nicely, becoming a featured blogger at CouponCabin.com. "CouponCabin.com"? And people made fun of The Daily Numeral?
3. WARDROBE MALFUNCTION: This is about the whole Janet Jackson Super Bowl Boob Flap. or Janet Jackson's Flapping Super Bowl Boob, but I had my own wardrobe malfunction earlier today, accidentally taking my pants off in the middle of an explanation of pronoun-antecedent agreement. AWK-ward!
2. KRIS JENNER: Mama Kardashian has revealed that she thinks she could have saved the life of Nicole Brown Simpson. Stunning. Kris Jenner had the opportunity to save the life of another human being--TWO human beings, Nicole and Ron Goldman. She could have spared the country the spectacle of OJ's low-speed bronco chase. She could have forestalled the searching conversations on race, celebrity, and the criminal justice system. Indeed, if her story is true, she literally had an opportunity to change the course of modern American culture and history, and while hindsight is 20/20, we could all benefit by taking a moment to reflect on what might have been. . . . But we won't because Jenner's daughter Kim Kardashian is dissolving her farce of a marriage. Ah, America!
And the number one trendiest topic at this moment in the space-time continuum is. . .
1. ZOOEY DESCHANEL: We've mentioned in this space that we really don't get Zooey Deschanel. Now comes news that she is divorcing her husband, Ben Gibbard, the frontman of Death Cab for Cutie. I didn't know they were married, but it makes sense: I've previously mentioned the fact that there's a quality in Gibbard's voice that makes me want to punch him in the face. The news of their divorce, though, makes me sad. They really had something: Unbeknownst to me, they formed the most annoying couple in the universe.
10. KELLY SLATER: Mr. Slater just solidified his claim to being the world's greatest surfer at a tournament at Ocean Beach in northern California. Or, to put this in a language that I imagine surf afficionados would understand: The dude totally walrused the droogie out past the whipwam!
9. ANDROID TABLETS: For when your robot has a headache.
8. DEPRESSION: Nice to see that depression has made it back onto the trends list. For a long time, depression couldn't get arrested on Yahoo! It was all Restless Leg Syndrome this and Seasonal Affective Disorder that, but you can never go wrong with the classics. Depression is the Bob Dylan of mental disorders, and it's nice to see it getting the recognition it deserves.
7. POLICE SLAM OAKLAND MAYOR: That'll teach the Honorable Jean Quan to make fun of Sting's sweater.
6. BLAKE LIVELY: I've never been exactly clear on who this person is: Apparently, she's in "Gossip Girl" and "Green Lantern," so I'm assuming she's some sort of Asperger's kid who can only appear in things that begin with the letter 'G.'
5. DANCING WITH THE STARS: This completes this week's "DWTS" appearance on Thursday Trendwatch.
4. KATE GOSSELIN: The former mother of 8 (she had to return them to the studio when the show was cancelled) has bounced back nicely, becoming a featured blogger at CouponCabin.com. "CouponCabin.com"? And people made fun of The Daily Numeral?
3. WARDROBE MALFUNCTION: This is about the whole Janet Jackson Super Bowl Boob Flap. or Janet Jackson's Flapping Super Bowl Boob, but I had my own wardrobe malfunction earlier today, accidentally taking my pants off in the middle of an explanation of pronoun-antecedent agreement. AWK-ward!
2. KRIS JENNER: Mama Kardashian has revealed that she thinks she could have saved the life of Nicole Brown Simpson. Stunning. Kris Jenner had the opportunity to save the life of another human being--TWO human beings, Nicole and Ron Goldman. She could have spared the country the spectacle of OJ's low-speed bronco chase. She could have forestalled the searching conversations on race, celebrity, and the criminal justice system. Indeed, if her story is true, she literally had an opportunity to change the course of modern American culture and history, and while hindsight is 20/20, we could all benefit by taking a moment to reflect on what might have been. . . . But we won't because Jenner's daughter Kim Kardashian is dissolving her farce of a marriage. Ah, America!
And the number one trendiest topic at this moment in the space-time continuum is. . .
1. ZOOEY DESCHANEL: We've mentioned in this space that we really don't get Zooey Deschanel. Now comes news that she is divorcing her husband, Ben Gibbard, the frontman of Death Cab for Cutie. I didn't know they were married, but it makes sense: I've previously mentioned the fact that there's a quality in Gibbard's voice that makes me want to punch him in the face. The news of their divorce, though, makes me sad. They really had something: Unbeknownst to me, they formed the most annoying couple in the universe.
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
An Open Letter to the Herminator
"Adding to the pressure on Mr. Cain, a lawyer for the second woman called on the restaurant association to release her from a confidentiality agreement signed as part of her settlement, raising the prospect that she could publicly dispute Mr. Cain’s account of what happened. The lawyer said the confidentiality agreement had left her unable to respond to Mr. Cain’s denials of any inappropriate behavior toward the women."Herman, really!
--"Cain Accuser Got a Year's Salary in Severance Pay"
A bit of advice: Call your old cronies at the restaurant association and tell them to release this lady from her confidentiality agreement. I understand why you would want to continue talking and defending yourself against "baseless" accusations while your accuser is legally forbidden to refute you. It's that same temptation we all feel to throw batteries at a panda that's been tied up in its cage at the Bronx Zoo. At the same time, though, as long as this woman can't speak, then people are free to imagine all kinds of things she might say. And irresponsible bloggers are free to speculate on these hypothetical revelations.
I mean, if I were an irresponsible blogger--which of course I'm not--I might wonder out loud . . . . What would this lady say you did? What could be so bad that you quickly paid her off rather than let her reveal it? I mean, back then, even if she had revealed that you had, say, propositioned her inappropriately, how bad would that have been? You weren't running for office back then, and you were already a pretty wealthy man, so it's not like you would have been ruined.
An irresponsible blogger--again, not me--would possibly speculate that you did something not only improper but downright weird and creepy. Maybe she would reveal that you ran around National Restaurant Association headquarters hopped up on pepperoni pizza and cocaine, randomly groping female employees--and a not-incosequential number of male ones--while bellowing, "HONK! HONK!" Or might she reveal that you were caught in flagrante with a major Republican donor, three prostitutes, and an otter? Something worse? Might she reveal that you actually like anchovies? Who knows? Nobody knows! And that's the problem.
Seriously, Sir, the collectively depraved imagination of the Blogotwitterverse is infinitely worse--one hopes!--than anything you might actually have done. As Maureen Dowd pointed out, "It’s not the cover-up that kills you; it’s the cascade of malarkey that spills out when you try to cover up the cover-up." Get out ahead of this thing before it's too late.
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Advice for Young Teachers: Masochism Hurts
When giving writing assignments, keep one thing in mind when you give writing assignments: You're going to have to read the damn things. Try to make the process as painless as possible.
Back in my undergraduate days, I took a Shakespeare class. For the "big paper," the professor assigned the class a close reading of a scene from one of Shakespeare plays. I mean that literally: He assigned a close reading of A scene from ONE of Shakespeare's plays, specifically, Othello, Act III, scene 3 (the handkerchief scene). Now, the scene itself is interesting and certainly central to the play. But I cannot imagine what would possess a professor--a Shakespeare scholar--to willingly subject himself to reading 25-30 ten-page exegeses, written by undergraduates, about the same scene. Even if he loves that scene! ESPECIALLY if he loves that scene!
It makes me wonder about those people who find Shakespeare boring. We assume that these are lazy high-schoolers, but maybe they're actually Shakespeare scholars who foolishly condemn themselves to tedious writing purgatory. If I had to read countless pages of semi-literate prose telling me over and over again about Iago's "sneakiness," I, too, would think Shakespeare a crashing bore.
If you must assign students essays--and you must--at least give them options. Assign a broad topic that tests whatever writing skills you wish to assess (narration, description, analysis, etc.) but that also allows some leeway in a choice of topic. At least then you won't read the same essay over and over. And you might even still be able to enjoy a production of Othello.
Back in my undergraduate days, I took a Shakespeare class. For the "big paper," the professor assigned the class a close reading of a scene from one of Shakespeare plays. I mean that literally: He assigned a close reading of A scene from ONE of Shakespeare's plays, specifically, Othello, Act III, scene 3 (the handkerchief scene). Now, the scene itself is interesting and certainly central to the play. But I cannot imagine what would possess a professor--a Shakespeare scholar--to willingly subject himself to reading 25-30 ten-page exegeses, written by undergraduates, about the same scene. Even if he loves that scene! ESPECIALLY if he loves that scene!
It makes me wonder about those people who find Shakespeare boring. We assume that these are lazy high-schoolers, but maybe they're actually Shakespeare scholars who foolishly condemn themselves to tedious writing purgatory. If I had to read countless pages of semi-literate prose telling me over and over again about Iago's "sneakiness," I, too, would think Shakespeare a crashing bore.
If you must assign students essays--and you must--at least give them options. Assign a broad topic that tests whatever writing skills you wish to assess (narration, description, analysis, etc.) but that also allows some leeway in a choice of topic. At least then you won't read the same essay over and over. And you might even still be able to enjoy a production of Othello.
Monday, October 31, 2011
Monday Miscellany--Cult TV Edition
Check it out, in what was ostensibly a straight-news story, the Times throws in an inside joke from Monty Python:
**********************************************
In an old episode of "The Simpsons," Krusty the Klown's fast food chain, Krustyburger, introduces a new sandwich, the Ribwich.
The Ribwich instantly gains a fanatical following, with legions of enthusiasts traveling across the country, following the sandwich from state to state. Finally, the caravan winds up in San Francisco, where Krusty addresses the crowd, thanks them for their support ("What a long, strange product rollout this has been!"), and then announces that Krustyburger will no longer sell the Ribwich, because the animal it was made out of has become extinct.
"The cow?!?" someone asks.
"Uh, think. . .smaller," Krusty replies.
"The pig?!?"
"Think. . .more legs."
All of which is by way of explaining why I will never--NEVER--eat a McRib.
"Debates have raged between those who love all God’s creatures and those who say the only good crow is a crow that has ceased to be." ("For This Menace, Only One Thing to Do: Ready, Aim, Fireworks!")And if you don't get the reference, then this blog is really not a good fit for you.
**********************************************
In an old episode of "The Simpsons," Krusty the Klown's fast food chain, Krustyburger, introduces a new sandwich, the Ribwich.
"The cow?!?" someone asks.
"Uh, think. . .smaller," Krusty replies.
"The pig?!?"
"Think. . .more legs."
All of which is by way of explaining why I will never--NEVER--eat a McRib.
Sunday, October 30, 2011
BIG NEWS FOR SOLIPSIST NATION!
Now I've seen everything. Well, OK, not everything. I haven't seen anyone throw a waffle at the Pope. I haven't seen a Republican candidate that I could imagine voting for without (or, hell, with) a gun to my head. But I have seen something I hadn't imagined existed: Wordplay, a blog devoted to crossword puzzle criticism.
Really? "I found Shortz' use of vertical clues pedestrian, but I give him credit for going four years without asking us to identify the Thin Man's dog."
Talk about having too much time on one's hands. This is the problem with blogs. Sure, they allow people to explore their creativity and perhaps break news stories deemed too provincial or controversial for the major news outlets. But all too often, blogs become nothing more than platforms for the autistic ramblings of cranks and crackpots, obsessed with minutiae of no interest to anyone beyond a handful of head-shaking friends and relatives. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm busy working on an essay about comma usage in the works of Cormac McCarthy.
[DIGRESSION: Just read that last sentence to WOS, and she said that Cormac McCarthy might be interesting to some people. Possibly, I said, but I doubt many people are interested in his use of commas.
[ADDITIONAL DIGRESSION: But they should be. EOAD]
[WOS said "Oh, I see what you're saying." Then, I realized that WOS thought I had said, "comma usage AND the works of Cormac McCarthy," so I apologized for my mumbling. WOS then said that I'd better make sure I pronounce it clearly in the blog. . . . Yeah, I know. EOD]
At any rate, this made me realize that there is a vast untapped reserve of material out there--all kinds of things that people encounter on a daily basis that can be itemized, analyzed, reviewed, or reviled. If people will read a daily blog about crossword puzzles, what WON'T they read a blog about? The periodic table of elements? The serial numbers of bills in my wallet? License plates? If I want to capitalize on this whole interwebs thing, I need to start branching out.
So. . . .I am thrilled to announce my FIRST second blog, or, as WOS says, the blog you've been waiting for but didn't know it: The Daily Numeral. (Yes, I know it sounds like a newspaper published on "Sesame Street," but still. . . ). Every day, I will bring my adoring fans. . . .a NUMBER!
Yeah, that's all, just a number.
(You mean, like, lottery numbers?)
No, just a number.
(I don't understand. You mean a lucky number?)
If you think it's lucky. . . .
(But--)
Oh, just click the link. And tell your friends! I'm telling you, this'll give that Huffington woman a run for her money!
By the way, it's "ASTA."
Really? "I found Shortz' use of vertical clues pedestrian, but I give him credit for going four years without asking us to identify the Thin Man's dog."
Talk about having too much time on one's hands. This is the problem with blogs. Sure, they allow people to explore their creativity and perhaps break news stories deemed too provincial or controversial for the major news outlets. But all too often, blogs become nothing more than platforms for the autistic ramblings of cranks and crackpots, obsessed with minutiae of no interest to anyone beyond a handful of head-shaking friends and relatives. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm busy working on an essay about comma usage in the works of Cormac McCarthy.
[DIGRESSION: Just read that last sentence to WOS, and she said that Cormac McCarthy might be interesting to some people. Possibly, I said, but I doubt many people are interested in his use of commas.
[ADDITIONAL DIGRESSION: But they should be. EOAD]
[WOS said "Oh, I see what you're saying." Then, I realized that WOS thought I had said, "comma usage AND the works of Cormac McCarthy," so I apologized for my mumbling. WOS then said that I'd better make sure I pronounce it clearly in the blog. . . . Yeah, I know. EOD]
At any rate, this made me realize that there is a vast untapped reserve of material out there--all kinds of things that people encounter on a daily basis that can be itemized, analyzed, reviewed, or reviled. If people will read a daily blog about crossword puzzles, what WON'T they read a blog about? The periodic table of elements? The serial numbers of bills in my wallet? License plates? If I want to capitalize on this whole interwebs thing, I need to start branching out.
So. . . .I am thrilled to announce my FIRST second blog, or, as WOS says, the blog you've been waiting for but didn't know it: The Daily Numeral. (Yes, I know it sounds like a newspaper published on "Sesame Street," but still. . . ). Every day, I will bring my adoring fans. . . .a NUMBER!
Yeah, that's all, just a number.
(You mean, like, lottery numbers?)
No, just a number.
(I don't understand. You mean a lucky number?)
If you think it's lucky. . . .
(But--)
Oh, just click the link. And tell your friends! I'm telling you, this'll give that Huffington woman a run for her money!
By the way, it's "ASTA."
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