# 01 May 2003, 04:58PM GMT+5:30: Just started reading The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon. Excellent so far. It's a rather-hyped mystery novel whose first-person protagonist is a 15-year-old boy with Asperger's syndrome (I think). Man, he feels familiar.
# 02 May 2003, 12:32AM: Math, an Indian Word For Monastery:
Finished the Haddon book. Yep, certainly something I'll be lending to Zack, Seth, and Leonard.
I watched many episodes of the PBS math variety show Square One TV and its subshow Mathnet (a Dragnet parody). One reason I sometimes wear a tie: Kate Monday wore a tie. Monday, a.k.a. Beverly Leech, has been more visible onscreen, post-Sq1TV, than has her colleague (Joe Howard). However, now I want to see DysFunktional Family even more because he's in it. Hm!
To top it all off: IMDB says that if you liked Mathnet, you'll probably like Babylon 5.
# 02 May 2003, 07:59AM GMT+5:30: Second Thoughts Aren't Doublethink: On second thought, maybe modern sci-fi already contains an abundance of the sort of thinking exemplified in The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, and my friends, who read much sci-fi, will not read The Curious Incident and think, "Oh wow! This person thinks like me!" Instead, perhaps, they will read it and think, "Why is this person going on and on about these obvious things? I could have written this, why am I reading it?"
# 02 May 2003, 08:09AM: Hurry Up & Wait:
Sometime today, I believe, Salon will call or email and tell me whether I have the job. I haven't felt so anticipatory in a year. My fingernails are too short to chew, and work is too boring to distract me effectively. My mind keeps wandering to the possibilities of living and working in San Francisco, and then I scold myself for jumping the gun. After all, the job listing is still up.
Things that distract me: Not distracting enough.
# 02 May 2003, 11:22AM: "basically it's like one of those hip hop DJ battles where they scratch with their butt or their elbow":
Months ago, I met Steven Schultz at Cody's and immediately discovered a rapport with him in which I recommend books and he compliments me. Recently he visited Korea for the purpose of getting cute Korean plush toys. I encourage you to read his travelogue. The pictures are quite good (he's the one with pink hair) and the writing amuses me.
Insadong is full of schoolgirls giggling at me, trying to tell me in broken English that my backpack is open, then running off laughing.
... here's the mountain that the park is named after. Maybe. I mean, even if it's not Pukan, it's still pretty good for a mountain, isn't it? right? think you could be a better mountain? huh? well, shut up then!
We go down Insadong, which is a big arts-and-crafts street. I buy the 'good luck on your exams' octopus. Why is the octopus the designated patron of exams? If you've got enough time to read this, why don't YOU call up the embassy and ask 'em?? Also, it's cold so we buy a big fuzzy green blanket at the pizza store. Sure, where else?
I fear that my writing isn't nearly as concentrated.
# 02 May 2003, 05:33PM: No, "Power of Babel" Is Not A Typo:
Interpretive spelling in a purchase order I just received:
# 02 May 2003, 11:41PM GMT+5:30: Still No Word From Salon: That pretty much defined my day. Steve's travelogue, a very nice evening with Adam, and some Gordon Korman (The Zucchini Warriors and Losing Joe's Place) distracted me. Man, I really gotta fill up my weekend. I'm probably going to get a fish and go to some BATS Improv.
# 03 May 2003, 10:04AM: On Booze:
Brendan makes what I would call a passionate, convincing defense of his teetotaling, except he's on the offensive, or at least not being defensive.
The things I actually hate in life are deliberate blindness and stupidity. They never accomplish anything worthwhile. They never make anyone happy in the long run. And living in Kentucky (or college, or America, or the world), I've seen so much of it that sometimes it makes me want to throw up.
I never want any part of that to be a part of me. My definition of maturity is not complete open- and empty-mindedness, but the unflinching refusal to be blind or stupid. It's considering the needs of others before your own, and choosing to act in a way that takes into account the consequences of your actions.
I'm not there yet: thus the struggle. It's me finding the parts of myself that won't listen and trying to dig them out with whatever tools I have, and it's my choice to never turn to chemicals to let me out of the job....
He reminds me of all the reasons I don't like to drink alcohol, and makes me ashamed of the reasons that I do.
...People think alcohol makes them more interesting because it is essentially a self-centering device. All drugs are. And all drugs make you less interesting to everyone but yourself....
# 03 May 2003, 10:17AM: So does Eminem count as punk? Or did he ever?
# 03 May 2003, 12:01PM: Go Fish?:
I thought I could get a fish at the East Bay Vivarium, where Jeana got stuff for her snake, because I thought vaguely "it's a 'Vivarium', word root is life, ergo they will have everything that lives." But no, the Vivarium is a herpetocentric pet store, so I'll be visiting Lucky Goldfish in Oakland or Albany Aquarium instead.
I found out about both of those from UCB Parents Advice about Pets, part of a tremendous wealth of experience and wisdom heretofore unknown to me. Casual carpool pick-up spots, Thinking about Becoming a Teacher, Where and How to Meet other Parents, My Daughter's Girly Party Embarrasses Me, how to have kids yet stay carless, name change info, people pee when they laugh hard, even the words to Brahms's Lullaby.
So cool.
# 05 May 2003, 08:23AM: As In A Traffic Jam, I Live In An Eternal Waiting Now Without Past Or Future:
I distracted myself more than adequately over the weekend. Terrific food at Bacheeso's and Trio, a viewing of not-so-great improv and a second viewing of the excellent This Is Spinal Tap, and much hanging out with Leonard and an evening with Steven Schultz.
Last night, I suppose, the acid in my worried stomach ate through to my brain and caused me to dream about losing my purse on a BART train and a job counteroffer from Cody's.
# 05 May 2003, 08:48AM: This is how Kremlinologists must have felt: Okay, I no longer see the "Salon is hiring" link on the front page, even though the job listing is still up. I'm going to wait calmly for contact from them sometime today, really I will.
# 06 May 2003, 08:11AM:
The "Salon is hiring!" page has changed to a listing for a completely different position, so the job I've applied for is filled, perhaps by me. I talked to my Salon contact yesterday and heard that he's going to send me an offer letter, but I'm going to wait on saying YAY! until I actually receive it.
KQED radio just now: "....That traffic check brought to you by Domino's. If you like clouds, we've got some now..." I thought the "clouds" bit was a continuing pitch for Domino's, not a weather update, and so I wondered what Domino's food product was cloudlike. Mashed potatoes? Cheese topping?
# 06 May 2003, 08:46AM: Disorder of the Phoenix:
Man Finds New Harry Potter Novel In The Middle Of A Meadow:
A walker found two copies of the new Harry Potter novel dumped in a field, The Sun tabloid reported Tuesday.
It said two unbound copies of J.K. Rowling's latest offering, "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix," which will hit the bookstores on June 21, were discovered in eastern England close to Clays Ltd., a firm contracted to print hundreds of thousands of copies.
The 40-year-old man who found them -- he was not identified -- handed over the books to the newspaper, The Sun said.
They are now stashed in a safe at its headquarters in Wapping, east London while The Sun makes arrangements to return them to publishers Bloomsbury, the newspaper said.
I have so many questions. First of all, why did the guy give them to The Sun, of all entities? Why not, say, keep them for himself (finder's rights), or give them to the police or publisher himself, or give them to his favorite child? Also, did he even flip through the book when he had a chance?
What was going through the guy's head when he saw the books?
How did the book get into that field? Maybe it did something wrong and was buried alive. Or those copies were defective and blew out of the dumpster. Or a disgruntled employee hopefully placed them there deliberately, wishing for a leak.
Finally: how hard would it be to crack that safe?
May 6, 2003 | LONDON (AP) --
# 06 May 2003, 09:01AM:
Steve Robertson's fiancée, Alice, now has a weblog. "Wow. Getting into the fabulous world of weblogs - I feel like I should have taken some oath or something. However, now Sumana can think that I'm cool, so that's better than an oath, anyway." If there's one hard thing I've learned in the topsy-turvy world of weblogs, it's that having a weblog does not make one more or less cool. Good thing Alice was already great. She dates Steve so I don't have to!
Alice is studying law and working towards a career in helping gay and lesbian couples adopt. Go Alice! Right now she's in New York City, but soon (insha'Allah and the creek don't rise) she'll transfer to Boalt Hall Law School here in Berkeley, and that way she and Steve will both be around here even after my sister leaves for grad school. Yes, that's the important thing, replacing my sister.
I saw Steve last night for the first time in half a year. I'm quite glad we got to catch up. We had dinner at Hua Hin (?), a restaurant forever doomed to obscurity as "That great Thai place at Oxford and Bancroft with the elephant in front." If they had any sense of branding they'd change their name to Elephant Thai.
# 06 May 2003, 09:04AM: Our Dumb Decade:
The Onion produced Our
Dumb Century, a book of fake newspapers satirizing
twentieth-century US history. Every once in a while a headline
heralds that some sensationalized court case is "The Trial Of The
Century." The Lindbergh kidnapping, the Rosenbergs, the O.J. Simpson
trial, and so on get almost identical places in this
running gag.
Looks like another one is coming up: Scott Peterson will soon go
on trial, because his wife Laci and their unborn child died late last
year and he may have killed them. Local mass media have followed the
story closely. While I feel the same disgust and sadness with the
death of Laci Peterson as I feel with any human death, I wish I
weren't hearing so much about it. I dislike media attention that
forces the mask of O.J. Simpson upon Scott Peterson.
Some part of me is glad that domestic abuse is getting some play on
the news, but I also want Scott Peterson to get a fair trial, and I don't like turning Laci Peterson into a Christ figure.
# 06 May 2003, 11:50AM GMT+5:30: Beyond Extreme!:
One of our distributors maintains a web page that alerts booksellers to hot new titles about to hit the market. One such title: Lost Souls of the Dead and Dying by J. Berkman.
Publisher Marketing: A nomadic group of vampires has come to Atlanta to find a new wife and daughter for their leader, a tortured creature who traded his soul for immortality and power. Tom Resnick, a successful conservative talk-show host, thinks he understands life, and that he is in complete control of his destiny-until his wife and daughter become the vampires' next target. Hell itself protects these creatures, and Tom refuses to believe they exist. If not for the intervention of a mysterious vampire hunter who's been chasing the monsters for over twenty years, Tom and his family would already by lost. But even with the stranger's help, Tom must quickly expand his view of reality, beyond logic and reason, to have any chance at protecting his family. To save his wife and daughter may cost Tom his own soul, but first he must admit he has one.
Will the pent-up demand for this book fill my store with Anne-Rice-haters champing at the bit?
# 06 May 2003, 01:43PM: It's now been about six weeks since Salam Pax, a Baghdad weblogger, last posted.
# 06 May 2003, 06:29PM: It's Up - It's Good!:
Just got my offer letter.
I am pleased to offer you a position with Salon...
Oddly enough, I've found my new job, my current job, and my apartment and boyfriend without Craigslist.
Dear Sumana,
Officially: YAY!
# 06 May 2003, 11:17PM:
In two weeks, about a year after my graduation day, I'll start a new job as a Salon.com Premium support tech. I think it'll suit me really well. Salon Premium: Spread The Meme-ium!
Getting this job has reminded me of starting to date Leonard -- "I've read your work casually for so long, and now you're a fundamental part of my life!" I still haven't completely gotten over working "behind the scenes" at Cody's; I wonder how long it'll take me to get over working at Salon.
# 07 May 2003, 10:15AM:
Leonard called me at work to tell me to read Dear Raed. Salam Pax is okay! Thank God, he's okay! He's alive! Just thinking of it brings tears to my eyes.
Update (10:50 am): I called Leonard back to relay the equally important info that Forrest Whitaker, the host of the new Twilight Zone show on UPN, was walking around on Telegraph. It looked like he and his entourage were scouting shooting locations on Telegraph. He didn't scowl at all that I could see. Man, he was the only good thing about Phone Booth.
# 08 May 2003, 12:55PM:
If J. Bradford DeLong is going to say that I have
The only other interesting thing I recall saying about discussion forums: the people you want to keep from commenting are people with more time on their hands than is good for them.
DeLong actually does talk the way he writes, throwing around words like "marginal." This is no surprise to those who have read A Brief Dialogue on Behavioral Economics or his conversations with his children.
Now I've been cited by two of the most famous Berkeley bloggers: Professor DeLong and Eve of InPassing. I can move to SF happy.
smart views on why comments sections of weblogs (and everything else collective on the internet) tend to degenerate rapidly to USENET levels of chaos and unpleasantness without constant very heavy lifting by formal or informal moderators
then I should tell you that half of what I said to him was a summary and citation of Leonard's Tar Pit From Hell model.when you add a public discussion forum to your site you are placing your site on a big slab of plexiglass which floats around on the Tar Pit From Hell. As long as no one actually uses the discussion forum, you are safe. But the more people pile on to use the discussion forum, the deeper your site sinks into the Tar Pit From Hell. There are various measures you can take to slow your descent into the Tar Pit From Hell, but none of them deal with the fundamental problem, which is the fact that your site is sinking into a [expletive] tar pit.
# 08 May 2003, 11:36PM: Kernels of Funny Bits:
First: Gollum in an ad for CapitolOne credit cards. "What has it got in its wallet?"
And second: will my new job have me pay a Salon Insurance Premium?
# 09 May 2003, 07:48AM: The Opposite of "Remember You Are Mortal": I walked along Blake Street and saw a woman in full graduation regalia. I shouted, "Congratulations!" She responded, fist raised, "Perseverance!"
# 09 May 2003, 12:03PM:
Better sites than mine have already noted The Eater of Meaning, but I
especially adore what it does to pages that were
already nonsense. Update: Favorite phrases scammed from
meaning-eaten zombie pages: These remind me of Alexei.
Also, I could be "Summons Harmony."
# 09 May 2003, 11:48PM:
A conversation with SteveS yields the catchphrase "No Context. No Hype."
I anticipate less persistence for this meme than I do for "case-diving," the
phrase I made up for finding lost books at the bottom of cases of shelves.
# 10 May 2003, 12:00AM:
I got to introduce the personable Diana Abu-Jaber, author of Crescent (an Arab-American love/food
novel), tonight at Cody's. Yesterday I saw Douglas Rushkoff say such
things as "I don't believe in 'homeland'" and "And they wonder why the best minds of my generation
are going to Buddhism." Abu-Jaber, when asked about her writing process,
replied while thinking it over, "Yeah...I don't really have any kind of a work ethic...[pause]...I'd kind of like to get one...."
I haven't actually attended that many author events during my stint
at Cody's, so I had forgotten how electric a good Q&A can be.
Some authors perform very well and the entertainment rivals any
you could buy.
# 10 May 2003, 01:40PM: Silly News, All Flavors:
My spiteful, stubborn tendencies put me right in Pike's camp. It's his house and he should be able to add a stoop. Intellectually I know the law wouldn't support me on the "if you don't like the way it looks then don't look at it" argument, but it's mighty appealing.
A Salon Premium fanfare for the uncommon schemer:
The answer is yes. All this and more are yours, thanks to one man: Rob.
Eminem won't let Weird Al parody the "Lose Yourself" video. Yes, Eminem, as long as you avoid the ominous embrace of Weird Al Yankovic, the artistic community will take you seriously. Did the careers of Coolio, Michael Jackson, TLC, Nirvana, Billy Ray Cyrus, and Madonna death-spiral because of Weird Al covers? Do listeners hear the parodies and think, "The work of New Kids On the Block is absurd! Weird Al, you've opened my eyes!"
Rob Cesternino has single-handedly saved "Survivor" and made all of my dreams of Aguirre-style manipulation, power struggles and delusions of grandeur come true. "But is there paranoia and hand-wringing?" you're wondering. "Is there relentless scheming and ruthless one-upmanship? Are there unpredictable, ever shifting alliances and petty grievances and enraged, spitty outbursts?" You have to stop yourself from smiling now. "I know it's too much to ask, but ... are there tearful recriminations?"
The Potter plot thickens, and the book's not out for another five weeks! Somehow shady employees of the publisher and a Sun sting operation play into this.
# 12 May 2003, 08:26AM: Neat!:
[NEVER MIND; see update.] "Position Available: Interpreter, must be fluent in Klingon." Portland, Oregon. "There are some cases where we've had mental health patients where this was all they would speak." There has got to be some unemployed dotcommer who can take this job and turn it into a heartwarming turnaround story.
Update: I done got caught by an urban legend/completely misinterpreted story. Details: as a lark, the agency put "Klingon" on the list of languages for which an interpreter could be paid by the county if necessary. That's all. Thanks to BoingBoing for the update.
# 12 May 2003, 08:46AM: The Found Weekend:
A very full weekend. Steve Schultz and I had food and watched the X-Men sequel (enjoyable, but I preferred the multiple allegories of the first film) and generally conversed for about five hours. I got to introduce him to Mondo Gelato at Shattuck and Center, where he found happiness in pistachio ice cream, and Cafe Colucci, a.k.a. "that great Ethiopian place at Alcatraz and Telegraph." Maybe we could call it "Alcatel Ethiopian."
Did you know that the lobby of the United Artists cinema at Shattuck and Kittredge holds a Dance Dance Revolution machine? I attracted a small crowd, perhaps because the theatergoers had never seen someone use one before.
Then I brought aid and comfort to Leonard and Kevin, who spent much of the weekend shut up in Kevin's house fixing problems for work. Man, they were frazzled. I hope they don't have to go through that too often.
Sunday afternoon I did laundry and rewarded myself with a visit to La Val's Pizzeria at Telegraph and Durant. No, I don't like La Val's pizza, but I couldn't resist the DDR machine. Great fun, and a dollar for four songs, which I find eminently reasonable. Michael is so extremely better than me, which makes sense, since the machine is labeled "DANCE DANCE REVOLUTION EXTREME." Also since he's disgustingly good at everything he tries.
I wonder why it's called La Val's. What is a Val? Furthermore, why doesn't DDR bring out the competitive nihilism I experience in so many other skill-based games? Scrabble, for example, I dislike playing against someone much better than me. Possible answers: I don't feel I'm playing against, but with other DDR players. I learned DDR later in life. The physical, right-or-wrong nature of DDR appeals to me.
I got home and showered in time to welcome Adam, who asked me to give his thesis a look-see. Looks solid. Today Adam turns in his senior thesis in linguistics and takes his last final (French). I look forward to reading the finished paper, and hope to whoop it up with him to celebrate his graduation!
And today begins my last full week of work at Cody's. Premature nostalgia, here I come!
# 13 May 2003, 05:44PM: Observations:
I see no Google text ads for the keyword "soothing".
A customer recently asked for "McLure's book, The Medium Is the Massage." He's not the first. I mix up the author's name all the time, but why is that misspelling so common? Reminds me of a friend's frequent misspelling of "college" as "collage."
Oh, wait, it's a real book. Whoops.
# 13 May 2003, 06:48PM: HYPE!: Some entity or other, I hear, will put on a free showing of the fun Seattle grunge history documentary Hype! tomorrow evening (Wednesday 14 May) at the United Artists theatre in Berkeley. I enjoyed it when I saw it five years ago, and it's free.
# 14 May 2003, 12:25PM: Quiet Pulse:
How's it going?
"Going great. Playing music. Doesn't get any better. I thought you were going to ask me about the war or something."
"Working hard. Children are grown. Pretty good shape. In a forward manner, not a backward manner."
"OK. That's the question? OK."
"Ruthless is how the hell it's going. Lost the keys to my house twice in the last week. I'm falling apart. I'm the most unhealthy person in Baltimore, and that's a direct quote."
"How's it going? That's it? I don't know how's it going. [To her boyfriend] Hey, honey, how's it going?"
There's more.
# 14 May 2003, 04:17PM: Google Surprises: Googling "city" (results): the first actual city is Kansas City.
# 16 May 2003, 08:39AM: Action-Packed Tuna: Yesterday I had two or three social occasions. Zed and I talked at lunch, Leonard came by after work, and a bunch of celebrants invaded the Swiss enclave of Fondue Fred's in Adam-graduating merriment. Only minor property damage occurred. Now I have a hunk of paperwork to do for Salon -- health plan decisions, blah -- but today's my last day in School & Corporate Sales, and this weekend I get to go to parties and meet one of Leonard's mentors. Monday's my last day on the sales floor. As it began, so shall it end.
# 16 May 2003, 01:40PM: Nisha Sharma Is My Hero: I am so proud of this gal! She got on the phone and busted her fiance for shaking down her dad for more dowry -- on the wedding day. Props especially to the relevant law enforcement for taking the issue seriously! Via ambiguous.
# 19 May 2003, 07:01AM: Workaround: How do you reference Britney Spears if you don't know how to spell her name? One spam refers to her as "B. Spears."
# 19 May 2003, 07:18AM: Finally, a Label: A Slate writer slams Bill McKibben's Enough, and in passing mentions the Copernican Principle: You Are Not Special. "More precisely, the principle says that, as a matter of statistical necessity, most observers must be 'typical.' So, if a given set of observers believe in a scenario that makes them highly atypical, they are almost certainly mistaken." Useful.
# 19 May 2003, 07:23AM: My Own Private Diaspora: Leonard is considering moving elsewhere in SF. I'm considering moving to SF in the early fall. Nandini's heading to DC for grad school. Sarah might move further into Oakland, Adam and SteveR to New York, SteveS to Japan, Zack maybe-maybe-maybe Montreal, the list goes on. ("And now you live in New York. You imbecile.") I'm quite glad I saw many of these friends this weekend, because who knows?
# 19 May 2003, 09:38PM: Farewell to All That:
My last day. Suddenly hot, as though to impress upon me that May is for flowering and breaking up and moving on and graduating and leaving behind. I tidied shelves and helped customers choose gifts. I'll work a Saturday once in a while, for a while, but now Cody's is like my old apartments on Dwight and Shattuck and 63rd; I wonder what it will be like to go in as a customer now. The nostalgia I've built up from fully living in this town for five years oppresses me as much as the heat.
San Francisco will be colder.
# 19 May 2003, 09:40PM: Performances I want to attend:
Klezmer at the Freight & Salvage and recommended (by an improvisateur) improv.
Also, Cody's Books author appearances in June will include Ursula K. Le Guin!
# 20 May 2003, 06:06AM: You Knew But Not So Eloquently:
An analysis of the genius of the first *NSYNC album.
Probably the most shameless and impressive gambit this album plays is presenting a whopping THREE consecutive songs expressing breakup regret. Again, the genius lies in the fact that a young listener has probably had more experience with the confusion and crushed self-esteem of being dumped than with the above mentioned undying love or cherishing. The fantasy of the tortured dumper, then, is a gratifying defense-mechanism for the dumpee. The existence of this fantasy is evident in that almost any girl who has experienced a painful breakup will be greeted with a barrage of sentiments from her friends stating, essentially "Someday he'll be sorry when he realizes what he lost." The prevalence of this fantasy is most bizarre simply because it is, with very few exceptions, never, ever true. While it is highly likely that he's playing video games, contemplating what his favorite brand of macaroni and cheese is, telling his friends what a psycho you were or giddily planning his next conquest, the odds that he's crying into his pillow wishing he could turn back the hands of time and right all the wrongs is almost infinitessimal. *NSYNC, however, boldly goes there...THREE TIMES.......
Fantasy #3: He'll be sorry he left you, girl.
Read the comments for the author's praise of New Kids On the Block for exemplifying the form and for tips on boy band parodies.
# 20 May 2003, 06:24AM: America's Moving Adventure: IF this job lasts, as I believe it will, then sometime in the early fall I'll move to San Francisco. Leonard doesn't plan to move his homestead, so now I have solid criteria for my new place: within walking distance of public transit to work (preferably BART), within walking distance of Leonard's place, at least a bedroom to myself, not too much more than $800 per month. Heck, if something doesn't work out I can always find another job and/or move back to the East Bay, or somewhere entirely different for that matter.
# 20 May 2003, 09:50PM: The most overpowering feeling of the day came when I was reading a Salon article about Buffy As Anthem, and I thought, I can't believe I'm reading Salon at Salon. It feels like I'm violating some natural law about how an solid cannot fit inside a smaller solid in 3-D space.
# 21 May 2003, 09:21PM: Today's Amazing Moments:
Seeing Scott Rosenberg for like the twentieth time and feeling the urge to tell him "Ohmigod I read your blog."
Sitting in on an editorial meeting, and then, just now, looking at the front page and seeing those decisions made flesh.
# 21 May 2003, 09:22PM: To quote Leonard from years ago: "My current task is reading O'Reilly's Java Servlet Programming. The guy who wrote the book is sitting at the desk across from mine. This is weird."
# 21 May 2003, 09:46PM: Brunching Shuttlecocks is over. Waaah, but at least the archives are still up.
# 22 May 2003, 11:48AM: Liar!: Jayson Blair, for those of you who don't know, was a reporter for the New York Times. He lied, a lot. He plagiarized and made up stories. For months. And now he's been fired and the NYT is investigating itself and lots of people are being interviewed. Blair is getting interviews, and has a book deal -- nonfiction. I can't stand that. I don't care what he has to say, because he's a damned liar.
# 22 May 2003, 06:10PM: SHarihareswara@fangirl.dork: Scott Rosenberg just gave me popcorn!
# 23 May 2003, 04:31PM: Famous People Update: David Talbot just asked me, "How's it going?"
# 24 May 2003, 06:56PM: George F. Will Can Take A Walk:
Nandini's housemate Laura raves about Cook's Illustrated magazine, but only today did I learn of the magazine's affiliation with America's Test Kitchen, which is a cross between Underwriters Laboratories and PepsiCo R&D. I saw an episode of the America's Test Kitchen TV show. And I saw a wondrous man. Christopher Kimball.
(He's the guy in the middle of the team photo. The team looks as though it's about to beat me up, but never you mind. Another dour/mysterious shot of him here.)
He is dreamy! Goofy and funny and scientific and sort of Bill Nye-y. I'm not the only one who thinks so. He tells us that process is more than recipes, and throw away your classic French sauces, and five facts about allspice, and he still finds time to write possibly sappy books and pursue the one-armed man.
Leonard has just arrived with a plate of cookies. Rawr rawr. Thanks, Leonard, and thanks to Christopher "Hottie!" Kimball.
# 27 May 2003, 06:48AM: Quickies:
Paul Ford gives us more pirate jokes and a New York Times Magazine parody.
A very sweet InPassing moment:
Jon Carroll strikes at the heart of Law and Order ("Why is it necessary to rip a novel from the headlines; couldn't it just be photocopied?") and possibly signs off with a They Might be Giants quote.
Robot Woman sighting! "I applaud your accuracy, but plead with you to take out whatever was in that damn bag, which was surely something to do with your fuel supply, or perhaps to repair one of your ambulatory motors, lest you handicap some other unfortunate soul."
Leonard felt a little earthquake yesterday. "We move the earth for you."
Coming up, reviews of a bunch of movies and books, and my obsession with Google Answers.
"Happy graduation!"
"Is this a joke? I don't get it."
"They were out of flowers at Safeway. Happy graduation!"
--A guy holding a beautifully wrapped bouquet of broccoli, and the girl he presented it to, at the Greek Theatre.
# 27 May 2003, 12:01PM: Mondeblues: The other day someone asked me, "Have you seen The Matrix Reloaded?" and I thought he said "The Magic Freeloaded."
# 28 May 2003, 07:14AM: Useful Information:
Only one of the ten most dangerous intersections in the US lives anywhere near me. It's in Sacramento.
Yes, I can buy an AC Transit pass at Andronico's.
# 28 May 2003, 10:07AM: Glimpses of Sadness: I entered the elevator and hit my button. The other passenger hit his button and, looking at my selection, asked if I was going to Salon. I affirmed. He said that I was lucky because it was probably a much better place to work than Macy's, where he was going. I futilely wished him a good day as he exited.
# 28 May 2003, 10:26AM: "Hypocrisy in people is not a vice, particularly when the alternative is to be sincerely horrible":
D-Squared Digest hits the mark yet again:
....Contrast with rightwing politics. As I've posted earlier, the single most sensible thing said in political philosophy in the twentieth century was JK Galbraith's aphorism that the quest of conservative thought throughout the ages has been "the search for a higher moral justification for selfishness". Some rightwingers are not hypocrites because they admit that their basic moral principle is "what I have, I keep". Some rightwingers are hypocrites because they pretend that "what I have, I keep" is always and everywhere the best way to express a general unparticularised love for all sentient things. Then there are the tricky cases where the rightwingers happen to be on the right side because we haven't yet discovered a better form of social organisation than private property for solving several important classes of optimisation problem. But at base, the test of someone's politics is simple; if their political aim is to advance all of humanity, they're on our side, while if they have an overriding constraint that the current owners of property must always be satisfied first, they're playing for the opposition. Hypocrisy doesn't really enter into the equation with rightwing politics; you don't (or shouldn't) get any extra points for being sincere about being selfish.....
# 29 May 2003, 03:11PM:
I can't help it. I must tell you about Aston Martin or whatever his name is.
Kutcher finds life in L.A. a goof. Give your keys to a stranger for valet parking?! "Back where I come from, you park our own damn cars," Kutcher commands from the screen. "I could park an F150"-buddy, that's a truck-"in the crack of your ass." Like Martin, Kutcher can flirt with the camera, solo, and seem to delight himself. Punk'd is his own creation and fiefdom; it's a nifty out-of-towner's reproof to Hollywood. "People go out to parties and try and like set trends," he says, as if making a discovery. "You're not cool because you're on the red carpet. I'm going to set a trend. The trend of you getting punk'd."
It makes me laugh all the time!
# 29 May 2003, 05:15PM: The Intersection of With-It and True:
"They really didn't care one way or the other. It absolutely did not matter to them at all."
Update: Link corrected.
# 29 May 2003, 10:09PM: I Expound, Leonard Distills:
"What if Data was gay?"
"They'd do an episode about it! It would be called Data's Gay!"
# 30 May 2003, 03:51PM: Hail To the Grief:
Leonard made up a Salon Premium theme song last night and I've been humming it ever since. It's quite catchy. It goes like this:
But if you're not a subscriber then in the middle of the song there's a Lexus jingle.
Salon Premium
Salon Premium
If you need help call Sumana at Salon Premium
# 31 May 2003, 11:51AM: No, I Don't Own A TV, But Humor Me Anyway:
Not only did I miss "Ultimate MUSCLE" this morning, I also don't think I'll see "America's Test Kitchen" because KQED has some Nick Stellino marathon going. Public TV/radio fund drives remind me that Salon's model, with DayPasses and seven-day trials and whatnot, is much less aggravating for the paying customer, because on PBS even paid members have to hear the guilt trip.
In other Saturday morning TV news, Cam, the underused geeky sysadmin for the Power Rangers Ninja Storm, went back in time to retrieve a powerful amulet to save the universe. Now he's a Green Samurai Ranger. Oh, and he's the son of the Power Rangers' sensei, who at some point tranformed from human into a guinea pig. The current story arc is as close as Power Rangers will probably come to having an entire spinoff show centering on Cam, so I'm a happy camper.
You can hire me through Changeset Consulting.
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