Terms That Annoy Me

And now for the annoying term of the day:

"power couple"

Usage: describes a successful and often pretty obnoxious husband and wife team
("husband and wife team" is another phrase which I hate)

Power couple examples that prove this to be true: Mary Matalin and James Carville, Lynne and Dick Cheney, Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, Mei Xiang and Tian Tian

The term's high-intensity tenor is what gets me in particular. It's another one of those journalistic cliches that's often used in the context of politics or business to lend a snappy, knowing air to a piece.

Expressions in the power couple family: power lunch, business casual, power nap, heads down, suit up

Giving myself and Eavsdrop D.C. shoutout

I just remembered that I had submitted two quotes to the blog Eavesdrop DC, which charitably posts lines that D.C. residents hear in passing that are generally unintentionally funny. Mine were posted a little while ago, but I forgot to check back until now. Well, here they are:

But the grass would be so whiny!

Guy to Woman friend in line at Murky Coffee in Clarendon: The floor here is so chic. They must have been like, how can we make this floor look chic? Let's strip off all of the tile. It's so emo. Hey, you know what I want? Emo grass. That stuff cuts itself.

posted by EavesdropDC @ 11:51 AM 1 comments

Can’t get enough of your love, metro

Metrorail conductor with sensual Barry White-esque voice pulls his blue line train into Pentagon: "Pentagon."

Metrorail employee standing on platform: "Hey, you're sounding good."

Conductor: "Thanks, man. Keep it light."

--Pentagon Metro station

posted by EavesdropDC @ 9:57 AM 0 comments

A hodgepodge

Lately, I have been wanting in subjects to blog about for various reasons, and because I cannot think of anything coherent to discuss but am smarting about a few things, I'll just jump around.

I finally finished Adam Langer's The Washington Story. It has nothing to do with Washington State or Washington, D.C., (I get enough of D.C. from living here and have little desire to read a novel set here at the moment). Rather, it is set during the time that Harold Washington was mayor of Chicago, from 1982 until 1987. I went back and forth on my opinion of this book throughout it. It is definitely one of the more personal books I've read, considering that the main character worked on her high school newspaper, is a young liberal-minded person, is reform Jewish, and lives in Rogers Park, a neighborhood in Chicago. While I never lived in Rogers Park, it is the nearest Chicago neighborhood to where I did grow up, and I know it fairly well. Other parts of Chicago play a role in the book too, particularly the near South side, which was apparently just beginning to become the fashionable neighborhood it is today in the late 80s.

The Washington Story became a little too zany at times, working off the impulse that many writers seem to have of linking all of a story's characters and their fates with one another. (Maybe such a tendency should be called the Crash syndrome, after the gimmicky Oscar-winner of last year, not to say The Washington Story was inspired by that glib movie). Nonetheless, I found the writing genuine and the sense of transience that Langer conveys about human desires and dreams to ring very true. Now that I'm through with it though, I need a new novel and hopefully one that is at least as compelling. Any suggestions?

In other news, my co-worker's blog has been put on the map by none other than the Food Network's Hungry Detective, a cop named Chris Cognac who sniffs around American cities for hearty meals. The Gourmet Piggy rips into the Food Network and in the process becomes the target of Cognac. Cognac's comments are unintentionally some of the most hilarious things ever ("I have a hot cuban wife and 2 kids that love me, so there..."). I love how the web connects people so easily--could this hilarity ever have ensued without the glorious "series of tubes" we (er..Ted Stevens) call the Internet?

Ben Stein Congratulates Himself

Recently, conservative commentator Ben Stein--perhaps most famous as the host of "Win Ben Stein's Money," and for countless "Celebrity Jeopardy" apperances, as well as stints with the government--penned an article about capitalsim, whose conclusion I agree with, but whose substance is completely disturbing in its unaware self-congratulation. My very wise and clever father offers an excellent take on Stein's "The Hard Rain that's Falling on Capitalism". First, here are excerpts of the article:

A FEW evenings ago, my wife and I were standing in the kitchen of our home in Rancho Mirage, Calif., feeding our voracious hounds, when a song came on the radio. It goes, “If only you believe in miracles, baby, so would I...”

Suddenly a flood of thoughts came into my head. I put on my swim trunks, and even though it was 42 degreesoutside, I got into my superheated pool and swam, looking up at the stars, and this is what I thought:

My whole life is a miracle so far. I live in glorious houses — tar-paper shacks by hedge fund standards, but plenty for me. I have a great American-made car. Above all, I have the most wonderful wife and the handsomest son on the planet.

My parents had a great, super life. They went from obscurity and lower-middle-class status in the Great Depression to fame and fortune in the postwar period. Their good fate was attributable mostly to their genius and hard work, but also to two culprits usually criticized in the media: President Richard M. Nixon, who made my father famous and powerful, and variable annuities, which made him and my mom well-to-do.

Thanks to Nixon’s appointing Pop as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers and to TIAA-CREF selling Mom and Pop those annuities, their latter decades were happy and comfy. (In the interest of full disclosure, I am the honorary spokesman for the National Retirement Planning Coalition, one of whose many sponsors is the National Association for Variable Annuities.)

All of the miracles of our lives are because of America and our ancestors’ lucky, brilliant decision to move here from the desperation of Eastern Europe. All of it is thanks to the brave men and women who fought and died and bled on World War II battlefields like Anzio and Tarawa to keep us free, and to the
framers of the Constitution.

But it’s also thanks to capitalism. I realized this as I swam back and forth in my pool looking up at the stars and the contrails. Under capitalism, my grandparents, my parents and I could be paid the value of what we produced.

Their (our) income and position in life were (are) a function of what value we could add, not of the status of poor stateless Jews that we would have been in Europe.

Capitalism values people as individuals according to contract, as we lawyers and economists learn, not according to the status of our birth. This in itself is a miracle.

This miracle has been vibrant in the lives of hundreds of millions of Americans who have gone from nothing to something, thanks to the dynamics of capitalism. They have seen their pay rise and they have been able to convert their sweat and toil and creativity into capital by saving and investing in the stock market and becoming capitalists themselves — myself. [...]

But, as I swam and watched the private jets’ lights as they glided right above my head into Palm Springs International Airport, I had a chilling thought: in capitalism, the most fundamental building block is trust. [...]

When I see what the top dogs at all too many corporations are now doing to that trust, I feel queasy. Outrageous— yes, obscene — pay. Greedy backdating of stock options, which in my opinion is straight-up theft. Managers buying assets from their trustors, the stockholders, at pennies on the dollar, then forestalling competing bids with lockups and insane breakup fees. [...]

Empires come and go. Economic systems come and go. There is no heavenly guarantee that capitalism will last forever as we know it. [...]

If that trust disappears — if the system is no longer a system for the ordinary citizen but only for the tough guys— how much longer can the miracle last?

Now, here's Ronald Meyer's take:

Since I have time, I thought I'd write my editorial thoughts on the attached op-ed, sitting duck though it be.

Fresh from overindulging on munchies and California wine with his wife, Uncle Tzvi* Ben Stein counts his blessing while lapping his pool. The pool is heated, so he can indulge himself at the expense of atmospheric CO2 levels, though it is 42 degrees in his yard. His house in Rancho Mirage is a tar-paper shack compared to the houses of those whose taste matters. It seems that Ben's wife let him into the pool too soon after eating, because he isn't getting enough perfusion to the old noggin as he experiences rapture in the pool.

Not only is Uncle Tzvi's life a miracle, but so were his parents', thanks to Nixon having made Dad chairman of the council of economic advisers and thanks to the TIAA-CREF variable annuities that his parents had no choice but to buy as academics.

There are so many miracles, especially capitalism, which "paid [his forbears] the value of what they produced." Further miracle, "capitalism values people as individuals according to contract... not according to the status of our birth."

But Ben cramps up as he realizes that Capitalism™--the board game is not fun to play when others at the table are cheaters, such as those greedy CEO's.

As Ben seems to be suffering an attack of Republiopia (the ability to see only one side of an argument, and an in ill-informed side at that), here are a few mental status queries to test if Ben's frontal lobes can compensate for his defective visual cortex.

1. Could you turn down the heat on the outdoor pool, Ben, and swim at the local J? That should provide a few carbon credits to offset those cranked out by your Caddy.

2. That sagacious President who set your Dad up as chairman--could his and his vice-president's tax evasion violations have helped to set a bad example for later government and corporate leaders? Hmmmm? How about his Dick's disregard for any rules: could they have been bad for our political culture?

3. OK, so capitalism esteemed all of those Jewish immigrants. What was it that allowed only small numbers of them to enter large swaths of institutions of higher education or corporations because of Jewish quotas? And why did all of those silly lady garment workers and other unionists not at the time see how fairly valued they were? Perhaps the thermostat on their backyard pools was set too low, and their brains had frozen.

4. What percentage of Americans are lucky enough to be able to participate in TIAA-CREF, Uncle Tzvi, and how many are stuck with what they thought were their corporate pensions that the capitalists have devalued or stolen by declaring bankruptcy? How many are thankful that your capitalists' boob--er I mean boy--George was not able to convert the social security benefits into a capitalist's high-fee feeding frenzy?

5. Say, Ben, TIAA-CREF beneficiaries pay pretty low fees and their investments follow the performance of market indexes. Why are so many Americans fooled or forced into buying worse performance for much higher fees from the likes of anarchists such as Merrill-Lynch, Smith-Barney, Dreyfuss, etc? Oops, did I say "anarchists?" I guess they are actually capitalists, aren't they?

6. Finally, Ben, how many laps can you go with your head so far up your butt? Now that is a miracle.
_________________________
* An Uncle
Tzvi is a Jewish Uncle Tom.

Mediocrity's Poster Child

I always kind of mentally roll my eyes when someone suggests that there should be an option on a ballot to vote for none of the listed candidates, but when the friendly driver of the Vamoose bus I took from New York back to D.C. last night gave us riders a choice of four movies to watch on the second leg of the trip, I saw where voting no confidence can seem to be the only way. Indeed, as we boarded the bus after a rest stop in Delaware, we were offered the following non-options:

• Big Mama's House 2
• National Lampoon's Vegas Vacation
• Just Friends
• Rush Hour 2

I wanted to laugh out loud or maybe cry at the wasted two hours I was about to endure. I voted for Just Friends, because it was the only movie of which I hadn't heard. Big mistake. First of all, as their names were flashed on screen, I realized I didn't know any of the actors, which is fine if a movie is trying to aspire to something but a really bad sign if it is merely aiming to be a romantic comedy. If a bunch of D-list actors are involved, you have yourself a D-list romantic comedy. I take that back: I recognized one name. Amy Smart. I somehow know who she is: I had seen her in that bad TV movie series "The Seventies" several years back as well as the movie Rat Race, which John rightly proclaims as having the worst movie ending of all time. The name of the lead man--Ryan Reynolds--was not particularly familiar to me though. Ryan Reynolds, Ryan Reynolds...sounds like I've heard the name perhaps but not instantly recognizable. Yeah, this movie's going to be bad, I thought.

Indeed, the opening scene presents an overweight man (fat suit, of course) sitting in a house in New Jersey in 1995. Fat suits never bode well for anything, especially comedy. The scene was kind of funny though because the heavy man, who turns out to be a high school senior about to profess his love to his best friend, is singing along to the song "I Swear" by All-4-One. I think my own memories of an overnight camp counselor who used to play "I Swear" every night right before our cabin went to bed made me laugh in recognition and appreication of this sad portrayal of being a teen in the 90s. It was all downhill from there, however, with the predictable effort at winning the viewer's sympathy through portraying the mean treatment of our fat protagonist at the hands of others paradoxically coupled with the script's own derision of him (he eats a lot, he is too sensitive, he cries, etc.). Heavy man then vows he will get revenge on all of the people who laughed at him in high school by being very successful. Okay, fine, that's a good enough story, even if it's been done a lot.

Ten years later, he is a Hollywood agent who can get any girl he wants. Fat suit gone, I recognize this man to be Ryan Reynolds, and I now realize I do know who Ryan Reynolds is. He's one of those people who you've seen in a few movies but is easily forgettable, and for good reason. Indeed, I feel a pang of longing for an earlier time when I could not put the name Ryan Reynolds to a face. There's nothing distinctive or interesting about him. He's not attractive, he's not a good actor, and, this lead part in Just Friends is probably the best role he's capable of. He was in "Two Guys, a Girl, and a Pizza Place." He's a poor man's Paul Walker. [I later recalled that he had a small part in the movie Dick, which I do enjoy, though no thanks to Ryan Reynolds (his part could have been played by a lot of people).] Here are a few actors I equate with Ryan Reynolds, in terms of sheer badness: Jerry O'Connell, Matthew Lawrence, and Seann William Scott. Here's a guy whose biggest aspiration is probably to be in a sequel to Old School. Ryan Reynolds is the Nickelback of movies.

As good as I thought the Vamoose bus ride was, I just have to wonder why they have such an awful stock of movies (the movie that was shown first was RV). And yet, I must also say, there is something elegant about the mediocrity personified by Ryan Reynolds, because if you ever want to illustrate the thorough unremarkable, uninspired, forgettable nature of something, just say two words: Ryan Reynolds.

Top Ten Cool Things of the Year (in the U.S.)

This wasn't such a great year. The situation in Iraq deteriorated even more, and yet OJ Simpson's absurd book seemed to generate more outrage among some--namely the over employed entertainment media. So, what was great about 2006? Not a whole lot. Doing my best to remember what on earth happened this year, I'll try to extract the few cool things that did happen, in no particular order:

1. Stephen Colbert at the Annual White House Correspondents Dinner: In May, Colbert helped draw attention to an event that usually serves as a bad inside joke for a few hundred people by humorously critcizing the president's famous ego. He mocked Bush's supposed steely resolve--"Events can change; this man's beliefs never will"--cutting it down to the publicity stunt it is:

I stand by this man. I stand by this man because he stands for things. Not only for things, he stands on things. Things like aircraft carriers, and rubble, and recently flooded city squares. And that sends a strong message: that no matter what happens to America, she will always rebound—with the most powerfully staged photo ops in the world.

Not only was Colbert's bit itself hilarious, but it became a watershed media event. YouTube, 2006's ubiquitous website, proved especially useful in the days after the event, allowing people to access what really went down at the dinner rather than taking the mainstream media's word for it. Their word was often non-existent, because many outlets initially determined the event not newsworthy--including The New York Times and The Chicago Tribune--despite the ramifications of the event: one of the country's most clever comedians had pointedly skewered one of the most insulated of modern presidents, who was sitting just a few feet away. It should be no surprise then that the second target of Colbert's routine was the lackadaisical media--many in attendance at the dinner--who have so often failed to vigorously question George W. Bush about his agenda:

Over the last five years, you people were so good—over tax cuts, WMD intelligence, the effect of global warming. We Americans didn't want to know, and you had the courtesy not to try to find out. ... And then you write, 'Oh, they're just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.' First of all, that is a terrible metaphor. This administration is not sinking. This administration is soaring. If anything, they are rearranging the deck chairs on the Hindenburg!

The event was remarkable for fusing politics and entertainment for constructive good, for being accessibile to a mass audience, and for serving as a jumping off point for debate about the usefulness of the media. The Colbert performance at the White House Correspondents' Dinner is perhaps the emblematic event of a year of consumer participation in newsmaking.

2. The Democratic Victory in the 2006 Congressional Elections: One can easily imagine the media narrative that would have persisted had the Republicans maintained control of Congress after the November 2006 elections: that Americans were satisfied with the direction of the War in Iraq despite visible reservations, that the economy wasn't bad enough to require a renewed focus on growing inequity--like the recent cuts in student aid and the failure to increase the minimum wage--and that, in general, Americans were satisfied with the Republican social agenda. A wisdom that had prevailed for years changed on November 7.

Up against a gerrymandered Congress, the Democrats still won big in the House. They also managed to eke out victory in the Senate, knocking out some formidable incumbents like George Allen of Virginia and Conrad Burns of Montana. Furthermore, they won with great help from the so-called "liberal bloggers," whose fundraising, organizing, and message generating did justice to the term netroots. The Democrats in 2006 were not the Democrats of 1996, who relied upon the contributions of moneyed coffers and directed most of their energies to retaining the presidency rather than making inroads in Congress.

The new Congress is focusing on a different course in Iraq--though it is still up to the intransigent President to assume one--and on economic issues that were ignored under one-party rule. Plus, the 2006 election was also a victory against apathy, with the number of voters up in the usually less participatory midterm elections. Especially encouraging: 24 percent of Americans 18-30 voted, the largest percentage in 20 years.

3. Harvard, then Princeton and UVA, End Early Decision: In September, Harvard and then Princeton and the University of Virginia moved to end the early admission option, deciding that it favored savvier applicants from more advantaged backgrounds. Although other top schools do not yet see the need to eliminate early decision, Harvard at least brought to attention the need for universities to be attentive to the disparate sophistication of prospective students with the college application process. Although some schools, like my Alma mater Northwestern, have made some reasonable points on why early decision still suits them, it is good for universities to publicly discuss institutional inequities. Hopefully, Harvard and its peers will figure out how better to assist both low income and middle class students with the costs of their education.

4. TV Programming Continues to Improve: Although there is still drek on television--there always will be--some TV programming continues to delight. While I think some of the critics favorite shows, particularly "Weeds" and "Scrubs" are overrated, "The Office," "The Colbert Report," "The Daily Show," and HBO programming continue to shine. "The Office" was rightfully awarded an Emmy for its fantastic ability to find humor in the mundane and for the genuine performances put forth by its cast. After a reportedly bumpy first year, "The Office" figured out how to adeptly adapt the British version to reflect the nature of the American workplace in year two. (Now, there is a French and German version of "The Office," showing that the workplace is a universal source of humor, though not necessarily the same humor). Office romances, career dissatisfaction, narrow-mindedness, and the American work ethic are depicted realistically and hilariously. To think, 10 years ago, the only good things going on network TV were "Frasier," "Friends" (meh) and "Seinfeld," and the sitcom (shudder) reigned supreme. Hopefully, the cool event of 2007 will be that cable companies lose their regional monopolies and prices decrease (I wish).

5. Some Bad People Went to Prison: This year, Jack Abramoff and Jeffrey Skilling, two men who enjoyed far too much power in the 1990s, were convicted to formidable prison terms. Abramoff was convicted of conspiracy to bribe a public official, defrauding a client, and tax evasion, and was sentenced to the minimum of 10-years, in anticipation that he will cooperate with investigations of other corruption cases. He and his lobbying firm contributed to the excess of Republican-controlled Washington. Abramoff was intimately involved with disgraced former majority leader Tom DeLay, who his lobbying firm treated to trips to the North Mariana Islands, and Abramoff himself secretly funded the trips of other Republican Representatives. Abramoff's corruption is too extensive to document here, but concurrent to his demise went the careers of a lot of disgraceful people, including DeLay, Randall "Duke" Cunningham, and Robert Ney.

Jeff Skilling, former CEO of the defunct Enron Corporation might be the person most single-handedly responsible for the California electricity crisis of 2000-2001, in which the state's recently deregulated electricty grid allowed for Enron employees to manipulate the energy markets in there, causing prices to spike and supply to be unevenly distributed. Too bad Skilling can't provide redress for all of the pension plans that were decimated by the Enron collapse as well as for the electricty bills and costs incurred by the state of California during the energy crisis.

6. Immigrant Rallies Across the Nation: Often defined by their demagogic opposition, tens of thousands of immigrants and those in favor of immigrant interests rallied across the nation in April, drawing attention to their contributions and advertising their presence to Congress, which was then considering immigration reform. For a group that fills mostly the least desirable jobs in the country, immigrants get a lot of flack, despite that the United States is a nation of immigrants. A typical complaint against illegal immigrants is that they use up public services, but wouldn't pushing for legalization and thereby getting them to pay into the system be a good way to prevent this? Of course, this would have to be accompanied by pay approximating a living wage...

7. FDA Approves HPV Vaccine and Plan B OTC: The current administration has not wholly succeeded in stymieing progress of its agencies. The FDA approved the Human papillomavirus vaccine and over the counter (OTC) Plan B contraception. Though religious zealots will probably tell you otherwise, there is never anything wrong with vaccinating against a sexually transmitted disease. The idea that it encourages unprotected sex or sex in general is like saying that a flu vaccine encourages not washing one's hands. The approval of Plan B also generated controversy, but it will make an unpleasant process easier to handle for many people.

8. An Inconvenient Truth Brings More Attention to Global Warming: In a year of erratic temperatures and a hostile climate, Al Gore used his influence and celebrity for good, bringing attention to the force behind climate fluctuations. It is amazing that the existence of global warming needs such a forceful defense, even though it is not in scientific dispute, but that is why Gore's contribution was so constructive. Though of course not as watchable as a movie like Casino Royale, Gore does an admirable job of meticulously deconstructing the arguments against global warming and detailing those for it. If parts of our country are submerged under water in the not too distant future, Al Gore can (somberly) say I told you so.

9. Google Buys YouTube: In an acquisition that didn't reek of evil, the search engine giant bought out the user-generated content giant. Not only does YouTube's searchable video content model seem commensurate with Google's model, but Google appears to be an encouraging parent corporation, managing to maintain the integrity and while innovating its other acquisitions, like this here software I'm using. (Meanwhile, the telecom market is consolidated by another dispiriting merger, as AT&T's absorption of Bell South Corp. is approved by the FCC).

10. Bob Woodward's State of Denial Released: The tipping point of popular opinion against George W. Bush must surely have been reached when Bob Woodward--establishment journalist and former Bush administration cheerleader--released State of Denial: Bush at War, Part III. Woodward's book seemed to cement the view that the War in Iraq was a mistake, and that its execution was poorly managed at best, providing an indictment of all of the key actors in the administration who consistently lied and misled over the years to save face.

This was a pretty difficult list to come up with, because this was a pretty difficult year, but I know I'm forgetting things. Please comment with any additional suggestions or any recommended subtractions.

The Borat debate reemerges

It being the time when film critics offer their top ten list of movies from the last year, the debate over whether the Borat movie is funny, manipulative, racist, or just plain dumb rages on. I still submit that it is highly overrated and lacks most of the humor of the television show. I have not yet seen a satisfactory rejoinder on why it is funny for Borat to wreck some harmless man's antiques or what exactly Baron Cohen is skewering about Southern gentility by re-emerging from the bathroom with a bag of feces at a dinner party. Many of the episodes in Borat seem trying, as if Baron Cohen could not get his subjects to be sufficiently ignorant, coarse, or racist without him acting obnoxious. Even then, they don't always come off badly: the befuddled shop antique owner seems helpless, the members of the Southern dining group understandably end the dinner early. The thesis of the movie--that Americans are an ignorant lot--seems to have been established before the movie was shot. On this score, Jonathan Rosenbaum of The Chicago Reader makes a good point:

I keep reading that this movie is a sly (or not so sly) critique of racism and intolerance based on ignorance, but Sacha Baron Cohen's apparent semi-ignorant intolerance of the Kazakhs is almost always factored out of the discussion. It's pretty easy to paint them as a pack of pathetic anti-Semites if you know nothing about them, but isn't that the kind of glibness Borat is supposedly attacking?

To me, the interesting aspect of the television episodes of "Borat" is the inhibitions revealed even in the most bigoted of his interview subjects. When Borat is driving with a blatant anti-Semite, the man goes off on Jews in a frighteningly absurd rant, going so far as to sanction the act of rounding up Jews. He then stops himself to say that we don't do that in this country. Oftentimes, when Borat starts baiting people with questions that could incense their latent racism, he receives variations on that same response: that we do not say those things in this country. Borat's bluntness is often met with cautious reluctance to disclose true beliefs, as when he gets a Republican primary candidate to hesitantly acknowledge that the logic of his beliefs mean that Jews will go to hell. In "Borat," Baron Cohen reveals a nation where political correctness has been internalized, and this may not be such a bad thing. Borat the film appears to be getting accolades for being "offensive," but that's no feat if the clever humor of the television show is lacking.

Conversations I've had with people about Golden Oreo Cookies

More conversations than you might think can be had about Nabisco's new type of Oreo Cookie, the Golden Oreo. I have instigated many. The tasty vanilla "creme filling" is better sandwiched between two rich, vanilla crackers than the standard chocolate, in my opinion. To some, this is Oreo blasphemy, but I have never much liked original Oreos (Oreoes?). The possibilities for discussion on these points are endless. Thus, I bring you, Conversations I have Had with People About Golden Oreo Cookies:

Setting: Cafeteria at work
Me: Man, I love these cookies.
Co-worker: Yeah, you say that everyday.
Me: This is my favorite moment of the day.

Setting: the Rosslyn Safeway
Store clerk: (looking down at the apples and Golden Oreo Cookies I just put on the conveyor belt) A healthy snack.
Me: Yeah, I love those things.
Store clerk: No, I didn't like them. They just weren't right. They're too original.
Me: Oh, really? Yeah, I just love the vanilla.
Store clerk: I had to give them to my mom. I had bought the Mint Oreos, Halloween Oreos, Regular Oreos, and those ones, and my cousins stayed over and ate them all except the Golden Oreos.
Me: Oh really? You should make them buy you more.
Store clerk: Well, they went back to New York. So all I had left was the Golden Oreos, so I gave them to my mom. She loved them.

See? The source of endless conversation.

Top ten Thanksgiving table conversations of 2006

...And the clichés that accompanied them:

(1) the recall of O.J. Simpson's book and interview
"I wonder how those jurors feel now, acquitting a cold-blooded murderer."
"I'm glad the media finally had some sense."
"That man will do anything to make a buck."
"The poor Brown and Goldman families."

(2) the Michael Richards racist outburst
"Kramer really is crazy!"
"The media and the politically correct police are at it again, making Kramer look bad."
"He should have apologized for being an awful stand up comic while he was at it!"

(3) Wii versus PS3
"Boy, the lines are going to be long tomorrow, huh!"
"Mom, can I get a PS3/Wii/Xbox" ad infinitum
(4) College football
"It really should be Michigan versus Ohio this year in the NCAA football championship; it's too bad they're both in the Big Ten."
"Boy [fill in the blank team] sucks this year."

(5) Professional football
Nothing interesting

(6) Traveling
"It was a zoo at the airport this year!"
"I hate flying, what with the security checkpoints and the long lines."
"It was a zoo on the expressway this year!"
"I hate driving, what with the tolls and traffic."

(7) Thanksgiving food and how it makes you full
"Boy, I'm not going to be able to move after this tasty meal."
"This is the best stuffing I've ever had."
"You've outdone yourself with the pie."
"Well, I know what I'm going to be having for dinner for the next week [pause for effect] turkey!"
"Time to loosen the belt buckle a notch or two."

(8) The weather
"You missed some great weather we had last week, Aunt Bertha."
"Boy, I guess I chose the wrong week to come to Chicago. It sure is cold here!"
"Why, I think this is the most beautiful Thanksgiving we've ever had."

(9) The new Congressional majority
something that inevitably makes things awkward between guests of opposing political loyalties

(10) What the younger dinner guests are going to do after high school/college/work/graduate school
"So, you have your colleges picked out yet?"
"So, you know what you're going to do after college?"
"You're an English major: what are you planning on doing with that?"

Please feel free to comment with other typical Thanksgiving dinner conversations.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hilarious Thanksgiving video from zefrank's The Show!

Roundup of the Ridiculous

I have never been filled with such glee.

This video is a brilliant (albeit totally unintentional) illustration of Corporate America.

Bank of America sings U2's "One"

I used to think that TV commericals that cheesed up classic rock songs were made by cynical people, but now I'm willing to believe these people are for real.

Secondly, I love Professor John Orman:

The political party formed by U.S. Sen. Joseph Lieberman after he lost the Democratic primary in August has a new chairman - and it's not Lieberman.

However, according to the bylaws adopted by its new chairman, Lieberman critic and Fairfield University professor John Orman, the senator is an eligible party candidate.

According to bylaws established by Orman, anyone whose last name is Lieberman may seek the party's nomination - or any critic of the senator.

Orman seized control of the Connecticut for Lieberman Party this week after registering as its sole member and electing himself as chairman.

Orman has triggered a process that will force Lieberman and state elections officials to decide the future of a party created solely to return the senator to Washington.

HA

The Long-Awaited Borat Movie

Rotten Tomatoes is showing that Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Glorious Benefit of Kazakhstan has an average of 100% positive reviews. Well, after a busy week at work and a three week preparation for the movie, consisting of watching seasons 1 and 2 of "Da Ali G Show" on DVD, I was ready to fully enjoy the Borat movie. That it was getting almost universally great buzz was highly encouraging, especially because there are so few quality movies inspired by television characters, and therefore critics are wary of being swiftly disappointed by this genre (duds include It's Pat and Stuart Saves his Family, and the only successful TV-to-big screen transition that I can think of right now is Wayne's World).

Unfortunately, Borat was underwhelming, and I am not saying that based on any contrarian agenda of my own. Like I said, I wanted to love Borat. I love Sacha Baron Cohen and want to believe that this young, funny, attractive, Jewish man, embodies sheer brilliance. And yet, Borat just wasn't that funny. I admit, I laughed myself to tears at the most memorable scene in the movie, whose contents I will not give away--anyone who sees the movie will know exactly the scene--but that was partially out of sheer astonishment. Otherwise, I think this reviewer puts it best:

It's offensively funny in places but it can't sustain itself for a feature length running time and it's not nearly as clever or as fun as it should be.

...A handful of these situations are hilarious, but the problem of the movie is that it's not structured as a satire that asks us to laugh at ourselves by seeing our inconsistencies through the eyes of an outsider. It asks us to laugh at the outsider by seeing him as a contemptible boob.

The satire that "asks us to laugh at ourselves by seeing our inconsistencies through the eyes of an outsider" is what makes the Borat installment on "Da Ali G Show" so brilliant. One of my favorite parts of a Borat segement is when someone starts explaining to him how we do things in America, and when Borat's American interviewees end up advocating suppression that should supposedly be an exclusive provenance of Borat's Kazakhstan--all while declaring the U.S. #1 because of our freedoms--we are reminded that the best comedy comes from reality, even if it must be provoked a bit.

This is why the sheer bufoonery that drives much of the Borat movie struck me as the dumbing down of the Borat concept by a studio that believed it needed to broaden its film-going audience by trading the clever for the obnoxious. Or maybe I am going too easy on Sacha Baron Cohen when I put the disappointment of the movie at the studio's feet. Either way, Borat could have been better.

The Hater and its Number One Target, Zach Braff

I have found my long lost twin, and she writes the A.V. Club's Hater blog. Granted, she's a little more in the know about pop culture than I, but her hilarious send-ups of celebrities--namely, the walking pet peeve, Zach Braff--are, as James Lipton would say (or maybe Will Ferrell's James Lipton would say) a delight! I have to thank John for showing me the light. It's common for people to be snarky about celebrities, but "fighting the good fight"--as one of the commenter's put it--against the eminently popular Braff is a cut above the average celebrity snark blog. Zach Braff's emo-quirky schtick is our generation's one-trick pony, less discernible than campy gimmicks of the past like Gary Coleman's "What you' talkin' 'bout Willis?" or Dwayne from "What's Happenin'"'s "Hey, hey, hey!" but still without originality or skill. Don't fall for the quirkiness! Don't doo it! And, check out this great clip, the quintessential Braff movie.

Noise Pollution

This weekend, I paid a visit to Philadelphia. I took a bus through one of the bus companies that serves Chinatowns of various East Coast cities, namely, Boston, Philadelphia, D.C., and New York (and probably others). Any of these bus companies are referred to as "the Chinatown Bus," though there must be half a dozen to a dozen in D.C. alone. I used the New Century Travel bus line because other than a company called Apex, it is the only Chinatown bus that goes straight from D.C. to Philadelphia.

I was pleasantly surprised with the ease and comfort of the ride except for one major annoyance, and it had nothing to do with the bus, the driver, or the heavy traffic (which, on a Friday afternoon outbound from D.C. is to be expected). Sure, there was a somewhat random stop outside a gas station and truck plaza in Baltimore on the way back at New Century's makeshift bus station out there (i.e. a parking lot), but that took five minutes.

Again, the only real problem that I encountered had nothing to do with the bus itself but rather with the two people sitting behind me: both college-aged, one male, one female. They were basically making small talk, which is annoying enough in an of itself. It's one thing to engage in a little empty conversation when you meet someone in passing, but I have never understood those people who make it their sole purpose on a flight, train ride, or bus ride, to engage their seatmate in inane conversation. A few pleasntries are fine, you know, "where are you from?" "what brings you to [fill in the blank city]?" Full-fledged conversations are another animal. To me, the great thing about traveling is that you have a few hours to yourself to just read and listen to music. How often in our day-to-day routine are we afforded such luxury? How can people squander that precious time by talking to someone about how bad their commute is, etc?

That is exactly what the two people behind me chose to do, for three and a half hours. They talked about college, they talked about "funny" movies like 40 Year Old Virgin, they talked about TV shows. Why do I know what they were talking about? Because when someone told the girl how to project back when she was younger, she took it to heart. She spoke loud, and she laughed even louder. Plus, her laugh was unpleasant. It was the point on the laugh spectrum where a cackle meets a guffaw. She laughed more frequently than an SNL audience at an old Eddie Murphy skit. And yet, nothing she was laughing at was truly funny. I would have taken a baby crying over that sound.

In view of this experience, my question is, am I allowed to ask this person to be quiet? I sat their stewing in the fact that had I been in another society--oh, say Paris--this disruptive conversation would be looked down upon entirely. The conversationalists' fellow passengers would stare them down to a point where they became mute out of fear. All I could so was turn up my music and try to fall asleep, pondering why our country must be one of loud talkers, of people walking down the streets speaking their cell phone conversations into the air. We may be protective of our personal space, but we are disturbingly open about our supposedly personal conversations. Worst of all, some of us are loud. I love the D.C. Metro right now, because it has definitions of bad train etiquette, such as blocking the left side of the escalator and talking loudly on a cell phone in the car. I hope the loud people will take it to heart, but I'm sure they won't. They're too busy yelling into their phones.

One little breach of etiquette isn't a big deal, whether it be what I refer to as noise pollution or escalator path obstruction, and I suppose I should calm down a little, but I guess I start writhing with anger at such ignorance because of the principle behind it: inconsiderate people. People who do not care how they inconvenience others. This is an ever-growing trend in our country, and little measures like signs in the subway are a good first step. A good second step would be a general valuing of those periods of time we have to ourselves, whether it be on a speeding Chinatown bus or a crowded train.

The Breakup: The End of an Era

So while I'm reading a thoroughly titillating book--John Updike's Couples, as you can see on my sidebar--my life is as humdrum as the book is exciting. Well, not true, but just for fun, I'd like to compare my recent breakup, with my longtime bank, Chase Bank (formerly Bank One) to the break up of one of the book's many adulterous couples. There are actually a lot of parallels:

• Protagonist contractor Piet Hamena breaks it off with dentist's wife, Georgene Thorne, over a phone call at work.
• Protagonist account-holder Elaine Meyer breaks it off with a Chase Bank account representative over a phone call at home.

• Piet loses interest in Georgene because he begins a relationship with another woman, Elizabeth "Foxy" Whitman: Foxy is younger, new to town, and--the kicker--she's pregnant!
• I lose interest in Chase Bank because I have begun a banking relationship in Washington, D.C.: Bank of America has banking centers and ATMs in both Chicago and D.C., and one could say BoA is "pregnant" with ever-more banking centers, as it also has several abroad and claims it is still expanding (Chase, you were just too slow to expand. Banking centers in West Virginia? Sorry, not close enough).

• Piet's relationship with Foxy is known of by everyone in town except his wife, Angela, and her husband, Ken.
• My relationship with Bank of America was known by everyone except Chase--that is, everyone who cared enough to listen to my riveting story about me switching banks because I had moved.

• When Piet essentially breaks it off with Georgene, she becomes desperate, begging him to just come over and visit her for 15 minutes. Nonetheless, what she offers isn't enough to sustain a dying affair.
• When I end it with Chase, they become desperate, offering me free banking and a free account without minimum balance requirements. Nonetheless, what they offer isn't enough--my Bank of America account already has free (or "free"--they are getting my money, after all!) banking and no minimum balance requirements with direct deposit.

So in a time when our relationships with the service sector and the financial sector are treated as delicate and as personal as our relationships with actual people, it becomes hard to sever ties with an old brand or old institution, even if that institution itself isn't very old and in fact is a very impersonal worldwide chain.

At least we can always call our bank if we need late night company or just want to check up on an account. After all, the customer call centers are open at all hours of the day and night, nowadays.

You're on Notice!

Pretty cool, eh? My own personal On Notice board. Make your own!

Deciphering the Tune-etic Code

I don't know how or why, but there are certain types of songs I think each of us like that span the genres to some degree but retain certain qualities. It is for this reason that I searched Napster persistently after I first heard a song called "Walk on By" played on a rural Michigan oldies station in the summer of 2000 and for this reason that my brother--who is all too familiar with my unfortunate habit of playing songs I've latched onto repetiviely for a couple of days--knew exactly which song I would like on the newest Flaming Lips CD ("The Sound of Failure," if you're interested). Dionne Warwick and the Flaming Lips do not seem similar, and I have such little knowledge of music that I could not begin to ascertain a connection between them, but in spite of this, I have a sense that there is something that connects them.

This sense is what drives a website called Pandora Internet Radio, which merely asks that you type in a treasured song or singer and goes to work finding songs whose elements are similar. A search of Marvin Gaye yielded me "These Eyes" by the Spinners, which I enjoyed. Pandora calls this process the music genome project but admits that it may not have understood exactly what you like about your original song or singer choice by allowing you to declare your dislike for a song they offer you. Like decoding a human genome, we are limited in understanding how the pieces define the whole, where in the human genome, the pieces are protein and in the music genome, they are things such as meandering melodic phrasing and acoustic sonority. If I hadn't quit piano in the sixth grade, I could probably tell you what that all means.

Still, experimenting with Pandora has allowed me to get a hold on what traits I find appealing in a song. I seem to have a penchant for orchestral arranging, major key tonality and a subtle use of vocal harmony. Alice Cooper I am not.

Any Two Schmucks

So, this post and its possible futility might well negate the seriousness I hoped to impart with the prior entry, but I was just thinking about how in life, people have talking points, and often times, these are talking points that they have unknowingly and unintentionally co-opted from others. After talking to a friend about a wedding, I thought about how the usual reaction among my age group when friends are getting married is a sense that we are getting older, that it's hard to believe friends are getting married, etc. This reaction is viral, so that when one is about 21, s/he is bound to express it. I too have reflexively agreed with this sentiment in the past, but tonight I thought about this milestone in a new light: Any pair of schmucks can get married. There are people who get married for the right reasons and people who get married for the wrong reasons, and considering we are told that half of marriages end in divorce, I wouldn't use weddings among my age group as a barometer of having Figured Life Out. I'm not saying I have it figured out but thinking that a wedding or a mortgage or an investment portfolio is a sign of growing up is as foolish as thinking that adults don't make mistakes. So if I am talking with friends about marriage, I herein vow to advance my talking point that any two schmucks can get married, unless of course I run the risk of sounding like a total kiljoy, in which case I'll just play along.

Stephen Colbert: making news in spite of the MSM

By suggestion, I am writing about Stephen Colbert's bit at the White House correspondents dinner. The way everything has played out--Colbert's great routine, the chilly reception on the part of the dinner attendees, the lack of print accorded to what was certainly the most newsworthy moment at a usually unexciting event, and the subsequent outcry by bloggers and many in the alternate media--point to the mainstream media (or MSM)'s decreasing relevancy.

Of course, they still have the largest megaphone, so to speak, which is free use of our nation's airwaves and mass-circulating, well-recognized newspapers, but as this group continuously clams up when faced with giving attention to events like the Colbert routine (not to mention a lot of troubling societal problems like stagnant wages, decreased social mobility, etc.), others are stepping in. The MSM is unsurprisingly treating them as crazy, unrelenting, out of the mainstream, and so on. They've been trying to write off bloggers forever, but in so doing, they're writing off the actions of average citizens. I don't know what's more elitist than that.

Take for instance how PBS's News Hour reported an instance in January when the ombudsman of the Washington Post shut down the comments page on the paper's website after posters wrote her that she had misrepresented the nature of former lobbyist Jack Abramoff's donations:

The Jack Abramoff scandal is one of the most explosive stories in politics these days but when Washington Post ombudsman Deborah Howell recently wrote about the paper's coverage of this story, little did she know that she was setting off a firestorm of her own.
...She was then deluged with close to 1,000 comments, most critical of her suggestion that both parties were complicit in the scandal.
...But the online onslaught didn't stop. [Emphasis added].

Note the words used to describe the commenters and their actions. They're not treated as concerned citizens who would like to see a large newspaper rectify its mis-reporting but rather are treated as a "deluge."

So back to Colbert. Again, the MSM reveals how uninterested--or perhaps just scared--they are to report strong criticisms of the Bush Administration, even if these criticisms are cloaked in humor. Again, the MSM demonstrates their irrelevancy. As a Time magazine television critic said recently, "What anyone fails to get who said Colbert bombed because he didn't win over the room is: the room no longer matters. Not the way it used to." Furthermore, "Colbert's roasting of the president this weekend got nearly 70,000 posts on blogs according to the blog-tracking Web site Technorati -- the most of any subject Thursday" according to an NBC correspondent. As a result, the MSM has had to acknowledge that this is a story.

Now, the talking point among the MSM has become that Colbert's skit was "not funny," which is not only blatantly wrong, but it also doesn't make the event any less newsworthy. (If the news got reported on based on their funiness, the D.C. press corps would be out of jobs). As Consortiumnews.com points out about the "not funny" line:

Milbank’s assessment was shared by many journalists at the dinner, a reaction that can partly be explained by the pressure Washington reporters have long felt from well-organized right-wing media-attack groups to give Bush and other conservatives the benefit of every doubt. [See Consortiumnews.com's "The Bush Rule of Journalism" or Robert Parry's Secrecy & Privilege.]

Consortium continues:

Even before the Colbert controversy, the White House Correspondents’ Association annual dinner and similar press-politician hobnobbing have been cringing examples of unethical journalistic behavior.

The American people count on the news media to act as their eyes and ears, as watchdogs on the government, not lap dogs wagging tails and licking the faces of administration officials. Whatever value these dinners might once have had – as an opportunity for reporters to get to know government sources in a more casual atmosphere – has long passed.

Since the mid-1980s, the dinners have become competitions among the news organizations to attract the biggest Hollywood celebrities or infamous characters from the latest national scandal. Combined with lavish parties sponsored by free-spending outlets like Vanity Fair or Bloomberg News, the dinners have become all about the buzz.

Plus, while these self-indulgent affairs might seem fairly harmless in normal political times, they are more objectionable when American troops are dying overseas and the Executive Branch is asserting its right to trample constitutional rights, including First Amendment protections for journalists.

Remember Bush's supposedly comic routine from a couple of years ago where he was searching under his desk for WMDs? The sight of an insulated White House press corps sitting in that banquet room watching and laughing a skit that basically trivialized our military's presence in Iraq was pretty sickening. Colbert is just tugging the veil off of a discomfiting relationship between the MSM and the current president, and it's not surprising that they're both mad at him for it.

Daily musings

Today I had some free time and walked out to the lake on the far eastern end of our campus. I'm not the first nor will I be the last to muse about our peaceful natural setting and its ability to transport one to a different plane than is the norm. Life seems fleeting staring out at a vast expanse that appears unending, and it can be liberating to realize this.

Now I am sitting in the library where students are working on various assignments and checking e-mail. For some reason, my eyes are wandering over to the note on my Diet Code Red bottle that says "For Best Taste Drink by Date on Bottle." Maybe none of this is that big a deal or maybe I'm just hopped up on Code Red.