2008
You are browsing the archive for 2008.
Intonation
This has been bothering me for a great while, and now is just endemic:Everyone? Here? Raises every statement that they are telling you? As like, a question? And then there’s the ‘thank you.’ It sounds like “Hank-KYOUU!!” from every female I’ve come across locally. This was pointed out to me by a screenwriter whose name […]
Our Favorite Snacks
I shop at a Korean supermarket. I could eat Korean food for the rest of my life. Isa’s in charge of obtaining the snacks to put in the cart, while I’m browsing the kimchi aisle. For herself, Isa gets:(I know, I know, It’s Japanese but they have a Korean counterpart, Pepero.)For John, she put this […]
Sandbagging
Craigslist has been hailed as a liberal triumph, and has put a lot of newspaper classified-ad staffers out of work. To me, it is mostly just odd. While cleaning up the yard last weekend, Micaela uncovered three 60 lb. bags of sand under a bunch of brambles. This wasn’t sandbox sand, or concrete sand, but […]
This posting is Rated R
Last week the New York State Department of Health ramped up its campaign to equate smoking in films with an R rating, taking out full-page ads in every major state newspaper containing pre-written clip-and-mail letters to major studio executives. I decided to make this the basis of a dinnertime civic discussion with my 10-year old […]
I Bet They’re eating Utz Pretzels and Charles Chips
This was the front page photo on NYTimes.com, for an article about Obama in Pennsylvania. I love this picture. Can someone please send me a cold Yuengling?
Letter Writing
I like to write letters to publications when something bothers me. Vogue published an article about female circumcision. I wrote them a strongly worded letter how I didn’t feel that what was happening to these women in Africa could be named such a thing, unless of course circumcision entails cutting off a man’s entire penis. […]
Shameless Self-Promotion
It’s no April Fools trick: I have co-co-co-authored a book, The Modern Con Man: How To Get Something For Nothing, which is out today through Bloomsbury USA. It’s filled with funny bets and pranks to pull on friends, enemies, lovers, coworkers, and total strangers, along with plenty of snarky commentary, flimflam history, and some blank […]
Jazz the Glass
Our local newspaper has a weekly, locally-written do-it-yourself home repair column. Authored by a single woman in her 30s, it has a breezy, sit-com feel, more about her travails than about offering any practical knowledge. I took little notice until recently, when the name Cabaret Voltaire registered in my peripheral vision. It was in a […]
Jack Silbert, curator