I park the car behind the house, on the grass on the far side of the driveway. I come in through the back door. I’m expected. The back door leads directly to the kitchen, and nothing’s cooking. It’s only 11:15, so nothing would be. No one greets me. The long walk from the door through the kitchen takes years. I remember last week. I remember how frail she looked, how much frailer than the week before, and the week before that, and the month before that. My foot hits the threshold of the living room. It touches...
Continue reading...Things I Drink And So Should You: Ft. Snow and the French 75
I am not a winter person. I’m not. I hate it. Worse: I‘m one of those people who constantly reminds everyone around them that I hate winter and think it’s awful. If you are among the thousands of people I have accosted with my rantings against, of all things (really, of all things), weather, I apologize. I will do it again, and soon, but I am sorry for having done it. It is regrettable. I hate winter for so many reasons: all of the reasons. It’s dark all the time. It’s cold. It’s damned treacherous on occasion....
Continue reading...Things I Drink and So Should You, The Return: Ft. the Toronto
Pop and I have been friends since before the internet, or since before a lot of people knew the internet existed. We were friends when the Patriots were a joke, when Britney Spears was not, when Bill Clinton was President, when the years started with a 1. We were young and naive, sitting in small classrooms discussing political and social issues with an eye on changing the world, on being the force behind the change. Pop and I both turned 30 this year. Age got to me first, around mid-year, and then to Pop just as the...
Continue reading...Faking It
From the Department of Blindingly Obvious Scientific Findings: A hundred-plus page report, The National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior, came out recently, documenting self-reported information about the sexual activity and behaviors of thousands of adults and teenagers. Among a myriad of results (some others are detailed here, there was this shocker: About 85 percent of men report that their partner had an orgasm at the most recent sexual event; this compares to the 64 percent of women who report having had an orgasm at their most recent sexual event. (A difference that is too large to...
Continue reading...Christine O'Donnell "not a witch"
In her new 30-second spot, Delaware Republican nominee Christine O’Donnell—who claims to have “dabbled in witchcraft“—begins by making it quite clear that she is not, in fact, a witch. But, with that black top, dark backdrop, and pale skin, it might be fair to say “She look like one?”
Continue reading...New York Times Columnist Line of the Day – 5 October 2010
If you’re one of the four-or-so frequent readers of this here blog, chances are you also occasionally check out the New York Times op-ed page. You may even know the names: Thomas “Friedman’s Just Another Word For Nothing Left to Lose” Friedman, Gail “The Colander” Collins, Nicholas “The Dark Crystal” Kristof, &c. This is a daily feature dedicated to these folks: one line that is either awesome, funny, insightful, intelligent, ridiculous, or utterly divorced from reality.] Today’s is from Roger “Life of the Party” Cohen, whose column “Change of Perish” I really, really liked. He begins: Before...
Continue reading...America's Next Top Jesus Sculptor
(Good?) News from Ohio, folks. The long wait for the replacement Jesus statue may finally be winding down, says Darlene Bishop, co-founder of the Solid Rock Church outside of Cincinnati whose “Touchdown Jesus” statue burned down in a freak (or God-sent?) lightning strike back in June. According to Bishop, the field of potential savior-portrayers has been narrowed down to 5, and a decision will likely be made sometime this month. The new portrait won’t be an exact replica of the old one. Rather than a bust, the new one will likely be a full-body sculpture, and it...
Continue reading...New York Times Columnist Line of the Day – 4 October 2010
If you’re one of the four-or-so frequent readers of this here blog, chances are you also occasionally check out the New York Times op-ed page. You may even know the names: Thomas “Friedman’s Just Another Word For Nothing Left to Lose” Friedman, Gail “The Colander” Collins, Nicholas “The Dark Crystal” Kristof, &c. This is a daily feature dedicated to these folks: one line that is either awesome, funny, insightful, intelligent, ridiculous, or utterly divorced from reality. Today’s is from Ross “Do That Thing” Douthat, who gives the president some sage Republican advice in his column “A Man...
Continue reading...The many moments of Rick Sanchez
On Friday, CNN went ahead and sacked show-host Rick Sanchez, a day after he called Jon Stewart a “bigot” and suggested that—yes, he really did—that CNN is run by Jews: “I’m telling you that everybody who runs CNN is a lot like Stewart, and a lot of people who run all the other networks are a lot like Stewart, and to imply that somehow they, the people in this country who are Jewish, are an oppressed minority? Yeah.“ Well, I’m surprised he’s lasted this long, really. His show, “Rick’s List,” wasn’t that great, and he hasn’t really...
Continue reading...Weekend Roundup
I’m reading Freedom, and it’s way better than The Corrections, which I read and promptly forgot pretty much the entire contents of. Yeah, I know, pretty novel for me to rave about Jonathan Franzen’s latest, but there you have it. It’s quite riveting. I always forget, though, when I embark on a Serious Contemporary Novel, how such books never ever have happy endings (or beginnings or middles, typically). Sometimes this bums me out. Like, there’s enough true sad stuff without having to spend one’s leisure time reading about fake sad stuff. I watched The Social Network, and...
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