Pedants on the Prowl: Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid ... of Laughing Out Loud

I was reading a wine column by Eric Asimov of the New York Times (his sister is a Friend of the Blog)and foolishly blundered into the comments:

7 comments so far...

*
1.
August 1st,
2008
8:07 pm

To Mr. Asimov, whose email address is not shown:
You write “It was the kind of wine you could sniff all evening without ever drinking, so compelling were the aromas …”. Be careful about falling into the trap of accepting trendy but incorrect meanings for words. Compelling is an adjective related to the verb compel that means “to drive or urge forcefully or irresistibly ” [Merriam-Webster]. Thus, it relates to action. It doesn’t mean “wonderful”or “delightful”. It means “having the quality to cause action”. A robber’s gun would compel you to hand over money. It is compelling. In that sense, if the aroma were compelling, one would definitely be driven to do something such as taste the wine.

— Posted by Lance
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2.
August 2nd,
2008
2:04 am

Lance, that’s nonsense. I’ve definitely experienced wines that had compelling aromas. They caused me to salivate, reflect, and return again and again to the glass.

— Posted by Rajiv
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3.
August 2nd,
2008
2:47 am

LANCE,

INDEED AS A VERB:

Compel enters in 1380

[a. OF. compeller and compellir (14th c. in Godef.) to compel, ad. L. compell-{ebreve}re f. com- together + pell-{ebreve}re to drive.]

1. trans. To urge irresistibly, to constrain, oblige, force: a. a person to do a thing (the usual const.).

TO YOUR SPECIFIC ADJECTIVE USAGE COMMENT, COMPELLING ENTERS IN 1901 AS:

com{sm}pelling, ppl. a.

f. as prec. + -ING2.]

a. That compels: see the verb.

b. Of a person, his words, writings, etc.: irresistible; demanding attention, respect, etc.

I think Eric has a solid command of his English usage.

ac.

— Posted by ac
*
4.
August 2nd,
2008
7:54 am

To Lance, whose email is also not shown. To continue the off-topic nature of your didactic response, please put periods inside of quotations unless providing an in-text citation after the sentence. Typically, colons and semicolons are the only punctuation that always reside outside of the quotation mark.

— Posted by James
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5.
August 2nd,
2008
9:24 am

How about compel one to smell the wine over and over? I’m sure many readers have experienced this urge.

— Posted by TWG
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6.
August 2nd,
2008
12:03 pm

To James: as long as this didactic discussion is continuing, you may find that the placement of periods relative to quotation marks is not entirely standardized. In Commonwealth countries in particular James’s punctuation is becoming the prevalent practice. Would you now care to comment on my apostrophe use in “James’s”?

To everyone more generally, I think Rajiv and TWG have certainly hit on ways that aromas have been compelling to me. Sometimes the compulsion to keep smelling one more time can be stronger than the compulsion to taste.

— Posted by Mark
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7.
August 2nd,
2008
3:45 pm

I dropped in for some wine talk and am shocked to find an english lesson. Gentelemen please stay away from my blog
( http://www.vintnersvoice.com ), I’ve never cared about winning a spelling bee.

— Posted by Jerry D. Murray

the punchline

write my will and take my pill

The Onion: Satire Lives, Thrives, Walks among Us

JibJab is Back

Send a JibJab Sendables® eCard Today!

Zombie Love/Zombie Hate

Brother Birney Jarvis shares this:






Man Kills Self Before Shooting Wife and Daughter

This one I caught in the SGV Tribune the other day and called the Editorial Room and asked who wrote this. It took two or three readings before the editor realized that what he was reading was impossible!!! They put in a correction the next day.

The Driving Lesson

The Ground Rule Double: An Email Symposium

Ricardo writes:

We've been watching the All Star Game. Evan Longoria of the Rays hit a ground rule double to left, driving in the tying run. Gayle said, huh what. So, I explained the ground rule double rule exactly as either of you would have done, including how many bases runners can advance.

She didn't buy it. Thought it was a total fako cheat. "Why isn't it a home run?" She asked.

Well, that shocked me so much that I could not argue. After ponderation, I think she's right. It should be a home run. We must rewrite the record books.

And I respond:

Unless my memory is faulty, back in the 19th Century *what we call a ground-rule double* was a home run! And, okay, I stepped away from this email to Wikipedia and:

Originally, all batted balls that cleared the fence after a bounce in fair territory or on a fly were counted as home runs. The rule was changed by the American League prior to the 1930 season and was subsequently adopted by the National League on December 12, 1930.

So there you have the strength and danger of wikipedia. When it confirms what you think you already know, the conversation grinds to a halt.

.

Michael Tola, This Better Not Be a Virus

A New View of the Golden Gate Bridge

I'd never seen it quite like this.

It's Nice to Have Something to Shoot For

Katy Crozier writes to say the world's oldest blogger died. Given the fact she was 108, I'd say for once the journalist got it right.

A Former Student Writes About Having Cancer

Hmm. This story is several things, most of which transcend the idea of craft. But all its inspirational and prophylactic excellence aside, we must note: It's a good story. It's a good job. It's good work. It ain't no soggy Reader's Digest fodder. Through his the fear and discomfort, George kept doing his journalism.

By the way, you are not surprised to learn my favorite bit is his explanation of how did he First Learn:

To be specific, I touched my right testicle. How do I explain? To be honest, I must have been getting ready to masturbate. I don't know. Picture me shrugging my shoulders.

News that Matters

Brother Michael Koppy loves folk to push their religious beliefs at him because he is so pleased with his rejoinder, to wit:

"I'm not superstitious."

And then he changes the subject. He says that this knocks them back on their heels because it is an effective shorthand not only for a general notion of his dismissal of the grounds on which religion presents itself but also the offhand contempt with which he regards those grounds. It suggests not only that he thinks religion is wrong but that it is trivial, at its foundations if not in its effects.

Now just speaking from the heart here, I must say that I am not religious but in some rather odd ways I am superstitious. Thus, I have not written of Little Oliver in a while because Little Oliver -- he who seemed doomed so short a time ago -- my friends, he *endures*.

And I don't want to jinx him, to upset the equilibrium by praising his health on Tuesday and then announcing on Saturday that he has finally lost control of his body's caboose and that we have murdered him as a result.

One does not murder animals, of course, or so our vocabulary tells us.

Anyway, his back legs do not work at all well, and sometimes it seems they are about to stop working at all, but a couple minutes ago he staggered over to the sofa on which he loves to curl himself and with a great and brave and desperate kind of bunny hop.... I will say no more.

Who knows what malign omniscience is listening?

Got a Snark Jones

Brother Andrew Goodwin, who has taken a vow of chastity when it comes to blogging during this whole long hot month, noted the local proposal to name a sewage plant after Bush the Younger and wrote:


If someone doesn't say something witty about this I shall get sick from blog withdrawal.

He has laid a mighty challenge since it's hard to imagine a comment about the act that does justice to the act itself. That is, this is a diamond that needs no polishing.

But if Thomas Jefferson were alive, I think he would rejoice at the confirmation of the fact that there really are some truths which are self evident.

A Literary Reference

I was talking to my Lady Wife about what snark is, so I wandered over to Wonkette to find some examples, and indeed one may say that the tide had gone out and the fish lay flopping in the mud and one had but to stretch out one's hand to fill the bucket.

Anyway, in the story about Charlie Crist's engagement I found this comment:

1. 

   wheelie says at 8:55 pm, July 3rd, 2008

   - Reply

   It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single Republican male Governor, in possession of a good political fortune, must be in want of a wife.

There's the Wit the Greater to have written it, but there's also the Wit the Lesser to have appreciated it.

Tonight Jesse Helms Dines in Hell But Not (I Think) in the All-White Section

Jesse Helms is dead. That is *swell*. Breathing the same air he breathed always filled me with disgust.

Raised as a fundamentalist Protestant, I was one of those walking contradictions that sometimes spring from that peculiarly American soil. I was told that humanity was evil -- which I accepted as a proposition even though everyone I knew was kind of nice -- but as a good American boy I was filled with the notions of progress and the march toward earthly perfection.

Perfection is too strong. I believed in meliorism. I thought things inexorably inched forward. Then, about the time I was finishing up my degree at Duke while teaching at North Carolina State, my wife and I saw on the television the pustulant racist fish-faced Jesse Helms doing editorials for a Raleigh TV in which he was railing at (I still remember this phrase) BLACK WOMAN JUDGES.

And much else. But that is the phrase my wife and I recall. He was loathsome, and ignorance was the only prism through which he could have been seen as anything else.

You know the rest of the story. And so as I lost my Christian faith, I simultaneously had to accept that Christianity was pretty much right on about our collective heart of darkness, and I saw that progress was impermanent and anything but inevitable.

The truth is some scary shit, my friend.

Next Stop Bartlett's Familiar Quotations

From one of the Poynter Institute's weekly emails, the one called E-Media Tidbits.

Posted by Amy Gahran 4:49:35 PM

Stupid Filter Tricks: OneNewsNow

tysongay.net Tyson Gay, world-class sprinter. Accept no substitutes.

Today, Mary Ann Akers reports in her Sleuth blog on WashingtonPost.com that OneNewsNow, a site run by the conservative Christian American Family Association, has been having some issues with its filter. Specifically, when it published a June 29 Associated Press article about sprinter Tyson Gay, the site's automated filter substituted "homosexual" for almost every occurrence of "Gay."

...Which led to hilarious absurdities, such as:

"Tyson Homosexual was a blur in blue, sprinting 100 meters faster than anyone ever has.

"His time of 9.68 seconds at the U.S. Olympic trials Sunday doesn't count as a world record, because it was run with the help of a too-strong tailwind. Here's what does matter: Homosexual qualified for his first Summer Games team and served notice he's certainly someone to watch in Beijing.

"'It means a lot to me,' the 25-year-old Homosexual said. 'I'm glad my body could do it, because now I know I have it in me.'"

William Faulkner: The Past is Not Dead. It is Not Even Past.

Or words to that effect. Anyway, Brother John Higgins is recapturing the madness of his youth by putting on YouTube some episodes from his career on late night monster TV 30 years ago.

There is no more late night monster TV. The rise of cable, DVDs, movies on demand, horror parodies on the YouTube -- no need now (nor economic incentive) for the late Saturday night presentation of the cheesiest of the cheese from the catalog of Roger Corman or Hammer Films, interrupted as the movie drew toward its close by an ever-increasing number of cringe-inducing commercials produced by local talent.

Also, I suppose the Nerd Boys -- dateless, spotty, eager to laugh at rather than being laughed at, who were the core audience -- are all playing video games now.

But once every community had some variant of Shock Theater, with all its injokes and barely veiled contempt for the fare being broadcast.

YouTube, our little time machine. Thanks.

Professor of Pop Closes Up Shop for July Holiday. I Sneak into His Blog and Take What I Want

The key word to me is "sentimental," though "narcissism" is good, too. Shall we change the world one navel at a time? (There's more of this, a lot more.)

Q9. In the 1970s and 1980s yours was one of the few – brave, if I may say so – voices arguing against a rose-tinted view of community media. What is your view now, in 2008, of the apparent explosion of creativity happening via self-made documentaries, music videos, mash-ups, social networking media like Facebook and MySpace, and – indeed, we ask nervously – blogs?

Nicholas Garnham: I was critical of community media both because in my view it over-emphasised the power of the media to change social conditions and because it took a sentimental view of community which has been carried forward into identity politics more generally. My view on new developments on the Web is similar. Yes in some areas where production and distribution have been made much cheaper it will encourage perhaps a wider range of participants in that particular form of creative practice. I am not against this of course, but I don’t see it as a great creative revolution -- much of it seems to be the expansion of a depressing individualist narcissism. Similarly with social networking media -- much of this is fashion and will wane. For the rest, so what? I know I am old-fashioned but I simply don’t understand the excitement.

Why I Start Each Day Reading Daily Kos

Markos was about to pony up his full allowance of $2,300 for Obama when O's fallback position on the FISA "compromise" and O's apparent disavowal of Clark's *specific response* to the suggestion that all good presidents should be blowed-up fighter pilots caused Markos to belay that order until Obama showed Kos just a little more starch in his grits.

Folk said OH NO, to which Kos replied:

Now I know there's a contingent around here that things Obama can do no wrong, and he must never be criticized, and if you do, well fuck you! I respect the sentiment, but will respectfully disagree. We're allowed to do that here.

(snip)

Ultimately, he's currently saying that he doesn't need people like me to win this thing, and he's right. He doesn't. If they've got polling or whatnot that says that this is his best path to victory, so much the better. I want him to win big. But when the Obama campaign makes those calculations, they have to realize that they're going to necessarily lose some intensity of support. It's not all upside. And for me, that is reflected in a lack of interest in making that contribution.

I like Obama just fine, and we had an Obama for President sign on the front of our house 18 months ago (someone either stole it or destroyed it!), but I felt all during the primaries that the big difference between H. and O. was 1) electability and 2) connotation, not denotation: Policy-wise they look like pretty much the same person.

Obama's got my vote pretty much no matter what, but if criticism -- criticism with a dollar sign attached -- makes him a better candidate, it's okay to play that card.

God, I love to mix my metaphors.

I Love to Play Games

A few of us meet New Year's Eve to play Fictionary, but last year the usual suspects were scattered, busy or momentarily morose, so it didn't happen. I am a man who loves him some tradition, so last week at the summer solstice -- which I think balances nicely with our rather fuzzy antipodal notion of when our lives reset -- we had that familiar crew over.

(Apologies to our non New Year's game crew. You are up next.)

Five fine words that emerged from the game:

1) Hebephrenia

2) Oxycoccus

3) Palule

4) Praiss

5) Griffinage

I could have linked to their definitions, but that would spoil *the fun.*

Blogging on Empty

Why am I posting so little this summer? I certainly have more time. I could write at length with more thought. Apparently I do not conceive of this blog as a place where I write at length and thoughtfully. Rather, it's a place where I stuff random thoughts into crevices in the day.

But now I have time enough to do more than that. And freedom becomes paralysis.

Interesting. About as interesting as writing about it in three grafs.

Berger *Blahgs*

That Kevin Berger is smart. We are glad he does his work.

Nailed Again

Thank you, Pajama Guy, via Geraldo.

Classic Profile

Janet Macolm's classic New Yorker essay "The Journalist and the Murderer" begins: ""Every journalist who is not too stupid or too full of himself to notice what is going on knows that what he does is morally indefensible."

A bit strong, but there's an important point. Journalists are out to get their story, and will often do it at the expense of the people they report on.

I thought of that when reading this in a New York Times Magazine profile of Mad Men and its creator, Matthew Weiner:

After my first day on the set, I met Weiner for dinner at L’Ermitage hotel in Beverly Hills, AMC’s base for out-of-towners. He was outside finishing a cigarette. Earlier in the day he commanded, “Don’t say I smoke!” Why not? His face changed, and he seemed about 12 years old. “My parents don’t know.” I found that appealing, though I could see him wince once he said it.

This is a good detail, the kind that spices up a piece. It's also a betrayal, but one so common in journalism that I'm not sure writer Alex Witchel even sees it as such. I'm not even sure if readers notice it either.

Do I have a bigger point? Not really. I guess you should think twice before agreeing to be the center of a big article in a magazine read by millions. At least remember your parents are bound to see it.

Once Pat Had Set Up His Sierra Camp, He Turned and He Saw...Nothing

Wake Up Call

Eats, Shoots and Leaves. Yeah.

Thanks, Teresa. This is apparently from Craigslist/DC.



Are you looking for an exciting opportunity make a real impact with your business and marketing writing talents? A dynamic, entrepreneurial for-profit college in Northwest DC is looking for an experienced copy writer and desktop publisher to lead aspects of both internal and external written communications.

To apply: Provide a resume and the following writing sample to demonstrate your abilities. (This is the type of thing we'll ask you to write, so if this doesn't interest you at all, you shouldn't apply) Draft an email that we could send to a student that has taken several courses at our college, but who has withdrawn, encouraging that student to come back and continue her studies.

The details:

You will report directly to the Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing and will be responsible for writing, editing and proofreading a wide range of print and online materials including content for our web site, emails to students, and other marketing materials.

The twist: while you are writing copy you will also fill the role of security guard, working 6:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. Monday through Thursday. We will buy your uniform. You won’t carry a gun. Applicants must be able to pass a drug screen as well as a criminal background check. The security guard spends most of the shift seated at the reception desk, and there will be very minimal security duties. Practically the entire shift you will be able to focus on writing copy – you’ll just happen to be wearing a uniform.

The ideal candidate will bring a BA or BS Degree in Journalism, Communications, English or other Liberal Arts degrees.

I'm Not Joking

A "gay" Othello set in contemporary California in the aftermath of the legalization of gay marriage. Does this sound homophobic? The intention is anything but. I'm serious. It would be -- as the youth say -- awesome.

Of course, it's probably been done 19 times already.

The Fat Othello. I'm ready for my closeup if that one goes.

I Have Just Downloaded Firefox 3

Everything now seems to load faster. Or is it late and my mind is closing down?

Speaking of one's mind closing down, it seems to me that the Cliffhanger is the best Sylvester Stallone movie. I love those nausea-inducing vistas, and Stallone's face looks like a rough draft of something from Mt. Rushmore.

Rocky? Watched it again on cable recently and Rocky's lunkheadedness seemed so calculated, so disingenuous, all which manipulation I somehow missed back there in the 70s.

Talking about Stallone after midnight and striving for the right word: My mind rally has slowed to a walk.

Whither Oliver?

Kitty is doing better than we ever thought he would again. He is still much compromised in the rear parts, but he insists on going up and down the steps, with more diligence than expertise, and we let him because it seems to give him joy.

Since he hasn't leaked for two weeks or more, he now has access to the bed again. In short, we are now imagining we might have him for longer than the next 48 hours.

What caused his improvement? He's had chemotherapy, steroids, daily applications of potassium paste and daily applications of a dark brown vaseline-like substance designed to improve his regularity. We've been pumping his bladder, though we haven't done that for two days since he hasn't made a mistake in so long.

Of course, he rests most of the day and doesn't ask to go out and wouldn't be allowed out if asked.

He's old. That's a fact. This good news can't last obviously, no more than I would be justified making table reservations to celebrate the year Twenty One Hundred. But perhaps I will have a lap buddy as I do the sacred business of The Chair for the rest of this summer.

We are hopeful people here in Oakland. It's our stock and trade.

Why I'm Voting Republican (Thanks, Nancy)

My Conversation with Tim Russert

Because Russert got a degree from John Carroll, which is a Jesuit school -- and certainly for many other reasons -- USF gave him an honorary degree back in 2001. As USF's resident journalist professor -- at the time the one and only -- I was asked to read the official proclamation.

I didn't write it. I was still nursing a grudge from some of Russert's commentary during the Clinton impeachment, but I was certainly not going to step away from the spotlight.

After I read the proclamation (the instructions said), I was supposed to approach Russert (who at this point in the ceremonies was standing center stage listening), shake his hand and return to my seat (the instructions said).

So: I read the proclamation walked over to Russert and said:

"I shake your hand, and I return to my seat."

As the instructions said.

I guess I thought I was being funny. Russert did not seem amused.

Ofay, Can You See By the Dawn's Early Kike...

I know I heard her say that. I know I did.

Plus here are their kids' pet geese, Honky and Mr. Charlie.

Baby Time

Miss Baby Cleo and/or Naomi Wachtel arrived at 7 this morning. We were number two on the watch-the-boys-while-we-race-to-the-hospital list, the idea being that we topped the weekend roster but that others -- perhaps better known henceforward until the end of time as The Layabouts -- would step up during the week.

The Layabouts, however, had turned off their phone or otherwise shirked their responsibility, so we got the call at 1 a.m. -- today? it seems like days ago.

E. stayed with O. -- kitty still needing some tending -- and I put on my fuzzy track suit and answered the call. The moon was low in the sky and half full, and it pleased me to think it was waxing, not waning.

After sitting on the Wachtel sofa for a while, attentive to any restlessness on the part of the boys slumbering nearby, I concluded that they, at 3 and 6, were probably capable of getting up for a glass of water -- indeed, I had no idea where the water glasses were and would probably cut myself -- so I went upstairs and lay down on the comfy bed and fell sleep, rumpled and fuzzy.

About 6:30 a thump-thump on the stairs woke me and thus arrived little Oliver (person, not cat) who had been prepared more than once to find an interloper in the parental bedroom but had, in fact, forgotten all that preparation and was about to slide from wonder to distress when Eliot came thump-thumping-thumping (a little louder and a little quicker) and greeted his godfather with a howl of pleasure, and much trampolining on said godfather ensued.

About 7:30 we got the call. Mom, baby, world doing well. And after a while Seth came home from Kaiser Hospital Oakland to pick up the boys for their first view of the new wonder.

And I yawned and came home, feeling privileged to have helped when help was needed, which is the sweet spot on the Louisville Slugger of life.

Bill Moyers Thinks on His Feet, Steps on the Feet of a Punk

USF's own Juliana Walters sent me this link. What we have is a punk O'Reilly producer trying to ambush Bill Moyers. Moyers doesn 't fade. He steps in, puts his hand on the punk and dominates the moment.

Cool.

And I don't mean an easy manner or casualness that suggests indifference or unconcern. I mean imperturbable.

'Expressing' Oliver's Bladder. A *Vet* Showed Me How to Do This. Seek Professional Instruction Once You Have Been Inspired by Our Demonstration.

Corrections:

Actually Oliver is not a young cat. He is 16. Was I concerned about his feelings by declining to state his age when the cameras were running?

Also, his problem is not just piddling in the wrong place. For ten days, he did not void; he leaked. That was when we were inspired by Sue Russell's treatment of her cat Spenser, who was paralyzed in the back parts from kittenhood, to squeeze Oliver's bladder.

Oliver is not quite paralyzed, but the video makes clear how limited is his control over his rear legs. And that poor little tail! Think of a furry overcooked noodle.

Today I Am 64

The good news is that 64 is the new 62. My only insight is that no one would be interested in my insights if I had an insight.

The iron rules of logic suggest you will disregard what I have just said.

Coming soon: My new haircut.

I Like This. I Have Invited My Wife to Read It....

Someone named Rebecca Traister over at Salon with a vigorous and thoughtful valedictory to Hillary.

Like it or not, Hillary Rodham Clinton was the first female battering ram to rattle the Oval Office door, and while sorrowful Hillary-heads may lyrically and lovingly catalog her many achievements, her bravery and grace, I'd prefer to think of her as she actually has been: a pain in the ass to support, an often inept and ungainly campaigner. She was ill-behaved, she made mistakes, and waged an often dirty and tone-deaf campaign, performing precious few electoral pirouettes. But she also pulverized any quaint notions of what presidential races are supposed to look like and how girls might compete in them.

Language fails us when we say that Clinton "ran for president." Hillary Clinton didn't just run for president. She hustled and jumped and slogged and cried and ate and drank and didn't sleep and put up with her nutty underminer of a husband for president. She lit herself, and everything around her, on fire for president.

Clinton behaved with the kind of naked drive and aggression and mercilessness we revere in, for example, football greats, wrestling stars and military heroes. Her political ambition and ruthlessness are qualities native to anyone putting themselves up for the job of running the country.

Oliver's Immediate Future in 20 Seconds

So Many Thought It. He Said It.

This is from a post at ethicalwerewolf on why HC should NOT be BO's VP.

When I want to see how people think of a candidate (and therefore, whether they'll make a ticket more or less likely to win), I don't rely on my own subjective impressions. My youthful fantasies of being the young White House intern Hillary would use for post-Monica revenge, for example, shouldn't have led me to believe that everybody liked her the way I did.

Even Though I Am a Fabulous Feature Writer, I Spent Class Time Doing A Few Crude Videos. (Technically Crude. Not *Naughty*.)

And here, from today's Chron, is one reason why.

We are talking about more than Hillary Clinton here:

Conquering video in the digital age has less to do with being telegenic or smart, as both Clintons are. Being a politician in the YouTube era means being comfortable with giving up control of your message and realizing that everything you say or do can be uploaded within minutes for the whole world to see - and then mashed up into something new.

Video is the media currency of the millions of young Americans who voted in the primary season this year, many for the first time. Stories told through video percolated to traditional media from blogs and online advocacy sites, from the tirades of Sen. Barack Obama's former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, to the off-script comments of Bill Clinton.

Authenticity is more prized online than high production values - the only thing worse than being caught in a gaffe is being perceived as overscripted. (emphasis added)

And thus my philosophy of: good enough for the Net.

All Kitty All the Time: We Are Like a Cable Network

What happens if the cat's current state endures, if we have achieved a kind of equilibrium?

Oliver now has minimal control of his hind legs, and he never moves further than three feet from his cat basket in which we have placed a heating pad set on low. But within those three feet are his two food bowls and his litter pan, and the one improvement in his state that has endured is his ability to control his bladder. As a kind of backup, we palpate his bladder -- I think "palpate" is the word -- and if it's plump enough I give it a nice squeeze. Whatever the cause, O. is using his litter.

His appetite has also returned in a small way. Early in the week we started squirting his potassium gel (for appetite) and his CatLax (for elimination) down his throat, and both seem to be working. So we now have a cat that can barely move, but whose condition may be tolerable -- for us. We keep him in the bedroom once again, and we give him some lap time and some bed time during which he is generously stroked.

He doesn't purr, though. He arranges his body as if he is comfortable and seems to like being petted, assuming we can read cat body language. But how does he feel?

How many cats can dance on the head of a pin? What goes on in a cat's brain, that meat microprocessor? If the pattern over the last three weeks holds, Oliver will be stable for only a short time and will soon lose: appetite and/or bladder control and/or mobility, and then we will "euphemize" him. But for right now it's equilibrium, and he lives on.

Too Late

Next week when this arrives from Hammacher Schlemmer, it will be probably returned -- unless some Kitty Jesus wanders by with healing in His paws. Reason for return?

Expiration of intended recipient

The Three-Step Pet Ramp And Staircase.
Item 73900
Gift Wrap: No

Postscript: And here it is: Jesus Cat.

I'm Sorry, So Sorry (That I Was Such a Fool)

From James Wolcott in Vanity Fair.

Markos spurned the classic liberal temptation to make nice and salve the bruised feelings of the angered and offended, something conservative opponents such as Ann Coulter and Limbaugh never bothered doing. The gibe used to be that a liberal was somebody so fair-minded that he wouldn’t even take his own side in an argument, and in the blog world the term for such namby-pambies is “concern troll.” A concern troll is someone perennially anxious about going too far and doing more harm than good by alienating moderates.

Note to Self

Call vet and see if they do home euthanasia. Not today and perhaps not tomorrow. But soon.

(And if they do, when my own time comes I'll douse myself with catnip...)

Kitty Update

Not so good. Won't eat. Use the big syringe, mix a little baby food and chicken broth and:

Voila. We hope.

Two Smart Boys

Over on the left side of this blog are my 'star' links to blogs in which I take a particular interest, such interest billboarded because it speaks so well of me, I think. I hang the walls of my mind with work I wish I could do.

Recently in 'silver in san francisco' we have Young Silver tracing the evolution of cyberstudies. Recently in the Professor of Pop we have Youngish Goodwin interviewing (in three parts) Nicholas Garnham about the evolution of Media Studies.

(Go look, lazy linkers. I want you to look at the billboards.)

In the latter I find this:


Nicholas Garnham: I was critical of community media both because in my view it over-emphasised the power of the media to change social conditions and because it took a sentimental view of community which has been carried forward into identity politics more generally.

As a sentimental man who fights a deep and pernicious tendency to take a sentimental view of change -- not forgetting the equally pernicious tendency to overreact to the previous tendency and sink into cynicism and its concomitant passivity -- I think I agree with NG on this point. May I recommend both essays?

As for myself, I note that with the semester done, I feel much less voluble, less inclined to 'think' simply to the end that I may 'say'. Professing is a talk-talk game: keep talking in the hope of saying something useful to your students, useful now or later; keep talking because it is the job description; keep talking even if it's not the job description because you fear the silence; keep talking because it's the necessary fuel for your self love and if you don't keep stoking the boiler, mightn't you end up coasting to a halt?

(I can't go on. I go on. Heh heh heh.)

So I praise youngblood with their Something to Say, since in fact they do. Good on you, lads.

I Can Play a Twitter

I sit in bed as Eydie irons while we watch Jon Stewart. The cat, bladder pumped, is at the foot of the bed on a pad. Color it *Friday night.*

Twitter in Plain English

An Oliver Update

The steroids seem to be helping. He is walking a little bit -- to walk at all, some limp and some drag, is better than he was doing Saturday and Sunday -- and he seems to have much better control of his bladder. Of course, Eydie and I are "expressing" -- weird nomenclature; whose sensibilities needed salving? -- his bladder morning and night *and I am getting pretty good.*

This means in a day or two: a video!

All Cat People Are Crazy Now

This is good, but how about cats who look like Mussolini?

The Head with Two Brains

We are the Sultan

Like Scheherazade, Oliver must tell us a tale each night so that he be allowed to live another day. His tales are a bit of a dumb show, of course, for a meow can be many things but never an argument.

Tonight he dragged himself into his litter box and urinated and then -- to the wonder of all -- bumped his way up the stairs.

And then he lay down. He had done enough. For today.

Twain's War Prayer

Heard about it but never read it. Kevin Drum at Washington Monthly provided the link today.

Cat Bulletin

Not good. When we got home from the A's game Saturday night, Oliver could walk only with great difficulty. He'd move a few feet -- shuffle really, like an old man -- and then sit for a while. Sunday morning we called our vet hospital, which was short staffed and told us no appointments were available, but Eydie said it IS an emergency and you WILL see the kitty and they did.

So the last round begins: a steroids shot and pills twice a day. We see no particular benefit 24 hours later. The little guy struggles to move, though he is using his litter -- some of the time. I do not think life is very pleasant for him, even by cat standards, which I have never thought of as particularly exacting.

What are the parameters of cat contentment? Were those all-night snuggles essential or incidental, one of many sources of warmth in the night? It is sentimental to put off killing him, I conclude, but I think that supposing we can be rational about all things is itself profoundly irrational and more distorted and misdirected than our wild spasms of intution. (Reverse is true, too.)

So: a few more days and then the hole in the garden, the tears at the vet (where sometimes they are unsettled when a man cries) and then the good memories take hold, and we accept things as they are and let those things resonate.



Here. Look at this. These are things I've said before.

The Future of Journalism: A Profession for Saints and Masochists?

By which I mean if it doesn't pay, who will play? When I disengaged from academia the first time -- and that's a story that changes in the telling with the mood or season -- I got a job as an advertising copywriter. I left that job to copy edit for Atlanta Magazine *because Atlanta Magazine offered me more money*.

(To be fair, when I announced my exit the ad agency offered me 20 percent more than Atlanta to stick with them, but they had lowballed me too long; I distrusted.)

That was among the reasons I left the San Francisco Chronicle for here in 1991: about the same amount of money the first year, but the upside was considerable.

(Chron also offered me more money to stay: 25 bucks a week. Oh boy.)

My heart now poured out, I suppose I'm proud to say that a concern about remuneration was *not* the focus of a recent AJR article by Carl Sessions Stepp. He begins:

Two dozen journalists from a national magazine have gathered to discuss their future and how to prepare. They seem somewhat anxious and uneasy, but what most intrigues me is where they focus their main concern.

It isn't about whether journalism will survive, or even whether they will have jobs.

Their rawest worry seems to be this: With all the stresses and cutbacks, will they be able to continue doing the job right? "The hardest question," as one puts it, "is how to maintain accuracy with less time."

That is perhaps THE point -- although, of course, he goes on to talk about money money money through innovation innovation innovation -- and it certainly fits with my saints/masochists model if innovation flags and the money does not, like manna, descend.

Let us assume that saints always love the truth. And more often than not the truth hurts.

If They Are Your Really Good Friend, You Don't Resent How Well They Write

Big Pat Daugherty: remarkable; splendid.

He writes of his "farewell tour" of Alaska, where he worked on the pipeline. Good writing takes you there and sits you down and makes you see.

Unless you’ve been here or one of the few places in the world like it, you can’t imagine the scale of wilderness. How close it is to you, how far it goes on once you’ve stepped into it, and what it does to you when you live nearby.

But, that was then and those times are as dead as 40-cent-a-gallon gas. Now, I arrive at Fairbanks International Airport wearing tan khakis, a close haircut, dragging a packed-to-the-tits doublewide Samsonite suitcase, a twice-too-big computer briefcase stuffed with cameras, prescriptions, tape recorders, iBook, polo shirts, and socks. Plus, one Sherpa nylon pet carrier holding Margaret Rose, my miniature Dachshund. If I had a pair of Bermuda shorts and a beach ball I would have need of nothing.

Uneasy Lies the Head That Wears the Chair

As Dr. Johnson more or less said, "The prospect of being hanged focuses the mind wonderfully."

Thus, I begin my time as chair of the Media Studies Department in and for the University of San Francisco. I look forward to it because it is an impetus to growth in the sense that the things I will be expected to do are not things that I am constitutionally inclined to do, that is, *lead*, no matter how you define the concept.

I loved being a reporter because a very important aspect of that job is to sit, to watch, to veil, to lurk, to self efface. And then I got to pounce by which I mean I got to write from a safe distance from those I wrote about.

But now, even if I do not lead -- already I'm shrinking back from that boast -- I must *herd*. Or, at minimum, figure out which way the herd is going and at the key moment scamper around in front! (Oh that's cynical, more crumbs in my beard from my days as a reporter.)

So, eyes bright and coat glossy, I look forward to expanding my oeuvre. One does, after all, want to do a good job, to be fair, to be efficient, to be honest. Thus, today I ordered a book on determining my "management style."

If it turns out I have one, I will let you know.

An Embryonic Teacher Writes: I Don't Quite Get Your Comments on Grading That Class You Liked So Much.

And he added that he is preparing to teach his very first class, a college lecture course with 75 enrolled.

I reply:

As for grading, doing 75 is easier than doing ten. With a big class, you establish your curve, you have at least two multiple-choice/short-answer tests to go with whatever writing assignments you set, you use a number system to go with whatever grade you stick on papers (a B essay is worth 85 points), you add up all those points at semester's end, and when the results are laid out before you, you impose your template. But a ten-person class is harder to grade in that: if you have taught for a long time; and if you have had more than your share of dull classes in recent years; and if your current class is a sudden and unexpected delight in that the mood of the class is involved, challenged and challenging *and approving of you*, you don’t want to discount the fact that every member of the class has contributed to that chemistry and may well deserve some extra credit.

All that said, in the class of which I speak, when I read their final big assignment (a 2,000-4,000 word profile) some were better than others; some really were strong A’s. And that meant I couldn’t give everyone in the class an A, though I wanted to. I did let a couple B’s float up to B+, but that was it.

At the end of the day, I want an A from Robertson to be strong currency.

Would You Like to Read an Email? You Can Be My Secret Friend.

Teresa:

Well, bunny cat is doing better. He's pissing on his own -- sometimes in his nice litter, sometimes on the pads he is supposed to sit on because he leaks. He still leaks a little, but the amount *may* be decreasing. He is very sad because he has slept with us for 16 years and now he is locked out of the bedroom. Odd thing -- maybe not so odd -- is that we are not sleeping very well, not well at all, though I would have sworn his presence was often a nuisance.

Meanwhile, I'm finishing up grading. Question: How much extra credit should a class get that you have enjoyed teaching more than any class in recent memory? I mean, if an individual grade is a B or B+, why not an A- for charm??

Later in the day: What I did was average up the grades, assign the extra credit and give everyone they mark they got. You get an A from me it means you got an A from me.

Phalanges Crossed

Oliver has regained some control of his bladder, which is good news. But immediately he started discharging small amounts of urine on those places he slept or rested while he was leaking.

The glass and/or bladder is half full, you might say.

Media Studies Held Its Senior Dinner Last Week

Big Funny: Today Speaks to Yesterday

Milking the Kitty's Bladder

Last night an amazing fountain of urine, wild and comic. This morning a steady dribble at best, accompanied by yowling. The chemotherapy does not seem to have achieved improvement, so the first Hail Mary falls to earth. Now we test for some obscure fungus and then we hit him with strong doses of steroids, which have some bad side effects, the vet warns so seriously.

But the side effect of his failure to improve is euthanasia I told the vet, whose expression was concerned but inscrutable if that's not an oxymoron.

And Robertson said: "Well, I Never."

Pabst sent me an email containing the following thoughts from Mike Bloxham at MediaPost.

Many of you will know Kluster.com, the site that functions rather like a collaborative social network based around brainstorming and concept ideation. Well, it has now launched Knewsroom, which not only allows its users to nominate stories of interest for inclusion in the next day's "publication," but also "invest" points in stories they particularly favor -- with the promise of a return if their invested story is included next day. Even more intriguing is the promise of a percentage of the ad revenue generated.

This is interesting in its own right. It somehow manages to mix news with the fun of game-play and investment -- wanna be a micro day-trader in news, anyone? Yet it's even more interesting to think about how this concept could play out in a TV environment. As with Google News above, substitute text for video, make it remote-friendly -- and it really would mess with all conventional notions of TV news and how it's distributed.

Nailed!

Hey Dr. J,

I was on MySpace and saw a feature for rating your professor. I looked up USF and then you. Looks like you got a B-. Not bad, but I would definitely give you an A+! I attached a screenshot. I don't think you can read the two comments, so I pasted them here:

Journalism 1	05/06/2008	C	This professor is a great challenge, but not in a good way. In the class I found it hard to understand what my personal issues were, when it came down to writing. He never really helped me, and I advise people to not take journalism at USF, how about that. Don't take it. You do not need a class to critique you. Students need a class to better develop their journalistic voice.	[Flag as Abuse]
Journalism 1	06/13/2006	B	The work can be tough and at times lectures can be long and boring. What makes him great is how passionate he really is about teaching young journalists. He always is open to talk and you can always ask questions. Would highly recommend him

The Cat Neurologist

Cat resting on adult diaper


In brief, he thinks it's progressive nerve damage caused by deterioration of the spine, which would be consistent with Oliver's back and hip problems over the years, each episode a little more severe and the frequency between episodes always shortening. Loss of bladder control is no surprise in a 16-year-old cat with such a history.

There is a less than 50 percent chance that surgery would help, and surgery would be expensive *starting* with a $2,000 MRI. The cat neurologist said cat chiropractic would not help. He said the passage of time would be extremely unlikely to bring improvement. I had to bring up that idea. He didn't suggest it.

The only "hope" he gave was that if Oliver had not had the history of spine trouble, he would have thought the cat had lymphoma, which was still possible. He thus suggested one chemotherapy session from our regular vet. If the problem is lymphoma, that session will produce immediate improvement. If there is no improvement, Oliver has nerve damage and will continue to constantly dribble urine, though that habit can be somewhat ameliorated if we learn how to squeeze the urine out of the cat's bladder several times a day.

I tried under the vet's supervision, but it's a hard trick to master. So this is where we are right now. We will try the chemo, but what we are probably faced with is an incontinent indoor cat with high blood pressure, a heart murmur and feline HIV. We'll probably give the kitty two or three weeks to see if there's any regeneration of function. The first harbinger of this recent episode was his spraining his tail so that it hung down like a plumb bob, and his tail is getting a little better.

If the improvement of the tail is not at some point accompanied by his regaining control over his bladder, we will euthanize him.

This will be difficult. He's only a cat, but he's everything a cat should be.

I Was His Mentor. End of Story.

Got to Look This Up. Mad, Quite Mad. Which is No Reason Not to Do It.

Brother Morahan writes:

Have you noticed: Lee Smith in the Chronicle of Higher Ed. says that the nations wealthiest colleges and universities should buy the NYT.

More About Our Leaky Kitty

Fifty dollars to tell us what we already knew. Pardon me. Fifty dollars to tell us the regular vet thinks the same thing we think and that we should take Oliver to the cat neurologist tomorrow to confirm the existence of a nerve problem that somehow keeps him from emptying his bladder.

The vet advised us that in the meantime we should "express" his bladder, that is, find the little balloon under the flesh and skin directly between his rear legs and squeeze. But -- we realized later -- he did not show us how to do so. No hands-on guidance.

Tonight we will experiment over the sink.

Could we end up trying to achieve quality of life with an aged cat whose bladder needs to be milked several times a day? This and other mysteries revealed daily at this the blog of blogs. The word of words, my friends, is quotidian.

I'll Be There When You See Me

Yesterday I registered my morning commute with 511.org and requested that I get an email at 9 every morning giving me the time it should take. (The system isn't flexible enough to give me a door-to-door time, but it will give a time from pretty near home to downtown SF.)

Here's my first:

MY 511 ALERT

	Inbox		X

alert@my511.org to me

show details 9:00 AM (50 minutes ago)

Reply

from alert@my511.org

Home to Work

(CA-13 S-I-580 E Ramp & I-580 E to US-101 N & Mission St Off Ramp)

= 17 min; Historical = 15 min

Bad

Our cat is 16+ years old. He has lost bladder control and now leaks urine constantly. Started on Thursday because at night he shares my pillow and thus I was among the first to know.

It seems to be related to a recent strain on his arthritic spine. Previous strains have improved over time. So now we are tucking him up in distant rooms on towels on top of plastic bags hoping that time will heal.

To the vet tomorrow hoping for a good prognosis.

What Should Young Journalists-in-Training Learn to Do?

Interesting discussion over at the blog of my feature writing class concerning the multimedia stuff -- blogs, photos, slideshows, short news videos -- I tried to give them a taste of this semester.

Kids don't think it was a success. Grads think it was a good idea, though the degree of success achieved they cannot judge.

But it is an informative discussion, at least to me. It is not a Socratic question, the answer already in the asker's mind, that answer a gate through which the askees will finally be prodded, as the interrogative mood turns into the imperative.

I really don't know what I should be doing -- if where how, the whole package of puzzlement.

Like the following: worth the trouble??

I've Got It! *Crunch*

A kind friend sent me this link to congratulate me on becoming the new chair of Media Studies. It's from the Financial Times.

No honeymoon for new Irish PM

By John Murray Brown in Dublin

Brian Cowen is expected to have the shortest honeymoon of any recent Irish prime minister as he assumes the job of Taoiseach faced by an array of political and economic challenges.

One analyst invoked a rugby metaphor, dubbing the handover a "hospital pass", coming as it does with unemployment rising, tax receipts dwindling and turbulence in international financial -markets.

From the Project for Excellence in Journalism's Analysis of The Daily Show

In its choice of topics, its use of news footage to deconstruct the manipulations by public figures and its tendency toward pointed satire over playing just for laughs, The Daily Show performs a function that is close to journalistic in nature—getting people to think critically about the public square. In that sense, it is a variation of the tradition of Russell Baker, Art Hoppe, Art Buchwald, H.L. Mencken and other satirists who once graced the pages of American newspapers.

Find the full paper here.

It's Not All About Me, But I Like the Part That Is

I am Lester's class assignment for New Media.

Oh This Kid Used to Mess Me Up

He liked to boast that he could always raise a question in class that would divert me from whatever I was trying to talk about.

Heck. He was right.

He he wants to be a TV reporter -- wants it enough to shed his beloved nickname of T.C and retreat to the blandness of Anthony, and to move from sports to "real" news.

He's started a blog where he critiques himself. The courage to look closely at your own work goes a long way.

Smart aleck kid -- but I like him. Ain't no angels in newsrooms.

The Patron Saint of Bloggers

The Curt Jester (Punditry, Prayer, Parody, Polemics, Puns from a Papist Perspective) suggests St. Jerome as the patron saint of bloggers since he had a naturally cranky temperament and lived in a cave.

CJ: I will do some research on the celibacy angle and get back to you. Also, if anything tore him apart that would be a plus.

(And thanks to my friend Jerome for pointing me at so plosive a pundit as the Curt Jester.)

Lyle York's Trip to Costa Rica

In the Land of the Great Potoo

We heard that the land of the Great Potoo

Has marvelous creatures and places to see:

Quetzal and mot-mot and the great jabiru,

Hummingbirds jeweled in violet and blue,

Café con leche and fruits of the tree,

Lunches for school kids, and no arm-ee.

We heard these tales and packed with glee.

“Take us there, Skybird!” we cried, and we flew

To the land of the Great Potoo.

Howler and rooster at break of day;

All we could eat in the place, but no tray;

It was steaming or cold;

We were covered with mold;

We had itches and scratches and turista too

In the land of the Great Potoo.

But onward we plunged!

For the visions of green

Gave us joy, and for those who could see

There were trogon, cotinga, pauraque and parrot,

Coquette and manakin, caiman and otter.

With eagle-eyed Carlos and Caitlin the spotter,

And Lisa’s acumen and Paco’s voodoo,

We were learning the land of the Great Potoo.

Yet we had not seen the Great Potoo,

That wise old spirit, none sager than he,

Who could whisper the secret of this coun-tree.

So we braved the volcano, the tourists, the flu,

We rode through bananas and sailed up the slough

Through the mud and the goo

And knelt at the feet of … the Great Potoo.

We begged him to tell us: Was it a dream?

Did we see what we saw, O Great Potoo?

He said not a word. But we knew.

Our hearts filled with rapture

And took wing and flew,

For it’s true!

It’s all true!

It’s all true!

Obama Thoughts

Viscerally, perhaps even counter intuitively, I am feeling better about Obama's chances in the fall. For so long, he didn't seem real with his sui generis background and his plastic message of hope and change. But now -- battered, grabbed at, pulled down, knocked off balance, lumbered with a friend and pastor who is a kind of clown-genius -- he seems more real and less like a cartoon of virtues and undefined hopes.

The "man" is showing through, and I feel better about that. I think he can get down in the dirt and close the deal, a close election, dirty and stupid but still a win. I'm not saying he wasn't real before -- whatever real means. I'm just saying now he seems real in my subjective terms.

Hillary Clinton always seemed hyper-real to me because I know her. I am married to a kind of Hillary Clinton (absent any philandering on my part) who has spent her professional career in the company of rogues and fools (of both sexes) trying to do her best and willing to settle for the imperfection of what can actually get done because the world stops otherwise. I can see the appeal in Hillary Clinton, though I think she's a little too vivid for majority taste.

McCain is real, of course, caricature real, a living exaggeration done in big smudgy strokes, kind of comic. All good caricature (as opposed to a mere cartoon) is high-relief and finds some truth. My gut says it will be a close race -- a coin flip -- but Obama comes up heads more often than not.

A Walrus That Looks Like Wilford Brimley

A Useful Link

Five cats that look like Wilford Brimley.

Thanks to Brother Bob Wieder, who loves him some Brimley.

A Day in Carmel

Nixon is Tanned, Fit, Ready, Moderately Well Preserved

I think I'll play VP brackets at Congressional Quarterly. It's like March Madness for potential McCain VPs. It's like eating one of those dangerously poisonous Japanese fish, delicious and terrifying at the same time.