Archive for the ‘Feeling Peevish’ Category
Natural Things Not Found in Nature
I learned today, from reading the article referenced below, that there is a crisis in sunscreens. Some sunscreens don't entirely block all UV, some people don't apply their sunscreen often enough, some sunscreens contain chemicals. Many of the sunscreens that claim to be "all natural" actually are full of petroleum and many other compounds not […]
In: All, Feeling Peevish, Will Rogers Moments
Things I Didn't Say First
The former governor [Mike Huckabee] said that “my use of the phrase ‘ick factor’ was as the established notion from within the Gay, Lesbian, Bi-sexual, Transgender (GLBT) community. It was not an indication of personal aversion, but rather a reference to an established phrase used mostly from same-sex marriage advocates and militants – not one […]
In: All, Feeling Peevish, Will Rogers Moments
Bad Analogies
At the moment there are at least two tools of language and writing whose abuse puzzles and irritates me substantially, perhaps out of proportion to logic, but there you go. One is stupid puns, by which I mean a punning word drawn against its will into a sentence because it might sound somewhat like another […]
In: All, Feeling Peevish, Such Language!
The Answer Is: All of the Above
It probably won't surprise you to learn that I found this animated "quiz show" about contradictions in the bible rather amusing (not to mention how the winner was determined and what his prize was). Actually, I laughed audibly. I also quite liked the voice of the quiz-show host; is it someone I should recognize? [YouTube […]
In: All, Feeling Peevish, Laughing Matters
Make a Crescendo to Reach a Climax
1962 saw the release of "The Manchurian Candidate", directed by John Frankenheimer, and starring Frank Sinatra and Laurence Harvey. Building to a shattering crescendo…. [John Farr, "Presidential Pictures: Top Movies About The Top Job", Huffington Post, 25 April 2010.] Sorry, stop right there! "The Manchurian Candidate" is a perfectly good movie that I quite enjoyed […]
In: All, Feeling Peevish, Such Language!
Metaphorical Inaccuracy
Some people hold a boning knife like a conductor's baton during a particularly slow part of Pachelbel's Canon. [Tom Mylan, a Brooklyn butcher, quoted by Kevin Purdy, "A Butcher's Tips for Avoiding Cuts in the Kitchen", Lifehacker, 10 February 2010.] Unfortunately, Pachelbel's famous "Canon" has only one tempo, one speed. Sections of the work have […]
In: All, Feeling Peevish, Raised Eyebrows Dept.
We Actually Stage Our Staged Shows
Today and yesterday I've listened to the announcers on my local radio station interviewing one or another conductor whose group is presenting a "concert version" of a Broadway show. "Oklahoma!" was one, "Follies" was the other. They explain that their productions are "fully staged", but done without sets and costumes. Oh, and without most of […]
In: All, Feeling Peevish, Music & Art
Truth in Snark: Justice Stevens on Corporate Personhood
While American democracy is imperfect, few outside the majority of this court would have thought its flaws included a dearth of corporate money in politics. [US Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, dissent to majority opinion in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, quoted by Mary Hall, State of the Union: Obama Walking in the […]
In: All, Common-Place Book, Current Events, Feeling Peevish
BBC Claims: Not Embarrassed by Own Stupidity
The BBC like to be on top of current issues and engage their public by running opinion polls at their website, generating some interactive excitement for their public discussion boards. More than a few jaws around the internet dropped in surprise, horror, and disgust at yesterday's poll question. Perhaps you've heard of it by now: […]
In: All, Current Events, Faaabulosity, Feeling Peevish
Deadly Silence on Ugandan Homophobia
For the past year or two the cauldron of homophobia in Uganda has been boiling, stoked and stirred by American career anti-gays who apparently aren't getting enough satisfaction our of American voters on oppressing homosexuals. The current situation has gone much, much too far. The incursion of anti-gays into Uganda to stir up homophobia was […]
In: All, Current Events, Faaabulosity, Feeling Peevish
Olympic Gloat
I'm sure you've heard before of the ironically named "Americans for Prosperity", a so-called "grass-roots" organization funded by oil & gas magnate and David Koch, the Americans who love America so much that they reflexively oppose everything president Obama does and infamously applaud and cheer the news that Chicago "lost" the Olympics. The "members" are […]
In: All, Faaabulosity, Feeling Peevish
Don't "Build to a Crescendo"
While I'm feeling a little peevish about things publishable, I want to talk for a moment to all those authors who want to be dramatic and write that something "built to a crescendo" — and those editors who edit them. Don't write it. Ask your musician friends first what this musical term means. The "crescendo" […]
In: All, Feeling Peevish, Writing
Oh! Those Poor, Poor Ligatures
Last week I was reading a novel — can't remember which one so its publisher will be spared the embarrassment — when I was distracted by ugly typesetting. The occasion was the author's use of the word "affiliated". There was a period, a brief dark ages of pseudo-typesetting. generally thought of vulgarly as "output", when […]
In: All, Books, Feeling Peevish
My Public Option
Headlines these days seem to be nothing so much as a circus of my pet peeves, whole tag-teams of peeves running up and pushing my buttons as quickly as possible. Let's put aside the amazing kabuki of the senate confirmation hearings of Judge Sotomayor and reflect, once again, on the health-care "debate". You may recall […]
In: All, Current Events, Feeling Peevish
On Reading A Life in Twilight
I am a big fan of J. Robert Oppenheimer and I like reading about him. I just wrote a book note about Mark Wolverton's A Life in Twilight : The Final Years of J. Robert Oppenheimer (New York : St. Martin's Press, 2008; 339 pages). What an excellent book it was! (You can tell I […]
"Advocacy" Means Doing Something
On some issues, though, I really don't see anything but black and white. Among them is the "question" of granting full equal rights to gay and lesbian Americans, which really isn't a question at all. It's a long-overdue imperative, one that the nation is finally beginning to acknowledge. Before his inauguration, President Obama called himself […]
In: All, Current Events, Faaabulosity, Feeling Peevish
The Children of Friends
I've had some friends that are actually homosexual. And, I mean, they know where I stand, and they know that I wouldn't have them anywhere near my children. — Samuel Wurzelbacher / Joe the Plumber, quoted most anywhere Oddly, Isaac and I have a number of friends who are actually heterosexual, and who actually have […]
In: All, Faaabulosity, Feeling Peevish
The Eleventh Commandment
[Joseph E. Kurtz, Archbishop of Louisville, who leads a panel of U.S. Catholic bishops set up to fight marriage equality: ] "With regard to marriage [equality], this implicates the right of Catholics to practice our beliefs. Here we are talking about the bedrock of society, it's not just a belief, it's written on the hearts […]
In: All, Faaabulosity, Feeling Peevish
Sound Enhancements
I was watching some video today, a presentation about something that had cute little graphics animations to go along with it. Every few seconds something would plop onto the screen or shoot across it. Inevitably, I suppose, each plop was accompanied by an unlikely "thump" sound, and each dash across the screen was indicated audioly […]
In: All, Feeling Peevish, Laughing Matters
Cheney: Giving 'Dick' a Bad Name
Some of the news this week concerned former Vice President Cheney's speaking here and there trying to convince people that he should not be prosecuted for torturing prisoners, called "enemy combatants" as an escape clause, detained without recourse to habeas corpus. Obama keeps talking about his desire to "move forward", but I hasten to point […]
In: All, Faaabulosity, Feeling Peevish