- Proclamation - While this video continues to make me laugh, I have no idea what to do with it. What would obtain as “appropriate” commentary? Suggestions are welcome, from the peanut gallery and elsewhere.
- Etiquette - I have a more clearly delineated inquiry than that above. My exchange of holiday gifts, to the extent that it’s occurring at all this year, involves much in the way of shipping. Among the wonders of modern technology is the capacity for any individual to either track his or her package or, at least, receive delivery confirmation. Thus, the gift-recipient can reasonably expect the gift-giver to have full knowledge of when any particular gift has been delivered. For argument’s sake, let’s say a person were to forego the formality of holding wrapped gifts until an arbitrarily preordained date. Would such a person, then be compelled to offer thanks upon receiving the package, or would it be more appropriate to delay gratitude until the aforementioned date, ignoring the fact that both giver and receiver were aware of the actual date of delivery? Is it possible that package tracking may have a deleterious effect on our underlying social connections?
- Plea - Many of you are aware that I listen to This American Life. At least some of you join me in enjoying that show’s podcast. Regular readers have already had their attention brought to the fact that NPR is facing budget shortfalls as a result of the falling economic tide; it lowers all metaphorical ships, after all. You can see where I’m going with this. In fact, if you can’t see where I’m going, then I may need to raise this forum’s Fog Index in an effort to keep out the riff-raff. Please donate to This American Life, so the podcast doesn’t become an untenable fiscal burden upon its parent station.
I wish I could tell you to join me in donating, but the sad truth is that the falling tide has left my metaphorical dingy clinging to its liquidity tighter than a Pennsylvanian with a church in one hand and an assault rifle in the other. I’ve given in the past, but it’s not in the cards this time around.
If you don’t listen to the show, allow me to offer a derivative rationale, if only because such an argument affords me the opportunity to be blatantly self-important. Since you’re reading these words, I’ll assume you read many of my other words. If this blog helps you waste 5 minutes of every workday, then I’ll round up and say that you get, on average, half an hour from me each week. For this service, I ask nothing in return; I don’t even trouble you with Google ads, even though I probably should. Now, as intellectually impoverished as this forum may be, it would be even more so, were my input sources narrowed. Thus, you might consider your donation to This American Life as a contribution to the source material on which I, and you, in turn, subsist. The argument may be tenuous, at best, but you get the gist.
- Complaints - Obama hasn’t been inaugurated yet, much less had his cabinet appointments approved. According to this story, however, there are some folks who won’t let such trivial facts as those prevent them from complaining. What’s more outlandish is that the complaints cited make no bones about the fact that they’re derivative of gender and ethnicity rather than qualification or politics. According to that logic, Tim Geithner would somehow be a better Treasury Secretary if he underwent a sex-change operation. One needn’t be bigoted to see the hole in such logic.
- Festivus - As Stat Boy noted on a recent episode of PTI, “Any grievances can be aired around the Festivus pole.” Today is that fated day, so I wish all my readers the very best as they erect their poles, administer feats of strength and air their grievances. Have a boisterous Festivus!
- Pork - While Honeybaked Ham remains America’s primary source for mail-order devil meat, anecdotal evidence suggests that Stripling’s is gaining some ground. This wouldn’t even come to mind, were it not for Stripling’s charming, nonsensical slogan: “You never sausage a place!”
The question of pork products brings to mind the odd phenomenon I’ve witnessed here in the Bible belt. The practice to which I refer is that of celebrating Easter, which often falls very close to Passover, by gorging on either ham or shrimp, both of which are decidedly not kosher. It’s as though Jesus rose on the third day and, after deciding whether there would be 6 more weeks of winter or 6 more weeks until spring, declared that kosher rules had magically become antiquated. Although I’m no Biblical scholar, I believe the actual case to be that the apostles made an executive decision to de-emphasize kosher rules so as to more easily sell their cult to the Roman populace. Those of you interested to read postulation about Christ’s life-long bacon-related ambivalence might be informed by Lamb, a very amusing novel by Christopher Moore. In reality, I’m guessing that the tradition of Easter hams began as an implementation of Hegelian dialectic.
- Warren - Much of the populace is up-in-arms about the fact that Evangelical megalomaniac and purveyor of myopic social policy Rick Warren will be giving the invocation at Obama’s inauguration. In practical terms, I think this Washington Post editorial makes more sense than does all but the penultimate sentence of the much-linked Christopher Hitchens’ opinion. Hopefully, this is an insubstantial publicity stunt by which the hope-monger extraordinaire means to co-opt the political Right, creating Obama Republicans as an historical echo to the phenomenon of Reagan Democrats.
Ideologically, of course, I take a stance somewhat stronger than Hitchens’ aforementioned penultimate sentence. Involving a preacher of any sort in the inauguration constitutes a breach of our sacrosanct separation between Church and state, as does the use of the Bible for swearing-in purposes and all references to “God” in or on federal property (paper money, for instance). “But,” you might say, “how can you say that religion will detract from the decorum of an event at which Shakira is scheduled to perform?” I’ll accept that argument as soon as someone shows me a founding document that explicitly creates a separation between government and booty-shaking.
- Holidays - In lieu of any other explicit statements, I should reveal that the two preceding bullets were written at the top of the weekend, when there was still some question about whether or not to post before Monday. Since then, I’ve slept through the vast majority of Festivus‘ Eve, failed to purchase a turkey to begin defrosting, and missed my chance to offer best wishes to Brooke Burke, the late Sammy Davis, Jr., and all other practicing Jews at the onset of the annual Festival of Lights. As the end of the year draws night, it just gets difficult to keep track of the days.
- Scapegoat - Yesterday, I noted some editorial issues, but I forgot to blame them on Windows Vista, which, while I was off at work, had elected to restart itself without saving the many browser tabs I’d left open for the following morning’s post.
[Shakes clenched fist in the air] Damn you, Bill Gates!
- Fight - In the week between the De La Hoya-Pacquiao fight and its airing on HBO, the action didn’t spoil. Perhaps that assessment goes too far, considering that De La Hoya was beaten progressively harder until his failure in the eighth round. Nonetheless, it’s fun to watch “The Fighting Pride of the Philippines” deliver that beating, particularly if, like me, you resent a boxer too pretty for his profession.
In more ironic news, Spike recently aired UFC’s “Fight for the Troops,” a fund-raiser for the Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund. Now, I applaud any efforts to benefit wounded veterans, but one has to look askance at people clearly disposed to combat who choose to contribute to the military in non-participatory roles. Then again, I’m open to the idea that I’ve misinterpreted an act of blue-collar solidarity. As a recent Atlantic profile of Rampage Jackson - whose pummeling prowess clearly outstrips his web-related skill set - mentions, UFC operates under a somewhat out-dated business model, wherein athletes are treated, to steal a reference from Baseketball, as “indentured servants.”
Mixed martial artists of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains. What’s that? You like your chains? Perhaps you misunderstood…
- Pirates - As has previously been noted in this forum, news of the brevity and singular implication of International Talk Like a Pirate Day has yet to reach Somalia. Apparently, though, that’s working out for the Somalis. The most recent development involves an anonymous party’s agreement to pay the $20 million ransom (dropped from $35 million; apparently economic implosion affects pirates, too) demanded for a Belizean ship laden with Ukrainian Soviet-era weapons. One continues to wonder both why the pirates didn’t elect to keep the arms from their personal use and why the world’s navies have yet to forcibly civilize the port or ports employed by these miscreants.
In what may be the most baffling related development, global warming continues unabated, despite the recent rash of pirate activity. Perhaps contemporary pirates aren’t donning His regalia of choice.
- Minnesota - With employers buckling throughout the country, the good people of Minnesota are finding a creative way to delay the onset of recession: keep election officials working. The AP reports this morning that, when the state Canvassing Board left for bed last night, an unofficial count had Norm Coleman’s U.S. Senate-race lead down to a paltry 2 votes. For those of you using scientific notation, that’s 2*10^0 or 0.2*10^1. Much more amusing details, such as those of a few questionably cast ballots, are included in the story running in the Star Tribune. Also, if you’re unfamiliar with the quirks of Minnesota living, you might be interested to learn that, yes, Justice Alan Page, the dissenting voice on the state Supreme Court, is the same Alan Page whose work as one of the Purple People Eaters earned him induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
In related news, the Vikings can lock up the division this week with either a win over Atlanta or a Chicago loss to Green Bay. While the former task is made more difficult by an injury to Pat Williams, the latter outcome cannot be invited without ambivalence.