Procrastination Nation

2005-06-23T08:37:00.000-07:00

Indian Nicknames
USAToday has this article about Indian nicknames and the NCAA. Marquette has been going through this tortured process with its nickname, Warriors to Golden Eagles to Gold to whatever now. I can see how nicknames like Redskins (Miami (OH), Washington) and Redmen (St. John's) are problematic, and logos definitely enhance the problem.

What I wonder is why schols like Texas Tech haven't gotten flack. I mean, what the hell else could "Red Raiders" mean? At least FSU has the blessing of the Florida Seminole Nation, and couldn't Marquette just change its iconography and keep Warriors? Why is this so hard?

2005-06-22T08:14:00.000-07:00

Indoor Mini
Sunday I orchestrated my own indoor mini-triathlon. 1500 m swim; 10 mi bike; 2 mi run. Just to get the feel of doing all the things at once. I think I'll survive an Olympic distance based on the test run. If Sunday had been T-day, I would've made it, but this was a good test to see how much more work I need on the bike.

On the other hand, my swimming is coming back together. Sunday I did a 400 IM straight. I lingered on the 3rd turn on the butterfly, and I took two 1-arm strokes into the 3rd turn, but otherwise I made it all straight. That in itself felt more impressive than the triathlon or even the half-marathon. I never thought I'd ever be able to make 4-lengths butterfly again.

I'm also noticing my times coming down on sets. Where I was doing my 200 FR on 4:00 and finishing in the 3:25-3:35 range, I'm now finishing at about 3:00-3:05 and repeating between 3:20 and 3:40. I also added some stroke work, and my 100 BK sets are about where my 100 FR sets were a couple weeks ago (in on 1:40-ish, repeating on 2:00). I won't be making Nationals anytime soon, but it is progress.

2005-06-18T19:31:00.000-07:00

Let Me Get This Straight...
They hired Jessica Alba, who hovers near the top of the perv-list rankings (though I guess she's finally in her 20's) as the actress to play the invisible woman in The Fantastic Four? Wouldn't it have made more sense to hire Rosie O'Donnell as the invisible woman?

2005-06-16T08:28:00.000-07:00

What the Hell?
Is there such a thing as adult-onset dyslexia? I've been wondering this for a couple years now, but I'm really starting to get concerned: flipping through a listing of Nick Hornby books on Amazon, I ran across a title that I read as Snogbook but was actually Songbook." Perhaps because he's British I "wanted" to see it say "snog" rather than "song," but I don't think so.

2005-06-15T11:20:00.000-07:00

Updates Redux

Latest article, parade of homes preview, is online. Nothing else lined up for now.
Frustrated with dissertation data. Struggling to make a compelling question out of rancid data.
Went to Jackson, MS last week. Apart from its being in Mississippi and all the red state baggage that entails, it is pretty nice little city, with my favorite hotel, The Edison Walthall Hotel.
Miscellaneous SAS freelance stuff is going alright. One fell through (just got tired of back and forth on the specs, so I quit), the other is just about done. Again, fortunately, nothing new is scheduled.
Go to Boston for a research conference a week from Fri. Presentation is Sat., but the highlight will be getting into Fenway Mon. night and seeing my friend from Vanderbilt while I'm up there.
Just shy of 3 weeks until my LASIK surgery. Nervous, less about the procedure, though that has amplified some, but more about what it reveals about me (i.e., I'm shockingly vain). I hope this isn't the anti-Powerball jackpot that I finally "win."
Still haven't settled on a triathlon. I'm worried that the LASIK will somehow incapacitate me (e.g., can I really swim in a hyperchlorinated pool with scarred eyeballs even with goggles?). I probably mentioned this before, but I am thinking I might add a marathon to my portfolio this year, one on my birthday and in Baltimore, 10/15.
Why is it, with all the information stored on the magnetic strip on your credit and debit cards (not to mention stored at the bank), that the ATM machine still feels the need to ask me what language I prefer? Can't that be added to my strip, or can't I call my bank and ask them to have that default information accessible to the card/machine when I swipe?
I have a Curb Your Enthusiasm spec script bouncing in my head. Probably pointless to write a spec script for an improvised show that's almost entirely controlled by the Larry David and Jeff Garlin, but what the heck. I'm going to commit as much as possible to paper; we'll see if I can finish something.

2005-06-03T15:33:00.000-07:00

Updates
Here is the latest news about Robert:

Most recent freelance article for the Tennessean about a family's kick ass basement.
Still on the triathlon routine. Settling in at 195. The weight lifting is going o.k.
I ran for the first time since the half-marathon, and my foot seemed to hold out o.k. I only did 5 min. walk/5 min. run alternating for about 35 min., but it's a start. I felt like I could go longer, faster; but, patience seems a good strategy for now.
I still feel like I'm swimming with gunshot wounds to my shoulders, but today I actually didn't feel terrible. I can see my sets getting faster on the clock, and doing 10 200's today I wasn't thinking, "Jesus, if I just could get to 150 I'd only have 50 to go," which is a nice place to be.
While I'm on the fine-tuning my body kick, I've decided to fork over the money to get LASIK done in July. Feels incredibly self-indulgent. I'm hoping that's it's just self-indulgent and not self-mutiliation.

Oh yeah, and my mom leaves for the Carribbean tomorrow. Note to self: Remember to call, remember to call.

2005-05-22T17:59:00.000-07:00

Let's Get Ironic
So I'm at the rec center Saturday lying out on the deck while the Tennessee Summer Special Olympics was going on at the surrounding ball fields when I hear the cleaned up version of "Let's Get Retarded." It's odd that changing from "retarded" to "it started" is sufficient to make people happy with, or at least forget, the origins of the song.

2005-05-19T08:30:00.000-07:00

Adjustment Process
I think this weekend I will post my first week's worth of exercise routines. Sets, reps, distances for all the crazy stuff I'm doing.

In the meantime, I'm struggling with how to deal with my weight. For the past 14 months, I've been focused on losing weight, primarily by eating better and walking/running on the treadmill, which saw me drop from about 253 lbs. to a low of 187, but a comfortable range of 192-195.

Now that I'm doing the weight lifting, I have to start dealing with the "adding muscle adds weight" issue. I can't focus exclusively on weight loss anymore. However, I don't know how to figure out whether my increase in weight is truly muscle gain or eating more than usual because the demands of weight lifting are causing me to be crazy hungry. It's only been a week, and it's only been about 5 lbs. (194 up to 199 in a week), and I know I took a plate too many at the Chinese buffet last night and a scoop too much of squash casserole and piece too much of cake the day before at the campus picnic. Still, I would've thought all the extra work would leave my weight unchanged.

So, by publishing my routines I hope to gain your insights into my problem.

Special note: today was my first biking experience. I can't tell if my hamstrings are still sore from lifting earlier in the week or if it's the biking itself, but Christalmighty are they sore. I always thought of cycling as more quad-intensive. Perhaps having the pedal straps means you get extra work on the up beat.

2005-05-19T08:12:00.000-07:00

Coincidence?
I got my first trial issue of Sports Illustrated yesterday and flipped through an article by Albert Chen (registration required) about Kenny Rogers rediscovering his changeup. Cut to this morning when I'm flipping through ESPN.com, where I see a piece "special to ESPN.com" by Phil Rogers on Kenny Rogers. The latter article spends a little more time on the "pitching past 40" angle and has fewer quotes from Dick Egan, a former Tigers scout who had worked with Rogers in the minors over 20 years ago in the Rangers system.

My questions are: (1) does Kenny or MLB have such an effective publicist that he got simultaneous articles about his effectiveness this past month or so?; (2) was this story so "obvious" that two national baseball writers were bound to write on it because this is a highly competitive business?; or, (3) did ESPN poach yet another story idea from elsewhere and pass itself off as original content?

I doubt it's (1), and (2) might be plausible. However, I'm inclined to believe (3). Before I went cold turkey off of sports talk radio (the precipitating event was largely a switch from being a SportingNews radio affiliate to being an ESPN affiliate), the folks at SportingNews radio used to complain all the time about one of their gets (a radio interview, reporting by one of its analysts from the radio or magazine) being talked about on ESPN without attribution, often with almost no additional reporting at the initial phase then followed up with a, "Stephen A. Smith is now reporting" after he (or whatever other reporter) had finally gotten around to talking to an original source.

2005-05-18T10:10:00.000-07:00

On Track
I started back to exercising Saturday following the half-marathon pain. My foot no longer hurts, but that may be because every other body part hurts. In pursuit of my new triathlon goal I've added weight lifting and swimming into the routine. Running is still out until June, so I've substituted stairmaster. I'll start exercycle probably Thursday.

Let's just say I was happy to yesterday was my first rest day. The swimming hasn't been too bad, still a little choppy, especially as I get tired. Still, it's amazing what 50-60 fewer pounds does for your ability to move through the water. I think things are painful because instead of doing my usual "weightlifting for tone" mode I've shifted to "weightlifting for mass."

Don't worry, I'm not looking to join Arnold myself. However, I had noticed over the past couple of years that even though I gained weight in my torso my arms and legs stayed essentially the same size. I now describe my physique in this way: torso of a plumber, arms and legs of a female supermodel. So, I thought I'd try to make my limbs more masculine while my torso gets less so.

I'm still looking to pick a triathlon date/location, but I'm pretty firm now that I'll plan to do an Olympic length one. In the meantime, I'll be investing in Advil and Aleve.

2005-05-11T15:26:00.000-07:00

Check 1, Check 2, Syballance, Syballance
I'm sitting just outside my office watching Little Richard go thorugh his sound check for tonight's concert for VU's graduates and their families. It's hard to believe 50 years ago Little Richard couldn't get arrested in Nashville--check that, all he could do in Nashville was get arrested--and now here he is performing at one of America's whitest universities. Fortunately, it's also one of the greenest, and I don't mean environmentally. Progress.

2005-05-06T21:10:00.000-07:00

Post-Half-Marathon Marathon
The time after the half-marathon has been perhaps more stressful and exhausting than the half-marathon itself. I would've written sooner, but shortly after the race on Saturday I went with my sister and new baby niece to see my grandmother in Alabama, followed by a return drive home, a dash to the airport, a dash to work to start my new temporary position at the university (until our grant starts in July), finish grading papers and collecting miscellaney from the kids and turing in final grades to the registrar, plotting for my trip to DC for a meeting, and doing some data checking for my dissertation. In between I agreed to help co-write the evaluation portion of a small grant, help a friend get connected to some folks before writing his own grant, and took on a new freelance opportunity with the paper. It's hardly shocking then that I had to push a freelance deadline back to the middle of the month. On the bright side, I'm going to see the O's Saturday, and I got a free radio subscription for baseball on the internet, through which I caught the Marlins-Braves, Jays-O's, and Nats-Dodgers yesterday.

So, with my kvetching out of the way, here are the pertinent race details:

I finished.
My final time was 2:01:43, well ahead of my seed time of 2:25, but just shy of my goal of 1:59:59.
I wish they had splits for each mile, but they calculated an average mile pace of 9:17.
My 10k time was about about 53 or 55 minutes.
I finished above the median for my age group (30-34), but only barely.
Complete results can be had at www.cmmarathon.com and looking up my number (11752) in the half-marathon results.

Now for some racing commentary:

The time waiting to start the race was not dissimilar to the time spent behind the starting blocks at a swim meet when you're in one of the first events. Lots of standing around, pacing, dissipating nervous energy. Only with more clothes on and no goggles.
The race used a wave start. This is a terrific idea, especially considering how crowded the race proved for the first 4 miles. I can only imagine what would've happened if they all started in one pack. The critical problem I think is that the course bottlenecked between markers 1 and 2 and stayed that way for, oh, the next 5 miles. Imagine letting out a U2 concert at Giants Stadium but forcing everyone through a turnstile.
The congestion, coupled with my naively chosen seed time and surprise that you could skip ahead to a different starting corracl, meant that I probably ran 14 miles just from weaving in and out of race traffic.
My sister and her baby camped out at my improv friend Ann's house, which is located on the race route on Music Row. She took some video footage, but looking through the camera while holding a baby doesn't make for effective identification (though it probably qualifies her to work security at an airport or perhaps the British consulate's office in NYc). So, she didn't notice I was going by, and only barely caught me on camera after I was about 3 steps past her. I hadn't bothered to yell out to her because it looked like she was shooting me already and, you know, I was running and afraid to waste oxygen.
I expected more cell phone usage on the course, but I didn't see my first mid-race cell phone usage until the sixth mile. Apparently people like to call each other to find out where they are on the course. I only saw one other instance (about mile 10), so it wasn't too bad.
I expected I'd start out fast, and I did, going roughly 7:30 to 8:00 for each of the first 2 miles before settling into the 9:30 neighborhood. I did a good job of picking people to pace off of, and for the first half of the race, I used pretty good judgment about abandoning folks to find somebody further ahead to pace off of who were closer to 9:00, which I would need to get under 2:00.
The problem came around mile 8: I got a little over-confident and stepped up my pace to about 8:30 or 8:45 for the next two miles. I hadn't run any beyond 8 miles before, but my previous good judgment for the first 8 miles and my first hit of water at mile 7 deluded me into thinking I would be able to cruise the last four miles.
Things were ok through 8, 9 and most of 10, but mile 10 turned out to be the longest damned mile of the race. As they readied us for the full/half course split, they ran us up a not too big hill but big enough in a short enough distance at that stage to cause me to take my first 20-30 second walk break.
I think I might've been ok after that except I let myself get a little dejected when I saw that we were going to have to double-back through part of the route: instead of turning left onto James Robertson Pkwy, we had to turn right for a piece then U-turn back. It just violated my sense that you should always feel like you're moving forward. So, I walked another little piece, about 60 seconds this time. I had one more 60 second walk up a slight downtown hill toward the beginning of mile 12.
The running experts say that unless you're one of the elite racers it's actually faster to plan to walk for some stretches because you end up running faster enough during the time that you run to offset the slow down that occurs by walking. It actually kind of makes sense based on my treadmilling: I can walk on the treadmill (if I hold onto the bars) at the pace that I practice at. Perhaps I should practice harder.

Well, that's all for now.

2005-04-11T08:30:00.000-07:00

And the Other Arcticle
This one is on resources in Nashville for picking a neighborhood to live in.

2005-04-08T07:15:00.000-07:00

Tub Be or Not Tub Be
Here is my latest freelance piece. It looks like it got a little mangled pulling some pieces out for the sidebar, but you get the point (and I get the check).

2005-04-02T12:16:00.000-08:00

Official
Well, I plunked down my credit card number and am officially entered in the Country Music 1/2-Marathon on April 30. $65. I hope it's worth it.

Also, here is one of those Tennessean articles I mentioned, this one is on bonus rooms. I have one on clawfoot bath tubs that was supposed to be out yesterday, but I think it got bumped. I also have a Sunday Home feature due out on April 10.

2005-03-21T23:08:00.000-08:00

Lighter
Hey, blogging will continue to be light for the forseeable future. Too much to do between class and freelancing and work and dissertating.

I did want to take a second to suggest an invention for t.v., if it doesn't exist already. Somebody needs to invent a way to "layer" television networks so that you can place content from different shows/networks on the same channel.

For example, say I'm watching a movie on HBO, but I want to know the scores for the day in sports, I could select content from ESPN (e.g., it's BottomLine ticker) to overlay the channel that I'm watching. Ditto for placing the CNN or FNC or CNBC ticker on top of a block of videos on MTV (if, in fact, MTV still plays videos). I could ultimately layer as much as I want (put a stock ticker and news ticker and a sports ticker), and ideally I would be able to resize and relocate the graphics with some kind of a mouse, too.

You could also set up reminder services like the flags/notifications on a computer screen. If I'm watching the basketball game on CBS and golf on NBC, I might like to set a flag that notifies me whether the other station (or stations) is back to live coverage or at commercial.

I think what would make this feasible is that the viewer decides what to overlay on the screen. The other networks aren't interfering with a particular network's broadcast, the viewer is. I mean, nobody complains that viewers are able to turn on closed captioning, and some people even like to watch shows while captioned. People don't seem to have a problem using picture-in-picture. It all seems like pretty similar display technology.

Whoever owns the ticker or notification agent could then sell ad space and piggyback onto other shows (e.g., ESPN could charge big(ger) bucks to Verizon to sponsor the ticker when it overlays CSI: and less for "Still Standing"). It is possible you might need to cut the bottom layer network some fraction of the ad rents, but there's a price for everything. This would seem like a great opportunity for expansion into TV for somebody like Google (adding external content to a main content page) or maybe an expansion area for Tivo.

2005-03-02T21:40:00.000-08:00

Geez, It's Been a While
I've been pretty damned busy with more grants, lots of teaching, a little travel, and sundry other projects. I'll mix some random thoughts with some random events/projects I've got going on.

I've got 3 new freelance articles in development for the Tennessean, all due in the next few weeks. All are home/design related.
I'm working up another parenting related idea, based on a talk and interview I did with infant development expert Renne Baillargeon of the University of Illinois. She's damned impressive, and her work is really interesting. She studies how infants learn about their physical world and how they learn about their psychological world (i.e., interpreting the actions of others). The experiments are as interesting as the results of the research.
Denise Richards and Charlie Sheen are splitting up. Who would've thought marrying a whore-chaser could turn out poorly?
Chris Rock is taking some heat for the Oscars. I blame a bigger trend in award's show: the marginalization of the host. If you were to watch the Oscars from 1985 and from 2005, you'd see that the host used to introduce all the award presenters; now the presenter does the monologue, introduces a fraction of the presenters, and the voiceover artist handles most of the introductions, in addition to the "fun facts as they walk on stage" info. He can't have much impact if he doesn't get the screen time.
I'm pleased to see that the Oscars have stolen yet another of my ideas. In addition to stealing my idea for moving it into the sweeps period (I routinely posted this in email questions to USAToday chats and to Ebert's movie answer man), they've now taken my idea of gathering nominees on stage to cut down on the walking up to the stage. (I'll search my blog for evidence of this.) I'm telling you, that in itself cut the telecast down by 30 minutes.
My sister, Courtney, had her baby just under a month ago. I can't remember if I blogged on this, but she's Haley Elizabeth, 8 lb. 5 oz., I think 19". I'll be home a week from today to meet her and continue showering her with gifts.
I'm going to a presentation on Friday by this guy Edward Tufte. He's speaking on ways to improve visual presentation of information. People seem impressed by him, but I just don't know enough to be wowed yet. Right now, I'm content to be excited about attending an all-day workshop free, including getting 3 of his books, while others are paying substantial sums. I'll rave or rant afterwards.
I spent this past weekend in Townsend, Tenn., on the edge of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, with a friend and some of her friends. I know many of these people, but most of them I only know or would be around through my connection to her. Anyway, it was pretty fun. I kind of expected more hiking and adventure within the Park, but it was nice to be out of my apartment being sociable and largely away from the television.

It also further cultivated my fantasies about being a real estate mogul and living in the mountains. Of course, there was no snow, and it was pretty mild out; but, then, that's what makes fantasies fantasies, no?

Probably the oddest thing about the trip though is that we exit off of I-40 and take US-321 North, only if you look at a map, it is more than a little obvious that we're not in any way going north.
The weight is holding steady between 190 and 193. Look for details on my "Oatmeal Diet." Got a publisher? I'm able to run 6 miles at a time. I think when I'm home, I'll try some outdoor running. I checked the price for the 1/2-marathon. Holy crap! $65 for a shitty t-shirt and the right to be jostled by strangers on the city streets? Can't you get that on Times Square free? I guess I know where all my freelance money will be going.

Alright, time to call it a night. God bless the man, woman, or deity that invented Spring Break.

2005-02-09T08:15:00.000-08:00

Boob Revealed
Thanks to a new friend in Ontario, we can now relay to you that the Nikki Cappelli character from the godaddy.com ad is Ms. Candice Michelle, and apparently she is known to Playboy. Here is her personal website.

2005-02-07T14:46:00.000-08:00

Super Bowel
Something about me and my relationship to sports has changed. Except for baseball I no longer care about the events themselves--mostly because they're too slow and not enough happens--and I'm content to follow the stats and results alone.

So, it's more important to me that I was right in my prediction of the game (an Eagles backdoor cover and the under), than that the game was entertaining. It actually was pretty decent, but nothing about it forced me to stop flipping through magazines. What's that Donovan McNabb is throwing another interception? Oh, they're punting again? [You may be saying to yourself, "When did I read Robert's predictions for Eagles covering and taking the under?" Well, unless you were the student I emailed my predcitions to on Saturday, you probably missed it. But, I have the email to prove it.]

I'm tired of the whole concert thing before the game. "Hey gang, let's go scream our heads off for a bunch of mediocre current acts who are lip synching!" I don't mind a concert at halftime if it's U2. I guess Sir Paul was fine. Still, I prefer something shorter. The game should be enough on its own.

And the ads were pretty weak, though I confess to missing a few to play in the kitchen. I was surprised that after Budweiser's ad mocking the Janet Jackson situation was pulled that the godaddy.com ad made it to air; apparently the NFL put the kibosh on a second airing. Nevertheless, I'd say she, Nikki Cappelli (if that is her real name, was the breakout character this year. Look for the requisite FHM spread in a couple months. (You can view the ad that aired and the full two minute version here. Note: she's definitely the kind of girl that looks better from a distance.)

I think the one that everyone will go sentimental on is the Budweiser one with the troops coming home. That'd be a nice ad for when they're coming home for good. Will we see random, spontaneous standing ovations now wherever more than two uniformed soldiers are? I guess since it's a (more or less) volunteer military, you have to give them credit.

Still, the ad itself felt unseemly to me. It's like we've outsourced responsibility for defending the country to these people, and we get to absolve ourselves of responsibility for their deaths or injuries by clapping for them and knowing they volunteered. As the song goes, "We eat and drink while tomorrow they die."

2005-02-05T10:27:00.000-08:00

A Fun Ad You Won't See in the Super Bowl
I saw a link to this ad posted over at Marginal Revolutions. Dick Cheney's wet dream.

2005-02-03T13:40:00.000-08:00

Teri Polo?
I meant to write about this yesterday. Local radio station 106.7 has switched to 24-hr sports with its local sports programming and nationally syndicated games (e.g., Westwood One's NFL and NCAA coverage) layered on a skeleton of Sporting News Radio. My new wake-up show is that network's "Murray in the Morning," which features Bruce Murray, who may be familiar to Washington Bullets fans, and Second City's T.J. Shanoff. Probably not going to be confused with Imus or Stern in terms of influence, but it's a solid alternative to Tony Kornheiser since I don't yet have an alarm clock that wakes me up to an Internet (or satellite) radio station. (An invention we definitely need, and soon.)

Since the show is new to me, I have learned that they routinely take advantage of their Chicago location to gain access to Playboy playmates for interviews. (Headquarters are at 900 N. Lakeshore Dr., which, incidentally, is the same building in which I would have worked had a gotten and taken the job I applied for at Northwestern. Would make for interesting office parties, no?)

Yesterday, though, they had Meet the Fockers co-star and current Playboy covergirl, Teri Polo, on the show by phone. I've seen the cover advertised on the show's website, and I'm sure she's quite lovely, but I wonder, "Is this who America is clamoring to see naked?"

This is actually related to a couple of questions I've been pondering for the past few months: when did it stop being cool to pose in Playboy, and who was the last person launched to stardom by Playboy? Playboy has always had two key features, besides the interviews and the "girl next door" model for its playmates, and those were that it was the place where you might see some superstar woman naked for the first time ever and that it was a legitimate career move for a nobody actress to become a somebody star.

Who is the last B-level star discovered by Playboy? Jenny McCarthy? She, Anna Nicole Smith, and Pamela Anderson (Lee) are the last to "make it" in the sense of being recognizable by some critical mass of people and having their own tv shows or name modeling gigs. Is there anybody else?

As for celebrities, who is the last person to pose for the first time that made you think, "Oh my god they finally got her!" Maybe Elle MacPherson? (Bill Simmons touched on this topic in a mailbag a few weeks ago, to a degree, focusing on would qualify as a "must purchase." As I recall they considered the Bush Twins, so you it's a slightly different kind of list.)

Perhaps this is just an age thing. Obviously I'm too old to be giving a shit about this, and perhaps I'm too old to care about who the young people care about. For example, maybe Denise Richards would get somebody stoked, but havent' we seen her naked before? Isn't she why Wild Things is part of the "creepy old guy" DVD starter set? (The other is Swordfish featuring a pre-Monster's Ball Halle Berry and a gratuitous boob shot. The criteria for "creepy old guy" status are (a) jaw-dropping nudity in a (b) movie with no other redeeming quality to it than the jaw-dropping nudity. And no, I don't own either, thank you very much!) America's already seen her naked and already ponied up its cash for her. Do they really want to see her after having married Charlie-fucking-Sheen?

And perhaps it's just a sign of market segmentation (e.g., people who are really into naked chicks have cheaply available porn and those who want the "softer side" have Maxim) and better career choices for women. Michelle Pfeiffer and Jennifer Anniston, whatever their merits as actresses, never had to stoop to pimping themselvs to that degree to get a good job.

Whatever it is, the magazine's efforts to hip itself up by poaching Maxim's editorial staff seem not to be paying off in terms of their gets or their launches.

2005-02-03T13:23:00.000-08:00

Way to Go, Kid-o
I watched Conan's tribute to Johnny on Tuesday. I found his to be the most eloquent and effective. He perhaps had the advantage of not being as close to Johnny as the other big hosts, but I thought he did an amazing job of making his only slight personal connection to Johnny into something appropriately grand and funny:

A sweet story about being a goofy kid working on the Simpsons giving Carson wrong directions off the Fox lot;
His opening for Carson at a birthday party for NBC's Bob Wright in the weeks between getting Late Night and starting Late Night; and,
A brief phone conversation with him five months ago after he landed the Tonight Show beginning 2009, where he said nobody could take away that moment when Johnny picked up the phone and said, "Hey, Kid-o."

It would have been the perfect eulogy for my "All-Star Celebrity Funeral" network.

For all of Conan's quirkiness and twitchiness as a perfomer (e.g., constantly flapping his hand down on the desk and banging his wedding ring and wrist during his eulogy), there's something to be said for having somebody who's not only funny but also quite intelligent giving a speech.

2005-02-03T13:20:00.000-08:00

Weight Updates
My weight is still holding steady, today at 189.6 lbs. Back on the treadmill after my week and a half of grant writing and class prep stuff. The cool news though is that I went to get my body fat tested "for real" (compared to what my scale reports back to me). Turns out that my actual body fat is now at 16.8%. My scale tells me anywhere from 20-24% these days. This compares to my last official test 11 years ago (caliper-based) of 25% (at 233 lbs). Not too flabby...I mean shabby.

2005-02-01T17:07:00.000-08:00

Johnny Bye-Bye
I didn't get to post on Johnny Carson. I taped Leno last week and Letterman last night. I'm taping Conan tonight. While I'm no longer a Leno fan (I admit I liked him before he took over the show), I thought he did a really nice job with his opening speech. Delivery was a bit awkward, but it was a difficult speech to give and was clearly sincere.

I was irritated with Letterman initially because I thought, "Is that bastard off this week, too!" because I recognized all the jokes. Then I realized he was doing a "best of" of jokes Johnny had been submitting to the show. They were good jokes.

I gave up on Leno's show about half way through (I had only set the tape for 30 minutes not knowing he'd do the whole show on him), but I thought it was a nice touch to have Newhart and Rickles tell stories, and Ed was a sensible choice. The thing that really burned into my mind watching Leno's Carson clips was how much it was like "The Larry Sanders Show" (or rather, how much TLSS was so spot-on about Carson). I kept mentally filling in what it was like backstage after the show.

Letterman's tribute though epitomized the difference between their two shows and reinforced why Carson seemed to love Letterman more. While Leno chose stock footage (great footage, but footage we've seen a bazillion times) and showed Carson mugging for a joke (e.g., dealing with the lost moustache, jumping in to lap up the Alpo when a dog walked off during the commercial), Letterman's approach captured the dignity of Carson while also showing his humor. Getting Doc and Tommy together was really nice. Even though I liked having Rickles and Newhart, it felt like it was about them, and not so much about Johnny. I guess Fred DeCordova is dead now, but I thought Peter Lasally was wonderfully sweet and respectful as the primary guest, and that just underlines the difference.

It also showed the relationship between the two men and what Carson meant to Letterman, which is a big part of what I came looking for: it was his love letter to his fallen hero. Leno was the adopted foster child, Letterman the first-born. Perhaps Leno could never win the contest with me: I mean, if he had showed clips of himself with Carson, would I have thought it tacky or self-serving? I would like to think I could be fair about it, but maybe not.

I remember thinking in the early '90s that Carson should hit the road, not because I never found him funny but because I didn't find him as funny as often. He had long since stopped using his characters, but more importantly he was on only 3 days a week at times (a Monday repeat, a Leno guest host, and 3 nights of new Carson). Also, he didn't seem particularly engaged with the guests much anymore, and at the time I thought Leno was doing better monologues. Then again, Leno was at the top of his monologue game back in the late-80s, and it's easy to look great 1 night a week.

Still, I loved Carson. It got me thinking about what his wake or funeral must have been like. Perhaps because he was so private, it might not have been as great as I would expect. But, in my imagination Dave and Leno and just a revolving door of about 10 people would get to speak, and it would be the funniest sad day in the world. If ever a funeral called for C-SPAN coverage, this would be it.

It also got me thinking about whose funeral I would like to attend, assuming I had to let a celebrity I admired and loved die. I still miss Phil Hartman, but I think his funeral was such a shock that it would have been tough to be pleasant. I think about the stories from public funerals (e.g., Dick Schaap's as told by Kornheiser), and I wonder if there isn't a market for it on t.v.

Anyway, thank you, Johnny, for being so funny.

2005-02-01T16:38:00.000-08:00

Up for Air
I've been toiling away at a grant for the past 10 days, if you were wondering where I've been. It's a grant to help coordinate government and provider resources for teens with substance use problems in the state of Tennessee. We led the writing of it for the state; our reward is the evaluation contract, which means salary for me after '05 if we get it.

I've been so busy with it that not only did I not blog, I did not use the treadmill. Nevertheless, I was able to keep my weight between 191 and 193 for the whole week. I got on today, and I'm back under 190. It'll take a bit to get back up to speed, but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. I ran shorter but faster, and then I walked for a while.

2005-01-20T09:52:00.000-08:00

Dreams Come True?
Some quick hitters here:

I mentioned I've started running on the treadmill. I can now run continuously for an hour (5 miles). This weekend I'll try to push it up to 8 miles. Considering before last week I had never run more than 3.75 miles continuously (once around Crofton Pkwy), I'd have to say I'm pretty pleased.
Could the disaster of Social Security reform end up making me a happy man? Saw this link where Bob Rubin, former Sec. of Treasury for Clinton, talks about its devastating effects on housing prices and interest rates. I still need to know what the interest rate-housing price tradeoff is. Any real estate agents out there?
I've started writing again related to the dissertation. I'm moving on to working on the proposal, even though I still need to finish my area paper. All pages count in the end.
I woke up in the middle of the night with an idea for a pretty good novel. It's not Moby Dick or anything, but I bet it could get published if I did it right, and really, that's more than enough.

2005-01-17T17:55:00.000-08:00

Crossing Under
Another weight update: As of yesterday, I was 187.2. It seems running has really boosted the calorie output. For those of you keeping score, that's now 66 lbs. I think this is the lightest I've been since late 1991 or early 1992.

2005-01-13T15:46:00.000-08:00

Are Americans Teens More Immature than the Rest of the World?
I was flipping through IMDB looking at the info for Lost in Translation, and I noticed that while the film is rated R in America (no one under 18 w/o a parent), in the rest of the world it's viewable without restriction by folks ages 12 to 15. What gives? This could be an interesting study actually, comparing cross-cultural age appropriateness of films. Hmmm...

2005-01-13T14:02:00.000-08:00

Dumb-de-dumb-dumb-dumb!
The Packers are considering hiring Seattle's VP of football operations, Ted Thompson, as their GM. This is the man responsible for accumulating their talent at wide receiver and developing the core defensive talent that yielded three losses to St. Louis. Sounds like a wise choice. This is not to say Mike Sherman should stay in the GM role; they just need to hire somebody better.

2005-01-13T10:05:00.000-08:00

Indian Tsunami, American Rains?
Is the tsunami responsible for the California rains/mudslides and the large volumes of precipitation throughout North America this month? I haven't seen any reporting connecting the two, so I wonder if it's simply so obvious nobody has bothered reporting it, or nobody has made this connection yet, or I simply haven't looked hard enough. I guess it's an open question: is there an unusually high volume of precipitation in North America this month?

I would have thought there'd be a ton of articles by now linking the two events, and tons more meteorlogical research discussing this, but so far I haven't hit on anything. To add a political slant here, Bush would then be able to claim the mudslide disaster relief efforts to be part of the tsunami relief, letting him raise the amount of aid offered but direct it locally.

2005-01-12T13:26:00.000-08:00

Survivor: Nashville
Well, things could have gone a shitload worse today. I think I scared them sufficiently that it would be a lot of work, though probably not as much as I let on.

I think the most important thing I learned today is that 75 minutes is a long-ass time, and that's after I only used 60 minutes and yielded the balance of my time to the senior professor from another section of the class.

2005-01-11T11:48:00.000-08:00

Eve of Destruction
Tomorrow marks my debut as a university teacher. I will teach undergraduate research methods course under the most ridiculous course title, "Systematic Inquiry." I am excited to get to do this, but I am kind of anxious about the outcome. For somebody who craves praise and desperately wants to be liked, standing before a group of 20-year-olds in a required course trying to impart the wisdom of the ages seems like a recipe for disaster. I was asked the other day, "What's the worst thing that could happen?" I said, "They might come back on Monday."

I was only half joking. I like the idea of this as a regular performance opportunity. I like the idea of putting together new material twice a week for them. However, I'm not used to the scheduling aspect. I can't be late, as I often am. I can't half-ass my way through this. Or, I could, but I actually take seriously the responsibility of teaching them.

I don't have any grand illusions that they'll become researchers or that they'll like the material. I do hope that they will be able to separate the course and its content from their judgment of me, even if I suppose that's impossible since I determine the content.

Anyway, I guess I'll take a break from obsessing about this for a while and get back to work.

2005-01-06T20:43:00.000-08:00

Conspicuous by Its Absence
Two things struck me from CNN's headlines. First, a case involving Vanderbilt is going forward. At issue is whether the university can remove the "Confederate" from the name of its dorm, "Confederate Memorial Hall." Second, NBC-Universal is in trouble over Motly Crue's New Year's Eve performance: Vince Neill screamed "Happy Fucking New Year" to Tommy Lee. (I'm surprised, actually, that it took so long for it to make the news. I saw it and though, "Oh, fuck!" But, I hadn't seen anything about it until today.)

What gets me is this: at the bottom of the Vanderbilt article, the judge asks whether it would be less of a memorial without the word "Confederate" on it; in the Crue article, the copy uses dashes to replace the "fuck" in "fucking." If you remove the word, but everyone knows what was there, then what does removing it accomplish?

Now, in the VU case, since you might write about the dorm, removing the word removes it from future writings. But isn't the dorm still tainted? Wouldn't the college be better off, except for the cost, tearing the dorm the hell down and building a new one, thereby sidestepping the legal issue?

I'm just not sure who is served or protected when the "bad word" is removed, especially in the fucking case: if you're offended by the ordered letters, "f-u-c-k," aren't you offended by space left available representing "f-u-c-k"? I mean, the idea is spelled out for you without your actually seing the word. If you know the word, you can't make your brain not conjure the image of the word. In the case of the dorm, aren't you just relying on people being lazy and ignorant enough not to know the history of the dorm's construction and presence on campus for decades, or for people who already know eventually forgetting. I don't know, I guess I'm just a vulgarian.

2005-01-04T14:40:00.000-08:00

Old Pet Peeve
I have a running argument going in my head over the NFL playoffs (and all professional sports playoffs) which guarantee postseason berths to division winners. To me this amounts to geographic affirmative action. We've seen division winners host teams with worse records, but to prove my point I hope next year provides a team that with a better record than a division winner who gets excluded from the postseason. There may be a rationale for affirmative action in employment and education, but I'm not sure whether there is a meaningful basis for geographic representation in the playoffs for pro sports.

2005-01-04T14:39:00.000-08:00

Latest Article
My Nashville Parent article is finally online. To all the parents out there, feel free to send me your abusive comments.

2004-12-30T15:11:00.000-08:00

Mr. Tony's Back
While I was back in Maryland, I discovered that Tony Kornheiser is back on the air with a local show on WTEM (SportsTalk 980) airing 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. ET. Before you get too excited though, it's only a 2 hr show immediately rebroadcast at 11:00 a.m., so plan your day (and phone calls and emails) accordingly. You'll need to register with them to get the audio.

2004-12-30T14:43:00.000-08:00

New Pub
I forgot to post my most recent academic article. Scintillating reading. No sign of my Nashville Parent article yet, but I'll keep you updated.

2004-12-29T09:33:00.000-08:00

Back in Town
I'm back in the 'ville. Should resume posting this week. I keep hoping my next article will come out online before January, but c'est la vie, I guess.

2004-12-20T13:33:00.000-08:00

"I Like My Meats Processed"
This is a quote from an improv show at ImprovBoston that has stuck with me for about four years. A fun scene. Now, I get to pay homage to winter's favorite processed meat, the summer sausage, in this article for the Tennessean.

2004-12-15T11:06:00.000-08:00

Weird Dream, Weird Idea
I had bizarre series of dreams last night, all running together, but when I awoke at a 4:00 a.m. I had this idea to fix the NBA: what if the referees officiated the game more like water polo? The idea would be to call incidental infractions (e.g., pushing, hand-checking) with a short-whistle. This would pause the clock, force players to reset a bit, but everyone would continue play instantaneously without (1) stopping play completely for a foul, (2) cut the number of ticky-tack fouls called and putting players on the bench in foul trouble, and (3) keep the game from becoming an interminable foul shooting contest. (I'd like to include some other classes of fouls like when two players roughly equally positioned collide going for a loose ball--instead of calling a foul, have the ref assign possession and move on--but pushing and hand-checking are a decent start.)

Refs could still call fouls for these infractions (and others like "over the back") using a double-whistle (beep-beep). You wouldn't have "ejection"/man-advantage situations like in water polo, but water polo's basic rules of "too hard" of a foul or a run of mini-fouls that excessively interrupt play would earn the type of foul we're accustomed to seeing in the NBA. And refs would still get to call

I think the additional benefit of this rule is that it encourages the refs to get over their fear of blowing the whistle. It keeps them active, keeps them engaged in the game, but it may diminish their fear that they will disrupt the flow of the game by calling a foul or that they will harm a star player by calling him for illegal plays.

This is not a perfect system. It would take a while for players and refs to get accustomed to the technique (though it could certainly be tested in a summer league). And teams may adopt a mini-foul strategy that perpetually interrupts the team's offense by committing mini-fouls. I think the extent to which this is a problem would also require some testing in a summer league. There's no reason to think this is all that different from "Hack-a-Shaq" or Riley-era Knicks-style defense--at least the game wouldn't stop for 30 seconds at a time for the same fouls repeatedly. Also, although you would think this would let players play physical without getting too physical (a sort of valve release), it is not inconceivable to think that players might flip-out in frustration. Again, testing would help gauge the magnitude of the problem. And finally, the accumulated pauses may make the games longer, depending on how many mini-fouls occur, how many full fouls in the game are removed, and how quickly the clock operators adapt to pausing/unpausing the clock (a slow hand, a slower game). The last is a learnable skill, and the former two can be tested in practice.

2004-12-14T10:42:00.000-08:00

Truth Will Out...When the Stakes Are High Enough
I was talking with a friend last night about all this crap coming out regarding Kerik, the would-have-been Secretary of Homeland Security. What I wonder is, "What is the calculus that determines whether prior actions become important enough to stop somebody from obtaining a job?" Several of these accusations and problems date to his time in NYC, yet none of them stopped his appointment to go Iraq. Some predate his time working for Giuliani, yet none stopped his rise to police commissioner.

To come from the other side, people knew about Clinton's dalliances and marijuana before he ran for president, yet it never stopped him from becoming governor of Arkansas. Yet suddenly because he was a candidate for president, it was important.

I understand why the people appointing him would want to look past these things. I don't understand why people who might oppose him or the press corps wouldn't do more to track down info on appointees themselves. I mean, isn't that part of what reporting is? How hard would it be to get an intern to spend $50 to run a background check on appointees, even lots of appointees?

Certainly something about the stakes of the appointment make sense. Perhaps it is too daunting to track down every single appointee at every level of government, and so institutions like the press or government agencies invest only effort commensurate to the level of appointment. On the other hand, maybe people who oppose a candidate reserve charges for when they will be maximumly damaging. It's just curious is all I'm saying.

2004-12-13T10:13:00.000-08:00

Connections
I caught a Seinfeld rerun last night, and it was the one where Elaine is so irritated by her braless, childhood friend from Baltimore, Sue-Ellen Mishkie, that she gives her a bra for a birthday present, which leads to Kramer and Jerry having a car accident. I recognized Sue-Ellen though as Brenda Strong, the dearly departed Mary Alice Young from Desperate Housewives. I need to figure how to get all the guest actors from Seinfeld and link them to actors on other shows/movies and compare it to other "guest role" nirvanas like Cheers.

2004-12-12T16:12:00.000-08:00

Back on Track
Hola! I realized I hadn't given a weight update in a while. Today I made it down to 191, 62 lbs. total. I took off the weight I gained on Thanksgiving by the end of that weekend, but I've been hovering in the 194-197 range for the past few weeks. So, I decided to make a concerted effort to get under 190 before getting home for Xmas. I'd say I have a reasonable shot at it.

Also, again I'm ahead of the curve. It took Ferecito (Fred Armisen) to call out Bono (Colin Ferrell) on SNL last night on the Vertigo counting problem. Someday I'll be on the damned show.

In the meantime, you can look forward to a few more freelance writings. I have a holiday food article coming out 12/20 in the Tennessean and an article in the January 2005 issue of Nashville Parent. I'll post the article links when they're available.

2004-12-10T10:31:00.000-08:00

The Real Tragedy
The Chattanooga Times Free-Press, which is actually a nicely laid out, decently written newspaper, is catching some flak for helping the guardsman grill Rumsfeld in Kuwait regarding dumpster-diving for equipment.

USAToday is helping stamp out the firestorm by downplaying the importance of the issue with articles like this.

The real tragedy is that the only way to ask these questions of America's leaders is by getting soldiers to stand-in for reporters. The reporter, Edward Lee Pitts, should get a medal.

2004-12-08T21:37:00.000-08:00

Blue States, Red Blood
For some reason I started thinking about where in the U.S. casualties were from, to get a sense of the impact of the war.

Where would you think the casualties are from? It depends on how you would code the person's "residence," right? Your map would look different if you recorded the address for where the person was posted within the U.S. versus where the person was recruited from, right?

Let's assume the address they use is where the person enlisted from. Where would you expect more pins on the map?

This site plots the "home of record" for US casualties thru 11/15/2004 (I'm checking on how this is defined). It turns out the casualties seem pretty heavily clustered in blue states, with heavy clustering in the east from MD, NJ, PA, and NY and out west in LA and SD.

If the "home of record" is where the person's regiment is headquartered, well this is a map that shows how America's military bases are distributed across the country. My guess is that it's probably the person's "hometown" before they joined the military since so many dots appear where there are no bases (though these could be reservists).

The other thing to keep in mind is that these areas have higher population densities, so it's natural to expect them to have greater numbers of "dots" than elsewhere. And the states are smaller, so the dots look proportionately bigger.

It's tempting to conclude that it's the blue state folks whose kids are dying in a war supported by the red states. And that seems to be the case in terms of aggregate numbers of casualties.

But, their main site has more details that slice-and-dice the data other ways. I combined the deaths by state with Census figures for population as of 7/1/2003. These are the casualty rates per 1,000,000 population:

State	Casualty Rate
Alaska	1.54
Nevada	2.23
Minnesota	2.37
Hawaii	2.39
Utah	2.55
Georgia	3.11
New York	3.13
Missouri	3.16
Connecticut	3.16
New Jersey	3.24
Florida	3.35
Maryland	3.45
North Carolina	3.57
Michigan	3.67
Massachusetts	3.73
New Mexico	3.73
Colorado	3.74
Ohio	3.76
Louisiana	3.78
Kentucky	4.13
California	4.23
Illinois	4.35
Montana	4.36
West Virginia	4.42
Maine	4.60
Virginia	4.60
New Hampshire	4.66
Indiana	4.68
Iowa	4.76
Alabama	4.89
Washington	4.89
Tennessee	4.96
Pennsylvania	5.18
Mississippi	5.21
Texas	5.24
Wisconsin	5.30
South Carolina	5.30
DC	5.32
Kansas	5.51
Rhode Island	5.58
Arizona	5.73
Idaho	5.86
Arkansas	6.24
Oklahoma	6.27
Oregon	6.74
Delaware	7.34
South Dakota	9.16
Nebraska	9.77
Wyoming	9.98
North Dakota	14.20
Vermont	16.15

A somewhat different picture here, as NY and NJ move down to the bottom 20% (lowest 10 states). CA and PA hang in the middle of the pack. It's probably not surprising to see the smallest population states at the top of the list because with such small aggregate populations, it doesn't take too many casualties to get a high score: Vermont, for example, has 10 casualties, yet its rate is 16 per 1m; Wyoming has 5, with about 10 per 1m. And, it's probably not too surprising to have the reverse happen: Alaska has 1 casualty, so its rate is very low even with a small aggregate population.

The lesson isn't that statistics lie and we should chuck the whole thing. The lesson is to know what question you're asking, what your data represent, and whether the questions match the data you have.

Forgive me, but I'm practicing being professorial as I plan to teach an undergraduate research methods class next semester. This struck me as a useful pedagogical tool.

Anybody who can help me figure out how to get rid of the huge space between the text and the table in Blogger would be my hero. (I don't see any HTML code that is forcing the extra space to be added.)

Updates: Jed is my hero. He figured out that Blogger was inserting a BR command with each return in the table. That is kind of obnoxious, but at least it's fixable by running all the rows and cells together in one long string.

Also, I heard back from the casualty mappers: the "home of record" is the place where the person enlisted.

2004-12-05T10:43:00.000-08:00

Key to the City
I've lived in Nashville for over 12 years now, and last night was one of the best uniquely Nashville nights I've ever had. Apparently the key to getting the most out of a city is to know the right people.

My friend, Bill, called me last night about 8:00 and asked if I wanted to go to a writer's night at The Bluebird Cafe. His musical hero, Big Al Anderson (another site), one of Musician magazine's top 100 guitar players and a former member of NRBQ, was part of a round hosted by Bob DiPiero (Brooks & Dunn's "You Can't Take the Honky Tonk Out of the Girl") and which included Leslie Satcher (LeAnn Womack's "A Man With 18 Wheels") and Tony Mullins (Kenny Chesney's "How Forever Feels"). Even if you're not a country music fan, you'll recognize their hits.

We were treated to about 3 hours of music and funny insider stories, including DiPiero's new Christmas Song about quarrel between Rudolph and Santa about dragging Santa's fat ass around the world. You can catch DiPiero on "Live at The Bluebird" on Turner South with another writing giant Gary Burr on 12/29 at 11:00p ET. Also, be on the lookout for Tia Sillers (LeAnn Womack's "I Hope You Dance") on 12/22 at 11:00, too. I got to sit in on an interview with her in a songwriting class, and she's really super.

2004-12-05T10:37:00.000-08:00

A-run-del High!
Congratulations go out to Mr. Denny Neagle (Class of '86) for having the foresight to avert a DUI charge by hiring a prostitute to blow him in his moving vehicle. This suggests an important question for the greater Gambrills, Md. area: will his mug shot go up on the wall at Kaufmann's, too?

2004-12-02T09:03:00.000-08:00

Holiday Shopping Will Be All Kinds of Fun!
This is what I have to look forward to at my hometown mall. As if being run into by SUV-sized strollers isn't fun enough, I can now look forward to having them stop in front of me and their drivers breaking into calisthenics. This should cause absolutely no disruption as I wander from store to Orange Julius to store.

2004-11-30T14:41:00.000-08:00

The Real Problem
Flipping through USAToday online and saw this report on a Title IX case from Birmingham: a women's high school sports coach complained about unequal access to athletic facilities and was fired; he sued under Title IX; at issue is whether he, as somebody who's not part of the protected class (in this case women), can sue to recover damages.

An interesting case on its own, but it's the passage towards the end of the article that got me to post:

"Litigation against school boards represents a diversion of scarce resources and a distraction from their mission of academic achievement that the nation's schools can ill afford," the National School Boards Association writes in its friend-of-the-court filing.

Ok, it's the fault of people who bring lawsuits to remedy discrimination that the school board can't devote resources to academic resources. If you were devoting the resources in the first place, you wouldn't be getting sued. Let's play the game:

"Lawsuits against the county government accusing it of voting fraud divert necessary funds from the county's mission of ensuring a fair election."
"Lawsuits against the city alleging discrimination on the basis of age in hiring divert city funds from being used to hire the elderly."
"Lawsuits against the doctor for malpractice divert funds from her practice that she would use to treat other patients."
"Lawsuits by women accusing men of rape are diverting the man's resources from supporting himself and his family."

It's a very clever piece of rhetoric. It looks like a cross between the:

I just love these kinds of word games. The art of the sophists still lives in law and political campaigns!

2004-11-29T11:07:00.000-08:00

Getting Ahead of the Curve
TalkingPointsMemo had this post over Thanksgiving weekend about legislative transparency that echos my suggestion. TPM posts some responses from Hill staffers.

2004-11-23T11:45:00.000-08:00

Yak in the Box
Kudos to the folks at Jack in the Box for springing for health insurance for (some of) its hourly employees. Perhaps now its employees will be covered after they eat meals there.

Seriously, though, it is good to see an employer taking a risk on behalf of its employees for a change. We don't know how much of a risk--JitB hasn't said what portion of the premium it will pick up--but it's a start. Also, the benefit only goes to employees with 12 months of tenure, so it's not clear how many people this truly affects. It's a nice perq for people who already have tenure, and a great incentive for people in their 10^th or 11^th month. There are times I wish I were a labor economist because this would be a sweet evaluation opportunity.

2004-11-22T22:24:00.000-08:00

Technological Virtue
The lame duck Congress finally got around to passing some of its main outstanding authorization bills, and so now, only after it has passed and is assured a presidential signautre, has anyone taken the time to read it. Tuesday's Post reports on Congress' new power to snoop in income tax returns, and there is this change overriding state laws to make legal abortions still more difficult to obtain (hat tip to TalkingPointsMemo).

My question is this: why is it not possible to post drafts of legislation to a web server and make them publicly viewable before they become law? If the 535 members of Congress cannot bother to read the legislation (and in fairness to them, it is a shitload to read and probably not physically possible to read), then let 280 million pairs of eyes read it and share in the responsibility?

I realize there is some level at which this may contribute to tyranny of the agrieved and vocal minority faction or even full-scale ochlocracy (mob rule). Just think of the work of the Christian Coalition in late '80s and early '90s. So, perhaps there may be a period during which the people paid to do the work should have first crack at reading it. But, you know what, it's better to find out what the hell is in the bills before they're passed than after they're signed into law. Look at the havoc created by the changes to overtime regulations this summer. (Of course, I can't find a damned thing on Google right this second, but...)

The other thing this accomplishes is that it countes (to a degree) the power of lobbyists to control legislation by controlling specific legislators. Including the citizenry in the effort means the public has a voice in the debate when the outcome is still (at least nominally) in doubt. If ordinary folks--ordinary in the sense that they're just citizens, not that they're a random sample of the populace--that, assuredly, is not the case--can stop Dan Rather from making charges against President Bush stick, imagine what similarly motivated people can do for legislation. This would also give these grass roots groups, left and right, something to do in the time between elections. Is this not a legitimate form of participatory democracy? The open source version of law making.

Update: I neglected to talk about two other key virtues last night, mostly because it was late, but also because I can't seem to keep multiple thoughts in my head at the same time and type and edit. Those virtues would be:

a system to track who makes edits to a document and when (e.g., you have to log on to the server to add/delete/modify items and privileges have to be set for you), and
an electronic "version compare" system to do roughly the equivalent of "document compare" in Word, but a little more sophisticated.

This is not to say that these systems can't be compromised (e.g., stealing someone's password to post edits, bribing someone to post edits), but such things can be tracked and dealt with as they occur. At least we will have someplace to start when investigating who and how something was added.

2004-11-22T09:17:00.000-08:00

And in South Carolina
John Feinstein recommended on NPR this morning that Clemson and South Carolina refuse their bowl invitations for their brawl Saturday, which is ostensibly blamed on the NBA fight of the preceding night.

News Flash: Al-Qaeda blames 9/11 on overpaid NBA players!

There's no bleeping way they will do it. Too much money, and no university president will punish its alumni. What I wonder though is what punishment they will mete out on the players, who they have little interest in protecting. My guess is that some of them will be barred from the game and have their scholarships revoked starting next semester.

Update: Well, I guess I was wrong for a change: both withdrew from bowl consideration. I'm still curious to see what happens to the players. And, I'm especially curious to see what that means for some of the smaller schools/non-money conferences, whether they'll suddenly get to go to some better bowls.

2004-11-22T08:08:00.000-08:00

Can We Blame This on Overpaid Pro Athletes, Too?
I'm sure there's got to be a way to blame this hunting incident on pro sports, the ole post hoc ergo propter hoc. Or, maybe we should blame it on literarture.

2004-11-20T13:55:00.000-08:00

Sports Is Porn
I haven't seen a full tape of the Indiana-Detroit melee. I saw from the foul through the first fight in the stands on the local sports last night. It's nice to know that we will never run out of things to moralize about in the sportsworld, especially sports talk radio. The one silver lining in all this for Ron Artest is that it looks like he'll get his time off to promote his album.

As people griped about who was to blame, why fans have become willing to attack athletes (and vice versa) on the field (e.g., White Sox fans, Cubs fans), near the field (e.g., Yankees bullpen and Red Sox ground crew), and off (e.g., David Wells, Charles Barkley), and people spouted theories about resentment towards players for their salaries, it dawned on me the essential problem is that professional sports is essentially pornography. Socially acceptable porn, but porn nonetheless.

A collection of wealthy individuals and/or companies hire freaks of nature to engage in an activity that anyone can participate in (and does participate in at some point in their lives), but with more skill and technique than the normal person is capable, for enormous sums of money. People watch with a combination of envy and awe. A combustible mix of desire, passion, and frustration, win or lose.
In no other industry are employees as perfectly commodified as they are in sports. Television itself is alienating because it reduces the performers to mere characters in a t.v. show. But we then take their likenesses and sell them in the form of jerseys, baseball cards, magazine and newspaper photos, highlight reels, and talk shows.
Nothing is more reductive than the video games: the person's performance is reduced to a creative representation of 1s and0s that the audience member controls; the players are literally under our thumbs.
What this game's not good enough? Let's switch to the other channel and watch the other people and see if we can get off.
Compare the average career length of a porn star and a pro athlete, especially football. Yet everyone points to the superstars as people who "made it" and ignores the hacks who fill out the rosters or don't even make the rosters.
In no other industry are the employees called on to do the equivalent of an Inside the Actor's Studio before and after performances or even practices with journalists. Porn stars do not have to suffer the indignity of meeting with the press every day. Even politicians might go a day without conducting an interview when in session.
And now players have to answer to the amateur reporter, the blogger, the obsessed fan who centers life around the performance of a particular player/team.
We want our women to look and fuck like porn stars, yet when they do, we fault them for being whores. We do the same to pro athletes. When athletes perform poorly or behave inappropriately, we call them out as social pariahs. When they perform well, we heap ridiculous amounts of praise. But sometimes even winning isn't enough. They should have won by more. They should have called the timeout sooner. They gave the other team a chance to win or make it close.
I won't even include the homoerotic undertones of the performances and descriptions by analysts, attire (e.g., who decided on the tight see through pants? who decided on the loose, off-the-shoulder tank-top for the NBA?), and social customs (e.g., the ass-patting, chest-bumping, the dances over the vanquished).

There are virtues in sports and competition. People can play for reasons other than those virtues: the love of the game; for fun; to earn approval or praise from others. However, the business of professional sports has divorced the virtues from the act in favor of what matters most: making money.

2004-11-19T09:41:00.001-08:00

Suppose I Should Mention
There's a new Slant out this week. Check it out. I wrote the Tom Hanks article.

2004-11-17T11:29:00.000-08:00

It's Just This Easy!
USAToday reports on a study that essentially confirms my diet and exercise regimen. Of course, it helps to be single, live alone, have no children or pets, and a job with flexible hours and good pay. Because I'm sure most people have time in their day to walk 4 miles.

Actually, people probably have the time but don't realize it or are too frazzled by day-to-day life to make it available. I've been on my little productivity kick--which I'm sure annoys people even more than hearing about their latest diet or their latest tale of romance (or romance lost)--and it is amazing how much time you can reclaim...and still make time to blog.

2004-11-16T11:31:00.000-08:00

Three More Options?
Revealing my mid-Atlantic biases, I wonder about three other potential successors:

Sen. George Allen (VA): has the party bona fides, but is in the same Democratic governor situation as Frist.
Sen. Rick Santorum (PA): I still marvel at how Tim Robbins imagined much of this guy in Bob Roberts before he existed. Another Democratic governor though. (Do yourself a favor and watch it. You'll forever be sitting there going, "He's in this? And she's in this?")
Gov. Bob Ehrich (MD): fortunately I haven't had to live in my home state under his governorship and learned first-hand how execrable he is, but he seems like W's kind of guy--somebody to play golf with and speak in trite, conservative, jingoistic soundbites. He also has history going for him (and we have it against us) in Maryland's previous VP, Spiro Agnew.

2004-11-14T15:52:00.000-08:00

Your Nostradamus Blogger
It seems either folks at the LA Times and the New America Foundation are reading my blog, or I'm just truly in tune with the nation's Zeitgeist. This op/ed from today's LA Times calls for an exchange student program in the U.S., eerily similar to what I posted last week. I need to start keeping tallies on this sort of thing.

Also, read this month's article in Esquire on Bill Murray. (It's not available online, but you can see him on the cover for the Dec. 2004 Genius issue.) The man is a comedic genius, and it provides a wonderful counterpoint to the impression one might have of him after reading this year's profile of Harold Ramis (whom I also enjoy immensely for different reasons) in The New Yorker.

2004-11-13T20:43:00.000-08:00

Curses, Foiled Again
Vice-President Dick Cheney once again disappointed Democrats by surviving a mystery illness that required him to be hospitalized. When ABC interrupted its college football coverage today with report of Cheney's hospitalization for what is now described as "shortness of breath," Democrats thought their prayers for his sudden death had been answered. Apparently the president intervened by praying for Cheney's speedy recovery.

This does raise an interesting question: what happens if the Veep dies before Dec. 13, the date electors cast their ballots and re-elect Bush and Cheney as president and vice-president? The short answer is: the electors can do whatever they want. Some states require their electors to vote for whom they're slated, but it's not clear whether they'd be required to vote for a dead man. One option is to posthumously re-elect Cheney, and then appoint a new vice-president. The other option is for the Republicans to put forward a nominee before Dec. 13 and encourage the electors to vote for this man.

This is where things get interesting, and it poses a significant test of the Republicans' unity: who the Hell would they pick? And would they try to wait or get it done early?

I'll take the latter question first. It's likely they'd try to wait because (a) they'd probably want to "honor" Cheney by re-electing him and (b) they'd need to buy time to find the right candidate. However, the longer they wait, the more potential for dissension and politicking for the job threatens to tear the party apart. So, the best case scenario is they have someone in mind who meets their ideological standards, won't piss off the party, and won't mind waiting until Jan. 20 to be appointed and confirmed.

So, we come back to the first question: who would be that person?

Jeb is out because of post-JFK anti-nepotism laws. Presumably that rules out daddy, too.

Would he go for some Reds from the Blue States? Does Giuliani's 9/11 associations trump his socially liberal background? He probably plays better nationally than he does to the Far Right. Does Pataki get to be the Nelson Rockefeller of his generation? Can the executive branch afford to have two lightweights at the top of the management pyramid?

An obvious choice is Sen. Bill Frist, the Senate majority leader. He's on the short list for '08 for sole reason that he's the beloved of W. However, Tennessee has a Democratic governor and presumably he'd pick a Democrat to replace Frist. Would the Republicans trade a Senate seat to get Frist into the VP slot? Probably, but not necessarily.

If they would, it'd be funny if Gov. Bredesen selected one Albert Gore, and almost as funny if he picked Rep. Jim Cooper, who lost to Frist for this same Senate seat in 1994. I think we can count Gore out, but you never know. Cooper would be the favorite, but it might be interesting to see Rep. Harold Ford get the leg up as he may have planned a run for Frist's seat in '06.

If they wouldn't, or if found Frist to be more valuable as majority leader, who else is there? Ashcroft needs a job. Or maybe Zell Miller. (Ever the comedian.) McCain leaps to mind, and Democrats would love to push him for the spot. But he has the same Democratic governor problem, and it's not clear the Far Right would support him. Neither is he "on board" with the neo-Con agenda. I'd say he's probably out. Powell has the stature, but probably wouldn't be considered or consider it if offered for similar reasons.

Would he try to make history and appoint Condi? Imagine a black woman a heartbeat away from the presidency: would the South go for it? Apart from her disappointing foreign policy analytic skills and national security mismanagement, you would think her lack of domestic policy experience would be a drawback, too.

I am skipping over some obvious names like Hastert and DeLay becasue they seem to have too much baggage and are too valuable running roughshod over the House. I suppose Frist is the most likely choice and the Republicans can afford the seat. Second best bet is Rice. I'll have to think some more on who else to consider.

2004-11-12T11:10:00.000-08:00

Counterpoint
On the other hand, maybe flamethrowing will make it all better.

2004-11-11T10:11:00.000-08:00

What Now?
Krugman's latest op-ed piece in the Times says Democrats can't succumb to defeatism or parrotting the Repbulicans' family values schtick. In particular, he suggests the following:

Yes, Democrats need to make it clear that they support personal virtue, that they value fidelity, responsibility, honesty and faith. This shouldn't be a hard case to make: Democrats are as likely as Republicans to be faithful spouses and good parents, and Republicans are as likely as Democrats to be adulterers, gamblers or drug abusers. Massachusetts has the lowest divorce rate in the country; blue states, on average, have lower rates of out-of-wedlock births than red states.

But Democrats are not going to get the support of people whose votes are motivated, above all, by their opposition to abortion and gay rights (and, in the background, opposition to minority rights). All they will do if they try to cater to intolerance is alienate their own base.

I wonder if perhaps there needs to be an equivalent of a foreign exchange program within the nation. Instead of sending our kids to live with a family in Belgium and taking in a teenager from Switzerland, we should swap kids between Kansas and Vermont. Given the popularity of all these family-member swapping programs, there seems to at least be cultural interest in it, though that may be driven by the fact that it's other people doing it for our own entertainment.

Still, it would be interesting to start a cultural exchange program among high school students (maybe 10th graders?). Maybe it's a just a semester. Maybe you pair kids between families so the two kids experience each others' hometowns. And sure, you could turn it into a t.v. show if necessary.

2004-11-10T11:58:00.000-08:00

Missed Opportunities
If you look at the electoral map by county (e.g., this week's Newsweek, this page from the LATimes), you will see that most of the blue areas in the South run along the lower (and upper) Mississippi River and the Ohio. While these may reflect racial patterns, I doubt it explains all the support. I maintain, as I have argued previously, that Kerry and the DNC missed a chance by not fighting in these areas. If Kerry wins Arkansas (6 electoral votes) and Louisiana (9), it's a 30-point swing, making it Bush 271, Kerry 267. That's spitting distance, without even considering Missouri. I guess the question is, could he still have won the Great Lakes states while working the lower Mississippi into his campaign? I'd wager that he could have, but it's too late to worry about now.

2004-11-09T09:39:00.000-08:00

Conspiracy Theory 101
If your liberal friends haven't sent you this link already, feel free to link yourself.

I don't know how true this is, but I wouldn't put it past them. I do know that Karl Rove (subscription required) appears to be a graduate of the Donald Segretti school of campaign sabotage. For those who haven't read the Rove article and can't get the subscription, it basically describes how in several Alabama contests he used whisper campaigns against opponents and even self-sabotaged campaigns to give his candidates martyr status in their races. I'll bring the article in this week and post some excerpts.

2004-11-08T15:51:00.000-08:00

Thanks for Playing
Michael Phelps can kiss any chances of winning SI's Sportsman of the Year goodbye.

2004-11-08T14:09:00.000-08:00

Follow the Leader
I'm just back from a few days in Atlanta and then a few days in Birmingham. On the election: As much as I hate the outcome, I take significant solace in being right about the election's outcome.

The highlight of the post-election orgasm in the Red States? I'd say it is this message left on my windshield in a Greater Birmingham parking lot, presumably inspired by my Kerry-Edwards bumper sticker:

HA: Karry Lost
Bush won! How is
Better now fuck'er

All mangled language and syntax is in the original. I'm especially fond of the superfluous apostrophe. And there's nothing like delirium-induced dyslexia. I'd say this pretty much sums up the Bush experience: the ignorant showboating about their ignorance. America has officially become the fifth grade.

2004-11-01T22:54:00.000-08:00

Prediction Time
Sadly, I'm standing by my pessimism and picking Bush with about 300-310 electoral votes. I just think all these fence-sitters are going to jump on Bush. The difference between this election and previous elections where the undecided break for the challenger is that I imgaine they're all peacetime votes. I just find it hard to believe the American public can separate its loyalty to the troops from its loyalty to the particular man who is Commander-in-Chief, no matter how poor a job he's doing.

On the other hand, there is a part of me that really looks forward to Kerry winning the electoral vote and Bush losing the popular vote. And even if Kerry wins outright, I long to see Republican flag-wavers rally behind President Kerry with the same patriotic enthusiasm for President Bush. God, that'll be fucking fun! And I'll take some incredible dare if I'm wrong and the flag-wavers truly rally behind President Kerry. But, as I said above, I think the senator will lose.

2004-10-31T09:45:00.000-08:00

Weird Dream
I almost forgot to mention that I dreamed I was checking into a hotel in some big city (maybe my upcoming Atlanta trip?) and John Kerry was there greeting people getting on the elevators. He was dressed kind of dissheveled, looked like he'd been up campaigning for a long damn time with his coat off, shirt a little wrinkled and untucked. I shook hands with him and said something encouraging, and he asked where are you from, and I said Nashville...and it just totally threw him. It was like he didn't know how to respond or make small talk about my being from Nashville. I hope that's not enough to keep him from winning, but I wonder if that will spell his doom Tue. Like I've said before, his losing may spare him a shitload of grief because, seriously, who really wants to take responsibility for cleaning up this mess?

2004-10-31T09:06:00.000-08:00

61
Well, I finally crossed the magical 60 lb. barrier yesterday. Down to 192.2 from 253+. Again, it's probably measurement error after exercising yesterday since I had crossed back under this a.m., but we take enjoyment even in flukes, especially when they're headed in the right direction. Even my size 34 pants are starting to feel loose.

If I get under 190, I will officially be at my skinniest (or more precisely lightest) since Aug. 1992, perhaps Feb. 1992 since I started creeping up after my college swimming career, such as it was, ended.

2004-10-28T14:23:00.000-07:00

Race is Tightening...
No, not the presidential race. The race for Sports Illustrated's Sportsman of the Year. If I were handicapping, Pat Tillman would be the leading candidate, and I'd say Curt Schilling has overtaken Lance Armstrong for 2nd place. Michael Phelps is probably 4th, maybe 3rd. If it were my vote, I'd go Schilling, Phelps, Tillman, Armstrong. I can't seem to find any actual odds on the Internet.

One note on Phelps: I didn't realize this, but apparently he was a volunteer coach at Loyola College (Md.), my alma mater, for the '03-'04 season. But, I believe he's off to Ann Arbor this year.

2004-10-25T16:04:00.000-07:00

Count Along with Bono
Perhaps Bono spent too much time visiting the Bush administration over African debt relief. You've no doubt seen the iTunes ads featuring U2's newest single, Vertigo. Listen to Bono's countdown though: "Uno, dos, tres, catorce!" For the Spanish-impaired, that's: "1, 2, 3, 14!" Perhaps there's a MENSA puzzle that rationalizes this series.

2004-10-25T14:43:00.000-07:00

Now I Get It
In the past week the Bush administration's Iraq/War on Terror has made sense to me. It took the unique phrasing of W's speeches--e.g., "Where does the senator think [al-Zarqawi]'d be? Opening a small business?"--for me to finally get it.

By attacking Iraq, the administration is fusing anti-American and pro-Islamic sentiment in such a way as to draw Al-Qaeda to into Iraq in order to divert Al-Qaeda's resources from planning against the United States. It doesn't matter whether Al-Qaeda ever had connections with Iraq, the U.S. was going to force Al-Qaeda to make a strategic decision: to focus solely on attacking the U.S. in the U.S., or attack American forces in the Middle East to thwart a democratic Iraqi regime. If they focus solely on the U.S., other Islamic interests in the Middle East suffer, including the disrespect of having the infidels on their holy lands; if they defend Iraq, then they divert resources from direct attacks on the U.S.

At one level, this is a pretty clever plan. Essentially, the U.S. uses its military as a decoy, drawing fire from the enemy so that everyone else back home can go along shopping and blogging without fearing a huge attack. If Iraq ends up democratic, great. But, it doesn't matter because the war uses up resources at Al-Qaeda's disposal, which may be diminishing through other global efforts (e.g., freezing accounts, anti-money laundering operations). It is a war of attrition, modeled after the Cold War--as the administration has been outlining--in which we count on our economic superiority and "will to win" to outlast the terrorists.

The flaw in the logic is that it assumes Al-Qaeda cannot (a) engage us in Iraq and within our borders simultaneously and (b) continue to raise sufficient funds to meet its objectives. That Al-Qaeda has not attacked within our borders since 9/11 is not evidence that they cannot attack again. It was 8 years between the first WTC bombing and 9/11. Globally, it was about 5 years between the first WTC and the embassy bombings in Africa; a year later they hit the USS Cole. They are patient and opportunistic, and it is unlikely that Operation Iraqi Freedom will make them impatient and less opportunistic. And with oil in the $50+ price range, plentiful poppy fields, antipathy toward America, and sufficient black market experience, it'll be a while before Al-Qaeda runs short of funds.

Finally, it is a less than honest or effective way to use our military, to treat them as RPG-fodder so we can shop online in peace.

2004-10-24T16:30:00.000-07:00

Weighting Game
No news on the weight front in terms of poundage. Still hovering at about 196. However, in other ways, I've noticed changes:

I can now wear size 33 pants (and not bust the buttons either)
I can now wear a L shirt rather an XXL (though XL is still probably better)

Hmm...I guess that's it. But, going from about size 38 and XXL to 33 and L isn't too shabby. I figure if I can get into the mid-180s, I'll be set.

2004-10-23T14:49:00.000-07:00

Plurality Rules
I was just thinking about the election and the chances that Bush wins again with less than a majority of the popular vote: That would mark the fourth consecutive presidential election (Clinton '92/'96 and Bush '00/'04) without a majority of the popular vote. Freaky.

I also have been thinking on the red state-blue state division. It occurs to me that the nation may become more red state in the coming two decades because of decisions to have children. Specifically, if red states are more "family-oriented" and express that by having larger families on average, could this cement their majorities? Could red state people in blue states (e.g., rural New England) nudge things to the red side?

To the extent that the blue states are more urban and urbane, I would expect them to have lower birth rates and smaller family sizes, limiting their capacity to shape statewide elections. The only remaining hope for the blue states is immigration (new immigrants tend to have larger families and be more Democratic leaning) and migration of the blue-thinking people from red states. The problem is red states can expand their size more quickly.

On the other hand, it's not a lock that every child will share their parents' political leanings, but I would bet it's correlated enough to lock us into a red state future.

2004-10-21T09:36:00.000-07:00

Miserable Sad
Changing your life is incredibly difficult, especially when the change involves somebody you love and care about. So now I find myself having to adapt to my new commitment to graduation and focusing on my life in Nashville without the most important part of my life there to support, encourage, and guide me. And it's all my fault because I chose to pursue this path. It's damned hard not to pick up the phone and call, not to reflexively make mental notes of things to tell her later tonight, not to wonder how her day is going. So, I still do the latter two things and fight the urge to call or email. The immediate future looks long and sad.

In "silver lining" news , I started my area paper (a prelude to my dissertation proposal and dissertation). I have a new "2 hours or 2 pages" rule: I have to write at least 2 hours or until I add 2 pages of text to the area paper. Two days in, I've got 4 pages written. I've also set aside a 30 min block to type in or download citations to my bibliography. These are not huge amounts of time obviously, but lately I've been working on the Grand Canyon theory of accomplishment (i.e., epochal erosion yields natural wonder).

2004-10-15T09:03:00.000-07:00

Crazy Year
Today I turn 34. In the past year, I've:

Become a legitimate freelance writer
Become a movie producer
Lost 59 lbs (down to 194.6 this morning)
Published three scholarly articles as first author
Flirted with moving to New York or Chicago, before deciding to stay in Nashville
Set in motion plans to end a 7-year romantic relationship this coming weekend.

Have I done enough this year? Here's to hoping that all this change and productivity bear fruit this year.

P.S. I'm still pessimistic about Kerry's chances. Maybe this year's change will be: "be less pessimistic about things."

2004-10-07T13:28:00.000-07:00

Visionary Stern
I was listening to the local sports talk radio here, and they mentioned that NBC will institute a 5-second delay on NASCAR races starting this week. This got me thinking about Howard Stern's move to Sirius. I wonder what will be left of broadcast t.v. and radio in 10 years.

If I were NBC (or one of the other networks), I might try expanding into the premium cable or satellite t.v./radio markets. First, the network can use it to develop experimental shows relatively free from "taste" issues regarding nudity, swearing, etc. Second, people who are interested in realistic or adult-focused programming are willing to pay to avoid the PAX-ification of primetime and sports lineups. The network can recoup its development costs through subscriber fees. Third, the nets can use these shows as a source of content for the flagship station (e.g., sanitize a show from the satellite world and rebroadcast for the masses a la Queer Eye's treatment with its Bravo purchase), or use the satellite as an outlet for repurposing shows from the flagship (e.g., air "Joey" thousands of times until enough people have been exposed).

2004-10-06T17:38:00.000-07:00

Weight Update
I haven't posted any weight news in a while because I haven't been exercising and haven't been seeing huge drops in weight. I stopped treadmillng for the past 3 weeks because I have some sort of tendinitis in my knee. However, I noticed that I am still losing a little weight. I'm down to 195.2 lbs, which is 58 lbs overall.

The secret? I think it's that I am awake for an extra 2 hrs per day now. The stress of the job situation made it to wear I would wake up at 5:00 a.m. and not get back to sleep, so I just started getting up and doing stuff, mostly cleaning my apartment or throwing stuff away or whatever. Well, let's say I normally get 8 hrs of sleep per night. That means 16 hrs awake. Now, take 2 hrs of sleep away per night. I've increased my regular daily energy requirements by 12.5%. And the fact that I am doing something beyond sitting in front of the t.v. or computer screen, the increase may be greater.

2004-10-06T09:35:00.001-07:00

Veepstakes
I'd have to say last night was fairly even in terms of effectiveness of each candidate. Accuracy is another matter, but if you look at the 90 minutes they were together, each had his own positive and negative moments. Some random observations:

Cheney loses those who vote based on posture: Does Cheney have some sort of degenerative back disease, or is he auditioning for The Hunchback of Notre Dame after he leaves office?
Is this thing on?: A related issue is why Cheney couldn't keep from rustling his damned microphone. The first point explains why, but I guess I'm wondering whether he couldn'tve adjusted it in some way or recognized the effect.
Edwards, the eager beaver: I wonder whether Edwards' leaning forward comes across as "engaged" or "too eager to please."
Obvious observations: I'm sick of post-analysis analysis which points out that the debates reinforce pre-existing perceptions of the candidates. This is kind of a "duh" comment at this point. They need to sift through and find the moments where Cheney was persuasive even to Democrats and Edwards was persuasive even to Republicans. I'd say Cheney busting on Edwards for his attendance was good. I thought his Howard Dean line was effective and would have been more so had he been able to sit upright. I liked his reference to El Salvador; I'm not sure I buy it as an analogy, but I thought it was likely effective.
Hand wringing: Was anybody as shocked as I was to see Cheney fidgeting with his hands, particularly at the beginning? He looked like he was doing a C. Montgomery Burns impression. How did the debate prep folks not catch this? It revealed his unease with the questions and/or format. I'm not fond of all Edwards' gesticulations, but his rarely fall into a negative stereotype.
Win for Gwen: Except for a few stumbles on the order of whose turn to respond, I thought she did a pretty good job of picking questions. Some were odd (e.g., Cheney pointing out, "You want me to respond about his qualifications?"), but she had some stuff that threw the candidates. The AIDS question is obvious, but the "without mentioning your running mate by name" rule on responding to one of her questions was great because it forced the candidates to speak outside of their programming (and revealed that Edwards had a tough time deprogramming). Actually, I noticed this with the trial for which I was a juror. The plaintiff's attorney repeatedly violated a rule about using the first names of his clients, in part because I'm sure that's how he practiced and it threw him to have to adapt.

2004-10-06T09:35:00.000-07:00

Cheney loses those who vote based on posture: Does Cheney have some sort of degenerative back disease, or is he auditioning for The Hunchback of Notre Dame after he leaves office?
Is this thing on?: A related issue is why Cheney couldn't keep from rustling his damned microphone. The first point explains why, but I guess I'm wondering whether he couldn'tve adjusted it in some way or recognized the effect.
Edwards, the eager beaver: I wonder whether Edwards' leaning forward comes across as "engaged" or "too eager to please."
Obvious observations: I'm sick of post-analysis analysis which points out that the debates reinforce pre-existing perceptions of the candidates. This is kind of a "duh" comment at this point. They need to sift through and find the moments where Cheney was persuasive even to Democrats and Edwards was persuasive even to Republicans. I'd say Cheney busting on Edwards for his attendance was good. I thought his Howard Dean line was effective and would have been more so had he been able to sit upright. I liked his reference to El Salvador; I'm not sure I buy it as an analogy, but I thought it was likely effective.
Hand wringing: Was anybody as shocked as I was to see Cheney fidgeting with his hands, particularly at the beginning? He looked like he was doing a C. Montgomery Burns impression. How did the debate prep folks not catch this? It revealed his unease with the questions and/or format. I'm not fond of all Edwards' gesticulations, but his rarely fall into a negative stereotype.
Win for Gwen: Except for a few stumbles on the order of whose turn to respond, I thought she did a pretty good job of picking questions. Some were odd (e.g., Cheney pointing out, "You want me to respond about his qualifications?"), but she had some stuff that threw the candidates. The AIDS question is obvious, but the "without mentioning your running mate by name" rule on responding to one of her questions was great because it forced the candidates to speak outside of their programming (and revealed that Edwards had a tough time deprogramming). Actually, I noticed this with the trial for which I was a juror. The plaintiff's attorney repeatedly violated a rule about using the first names of his clients, in part because I'm sure that's how he practiced and it threw him to have to adapt.

2004-10-01T13:25:00.000-07:00

A War Worth Winning?
No, not Iraq--the presidency. While I thought Kerry summarily trounced the president (not that he was perfect, just immeasurably superior), it occurred to me: why in god's name does he want to stick himself with this cluster fuck in Iraq? Unless he can get the rest of the world to participate and deliver on all the things that need to happen to succeed over ther--which looks fairly impossible no matter who wins the election--all that can happen is for Kerry and the Democrats to get the blame for everything wrong: It may be impossible to win even if he gets all the support of the world, so he looks inept as a leader for not winning; if he can't get everyone together and we lose Iraq, he didn't deliver on his promise to bring in the world, etc.

Now, maybe they could out-Rove the Republicans in the coming year (i.e., blame it on the predecessor), but I doubt they could make it work. Maybe Bush needs to win so that things get even worse over there to improve the Democrats' chances in 2008. A rather tarnished silver lining in a Bush victory.

2004-09-30T14:53:00.000-07:00

Decision '04
Alright, the perseverating is over: I've decided to stay in Nashville and pass up the job in NYC. I decided finishing the Ph.D. is too important not to do. Even a chronic procrastinator has to finish eventually, right? A procrastinator who doesn't finish is just a loser, and I don't need that.

While I will be staying, it will mean a whole bunch of changes here to reorganize my life around getting finished. We'll see where blogging ends up in the sorting process, but for now, it's still o.k. because I haven't made my lists yet.

So, onto that other campaign...I think the best I can hope for is that Kerry's performance over the past few weeks has been so uniformly awful that by being even marginally better than he has been the perception will be that he has done tremendously, giving him a boost in the buzz factor. If I get greedy, maybe he will have actually improved his speaking style and clarity. Sadly, I think we're likely to see a reinforcement of everyone's perceptions. Sigh.

2004-09-27T15:34:00.000-07:00

Back for More
Hey, I'm back for a bit. Kind of overloaded with "what am I doing with my life" questions over whether to take this job in NY. Leaning towards going, but not 100% committed.

On the bright side, some new freelance stuff may be in the offing come January.

On the campaign, I have the following suggestion for the Kerry-Edwards ad team. Try the slogan, "This is Success?" in t.v. ads, with an avalanche of negative images of the past 4 years (sans 9/11), including Abu Ghraib, snapshots from the beheadings (pre-beheading), newspaper headlines with "no WMD" and job layoffs and deficit rising, GAO reports about the secret energy meetings, the Medicare Rx boondoggle, etc. Then cut to, "I can't think of any mistakes I've made" from that press conference. Then some happy music showing Kerry-Edwards, a brief v.o. of how they will lead America forward (blah-blah), and the slogan, "This is SUCCESS!"

2004-09-16T11:37:00.000-07:00

Wish I'd Thought of It
Some people think of great ideas, some people have money, some people do both. An investment banker bought blocks of tickets for the Dodgers-Giants game and is reselling them with a stipulation that he gets Bonds' 700th home run ball (if it's hit there) and he gets to resell the ball and split the proceeds 50-50. At $10 a ticket he only has to sell about 2260 of the 6458 seats to make back his purchase.

2004-09-16T08:06:00.000-07:00

Willkommen, Herr Jefferson
The U.S. Mint continues its currency makeover with new nickels unveiled yesterday. Instead of Jefferson's profile, the Mint substituted a publicity still from his starring role in a Colonial production of Cabaret. For the back of the nickel, which currently features Jefferson's home, Monticello, the Mint chose two alternate images, a buffalo and scene of the Pacific Ocean. The images will remind Americans of the natural beauty buried under the nation's Super Wal-Marts and strip malls.

2004-09-15T13:31:00.000-07:00

McGreevey Effect
Kerry seems to be fulfilling my McGreevey Prophecy. Newsweek said in this week's issue that NJ is back in play, as Kerry's double-digit lead tumbles to single digits. The LATimes' poll synthesis concurs. It is interesting though to see the discrepancies between the maps, particularly all the "no recent poll" information in the LAT.

2004-09-15T06:03:00.000-07:00

Life After Seinfeld
I was at least as annoyed about all the Father of the Pride promos on NBC during the Olympics. However, I gave the show a shot based on reviews about how funny Siegfried and Roy were, even though they aren't the stars. The reviews are correct about them, and the show is good enough to keep you around until S&R reappear.

I noticed during the intro credits that Peter Mehlman wrote the episode. Mehlman was a Seinfeld writer, who put together the Virgin episode (starring a pre-Frasier Jane Leeves and JFK, Jr.), the Implants (starring the pre-Superman Teri Hatcher), and the Yada Yada episode (a pre-Will & Grace Debra Messing...also a post-Ned & Stacy Debra Messing). That alone should be sufficient incentive for you to give the show a shot.

2004-09-09T22:50:00.000-07:00

When I'm the All-Being, Master of Time, Space and Dimension^*...
I will do away with GEICO advertisements. The sheer volume of ads, on both t.v. and radio, is obnoxious enough; but, to have such a variety of shitty ads is overwhelming.

I wonder if this is a Tennessee thing, because in addition to GEICO, the next most common set of ads is for 1-800-Safe-Auto, followed by Direct Insurance. I know Tennessee only recently mandated universal car insurance, but sheesh...it's like televised spam.

Rapidly rising the charts of advertising annoyance, however, is the Tennessee Lotto's new Cash 5 game, featuring Elvis impersonators singing an Elvis-inspired lottery jingle. Happy for the jingle industry, but ready to decapitate myself to spare myself from further exposure.

^* Courtesy: Mr. Steve Martin.

2004-09-08T15:54:00.000-07:00

Ready...Set...Panic!!!
Well, it looks like I will get the offer in NYC. Now I have to decide whether I really want to move to NYC and figure out how to find someplace cheap (o.k., affordable) to live. Craziness. Feel free to email ideas and leads. The job is on the Upper East Side (90's).

2004-09-07T08:51:00.000-07:00

Retail Nation
As you know from your occasional visits to this site, I am facing the prospect of a possible move from Nashville to New York City. Whether I go or not, I am taking the opportunity to clear out a bunch of crap from my apartment. For example, I gave away about 40 t-shirts and dress shirts to Goodwill. Yes, I have a lot of crap.

It has also been an opportunity for me to learn the magic of online retailing. I set up my PayPal eBay account, but haven't listed anything there yet. I also set some books out for sale at Amazon.com:

All the books listed together and separately below;
Massage for Dummies;
The Practical Dreamer's Handbook;
Pilates: The Way Forward;
Time Management for Dummies.

It's amazing what you learn about a person when you go through their books.

2004-09-02T06:19:00.000-07:00

It's Over
I looked at the electoral map in this week's Newsweek, and it's official: Kerry's fucked! (Scroll down in the link to the map. You can safely Donna Brazile's associated advice column, not simply because she led the terrible Gore2000 campaign, but because she offers no real insights...but read it if you must.)

With the exception of New Mexico, Kerry will have successfully marginalized himself and the party, restricting his electoral votes to the North Atlantic and Pacific coasts and parts of the Great Lakes. Great work, guys!

(I shouldn't blog this early in the morning...I'm awfully cranky!...And prone to using exclamation points!)

2004-09-02T06:10:00.000-07:00

Don't You See? It Was Consensual Because I Consented
Good Lord! After reading Kobe's statement after his case was dismissed, it's a good thing Kobe has terrific lawyers. Could you imagine if he had to use a public defender and ended up testifying? Is this not tantamount to an admission of guilt? This should give new hope to rapists and date rapists across America. "Gee, your honor, I sure thought it was consensual. I guess I misinterpreted her muffled cries from beneath the gag and her sluggishness from the gallon of vodka she drank, and the Rohypnol I gave her before I knew how drunk she'd get, as signs she was getting into it." Congratulations, Kobe!

2004-08-31T17:55:00.000-07:00

That Depends on What the Meaning of "Win" Is
Who's the flip-flopper in this campaign? When a Republican, say, the president corrects a statement, he is simply clarifying his statement's meaning. Democrats never misspeak; when they edit their statements, they're flip-floppers. Didn't anybody teach you this in political science or Bible school class?

2004-08-30T09:25:00.000-07:00

A Standup Guy
For those who like to point to Iverson as the walking symbol of Team USA's failings in Greece, I point you to Gene Wojnarowski's excellent defense of Iverson's performance. Many of you will dismiss it as "loser talk," but I found Larry Brown's constant carping about his team to more clearly embody a loser's mentality. Were it not for this past season's NBA championship, Brown might have been the fall guy.

This is not to say that USA Basketball doesn't deserve the majority of the blame for its selections, leaving off the handful of basketball players who can shoot above 40% from the outside. But, once you've picked your team, you have to make the best you can of what you have rather than bitch about the state of basketball in this country or the failings of your players.

2004-08-30T08:48:00.000-07:00

Opening Second Front Against Drunk Driving
I've seen some recent reports about declines in drunk driving, and Tennessee has a huge drunk driving campaign that emphasizes revocation of your driver's license and significant jail time. However, I'm not sure it's the driving that is a big of a problem as the drinking.

Suppose instead (or more usefully, additionally) we issued a new driver's license that includes a code (or some sort of marking whether a Scarlet Letter-esque graphic or just a letter) that says, "I may not purchase alcohol" for some length of time (60 days, 180 days, 2 years, 5 years, whatever).

Stores and servers already inspect licenses for age, now they'd have to check for this code. In bars, it might be a bit more complicated (e.g., could bars refuse access to the facility entirely?), but there are workarounds for most problems.

I know this wouldn't be 100% effective any more than restricting sales to 21 year olds has stopped under aged drinking. However, it seems like a relatively low cost effort for states to cut down on drinking (as well as drinking and driving) and raises the cost of drinking to the person convicted of DUI (e.g., they have to bargain with friends to get them alcohol, they have to get fake IDs). Also, the risk of not being able to purchase alcohol at all for some period of time might deter those at the margin from drinking over the threshold of legal intoxication and encourage them to use cabs or other alternatives: you might not take that extra drink if it means you can't (easily) drink again for another year).

I think the restriction might be an extra inducement to help friends exert peer pressure against the offender to stop his/her drinking because they can no longer say, "It's their choice. I can't stop them from buying alcohol." Now, they would have the power to say no.

Also, regardless of its effectiveness, I think it provides a powerfully symbolic policy against excessive drinking. Just an idea.

2004-08-27T09:11:00.000-07:00

You Can't Describe How You Feel? How Shocking!
I can't complain too much about the Olympics coverage, mostly because I haven't watched a whole lot of it. Having a job, vacationing in a disaster area, and not having cable have interfered with my t.v. quota.

The one thing I have gotten tired of is post-race interviews which ask, "How does it feel to have (won/lost/finaled/finished/lost your limb)?" and other variations thereon, to which the response is always: "You know, I just can't really describe it." Why should we expect people that make their living doing something physical to demonstrate a similar verbal dexterity about their emotional state? Maybe someday we'll just be able to run them through a brain scanner and look at what emotional centers are activated. Then we'll know what they're feeling! Or, at least, where and how they are feeling it. Can we replace them with trained psychologists at least?

Olympic interviewers are no worse than the other journalistic disasters (e.g., local t.v. reporters, sports sideline reporters, me), but it's time we or the networks develop a penalty system, fining reporters who ask such ridiculously stupid, open-ended questions. Or make a drinking game out of it, whichever is easier.

2004-08-27T09:09:00.000-07:00

New Article
Here's an article I wrote for the Tennessean previewing the new Cottage Living magazine. For comparison purposes, here is USAToday's version.

2004-08-25T08:19:00.000-07:00

"I Invented That, But Then I Found Out They Had It Already"
The immortal words of Bill Blazejowski (Michael Keaton) in Night Shift have been the story of my creative life. Everytime I come up with the idea for something, within a few days or months I find out that thing already exists. The examples are too numerous to name, but this week presented two examples.

Exhibit A from this week is the idea of a postage-paid postcards. I know the post office sells them, but they're very generic. But, suppose when you bought a postcard your postage was already included on the card? That's always the biggest nuisance in buying a card in the first place. The only handicaps are that postage rates increase (which can be handled by better inventory management by suppliers and shops) and international rates will be higher and vary by location (which can be handled by making foreign-postage versions and tinkering with pricing strategies). In fact, I thought this would be an ideal ebusiness for somebody, especially for holidays and stuff as a substitute for greeting cards and such.

Turns out that the post office is already in this business.

Exhibit B comes from the world of animation. I always thought it was surprising that as realistic as Pixar and Dreamworks draw characters that it would not be far-fetched to see somebody use Flash animation to make their own animated porn movies. I know such movies have existed in the past (Fritz the Cat, for example), and I figured there's probably a niche for this already, though I don't run in those circles. It's obviously only a small step from strip poker video games, not to mention characters like Jessica Rabbit, and video broads like Lara Croft. On top of that, it's disease-free and avoids diffident or drugged out starlets and stars. Heck, I could imagine there would be a time where actors/models would license their images to video game makers so that you could, as Dennis Miller used to say, fuck Claudia Schiffer in your barcalounger for $19.95.

Well, apparently Playboy is beating a path down this road with a new spread featuring animated characters from video games. It's not hard to imagine a sort of sexual Dungeons & Dragons emerging where you could design women on your computer, a la Weird Science, and play interactive "games" with your creations.

Yes, I'm procrastinating.

2004-08-25T07:23:00.000-07:00

New Year's Day
Well, school is back in session. To celebrate, a new edition of the The Slant.

2004-08-24T15:19:00.000-07:00

Comeback Kid
I know I've been gone a while. I caught the aftermath of Hurricane Charley from Tampa over to Daytona. I'll fill you in on that when I get a chance. Quick observation on Orlando though: when did it become a territory of the British Empire? I heard more varieties of British accents than Henry Higgins.

On the Olympic gymnastics controversies, my question is this: how can there be disagreement or uncertainty about start values? In diving, the diver writes out the list of dives with the degree of difficulty, signs it, and submits it to the officials, who review it and put it on the board. The dive announced is the dive written on the sheet and that's the dive you perform. You do a different dive, it's a failed dive.

Now, given the complexity of combinations, gymnasts need some flexibility (ha-ha) in terms of move choices (e.g., you know after your round off back handspring you won't be able to add the full twist to your double-back). That's fine, but they obviously have some process for determining a start value--it can't be that hard to submit the list correctly and get the start value posted correctly. Do they even post/display/announce the start values in the gym like they do in diving? Seriously, do we have to waith for Al Trautwig--a definite improvement over John Tesh--to ask Tim Daggett about the start value after the routine? Why is this not part of the information about the person's name and country of origin?

If it's posted incorrectly, that might be the time to raise hell, although it should really happen at the time the list is submitted: you hand in your routine with your presented start value, the official signs off on the start value or if you disagree, you figure out a start value that both can sign to (all of which is done x minutes before the start of competition for that day). This is not the most complicated thing in the world, and it is not unreasonable to expect the least subjective element of the gymnastics scoring process to be error free.

I'm not sure what you can do to fix the scoring biases. It seems inherent to any rating system, like the BCS in college football. The judges already have the deduction scales for each deficiency (just as in diving--in fact, in diving you could theoretically get a negative score with all the deductions). Reputational effects abound in most of these instances (favorite divers, favorite college football teams/conferences, favorite gymnasts, calling balls and strikes, calling pass interference) with each judge having her/his own tastes.

However, one option might be to review judges' ratings over time to identify patterns of variability in ratings. You should be able to identify judges who consistently score (one or two standard deviations) above the average, below the average, or above/below final scores for particular gymnasts or teams, and penalize judges who show problems. You could also work out models for trend effects within competitions (the tendency for later performers to be scored higher than later ones, or early performer to be judged more harshly than later ones--I think there's literature on these kinds of effects).

Now, this does little to address all problems like upward bias ("grade inflation") in scores (you can reduce variance at the top of the scale by scoring people closer to 10.o, or 6.o for skating) and this might penalize judges who preserve standards (e.g., most judges inflate somebody to 9.90 but you hold firm to the 9.70 they deserved and get penalized for being outside the norm), but I think there are workable solutions to all of this. The data certainly exist to evaluate these patterns, and based on the patterns we should be able to determine incentive structures that fix the problems.