Rhetorical questions, questionable rhetoric and whimsical observations about the absurdities of contemporary life:
Never trust a man with a pocket watch, an ascot or a manicure.
Life ain't easy these days. Not when the movers and shakers keep moving the goal posts instead of leveling the playing field, while the rest of us have to have a multitask mind-set while fighting a never-ending learning curve. So all you can do is hit the ground running, play hardball when you have to step up to the plate, and at the end of the day, pick all the low-hanging fruit.
Let's face it, the fat cats have us on an emotional roller-coaster, no matter how much they try to downsize the elephant in the room. So cut to the chase, and before the whole ball of wax reaches critical mass, we'll take stock of the benchmarks and the Big Picture and come to the realization that we must go back to the drawing board. It is what it is.
So it turns out some of Subway's foot-longs aren't really a foot long. I guess someone outed them to the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Sandwiches.
It's interesting to hear that there's growing opposition in China to the one-child rule. Why the uprising? Shortage of workers! It always comes down to money, doesn't it?
Speaking of money, brokers admit that they lie through their teeth. In fact, sometimes they "even lie through other people's teeth," concedes a Wall Street veteran . . . ."--Columnist Joe Queenan in the Wall Street Journal.
Media Word of the Week (a word you only see in print but never ever hear a normal person use in real life): "Soupcon."
Baseball players are smarter than football players. How often do you see a baseball team penalized for too many players on the field?" - Jim Bouton
The Manti Te'o nonexistent girlfriend mishigas at Notre Dame makes this quote from novelist Paul Auster (in the Toronto Globe and Mail) seem all the more prescient. "The real is always way ahead of what we can imagine."
Useful Scottish word with no English equivalent: Tartle. The nearly onomatopoeic word for that panicky hesitation just before you have to introduce someone whose name you can't quite remember.
Department of Curious Verbiage: "The robbery took place in broad daylight." As opposed to narrow or marginal daylight?
Art-ifacts: In the early 20th Century, the "Mona Lisa" was receiving so much fan mail that it had its own mailbox at the Louvre.
I've seen funnel clouds, double rainbows and cats and dogs, but I've never ever seen a phone "ringing off the hook." And neither have you.
Last one out of the Baseball Hall of Fame, please turn out the lights.
Jargon Word of the Week: "Fiberhoods." Neighborhoods, according to Jonathan Keats in Wired magazine, with fiber-optic cable to give homes and schools 1-giga-bit-per-second Internet service.
Google is making districts in Kansas City compete to become the first fiberhoods, fast-tracking those that rally the most residents to pay $70 a month for the privilege. (Bringing brand new meaning to "There goes the neighborhood. . . .")
If a cow could laugh, would milk come out its nose?
Overheard: "My dentist told me my teeth are OK, but my gums are going to have to come out."
I love when people engage the "either-or” syndrome; as if both outcomes could not be applicable. Guy says to me: "Am I crazy, or is it really warm in here?” "Well, now that I think about it . . . ."
Actual notice attached to a Pentium chip: If this product exhibits errors, the manufacturer will replace it for a $2-shipping and a $3-handling charge, for a total of $4.97.
"A drunk driver is very dangerous. So is a drunk backseat driver if he's persuasive. "--Demitri Martin
Action: Lance Armstrong confesses to Oprah Winfrey.
Reaction: When did Ms. Winfrey join the clergy? I guess the ordination wasn't televised. (Obviously, she didn't take the vow of poverty.)
I guess there was a changing of the confessional guard while I wasn't watching. Barbara Walters out, Oprah Winfrey in. (Diane Sawyer didn't make the cut.)
Today's Latin lesson: Quis est in is mihi? ("What's in it for me?")
Rhetorical questions, questionable rhetoric and whimsical observations about the absurdities of contemporary life:
Political strategist and forensic blood-spatter expert: Two occupations that no kid ever fantasizes about!
At the end of the day, we need to have a dialog about the national conversation regarding loose talk about kicking the can down the road. (God forbid.)
Wouldn't it be funny if microwave popcorn had been invented before the microwave? ("Gee, what do we do with this stuff?")
I know a guy who won't eat snails. He prefers fast food!
Snack Food Fun Fact of the Week: Cheetos are sold in more than 36 countries, so the flavor and composition are often varied to match regional taste and cultural preferences--such as Savory American Cream in China, and Strawberry Cheetos in Japan. (Kind of hard to work into a conversation, but that's your problem, not mine.)
Door County, Wisconsin’s sister city is Jingdezhen, China. I wonder if they sell live bait and cheese curds over there? . . . . Yeah, hey! (If they do, it's probably "to go.")
Another sign of the stressed-out economy: Parking lots that are about five years overdue for re-striping of parking-space boundaries.
Faded Words: "Riffraff." "Skulduggery."
I saw a rave review of the new Volkswagen Jetta hybrid. How crazy is the world when a pioneering German automaker is having its cars built in Puebla, Mexico? Can you get good gazpacho in Stuttgart?
"100 percent of the people who give 110 percent do not understand math."--Demetri Martin
Putdown term that has apparently fallen out of favor: "Twerp." As in, "That little twerp!"
Jargon Word of the Week: Mambalgins. They are potent painkillers derived from venom of the deadly black mamba snake. Mambalgins may be as powerful as morphine but lack the opiate's side effects, according to Jonathan Keats in Wired.
Most recent fortune cookie received: "Genius is more work than just being a genius."
Another Media Word (a word you see or hear only in news reports and never hear a normal person use in real life): "Kudos." (Lifetime Achievement Award?) You'll hear an audience shout "Bravo!" or "More!" But "Kudos!" Never!
"If you don't know history, then you don't know anything. You are a leaf that doesn't know it is part of a tree."--Michael Crichton
Waiter: "Ground pepper on your salad?" Me: "No, but I wouldn't mind a little more rata in my touille."
Speaking of restaurants, here's an excerpt of an actual review in a Chicago newspaper:
" . . . [The chef] also provided exciting surprises, like the dehydrated truffle powder that tops the menu's seared Angus beef. When the powder hits your tongue, it rehydrates in tiny explosions like a bunch of Dippin' Dot ice cream pellets invading your mouth." (And you wonder why restaurant critics guard their anonymity so zealously!)
Tech Talk: Five years after the iPhone revolutionized the industry, we’re probably seeing the end of quantum leaps in smartphones—at least for a while, wrote Nick Wingfield in The New York Times. Technology, he says, often downshifts into periods of "slower evolutionary change after a big disruption”; it happened with both cars and PCs.
Future Focus: The incremental changes will add up, Wingfield says. "The difference in smartphones from year to year may not seem spectacular, but the "long arc of technological progress” certainly will be.
I wonder how many people have text-messaged while having surgery under local anesthetic? Don’t laugh; somebody’s probably doing it at this very moment. (Send me a Tweet from the surgical suite.)
"To live only for some future goal is shallow. It's the sides of the mountain that sustain life, not the top."--Robert M. Pirsig, author of "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values."
Is it just me or are magazines getting more and more impossible to read? You've seen it--microscopic, light-shaded type--often on pale/pastel backgrounds, surrounded by oceans of white space that could be better utilized to enlarge the type and enhance readability. And who needs full-page head shots of people we've seen dozens of times? Use that space to make the words you're so proud of actually readable.
Movie Music: Diminished chords create a mood of unease, according to film composer Michael Giacchino ("Mission Impossible III," "Ghost Protocol," "Alias"). (For all you young composers out there, Giacchino generally begins in the key of A minor.) And, according to David Arnold--who scored five Bond films, among others--silence is the key to creating tension. "Part of the secret is knowing when to not do anything."
Today's Latin Lesson: Ut vestri opus fatur pro ipsum don't rumpo. Or: "When your work speaks for itself, don't interrupt." (Attributed by the Associated Press to industrialist Michael Kaiser, who, presumably, said it in English.)
Rhetorical questions, questionable rhetoric and whimsical observations about the absurdities of contemporary life:
I'll start using a "man bag" when women start carrying wallets in their hip pockets.
New this year: The jimjustsaying Chia Pet--the perfect stocking stuffer for that person on the fringes of your Christmas gift list! ("Ch-ch-ch-chia!)
(Jim thus joins an elite roster of Chia figures, including Garfield, Scooby-Doo, Shrek, the Simpsons, Daffy Duck and SpongeBob.)
Morning in America: "Synthetic drugs are coming out so fast, quicker than tests to find them. We can have people die of overdoses, and medical technology hasn’t caught up yet with what they overdosed from.”--Dr. Stephen Cina, Cook County Medical Examiner, in the Chicago Sun-Times.
Our cat used to get one piece of mail a year--a reminder from the vet about his annual checkup. But that’s it.
Apparently, pets are immune from the junk mail/mailing-list plague, because he never got any catalogs, credit-card offers or charity appeals. (I assume dogs are similarly blessed, although I lack actual evidence.)
Adage updated : It's the gift that counts.
Which brings me to this thought: Is it better to re-gift than to re-receive?
Jargon Word of the Week: Deceit Perfume--an aerosol, developed for the Iranian military, that works like an air freshener to conceal the acrid smell of gunpowder and available in various scents, Wired magazine reports.
Fading words: Skedaddle and shindig.
"If it weren't for problems, the workday would be over by 10 a.m."--Woody Allen
Three fruits most people have never eaten: Persimmon, guava and kumquat.
Is there low fructose corn syrup? If not, the world is waiting . . . .
Whatever happened to Emo Phillips?
Master Card, Visa, American Express . . . . Diner's Club? You hear so little about that one these days I was surprised to find out it still exists. But in fact Diner's Club was acquired by Discover in 2008.
"You can avoid reality, but you can't avoid the consequences of avoiding reality."--Ayn Rand
"When I started here in the Senate [1989], a blackberry was a fruit and tweeting was something only birds did."--Retiring Sen. Joe Lieberman (D., Conn.) in his farewell speech on Dec. 12.
What do the Dalai Lama, Billy Graham, Nelson Mandela and J. K. Rowling have in common? They have all been featured speakers at a Canadian ballpark--the Rogers Centre, where the Toronto Blue Jays (and other pro sports teams) play.
Season's readings: Pope Benedict XVI says in his new book that there were no oxen, donkeys, or other animals at Jesus’s birth. The pope also says the entire Christian calendar is based on a 6th Century monk’s miscalculation of when Jesus was born.
A man after mine own heart: " “I never cared for fiction or storybooks. What I like to read about are facts and statistics of any kind. If they are only facts about the raising of radishes, they interest me. Just now, I was reading an article about mathematics. Perfectly pure mathematics. My own knowledge of mathematics stops at 12 times 12, but I enjoyed that article immensely. I didn’t understand a word of it; but facts, or what a man believes to be facts, are always delightful.”--Mark Twain in an interview with Rudyard Kipling
Another Media Word (a word you see or hear only in news reports and never hear a normal person use in real life): "perfervid."
'It's useless to hold a person to anything he says while he's in love, drunk or running for office."--Shirley MacLaine
People who wear white socks outside the gym or the ball field are candidates for immediate counseling. (There's never a fashion policeman around when you need one!)
Another Stupid Warning Seen on an Actual Product: On a blender: "Not for use as an aquarium."
Health term of the week: NERD (Non-erosive reflux disease): Chronic heartburn with no evidence of acid damage in the esophagus.
Snack food product that doesn't exist but probably will: Dorachos.
Today's Latin Lesson: Est is melior ut redonum quam ut resuscipio? ("Is it better to re-gift than to re-receive?")
Rhetorical questions, questionable rhetoric and whimsical observations about the absurdities of contemporary life:
I’m trying to trace my family’s roots, but I’m a bit puzzled. I mean, where is Caucasia anyway!
People used to wrap fish in newspaper, but not so much anymore. There's probably an app for that.
Speaking of apps, the Video Poker game on my iPod Touch keeps nagging me to download updates. What's to possibly update? Have they invented another suit? Clubs, hearts, spades, diamonds . . . and rubies?
Which pays more: Working in a bookstore or a library?
Future Shock Item of the Week: Caviar vending machines, now actually in place in--where else?--Los Angeles? ("Pssst, hey buddy--got change for a $1,000 bill?")
Jargon Word of the Week: Facekinis--face masks designed to be worn at the beach. Pierced with small eye-holes, the colorful Lycra headgear have, Wired magazine reports, become a fashion statement in China, where suntans are associated with farmwork.
If the 10-gallon hat were named according to the metric system, it would be a 37.9-liter hat.
You're a lot younger than I am if your baby pictures are in color.
Another Media Word (a word you see only in print and never hear a normal person use in real life): "bellicose."
Why do people say "brrrrrrr" when they're cold? Shouldn't they be saying "frrrrrrrrr"?
No two tire-pressure gauges give the same reading.
Politically, you could call me a conservatal or a liberative—take your pick.
"Amen, brother" Item of the Week: "Owning property on the shore has an inherent risk—a risk that seems to be growing as sea levels rise and storms become more powerful. Taxpayers shouldn’t be asked to subsidize those who build castles at the ocean’s edge."--USA Today editorial on Hurricane Sandy
Redundancy Patrol: "Each and every"; "pick and choose"; "separate out."
What happened to all the impressionists? Time was when you'd often see the likes of Rich Little, Frank Gorshin, John Byner and a few others on TV variety and talk shows. Now, it's Frank Caliendo . . . once in a while . . . and that's about it.
A pox on people who put the greeting cards they don't like back in the wrong slot.
Game-show buzzers have the same sound as when you try to start a car that is already running.
Do mothers still warn their kids about "putting someone's eye out"? (In certain neighborhoods, the eyes are the least of their worries!)
Do Chinese restaurants now serve Beijing Duck? And why did they change all those names anyway? The locals are probably confused.
People who write in goofy names in the voting booth should be deported immediately. That's perverting your Constitutional right.
How did the Princess Phone get that name anyway? (Because it sounded better than Queen or Duchess or Royal Wench?)
Stupid Product Warning on an Actual Product: On a set of children's alphabet blocks: "Letters may be used to construct words, phrases and sentences that may be deemed offensive."
Insult of the Week: "May I have the pleasure of your absence?"
Today's Latin lesson: Si vos can't pello pepulli pulsum lemma , suo lemma. ("If you can't beat 'em, join 'em.")
Rhetorical questions, questionable rhetoric and whimsical observations about the absurdities of contemporary life:
Is it a federal law that every garbage truck has to have screechy brakes? If so, then everyone seems to be in full compliance!
Good thing Mitt Romney didn't win--there are no car elevators in the White House. (I have a vision of him holding press conferences in a smoking jacket, which probably isn't all that far-fetched, now that I think about it.)
Speaking of which, does the White House have a WestRoom? We're always hearing about the East Room. (Maybe the West Room is the . . . Rest Room? Which would explain why it doesn't get much press.)
I don't recognize most of the songs on the Oldies stations, so I'm not sure if that means I'm too old, too young--or just out of it!
There are two types of people in the world: Those who like dark chocolate and those who don't.
Incompetence runs amok: A dentist reports on the Daily Beast site that has received three renewal notices from Newsweek in the weeks since it announced its demise.
(Memo to Newsweek circulation department: It's over. Done. Kaput. Finis. I read it in Time magazine.)
It's easier to find a $100 bill on the street than to find someone who knows how to play mah-jongg..
Channel surfing: Some of the programs on the TV grid for a recent evening: "Secretly Pregnant" (Discovery Health), "Mothers Who Kill" (Biography), "Kids That Kill" (Biography), "Tattoo Nightmares" (Spike), and, also on Biography, "My Little Terror" (Synopsis: "The true stories of children with extreme rage issues, children possessed, and evil geniuses").
The FCC's Newton Minow famously called TV "a vast wasteland" many years ago. Methinks he'd use stronger words today. A lot stronger words.
How often have you ever had your money “cheerfully refunded”? (About the same number of times you've heard the words "No restrictions apply.")
Newspaper Obituary Headline Nickname of the Week: "Snowshoe." As in Lloyd W. "Showshoe" Rogers (Green Bay Press-Gazette obituary, Nov. 1, 2012. R.I.P. Mr. Rogers.)
Pompous Ass Candidates of the Week: People who use the verb "posit" every chance they get.
Three things you can't wear out: A spoon, a thermometer and a hammer.
Candy Nugget of the Week: The Snickers bar was named for inventor Frank Mars' favorite horse.
And the Milky Way bar, Mental Floss magazine also reports, was named not for their home galaxy but from a type of malted milkshake that was popular in the early 1920s. (Kind of hard to work into a conversation, but there you have it.)
Do kids still play with pipe cleaners, or has that been outlawed too?
Speaking of kids, did you know that the voting age in Argentina has been lowered to 16
Jimjustsaying's "That Should Be A Word "of the Week (by Lizzie Skurnick): Martyrmony--(MAR-tur-MOAN-ee), n. 1. To stay married out of duty. “Four kids and constant bickering had turned Jeanine and Henrique’s romance into mutual martyrmony.” See also: Boudwar (dispute originating in bedroom).
Time magazine's Word of the Week: Micropolitan (adj. small but regionally important population center of 10,000 to 50,000 residents . . . examples: Hilton Head, S.C., and Wooster, Ohio, don'tyaknow.)
The world is moving so fast these days, precious few people can remember more than three sex scandals ago.
Does Campbell’s make a Russian alphabet soup? (I called and was transferred to the New Product Development department, where I got a recorded message. I’ll get back to you on this if they ever get back to me.)
When did people stop referring to births as "the blessed event"?
People who shine deer are a most pathetic lot--and that's being extremely kind.
I never heard a woman say "I don't know how to dance."
People who run scams from prison (no, I'm not making this up) have way too much time on their hands. Speaking of which, whatever happened to "30 years at hard labor"? You don't hear that anymore. (The ACLU strikes again?)
Today's Latin Lesson: Isest ferreus reor callidus editio ut reddo sulum mensis. ("It's hard to think of a clever statement to translate every month.")
Rhetorical questions, questionable rhetoric and whimsical observations about the absurdities of contemporary life:
Why don't they just have Ohio vote for president and be done with it?
I admire people who are good at chess, because I am beyond hopeless. Always have been. I mean, I used to open with the Heimlich Maneuver!
There’s no denying it: Due to a cruel quirk of nature, men were born without the curtain-shopping chromosome.
Morning in America: For two years, the nationwide BioWatch system, intended to protect Americans against a biological attack, operated with defective components that left it unable to detect lethal germs, according to scientists with knowledge of the matter. --Chicago Tribune, Oct. 23.
I'm always a bit queasy about pitching those sweepstakes entry forms I always get in the mail.
Congrats to the estimable Robert J. Samuelson of the Washington Post for crafting a variation of the hokey "that sound you heard" lead that so many writers resort to when they can't think of anything else.
In his Oct. 15 column headlined "The BRIC rescue that wasn’t," he opened with: "Just in case you didn’t hear it, that was the sound of the BRIC bubble popping. . . . " (No, Mr. Samuelson, I didn't hear it; nor, I trust, did anyone else.)
Magazine renewal notices that say "Last Chance" really mean that there are five more coming. Maybe more.
Memo to all sports announcers (especially radio guys): No one has ever complained about a play-by-play announcer giving the score too often.
The most frustrating part about being “on hold” is when the music stops and you think your number is up . . . and it’s just a recorded voice coming on to tell you “how important” your call is to them. If you’re on hold for 10 minutes, you get that at least 10 times.
Memo to Corporate America: If our calls are so important to you, prove it by increasing your call-center staffing. Then and only then will we truly feel the importance you’re so fond of mentioning.
Don’t you also love it that whomever you’re dealing with will, even if pressed, give you only his or her first name . . . even though they have a full dossier on YOU?
I'd pay a princely sum to see Newt Gingrich on "Dancing With the Stars."
When is the last time you ordered--or made--French toast? And what's so French about it anyway. Did they invent the egg?
It's only a matter of time before the absence of Steve Jobs is felt acutely and some other firm (or some other visionary) out-Apples Apple.
Speaking of which, computers seem to me to be a highway that's always under construction. Just when you think you're rolling . . . there's a detour or a breakdown or a "new release or update" . . . . Will they ever get these things fixed?
I've never liked anyone who had "the III" after their name.
Jim's Snack Food Find of the Week: Larry the Cable Guy's Fried Dill Pickle Tater Chips.
(Full Disclosure: Larry and I go way back. Hell, I knew him when he was Larry the Over-the-Air Guy!)
Jim's Book Pick of the Month: "iDisorder/Understanding Our Obsession with Technology and Overcoming Its Hold On Us," by Larry Rosen, Ph.D.
I'll come right out and say it: "60 Minutes" is a shadow of its former self without Mike Wallace and Andy Rooney.
Speaking of iconic shows, has "Saturday Night Live" ever come close to replacing Gilda Radner and John Belushi? It's only been 30 years now!
Another Media Word (a word you see or hear only in news reports and never hear a normal person use in real life): "jejune," a particular favorite of the New York Times' Maureen Dowd.
Speaking of Ms. Dowd, she can take credit for the jimjustsayingQuote of the Week: "Republicans are geniuses at getting people to vote against their own self-interest. "
Ever wonder why some Red Lobsters aren't participating in whatever it is the rest of the Red Lobsters are participating in?
Today's Latin lesson: Ego don't teneo ultum super professio tamen Ego teneo quis Ego amo. ("I don't know much about art, but I know what I like.")
Rhetorical questions, questionable rhetoric and whimsical observations about the absurdities of contemporary life:
When a guy "pops the question," is the woman supposed to "pop the answer"? (I'm just sayin' . . .) They never address that part of it.
I like to go for fall color drives at night. Much less traffic!
Doesn't it strike you as a bit odd if not off-putting that two men who are running for the presidency have to have three days of intense "debate prep" before the so-called "debates" (a.k.a. extended stump speeches with opponent present)?
The issues are known, the problems are known, and the opponent's "talking points" and criticisms are known, so shouldn't these two people be able to speak extemporaneously and knowledgeably about all this without having to cram like two frat boys who have loafed away the semester? Downright demoralizing to this voter.
Speaking of politics, who made the decision that all TV anchors and commentators should pronounce "candiDATE as “candiDIT”? (What dit is the election? Do you have a dit for Saturday night? )
Misnomer note: There's no such thing as a lead pencil. They're made of graphite.
Much was made recently of firemen from a Wisconsin town wearing pink during a breast-cancer fundraising event. How did this color come to be co-opted by the female sex and virtually verboten for the male sex? (If there's a color that "real women" aren't supposed to wear, I don't know of it.)
"At times like these, it helps to recall that there have always been times like these."--Paul Harvey
Jim's Law of Car Buying: Never buy a used car with more than six bumper stickers on it!
I like sweet potatoes--and their being loaded with beta carotene is a nice bonus. (Frankly, I prefer alpha carotene, but, hey--that's just me! That's just me!)
"A real patriot is the fellow who gets a parking ticket and rejoices that the system works."--Columnist Bill Vaughan on Forbes.com
All-Overrated Club, Comedy Division: Carrot Top, Gallagher and Ricky Gervais. (Ray Romano and George Lopez can wait in the lounge till something opens up.)
Something to chew on: The number--40 percent. The fact--That's how much of the food produced in the U.S. ends up in the trash. So says a new report by the Natural Resources Defense Council. (It comes out to 20 pounds per person per month.)
"If you can't explain it to a 6-year-old, you don't understand it yourself."--Albert Einstein
Redundancy patrol: "Free giveaway." I think there's only one kind of "giveaway" . . . and there's no payment involved. If it isn't free, it's NOT a giveaway!
You can always tell a pompous person by how often they use words like "juncture"and "scenario."
Do people still buy perfume or cologne? If so, why? All you have to do is subscribe to a magazine or have a charge account at a department store, and you’ll get all the scent products you want absolutely free. You don’t have to have a perfume or cologne budget; all you need is a mailbox.
(What are you wearing, dear? Is that Polo Musk? No, It’s Men’s Health, September issue!)
Ridiculous Product Warning of the Week: On a calendar: "Use of term 'Sunday' is for reference only. No meteorological warranties express or implied."
Forty-fourth entry in the Wisconsin Town I Didn't Know Existed Until I Saw it Mentioned in a Newspaper Obituary sweepstakes: Stiles, Wis. (R.I.P., Linda Marie Johnson, Green Bay Press-Gazette obituary, Oct. 4, 2012.) Previous entries: Athelstane, Walhain, Duck Creek, Breed, Anston, Sobieski, Amberg, Osseo, Angelica, Brazeau, Waukechon, Sugar Camp, Kossuth, Lessor, Kunesh, Pulcifer, Cato, Florence, Greenleaf, Eaton, Poygan, Hofa Park, Hilbert, Hollandtown, Beaufort, Glennie, Harshaw, Bessemer, Crooked Lake, Tigerton, Goodman, Readstown, Dousman, Butternut, Montpelier, Cecil, Red River, Gillet, King, Laona, Kelly Lake, Glenmore and Tonet.
Obituary Headline Nickname of the Week: Ted “Cassanova” (sic) Dudek, Kenosha News obituary, June 14, 2012. R.I.P., Mr. Dudek.
Morning in America: Jobs are scarce, the weather is miserable and we encounter headlines like " 'Delirious' Blood-Covered Naked Man Selling Candy Kills Motel Worker In Violent Rampage." It actually happened in a small town (Tracy) in California.
Another injimjustsaying's series of Media Words, words you see or hear only in print or on news broadcasts and never, ever hear anyone use in real life: "hustings." (As in, "The candidates have once again taken to the hustings for another round of campaign speeches.")
Political Quote of the Week: "Mitt Romney . . . acts instead as if he learned his foreign policy at the International House of Pancakes, where the menu and architecture rarely changes.--Thomas L. Friedman in The New York Times
Overheard: "It's "i" before "e," except after "c" and, of course, after "w," as in Budweiser."
Today's Latin lesson: Quis pessimus ut could venio? ("What's the worst that could happen?")
Jim Szantor was managing editor of Down Beat magazine for three years and a Chicago Tribune editor-writer for 27 years. He is the author of "A Portrait of Bill Chase" (Great-Music, 2007) and "Lol-i-Gags: One-Liners, Irreverent Opinions, Fun Factoids and Astute Observations About Our Wild and Wacky World" (MavenMark Books, 2014).
