It really comes in handy

I was at the quarterly meeting of my investment club today and our hostess is Orthodox Jewish.  The topic of carrying during the Sabbath ("what about your children?  Can you carry them?") came up and so my friend was explaining that some Jewish communities create what she described as a sort of fence to enclose, say a neighborhood, and make carrying acceptable within that space.

"Oh," I said, "an eruv?"

My friend's jaw dropped and she said "You know that?!"

Her equally stunned husband said "How do you know that?"

"Public radio." 

"Huh," said the husband, "maybe they shouldn't be defunded."

Not green

I once mentioned that as far as I could tell, red is the only color that doesn't have a pastel partner.  One hears people talk about "pale blue" or "soft yellow" or such, but I've never heard anyone talk about "pastel red" because "pastel red" has it's own identity:  pink.

Sure, in some ways that's more a quirk of language, rather than spectrum, but I dunno.  When you make red darker it looks blacker.  When you make pink look darker, it looks ... bluer.

I was, of course, mocked for this and generally kept down by The Man.  And as I'm neither a lighting designer nor a painter,* I don't have the background to make a better argument, so I let it drop.

But ...

But ...

Thanks to Alice, Facebook, and NPR, this little tidbit has fallen into my lap.

I'm probably still wrong, but somehow I feel --- less wrong.

There is no blue food.  There is no pink light.

*Because colors in light and colors in pigment are two separate things.  The former is additive color and the later is subtractive color.**


**A fact I'll be able to retain until just after I post this, of course.

Quoted

New Hampshire Public Radio covered NPR listeners response to their 9/11 coverage.

Now I'm wondering if I should write and tell them that when I hear "you'll reap the rewards" in their fundraising ad, my brain automatically fills in "of your pluck, my boy, in the Bailey and Middlesex sessions."

I can't take it anymore

Sometimes public radio does what I call over covering a story and rather than just bitch to David about it, I wrote to the Ombudsman* and outlined my concerns.  I didn't use any of the bad words that I've been using to the radio recently, so I consider that a win.  (If this siphons off some of my annoyance and David doesn't have to listen to me be irritated, he may consider it a win as well.)


I suspect that this will accomplish nothing but I feel better for having written it.  During the last president election caller after caller to the Diane Rehm show begged the panel on the Friday News Round Up to scale back the discussion of the "horse race"**.  The panelists, every time, said that they had to talk it to death because that's what people are interested in.


The New York Times ran a piece back in 2007 that neat sums up my dismay with horse race coverage:  "The campaign coverage has been sharply at odds with what the public says it wants, the study found, with voters eager to know more about the candidates’ positions on issues and their personal backgrounds, more about lesser-known candidates and more about the debates. 


But the media is even more obsessed this time around with questions of tactics and strategy, despite what the study described as a “generational struggle” in both parties. Horse-race stories accounted for 63 percent of the stories this year compared with what the study said was about 55 percent in 2000 and 2004."


If you are the sort of malcontent that I am  -- or if you are dismayed that there is not enough coverage of 9/11 this week or won't be enough of election -- the Ombudsman (see job description, below) can be reached via the Contact Us button on NPR.org.

Dear Ombudsman,
An effective way to make me no longer care about a subject - or to get angry every time it's raised - is for public radio to over cover it.  When public radio becomes One Thing Considered -- as it has with the 9/11 anniversary --and has story after story on the subject, each one with a more tenuous connection, it just burns out any ability to hear any more about it.

The events of 9/11 were a defining tragedy for this generation and it makes me truly sad that I can't listen to Morning Edition or ATC right now without thinking "Oh good grief, another one?"  and changing the station.  I won't be listening to public radio this weekend because I can't stand to have truly important things turned into noise.

I understand that anniversaries make a convenient hook for stories that might otherwise lack one.  But the hook is overfull.

The same thing will happen during over coverage of the 2012 election.  By the time the 2008 election was over I believe that public radio had spoken to every person living in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina.  I grew to hate all of them, let alone the people running for office who I had grown to detest long before through overexposure.  I remember at one point thinking "Another election story?  Another?  Is nothing happening anywhere else in the world?  Sweden maybe?"

Please consider scaling back.  I would appreciate it and I don't think I'm the only one.

*Ombudsman is a Latin term that means "the person corporate has assigned to actually have to listen to the random whining and complaining of the malcontents."  What a great job to have ...


** The horse race is political handicapping and on the FNRU it's usually about the fundraising.

An RC Cola

The only Mardi Gras I ever attended was in Mobile, Alabama, so it was awfully nice to hear this story yesterday on All Things Considered about Mobile's claim to have been celebrating Fat Tuesday before Neworlens was even a Blackened Cajun spot on the map.

I don't remember catching any Moon Pies, but there were definitely beads, and candy, and trinkets, and dime store junk a-plenty flying through the air. My cousin, Robbie, was living with my grandparents in those days and he was taller than we were, so he caught as much as he could for his younger girl cousins from up North.

And here is a little more about the Land of My Father.

Perhaps we should send a card

NPR tells us that DARPA is turning 50 this week.

My company has a contract or two with DARPA, so we're considering a tasteful bouquet. And maybe some chocolates.


Of course, as one of the tech staff pointed out: We would only want to do that if there was a low probability of success for getting the card out the door, and a high payoff if we did happen to succeed in getting the card to them.

Skanky factlet

In all the hoopla regarding the Eliot Spitzer unpleasantness, I heard this interview on All Things Considered:

Michele Norris talks with Martin Monto, professor of social psychology, at the University of Portland. Monto did a study on customers of prostitutes. His research shows that many of the assumptions of why men seek out prostitutes are accurate. They are seeking greater variety, something simple, no commitment. He says many are also attracted to the very illicit nature of prostitution. This risk-taking on behalf of people in the public eye can have several components.

The part that caused me to stare at the radio, grossed out? That would be the part where Professor Monto said that about 20% of men have used prostitutes. That would be 1 in 5. That would mean that I must know several of them. Or lots and lots.

If you are one of them, please don't self-identify. I don't want to know.

Ick. Ick. Ick.

And if I misheard that statistic, what with driving and paying attention to the road and all, please feel free to correct me. Or rather, correct me if the number is lower as that would make me feel a bit better. If it's higher then I really, really don't want to know.

Or *what*?

I'm listening to Weekend Edition and Liane is interviewing Edward Lucas about his book "The New Cold War." At least, I think that was the subject of the interview because I was surfing around and not playing close attention. I know they talked about Gazprom, the Russian oil company, though, because shortly before he said "Gazprom," Mr. Lucas said the phrase that caught my attention..."three things, gas, cash, or...." and I don't even remember what the third was because my brain was too busy jumping up and down like an hyper eight-year-old insisting the rest of his sentence - in his lovely British elocution - was going be "or ass, nobody rides for free."

And, yes, I know that the best version of that bumper said "gas, grass, or ass" but even so.

A couple of quotes for Friday

Richard Land, with whom I so rarely find myself in agreement, said something that rang totally true for me:

I feel sorry for Hilary Clinton running against Barack Obama. She's trying to conduct a job interview and he's on a date.

And I ran into this one from Sean Combs in whichever Time magazine I'm currently carrying around. He was asked "what factor makes a record a sure hit"?

Melody. When you hear a Beatles' melody or Marvin Gaye, it changes everything around you. You ever see those commercials where somebody's someplace and then the whole room changes? Melody does that.

The Things That I Would Carry

I know that many of us have been following the San Diego wildfire story - either closely or casually. I heard on NPR this morning that KPBS, a San Diego public radio station, has created a Google Maps of the situation. More importantly, in the sidebar is more or less up-to-the-minute news about which shelters are open, which neighborhoods are now safe, and other useful infomation.

You can find it here.

I have spent random minutes in the last few days wondering what I would take with me if I had to bug out and considering what a sentimental pack rat I am, the list is pretty short:

Pekoe and his kit (food, bowls, litter);
My purse;
My passport;
As much cash as I could;
Kipling (my teddy bear because he is very reassuring and makes a great emergency pillow);
Clean underthings;
A book or two - probably Middlemarch because then I would forced to finish the darned thing (and besides, it's long) and something more fun than Middlemarch;
A small "collage" I put together of family pictures; and
David.

That was all I could come up with and I could put all that in the car in twenty minutes or so. If I had to grab-and-go the list would be:

Pekoe;
My purse;
My passport;
As much cash as I could; and
David.

After Hurrican Katrina David and I worked out a very basic, "I guess we'd" script of what we'd do if required to leave in a hurry. Daddy always says that they'd like to see more of us, so I guess he'd be happy to know that his and Audrey's house is where these refugees would arrive. With cat.

A few weeks ago we nearly had "Bring Your Cat to Work Day" because the fire alarm went off in my building as I was getting dressed. I finished dressing, stuffed Peek into his cat carrier using my never-fail technique (available upon request), and headed out. I dithered around for a bit but as the fire department had arrived pretty darn fast, I was able to return Peek to the apartment rather than figure out what to do with him for a full day at my office which is not set up for him or his needs at all.

On that day it was Peek, purse, passport and go. I have a horrible time letting go of things but I do know that things can be replaced, (it helps to be able to prove one's identity, of course). One place where Mollie and I lived had a nasty flood (raw sewage) in the basement and I hated with a white hot passion going through the ruined things and that was only the things I kept in basement storage. It can be done, it just sucks enormously.

I have always travelled light and though I would miss every single thing that I own, if I were asked to evac, I would lock the door, hope for the best, and leave.

I just hope I never have to.

I guess they're not "Times" subscribers

Today on Morning Edition Renee Montagne and Steve Inskeep were reporting the current state of the throwdown between Kanye West and 50 Cent. Steve got to the second reference to the latter, called him "Mr. Cent," and he and Renee cracked up. On the air. "That's what it says here - Mr. Cent!" he laughed and they continued, chuckling only slightly.

It's still in the story on the web so if you want to hear NPR staffers who aren't Scott Simon cracking up during a broadcast, just hit the "listen" button.

I so look forward to their next story on Iggy Pop.

APM, NPR, PRI

In A Prairie Home Companion's weekly newsletter, Garrison Keillor prints a letter from a listener. This week's regards distribution credit. Geeky as I am, I have still been guilty of public radio conflation and I'm glad to know that Mr. Keillor doesn't hold it against me.

Dear Mr. Keillor:
Does it ever irritate you when people refer to APHC as an "NPR" show? Because, as far as I know, it was NPR that turned down the show back in 1978 and it's American Public Media that distributes it now.

It's astonishing to see how consistently this error is made. I've seen it in AP stories, on public radio station Web sites and even on the Web sites of musical artists who are careful to point out that they have appeared on your show. Or am I wrong?

Edmund M.
Energy, IL

PHC was never distributed by NPR, and you're right about NPR declining to distribute it lo these many years ago, but no, it doesn't bother me. NPR is the organization in Washington and "NPR" is the common term for public radio, sort of like kleenex means tissue and xerox means photocopy, even if you're using Scott Tissue and an HP copier. I suppose the NPR references bother the folks at APM and they probably have someone whose job it is to call up the AP and complain, but I don't care. I am just very very grateful that NPR didn't pick up the show for distribution back then because if they had, I'm pretty sure the show would've died a painful death by committee. They can have all the credit the AP wants to give them, so long as I don't have to report to some vice-president in Washington.

But then I could never hear it again

My friends and I noticed several years ago that as soon as we buy a copy of a movie, we never see it again. If we're playing flippy-channels and run across it, we don't stop because "we have that on DVD" and we never seem to pop in the DVD. I don't know why, I'm sure, but we don't.

So please don't buy me this.

Every year on Independence Day, NPR staffers* read the Declaration of Independence from start to finish. I more or less plan my 4th of July morning around hearing that and by the time we get to with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor, I'm all teary eyed. In fact, I'm a little verklempt just typing that phrase.

There's something about that document that appeals to so many parts of my personality: the need to lay before other nations a tidy list; the "if we don't hang together we shall surely hang separately" teamwork; and the willingness to put their names to it and take the consequences. They were far from perfect, but they were better men, and far more heroic, than I.

The Declaration itself tells us early on that our country will never be perfect or even not hypocritical: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. In the 18th Century the set of "all men" - at least in Virginia - meant all male, white, Protestant, landowners over the age of 21. The rest of us were not so equal. And many of us are still not so equal.

So we'll never be perfect but we keep trying. Jefferson said “I am among those who think well of the human character generally. I consider man as formed for society, and endowed by nature with those dispositions which fit him for society… his mind is perfectible to a degree of which we cannot as yet form any conception.” But now I'm digressing into the Constitution, which for some reason I find less stirring.

Anyway, if you miss the reading tomorrow morning, the text is available on The Archives Declaration page.

Of course, if you're shopping, I wouldn't mind this.

*On-air staffers, of course, I never get to hear Stacey or Bej reciting our grievances, more's the pity. Although if they did, and if I got to choose which one Stacey would read, well, duh, it would have to be For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury because that would sound as though my G&S-hating pal were decrying the absence of that operetta. Which would be so neat.

Reading Plants

I really enjoy Ketzel Levine's stories on NPR and now they're hosting a blog that she's writing about plants. Clearly - and no surprise - she is more informal in a blog setting than on the air. My favorite paragraph from the first Talking Plants post:

I am no Pollyanna poster child for emotional equanimity. (Click here for the TP list of Preferred Pharmaceuticals. OK, I was kidding. Stop clicking.) But don't let a lifetime of anti-depressants fool you. I am a gardener. Are you a gardener? Gardeners do not put plants in the ground in the hopes that they will suffer and perish. Gardeners plant to see tomorrow.

So it looks like I have another to add to the blog roll.

Thanks to David for the formatting assist.

Reliable Source

From Jeffrey Hatcher's Scotland Road:

John: Where'd you get that? Another tabloid?
Halbrech: No, I heard it on the radio. Public radio.

You can probably do an NPR geek check at each performance, based on on the laugh that line gets. We were well represented tonight.

Aging beautifully

All Things Considered ran a piece the other day on Tom DeBaggio, a nurseryman who has been living with Alzheimer's Disease for the past several years. I was listening in a sort of "oh, how sad" kind of way as I drove home but eventually the voice of Tom's wife, Joyce, caught my ear. She must have grown up around here because she sounds like so many of my friends. Which reminded me of something that I've been noticing lately, that is that none of us are getting any younger.

Yep, nothing gets past me.

(Warning: the following contains a Lifetime TV level of gushy content.)

My mother has advanced (and advancing) MS and a several good friends have relatives with Alzheimers and these are frightening and cruel things to happen to intelligent, productive, interesting, good people. Like most people, I am afraid of those cruel fates, but I've realized that I'm not afraid of getting older. At least not at the moment.

I've had a bit more free time lately and have spent as much of it as I could with my college friends and the extended social circle that we've built up. One of the things that I've always liked about this crowd is its ability and willingness to increase and include new people. The sole criterion seems to be a desire to be with us. (Or as I like to say about my Friday lunch group, "a willingness to endure what we consider to be interesting conversation.") So my "college friends" crowd include a lot of folks I never went to college with and some that I did, although we went in different decades. It also includes a lot of my friends' children who range from little babies to actual adults, so grandparenthood isn't too far in the future for some of us. (Or, rather, them.) I am, by the way, constantly impressed with the amazing level of niftiness of my friends' kids. And by what really great parents my friends are.

Brett for years claimed that there was no way that his little sister was [whatever her then current age was] and that she was only 16. Stacey was 16 for at least a decade. Brett allowed her to move up to 19 after she and John got married and he may even be admitting to over 21 now that Stace and John have children, but I'm not completely sure about that.

I don't go to great efforts to hide my age, especially as Mom's genes and neither smoking nor tanning means that I don't look my age, so why worry about it? But I don't advertise it either because I know enough age-ist directors that I'd rather lose a part to a better actress than to my birth certificate. For the record, I'm ..... I'm ..... well over 21. Very well, indeed, I guess.

But anyway, I'm noticing that we're getting older. Hair is graying or not, weight has been gained, or lost, or regained. Lines are showing up around our eyes. We're complaining less about our knees and more about our backs.

I thought that I'd be worried about this because our society doesn't exactly reward getting getting older but it doesn't bother me. Instead, I think it's really kind of cool to watch everyone as we pass through time. Yeah, in general we're aging pretty gracefully but I've realized that looking at Brett or Emily or Graymael or even Alice (well, not really Alice; she's only "19") and seeing gray hairs or crows' feet where none were when we all met gives us a kind of ownership in each others' lives.

Every time I look at my friends I don't just see now, I see the years that we've known each other getting to now. Some of us have lived longer than our parents. I'm older now than my mother was when she became a divorceé with two kids. We've raised and lost pets. I feel like Hume Cronyn looking at Jessica Tandy. And I'm reminded of one of Peter's best lines in The Pavilion when he tells Kari that he's missed getting to watch the little lines appear around her eyes because of the stupid way he treated her when they were young.

I am so lucky to have these people and so thankful that no matter how stupidly I've treated them now and again, I still get to be around - and they are still around - for me to see the lines coming out. I'm not sure if I'll have the same "life's rich pageant" attitude when we all start using walkers or require home health care, but I hope I do. We've joked for years about having wheelchair races at the Old Folks Home and I'm kind of looking forward to them.

Well we know where we're goin'
But we don't know where we've been
And we know what were knowin'
But we can't say what we've seen
And we're not little children
And we know what we want
And the future is certain
Give us time to work it out

The Talking Heads

Lift Every Voice and Sing

Today on Morning Edition, Juan Williams interviewed Rep. John Lewis about his endorsement plans for the '08 presidential election. Lewis declined to commit this early on, but he mentioned that Bill Clinton was the first American president who knew all three verses to Lift Every Voice and Sing, which happens to be one of my favorite hymns. So here are all three verses which we sing in church every January near Martin Luther King's birthday.

Lift Every Voice and Sing

Lyrics by James Weldon Johnson, Music by John Rosamond Johnson

Lift every voice and sing, till earth and Heaven ring,
Ring with the harmonies of liberty;
Let our rejoicing rise, high as the listening skies,
Let it resound loud as the rolling sea.
Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us,
Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us;
Facing the rising sun of our new day begun,
Let us march on till victory is won.

Stony the road we trod, bitter the chastening rod,
Felt in the days when hope unborn had died;
Yet with a steady beat, have not our weary feet,
Come to the place for which our fathers sighed?
We have come over a way that with tears has been watered,
We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered;
Out from the gloomy past, till now we stand at last
Where the white gleam of our bright star is cast.

God of our weary years, God of our silent tears,
Thou Who hast brought us thus far on the way;
Thou Who hast by Thy might, led us into the light,
Keep us forever in the path, we pray.
Lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met Thee.
Lest our hearts, drunk with the wine of the world, we forget Thee.
Shadowed beneath Thy hand, may we forever stand,
True to our God, true to our native land.

I thought as much

When I started listening to NPR, Corey Flintoff used to start the news by saying "This is NPR news and I'm ..... Corey Flintoff." This drove me slightly nuts. Was he assuming that someone was plugging in a drumroll? Was his name on the next page and he had to turn the page to read his name? Did the page say "This is NPR news and I'm [insert your name here]" and he couldn't remember his name? Was he in the Witness Protection Program and was mentally sorting thorugh his various aliases? Was he imitating Paul Harvey just to push my buttons? Aaaaarrrrggghhh.

So one day I asked a certain NPR staffer*, "So, uhm, what's up with the big pause before Corey Flintoff says his name? Can't he remember it?" The question was passed on and Corey - who I admire and who has a lovely voice, by the way - said that it was a dramatic pause. "Well, at least one of your listeners thinks that you can't remember your name." The pause went away and a grateful nation still sends me flowers and chocolates. Or at least thinks about doing that, but never quite gets around to it. After this blog post, of course, I'll be carried through the streets of Montgomery County on the shoulders of NPR geeks, I'm sure.

So anyway, today Michele Norris started the broadcast by saying "This is All Things Considered from NPR and I'm Robert Siegel." Then Robert Siegel, sounding very amused, said "And I'm Robert Siegel." It was sort of like a radio version of To Tell the Truth. (Sadly for those of you who missed, it'll probably be cleaned up before the repeat, so St. Crispin's Day-like, you will just have to call yourselves a-cursed who did not hear it.)

Anyway, now we know that the piece of paper - or more likely the monitor - said "This is NPR news and I'm [the actual name of the host or newsreader]. Glad to have that settled.


*The downside to working at NPR is the sheer amount of off work time that you have to spend explaining and hearing about your workplace from geeky listeners. I have been assured that I am not the only one who does this.

Why Scott Simon is in my top 5

Very important announcement first:

I am copying this directly from the program for Blair's current production of A Christmas Carol, which I saw (and greatly enjoyed) last night. As Brett can tell you, Blair is my own beloved high school, but as he may not know, I was also in a Blair production of Guys and Dolls way back then. So without further ado:

The Montgomery Blair Players on Channel 26!

In 2001 The Montgomery Blair Players produced Guys and Dolls, with music and lyrics by Frank Loesser. We are happy to announce that video clips from that Blair production have been included in the new documentary on Mr. Loesser that will air Sunday, Dec. 3rd (this Sunday) on WETA Channel 26. We have not seen the show, but the producers tell us that Blair is featured and named in the broadcast. Please consider tuning in, and feel free to forward this note to anyone you feel may be interested in watching, especially alumni.

http://www.loessermovie.org

And now back to our regularly scheduled blog post.

NPR geek that I am, I happily spend my Saturday mornings listening to Car Talk, Weekend Edition Saturday, and Wait, Wait. And like most NPR geeks, I have favorites. I love listening to John Burnett, Wade Goodwin, and Julie Rovner's stories; I adore Robert Siegel's warm, engaging laugh; Beej is just a lovely person to know; etc. I'm fickle enough that people drift in and out of my favorites list - which I will never be foolish enough to laminate - but a couple of positions are pretty solid. My pal Stacey is my all-time, no holds barred, favorite NPR staffer.

But Scott Simon is never out of the top 5. Warm laugh, goofball sense of humor, and he runs stories that apparently were chosen just to reward me for listening. This morning we got stories on famous poisonings in the Classical era; an interview with the author of a book about diagramming sentences, a school activity that I used to enjoy; an interview with Frank Loesser's daughter about the documentary which will feature the above-cited Montgomery Blair Players; and (oh my beating heart) an update of Ko-Ko's list song from The Mikado making fun of the new airplane security watch lists.

He likes Gilbert & Sullivan!! (Note to Scott - I was in the chorus of the Victorian Lyric Opera Company's production of Iolanthe from which the late Chief Justice Rehnquist got his robe stripes. I'm just sayin'.)

I wrote to Scott and asked for permission to post the lyrics. When he wrote back (!!) he pointed out that "since I did not sing, I did not exactly follow the rhyme scheme, but merely used it as a suggestion" and gave me the lyrics. Yes, yes, they can also now be found on NPR's website, but I got them directly from Scott.

All in all, a fine day for radio.

--The Transportation and Safety Administration, which is often assailed for wasting resources by checking infants in strollers and grandmothers with walkers, faced criticism this week for trying to focus its efforts by keeping a list that apparently assigns some kind of Threat Assessment Level to each passenger.

By now, probably every flier has a favorite story of what looked like an absurdity: a toddler who was made to take off his tiny rubber shoes and get wanded; an elderly war veteran who had to remove his plastic leg.

The wife of Senate Commerce Committe Ted Stevens, Catherine, was questioned at an airport because her name is the same as singer Yusef Islam, who used to be known as Cat Stevens.

But you ought to hear Mrs. Stevens sing, "Moonshadow."

There are also complaints that many lists do not contain the names of more plausible terrorists--because investigative agencies don't want to tip off people that they're being scrutinized.

The alarm over each flier being assigned some Threat Assessment level is that inaccurate or misleading information could lay around for years in some data base. Could an employer refuse to hire someone because they had a high Threat Assessment number? Could a bank turn them down for a loan? Will young couples in coffee bars ask, "What's your Threat Assessment Level," instead of "What's your sign?"

A lot of us who fly may have our own lists of people we'd like to leave at the departure gate:

As someday it may happen that a Watch List must be made
I've got a little list! I've got a little list!
of irritating passengers I'd choose to barricade
And who never would be missed! Who never would be missed!

There's the fellow with a backpack
that's the size of Zanzibar
He slings it o'er his shoulder and
leaves your nose all scarred

All people who just want to chat
when you just need to sleep
who tell smutty jokes about acrobats
rabbis, nuns, and sheep

And those who eat burritos
just before they board
they think they are discreet-o
but burp like harpsichords

There's the man with travel luggage
he dragged through yellow snow
who puts his grimy wheels on your coat
and crushes your hat like a bus rolling over a banjo

All people who shout into Airphones
"I'm calling from the plane!"
What was so damn important?
They never do explain.

And pilots who must point out--
"Uh, folks. Flying over Toledo now,"
as if beholding the Taj Mahal
Each access road and shopping mall
holds them in a thrall.

There's the man who has six martinis
and crawls on the drink trolley
Then sings drinking songs from Rawalpindi
all the way to Bali.

But it really doesn't matter whom
you put upon the list.
They'd none of them be missed.
I'm sure they'd not be missed.

I thought that instead of Toledo he said "Silver Spring," and a reference to my hometown would probably have pretty much cemented him in the #2 slot, but perhaps I misheard...

One Mom missed

My mother seemed to like to go to schools that aren't where you'd think they are. She started at Miami University of Ohio and when her family moved she transferred to Washington University in St. Louis. Unfortunately, she broke her streak when she got her master's at the University of Rhode Island when she and Dad were living in East Greenwich. (For those of you who are keeping track, was after Pennsylvania; Dallas; San Francisco; Grand Prairie, TX; Cleveland; St. Louis; Pensacola; and Mobile and before Monterey; Annapolis; Kingston, RI; and Silver Spring.)

I heard a reference this morning on NPR to "California University of Pennsylvania." Except that it's closer to Pittsburgh than it is to the ocean (oceans being two of the three locations in the Navy's version of the real estate mantra "location, location, location"), Mom and Dad could have lived there and she could have attended that school. Had she decided to go on for a Ph.D., she could have matriculated somewhere like SUNY at Stonybrook, so that she would have had both an "of" and "at," though she'd lose that "not where you think it is" part.

Is there a university or college that isn't where you think it is, but has two or more prepositions in it's name? Something like University of the Pacific at Omaha in South Carolina. Because that would be the place to go. Just picture what the sweatshirts would look like with all of their footnotes and such.