Jeremy Blachman's Weblog: 2012

Subway Ride

Here's a good way for the conductor to freak people out on the subway:

Come into the subway car, gesture to a bag no one had really noticed, and say, "We realize there's an unattended bag in this car. Don't worry. We know about it, and we'll be stopping at Jay Street to investigate and figure out what it is."

Uh, thanks.

That caused my roommate and I to switch cars at the next stop. And then, at Jay Street, as the conductor announced, "We'll be stopped in this station pending an investigation. We should be moving shortly," we got out and walked to another stop, since we figured it might be a while.

Obviously I'm sure it was nothing. Makes the subway ride more interesting though.

David Foster Wallace

I mentioned the new David Foster Wallace essay collection before, "Consider The Lobster," and it's linked over in the sidebar, but just another note on it -- I read one of the essays today over lunch, and it was really, really terrific.  It's called "Up, Simba," and it's an account of a few days he spent as a reporter covering John McCain during the 2000 primary season.  It's probably the best thing I've ever read about a political campaign and what it's like to be a member of the media covering it, and it's a terrific profile of McCain.  It makes me want to go back and re-read Michael Lewis's book, Trail Fever, which I remember as being excellent but I can't imagine it sustains the excellence of Wallace's piece throughout, because I don't know if anything can.  It's a really terrific piece.  Best piece in the book, although everything in there is pretty readable and interesting.  The piece on the Maine Lobster Festival is probably my next favorite.

Rough transcript of phone conversation with my grandmother 90 minutes after I took Robitussin, reconstructed from notes I took while on the phone and thinking this could be a funny post.

Grandma: "How's your cold?"
Me: "It's okay.  I took Robitussin."
Grandma: "If you were here I could have given you Robitussin.  I have a whole bottle."
Me: "You probably have a different kind than what I took.  They have all different kinds."
Grandma: "I'm looking.  I have DM.  What does that mean?"
Me: "It's for dextromethorphan.  There are a bunch of ingredients and they mix them all up to make in confusing with all the different kinds.  Cough and cold.  Cold and chest congestion.  Cough and flu.  Flu and cough.  Cough and foot.  Arm and shoulder.  Cough, cold, and thirsty.  It's confusing.  I took CF."
Grandma: "I have something else in here too.  It's a cough syrup with codeine.  I don't remember getting this."
Me: "That sounds like it would be a prescription."
Grandma: "Yeah.  It says January 2005.  So a year ago.  I didn't even use it.  It's a whole bottle.  I'm glad I have this."
Me: "Why are you glad you have it?  You should probably throw it out."
Grandma: "I don't throw anything out."
Me: "It's probably not good anymore."
Grandma: "Eh, I'll leave it.  I have all sorts of things in here."
Me: "I'm sure you do."
Grandma: "I was just talking to your uncle.  I had this nice plant and it had grown to like a foot and a half and I came downstairs a few days ago and the leaves were all limp and it looks like it's dead."
Me: "Terrorists."
Grandma: "What?"
Me: "Maybe it was terrorists."
Grandma: "No, I think I gave it too much water."
Me: "Maybe.  Did you see the news thing about the ABC anchor who got hurt in Iraq?"
Grandma: "No, I didn't see it, I just got home."
Me: "Woodruff, on Channel 7."
Grandma: "Oh, he seems nice.  You know who I don't like?  That guy on CNN who's always on, what's his name?"
Me: "Anderson Cooper?"
Grandma: "Yeah.  He looks like a spoiled brat."
Me: "They like him because he shows emotion on TV."
Grandma: "I think he talks too fast.  And his name is all over the screen, on the top, flying back and forth.  And what's that number they put after his name all the time?  What does that mean?"
Me: "360?"
Grandma: "Yeah.  What is 360?"
Me: "It's the number of degrees in a circle.  It's like he's looking all around.  I don't know.  I guess it's stupid once you think about it."
Grandma: "Yeah.  And what did they do with the guy from before?"
Me: "Aaron Brown?"
Grandma: "Yeah.  I liked him.  I think they think he talked too slow.  I notice people on the news are talking faster and faster, and it's not just because I'm getting older.  I think they have to talk faster to get more news in a shorter time so they can have more commercials."
Me: "Maybe.  They fired Aaron Brown."
Grandma: "Oh, I feel terrible for him.  I liked him."

"And it's not just for pets!"

I just saw a commercial for a product called "Urine Gone."  That's right, Urine Gone.  Nothing subtle about this product.  It removes urine stains.  It doesn't just mask them like other stain removers, but actually has a special enzyme formula that destroys them.  At one point, the announcer said, "And it works on all kinds of surfaces!" and a list appeared on the screen.  Wood, linoleum, carpet, and, somewhere in the middle of the list, "feces."  Really.  Here's my question.  If you've got a urine stain on top of feces, is the urine really the biggest problem here?  "Honey, I got all the urine off the feces, the house is clean now."  That doesn't even make any sense.  And then, right at the end of the ad, "And it's not just for pets!"  Real subtle, makers of Urine Gone.  And, according to the website, the product comes with a free black light, so you can find your very own urine stains, wherever they lurk.  What fun.

And: apparently this stuff doesn't even work:

Our volunteer Tami Michaels thought it worked really well but other consumers complain that some enzyme cleaners remove the stain initially -- only to have it return later.

Tami says 2 weeks later, the pet urine stain in her white carpet "does" appear to be coming back slightly....

And don't confuse this with a similar enzyme product called "Urine-Off".

The Anonymous Lawyer Post I Decided Would Make More Sense Over Here

I was going to post this over there, but it makes more sense over here:

The ambulance just came and took one of my associates to the hospital, after my meeting with her got a little out of hand.  I didn't mean to actually hit her with the California Reporter, but my aim was off.  I thought I'd just clip the side of her head, make her feel the breeze as it flew by her and hit the wall, but I missed by a couple of inches and got her right in the eye.  Still, I don't regret it.  She handed in a memo this morning that's riddled with mistakes.  I called her in to talk about it.

"You claimed that there were sixty-two cases with similar facts that had all been decided in favor of our client's position.  I can't find any evidence that any of these cases even exist."

"I may have embellished the facts of cases, but I stand behind the essential truth of them."

"The cases don't exist.  There are no cases."

"I thought I remembered some cases.  There was one case I read about.  I don't have the citation.  But the meaning behind the cases is what's important, and I stand behind my interpretation of that meaning."

"There are no cases.  We have nothing to argue in front of the court."

"In a technical sense, there are no cases.  But the spirit of the memo still holds true.  I wrote this memo inspired by actual fact.  We have a justice system.  I was in a courtroom once.  These cases could have existed, but, more important, the message of these cases is a message that I think most readers of my memo will be touched by."

"But there are no cases."

"That's merely a detail.  I admit I embellished some of the details.  But the essential truth---"

"I know.  The essential truth.  On page 43, you cite a case involving a train, a conductor, and a carton of shelf-stable lactose-free milk.  Was there a train?"

"In the technical sense, no."

"Was there a conductor?"

"I believed at the time I wrote the memo that there had been a conductor.  Since writing the memo, I have been informed that it would have been impossible for there to be a conductor.  Nevertheless, I stand behind the existence of the conductor, whether or not he actually existed."

"Okay.  Was there any milk?"

"Not in the strictest sense.  The story of the milk may have been vastly accelerated in my memo."

"Vastly accelerated?  I don't understand that.  What does that mean?"

"It means there was no milk.  But I stand behind the message of the case."

"There was no case."

"That's not important."

And then I threw the California Reporter at her head.  Oops.

(Apologies for today's obsession with James Frey.  It'll pass.)

James Frey, cont'd

Nice.  I mean, I'm sure Oprah's reversal on her support of Frey was based on the public's reaction, but, still, good for her.

More here.  Of course, it's probably going to end up selling more books for him, which kind of sucks.

Curt Schilling

Bill Simmons interviews Curt Schilling.  This is a fantastic read.  Schilling talking about all sorts of things Red Sox, in great detail.  Most interviews with ballplayers are three lines long and just platitudes that anyone can make up.  This is not like that.  Great stuff.  Whether or not you care about Curt Schilling at all.  This piece kinda makes me want to interview famous people for a living, at least for a few days or something, until it got boring.

Airborne

So I've been using these Airborne lozenges for about 7 hours now.  They say to suck on one lozenge an hour.  I feel a little bit better.  Maybe these things do work.  But I'm not really understanding the sales pitch.  "Created by a second grade school teacher!"  This is a medical product.  I'm hoping it gets rid of my cold.  Why is it a good thing that a second grade teacher created this as opposed to, say, a doctor.  With a medical degree.  They say she was tired of getting colds all the time, and so she came up with this special formula.  I understand why a teacher would like this product.  I just don't understand how a teacher would make the product.

I think it might be a failure of the educational system, actually.  We're giving people too much self-esteem.  They think they can do anything they set their mind to.  Well, not all of us can.  I may think it would be cool to fly to outer space, but I don't know how to build a rocket, and if I try, and come up with something that sorta looks like a rocket, you'd probably regret it if you let me light it on fire with you inside, just to see what would happen.

I don't get why the sales pitch is working.  Why anyone is thinking, "Oh, a second grade teacher made these medicinal things -- that means they must be great!"  They don't even tell us if she was a *good* teacher.  What are her students' test scores?  Do parents like her?  Where does she teach?  I liked my second grade teacher a lot, but I don't think I'd trust her to heal me.  That's why we had a school nurse.  I wouldn't trust the nurse to teach me math.  It's just not something she's trained to do.

I fear the success of Airborne will lead to all sorts of other attempts for people faced with problems to try and create their own solutions and market them as such.  But will it work?  I don't know.

"Gonorrhea cream -- created by a real prostitute!"  Does that inspire confidence?  Not to me.

Yet I bought this stuff, and it seems to maybe be working.  So what do I know?

Billy Joel

I just got back from seeing Billy Joel in concert at Madison Square Garden.  It was his second of twelve scheduled shows there.  He was really good, it was a really good show.  Had what should have been terrible seats but really weren't that bad.  Very last row, all the way at the top, but it was in a direct line with one of the video screens, and it was pretty good position relative to the stage -- probably about in line with the top of the key if the stage was at the basket, same side of the arena, so that was good -- and the rows of seats were steep enough that there weren't any heads in the way and the view was pretty clear.  What really impressed me was the Madison Square Garden sound system.  The sound mix was perfect, lyrics completely clear, volume was right, it was all really good.  I saw Billy Joel perform once before, about 6 years ago at Nassau Coliseum, and it was pretty hard to hear anything, hard to see anything, and just generally pretty disappointing.  This was a lot better.

[Oddly enough, I just checked a Billy Joel message board to find the setlist, and found photos from a guy who it turns out was in the same section as I was, 423.  It makes no sense to take photos from so far away, but here are this guy's photos.  The guy right in front of me had a camera phone, but I don't think this was him, since he was mostly asleep.]

Much of the setlist was the expected hits, but he did throw in a bunch of album cuts that were nice to hear.  You could tell which ones were the album cuts, as opposed to the hits, because those were the songs when everyone went to the bathroom.  That's got to suck, if you're a performer.  You pull out something unexpected, people hear three notes they don't recognize, and, suddenly, "oh, I don't know this one, I have to pee."  I like hearing different stuff mixed in.  It's no fun if you can predict every song.  I feel like this is a phenomenon unique to concerts.  People don't run to the bathroom when managers put in a pinch hitter at a baseball game.  "Oh, they're putting in the backup second baseman.  Time for another hot dog." 

Summer, Highland Falls is one of my favorite Billy Joel songs, and he hadn't been doing it in previous shows on this tour, but he did it tonight, so that was cool.  He had a section of the show which he said he was doing songs with place names in the title -- Summer Highland Falls, New York State of Mind, Vienna, Zanzibar, and Allentown -- and when he said that was done I figured no Miami 2017, but that came eventually.  It was a cool show, I liked it a lot.

Miami 2017 has a bunch of place name shout-outs that get applause.  He sings Brooklyn, people clap.  He sings Queens, people clap.  He sings the Bronx, silence.  Utter silence.  He sings Harlem, worse than silence.  There was negative sound.  I could hear the toilets flushing, with all the people who left because they didn't know the song.

Heading into the arena, there was a crush of people trying to form lines to go through the turnstiles and get our tickets scanned.  An absolute sea of people.  I once saw a Daily Show clip where they had footage from a hockey game and tried to find the black people in the crowd.  That seemed like an easy task compared to what it would have been like here.  Every white person from Long Island was at Madison Square Garden, but, all night, I saw one black person and some guy that was maybe half-British.  That was about it for diversity.  I was talking to a friend just now, after I got home from the show, and he said he saw a Dave Matthews concert and it was the same thing -- there were more black people on stage than in the audience.

The show ran pretty much exactly two hours long, almost close enough that I imagine putting together the setlist is kind of like being a contestant on The Price Is Right and trying to get to that two hour point, as close as you can, without going over.  I mean, it makes sense, since he has to stay fresh for the other ten shows at MSG and wherever else he's going too, but it was just kind of amusing that it hit that 2 hour mark and he was in the middle of Piano Man, and just stopped and left the stage.  I'm kidding.  Sort of.

It was a really good show though.  I liked.  Worth seeing.

Hiccups

In the improv comedy class I'm in, someone said last night that the way to get rid of hiccups is to touch your throat and say the word "pineapple."  I think that's what he said.  It didn't make that much sense when he said it, and it doesn't make any more sense this morning, but what do I know?

My computer's doing fine since its little hiccup on Tuesday.  I expect it's probably a fan issue.  I expect I'll do nothing about it until it happens again.  I expect I will come to regret that.

On the recommendation of a friend, I'm about to go buy something called Airborne to see if it'll knock out this cold I felt come on last night.  I've gotten about 30 hours of sleep over the last three nights, so that's clearly not my problem... nevertheless...

No one cares, but Mets Geek has an interesting post about the upcoming season.

Also, if anyone wants to throw something in the comments on this topic... I feel like when I go eat sushi -- and I mean relatively inexpensive sushi, like a $7 lunch special somewhere -- I'm missing out on a world of interesting things I just wouldn't think of ordering because I don't know about them.  Fish or not fish, raw or not raw, no matter.  And my only limits to adventure are things with eyes (I once accidentally ate a fried shrimp head.  Oops.) or things that'll kill me (I read a blog post about Fugu somewhere a few weeks ago).  Tried sea urchin once (when someone else was paying).  Liked it well enough, but not so much that I want to pay 4 bucks for a bite of it.  Chirashi lunch specials seem to be good value, from my limited experience -- a bunch of fish, some rice, it's generally good stuff and nice variety.  But I feel like there might be an even bigger world out there that I'm missing.  Any ideas?

I Hate Computers

If you pretend a computer didn't shut off suddenly without warning, twice in one day, will the problem go away?  Part of me is hoping that's the case.  The more sensible part of me spent some time tonight burning anything I may ever want from this computer onto DVD.  The part of me that writes my book is going to be e-mailing it to myself every 10 seconds or so.  What a pain, but, then again, as calamities go, it's pretty tolerable.  Hopefully it was just the dust that built up under the fan, a bit.  I doubt it, but it seems to be okay tonight, for the past 2 hours or so, since I cleaned the dust.  Who knows.  It's a machine.  Machines are weird.  My George Foreman grill sparks sometimes when I unplug it.  The freezer doesn't always keep ice cream totally frozen.  My watch gains a minute a month.  Machines.  I hate machines.

Throwing Rocks

A friend e-mailed me this bit from a sports article over the weekend:

A rock was thrown through the front window of the home of Pete Morelli, the N.F.L. referee who made an incorrect call in last Sunday's playoff game between the Steelers and Colts. Morelli is also a high school principal. The police in Stockton, Calif., where he lives, said it was unclear whether the incident was related to his job at the school or as a referee. There were no suspects and no one was injured.

That's kind of funny.

Planet of the Offensive Online Recommendation Engines

There's a New York Times article today about online recommendation engines from stores like Amazon, NetFlix, and iTunes.  The highlight:

Earlier this month, Walmart.com issued a public apology and took down its entire cross-selling recommendation system when customers who looked at a boxed set of movies that included "Martin Luther King: I Have a Dream" and "Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson" were told they might also appreciate a "Planet of the Apes" DVD collection, as well as "Ace Ventura: Pet Detective" and other irrelevant titles.

That's great.  So I decided to try a little experiment.  I signed up for a new Amazon account and added the most offensive products I could think of to my wish list, to see what recommendations I'd get.  I made a wish list consisting of:

• Mein Kampf, by Adolf Hitler
• A confederate flag leather vest (check it out, it's really ridiculous)
• David Duke's book, Jewish Supremacism (according to one of the Amazon reader reviews, this is the edition "with the addition of a section on the Israeli foreknowledge of the 9/11 attacks."  That's a relief.)
• Bring It On, by Pat Robertson (a book of Robertson's answers to questions like "Do Clones Have Souls?" -- seriously, that's an example listed in the excerpt)
• Gigli DVD (Ben Affleck & Jennifer Lopez)

Among the recommendations generated:

• Mariah Carey's Glitter DVD
• An appropriately-titled book called "Why Johnny Can't Think" (well, if he's reading everything on my wish list...)
• "The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History"
• Alfie, with Jude Law
• Maybe the world's worst-titled book ever, "Hell's Best Kept Secret."  The very first line of the first Amazon reader review on the page: "Satan does not want you to read this book! Though it has been out for a decade, it has really been continually suppressed by the Devil. Not anymore! With the Internet as a resource, as long as there are brothers like myself who are convicted of God's word, I will make sure that this secret is no longer kept hidden!"

This didn't actually teach me anything, but it was sort of fun to fool around with.

Just a few links

This is a really sad story about former baseball pitcher Jeff Reardon, who was arrested last month for robbing a jewelry store.  Seriously heartbreaking stuff, about his son's death and how he's been unable to cope.

This is a Slate article about Louis Sachar, author of some best-selling children's books.  He wrote "Sideways Stories From Wayside School," which I read as a young kid and thought was really terrific and funny and engaging.  Loved it.  Apparently a few years ago he wrote a book called "Holes" which won some awards, and he has a new one now, "Small Steps."  The article makes him sound like someone who writes with a reason, like he has something to say.  That's good.  It's not a great review of "Small Steps," but kind of makes me want to read it anyway.

This is a weblog by a Canadian law graduate who wrote a book called, "So, You Want to be a Lawyer, Eh?" a guide for prospective and current Canadian law school students.  I can't vouch for the book, but the guy e-mailed me and his blog looks okay so I figured I'd put up the link in case anyone's in the market for such a book and wants to check it out.

Looking for Comedy In The Muslim World... Did I Find Any?

Like I posted last week, I'm a big Albert Brooks fan.  Saw his new movie, "Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World" this evening with a friend.  Saw the 5:15 showing.  Good time to see a movie, if you want a nice seat.  Theater wasn't empty, but it was far from packed.  The reviews, unfortunately, seem to have gotten it mostly right.  It's an okay movie.  There are laughs.  It starts out really well.  There's a line about two minutes in, that wasn't in the trailer, that had me laughing out loud, and then laughing out loud again a few minutes later when I thought about it again.  When he's satirizing Hollywood, it's very very funny.  But then he goes to India, and at the point where the movie should really take off, it doesn't.  There are funny moments, but it never seems to build any momentum, and there are so many avenues of comedy that don't get explored.  I'd have loved to see some scenes where Albert Brooks explores India a little more.  Goes into a supermarket.  Goes into a restaurant.  Goes into a store.  Goes into a museum.  Tries to buy some vegetables.  There's a point where he decides to start wearing traditional Indian clothing.  I wanted to see the scene where he picked it out, and tried it on.  There's a scene where he meets with representatives from Al Jazeera TV.  I wanted to see a longer riff on that, some other shows, some more meat on the jokes.  A large chunk of the movie is a comedy concert he gives that isn't that funny, and slows the movie down completely.  And then he goes to Pakistan and the movie starts to lose its logic and grope around for an ending.  I didn't expect or need the movie to say something profound about comedy in the Muslim world and what Muslims like to laugh at -- and it didn't, but that wasn't the problem with the movie.  The problem was that it was only funny some of the time, and left so much potential on the table.  I left feeling like it was a great first draft, but disappointed that he didn't go back and really work on it.  And maybe that's not fair, and maybe that's not how it happened.  But he's so good when he's good, and this just felt like a weak effort.  I still recommend it, but I'm a little bummed out that it wasn't the movie I hoped it would be.