Archive for September, 2010
We’ve all had a chuckle at the expense of bad spelling or usage a time or two. Signs wind up advertising not quite what they thought, the IKEA instructions tell us to “place the longer shaft in the lower hole for maximum comfort;” French politicians say “fellatio” when they mean “inflation.” That’s just part of [ READ MORE ]
An off-day post, from the front page of today’s Wall Street Journal: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703369704575461542987870022.html?mod=WSJ_hps_MIDDLEFifthNews Cheerful way to start your day[ READ MORE ]
Do you have a loved one, a spouse; a special friend in your life? Are they, too, an avid reader? If you do and they are, you already know where this post is going, as the weather turns cool and the blankets come out: snuggling up with a book and a loved one is about [ READ MORE ]
The Bard gave us some of the greatest work in the English language, but he also wrote some of the lamest dick jokes ever. I like to think that I was honoring the latter part (hur hur hur) of his legacy when I first scribbled down a handful of titles for “Shakespearean Parody Porn,” which [ READ MORE ]
I tend to credit my mother with teaching her sons to cook (since she knew she’d never get grandkids on the strength of our other merits), but I realized tonight that I may have actually inherited most of my technique from my father. This does relate to writing, so bear with me! Dad tended to [ READ MORE ]
Books! We love ‘em. At least I hope everyone reading this blog loves ‘em, because I will surely be bothering you to read at least one at some point. Not for a while, though, don’t worry. Anyway. Books! Writers should read ‘em, as anyone who’s ever even vaguely looked into the career has heard a [ READ MORE ]
Today is one of those days where my brain comes up dry. There’s nothing post-worthy in it (seriously, you should have seen the draft that revolved around allusions to Werner Herzog’s adaptation of Woyzeck). But that’s okay, because I can pick other people’s brains, and here is a lesson for all my writer-readers: surround yourself [ READ MORE ]
Musicians like to joke about working to support their job, or at least I heard it from a musician first. But it’s pretty good for anyone in an artistic field, right? Writers actually have it kind of easy, on account of only needing to pay for food, utilities, and something to write on plus (these [ READ MORE ]
I don’t actually try to make dinner parties more awkward than they need to be, but that didn’t stop me from kicking Saturday’s northern-Minnesota shindig off by mentioning that I was from Iowa, which for those of you living outside the Midwest is somewhat akin to listing “retaking the Palestinian homeland” in your interests on [ READ MORE ]
The difference between a dish towel, a dish cloth, a washcloth, and a tea towel: neither the set-up for a joke nor something I knew a few years ago. For that matter, it’s not something I ever considered anyone else knowing, or caring about. I was dimly aware that all of those words/phrases existed and [ READ MORE ]
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