The Next Dark Age
We're in it Now
Public Service Announcement – Father’s Day Gifts
I have no idea what to get, or rather, send, to my father for Father’s Day. He and I had a great system for several years. For birthdays and Christmas I would send him stuff for his dog and he would send me stuff for Kiwi the Grey. Then he re-married and that just seems weird. But I know what not to send him:
These are the shelves in the Library’s Used Book Store dedicated to Sports. Do you see all that green? Golf books. We get an obscene number of donations related to golf. Many are clearly not opened. My conclusion? People are buying them for their dads, who are not interested in golf. Or maybe reading. Seriously, do you know anyone that would by himself (I suppose it could be herself) a book on golf? Really?
Look, I realize that dads are difficult, and personally, I have no idea what mine has seen on TV, read or listened to on his iPod lately. Actually, I don’t even know if he has an iPod. But I have to do better than a book on golf. Something funny, or nostalgic, or suprising, or clever. I am not above spending 50 bucks on a joke gift, either.
Stupid Facebook and Stupid Blogging
USA Today had a fun article about how everyone on Facebook and Twitter is boring:
“We all have to go to status-update charm school,” jokes Hal Niedzviecki, author of The Peep Diaries: How We’re Learning to Love Watching Ourselves and Our Neighbors, who joined a slew of online social networks to investigate how they are changing the definition of privacy. “Just one in every million status updates is worth reading, maybe one in every 5 million if you’re looking for poetics.”
I agree. And I am glad that they are not picking on traditional blogs today.
Scalzi wrote not long ago about how people blog (or start blogs, anyway) for different reasons, which is why many have defected to Twitter. Some are trying to count their friends. Some want to post pictures of their babies. Few are more annoying to me than the people that think they are going to get famous.
Personally, I am in part meeting people and keeping in touch, part journaling (because I don’t keep a real one anymore) and part practicing the art of writing for purposes of putting out a half-decent employee newsletter. I should really start working on that now. Oh, and giving my mother the joy of correcting my English.
If I could only use this blog for one thing it would be keeping track of the books I have read and what, exactly I thought about them at the time. But my Facebook updates? They suck as much as the next guy’s.
Three Cups of Tea, by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin
Book 22
I found Three Cups of Tea, by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin at the Library UBS after hearing raves about it. The Amazon description:
In 1993 Greg Mortenson was the exhausted survivor of a failed attempt to ascend K2, an American climbing bum wandering emaciated and lost through Pakistan’s Karakoram Himalaya. After he was taken in and nursed back to health by the people of an impoverished Pakistani village, Mortenson promised to return one day and build them a school. From that rash, earnest promise grew one of the most incredible humanitarian campaigns of our time—Greg Mortenson’s one-man mission to counteract extremism by building schools, especially for girls, throughout the breeding ground of the Taliban.
The first half of the book was fabulous. In describing the climb, the region and how Mortenson came to know the people of Korphe, a village in Pakistan, we are made to care about the quest. Then came the story of a total novice trying to raise the funds for one school, and finally finding a sponsor that has the cash. Then they talk about how having the money is only half of the struggle for a foreigner trying to navigate the socio-cultural issues of the country he is trying to help.
Then comes the story of trying to build an organization that can do it again and again.
Mortenson seems to be a pretty humble guy. He went so far as to print the complaints of former members of his Board, which takes some courage. He has no problem retelling and analyzing mistakes that he has made, which is fabulous for people who are making similar efforts. The weird thing, though, is that it is written entirely in the third person so that Mortenson is actually quoted in the text. As in “Mortenson says”. That was distracting to me since he is a co-author and this is his story.
His description of 9/11 – he had started trying to build schools in Afghanistan at the time – was rather unnerving. His aftermath involved the first hate mail he had ever received from people that didn’t appreciate his message: that we should be spending money on helping rather than bombing. And his own experience being detained with a passport problem. He was actually asked where Osama bin Laden was hiding. I am not criticizing the government here, but I must say that I completely understood Mortenson describing his urge to laugh at the absurdity of that question and knowing that he would be totally screwed if he did because these people were dead serious. So he summoned all of his willpower to keep a straight face and say, “I hope I never know a thing like that.” It was cinematic.
Finally, one must assume that a major reason that Mortenson bothered to write a book was for the fundraising potential. The least I can do is put in a link to the website for his organization, the Central Asia Institute. Also, I must add that I the web site shows Mortenson’s speaking schedule. It confirms that his wife is a saint.
Theories
My friend Jenny has a theory, first formulated in college:
Women meet the right guy and decide they want to get married. Men decide to get married and ask whomever they happen to be with at the time.
I have always found this a plausible theory, but the men I know continually deny it. MSN had an article called “Why Men Dump Girls They Dig” and I clicked it to see if there was any insight. And oh my God, there it was, number 1 on the list:
“Women get serious when they meet the right man. Men get serious with whomever we happen to be dating when we’re finally ready to settle down. That means after every other aspect of our life is in order — whether it’s finishing grad school, finally pulling down a good-size paycheck, owning a car outright — or when our friends start dropping like flies (that’s guyspeak for getting married).”
Then I saw the article was originally printed in Cosmo. (Ugh.) But still – validation for Jenny.
American Express – Reviewing the Rewards
I have completed my first year using the American Express Blue Card. You may recall that I applied for this card after I dumped Bank of America for being a pain in the butt. Because I pay my cards in full each month (except when I have a 12-month no interest at Best Buy or something), I did some homework on rewards programs before settling on this one.
The cash back formula is:
1% on gas, groceries and drugstores and one half of one % on everything else on the first $6,500 spent each year. After that, 5% on gas, groceries and drugstores and 1.5% on everything else.
I used this card for everything, everywhere that takes Amex, including two dollar purchases at McDonald’s and most travel expenses for work. I used my Mileage Plus Visa as a backup. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Amex is accepted most places. Notable exceptions were:
1. School tuition. Part-time students can pay by credit card, but BU doesn’t take Amex.
2. Doctor’s offices. Veterinarian’s offices.
3. Hair salons and spas are iffy.
Hidden perk – Costco only takes American Express. So I was able to start buying my gas there. I don’t do it all the time, but it is a nice option to have.
The bottom line? $703.65 was my cash back for the year’s purchases.
The web site analysis told me that the average card user manages the 5% return on 15% of her purchases. My 5% return was on 25% of my purchases. I attribute that to two things:
1. I pay for groceries on my credit card. That makes some people squeamish.
2. My prescription drug program has me making the initial purchase and then being reimbursed by BCBS. So I am getting 5% back on all of those allergy drugs.
There is some fine print to note regarding the rewards program. For one thing, if you pay your bills late, you may forfeit the cash back altogether. That would suck. Also, there is a limit to the single-visit cash back for that 5% return ($500?). Neither of these things is an issue for me.
At the close of the year, American Express says that it will pay the reward after 30 days. Mine posted to my account over the weekend, so I was pleased.
Where I am not-so-pleased:
The web site shows earnings of 1.25% rather than 1.5% for the next time around. I am disappointed, but the talking heads warned us that these benefits were in jeopardy as banks tried to stabilize. So I am not crying about it.
Especially since that $736 that I spent in New Orleans was pretty well covered by that cash back. So my “free” vacation just became free again. Almost.
Required School Reading
I was reading an article not long ago about the high school reading lists. It was one of those great debates of the value of the “classic” versus something to which the kids might better relate. Or for which there is a modern message. Whatever.
I was in Barnes & Noble today and spotted the Required Reading table:
OK, there was no way to get a good picture here.
In addition to Fitzgerald, Steinbeck and Harper Lee, we find The Kite Runner, Tuesdays with Morrie and Reading Lolita in Tehran. On the other side of the table were The Joy Luck Club (which my brother actually read in high school, which is how I discovered Amy Tan) and Wicked. The Lovely Bones was there, along with The Memory Keeper’s Daughter. While I wouldn’t call either great literature, they were good reads that had…themes…and stuff.
Mostly, I am loving this – with the hope that these modern titles will encourage more reading in general. But I also appreciate the other side of the argument – there is only so much time in the school and the classics are classics for a reason. And shouldn’t there be some books that we all read in high school? I suggest that the closest we come to “everyone was assigned these books” was Hamlet and To Kill a Mockingbird. And I am sure you will all recall that I didn’t read the latter until I was 30. I do remember being assigned one modern novel. It was one of Anne Tyler’s and I hated it. The way I remember it, the writing just seemed so…middle aged.
In Ian McEwan’s novel, Saturday, the grandfather paid the granddaughter to memorize poetry. She grew up to be a published poet. I swear I am going to pay my nephew to read books.
Friday Randomness
Summer hours have started in my office, which means Fridays are really quiet. I plan to spend a bunch of time in our mail room.
A dozen years ago, when I first started here, my boss told me that our mail room was overwhelmed with the new business brought in by our new affiliate company and if I had any spare time I should go help out there. I did, and it was fun. To this day I will maintain that the best way to learn the names of everyone in the company is to work for awhile in the mail room. Of course, as years went by (and my job changed and changed), I spent less and less time down there. And since we moved to the big-bad office complex I am rarely there at all. The equipment has evolved and I am afraid to touch anything, but I think it will be fun.
Complaining:
Many years ago, I asked my mother to pick up some oatmeal at the grocery store. There is only one flavor of oatmeal allowed in my house: Maple & Brown Sugar. I thought she also understood that there is only one brand: Quaker Oats. She brought home the Jewel brand, saying it was on sale and was exactly the same thing.
It was not.
This morning, I wanted something hot for breakfast and picked up some oatmeal at the deli. It was not Quaker Oats. It was not the same thing:
It isn’t bad exactly. It just tastes wrong.
Ongoing Search for the Perfect Hand Cream:
This is hardly worth reviewing because I don’t think it is made anymore. However, I was running low on hand cream at the office, so I brought this one from home:
Breathe:energy from Bath & Body Works has shea butter, so for work I’ll have to be careful what I touch after applying it. But that means it does last for the entire time between bathroom breaks/hand washings. The scent on this one is ginger verbena, which I really like. It was pretty expensive at $12.50, but I bought it at 75% off at the last clearance sale.
Geez. It really feels very Friday today.
The Goode Family
One was when Joey figured out that Monica was hooking up with Chandler. The other was when Beavis and Butthead…ummm…said stuff. Heh heh.
Anyway. During the last couple
of episodes of Lost, I saw the preview for a new Mike Judge show called The Goode Family. It looked kind of like King of the Hill for crazy-green people. I caught the first two episodes last night. And it was kind of like King of the Hill for crazy-green poeple.Judge does the voice of the dad, who I would describe as the hippie teacher from Beavis & Butthead if he got married and had children. That was a nice dose of nostalgia. The mom was like the mom on Daria, another Judge cartoon on MTV. The grandpa kind of reminds me of Hank Hill’s dad. I guess my point is that I wouldn’t exactly call this new. In fact, I wouldn’t even say I was totally paying attention. But:
Watching the eco-dad trying to get on with the football dads was fun. Watching the dog, doomed for all eternity to eat soy bones, hunting squirrel was fun. I wouldn’t use up DVR space on this show, but it has some potential. And it has to be better than watching reality TV all summer.
Carradine
The End of the "Bring Me a Book" Story
After struggling for a bit, I decided to bring Jodi two books in New Orleans. The first was A Confederacy of Dunces, by John Kennedy Toole. It is set in New Orleans and I loved it. But because it is rather…weird, with a rat-crazy hero, I thought I had better have a back up plan. So I brought an Oprah book, too. I also had my six back issues of Vanity Fair for the worst case scenario. And I knew where the Walgreen’s is.
Turns out, she was loving A Confederacy of Dunces. I can’t tell you how happy that made me. This reminds me that I saw an actual statue of Ignatius Reilly out in front of a hotel on Canal Street. Sorry about the glare.
Of course, now I can’t expect to get the book back. Which is fine…I am sure I can find a nice hard cover at a used bookstore somewhere.
The Next Dark Age 