Ready to Mount

Do you think Hillary or the photographer was chiefly responsible for the composition of this photo, which sorta implies she's getting an idea of how her visage would look on a new-and-improved Mt. Rushmore?

As an aside, if there had been women at the constitutional convention, I guess we'd be referring to them as Founding Mothers, huh? I don't know what I think about that, but it does sound like a good name for a band.

Feed the beast

It's a little annoying that the cover story of this week's Sunday New York Times Magazine is this 7,900-word first-person account of a blogger's highly-self-analytical (or, as Loree likes to call it, navel-gazing) and not-that-interesting life while she was blogging on her own and as an editor at Gawker.

Annoying because -- although I admit I read the whole thing -- it is, as I've already mentioned, not that interesting. It's just a really self-indulgent story about how and why this woman blogged so much about her personal life in the midst of breaking up with two boyfriends. BFD.

But what's even more aggravating than the article itself is the righteous indignation with which readers are responding. As of this morning, there were already 837 comments ... now 840 ... now 843 ... on the Times site (and who knows how many others about the story on Gawker and other independent blogs). By comparison, a cover story two weeks ago on opportunities for girls in competitive sports had prompted 289 reader responses.

I didn't read each of the comments about the blogger article, but from a quick scan, about 98.5 percent of them were highly critical of the writer (for being so caught up in her relatively unimportant existence), the Times (for having the audacity to give major treatment to something so insignificant), or both. Many of the complaints included some thread about how much time and thought was being wasted on this.

Apparently none of them really picked up on the irony (and not the fake Alanis Morissette fly-in-chardonnay kind) that this story that they deemed absolutely irrelevant had prompted them to take the time to write long -- and sometimes eloquent -- posts of their own, sharing their own self-important thoughts. All of their ranting and raving sure sure seems to give more credence -- not less -- to the Times' decision to put the dumb thing on the cover.

Oh, and the comment count is now up to 854.

Nice going, blowhards.

AA = A-hole Airlines

Prediction: Inside of 18 months, we're going to have to pay to use the rest room on commercial airplanes.

If I flew more than a few times a year, I'd be really irate about this. Aw, hell. I'm irate anyway. It figures that the new fee goes into effect the very week we're flying cross-country for our first trip of the year.

I get that businesses need to charge customers more money when their own expenses go up, but why do they have to do it like this? I'd much rather pay more for the single major cost (the ticket) instead of paying for the ticket and then having to shell out 10 bucks here and 20 bucks there for ticky-tack fees. Maybe you're losing money because you keep pissing off your customers. Does anyone know if American hired executives from Sprint recently?

I'm glad I just cashed in most of my frequent flier miles on American, because after this, they can get bent.

Somebody invent this

You've got the time. You've got the know-how. Put it to work.

I want a pair of self-cleaning eyeglasses.

Anyone else have suggestions for products we desperately need?

On an unrelated note, it turns out that brown shoe polish may not be the best choice for tan shoes. But it sure smells good.

I swear: The update

In my last post, about Sue Simmons' interesting word choice during a live broadcast, I jokingly (I thought) suggested that news anchoring mostly required the abilities to sit in a chair without falling over and read a prompter.

Little did I know, there's also ample video evidence that Sue's maybe not so great at that first requirement, either.

Of all the snarky comments I could have made, pretty good that I went with "sitting in a chair," huh? Thank you, thank you.

I swear, to tell the truth

Maybe it's just me. But if the two most important parts of my job were (1) sitting in a chair without falling over and (2) reading words off of a prompter, I'd make sure I executed both flawlessly on a regular basis.

Sue Simmons, the longtime anchor on WNBC-TV in New York, seems to have part 1 down OK, but apparently she figured she could phone it in on part 2. From the sound of it, reading 30-second teasers for the 11 o'clock show must be superfreakin' stressful.

(Not sure how long this link will work -- I'm guessing NBC is making people remove the clips -- so click through early and often.)

Personally, I don't think this is a very big deal, but it is kinda funny. Actually, it'd be cool if local stations got their on-air talent to do this more often, but at random times. It'd be like watching auto racing for the wrecks.

Duck, duck...

I'm not going to get into the politics of foie gras -- well, not now, anyway -- but I will let you know that it's a momentous day for foodies in the Windy City. Chicago has repealed its two-year-old ban on restaurants serving foie gras.

Well, it's not quite the 21st Amendment, but it should be big doings in my former hometown.

I'm sure you can read more about the news on Chicago newspapers' web sites, but the link in the first paragraph points to the New York Times food blog for a reason. Click through and read the last two paragraphs of the article -- the part in which a Chicago alderman warns his colleagues that "It" could happen to them -- and then check out reader comments 4, 5 and 7. Maybe I'm just tired and slap-happy, but I laughed my ass off.

(Don't read the other reader comments if you have a weak stomach.)

All of this should make the kids over at Hog Doug's, purveyor of the world's best hot dogs -- seriously, there's no debate -- pretty happy. (Check out the daily specials for an idea of the monstrously ingenious things they do with encased meats.)

If memory serves, Doug was cited a few times for continuing to serve foie gras in (or on?) his sausages, despite the ban. Was pretty clever how he tried to get around it though, by intentionally misspelling the item on his menu. Something like fwah grah, I think. Damn, I could really go for a trip to Hot Doug's. Who's in?

Oh, and thanks to my gorgeous and wonderful wife for sending me the news.