Barack Obama won (27.9%) the MoveOn straw poll on Democratic candidates and Iraq, scoring just ahead of Edwards (24.8%) and leaving everyone else, including Clinton (10.7%), in the dust. The more I hear about Obama, the more I like. What thoughts do you all have?
Jana is the Girl Anachronism. Our musical tastes don’t always overlap (her love for John Denver clashes with my Rush fetish), but we share a taste in artists who are difficult to categorize (consider anti-folk and punk cabaret).
Have you ever wanted to spend the night in Paradise(, Michigan)? What if I told you to go to Hell(, Norway)? Wikipedia has a list of Place Names with English Meanings. Apparently, Hell is also in Michigan (near Detroit, perhaps?). My favorites are Thong, England, America, Netherlands, and, of course, Fucking, Australia. (”Where are you?” “Fucking Australia!”)
A lesson for self-respecting, aspiring writers: don’t write like Dan Brown. Sure, he may be a billionaire twenty times over, but left a trail of feeble style and misshapen modifiers. When you’re tempted to sell out, think of your poor old 8th grade English teacher.
This one is for all you philosophers out there, compliments of Dewey and Rorty.
4 responses so far ↓
1 Deborah // Apr 13, 2007 at 4:22 am
“poor old 8th grade English teacher”
Or vibrant young 8th grade English teacher. Come now, John.
2 Miko // Apr 13, 2007 at 1:54 pm
It’s nice to have more reasons not to have liked Da Vinci Code. After having read it, I read at least two others of his books: they’re exactly the same. It’s really disappointing.
Re: place names: I’ve been to Intercourse, PA (or should that be through?). Apparently, they have a booming postal trade: people send boxes of cards, along with, one presumes, a check to the city, to be mailed with a postmark from Intercourse. When I was in 8th grade, that seemed like a really cool (funny?) idea, but having now sent wedding invitations, I can’t imagine why anyone would do that.
Also, in Augsburg (Germany), there’s a F?ºrstliche castle that a classmate of mine lived in. It has a section, called the Fuggerei, which is an enclave for the poor where the only rent is one dollar a year and to pray for the souls of the Fugger family. Until contact with the English-speaking world, this royal family was the Fucker family and the enclave, the Fuckery (by pronounciation, it would have ended in “ei”, not “y”). This caused endless amusement when we high schoolers found out our classmate’s family’s history.
3 Miko // Apr 13, 2007 at 2:00 pm
oh, and re: Obama v. Hillary, I was totally pro-Obama (as a Green, I’m not sure what that’s worth) until I heard the, to me, very convincing argument of a (black) woman interviewed by NPR a few days ago. She said that Obama is very idealistic and young and she wants to support him because both of those appeal to her heart but that Hillary is experienced and that, at the end of the day, she wants experience in the White House. I think I fall into the same category: Obama is the ice cream I want for dinner but Hillary is the soup and salad I’m actually going to eat…which sounds a little less like I meant it to now that I typed it, but I stand by it.
Incidentally, Obama’s campaign extends to Japanese canned coffee. (sorry, couldn’t resist)
4 Johnny // Apr 14, 2007 at 8:41 am
Lol!!!
Pure pragmatism really does do the trick!
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