Beverages as a hallmark of "Southern-ness"... a little food anthropology for y'all to enjoy.

I've always thought that a better indication of "southern-ness" than the Mason-Dixon line is what I term, "The Beverage Line." If you order tea in a restaurant and it comes on ice in a glass, you're in the south. If your waitress asks, "What kind of coke do you want?" and she's offering Pepsi products, you're in the south. I'm in Louisville, KY, and I'm rather partial to Twinings Lady Grey, hot, two sweet n lows, maybe a slice of lemon. But my mother keeps a pitcher of tea in the fridge at all times, and I have been known to refer to my beloved Tab, or my son's Mountain Dew, as "coke."

Imagine my surprise to learn that science is on the case- at least, as far as Virginia is concerned. Check this out. Don't just read the text, go to the data as well. Fascinating stuff. Myself? I'd like someone to codify those variables for KY and Southern IN.

Local response to the lead law from hell...

Even my local paper, the Courier Cage Liner, realizes that this law is having unintended consequences for small businesses and thrift shops. Of course, being the cageliner, they frame it as "trimming inventory." Because they suck that way.

This woman is an idiot.

Demint's idea is basically to halt implementation of this law until we can clean up what we mean for the law to do. There is no threat to the safety of children, here. But SC representative Cobb-Hunter has her panties in a bunch "for the children." Ten to one she's not even read relevant EXCERPTS of the lead law, let alone the entire thing. I'm pretty sure she's ignorant of Demint's response proposal as well.

I'm starting to think we need to pass a law to the effect that failure to read a bill means you're not eligible to vote on it. I can see it now- The house leader passing out little bubble-in sheets and a paper quiz. "Okay, you have to score above a 70 on this in order to cast a vote on the subject this afternoon. Does everyone have a number 2 pencil?"

Another wonderful entry on the Lead Law debacle. But even better, she has embedded a segment of Ray Bradbury talking about his love of books. Couldn't be more timely.

The CPSIA

Yes, it is a Terrible, Horrible, No good, Very Bad, Day....

Here is this morning's round up of news on the lead law that is destroying kiddie books all over the country. (Not to mention, dirt bikes, baby clothes, and the careers of thousands of handicraft makers.)


And Overlawyered has responded to the NY Times' ridiculous editorial in favor of the law. You'll want to read both the original, and the response.

I didn't read a ton of kid's books as a child. I read what we had in the house, which was largely classic novels. The elementary school library, and the scholastic book club handouts, introduced me to all kinds of wonderful kiddie books. Just for the hell of it, I googled to see which of those I remember fondly have been out of print since 1985 or before. Under the new law, these books are now illegal to sell.

Confessions of a Toe Hanger by Christie Harris

Runaway Alice by Frances Salomon Murphy

The Bad Times of Irma Baumlein by Carole Ryrie Brink

Tee-bo the Talking Dog on the trail of the persnickety prowler and Tee-bo the talking dog and the great hort hunt, by Mary Whitcomb

The Resident Witch by Marion T. Place

This is just off the top of my head, a few books I loved in elementary and have either picked up, or been looking for new copies of, every since. This is to say nothing of my beloved Alfred Hitchcock and the three investigators, or Encyclopedia Brown- both of which are now "in print" again. But surely more copies were available at used bookstores around the country than are sitting on shelves at an Amazon warehouse. Those books will no longer find their way into the hands of children, and I find that tremendously sad.

An Open Letter to Our New President

Congratulations, President-elect Obama. No, I didn't vote for you. But in a strange way? That's good news. See, you didn't make me a ton of promises on the campaign trail, so you can't possibly disappoint me. My expectations were low going in; there's nowhere you can go from here, but up. So I have here some advice for you.

You're going to need me, and here's why. All those folks on the left who are so madly in love with you right now? They're going to be disappointed. No, it's not your fault, sir. It's just that they've built you up so much, set such high expectations for your presidency, that you cannot possibly meet them all. This is no reflection on you yourself: I honestly believe no mortal man could meet all their demands. But some of them are going to be disappointed in you, and some of them are going to turn on you. They always do.

When that happens? You will need people like me. You will need our good will. And considering that we didn't expect much from you? It will be easy to please us.

Issue one: Fight the war, let us win. Our men and women in uniform deserve no less from you than your full support. Right now, you've got the party eating out of your hands; use that power for good, for our nation's security abroad.

Issue two: Please don't take all our money. I know you just want to help out the little guy, the guy who needs a hand up- but a hand up is not a handout. Businesses don't pay taxes, customers do, in the form of increased prices. Workers do, in the form of reduced wages, benefits, and available jobs. If you want to help the little guy, protect his job. You can do that by not putting roadblocks in the way of his boss, the guy who signs the paychecks.

If you want to do even more to help the little guy? Improve the climate for business in this country. Quit spending so much money on people who hate us abroad, and invest some of that money here in our infrastructure. I can point you to some bridges and roads that could use a ton of newly-employed folks to bring them up to speed.

You can help cut the little guy's fuel bills by investing our money in nuclear power and clean coal technology. I know you said something recently about bankrupting coal companies, but I'm willing to forget that if you are. (I figure it's just something in the air in San Francisco, it makes people say and do silly things sometimes.) But I'm sure you didn't mean to insult Pennsylvania, Virginia, Indiana, Colorado, and Ohio- all those nice states with coal industries, who helped vote you in last night. I'm sure you don't want to put them out of work and I'm sure you don't want us all to be cold this winter.

Anyway, my point is, we're pretty easy to please here on the right. If you get just a few things right- the war, energy, economics 101- we'll be willing to overlook any little mistakes you might make. We're a remarkably forgiving bunch, and on the whole our patriotism is tied not to the individual, but the ideal, to the nation itself. You can make us your allies pretty easily, or you can alienate us completely. I'm trusting in your words last night. You promised me the opportunity to let you earn my support. Sir, you have that opportunity. Please make good use of it.

I stumbled across this today and it's well worth linking. Tax law explained via beer analogy. Go read it!

Time for a teachable moment. This is a fascinating look at what brought us to this current financial situation. Whether you are democrat or republican, you need to hear this, now.

Wow, I still have a blog; I'd wondered if I'd neglected it so long that it disappeared on me.

I won't bore you today. My own rhetoric is vastly inferior to the acres of ink spilled already on the subject of the presidential election. Anything I could say in defense of John McCain and Sarah Palin has doubtless already been said elsewhere, and more eloquently. And fortunately, both are up to the task of fighting their own battles; two such strong characters do not need my clumsy attempts at protecting their good names.

I just want to take this opportunity to link to the best speech I've ever witnessed. Since the dying, dysfunctional medium known as the "mainstream" media refused to air it, it is my opinion that Fred Thompson's RNC speech should be posted on every conservative blog in the country; it should be mirrored and linked, transcripts should be emailed in quantities rivaling the most insidious of chain letters. Segments of the speech should be put into political ads; individual lines should be disseminated on t-shirts, posters, and bumper stickers.

I think I have just witnessed the birth of the political heir to Ronald Reagan.

Literary Travesties

Why did no one tell me that the Mitchell estate had commissioned another GWTW book? I had to find out on the streets. In a grocery store. Since I was not forewarned, I had to pick it up and look at it, to establish what it was. I feel so dirty. I came home and googled it, and it looks as if a 'real' writer got the job this time... but it's a man. And not just a man, but a man who had, in fact, never read the original before he was hired. Sigh. Facepalm. Firstly, no one should ever have tried writing an authorised sequel/prequel or anything else. Unauthorised? Fine. Make with the fanfic, paid and otherwise. But slapping a label on it and calling it the "authorised" companion book doesn't mean a damn thing; it is NOT Margaret Mitchell. I view Ripley's "Scarlett" as very expensive (and not very well written) fanfic. This new book is just very expensive, slightly better written fanfic. "Gone With the Wind" is a classic piece of American literature; it may be THE "Great American Novel." So... if the idea is to pay someone to render up well written fanfic on the subject... perhaps the best start might have been to hire someone who, erm... knew and loved the book? Not just the period, but the book itself, and its characters? Of course, it might be harder to find willing participant writers among the book's fanbase- since most of them (like myself) are a) satisfied with the book's original ending, and b)view Margaret Mitchell as something of a literary deity and personal saint. Walk a mile in those writerly slippers? No, thank you. I lack for sufficient hubris.

Genesis, the Program!

Dunno how long this has been around, but I just stumbled across it tonight. Genesis, the computer program! Warning, it's kind of long. But hysterical. Spew warning, beverage advisory, whatever, just don't spray your monitor when you laugh.

http://celobox.googlepages.com/god.html

Clovis First is the new Flat Earth

This one's for my prehistory/anthro loving pals. It's a link to the board I lurk on regularly- Hall of Ma'at, a board which is largely responsible for my decision to take so many anthro classes this year. (I'm still dithering between a Humanities or Anthro major.) Anyway... some great pictures of microwear analyses at Pedra Furada. http://www.hallofmaat.com/read.php?1,464743,464743#msg-464743

miscellaneous musings

Nothing much here, just wanted to share some linkage:

There's a movement afoot to reopen the authorship question. The petition is signed by a number of people I respect and admire, and the declaration is a beautifully worded, short explanation of why the doubts remain. I encourage anyone who reads Shakespeare to check it out. (Okay, I encourage EVERYONE to check it out.) It's a well-made site, with a functional, realistic goal: making the Authorship Question academically viable, and reopening intellectual discussion of the issue. It doesn't purport to identify the writer (Though I'm a De Vere enthusiast) merely to make the debate available.

I stumbled over a great first-person account of what it's like to have Asperger's Syndrome, and thought some of you might enjoy the read.

After reading evilbearhunter's recent linguistics post, I decided to see if anything else had come out about Piraha. (This is that language I mentioned a while ago- the one without numbers, creation myths, and recursion.) I found a fascinating article about the folks who've been studying the people and their language. It focuses a great deal on the thoughts of the researchers, on their personal lives- but that only serves to make it more readable. It's a great description of the kind of work ethnologists and linguists do in describing a newfound language. (And it manages to discuss the issues without resorting to Chomskyan dry techspeak . This is a very good thing! I don't dispute the validity of Universal Grammar as a theory- I just wish to heaven Noam was a better writer. I have this sneaking suspicion that most people who love Chomsky have never tried to actually read him.)