The Babysitter’s Network is a wonderful thing. We’ve known for about a week that this has been going on, because babysitters talk to each other. An EDP (emotionally disturbed person) has been running around my neighborhood for the last week or so, offering to relieve mothers/babysitters of their babies. In at least four cases, apparently, […]
Continue reading... July 18, 2002
The First Law of Reruns
Why is it that when you tune in to a rerun of a show you saw only once during the previous season, they’re inevitably showing the exact episode you saw last time?
Continue reading... July 18, 2002
Two Years of J-School Serves NYTimes Reporter Well
From the NYTimes: OUTH HUNTINGTON, N.Y., July 17 ÷ It was the classic news story: man bites dog.
Continue reading... July 15, 2002
A Serious Case of the Munchies.
I was poking around the Fond du Lac Reporter for the Quad Graphics story, and found this: Ricky R. Bridges, of 379 N. Peters Ave., Apt. G-8, was charged with operating a vehicle without the owner龝 consent after he allegedly stole an Old Dutch Potato Chip truck, and ate some of its contents. <snip> A […]
Continue reading... July 14, 2002
Coming Soon To The Microsoft Palladium
When Microsoft announced its “trustworthy computing” initiative, I foolishly thought it meant that the company would concentrate on shipping software that didn’t crash and that didn’t create critical security vunerablities for its clients. Turns out they had in mind something like Palladium. Mitch Wagner has been doing a stellar job in unspooling what Microsoft has […]
Continue reading... July 14, 2002
Why I’m Not Seeing Springsteen This Time Around.
It’s noon Saturday, and tickets to the E Street Band’s Summer/Fall tour are imminently going on sale. I’m sitting in bed, laptop propped up, Ticketmaster loaded, mouse finger twitching, waiting for the stroke of 12. My wife, Olivia, brings in the twins (who turned seven months today) to play on the bed. M is still […]
Continue reading... July 13, 2002
Another Madiera, M’Dear?
From Ananova, but too good to not quote in its entirety. An Italian professor says it takes 15 minutes of oral sex to burn off the calories consumed in a long sip of wine. Dietician Bruno Fabbri has been looking into the exercise value of sexual activities. He found a 26-minute sex session which ends […]
Continue reading... July 13, 2002
What a Paradigm Looks Like When It Shifts.
Peggy reads Good Housekeeping, bless her. If you can believe it, Good Housekeeping has some cutting edge content in the current August 2002 issue. Of course, it’s all in the ads, but what a shift it reflects: …… So what do we have here? Pages that advertise the internet embedded in your main kitchen appliance, credit card protection […]
Continue reading... July 13, 2002
Your Print Job May Be Delayed.
Big fire at the Quad/Graphics printing plant in Lomira, Wisconsin. Quad, if you don’t know, is one of the world’s largest printers. The Lomira plant is the biggest printing complex in the Western Hemisphere; this story says the 46-acre campus employs 2000 people and includes an apartment complex. From CNN: The area where the fire […]
Continue reading... July 12, 2002
Not A Light, Exactly. And It Might Not Be the End of the Tunnel. But Still….
From the NYTimes: Outlook Improves for Magazines Ads. The decline in advertising pages in magazines slowed in June, falling by the smallest amount for any month so far this year, according to data released yesterday by the Publishers Information Bureau. Slim comfort, but comfort nonetheless, when the best you can say about your industry is that […]
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