Month: February 2008

Little lamb

Via Minor Tweaks, I learn that:

Two men are accused of burning down the birthplace of the woman made famous by the nursery rhyme “Mary Had a Little Lamb.”

Yeah, you know, old…whatshername? Okay, so “famous” is maybe a relative concept.

I learned more via CBS News:

They are scheduled to be arraigned Tuesday in connection with the Aug. 12 fire that destroyed a vacant house in Sterling where town officials say Mary Elizabeth Sawyer was born in 1806.Sarah Josepha Hale reportedly published a poem in 1830 about Sawyer, as a child, bringing her lamb to school with her. Other accounts, however, claim the original writer was a young man who was inspired by the incident.

First Robert Frost’s home was vandalized, now this. Which poet’s house will be next, I wonder? These things always happen in threes, don’t they?

Ticker-taped

There were lots of football fans in the city this morning for the big ticker-tape parade. What I’m wondering is, don’t these people have jobs? Shouldn’t these kids be in school? I mean, I’m all for honoring New York’s own for a job well done this past weekend. Even if I didn’t watch the big game, and even if they are, technically, from New Jersey. But seriously, there comes a point when…

Well, actually, maybe some of those schools were closed because of the election day. And maybe there is something to be said for taking the day off from work to take your kid to a parade in the city. And maybe I’m just a little bit jealous because I spent all day hunkered over my computer at work.

So, okay, forget it. They’re okay.

The football fans who stayed in the city all day after the parade, drinking, though…

January’s soundtrack

Oh, so yeah, I’m doing that whole mix-a-month thing again this year. I’m not holding myself to 12 songs a month again — that got old fast, actually — but to just whatever I happen to be listening to. Here’s what January sounded like:

  1. “Hokey Pokey” by Richard and Linda Thompson
  2. “What We Need More of Is Science” by MC Hawking
  3. “Just a Song About Ping Pong” by Operator Please
  4. “If You Want Me” by Glen Hansard & Marketa Irglova
  5. “Falling Slowly” by Glen Hansard & Marketa Irglova
  6. “Hippy Hippy Shake” by Swinging Blue Jeans
  7. “The Court of the Crimson King” by King Crimson
  8. “Don’t Touch Me There” by the Tubes
  9. “‘Til the Money Runs Out” by Tom Waits
  10. “Cold Cold Ground” by Tom Waits
  11. “Ámuñegü (In Times to Come)” by Andy Palacio & the Garifuna Collective

I’m not watching

Apparently there was some kind of…football game going on tonight?

Gone are the days when I’d even pretend to care — I mean, good for the Giants, the underdog, and everything, I guess, but seriously, I don’t care. I didn’t watch a minute of the game, and I had even less interest in watching the advertisements. I know the news media spent a week pounding into our heads how they’re the real reason everybody tunes in nowadays, how a record number of billions have been spent on advertising — mostly by companies that have really deep pockets already, but sure, okay — and how we just couldn’t wait to see what those kooky nuts in marketing had dreamed up for us this year.

But really, honestly, I don’t care.