Crucial Minutiae

Since several of us Crucial Minutiaeteers don’t have traditional office jobs, you can often find us in coffee shops around New York City, in groups, typing maniacally and searching for open outlets where we can plug in our laptops. Evidently, many New York celebrities also do the coffee shop shuffle. Here are the sighting highlights from the last year:

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Those opening the Opinion pages of The New York Times yesterday were greeted with a strange surprise—Bono is the Times’ new columnist. You’d think to be a Times columnist, you’d have to (a) have a last name and (b) take off your sunglasses for your columnist photo, but apparently, neither is the case. The topic of his first column? Frank Sinatra and New Years’ Eve—the kind of piece most columnists wait a few weeks to do, when they’re at a total loss for real things to write about.

Now, I actually like Bono. I do. But his writing is, well, not good. He does what many non-writers do when they’re told to write—he overdoses on flowery language and packs in as many adverbs and gerunds as he can in a sentence. A sample:

“Glasses clinking clicking, clashing crashing in Gaelic revelry: swinging doors, sweethearts falling in and out of the season’s blessings, family feuds subsumed or resumed. Malt joy and ginger despair are all in the queue to be served on this, the quarter-of-a-millennium mark since Arthur Guinness first put velvety blackness in a pint glass.”

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A few months ago, I wrote about how the North Carolina Department of Motor Vehicles had, without getting the joke, issued license plates with numbers beginning in “WTF.” But the Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles (and, um, who ever heard of a BMV?) is not to be outdone. Last month, they announced new rules for anyone snapping a drivers license photo—no hats, scarves, glasses, hair in the face, or smiling. Why? Because the state’s facial recognition software, which scans past and present photos in an attempt to cut down on license fraud, works best with a straight face. Indiana is one of 20 states using this software.

When I read this story, my first thought was, “Smile? Who has ever smiled at the DMV?” But then something else hit me. Facial recognition software? In 20 states? For everyone who gets a drivers license? Am I wrong, or does that feel a touch big brothery?

No, no. I am not kidding. According to a New York Times story that just went up, a 23-year-old Malaysian dude was killed in Borneo last night after people thought he was “hogging the microphone” at a karaoke joint. And, as the Guardian says, “Karaoke rage is not unheard of in Asia…Frank Sinatra’s ‘My Way’ has reportedly generated so many outbursts of hostility that some bars in the Philippines now do not offer it on the karaoke menu anymore.”

Come on people, karaoke is supposed to be fun. Even community building? Try a group hug while singing “More Than Words.”

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In my neighborhood, people love their dogs. Every other block here boasts a pet boutique that sells coats, sweaters, and even hoodies sized for little Fido. At all hours of the night, there is at least one French bulldog or Scottish terrier being paraded down the street. And when a cute dog passes you on the street, it’s customary to coo and stop to pet him/her for a minute. So I’m counting the minutes until someone steals this idea from a company in Novosibirsk, Siberia: paying pet owners to use their dogs as walking billboards. “Obviously companies now are asking how they can keep their products visible without having to spend vast sums of money on expensive multi-media campaigns,” said a spokesman for Promo Dog. “Dogs go everywhere and are highly visible on the streets.”

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Halloween costumes are a lot of pressure. I’ve never been a fan of the cheesy one-size-fits-all costumes that come in see-thru bags with plastic handles, and am a firm believer that you should be able to make a great costume from the stuff you have in your closet. So, since I didn’t have much work to do this afternoon, I am currently sitting in a pile of clothes trying to figure out what costume I can make with a blonde wig, alien antennae, ladybug wings, a witch hat, a fuzzy leopard print skirt, a pink ball gown, and a hideous silver-and-lime-green faux Pucci get-up. Do I go as an alien princess? Or maybe a washed up movie star? Pebbles? Other ideas, please?

So I decided to look up what costumes other people are leaning towards. According to Yahoo, most peeps this year, go figure, have politics on the mind. The most popular political costumes, and I think this speaks volumes about our society:

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I, like so many of you, watched the debates last night and couldn’t stop thinking, “Who’s this Joe the Plumber guy?” My first instinct was to look up the Toledo white pages and try to find him, but I was sure some other reporter was already on it. And, oh yes, they were. Check out the story here.

Also, there are already Joe the Plumber t-shirts available in multiple designs here.
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A good one happens to be for sale, according to MSNBC.com—the Elvis is Alive museum in Wright City, Missouri. It includes assorted Elvis memorabilia plus FBI files and DNA reports that suggest that the King is still alive and kicking. Oh, and it has a cool Anheuser Busch chandelier, too. All this could be yours for the price of $15,000 on eBay. The museum did get one bid for the asking price, but it turned out to be some kid playing a joke.

Come on, any takers? —Kate

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Last night was a very, very big night for all the TV Heads out there—the series premiere of the new Beverly Hills, 90210.

“If it walks like a duck and it talks like a duck—”
“Go to hell, Brenda.”

Sorry, just reliving old times. If you aren’t familiar with the aforementioned reference, please proceed directly back to 1994.

But back to the present. I have to say that I had some mixed feelings about last night’s season premiere. What I loved:

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Sure, it’s a little trite to get up in arms about an ad. (Flashback to 7th grade “Media Literacy” class where we had to give five-minute presentations analyzing commercials. I think I found a phallic symbol in a Crest ad?) But I saw two ads this weekend that really baffled me. First, was a new commercial for Secret’s Clinical Strength deodorant. It showed a woman in a wedding dress rolling around in a bed with her groom in his tuxedo—presumably this is after hours of champagne guzzling and intergenerational dancing at their wedding. As they stare adoringly at each other and nuzzle, piano music in the background, of course, a female voice says, “It doesn’t take much to ruin the moment.” Really, Secret? All I have to say is, if you’re worried about a little sweat on your wedding night—you have much bigger problems than BO.

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Every fourth summer, I go into what I call “Olympic hibernation.” I am simply obsessed with the Olympics. Gymnastics, swimming, beach volleyball, ping pong, tandem springboard diving—I could (and often do) watch this stuff all day. I’m drawn to people who ride that fine line between passion and obsession, and Olympians are the ultimate examples—they dedicate their entire lives to perfecting the minutiae of their chosen events on a level that 90% of spectators can comprehend. (A sample gymnastsics commentator from last night: “Did you notice she was an inch too close to the bar on that release move?” No, not even slightly, but I’ll trust you on it.)

I love everything about the Olympics. I love the rivalries, I love the last second upsets. I love the athlete back story segments, which inevitably begin with a shot of the athlete, arms crossed, standing in front of the waving flag of his or her country while choral music builds in intensity.

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I went to three office supply stores this morning in search of my favorite notebook. This made me realize that, well, I’m extremely picky when it comes to notebooks. I have one kind I’ve been buying for years, and since I think it’s god’s gift to journalist, I thought I’d share: Mead’s Five Star, 2 subject notebook, in the 9.5 x 6 size.

Why do I love it so? It has a thick cardboard back, so it feels sturdy as you furiously take notes. The pages are wider than a steno pad, so I can pack a lot into a page before having to flip. Speaking of, it flips horizontally rather than vertically—don’t know why, I’m just a much faster flip that way. It’s durable so can be easily shoved in bags for the two months it takes me to fill it up. (Yes! It lasts two months—a miracle on par with the Chanukah candles.) And I haven’t even gotten to the best part—it has a pocket inside, which is perfect for business cards or other random things people hand you when reporting. Thank me later. —Kate

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Brooklyn Beckham, Kal-el Cage, Pilot Inspektor Lee, Apple and Moses Martin. Hollywood sure has given us some absurd names in the past few years. Apparently, normal folks have followed suit and are now much more likely to give their child an “unconventional” (read: insane) name.

But a New Zealand judge is trying to put the kabosh on the trend. Today he ruled that a 9-year-old girl, who’s lived for 9 years as Talulah Does the Hula From Hawaii and has been so embarrassed about it that she goes by “K,” must be renamed. “The court is profoundly concerned about the very poor judgment which this child’s parents have shown in choosing this name,” Judge Rob Murfitt said. “It makes a fool of the child and sets her up with a social disability and handicap, unnecessarily.” Evidently, New Zealand has also struck down the names Fish and Chips, Yeah Detroit, and Sex Fruit.

Now if only someone could help out Kyd Duchovny.

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At Pearsontown Elementary School, we had an annual Balloon Launch. It was a fundraiser—all the kids would go around our respective neighborhoods, selling balloons for a dollar a piece. On the anointed Balloon Launch day, the balloons would be filled with helium and tied to posts on the playground. Each balloon had a tag attached with the school’s telephone number and the name of the person who bought said balloon. On the principal’s count of three, all the kids would run around and cut the strings, sending the balloons skyward in a multicolored rush. Then we’d all just stand there looking up into the sky in awe. For the next two weeks, calls would come into the school reporting where various balloons were found, and they’d be charted with thumbtacks in a map in the office. The owner of the balloon that made it the farthest distance won a prize—I don’t remember what, exactly.

By the third grade, the Balloon Launch was history—evidently, it was an environmental hazard. But I still remember the sight of all those balloons rushing into the air. It was one of the prettiest things I’ve ever seen.

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Here’s a funny little story out of my home state. A few months ago, a teenager in Fayetteville, NC, clued her grandma in that the three letters on her license plate, WTF, are text-slang for…well, you’re reading a blog, so I don’t have to tell you. Granny in turn called the DMV to complain. Evidently, more than 10,000 drivers currently have WTF license plates in the Tarheel State—and the sample license plate on the DMV’s website even bore the three letter code. So how did no one notice this before?

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What were you doing last Friday? Hopefully something really good, because according to British psychologist Cliff Arnall, June 20th is the official happiest day of the year. Arnall’s formula is simple: O + (NxS) + Cpm/T + He. Got it? Just kidding, I’ll translate. That’s Outdoors + (Nature x Time Socializing with Friends) + Childhood Positive Memories / Temperature + Holiday Expectation.

In honor of Dr. Arnall, here is a selection of things that happened on June 20th, both happy and not-so, according to Wikipedia:

1789: Deputies of the French Third Estate take the Tennis Court Oath.
1863: West Virginia is admitted as the 35th U.S. state.
1877: Alexander Graham Bell installs the world’s first commercial telephone service in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
1948: The Ed Sullivan Show debuts.
1949: Lionel Richie was born.
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