Month: May 2004

Why George Orwell hated Esperanto: “Apparently, Orwell, during his down-and-out phase in Paris, had to accept a room in the lodgings of a cousin. The fact that she and her live-in lover spoke only Esperanto together at home — a language he could not understand — left him less than enthusiastic.”
There is something about a couple speaking only Esperanto to one another that is really romantic. And I’m not even kidding.

If you’ll excuse what appears to be a porn focus on this blog of late, the LA Times does its usual excellent job on the porn/HIV story.

Here’s my story from today’s front page, on how the Texas House has slipped an unusual and unnoticed clause into its school finance bill: eliminating the high school TAKS test. Reports from the field suggest this story is even being talked about on the radio in Austin — so it must be important.
Also, here’s my sidebar.

I’m on TXCN tonight (assuming they found time to edit out my stumbles). And that story that was supposed to be on today’s front page will be on tomorrow’s.

This is a crime against humanity.

“When the United States went off the gold standard in 1933, the government went bankrupt. Government leaders, in order to secure credit from foreign powers, secretly pledged the ‘lifetime worth’ of American citizens as collateral.”
Square trees.
“The best TV I had in my whole life, it was history. I had over 2,000 of them snap-on ties I lost in that fire. I had 16 Western shirts that was homemade. You can’t buy them in the store.”
Great NYTimes story on two Alaskan “bridges to nowhere.”
Porn for a good cause. “We believe it is possible to use people

Here’s my story from today’s metro front, on how one school district’s needs have increased over the last 20 years. Perhaps not my most interesting piece. I should have a better one on the front page tomorrow.
Also in today’s paper is this piece on walking to work, featuring official Friend of Crabwalk.com Cortland Kelly.

Warren Buffett on the future of newspapers:
Buffett and [Robin-like sidekick Charlie] Munger were surprisingly bearish on newspapers, a major investment for Berkshire through its large stake in the Washington Post Co. and its outright ownership of the Buffalo News.
After saying that he and Munger are “newspaper addicts” and that “it’s still an unusually good business,” Buffett struck a somber note.
“The economics of newspapers are very, very close to certain to deteriorate over the next 10-20 years,” he warned. “I see nothing that will turn around the erosion from both the circulation and advertising standpoints.”
Yay!

A Brand New You: How our favorite brands help assemble our self-image, and how we interact with them. Quote: “For most people, Jell-O shows up as a childhood friendship. Johnson & Johnson is more a mother and child relationship. Microsoft, for a larger than average number of people, forms a master-slave relationship.” And: “Apple Computer doesn’t create new family members so much as brothers- and sisters-in-arms…It invites users to think of themselves as revolutionary–even though, by buying and supporting Apple, they’re really just responding to another marketer’s push.”

How to execute a fair coin flip over the phone (page 5-6).