Do the Yak

D'OH! This is a later addition -- I forgot to include the link to L's terrific inauguration multimedia experience . I took notes on this momentous day because I was just so damn psyched I that I wanted to be able to remember it later. OK, so I didn't get around to actually posting it until 10 days after the fact... whatever. 7:00 – Awoke to NPR, which continued in the exciting historical spirit of last night’s CNN pre-coverage. Kept listening on the car ride to the Alewife subway stop. Highlights included the mayor of Newark and his father, and the story of 105-year-old Ella May Johnson attending the inaugural accompanied by a nurse and bundled in a sleeping bag, and Cory Booker, the black mayor of Newark (“ Black Politician Says He Represents All Americans ”). Lest we get too giddy about everything, this disheartening reader comment on the latter NPR piece reminds us that ignorance and bigotry still alive and well in American as seen in this reader comment on that story:...

I had a couple of posts started but they kept appearing in Hindi, for God's sake. Much investigation revealed that deep in the bowels on this blog, SOMEHOW a setting got turned on that said "enable transliteration." So now we're good to go, but I couldn't recover the bits I'd written before, so there will be blatherings about the inauguration etc. as soon as I recover my equilibrium as well as the digestive-tract health of the entire family (three of us dwelt in the House of Heaves earlier this week, and I'm now at home with Sarah, the last to succumb). More soon.

And I'm sad and angry. The Pictorial Gazette, where I had the most fun, learned the most and did my best work is no more. It's a small drop in the deluge of foundering newspapers nationwide, I know, but it certainly hits home. It was a good paper when I was there -- we won several new England Press Association awards. I actually quit in protest over the firing of another employee, high-minded person that I was (not to mention mortgage-less). Here's the story from another paper on Dec. 20, 2008: Journal Register Apparently Shuts Several Papers Weeklies owned by parent of New Haven Register covered shoreline towns Five weekly newspapers serving towns along the Connecticut shoreline, along with several others in the New Haven area, appear to have been shuttered by their parent company, Journal Register Co., which also publishes the New Haven Register. Employees who worked for Pictorial Gazette, Branford Review, Clinton Recorder, Main Street News, East Haven Advertiser and a h...

Enjoy the ducks. They love us and we love them. New Years' duck Duck riding shotgun (watch the video)

Election detox update: Autumn mania has faded, but a small inner glow remains. Cabinet choices: so far so good. Can't wait for the inauguration. A couple of my coworkers are going so as to experience the history along with thousands of strangers in the cold. I've been meaning to write about the ongoing demise of the newspaper business but there wasn't a recent news peg until yesterday's announcement that the two Detroit papers are cutting back to home delivery only three days a week (with only a pared-down newsstand print version on those days), since the web has for some time been Numero Uno. In weeks previous, there've been articles about the Tribune Co. filing for bankruptcy , professional web-only journalists successfully competing with traditional media in several cities, and apparently at least one paper outsourcing all its editorial functions to India for pennies. Wow. I got into newspapers at what was, in retorpsect, the last gasp of the golden age of th...

Massachusetts and New Jersey, to name just two, have a reputation for political corruption. But nothing, and I mean NOTHING, could top the hinkle-pinkling of Ilinois Gov. Roy Blagojevich as just reported on CNN.com . Trying to auction off Obama's Senate seat to the highest bidder? If he doesn't get enough moolah, maybe appoint himself to the seat so he could rake in more graft from the Senate than he could as governor and also rehab his already-crappy image for a 2016 presidential run? Or how about threatenting to withhold state assistance from the Tribune Co. unless they fired their editorial board that had been critical of him? It's so juicy I can hardly stand it. Plus as an added bonus, his photo on CNN.com reveals what I firmly believe is a toupee worthy of Buddy Cianci. No one who is 52 has hair that thick and dark brown, with the possible future exception of George Stephanopoulos. Diane Wilkerson looks like a nun in comparison. Edited to add: A blog post in TIME cla...

I've recently discovered StumbleUpon and have already wasted many happy hours with it. Some great yields: Absolutely Ridiculous Christmas Card Photos (not to be confused with 1970s JC Penney catalog photos ) Australia Gets Drunk, Wakes Up in North Atlantic 2208 A.D. Looks Back on George W. Bush ...and I'm going to recommend Obama Victory plates on StumbleUpon even though it's not intentionally funny, but it's oh so America. (Be sure to have your speakers on to hear the ludicrous voice-over.) Get 'em while supplies last! ...and the most recent Mimi Smartypants , whose young daughter Nora was recently doing some sort of art project: Nora: MOM! Do we have any of those, those, those things that make spinning happen? Me: [Percocet? Stationary bicycles? Colonial Williamsburg?] Sorry, what? Nora: The metal things! With the sides! Me: Can you explain more... Nora: AHHHHHHH! [runs away as I am clearly too dumb to live] [blessed silence punctuated by faint rummaging sounds...