I Want to Put a Smart-Aleck Book in Your Pocket TODAY!

The Oregonian’s Books section has a piece today by Katy Schneider on The Pocket Guide to Brilliance.

It's Not the Heat, It's the Stupidity

What are the odds that the A.C. will conk out right in the middle of Portland's biggest heat wave?

Pretty good, actually!

Is There an Inoculation Available?

Thus far, I have been able to resist the temptation to take and post photos of my books in their natural habitat.

However, I have no natural resistance to other people's photos, like this one taken at a B. Dalton in Chicago. (Thanks, Kellie!)

The Ad That Had to Be Stopped

If you have thirty seconds, watch this mildly amusing ad:


Now then, were you enraged by the patronizing way the daughter and wife treated the father? Yeah, me either. Even so, after a campaign led by Glenn Sacks, the ad was taken off the air. Sacks explains his opposition here, stating the ad is “symptomatic of a larger problem in our society—the denigration of males in popular culture, and the decline of fatherhood.”

My favorite part of Sacks’s broadside is this: “One father sent me his letter of protest to Verizon, adding ‘I never knew what love really was until I had a daughter.’”

And THAT’S why this ad must never again see the light of day!

Driveway Trompe L’oeil

While I do have a bike rack in it, my garage is otherwise nondescript. But I could stretch a "photo tarpaulin" printed with a jet fighter over the garage door. That'd spice things up!
Thomas Sassenbach can make you a garage filled with the kind of fictional contents you specify. And he advertises his false doors as being indestructible, as well as being easy to install and change. (I think I'd like something like the above shot, but showing a stop on Portland's light rail system...)

Magical Thinking in the Morning

As you can see, I was pretty worked up about appearing on AM Northwest this morning. And I wasn’t alone! Note the responses of host Helen Raptis and youthful magician Caleb Sohigian. (Link to the video through the picture to the left or at the bottom of this entry.)

I was concerned because the show was also going to feature actor/musician Bart Kane. Note the promo; how could it be that Bart King and Bart Kane were going to be featured on the same program?

The more I thought about this, the more enraged I grew! What are the odds that there’s a guy named Bart Kane who’s breathing my air AND maybe going on the air before me?

So you can imagine my relief when the gentleman in question turned out to be Christian Kane (of TNT’s show Leverage). It was a mere misprint! (And Kane turned out to be pretty cool, too.)

As to our appearance, that realistic cry of pain from off-camera was courtesy of Caleb’s dad, Dave. (Not to worry; the doctors say that the eye-patch should come off in a couple of weeks.)

The Window Seat

Gazing out upon the bustling street, a curious melancholy steals over me... why is it that life's losses can hurt us so deeply, leaving us saddened and bewildered?

Or, to put it another way: Popsicle all gone.

CANCELLED: Bart King Memorial Tribute Bike Ride

As some of you may know, I recently suffered a dramatic bike crash. (Note: In this context, the word “dramatic” signifies a low-speed, high-dorkiness incident.) In the tragic aftermath, I hit rock-bottom when I accidentally smeared some Neosporin on the couch.

Hearing of this bad news, a friend charitably wrote to me:

Your carrying on despite your life-threatening injuries is an inspiration to all of us. A small group of your friends is establishing an international foundation and a tribute bike ride in order to prevent such a disaster from happening to anyone else. Just the thought of what we hope to accomplish brings tears to my eyes.

While I was touched by this outpouring of support, I’m afraid that I really must cancel the event. Please rest assured that I don’t do this out of any misguided sense of nobility or martyrdom.

Rather, I seem to have gotten better. (Go figure!)

The Eternal Question: Dostoevsky or Pabst?

I spotted this over the weekend. (There were a number of two-fisted reader types hanging around. Their library cards had bottle openers attached to them.)

Further investigation revealed that the library was, in fact, RIGHT NEXT DOOR to the liquor store.

Now THAT'S Uncool

Oh, I see. It’s a photo-studio.

Whew!

As seen over here.

The World's First and Only Hot Baboon Ride

The Bulwer Lytton literary parody contest recently announced its winners. The idea is that writers serve up opening lines for a story that will never be written. And the more spectacularly bad that opening line is, the better!

For example, Eric Rice won the detective category with this:

She walked into my office on legs as long as one of those long-legged birds that you see in Florida - the pink ones, not the white ones - except that she was standing on both of them, not just one of them, like those birds, the pink ones, and she wasn't wearing pink, but I knew right away that she was trouble, which those birds usually aren't.

Here’s another good detective opener from Glen Robins:

No man is an island, so they say, although the small crustaceans and the bird which sat impassively on Dirk Manhope's chest as he floated lazily in the pool would probably disagree.

Tony Alfieri gets to the point in his adventure story:

In a flurry of flame and fur, fangs and wicker, thus ended the world's first and only hot air baboon ride.

And in the same genre, here’s the award winner from Joe Wyatt:

How best to pluck the exquisite Toothpick of Ramses from between a pair of acrimonious vipers before the demonic Guards of Nicobar returned should have held Indy's full attention, but in the back of his mind he still wondered why all the others who had agreed to take part in his wife's holiday scavenger hunt had been assigned to find stuff like a Phillips screwdriver or blue masking tape.

My reaction to these, the best of the worst opening sentences, is that they can transcend the “so bad they’re good” world of ironic entertainment. I think they ARE good! Oh dear, this one by Matt Dennison (from the Romance) may force me to change my mind:

Without warning, their darting tongues entwined, like a couple of nightcrawlers fresh from the baitshop--their moist, twisting bodies finally snapping apart, not unlike an old man's muddy galosh being yanked away from his patent leather shoe.

Blech! Okay, let's close with Dan Blaufuss’s entry:

As Lieutenant Baker shrank his lips back to their normal size, he tried desperately to think of a situation in which his new-found power might be useful, as have I, your narrator.

Let's...Go...Fly a Kite!

Or not.

Why Your Teachers Act That Way

Dealing with parents has never been easy.

But while some generation-gap issues are eternal (“I want this cave cleaned up!”), what particular issues did kids face in, say, 1959?

To answer that question, the fine website named Awful Library Books posted this volume from that very year! And for answers to our questions, the book’s back copy reveals:

This reminded me of one of my favorite library books, which was snagged during a library’s book cull. It’s 1979’s critically acclaimed Jammin’! by dancer/skater extraordinaire Bill Butler.

Bill was a close friend of mine in the 1970s, and I performed with him at a number of skating rinks across the Midwest. (Man, those were the days. We’d roller-boogie all day! Then at night, we’d sleep.)