It's My Dog's World: I Just Live In It

The Old Coot (me) rants about you soft kids (yes, you, John Oliver) and your Port Authority complaints

 

The renewed focus on the Port Authority, specifically the Port Authority building in midtown Manhattan, was probably set off partly by the ongoing shenanigans of folks in and around the Port Authority and the brilliant John Oliver. Who makes some points (really, Port Authority?-ceasing and desisting Fishs Eddy?), but is, in fact, a young whippersnapper in terms of NYC whinging.  

As is WNYC.

Yeah, the Port Authority is pretty terrible, but it is far from Hell. And it is far from where it was in the 80s. Maybe that's why I have trouble with these headlines. I try not to say this too often, but if you didn't visit/live in NYC inthe 1970s and 80s, you don't really have a clue about how hellish public spaces could get. Sometimes I just sit in Bryant Park and rub my eyes with my fists like a little kid: am I dreaming? Are the Greenmarket vendors at Union Square all actors? Did Will Smith just buy Washington Square Park and turn it into a movie set? Is this real life? 

I have big fantasies about taking a crew of my favorite civic hackers in there, and just data/physically improve the building in a long weekend. Cardboard signs! Putting somebody on the second floor to answer questions! QR codes people could scan to get more information! Tweaks! Just to give a tiny vision of what the Port Authority could be doing NOW. 

Here's what the Port Authority also is: There's a great blood donation center there (don't mock, there is) with cheerful staff and cheerful donors. And as crazy as their Au Bon Pain can be at commuter rush times, their wi-fi has been a life saver when I've had to do a quick online meeting. I've had a wonderful conversation with a postal worker (yes, there's a post office there, too) about Shirley Chisholm. And if you slow down, notice the rotating art gallery on the first floor of the south building, which has included art by two artists on the autism spectrum for the past two years. 

There are TWO. FRIGGING. BOOKSTORES. 

Still, kudos to the lovely funny Adam Wade for brightening up this article. You are the best. http://www.wnyc.org/story/surviving-port-authority-bus-termnal/

Meet the New Media Boss. Same as the Old Media Boss: 3 Profiles in Stupid PseudoJournalism

Let me be perfectly clear: The only thing that's different now from 20/50/100/1000  years ago is speed and scale.  There have always been mobs, and rumors, and reporters so hungry for the scoop they don't check the source or confirm the facts with anyone. Technology just allows us to be irresponsible jerks quicker.

We need to be better than this. We are not. I have no anwers.

When Luke Russert, who is the child of two famous journalists, can't get it through his head not to do this, I am not hopeful.  That used to be the upside of staying in the family business. You were supposed to pick up the craft. 

When the political editor of Buzzfeed pretends that he is part of some avant-garde bit of the Internet which is why he posted the (unsubstantiated) Weiner story, I am not hopeful--but I am laughing. 

And when CNN can't apologize for being a chief agent in ruining a woman's life--even when she tried to correct them over and over again--well, people, we are kind of screwed.  

These are links to longer stories by On the Media or the New York Times, with summaries taken from the first part of the stories. 

Sorry about the paywall, kids.  As people are too fond of telling us, we are in a New Age of New Media. 

http://www.onthemedia.org/2013/jul/26/dirty-laundering/

This week, the gossip website The Dirty posted screenshots of explicit chats between an anonymous woman and New York City mayoral candidate Anthony Weiner. Even though the legitimacy of the screenshots could not be confirmed, other news outlets ran the information, and within hours Buzzfeed had identified and named the woman in the chats. Brooke talks to McKay Coppins, Buzzfeed's political editor, about reporting, transparency, and veracity.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/28/magazine/should-reddit-be-blamed-for-the-spreading-of-a-smear.html

On an overcast day in early May, I traveled to suburban Philadelphia to visit the family of Sunil Tripathi, the deceased 22-year-old Brown University student who, for about four hours on the morning of April 19, was mistakenly identified as Suspect No. 2 in the Boston Marathon bombings. The Tripathis had just arrived home after nearly two months spent in Providence, R.I., where they went to organize the search for Sunil, who disappeared on March 16. When I entered the house, Judy Tripathi, Sunil’s mother, asked me for a hug. In a shattered voice, she said, “I need hugs these days.” We sat at the kitchen table and talked, and at one point Judy handed me a photo of a young, smiling Sunil, caught in the motion of throwing a ball. “Look how happy he looks,” she said. For the next two hours, she and her husband, Akhil, and their daughter, Sangeeta, described what happened to them in the early-morning hours of April 19, and how the false identification of their son derailed their ongoing search for him and further traumatized their lives.

http://www.onthemedia.org/2012/nov/30/my-stolen-face/

In the summer of 2009, Neda Agha-Soltan became the face of the Iranian Green Revolution after her tragic death by gunshot was caught on cell phone camera and uploaded online for the whole world to see. The international media rushed to put a face to the victim--but the face they used was that of another Iranian woman by the name of Neda Soltani, who was still very much alive. Brooke speaks to Neda Soltani, author of 

My Stolen Face: The Story of a Dramatic Mistake.

Dear Hoboken Drivers--quit your bad habits, before you get a present from my dog

Yesterday:  10 minute walk home, counted three--THREE--cars either in the crosswalk, or blocking the box.

Sigh.  This morning when I was walking Faith, a Hoboken driver started to park in the crosswalk--while Faith and I were WALKING IN IT. 

Now, bad Hoboken parking  has gained national public radio fame....Listen to Kathy, a Hoboken resident, explain to a reporter from radio show This American Life about some flagrant illegal parking as she is giving the reporter a tour...only to encounter a city employee from the parking authority---parking his vehicle illegally.  And really, really not giving a crap.

Listen here.

Now, of course I'd never do this in real life, but if I were an invincible superheroine--say Claire from the first season of Heroes when it was still good--I'd try to kill two birds with one stone...I would clean up the random poop I find on the sidewalks (another Hoboken problem) and deposit it on the cars in the crosswalks--and fling it at the cars that run stop signs.  And if I were Claire, of course, even if someone tried to run me over with his car, I'd heal...and live to fling more poop another day.   Until the rotten driving stopped.

Well, I can dream.

I Hate Your Shoes. No, I Hate You.

I should have been in a good mood this morning. I'd had a day off, I had listened to the B-52s Funplex (yes, they're older. So is Madonna. So is John McCain and you know what? So are you), Faith behaved admirably on her walk, I'm reading a terrific book, I just started attending a memoir class and my fellow students blew me away.

Then I got on the train and met the Pole Hog. 

Pole Hogs, for any readers who don't take mass transit, are people who wrap their bodies around one of the floor to ceiling poles that are place in the trains at regular intervals.  They are especially useful for people who a) don't get seats and b) are too short to grab the subway straps (which are actually metal handles) comfortably.  Like me.   Grabbing the overhead straps for long periods of time hurts.  That's why holding the pole feels so nice.

And it was rush hour, and there were no seats, and other poles were crowded with passengers.  But Ms. Pole Hog was plugged into her Ipod, and had entwined herself by wrapping her crossed arms around the pole==an act of hoggery that looked all the more hoggish because of her nice attire.  And she was flaunting both a shopping bag from theory and silver flats with that big old Tory Burch double T medallion on it.   And even after I gave her and her shoes the Big Evil Eye, she ignored me.  Shameless.

And for some reason the shoes--comfortable, glamorous, expensive, notorious-- made her more hateful.  I should be more evolved than that.  But I'm not.  Tonight I saw my delightful neighbor wearing the same pair of shoes, and I caught my breath.  On her, the shoes looked lovely, everyday wear for a regular sweetheart.     I started to bless the shoes.  I love flats. People are always telling me how comfortable these shoes are. And I think it's pretty inventive of Tory Burch to come up with a logo that looks both like something from Chanel, and a page from the alphabet Kama Sutra:  two Ts, head to head having tantric sex. 

It wasn't the shoes at all that had made the Pole Hog a Pole Hog.  It was her barefaced, flat-footed sense of entitlement. 

Silence STILL = Death

For so many years, this was such a heavy day, because the loss was raw, the loss was deep, the plague unstoppable.

Goodbye, Charles Ludlam. What great work might you have been making now? Goodbye, Ron Vawter. Thanks for Roy Cohn and Jack Smith. Goodbye, Brad Wojcoski.  Balducci's still misses you.  Goodbye, Raul. Goodbye, Richard. Goodbye, Robyn. Goodbye, all.

For some, the plague has slowed.  I watch Project Runway, and note that  one of the designers  has been HIV-positive  for  a decade and a half, and speaks about it matter-of-factly.  I marvel at the sea change, at least in the US.   And I pray that  all the seas will change, and the plague will stop.

But prayer--especially coming from a crabby atheist--is not enough.  Faith without works is dead. The great work continues.

More Than You Thought You'd Ever Learn About Dogfighting on My Blog

Not much left to say about Michael Vick and his dogs.  Bill Maher said something very sharp, which was that if there was anything heartening about the whole discouraging, sickening mess, it was that the American public didn't look at Vick's dogs and say, "Well, that's just what pit bulls do."   Instead, they saw the dogs as what they were...victims of human cruelty.

Now, their future hangs in the balance: SI.com - 2007 NFL Preview - Gov't asks animal experts to investigate seized dogs.

 

Let's hope that some of these poor creatures are salvageable.  And hey, wouldn't it be great if Oprah adopted one of those poor dogs?

Take That, Maureen Dowd: Manolo the Shoeblogger Speaks (Hairy) Truth to Power

Once again, the remarkable Manolo the Shoeblogger manages to notice what all the pundits miss:

Manolo says, as one of the internet’s foremost authorities on the political coiffure, the Manolo has been asked to opine on the matter of the John Edwards $400 haircuts.

First allow the Manolo to begin with effusive praise for John Edwards’ hair.

This is the beautiful and silkily wonderful hair, the sort of marvelous, bouncy, glossy mop favored by the 1970s pop idol Bobby Sherman. And it is by far and away the John Edwards’ greatest political asset.

“But Manolo,” say the Manolo’s internet friends, “is not $400 very costly for the hair cutting?”

Perhaps many of the Manolo’s internet friends who still go to the Super-Duper Cuts, or the Floyd the Barber, do not know that the truly high quality, super fantastic hair cut now costs at least $100.

More, so much more, right here.

Maureen Dowd, I'm Calling You Out

I know, I'm a day late and a HuffPo and DailyKos short to the Edwards' hair brouhaha.  But really, Maureen, using the term "metrosexual" to describe anything, especially a political candidate?  So 2005 ago.

As one urban fakish redhead to another, you don't really expect me to believe that you a) don't regularly have your hair done, especially when it's time to pundit up and b) when it involves a cut and color, you're not at least 200 bucks lighter...unless, of course, your guy comes to your house, which might, with tip, bring it up to about...

400 dollars.

I'm just saying.  And as a letter to the Times pointed out beautifully today, being a President who also has a few bucks doesn't necessarily disqualify you from...ending the Depression, for example.
.

Revelry: Good. Vomit on the Sidewalk: Bad.

You may not know this, but it is St. Patrick's Day.

Really. Right now, in my town, teeming hordes of folks are lining up outside the bars to drink.  This is a town custom I have never quite fathomed, but then, my drinking days ended around the time Jimmy Carter's presidency did. 

The revelers have been imbibing  since the wee hours.  How wee?  Well, I spotted my first pile of vomit on my block at 10:15 a.m., Eastern Central Time.

Okay, vomiter.  Maybe you had the flu.  Maybe I am judging you harshly.  I have the flu.  It is the flu season.  But today, it is also beer season in my town, and tomorrow, I will still have to live here, and you will be on to another bar.  So, a few simple requests, based on past years:

Dear Reveler:

1. Do NOT lean into my dog's face and tell her how cute she is while staggering on high heels and almost falling. She will not interpret this kindly, and I may even get mad, too.   The only upside to this encounter is that you will be too drunk to remember the potentially litigious details.

2. Do NOT attempt to throw the heavy metal Lotto sign in front of the deli to your pal in an attempt to invent a new Olympic sport.  This will also freak my dog out, and it is not fair to the deli owner.  Just because you bought cigarettes from him, doesn't mean you get to mess with his signage.

3. DO consider throwing up in the bathroom.  It makes things easier for everybody, even you.

4. DO think about going home when you are standing looking at a sign that reads "SECOND STREET," and you are shouting  into a cell phone "I'm at Third Street," unless, of course, you are trying to dodge a current or ex-girlfriend.  In which case, you are totally screwed, because you are already too drunk to dodge her, and she will find you: it's the luck of the drunk. So go home, okay?

Otherwise, happy St. Patrick's Day!

 

Just When I'm Beginning to Have the Tiniest Little Crush on Bill Gates...

Because he is,  you know, kind of saving some major parts of the world, and he is doing it Nerdystyle...as in, "This is a problem and we must fix it," my Outlook program has developed a major hiccup.  It has stopped talking to my ISP's e-mail server, both incoming and outgoing.  However, it is perfectly willing to take any Plaxo updates, and send them out.  In short, Outlook is still friendly to its brother Microsoft program...everything else?  Not so much.

If anyone is reading this, please don't tell me to: get a Mac, download Firefox, return to Eudora, renounce Bill Gates and all his satanic works.  I can still get my e-mail by using, ahem, other e-mail-reading programs.  This is a luxury problem, most likely caused by a virus that snuck under my Norton shield, or a rogue command/keystrokey kind of thing.  Fixable. Not earth-shattering.  It makes returning e-mails a little less fun, weeding spam a little spammier, and...gosh, could that mean I'll actually spend less time in front of my computer? And might that not be a good thing?

Or else, hey, maybe I'm being eavesdropped upon in the name of national security!  Wouldn't that be a hoot?