Andy Rooney's December 3rd piece is about Christmas catalogues. It is a pile of stream-of-conscious nonsense and he should be fired for writing such drivel. His words in italics:
"I get a lot of catalogs at this time of year. I never buy anything in any of them but that doesn't seem to discourage the people who send them to me because I keep getting catalogs from the same companies year after year.
I'm no marketing expert, but the fact that you are holding them up on your show that gets millions of viewers may actually be a pretty good reason for companies to continue to send them to you.
"There's one word that's never mentioned though - not once in any of these. You know what the word is?
Curmudgeon?
"The word "Christmas" is nowhere in any of these 27 catalogs I have. The word they use to replace "Christmas" is "Holiday."
I think they're actually using the term "Holiday" to encompass all of the holidays that fall in December so not to be exclusive, so they have a larger group of buyers. It's called "capitalism."
"It's funny you never hear anyone say "Merry Holiday."
And you never hear people say "Happy Christmas, while you do hear people say "Happy Hanukkah" but not "Merry Hanukkah." And of course, people do say "Happy Holidays." I don't see how the adjective we attach to a particular holiday well-wish matters one bit.
"he "Circuit City" catalog looks as if it wants to sell you a car for Christmas but the ad isn't for cars - it's for a television set. You save $300 instantly, the ad says. Does anyone really believe they save $300 instantly on anything?
My guess is that the sale price is $300.00 less than the regular retail price. So yes, if you buy the TV during the sale, you save $300.00 in a sense.
"All the prices in a lot of ads still end in 99 cents. $29.99, $49.99, $129.99. They've been doing that for years. Do you think that 99 cents stuff still works? Are we really that dumb? We don't realize that $129.99 is really $130?
The marketing people have data that suggests that yes, we are that dumb.
"The Sharper Image" offers 50 percent off on two units. What they don't tell you until down here is that one unit costs $499.95.
Are you worried that consumers will go to the store before verifying the price?
"I wonder how much they paid this nice-looking woman to stand here in her underwear while they took her picture? She probably got more this guy got for lying there in bed, pretending to be asleep.
Whatever it was, they deserved it a lot more than you deserve making whatever you make to spout this ridiculous nonsense.
"Solutions" has 162 gifts for under for under $30, in case you want 162 gifts for under $30.
Or in case you want any one of those 162 gifts for under $30.
I personally like a present better than I like a gift. A gift is apt to be something I take back.
"Gift" and "present" are synonyms. They are not different in any way.
"Monitor The Weather From Your Own Backyard." Well, I do that all the time. I stick my hand out and if it gets wet, I know its raining.
Some people would prefer to know more than what the weather is currently doing.
"1,001 Movies You Should See Before You Die." The average movie is around two hours long so I multiplied it out. It would take you about 83 24-hour days to watch all of these. That's without ever getting up to go to the bathroom, too.
Perhaps their target audience for such a list isn't cantankerous old men? I guarantee you I will watch 1,001 more movies before I die. If I live for 40 more years, that's only 25 per year.
"I don't want to sound negative about all the catalogs I get though. I look through them and really enjoy all the money I save by not buying anything from any of them.
As Martin Sheen said in Wallstreet, "money is only something you need in case you don't die tomorrow." And for you Mr. Rooney, that might not be a bad motto to start living by.
Tuesday, December 4, 2007
Fire Andy Rooney Part II
A while back I fisked an article Andy Rooney wrote about baseball. That post gets a lot of hits from people searching for "Andy Rooney baseball" or "Andy Rooney douchebag." I just tried to track down the original article on CBS's website and found an article that is a-a-a-a-almost the same, but a lot of the stuff I called him out on had been changed. For example, the original column said:
"Baseball has never been my game. I never liked it as a kid, probably because I could never throw a ball very well. My friends said I threw like a girl and that's enough to put any young boy off a game. As I've probably told you — after over 4,000 columns it's sometimes hard to remember what I've said before — my father took me to a Yankee game when I was about 10 years old and Joe DiMaggio struck out three times.
"My disinterest in baseball as a kid has lasted all my life. I'm still not interested in the game. I don't watch it on television or follow it in the newspaper. I know all about Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig, but today's baseball stars are all guys named Rodriguez to me."
The emphasis is mine. But the version on the CBS website says:
"This is the big time of year for baseball fans. I've never been much of a baseball fan myself. My father took me to a Yankees game when I was young and Joe DiMaggio struck out twice. I think that's what cooled me off on baseball. I know all about Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig but today's baseball stars are mostly unknown to me."
Emphasis mine again. So he, or CBS, took out the lie about seeing Joe D. play when he was ten (DiMaggio was first brought up to the majors when Andy Rooney was 17 and probably never struck out 3 times in one game) and the racist bit about guys named Rodriguez. Maybe he did it to cut down the word count, but I doubt it.
This just bugs me. This guy has no sense of decency.
"Baseball has never been my game. I never liked it as a kid, probably because I could never throw a ball very well. My friends said I threw like a girl and that's enough to put any young boy off a game. As I've probably told you — after over 4,000 columns it's sometimes hard to remember what I've said before — my father took me to a Yankee game when I was about 10 years old and Joe DiMaggio struck out three times.
"My disinterest in baseball as a kid has lasted all my life. I'm still not interested in the game. I don't watch it on television or follow it in the newspaper. I know all about Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig, but today's baseball stars are all guys named Rodriguez to me."
The emphasis is mine. But the version on the CBS website says:
"This is the big time of year for baseball fans. I've never been much of a baseball fan myself. My father took me to a Yankees game when I was young and Joe DiMaggio struck out twice. I think that's what cooled me off on baseball. I know all about Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig but today's baseball stars are mostly unknown to me."
Emphasis mine again. So he, or CBS, took out the lie about seeing Joe D. play when he was ten (DiMaggio was first brought up to the majors when Andy Rooney was 17 and probably never struck out 3 times in one game) and the racist bit about guys named Rodriguez. Maybe he did it to cut down the word count, but I doubt it.
This just bugs me. This guy has no sense of decency.
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Man Man
On Sunday night I went to the Modest Mouse concert at the Eagles Ballroom. I had some of those "free" tickets where you get in free but have to buy two drinks for $25. Awesome deal. I enjoyed the show, but I'm getting too old to be going to [indie-] rock concerts on Sunday nights. For me, the highlight of the whole night was the opening band. It was this punk band called Man Man. They were like nothing I'd ever seen before. If I had to guess, I'd say their major influences include David Bowie, Blue Man Group and Dr. Teeth & The Electric Mayhem.
These five dirty guys come out, all wearing plain white t-shirts and unusual hair and beards. One looked like a tennis player from the 1970's, another had a giant scruffy hipster beard, stuff like that. They were all clearly on really good drugs. Nothing was conventional about this band. Each member played a bunch of different instruments; from keyboards, guitars and saxophones to steel toms, kazoos and milk jugs. Every member had some sort of percussion instrument. And they jammed. Go see them next time they're in your town. Until then, here are some Man Man clips on youtube:
Saturday, November 10, 2007
Tell me what's in the envelope.
Criss Angel is cooler than I ever would have guessed. There's this new show on NBC called Phenomenon. It's basically American Idol, but replace the singers with "mystics" and "mediums" and crap like that, and replace Simon, Randy that tubby Laker girl with goth magician Criss Angel and spoon-bending douchebag Uri Geller. When I first saw ads for this show I had very low expectations. One thing that drives me nuts is pseudoscience. I can't stands that guys like John Edward (The A-hole that hosts Crossing Over, not the A-hole that's running for president) can become gazillionaires by manipulating vulnerable people.
From the ads, two things struck me as troubling about Phenomenon. The first is that they never described any of the contestants as Magicians. This implies that the contestants are suggesting that what they are doing (reading minds and shit) is not a trick, when it should be obvious that it is just a trick. The second problem with the show is Uri Geller.
Uri Geller came to fame in the 1970's by performing various psychic tricks, bending spoons with his mind, dousing and stuff like that. It's obvious that many Americans are not familiar with Geller or have forgotten his downfall since he has a job. Geller has been debunked time and time again. Perhaps the most famous incident occurred when Geller appeared on The Tonight Show in 1975. Prior to the show, Johnny Carson, an amateur magician himself, contacted friend James Randi, a well-known debunker of pseudoscience. He told them to provide their own spoons and other props. As you might have guessed, Geller couldn't do any of his tricks. Here's a video:
But now Uri Geller is back on network TV propagating his bullshit. Luckily, his co-host is Criss Angel. I was unfamiliar with Angel prior to seeing Phenomenon, but apparently he's a very popular street magician similar to David Blain. He's hosted several specials and a TV show called Mindfreak. Although Angel has been the subject of some controversy, he admits that his act is all trickery and doesn't claim to have any supernatural powers. He's one of the good guys.
On the second episode of Phenomenon, a contestant named Jim Callahan did a performance in which he claimed he was in contact with a dead guy named Raymond who told him what object was in a closed case. Uri Geller ate his performance up. Criss Angel didn't:
Angel took a page out of the James Randi playbook and made Callahan look like what he is, a phony.
From the ads, two things struck me as troubling about Phenomenon. The first is that they never described any of the contestants as Magicians. This implies that the contestants are suggesting that what they are doing (reading minds and shit) is not a trick, when it should be obvious that it is just a trick. The second problem with the show is Uri Geller.
Uri Geller came to fame in the 1970's by performing various psychic tricks, bending spoons with his mind, dousing and stuff like that. It's obvious that many Americans are not familiar with Geller or have forgotten his downfall since he has a job. Geller has been debunked time and time again. Perhaps the most famous incident occurred when Geller appeared on The Tonight Show in 1975. Prior to the show, Johnny Carson, an amateur magician himself, contacted friend James Randi, a well-known debunker of pseudoscience. He told them to provide their own spoons and other props. As you might have guessed, Geller couldn't do any of his tricks. Here's a video:
But now Uri Geller is back on network TV propagating his bullshit. Luckily, his co-host is Criss Angel. I was unfamiliar with Angel prior to seeing Phenomenon, but apparently he's a very popular street magician similar to David Blain. He's hosted several specials and a TV show called Mindfreak. Although Angel has been the subject of some controversy, he admits that his act is all trickery and doesn't claim to have any supernatural powers. He's one of the good guys.
On the second episode of Phenomenon, a contestant named Jim Callahan did a performance in which he claimed he was in contact with a dead guy named Raymond who told him what object was in a closed case. Uri Geller ate his performance up. Criss Angel didn't:
Angel took a page out of the James Randi playbook and made Callahan look like what he is, a phony.
No Geoff, thank you.
Geoff Jenkins is a really classy professional athlete. The Brewers have decided not to pick up his option so his ten year tenure with the team has come to an end. Today he took out a full page ad in the sports section of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in which he thanked the Brewers, the fans and the city for supporting him. I wish I could link to it, but it's only available in the print version. I have never heard of any player on any team doing something like this in the past and it strikes me as a very classy move. Word is, that that's the kind of guy Jenkins is.
Last year, my 11-year-old cousin lost an important little league game. Afterwords, he and his team went to Kopp's for frozen custard. Jenkins was there with his family. He took the time to hang out with my cousin's team. He took the time to ask a bunch of star-struck little leaguers what team they're on and what position they played and that sort of thing. It seems like everyone I know has a story about meeting Jenkins and they are all very positive. Milwaukee was lucky to have him.
When he joined the team ten years ago, he was "that kid on the Brewers that looked like Brett Favre." Here's a clip from Jenkins's rookie season of him and Favre joking about their similar appearance.
In this state, #4 enjoys god-like admiration. But #5 has made a name for himself over the last ten years as well. Jenkins was the brightest spot in some dismal Brewers seasons and it kills me that we couldn't get him to the playoffs in his last season with the team. He hit 200 home runs for the crew and has a career average of .278. He's been streaky for the last few years but he's still an outstanding defensive player. I'm sure some team will pick him up and I wish him the best of luck. I hope that if Jenkins ever returns to Miller Park, we give him the standing ovation he deserves no matter what color his uniform is. Thanks Jenks.
Last year, my 11-year-old cousin lost an important little league game. Afterwords, he and his team went to Kopp's for frozen custard. Jenkins was there with his family. He took the time to hang out with my cousin's team. He took the time to ask a bunch of star-struck little leaguers what team they're on and what position they played and that sort of thing. It seems like everyone I know has a story about meeting Jenkins and they are all very positive. Milwaukee was lucky to have him.
When he joined the team ten years ago, he was "that kid on the Brewers that looked like Brett Favre." Here's a clip from Jenkins's rookie season of him and Favre joking about their similar appearance.
In this state, #4 enjoys god-like admiration. But #5 has made a name for himself over the last ten years as well. Jenkins was the brightest spot in some dismal Brewers seasons and it kills me that we couldn't get him to the playoffs in his last season with the team. He hit 200 home runs for the crew and has a career average of .278. He's been streaky for the last few years but he's still an outstanding defensive player. I'm sure some team will pick him up and I wish him the best of luck. I hope that if Jenkins ever returns to Miller Park, we give him the standing ovation he deserves no matter what color his uniform is. Thanks Jenks.
Thursday, November 8, 2007
For Art's Sake
I spent the better part of today sitting in a conference room that overlooks the sculpture garden on the roof of The Milwaukee School of Engineering's new Grohmann Art Museum. The museum and the collection were donated by Dr. Eckhart Grohmann, an MSOE regent and area rich dude. The collection is titled "Man at work" and features sculptures and paintings from a wide range of styles and time periods that all focus on industry and labor. It strikes me as fitting for an art museum at an engineering school. I haven't visited the museum yet but I'm pretty sure that a lot of the paintings in the collection used to hang in MSOE's library. A while back, I was researching some shit about welding for a fire case I was working on and I noticed that the paintings on the wall at MSOE's library were really great. I spent a half hour walking around looking at paintings there. Lots of glowing molten stuff and people swinging hammers and axes and shit. Don't worry, I didn't bill that time. I'm anxious to check all this stuff out in it's new home at the museum.
Recently this completely private museum that is opened to the public and charges no admission fee and was built due to a multi million dollar gift from a generous man has come under attack by some crusty old art snobs. It started with this old lady named Whitney Gould who chastized the museum because the building is a refurbished warehouse and because the collection contains a bunch of paintings that were commissioned by the Third Reich. She starts with this:
But not to point out its shortcomings would be dishonest. Those shortcomings start with the building itself: a remade garage and former check-processing facility now capped with a heavy, Kaiserkopf dome and a ring of monumental bronze statuary perched along the roofline. The effect is rather like Old World Berlin as reinterpreted by Walt Disney.
And continues:
As my colleague Mary Louise Schumacher and I reported recently, one of the artists most heavily represented in the collection, with 81 works, is Erich Mercker (1891-1973), who was commissioned by the Third Reich to record its muscular infrastructure: bridges on the Autobahn, one of Adolf Hitler's proudest achievements; shipyards building U-boats; factories churning out steel; quarries producing stone for the Chancellery in Berlin, seat of the power in the Reich. At least two other artists in the collection also had Nazi ties. And, according to one of the art historians whom we consulted, some of the figures portrayed in paintings from the war years likely were slave laborers.
What a snotty bitch. She basically says that the Museum has some sort of duty to explain every painting in its historical context or some crap like that, as if a reasonable person couldn't guess that a German artist painting U-Boats being built in 1938 couldn't guess that the commission had some sort of tie to Hitler. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel editorial board echoed this sentiment too.
Ms. Gould and the MJS editorial board strike me as being tremendous tools. I'm admittedly a left-brained person so I really don't "get" art in the same way that many people do. I definitely try to pay attention to art and get some culture now and again, but this kind of thought process--that the meaning or the context needs to be known for the artwork to be enjoyed - drives me bonkers.
I few years ago I read an article about this artist named Christo, who is famous for doing these major outdoor art projects. For example, he wrapped the Reichstag in plastic and placed like 2000 yellow umbrellas along the California coast line. At first I thought Christo sounded nuttier than a squirrel turd, but after I thought about him a little more, I thought he was pretty cool. I'm obviously no expert on Christo, or art in general, but what I liked about him was that whenever he was pressed to explain why he created a particular work, he seemed to respond by saying something like, "because it's beautiful." Nothing pretentious. No cause or symbolism or reason. Just because he thought it looked cool. And usually it did.
I think this bird from the MJS needs to lighten up a bit. When people see the Great Pyramids at Giza I assume they say something like, "Holy shit, that's a big, cool, old building. Nobody says, "there should be a plaque explaining that these were built by slave labor." Just like nobody made Christo put up a sign explaining his umbrellas. This is a museum at a school of engineering. If she wants to be a useful art critic, she should tell us whether or not the collection looks cool.
Recently this completely private museum that is opened to the public and charges no admission fee and was built due to a multi million dollar gift from a generous man has come under attack by some crusty old art snobs. It started with this old lady named Whitney Gould who chastized the museum because the building is a refurbished warehouse and because the collection contains a bunch of paintings that were commissioned by the Third Reich. She starts with this:
But not to point out its shortcomings would be dishonest. Those shortcomings start with the building itself: a remade garage and former check-processing facility now capped with a heavy, Kaiserkopf dome and a ring of monumental bronze statuary perched along the roofline. The effect is rather like Old World Berlin as reinterpreted by Walt Disney.
And continues:
As my colleague Mary Louise Schumacher and I reported recently, one of the artists most heavily represented in the collection, with 81 works, is Erich Mercker (1891-1973), who was commissioned by the Third Reich to record its muscular infrastructure: bridges on the Autobahn, one of Adolf Hitler's proudest achievements; shipyards building U-boats; factories churning out steel; quarries producing stone for the Chancellery in Berlin, seat of the power in the Reich. At least two other artists in the collection also had Nazi ties. And, according to one of the art historians whom we consulted, some of the figures portrayed in paintings from the war years likely were slave laborers.
What a snotty bitch. She basically says that the Museum has some sort of duty to explain every painting in its historical context or some crap like that, as if a reasonable person couldn't guess that a German artist painting U-Boats being built in 1938 couldn't guess that the commission had some sort of tie to Hitler. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel editorial board echoed this sentiment too.
Ms. Gould and the MJS editorial board strike me as being tremendous tools. I'm admittedly a left-brained person so I really don't "get" art in the same way that many people do. I definitely try to pay attention to art and get some culture now and again, but this kind of thought process--that the meaning or the context needs to be known for the artwork to be enjoyed - drives me bonkers.
I few years ago I read an article about this artist named Christo, who is famous for doing these major outdoor art projects. For example, he wrapped the Reichstag in plastic and placed like 2000 yellow umbrellas along the California coast line. At first I thought Christo sounded nuttier than a squirrel turd, but after I thought about him a little more, I thought he was pretty cool. I'm obviously no expert on Christo, or art in general, but what I liked about him was that whenever he was pressed to explain why he created a particular work, he seemed to respond by saying something like, "because it's beautiful." Nothing pretentious. No cause or symbolism or reason. Just because he thought it looked cool. And usually it did.
I think this bird from the MJS needs to lighten up a bit. When people see the Great Pyramids at Giza I assume they say something like, "Holy shit, that's a big, cool, old building. Nobody says, "there should be a plaque explaining that these were built by slave labor." Just like nobody made Christo put up a sign explaining his umbrellas. This is a museum at a school of engineering. If she wants to be a useful art critic, she should tell us whether or not the collection looks cool.
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
Uh oh, th Vikings just signed Koy Detmer
Hah. As much as I was looking forward to seeing Brooks Bollinger start for the Vikings this weekend, Koy Detmer might be even more entertaining. Remember last time he tried to take on Favre?
I don't remember the exact circumstances, but I know Koy (Ed. Who names their child "Koy"?) threw a late TD pass, and thinking he had the game wrapped up, did a celebration dance in which he mimed pulling his junk out and swatting a girl's/guy's (Ed. which do you think he was imagining?) ass as he mimed doing her/him. Very classy Koy. Very classy. So then Favre gets the ball back and.... the Packers win.
I don't remember the exact circumstances, but I know Koy (Ed. Who names their child "Koy"?) threw a late TD pass, and thinking he had the game wrapped up, did a celebration dance in which he mimed pulling his junk out and swatting a girl's/guy's (Ed. which do you think he was imagining?) ass as he mimed doing her/him. Very classy Koy. Very classy. So then Favre gets the ball back and.... the Packers win.
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