Writing Ain't Dead Yet: Tuscan Whole Milk, 1 Gallon, 128 fl oz

Reading this it graciously becomes apparent writing is not dead yet.

He always brought home milk on Friday.

After a long hard week full of days he would burst through the door, his fatigue hidden behind a smile. There was an icy jug of Tuscan Whole Milk, 1 Gallon, 128 fl oz in his right hand. With his left hand he would grip my waist - I was always cooking dinner - and press the cold frostiness of the jug against my arm as he kissed my cheek. I would jump, mostly to gratify him after a time, and smile lovingly at him. He was a good man, a wonderful husband who always brought the milk on Friday, Tuscan Whole Milk, 1 Gallon, 128 fl oz.

Then there was that Friday, the terrible Friday that would ruin every Friday for the rest of my life. The door opened, but there was no bouyant greeting - no cold jug against the back of my arm. There was no Tuscan Whole Milk in his right hand, nor his left. There came no kiss. I watched as he sat down in a kitchen chair to remove his shoes. He wore no fatigue, but also no smile. I didn't speak, but turned back to the beans I had been stirring. I stirred until most of their little shrivelled skins floated to the surface of the cloudy water. Something was wrong, but it was vague wrongness that no amount of hard thought could give shape to.

Over dinner that night I casually inserted,"What happened to the milk?"

"Oh,"he smiled sheepishly, glancing aside,"I guess I forgot today."

That was when I knew. He was tired of this life with me, tired of bringing home the Tuscan Whole Milk, 1 Gallon, 128 fl oz. He was probably shoveling funds into a secret bank account, looking at apartments in town, casting furtive glances at cashiers and secretaries and waitresses. That's when I knew it was over. Some time later he moved in with a cashier from the Food Mart down the street. And me? Well, I've gone soy.

More reviews (1,148) here.

A tip of the hat to the Daily Dish for leading us here.

Yamasaki, Inc, Closes

Michael R. Allen writing in the blog Ecology of Absence reports:

The Detroit Free Press reports that Yamasaki, Inc. has closed. This is the end of one of modern architecture's most illustrious American firms. Founded by Minoru Yamasaki in 1959, the firm's name is found on the drawings for the ill-fated World Trade Center as well as many significant modernist designs.

The firm marked the departure of Yamasaki from the Detroit-based firm Hellmuth, Yamasaki & Leinweber, which Yamasaki had founded in 1949 with St. Louisan George Hellmuth and Joseph Leinweber. The three had worked together at Detroit firm Smith Hinchman & Grylls.

Hellmuth, Yamasaki & Leinweber left a tremendous impact in St. Louis, designing the terminal at Lambert Airport (1956) and most of the St. Louis Housing Authority's projects from the early postwar era, including the Pruitt-Igoe project(1954). When the firm split, Hellmuth created the firm Hellmuth Obata Kassabaum in St. Louis, which went on to become the world's largest architectural firm and continues to be a giant among American firms.

Rejected Mancrunch Super Bowl Ad

A Daily Dish reader nails it:

Call me cynical, and I can't imagine I'm the first to point this out, but haven't the folks at ManCrunch done a wonderful job at advertising their site without having to, you know, pay to advertise their site?

They created an ad that was almost certainly going to be rejected by the CBS brass. Think of the firestorm after Janet Jackson's tit popped out for a millisecond at the Super Bowl half time show in 2004. Now imagine how those same people - and more - would react two gay men making out in front of their children. It's not hard. You can practically hear Bill O'Reilly's "Memo" on it already - secular progressives, overriding the values of millions of Americans, blah, blah. In fact, I'm almost glad CBS has saved us from the inevitable Fox News/Drudge backlash, however hypocritical Drudge's protestations might be.

As for ManCrunch, they're getting the type of publicity you get from a Super Bowl without having to fork over the $2.6 million they'd need to run that ad during the Super Bowl.

So is this a victory for common sense or equal treatment? No. Does ManCrunch win anyway? Yes. And are we all spared the usual rants from the usual ranters?

God, let's hope so.

A Gracious Hello - How We Communicate Is Changing

Back in the early 1970s, when I was stationed in Europe, the PvtRN and I exchanged hundred of letters and the occasional phone call. But mostly we wrote letters to each other. Phone calls were very expensive and it only cost 8 cents to mail a letter to Europe.

In the late 1970s, we exchanged letters with her parents, sending them in care of General Delivery to the towns on our route. We would write probably a letter a week. It was always exciting to go to the post office and get mail.

Phone calls were made about once a month or when we had some hot news. We made them from pay phones. The usual deal was to call the police department in the town and ask them to bring a message to the party to whom we wished to speak. Sometimes the police would only deliver the message if it was an emergency. Our garage burned down many times that summer.

We would leave the phone number of the pay phone we were by and await the call. Most payphones were outbound and inbound phones at the time.

Now, cell phones, internet access and email make exchanging information a lot easier. Some think the iPad may replace books.

I can't remember the last time I wrote a personal letter. My family and I keep in touch via our cell phones, email and our blogs.

I am on facebook and twitter. It seems that since I got on those two services, my blog posts have not been as frequent. Instead of writing an 800 word blog post, I distill it down to a pithy 140 characters or a sentence or two on a facebook news feed.

I discuss with my friends the 24/7 news cycle and how nuances get lost in the flow of information. I saw that in last Friday's coverage of Obama at the Republican meeting.

Nicholas Carr is a member of Britannica’s Editorial Board of Advisors and author of the forthcoming book The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains, available this spring. He originally published this post with the FUTURIST magazine. Money quote:

Our eager embrace of a brand new verb — to text — speaks volumes. We’re rapidly moving away from our old linear form of writing and reading, in which ideas and narratives wended their way across many pages, to a much more compressed, nonlinear form. What we’ve learned about digital media is that, even as they promote the transmission of writing, they shatter writing into little, utilitarian fragments. They turn stories into snippets. They transform prose and poetry into quick, scattered bursts of text.

This Snow Will Make The Gardens Grow....

I am eagerly awaiting Spring!

Attention Race Fans!

Still More Leaves From An Ozark Journal

The continuing saga of Leaves From An Ozark Journal.

Jan. 24. Snow and flu, 17 at S.S. and church. 17 at C.E. Roads dangerous. Schools dismissed because of bad roads yet I drove to Houston for County Board Meeting.

Jan. 25. About sick with flu. Reading Tarbell's "Life of Lincoln." Horrible reports of floods on Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. David sick with flu. Nora next. Quite a job to cook and care for the kiddies.

Jan. 29. Lois down with flu. David up. Schools dismissed. No sleep on Saturday night, flu had me. Spent Sunday in bed and missed Houston date. No S.S. today, all families sick. Nellie doing chores for us.Ohio River overflowing its banks in Louisville, Kentucky, January 1937.

Driving Across Kansas With $1 million In Cash That Smells Like Pot = Illegal Behavior?

From the Hutchinson, Kansas hutchnews.com:

MINNEOLA - Clark County's undersheriff discovered more than $1 million hidden inside a truck traveling last week on U.S. 54, and now county officials are seeking the forfeiture of the cash.

Undersheriff Daniel Knowles was conducting a traffic stop at milepost 65 on U.S. 54, just west of Minneola, when he found the $1,017,183, according to Clark County Sheriff John Ketron. Knowles had pulled over a pickup pulling a trailer that had failed to signal a lane change.

After Knowles spoke with the male driver, who was traveling alone, the driver "granted consent to a search of his vehicle," Ketron said.

Ketron said he could not speak for Knowles as to why a search was requested, and Knowles was not immediately available for comment. He noted, however, that the undersheriff is trained in "criminal interdiction on the highway," has 15 years of experience detecting criminal activity on highways, and previously worked in Emporia patrolling Interstate 35.

"Normally, something draws officers' attention," Ketron said. "We don't normally just search every car."

The driver of the pickup, who has since been released, claimed he didn't know how the money got into his pickup or who it belonged to, Ketron said. A K-9 brought to the scene "alerted on the vehicle where the money was hidden, because the money had an odor of narcotics on it," he said.

The cash was "in all denominations," from $1 to $100 bills, Ketron said. Nothing else suspicious was found in the pickup.

The driver's name and age have not been released, and Ketron could only confirm the man was not a Kansan. The pickup had out-of-state plates, although, Ketron could not say from what state.

"The vehicle was not from Kansas nor was it headed to a destination in Kansas," he said.

Ketron said he could not release further details about the stop since the case has been turned over to the federal Drug Enforcement Administration.

"There's a pending investigation on where the money came from and where it possibly would have been going," he said. "I don't want to hamper anything the DEA might be working on."

Ketron thinks the $1 million discovery is the largest cash seizure ever in Clark County. Paperwork has already been filed with the Clark County Attorney's Office for the forfeiture of the seized cash.

"Under statute, the money goes through a forfeiture process," he said. "Every party with interest in (the money), including the driver and the owner of the vehicle, will be notified and will have a certain amount of time to file a claim."

If it's proven the money legally belonged to someone, "then they have the opportunity to get their property back," he said.

"Often, nobody claims it," Ketron said, noting it wasn't the first time cash and drugs have been seized in Clark County.

He admitted the sheriff's office annual budget is "nowhere near $1 million." Minus salaries of 10 employees, the sheriff's office annual budget is about $330,000, he said.

Should the $1 million be forfeited, 85 percent will go to the Clark County Sheriff's Office and 15 percent will go to the Clark County Attorney's Office, he said.

And of the sheriff's office portion, "there are statutory requirements as to how the money can be used," Ketron noted.

Forfeited money that's been seized by officers can be spent on drug and crime prevention programs, officer training and technology upgrades, he said.

"It's not just to operate the department," Ketron said

By Jobs, I Think He's Got It!!!

We're talking about a cool pad, man. Can you dig it? Like ice cream, man!

It's only a marginal revolution:

My theory is that Apple wants to capture a chunk of the revenue in this nation's enormous textbook market -- high school, college, whatever. Why lug all those books around? The superior Apple graphics, colors, and fonts will support all of the textbook features which Kindle botches and destroys. Apple takes a chunk of the market revenue, of course, plus they sell the iPads and some AT&T contracts. There are lots of schoolkids in the world.

As Kottke says, it is a device you use sitting down. And it fails to solve the "sunlight on your reading screen" problem/ Those both point to somewhat sedentary uses.. And it doesn't seem to have a camera.

In the longer run the iPad will compete with your university, or in some ways enhance your university. It will offer homework services and instructional videos and courses, none of which can work well on the current iPhone or Kindle. The device also seems to allow for collaborative use.

Can you imagine one attached to every hospital bed or in the hands of every doctor and nurse?

It will take some business away from Kindle but that will not be the major impact. The commercial book trade just isn't that big in terms of revenue and arguably that sector will shrink with digitalization, as recorded music has been doing.

The story here is one of new markets, not cannibalization or even competition.

Most of the commentary I've read hasn't been very imaginative about what the content might be.

Addendum: Chris F. Masse, who sometimes reads my mind, sent me this article (before this post was up):

“The book will never die. But the textbook probably will,” says Inkling CEO Matt MacInnis. Inkling is working directly with textbook publishers. First, they’ll port their existing tomes onto Apple’s iPad as interactive, socialized objects. Then, they’ll create all-new learning modules — interactive, social, and mobile — that leave ink-on-paper textbooks in the dust.

Driver's note: How many pads did you think of before you thought of 'bachelor pad'?

Someday.....

Someday I will grow up and I will have a son. I shall name him "Steve".

Rainey's Harley, October 5, 1922

Maurice A. Rainey (ca. 1891 - Oct.9, 1952). Son of Robert B. and Catherine B. Rainey. A veteran of WWI, he is interred at Arlington National Cemetery.

Washington Post, Oct 2, 1921
Praises Officer Rainey.
Park Policeman M.A. Rainey, who was reprimanded by Judge Mattingly in the Police court early in the week for alleged "wild west tactics" in bringing a speeding motorist to a halt, was yesterday commended for his work by Col. C.O. Sherrill, superintendent of public buildings and grounds.

Col. Sherrill conducted an investigation into the incident, and after a hearing in his office yesterday stated that Rainey's "actions were beyond criticism and were most admirable." He expressed his appreciation of the aid given Rainey in making the arrest by Serg. F. Wilson, Gen. Pershing's chauffeur, and Park Policemen C.D. Fortner and O.E. Morgan.


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Washington Post, Feb 28, 1922
Wrecked in Liquor Race
An exciting chase between Park Policeman Maurice A. Rainey, stationed on the speedway, and an alleged bootleg automobile through the streets of the northwestern section, early Sunday, resulted in the machine crashing into a tree at Twenty-sixth street and New York avenue northwest, wrecking it. The alleged bootleggers escaped. The bootleggers threw a quantity of Scotch whisky, Rainey declared, from the the speeding machine. The wrecked car was confiscated by the police and revenue agents. When the bootleggers jumped from the machine Rainey abandoned his motorcycle and gave chase on foot, but was outdistanced by the negroes.


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Washington Post, Jun 28, 1931
Park Policeman Hurt; Motorist is Released
Park Policeman M.A. Rainey was injured yesterday morning when he was knocked from his motorcycle by an automobile driven by James H. Harper, 23, of Mount Rainier, MD., at Ellipse Road.

Rainey was treated at Emergency Hospital for a broken leg and bruises. Harper was held at the Third Precinct until the extent of the policeman's injuries were determined. No charges were placed against him and he was later released.


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Washington Post, May 13, 1933
Buddies of the Lost Battalion Meet Here after 15 years
A shadowy line advanced across a French battlefield. It as 1918, the Lost Battalion was hemmed in by enemy forces and the First Gas Brigade was attempting to cut an escape passage through for their beleaguered comrades.

There was a burst of machine gun fire. Many of the advancing line fell in their tracks. One was Pvt. M.A. Rainey. His sergeant, Edward McDade, stopped a moment: "Can I do anything, Rainey," he said. "Go ahead," said Rainey. "I'll get by somehow."

Sgt. McDade went ahead. After an interminable wait, stretcher bearers got Rainey back to a base hospital.

Night before last Private M.A. Rainey, of the United States Park police, was assigned with the detail to move the bonus marchers from Seaton Park. Rainey was strolling through the milling veterans when a hand was laid on his arm. It was his old sergeant, "the best sergeant a guy ever had," said Rainey.

And the two men had a reunion right there. It was the first time they had met since Rainey fell with five machine gun slugs in his body. Rainey finally recovered in the base hospital and for fourteen years has been connected with the Park Police. McDade, who comes from Michigan, rode here on a freight train to ask for his bonus.

"Always Something Interesting"

Always Something Interesting....

19th century steam technology wore its power on its sleeve, so to speak. The locomotive engineer presided over a roaring fire in the heavily riveted firebox beneath and in front of the cab, whose superheated gases passed up and forward through the boiler tubes, raising steam which was further superheated in the domes above the boiler before doing its work in the cylinders connected to the drive wheels. Unlike a steamship, with plenty of room to spread out, all this power must be concentrated in a motive unit fitting within the standard dimensions of a train and tracks. Contemplate the arrays of bolts, rivets and massive steel members required to channel this power and withstand the pounding of years of service. No wonder the engineer, riding this beast in exposed conditions, controlling this power (and the whistle) to make the train run on time, was the envy of every boy watching him work.

Wal Mart Cuts 9% (11,200 Jobs) At Sam's Club Warehouses

The AP is reporting that

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. will cut about 11,200 jobs at Sam's Club warehouses as it turns over the task of in-store product demonstrations to an outside marketing company.

The move is an effort to improve sales at Sam's Club and comes on top of a decision to close 10 underperforming warehouse locations, which cost 1,500 jobs.

The cuts represent about 10 percent of the warehouse club operator's 110,000 staffers across its 600 stores. That includes 10,000 workers, mostly part-timers, who offer food samples and showcase products to customers. The company also eliminated 1,200 workers who recruit new members.

Employees were told the news at mandatory meetings on Sunday morning.

"In the club channel, demo sampling events are a very important part of the experience," said Sam's Club CEO Brian Cornell in a phone interview with The Associated Press. "Shopper Events specializes in this area and they can take our sampling program to the next level."

Shopper Events, based in Rogers, Ark., currently works with Wal-Mart's namesake stores on in-store demonstrations. Sam's Club is looking to the company to improve sampling in areas such as electronics, personal wellness products and food items to entice shoppers to spend more.

A better way to entice shoppers to spend more would be to have more checkout lanes open.

Shopper Events charges $200 a day to each Walmart store to pass out samples.

1937 Trailer Camp

How To Get Things Done....

Busch, Herzog Slam The Big Mac

Alden Gonzalez is reporting on MLB.com that former Cardinal Manager Whitey Herzog and Adolphus Busch IV, the great-great grandson of Anheuser-Busch founder Adolphus Busch, whose family owned the team from 1953-1996, are not happy with the way the organization has acted in the McGwire affair.

First, portions of Herzog's comments:

"I don't want to comment on steroids because they're all lying," the Appleton Post-Crescent reported Herzog as saying. "And they're still lying. They get on steroids because they say they want to get back on the field. The reason they're on steroids is because they got injured because they were taking steroids. Because their muscles grow too fast, and every time they make a false move, they slip and pull something. It's always a pulled muscle, rib cage, a minor something."

Busch also takes a turn slamming Big Mac:

"McGwire is not apologizing for his deceit, only for the embarrassment that came from his admission of having previously lied," Busch said in a statement issued Thursday. "The timing of his announcement at the start of a new baseball season has allowed him to hide behind the frenzy of a new Cardinal season and the blinding faith of Cardinal loyalists."

Busch also lashed out at Cardinals manager Tony La Russa, who said he was not aware of McGwire's steroid use when he served as his manager with the Athletics and Cardinals.

"McGwire has chosen to come out of the closet at the perfect time -- alongside a manager who also refuses to be honest, to the fans or to the game itself," Busch said. "After all, why would Tony La Russa hire a hitting coach whose lifetime batting average was only .263?


"He was paid millions while perpetrating a fraud."

More Leaves From An Ozark Journal

Frequent bus riders will recall the first installment of Leaves From An Ozark Journal. We pick up where we left off.

On Jan. 5 Dr. Tilley deposited $300 for church building fund. Others gave smaller sums. Twenty men signed for donated labor.

Jan. 7. Helped provide clothes for W.P.A. family of eight children. Another family in need--14 people living in three rooms. Warm discussion over causes of War, in Moffatt store. Some favor killing the leaders of war first.

Sleet and ice Jan. 9--no one for church, few people in town. Grace makes new sentences--"Daddy, tie my shoe." Takes off her shoes and goes bare-footed. Tries to count. David trying to write.

Reading "Pathfinder" and pamphlet on Ozark Christian College. Hardly twenty families at church Jan. 10. Canvass report showed 1937 budget pledged; 78 days of donated labor pledged for S.S. Annex. Reading Jan '37 "Reader's Digest."

Jan. 11 at Houston to hear Supt. Tate at United Dry Forces meeting-13 present. Local option by counties the next step.

Mrs. Beaumont gave me a three volume set of Br. Heaumont's "Evenings with the Bible" by Isaac Errett.

Several workdays at church this week. Some joke when Otto McLaughlin's dynamite took a plank out of the church house floor and damaged the ceiling.

Half the people sick with flu at Stoutland. No one came to Sunny Side Service. Twelve present at Friendship, seven went in my car. Could allow myself to get discouraged.

Jan. 18 in Hartville meeting. Roomed in the Carter house. Aunt Mary, 81 years of age, liked to talk to Todd and me.

Many calls in homes and schools. Marion Palmer, strong in the faith, turned from the Baptist faith forty years ago in a Giddens vs Baptist debate.

Seventy-five at church one night, only 14 the next night when the blizzard came.

Todd and I in our room talked until midnight. He told of baptizing one man, no others present, both were nude.

Met Perry Rainey family. Mr. Rainey is Vocational Ag teacher. Supper in Rainey home. Church cancelled on account of weather.

If Money Equals Speech,

citizens should have the right to bribe elected officials.

Roy Blunt: True Missouri Values

Abigail and Congressman Roy Blunt with Michaela and Tareq Salahi. (Photo by Tony Powell)

MMMM, almost as good as bacon.

How dumb does he think we are? The uncropped photo:
For those of you who are wondering what is going on with their hands in this photo, this will give you some idea.

Dixon Accepts $500.00 Contribution From PayDay Loan Operative--So Much For Cracking Down On The Payday Loan Industry.

Cash America, 1600 West 7th Street, Fort Worth TX 76102, gave a $500.00 cash contribution to the Bob Dixon for Senate Committee. The contribution, made on November 9, 2009, was reflected on Dixon's January Quarterly Report filed with the Ethics Commission.

Now, granted, this was before Governor Nixon mentioned how he was going to crack down on the payday loan industry. And before the Republican Dixon stood to signify his solidarity with the governor....I guess Cash America is one of the GOOD payday loan people.

651% Interest, at that rate, they can afford to give Bob a heck of a lot more money. And I'll betcha Bob will take it.

What A Mess With McGwire--

Bryan Burwell, a sports writer with the St. Louis Post Dispatch, has some thoughts on the mess with McGwire.

"I hope you can all accept this," McGwire said with a nervous grin. "Let's all move on from this. Baseball is great right now. Baseball is better. Let's just all move on."

Nothing to look at here, people. Just move along, please just move along.

So here's how Wag the McGwire works. They are counting on you to be as gullible and fatigued as this small sampling of Cardinals fanatics proved to be. They are hoping that you will be just like the folks in LA and the folks in San Francisco and the folks in New York who have already participated in the scam so successfully.

They give you a little snippet of the truth, an ambiguous alibi that never quite tells the full story, and they are counting on that being more than enough for you.

Ding-dong, the steroid era is dead.

That may work for some of you, and I understand that. But that does not work so well with the other characters in this show whom the spin doctors are having a devil of a time manipulating fully. Reporters don't move on simply because they have been told to move on. It's not our job to move on. It's our job to dig in and keep probing until we get the entire truth.

And just so you know, there still are plenty of questions that need to be asked and answered. Important questions that must be addressed now that the Cardinals have put one of the biggest steroid cheats in baseball history — one of the scandal's original sinners — right back in the clubhouse and put him in charge of nurturing all their hitters.

The same scam is being perpetuated on us. Go back and read this again.