Guilt and Innocence: A daily primer

TV makes you dumb and other lies your mother told you

And now for the exciting column where I talk about Steve Johnson's theories about how television makes you smarter. Of course, I did write this before I read his nice alternate universe bit about how, considering this, all readers might as well be sociopaths. Oh, well. Here it is:

Who knew? Television might be good for you.

Bookstore or Grocery Store?

The NY Times discusses the new trend of grocery stores putting a greater emphasis on selling books: Attention, Shoppers: Sale on Fresh Books in Aisle 3.

Bookstore owners complain that grocery stores, like warehouse clubs, are killing bookstores and possibly the book business, too. By focusing almost exclusively on best sellers, grocers do not support the thousands of lesser authors whose books are carried at independent and chain bookstores, the critics say. Nor do supermarkets carry large selections of older books, or the backlist, which for most publishers is the most profitable portion of their business and which often supports their publishing of newer, less-known authors.

Allow mw a miserable, book-loving, channeling-Jon-Stewart moment: Stop killing books! You're hurting books for everyone! Put down the Dan Brown, please, for just one second. Just one second! and read something written by someone who can write.

Okay, now go back to your goddamned chick lit.

G.R.I.T.S.

Despite having lived outside of Louisiana for over six years now, according to this handy little quiz, I've still retained 65% of my Dixie dialect. I don't know that that's necessarily a good thing.

Southern Dialect Quiz.

Although, I have to admit that I don't actively call soft drinks "Coke." Mostly because, since I don't live in the south any longer, I would actually end up with Coca-Cola. I'm not sure what I call them anymore, since Columbia seems to be at the center of the soft drink name divide.

Also, a Sub sandwich with lots of toppings is msot definitely a Po'boy. Which is disntinctively Louisianian, I think, but that's one of those southern things that's stuck with me, even if I rarely use the term, since no one ever knows what I'm talking about.

An Alternate Universe of Doom

Steve Johnson offers a terrifying picture of what popular culture could have been:

"Imagine an alternate world identical to ours save one techno-historical change: videogames were invented and popularized before books. In this parallel universe, kids have been playing games for centuries—and then these page-bound texts come along and suddenly they’re all the rage. What would the teachers, and the parents, and the cultural authorities have to say about this frenzy of reading? I suspect it would sound something like this:

Reading books chronically under-stimulates the senses. Unlike the longstanding tradition of gameplaying—which engages the child in a vivid, three-dimensional world filled with moving images and musical soundscapes, navigated and controlled with complex muscular movements—books are simply a barren string of words on the page. Only a small portion of the brain devoted to processing written language is activated during reading, while games engage the full range of the sensory and motor cortices.

Books are also tragically isolating. While games have for many years engaged the young in complex social relationships with their peers, building and exploring worlds together, books force the child to sequester him or herself in a quiet space, shut off from interaction with other children. These new 'libraries' that have arisen in recent years to facilitate reading activities are a frightening sight: dozens of young children, normally so vivacious and socially interactive, sitting alone in cubicles, reading silently, oblivious to their peers.

Many children enjoy reading books, of course, and no doubt some of the flights of fancy conveyed by reading have their escapist merits. But for a sizable percentage of the population, books are downright discriminatory. The reading craze of recent years cruelly taunts the 10 million Americans who suffer from dyslexia—a condition didn’t even exist as a condition until printed text came along to stigmatize its sufferers.

But perhaps the most dangerous property of these books is the fact that they follow a fixed linear path. You can't control their narratives in any fashion—you simply sit back and have the story dictated to you. For those of us raised on interactive narratives, this property may seem astonishing. Why would anyone want to embark on an adventure utterly choreographed by another person? But today’s generation embarks on such adventures millions of times a day. This risks instilling a general passivity in our children, making them feel as though they’re powerless to change their circumstances. Reading is not an active, participatory process; it’s a submissive one. The book readers of the younger generation are learning to 'follow the plot' instead of learning to lead."

In that world, I would be a crazy sociopath child. And sad. Very sad. (Originally seen on Kottke.)

Post 9/11 Security and Penguins

There are days when I miss Denver terribly. I'm not so sure this is one of them. As Channel 7 News in Denver (the ABC affiliate) covers two traveling Seaworld penguins going through Airport security:

And a speculated quote from one penguin:

The first penguin seems to be wondering why this is necessary. "It's not like I planned to hijack the plane to Antarctica."

I wonder too, buddy.

Book #12: Nonrequired Reading 2004

Maybe it's because I've grown more discerning in my tastes in books, or that I've simply been reading too much so all books are starting to sound the same, but I'm finding myself disappointed by books more often than not. However, no matter how many books I read each year, I know that there will be at least one I love, and it's the America's Best Nonrequired Reading for that year.

This is the third year that the book has been published, and the third time I've bought it. They're edited by Dave Eggers, which may add to their appeal and quality, and are the best selections of reading anywhere. On top of that, they generally encompass all genres: Non-fiction, fiction, and have even as of late included some graphical stories, as well as authors from the well-known to the virtually unheard of.

I love this series to pieces and think everyone should run out and buy all of them right this instant. But I suppose that would take a little bit of integrity out of the title "Nonrequired," wouldn't it?

Columns, Laziness, and Books.

I've had this problem recently, where, since  I can't find a good news event, I've been trying to write about things that bother me in a more general sense.

However, I invariably end up not having enough to say about one aspect of something, so I try to write about two, and then end up not saying much of anything at all. This column is another example of that, I think.

Textbooks, lazy readers threaten good books.

Questing for Soup and Popsicles

Number of classes attended so far this week: Three

Number of popsicles eaten: One

Number of meals wasted on obtaining essentially a bowl of soup: Approximately four

Number of interviews: Two

I'm tired, and though that may come as a surprise to any of you who realize I've spent most of this week sleeping, it's quite true. I got out of bed at nine-thirty today to shower and go to American Government, despite the fact I woke up with my throat on fire and feeling generally crappy.

Jessica asked if I had dragged myself out of bed just to go to Government, a class I'm no longer technically responsible for, and then pointed out there's really no reason I should be going. I'd figured I would feel better after a shower and continued to get ready.

In reality, I felt worse after my shower and have only just now finally dragged myself out of bed. Screw you pollen, or bacteria, or whatever is causing the pain in my head right now.

Despite my bodies constant immune system attacks, I've made it through two interviews this week. One was for a Desk Attendant job at Mark Twain and the other for Forum Editor at the Maneater. I'm supposed to know about the editor position by tomorrow, but the waiting for both is causing me an undue amount of anxiety. I just want to know whether I got the jobs or not. I'm not particularly attached to either one, though having a DA job would be super convenient, but I definitely need some sort of job next semester. Especially since I think it's quite possible I may end up in a lower-paying retail job this summer. And I plan on blowing a few hundred dollars to go to Boston.

I really don't care for being sick while stuck in the dorms. When I was sick at home I would stay in my pajamas all day, not shower, and watch lots of mediocre cable. However, even if I stay in the dorms all day, I have to face about fifty people just to get a bowl of soup from the dining hall. So, I have to shower, get dressed, and look somewhat presentable just to suffer through a bowl of soup, when really I just want to lounge around and be generally miserable.

However, there is only one more day of this weird too much to do, too sore throat, odd week.

And then, if you can believe it, only three more weeks of my freshman year of college.

Cookie is for sometimes? I think not.

It's that time of the week again, and this time I am defending Cookie Monster's idiosyncracies, as well as going on my usual rant about parental responsibility. I give you, the column:

Parents more powerful than Cookie Monster’s diet.

Garrison Keilor: Newspapers have taken a wrong turn.

I think part of my revernce for Garrison Keilor has something to do with growing up in a Unitarian Universalist church. There's something in his demeanor that seems to universally attract Unitarians to the Prarie Home Companion, so when Garrison Keilor has something to say, especially about what will, hopefully, some day be my profession, I take note.

Keilor on traveling in a cocoon populated by readers, has something to say about Journalism:

"I think that I would want to talk about the beauties of journalism and say a word in its behalf, as against, say, the personal essay and the memoir and other genres that seem more in vogue. ... But I think that American newspapers have taken a very serious wrong turn, and that aside from a few newspapers the quality of the product is in decline, especially for the reader, and I think that newspapers have forgotten that their readers are readers and love writing - writing is what people want. They don't want a sort of concept of journalism; they want writers. And writers are always individuals.

"This is what people turn to newspapers for. They don't turn to newspapers for advice and for personal service and for sort of glossy pieces about lifestyle and home decor and cooking and how to bring up your children. They're really looking to newspapers for the same thing that people looked to newspapers for back before television - television didn't change anything and USA Today didn't really change anything."