Quote

From me, from Oct 25, 2006

"Bad things don't come in threes. They come in ones, we just remember them in threes."

Pic from here.

Michael Jackson, Farrah Fawcett, Ed McMahon

So in a matter of days, Michael Jackson (50), Farrah Fawcett (62), and Ed McMahon (86) die. McMahon seemed like a decent fellow and he lived a long life. Fawcett seemed like a dingbat and since I was too young for her heyday, I never found her that attractive or interesting. Sad to die of serious cancer though. Bummer.

Then we come to Michael Jackson, who was of my era. After a day's full of hype over his death, my first and lasting reaction is "meh." Yes, his music was great... but not recently. In that sense, he stopped being relevant to me a while ago. And in the age of producers/DJs/mixers, I have a hard time figuring out how much was him and how much his crew.

Then there's the fact that his early years (which I like; "ABC" is one of my favorite songs) were the result of serious child abuse from a horrific stage-father - it taints everything from that era.

And let's not forget the persistent charges of child-molestation. Meh.

I understand the veneration for John Lennon who was a musical genius and a martyr; I understand even the intensity for Elvis... but I have never understood the attention/concern about Michael Jackson.

But "Billie Jean" is a great song.

Pic from here

Personal Update

I've been away a long time, but for real reasons. We had to take my wife to the hospital, back at the end of April, for pregnancy complications and she was basically in there for almost a month until the birth of our daughter on May 22. After that, it's been non-stop catch-up for all the things in my life. I hope to get back on track soon.

Jack Kemp Dies, 73

Jack Kemp died last night from cancer at 73. I actually liked him; he was the real deal. I guess because he and I are both upstate New Yorkers. But he's a vanished breed - a non-racist, moderate Republican politician. I have long said that the 1996 Election was one of the only ones in my lifetime where I could have lived with either choice (as opposed to, lets say, 1988 which was a disaster every-which-way). In fact, it could have been a Kemp v. Gore battle in 1988 which I would have liked very much (despite that I was 2 years away from voting age). Ah well.

State of the Parties

Soon may be the day when the largest party affiliation will be no party:


h.t. to Sullivan for the chart

Video of the Day: Texas Secession

My brother sent me this youtube clip about Texas' most recent plan to secede from the Union. A grateful nation thanks the dude who made this clip.

BATman

The identity of the author of the Styx is a deep mystery, shrouded in intrigue, only barely discoverable by intellects who are able to type and have access to Google. Nonetheless, my anonymity is a legal fiction I intend to uphold for now.

That said, I cannot and will not admit that I have a brother specifically named Aaron Cypess, M.D., Ph.D., but were he my brother I would be incredibly proud that Aaron is the first author of a New England Journal of Medicine article about "brown fat" (Brown Adipose Tissue = B.A.T., hence the fat Batman). The article is so important that it was carried by every major newspaper as well as NPR and even the major network TV news: NBC with Brian Williams, the Today Show, and CBS News.

Some newspapers decided to break with scientific and journalistic tradition and they did not mention the first author's name. One paper in particular, whose name rhymes with Shnew Dork Shtimes, committed this calmnus fraud. Not sure why... I won't say it's because Aaron wore a yamulka to the interview; it's probably because the Shtimes is a rag.

Yet, because God has a sense of humor, this story broke on the first day of Pesach. Which meant that the entire frum community, who weren't able to listen to NPR or watch 2 of the major news networks on Chag, were stuck reading the Shtimes and thus did not know that the Cypess Family Name was being honored so greatly.

What follows is a list of the journalistic heroes, i.e. those that carried Aaron's name along with his revolutionary findings. Also are three video clips noted above (NBC, Today, CBS) - where Aaron is shown doing his research proudly wearing his keepah:

NPR: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=102887700

NPR audio: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=102887700

Reuters (as Cypress): http://www.reuters.com/article/healthNews/idUSTRE5378SL20090408?feedType=RSS&feedName=healthNews

CNN: http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/04/10/brown.fat.obesity/

WSJ: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123922489513102541.html

WPost: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/08/AR2009040804290_pf.html

Boston Globe: http://www.boston.com/news/health/blog/2009/04/brown_fats_hold.html

Forbes: http://www.forbes.com/feeds/hscout/2009/04/08/hscout625876_print.html

Scientific American: http://www.sciam.com/blog/60-second-science/post.cfm?id=adults-store-calorie-burning-brown-2009-04-09

LA Times: http://www.latimes.com/features/health/la-sci-fat9-2009apr09,0,6366429,print.story

WebMD: http://www.webmd.com/diet/news/20090407/can-brown-fat-make-you-thin

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News

Congratulations Aaron, if you were my brother, I'd be very proud of you.

Fat Batman pic from here.

Daytime TV

While lying in bed, gently writhing in lumbar-exploded pain, I was able to catch up on about 5 or 6 years of back TV watching. When I was a child and sick on a weekday, I had to make do with either the weird stuff they put on PBS after 10 am, or, if I was lucky, the Price is Right (in fact, ask any gen-Xer, and we'll tell you that 2 things are synonymous with being sick: the Price is Right, and ginger-ale).

Anyway, this decade, I was able to relive my childhood not through bad TV but through VH1 - which is now strictly programmed for my age group. I was able to soothe my pain with 5 straight hours of the Top 50 One-Hit-Wonders of the 80s. Electric Avenue, indeed.

Back Blowout

So, there I was, minding my own business, right about to leave for hashkama minyan, grabbing my youngest son in an attempt to tickle and/or kiss him, when an almost audible muscular-explosion hit a whole bunch of my lumbars (see pic to the left of me in Terminator-o-Vision).

I've had back pains and problems before - a lovely paternal inheritance - but nothing like this. Holy macaroni.

I was able to struggle up the stairs from the basement and then collapsed on my living room couch where I stayed for 12 hours, almost totally incapacitated. To get to the bathroom I needed to crawl and a round-trip took about an hour. My wife was an indispensable help but since she's in her last trimester, we couldn't risk her supporting my weight (which usually requires two strong men or one small burro).

A fellow-congregant of my shul, a high-demand orthopedic specialist, even paid a house-call Motzei Shabbos. He gets a big bunch of Olam Ha-Ba for that.

It took 24 hours of immobility until I was strong enough to stand for a short period of time; 48 hours until I could sit for a minute or two and 72 hours until I felt half-way normal. Today I'm still in pain, but I can at least stand and sit for longer periods. Let's see if it can handle a three hour seminar today.

Oh, and what ran through my mind was the Wilfred Brimley line from one of my top-5 movies, Hard Target: when asked "can you get up?" he replies, in a weird Cajun accent, "I cannot dance, but I can get up."

It's in this clip below at 3:47 (to get there you need to sit through almost 4 minutes of straight gunfire, explosions and John-Woo-Style killing... see above for 'top 5.'):



Pic of my back pain from here.

Passover Coke

I am not the only one - by far - who is obsessed with true-sugar Passover Coke. NPR is on the case; so is USA Today; so is about 1000 other blogs and websites (e.g.).

My favorite Passover Coke story comes from my second year in college. My freshman year dorm had 4 guys and for sophomore year we added a fifth and were able to occupy one of the 2 "quints" in Mathey College. We lost out on Blair Arch (I was told that an elaborate and well-planned conspiracy managed to land it, year after year, to some beer-soaked frat), and we settled into Hamilton Hall.

Two of the original four were not Jewish and were well acquainted with the other two's Hebrew ways. The newest roommate was less so (he was a devout Catholic, an officer in the campus Aquinas Society, he's the one who told me that an Opus Dei dude considered his church "Bloody Protestant" compared to the 'Dei). In any case, this roommate - an Electrical Engineer - came into the room 'round this time of year and started waxing enthusiastic that the "P-Coke" was finally in the stores. When asked what he meant, he explained that if you looked at the can-o'-coke's lid, there was a "P" stamped on it. And it was his unadulterated opinion - he had no idea that it was a Passover thing - that it was the finest Coke you can buy.

He's right.

Birkat ha-Chama

The accompanying picture of Rabbi Samuels of Cong. Shaarei Tefillah leading the shul in Birkat ha-Chama #206 (5769) was taken by me with my palm Treo at 6:57am.

On one side, Birkat ha-Chama is a fun halakha; as we'd expect with astronomy, in good Halley's Comet form, it comes so infrequently to make it very special.

On the other side, for people like me - highly secular educated religious Jews - this halakha exemplifies the worst of the quasi-science that the anti-Rationalist Daas Torahniks like to inflict on the rest of us. The rabbinic cognoscenti know that everything declared to be a "fact" with Birkat ha-Chama is actually untrue (e.g. the calendar is according to Rav Ada, not Shmuel; we basically hold like Rebbe Eliezer for creation, not Rebbe Yehoshua... in fact, I'd claim that the rabbis are signaling us that this is a charade by davka paskening like Shmuel etc.) And don't get me started on how we add days for the Gregorian shift yet don't take into account the modifications of the Julian calendar.

So it's difficult to stand up and say 'we need to wait 28 years in order for the sun to be in the exact position at Creation' while using NONE of the Torah-True-Science that would give us the accurate day.

I mean, seriously, why don't we do this every year on the 29th of Elul? That would at least be honest in the sense that it says "this is a religious event, following Scripture, to acknowledge creation." Instead we use pseudo-science, and pseudo-logic. It's things like this - claiming false-science as true - that drive away the intelligentsia.

	The Beatles - Here Comes The Sun
	Found at bee mp3 search engine

Ranking the Comics, Part 1

{Contiued, from this backpost, started originally on Jan 24, 2009}

The comics service I subscribe to, gocomics.com claims on their homepage that Calvin & Hobbes is the greatest comic strip ever. Normally I don't take corporate claims seriously, but comics are a serious business (to me).

What are the top possible comic strips? Again, to me (in no particular order):

1. Calvin & Hobbes (1985-1995)
   
2. Peanuts (1950-2000)
   
3. Doonesbury (1970-current)
   
4. Bloom County (1980-1989)
   
5. The Far Side (1980-1995)
   
6. Pogo (1948-1975)
   
7. Krazy Kat (1913-1944)
   
8. Dilbert (1989-current)
   
9. Get Fuzzy (1999-current)
   
10. Baby Blues (1990-current)
    
11. Citizen Dog (1995-2001)
    
12. Sherman's Lagoon (1991-current)
    
13. Foxtrot (1988-current)
    
14. Ernie/Piranha Club (1988-current)
    
15. The K Chronicles (1996?-current)
    
16. Frazz (2001-current)
    
17. Life in Hell (1977-current)
    
18. The Spirit (1940-1952)
    
19. Rube Goldberg's machines (1914-1970?)

Note, there are some classic strips that others do include on all time best (e.g. Lil' Abner) which I don't mainly because I just don't like reading them. Moreover, there are many really good comics out there that I like but don't think belong on an all-time list (e.g. Boondocks, Liberty Meadows, Non Sequitur). Just to note, while it's too early to say, one comic that has a potential to be an all-time-great is Cul-De-Sac.

I judge based on 6 criteria: (1) art quality [AQ] (being drawn well gets high regard from me), (2) readability [R] (a ranking of narrative/storytelling ability; is the comic a pleasure to read), (3) creativity [C] (how much does the artist/writer do with his charcters - e.g. Garfield has moments of creativity but is basically a one-joke strip, but makes it a higher rank than Beetle Bailey); (4) humor [H] (some comics are very high ranking in major categories but just isn't funny, e.g. Boondocks); (5) intelligence [I] (does the writer assume the reader is smart, how smart do you need to be to grok the strip), (6) wisdom [W] (does the writer teach the reader? Many strips get zeros in this category, taking them out of 'best of all time' running, and the ones that are highest in this category make it to the best). A seventh criterion - consistency - is hard to rank individually, so I average it into the whole series (e.g. at one point Blondie may have been a real rib-tickler, now eh...)

The full ratings and rankings in a moment. This is what took me so long to finish, originally.

Wisdom of Calvin And Hobbes

{Backpost: Started this Jan 24, 2009; This is a huge topic, so I'll cut this post off and try to finish the whole thing later.}

Is Calvin & Hobbes the best comic strip ever? Someone has claimed that, and it may actually be true. This came up because, in my Sociology of Gender Theory and Time Warp to Second Wave Feminism class, I found myself quoting/referring to the following, timeless, wisdom from the modern day philosophers of Calvin, Hobbes, via Watterson:

An example of a permanent, useful, strip (from Feb 23 1994): So I have a long discussion on this topic (so long that I had to stop writing it three months ago) and I hope to restart it in the sake of time-wasting, procrastination, and comprehensiveness.

Random Personal Firsts

As I was listening this morning to my tunes, I went through a list of personal musical/entertainment milestones - which, because I am as yet only a consumer not a producer - are all about acquisition. My wife produces (she's a moose-ishun) and I believe my role in the entertainment industry will be harnessing the talents of my kids. That said, the milestones:

1. The first TV show I recorded on my home VCR: parts of the 1984 Summer Olympics

2. First CD purchased: In 1986 (or so): Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band by the Beatles. [As with most of the following, this was a purposeful decision - to declare that this was the epitome of albumlyness.]
   

3. First CDs acquired through the BMG Usury Club: "Digital Duke" by Duke Ellington, "Chronicle Vol 1" by CCR, "Rewind" by the Rolling Stones [All of these were to impress my father in the erroneous thought that he wouldn't mind me buying stuff if he liked the music as well; anon]
   

4. First CD Box-sets: purchased simultaneously: The Temptations, Emperors of Soul & Led Zeppelin's Box Set. [This was my declaration that these were the two pillars of my soul-ar system - what music about which I wanted to be comprehensive.]
   

5. First DVD: 1999 - "The Matrix" [like with Sgt. Pepper, I felt that this was the epitome of DVDyness]
   

And speaking of Temptations, courtesy of Dewey Cox:

Sexual Abuse Among the Amish

{Backpost: From October 18, 2007, 11:33 am. All I had was the link}

This is an instructive story for those in the frum community who cannot understand that sexual predators are found everywhere. Charedim and Amish are often compared (mainly because they share wardrobes) and the lessons about predators in their midst are the same:

1. There's an irreducible percentage of the population that is just plain bad-crazy. Total immersion in Chumash, Shas and Mussar will not change crazy. Removing outside/secular influences will not change crazy.

   
   

2. All you can do with crazy is be vigilant and stop the sickos with the early warning signs. Halakha tells us this, ya know.
   

   
   

3. You must understand that to the twisted, diseased brain of a predator, sheltered religious communities are Candyland. The victims have been taught to not question authority, and the predators are hidden by a cloud of systemic respectability (a rabbi wouldn't molest! A parent wouldn't harm his kid!) As such, even if you think that the percentage of sickos are going to be reduced because of the healing light of Shas, Poskim, and Rashi on Chumash, the predators from the outside will be drawn to these communities and the internal home-grown predators will thrive.

There is a difference between the Amish and Charedim, as the news story illustrates as seen in this quote about a victim: "Mary's father was killed in a buggy accident when she was 5."

{Amazing picture from this - totally unrelated story - on this blog.}

Mervin Verbit

Mervin Verbit is a distinguished professor of Sociology at CUNY - which was my second choice for grad school (they offered me a prestigious scholarship) after Brandeis - and I've seen his name referenced a bunch of times. But, I must admit a chronic weakness of mine, one that's shared by some of my heroes (notably, Dave Barry) which is that I cannot resist a funny name.

This man is a senior colleague in my field yet his name is a caraway seed in the dentures of my mind because his name is beautifully, tragically funny.

We were brainstorming what his middle name is: Bert? Gertrude? Murgatroyd?

Story illustrating the use of the name from this morning: I gave a gift to my eldest son: a small paper map of the 553 bus route. He loves it. It's got roads, railroad tracks, the letter T, etc. And there's the picture of the guy I call "Mr. Bus Man" - his smiling face is on a number of bus maps and the MBTA does not identify him. Is he a driver? Does he own a bus? Did he invent Boston? No idea. Anyway, my eldest asked me, naturally, who this guy was. My answer, also naturally: Mervin Verbit.

Mervin Murgatroyd Verbit, to be honest.

A la Grover, I am so ashamed.

Song of the Day: "Convoy" by C.W. McCall

One of the all time great novelty songs, Convoy (1975), by C. W. McCall. "All-time," because it's possible that the song launched the CB craze of the 1970s, which connected with concomitant 'fast driving Southerner' craze. Hence without the song, there'd be no Dukes of Hazzard (1979-1985), Clint "My Man" Eastwood's chimp movies, and the entire career of Burt "My Man" Reynolds (cf. Smokey and the Bandit 1976, Hooper 1978, Cannonball Run 1981, etc.).

Many of my all-time-favorite songs are 'story-songs' and this tune was made into at least one movie (regrettable, I've never seen it, but understandable given the cool story). Check out all of McCall's ouvre; he has consistent cool-goodness (which is the opposite of Bad Craziness). I also like snare drum music, and (what Wiki tells me is) Sprechgesang.

The music and lyrics can be found from this French site: C.W. McCall - Convoy. My clot of lawyers explains that you cannot download or use the MP3 on that site unless you purchase the song and/or are French.

Lyrics (fixed by me) [I need to make an annotated version]

(Uh breaker 1-9 this here's the Rubber Duck
you got a copy on me Pig'Pen? C'mon.
Uh yeah 10-4 pig-pen for sure, for sure.
By golly it's clean clear to Flag-town, C'mon.

Yeah that a 10-4 there Pig-Pen, yeah we definitely
got the front door good buddy.
Mercy sakes alive looks like we got us a convoy)

Was the dark of the moon on the
sixth of June in a Kenworth pullin' logs.
Cabover Pete with a reefer on
and a Jimmy Hauling hogs.
We's headin' for bear on I-one-oh
'bout a mile out a shaky-town.
I sez pig-pen this here's a Rubber Duck
and I'm about to put the hammer down.

CHORUS:
(Cause we got a little ol' convoy rockin' thru the night
Yeah we got a little ol' convoy ain't she a beautiful sight
Come on and join our convoy ain't nothin' gonna get it in your way
We gonna roll this truckin' convoy across the USA. Convoy. Convoy)

(Uh breaker Pig-Pen this here's the Duck and a-you wanna back off with them hogs? Uh, 10-4. 'Bout five mile or so, 10. Roger. Them hogs is gettin' in-tense up here.)

By the time we got into Tulsa town we had eighty trucks in all.
But they's a road-block upon the clover-leaf and them bears was all to wall.
Yeah them smokies as thick as bugs on a bumper they even had a bear in the air.
I sez callin' all trucks this here's the duck we about to go a-huntin' bear.

CHORUS

(Uh you wanna gimme a 10-9 on that pig-pen?
Uh negatory pig-pen you're still too close
Yeah them hogs is startin' to close up my sinuses.
Mercy sakes you better back off another ten)

Well we rolled up Interstate 44 like a rocket sled on rails.
We tore up all of our swindle sheets and left 'em settin' on the scales.
By the time we hit that Chi-town them bears was a gettin' smart.
They'd brought up some reinforcements from the Illinois national guard.

There's armored cars and tanks and jeeps and rigs of every size.
Yeah them chicken coops was full of bears and choppers filled the skies.
Well we shot the line and we went for broke with a thousand screamin' trucks.
And 11 long haired friends of Jesus in a chartreuse Micro-bus.

(Oh rubber duck to sod buster come on here yeah 10-4 sod buster
Listen you wanna put that micro-bus in behind that suicide jockey?
Yeah he's haulin' dynamite and he needs all the help he can get)

Well we laid a strip for the Jersey shore, prepared to cross the line.
I could see the bridge was lined with bears but I didn't have a doggone dime.
I said Pig-Pen this here's the Rubber Duck; we just ain't a gonna pay no toll.
So we crashed the gate, doin' 98. I sez 'let them truckers roll.' 10-4.

CHORUS (with catcalls and hoots)

(Uh, 10-4 pig-pen what's your 20? Omaha!?
Well they oughta know what to do with them hogs out there for sure.
Well mercy sakes good buddy we gonna back on out of here.
So keep the bugs off your glass and the bears off your tail,
And we'll ketch ya on the flip-flop.
This here's the Rubber Duck on the side. We gone. Bye Bye.)

This Youtube clip is from some dude who put pictures to the lyrics (an art form which probably has a name, but I don't know it); the song is low-quality, the images even lower, but it's worth a glimpse:

Madoff and Me Update

Mr. Nonymous, an unknown Brandeis student (I believe), commented on my original post about the Madoff Chair, said that the plaque had been stolen. This was a good rib-tickler, or so I thought. Turns out that she/he was telling the truth (as the picture attests): someone took the plaque down. Will Madoff's trechery not cease?!

The Doodle-Flu

My youngest son a stomach-flu two weeks ago, which spread quickly to my whole nuclear family. It started on Tuesday, the week before Purim, and my last day with it was Purim itself. The symptoms were all gastric (pretty similar to the ones of the food poisoning in Airplane!; I'll see if I can find a clip).

I call it the "doodle-flu" because I call my kids 'doodles' (yeah it's cutsie-poo; there's a long story behind it, but my kids are cute so it works for them).

We knew he wasn't feeling well because he had a lack of appetite even when we were in our favorite restaurant (as you can see in this pre-dated story): the Brandeis cafeteria. Then, near the end of the meal, my youngest let loose with a truly heroic Yorq.

We were mortified (this happened a few months ago to our oldest and we think that there's an unwritten 'three-yorqs-you're-out' clause somewhere). But they were very nice about it. We thought it could have been caused by any number of factors (kids don't need excuses to boot; for the first 12 months of their lives they boot frequently), but as the night progressed we saw that it was part of a constellation of symptoms that developed into the Doodle-Flu.

Now my youngest probably got it from some of his miscreant toddler friends at day-care, and when we called our doctor's office they told us that it was running rampant through Boston.

And that's what I was willing to believe, until this morning.

In preparation for telling the Campus newspapers about my Madoff chair, I went to the website of one of the two papers, The Hoot, where I saw this headline:

Kosher food not responsible for G.I. bug
by Ariel Wittenberg
March 13, 2009

The Health Center confirmed that there was no food poisoning in Sherman Dining Hall after 29 students came to the center complaining of vomiting and diarrhea.

The complaints came from students falling ill after eating at the dining hall, specifically, in the Kosher section; however, Nursing Director Kathleen Maloney said that these students were suffering from a norovirus, or “tummy bug,” and not food poisoning.

[snip]

... [Nursing Director] Maloney said that only three of the 29 students who went to the health center with the virus reported on their health records that they followed a Kosher diet, despite the fact that rumors had speculated that Kosher food was to blame.

Jenna Rubin ’11, who chairs the Student Union’s Dining Services Committee, said that she heard the rumors of food poisoning from multiple students who, after becoming sick, refused to eat food that came from the Kosher Dining hall.

“They wouldn’t eat kosher food, so they couldn’t eat any food on campus,” she said. “They were eating chips and fruit for two days because they were so afraid of it.” [more]

Circumstantial evidence falls to blaming my young son - who is too cute for serious punishment; I still feel guilty.

Pic of a doodling bug, a doodle-bug, from here.

Madoff and Me

Unwittingly, I have occupied the Bernard Madoff Chair at Brandeis University. My recent, favored, seat in the library is in the Farber Mezzanine computer cluster/study area. I've found that it's quiet, the computers are good, and I was given a gift of a free copy/printer card that only works at that cluster. On pure chance, the carrel I prefer to use is on the far wall, and I've been sitting at the carrel for the past few weeks without noticing that it was donated by "Mr. & Mrs. Bernard Madoff." It could be the Madoffs of Hoboken, Weehawken, or Sheboygen... but I think it's Inmate # 61727-054.

I told the library people and they'll probably tell the campus newspaper (if not, I will), so this will become news soon. But it's my scoop, heh.