Long Shrift

me and 16,000 other dorks

A few weeks ago, I read about the Distributed Proofreaders Web site. Their goal is to convert works in the public domain into e-books, making them more accessible. Volunteers compare page scans to OCR text, looking for errors. Each work goes through at least two proofing stages, and then more revisions for formatting issues. This may sound slow - it is - but the DP project has converted almost 12,000 books.

I finally tried this out a few days ago, picking projects at random. The textbook on Norse mythology was mildly interesting to read, and required very little editing. The history of early English kings was a little trickier, as the OCR text was gagging on extended ASCII characters like Æ.

Today, I went back to the DP site, picked a project and started in. Boring transcript of testimony of police officers, and whether or not they had looked in both directions while driving out of a parking structure. It got less boring when I read this page:

Mr. Patterson, my name is Leon Hubert. I am a member of the advisory staff of the general counsel of the President's Commission. ... I state to you now that the general nature of the Commission's inquiry is to ascertain, evaluate, and report upon the facts relating to the assassination of President Kennedy and the subsequent violent death of Lee Harvey Oswald.

In particular as to you, Mr. Patterson, the nature of the inquiry today is to determine what facts you know about the death of Oswald, and any other pertinent facts you may know about the general inquiry, including what you know about what Jack Ruby might have had to do with it.

I proofed about 20 pages more, hoping I'd come across something really exciting, but the closest I got was a patrolman in the jail who happened to be nearby when Ruby shot Oswald. If you'd like to see the sections yourself, you can see all the transcripts of the Warren Commission hearings; the stuff I was proofing is in volume XII, which I figure is about 11 volumes after the really interesting stuff. (And here's some background on the Warren Commission.)

So far, something like 16,000 volunteers have taken part in the project. If you're like me, and you happen to need an outlet for your anal-retentiveness and a way to procrastinate from doing your own stuff, it's an ideal destination.

Tase him, bro

We all know the story of Andrew Meyer, the college student who got tasered at a John Kerry lecture. We saw the buzz develop, we may even have sat through the video. (Or one of the remixes.) We made fun of it. Maybe even bought the t-shirt.

It's widely accepted that Meyer was trying to draw a lot of attention to himself, and make sure the incident was caught on camera. He must have realized that starting out his questions with "You will take my question because I have been listening to your crap for two hours" probably didn't set the stage for a convivial discussion.

The Florida incident added to the ongoing discussion of Tasers and their use - or overuse. While the Taser may be a (usually) non-lethal alternative to deadly force, many law enforcement agencies don't have straightforward guidelines on when they should be used. This may contribute to the use of Tasers to intimidate people or inflict pain, and even confusion over when they should be used at all. And Tasers have been known to kill people, to the point where Amnesty International has recommended that use of Tasers be strictly limited.

And there's more. Taser International is developing a projectile that can be fired from a shotgun, so tasing somebody doesn't have to be so personal. They're also developing the 'Shockwave,' essentially a modular Taser version of a Claymore mine. (I had to chuckle nervously at the 'keep out of here' notation on that diagram.) And the Taser is now available in a stylish pink. It's enough to make you want to take some steps to protect yourself.

All that being said... I'm not all that angry that Meyer got tasered. I realize that the security people may have used excessive force in restraining him, and it may not have been necessary to drive stun him at all. And there's a small chance, whenever a Taser is used, that the recipient could suffer lasting harm or even death. But Meyer, in addition to being a publicity-seeking jackass, created a pop-culture reference that will endure forever. The incident will become fodder for trivia games, stand-up routines and VH1 retrospectives. Maybe this sounds overly harsh, but I'd go back in time and tase Clara Peller if I could.

return to the underground

A while back, I did a post on a cinema/bar/lounge that was discovered in a Paris catacomb. Turns out that was the work of the Untergunther. A recent article in the Guardian touches on some more recent hijinks, in which members of the group snuck in and repaired a clock in the Pantheon, a Parisian monument:

Four members of an underground "cultural guerrilla" movement known as the Untergunther, whose purpose is to restore France's cultural heritage, were cleared on Friday of breaking into the 18th-century monument in a plot worthy of Dan Brown or Umberto Eco.

I originally heard about the Pantheon escapade from Metafilter, which can usually be counted on for clever commentary. This guy blows away all of my snide jokes on The Da Vinci Code:

Their plot was wooden, simpleminded to the point of absurdity and showed only the most dilettantish efforts to understand the complexities of the subject matter at hand and yet still sold eight bajillion copies to a willing public that prefers even their light summer genre reading to be a comforting pap of raw donut batter?

actually

Our son is almost three, and he's talking up a storm. He often mimics his parents, speaking with our inflections and cadence. Having someone else pick up on your mannerisms can be a little unsettling, too: Quinn will say something, and his mom and I will point to one another and say "He got that from you."

For example, I often start sentences with "Actually...." followed by a long pause. I think I picked this up from my father: English wasn't his first language, so I think part of his occasionally halting speech is a byproduct of his search for the right word. Growing up, I always thought that made him seem exotic and intelligent. This awe was slightly tarnished one day at Boy Scout camp, when one of the other adult leaders took me aside and asked if my dad was mildly retarded, or had suffered a head injury at some point.

In any case, my friends have pointed out my overuse of "actually" on several occasions. None more pointedly than a friend of a friend of a friend (OK, I suppose we didn't know him from Adam) who came to visit from Italy a few years back. I'm not much of a Milwaukee ambassador (we took him bowling and, er, not much else), but it didn't matter: Marcelo seemed fascinated by things that seemed trivial to me, like squirrels. (I've heard since that squirrels are rare in Italian cities, so seeing one of these rats with bushy tails in an urban park is bizarre for your average Italian.)

Anyway, at one point, Marcelo turned to me and said, "You say 'actually' often - what does this word mean?"

I had no idea.

I may have a new excuse to use it, now that I received a copy of The Book of General Ignorance. As in, "Actually, it's dirt, not carbon dioxide, that makes champagne fizz." Or, "Actually, lemmings don't commit mass suicide."

So far, the book is an entertaining read, but it still pales in comparison to the custom iPod sock my wife made for me. I made much mockery of iPod socks when I first heard of them a few months ago, and my wife shook her head and smiled faintly as I recounted how incredulous I was to see Apple was charging $30 for a half-dozen of the things. The fact that she actually made one for me (light gray, with a skull-and-crossbones patch) demonstrates that she took time out of her hectic life to make a gift for me... and perhaps more importantly, that she patiently listens to my rants. If that's not love, I don't know what is.

the holidays are tiring

"I don't know why I'm so tired," I said to my wife, as I stifled a yawn.

She shot me a sidelong glance. "Maybe it's because you had a beer at 11 this morning, then spent three hours Christmas shopping."

forbidden pleasures

I was folding laundry, my wife was wrapping Xmas presents. The commercial for Estee Lauder's "Pleasures" - featuring Gwyneth Paltrow, laying pensively in a field of wildflowers with a breathy voiceover - came on for the nth time.

"Yeah, must be a pleasure not to have to get a real job," I said to the TV. I was immediately taken aback by my own sentiment. I turned to my wife. "Is it wrong not to be sympathetic? I mean, she's got a great career, she's got a ton of money, she's married to that guy from Coldplay."

My wife shrugged. "The other day, when that commercial came on, I told Gwyneth to suck it."

three days after Xmas

"Where's that new toy we bought for you? What do you mean, you left it outside?"

and this will really screw up his Amazon recommendations, too

Every year, my in-laws ask me to provide an Xmas wish list, and I usually have a number of books on my list. My conservative father-in-law does most of the shopping, and in recent years, I've tried to provide him with some entertainment by requesting some unusual titles (he still laughs about Douglas Coupland's All Families Are Psychotic). I don't go too far - these are my in-laws, after all - but if I wanted to freak him out a bit, I might ask for some of these...

• God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything
• Lizzie Borden in Love: Poems in Women's Voices
• Perfectly Legal: The Covert Campaign to Rig Our Tax System to Benefit the Super Rich - and Cheat Everybody Else
• Armed Madhouse: From Baghdad to New Orleans - Sordid Secrets and Strange Tales of a White House Gone Wild
• Sex, Gender, and Christian Ethics
• How to Be a Great Lover: Girlfriend-to-Girlfriend Totally Explicit Techniques That Will Blow His Mind
• The Easy Way to Stop Drinking
• Healing with Crystals & Chakra Energies
• I Am a Strange Loop
• The Koran
• Medieval Combat: A Fifteenth-Century Manual of Swordfighting and Close-Quarter Combat
• Learning to Love Yourself
• The Ultimate World Wrestling Entertainment Trivia Book

And, of course...

• Coping with Your Difficult Older Parent: A Guide For Stressed-Out Children

beware Dr. Seuss

I don't just generally dismiss a movie or book just because someone 'says' it's meant to be something else...but this is worth knowing if you plan to read it (or plan to take your kids).

I just wanted to inform you what I just learned about a book which is entitled HOP ON POP. It stars Mr. Brown and it is directed toward children. What is disturbing to me is that this is the first of a trilogy of books for children called DOCTOR SEUSS CLASSICS written by Theodor Geisel of Massachusetts.

He's an atheist and his objective is to bash Christianity and promote atheism. I heard that he has made remarks that he wants to kill God in the minds of children, and that's what his books are all about. He despises C.S. Lewis and Narnia, etc. An article written about him said "this is the most dangerous author on the East Coast" and that Geisel would be the writer "the atheists would be praying for, if atheists prayed." Geisel said he doesn't think it is possible that there is a God and he has great difficulty understanding the words "spiritual" and "spirituality." What I thought was important to communicate is what part of the agenda is for making this book. This book is a watered down version of the first book, which is the least offensive of the three books. The second book of the trilogy is THE CAT IN THE HAT and the third book is YERTLE THE TURTLE AND OTHER STORIES. Each book gets worse and worse regarding Geisel's hatred of God. In the trilogy, a young pup becomes enmeshed in an epic struggle against a nefarious furry thing known as the Sam-I-Am. Another character, Pat, describes Christianity as "a very powerful and convincing mistake, and not something I should sit on." As I understand it, in the last book, a turtle and a Zizzer-Zazzer-Zuzz are depicted representing Adam and Eve and they kill God, who at times is called YAHWEH (which is definitely not Allah). Since the book would seem mild if you read it, that's been done on purpose.

They are hoping that unsuspecting parents will sit with their children and Read the book, that they will enjoy the book and then the children will want the books for Christmas. That's the hook. Geisel says he wants the children to read the books and decide against God and the kingdom of heaven.

If you decide that you do not want to support something like this, I suggest that you boycott the book and reading in general. I googled a synopsis of HOP ON POP. As I skimmed it, I couldn't believe that in a children's book part of the story is about three fish in a tree and playing ball on a wall.

I got this on the Internets - pass it on to everyone you know.

home deposition

My son and I went to Home Depot for the purpose of buying a chalk line. My hope was to simply get in and get out, without getting distracted along the way. We had only been in the store for a few minutes when Quinn told me he needed to go potty.

So the clock was ticking. I wondered if I could find, choose and pay for the chalk line and make it out of there. I wondered if the car seat was machine-washable. I glanced around for the aisle where I'd find the chalk line, and then I saw the sign for the restrooms. I hesitated, wondering what the bathrooms might be like in a place like this. Well, at worst, I suppose I could hold him over the seat and hope for the best.

Quinn assured me he could make it the 300 yards to the other end of the store, and off we went. He paused several times to ask me what things were. Normally, I'd be proud to share my knowledge of home improvement with my son (so long as there wasn't anyone around to contradict me), but not today.

The bathroom was surprisingly clean. I'm not sure what I expected it to be otherwise; a neighborhood hardware store probably would have had sawdust on the floor, old Snap-On calendars on the wall, and inexplicable grease marks everywhere. The Home Depot bathroom was glaringly white - and on a Saturday morning during the Christmas shopping season, no less. It was also, thankfully, empty. Perhaps other people had the same assumption of cleanliness that I did. (Perhaps I shouldn't tell them otherwise. Damn.) I hustled Quinn into a stall, and got him on the seat.

And waited. Perhaps it was the excitement of something new, but Quinn wasn't doing anything. Normally Quinn takes to the potty with admirable vigor, but today was his turn to be distracted at the Depot. The fact that there was virtually nothing to see was not an issue. After identifying the toilet paper dispenser for the seventeenth time, he fell silent... but not for long.

Someone sat down in the next stall. He sat down laboriously, unbuckled what was either an elaborate belt or a system of pulleys, sighed deeply, and farted. Quinn pointed to the man's shoe, and asked "What is that?"

I tried to get him to focus on the task at hand, to no avail. He asked again, and again. I didn't answer. This is stupid, I thought to myself. This guy obviously knows I'm in here with a toddler, it's not a big deal if my kid sees his shoe. Quinn kept asking. I was embarrassed, and for all I knew, I was witnessing Larry Craig's unusually wide stance.

Finally, we jointly decided that Quinn did not need to go potty at all. I held him up while he washed his hands in the sink, and coaxed him into using the paper towel dispenser. I found the chalk line. We paid for it at the self-service checkout, and Quinn climbed up and stole the change out of the dispenser while I was getting the receipt.