Trying your patience more than ever before

Soooo, have you guys looked through your spam folder lately? It's a treasure chest. I was flipping through mine earlier this week and was so delighted by what I found, I would be remiss to keep such pure joy from you.

Here are a few of my favorites:

Sender: Russian Brides
Subject: HAVE YOU SEEN THE WOMEN IN RUSSIA?!?!?!?! Click here and meet HOT Russian Woman.

Rebuttal: Well. I don't know about you guys, but when I read Sarah Plain and Tall in fifth grade, I fell in love with the idea of becoming a mail-order bride. I'm quite sure that's the exact opposite of what the author intended, as the idea of someone, well, you know, sending for you like I send for LLBean outerwear, isn't exactly the height of feminine liberation. But hey, I was 10, and it seemed like a good idea. If I was delivered and my new hubby didn't take a shine to me, it would be too late. And, once he saw how handily I could build sod houses and control plains fires, he'd learn to love me.

Note: I had seven of these Russian Bride e-mails on the first page of my spam folder. How does Google know me so well?

Subject: Peter Larry
Subject: We don't care about your score; you'll be approved.

Rebuttal: How nice of you, sir, but if I may say...not such a good idea for your business. Please see The Housing Bubble and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good Very Bad Year.

Sender: Resveratrol
Subject: Can you live to 150?

Rebuttal: Oh God, I hope not.

Sender: Sell Your Gold
Subject: Ed McMahon got top dollar for his unwanted gold. Learn to make instant cash with Cash4Gold.

Rebuttal: A great example of an advertiser targeting exactly the right audience. Every day after interminable hours of college classes, when I sit down to eat whatever frozen dinner entree was on sale that week, nestled inside several layers of threadbare clothes to keep me warm in a house that's nearly too expensive to heat, I sigh and think to myself, "I just have too much gold."

So everyone, take a look through your spam folder. You never know, maybe you'll find a wife.

Editor's Note: This is the blog's 100th post!

Songs that make you wish your eyes were a different color

So I have this character quirk that causes me to make greater-than-average eye contact with people, and then form sweeping generalizations about their personalities based on the impression I get from staring deeply into their eyes. In case you haven't heard, they're called the windows to your soul! And if you try to deny these qualitative research methods, I will vehemently shoot you down and resume staring awkwardly at you. Some have told me I am a creep.

While it is against my constitution to suggest that people should change their eye color (colored contacts are a capital sin), I list here for you several song that romanticize the dreamy qualities of all of our different-colored irises. This comes after Connie brought to my attention the constant joy we derive from this song:

BROWN EYED GIRL, VAN MORRISON




Excerpt:
In the misty morning fog with our hearts a thumpin' and you,
My brown eyed girl.

And didn't Kelly Clarkson make us feel that hazel-eyed girls were just that much more entitled to MAD CRAZY post-Idol rage? The embedding is disabled on the official video, so here is a creepy-ass Sims version:





Excerpt:
Broken up, deep inside
But you won't get to see the tears I cry,
behind these hazel eyes

Did we all see Garden State? Here's Blue Eyes, by the Cary Brothers.



Excerpt:

Cause Blue Eyes
All the lights on and you are alive
But you can't point the way to your heart

Green Eyes, Coldplay



Excerpt:
Green eyes, you're the one that I wanted to find
And anyone who, tried to deny you must be out of their mind

Honorable Mention: Bob Dylan's Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands. I felt it would be wrong to feature this ditty, as "sad" is not a color, but this is one of my top-five Dylan favorites. So listen to it.

Putting the class back in classroom

Lately, I've noticed many people swearing during class. Call me old fashioned, but I think these whippersnappers need to leave their bad language behind. I might start bringing a swear jar to class and collecting fees.

Granted, a lot more discussion-based learning takes place in college than high school, and often that sort of learning works best when students are comfortable and willing to talk about what they really think. But in the past week, I've heard many students pepper their classroom contributions with some rather colorful syntax.

In my History of Disease: PLAGUE TO AIDS (yes it is as amazing as it sounds) class, we had a reading about a husband in the early 19th century who contracted VD from a prostitute, transmitted it to his wife, and then fled town before the symptoms showed up in the Mrs. A real class act. When our professor asked us what we thought about the reading, many said, "What a douche bag!"

Guys. No. You could say "scum bag" or "sleaze ball" or "meany." I think it's unprofessional and unnecessary to use that kind of language in a setting that is supposed to have some sort of decorum. Maybe they felt more liberated to speak that way because we were talking about sex and STDs. Maybe they're just rude. In my magazine class this week, one student ended a sentence with "and all that other shit," which my professor then repeated later to echo the student's earlier points. My mother always said people who resort to such obscenities are simply not intelligent enough to have better words at their disposal. Perhaps lessons like these, and the fact I was not allowed to use the word "butt" as a child made me more more sensitive to those who vituperate so freely.

What do you guys think about swearing in the classroom? Is it only me that this bothers? AM I BEING A NINNY!? You an tell me.

Linkfest: Soft News

I've been remiss in blogging this week. Schoolwork picked up and my computer was back to its old troublesome tricks. Here are some things I've read or written(!) to keep you occupied until I come up with an original idea:

This Newsweek article investigates organ trafficking around the world, and most shockingly, at top hospitals in the United States. The good news? Your kidney can fetch a pretty penny. The bad news? ORGAN TRAFFICKING IS TERRIFYING. If breaking the law isn't your style, you could also sell your inner business on Craigslist. (At this rate, if I sell a bunch of my eggs, a kidney, and half my liver, I could make a real dent in paying back Sallie Mae.)

Can you tell that I like health reporting? Campus magazine What the Health allows me the honor of posting about health policy on their blog. This week, I ran off at the mouth about all of the recent food recalls and how the FDA and USDA totes don't care!

Earlier this week, I talked to Chris Myers Asch, co-founder of the U.S. Public Service Academy, for a story for my magazine class. In case you're unfamiliar, he has put forth a propsal to Congress for a four-year civil service academy, which will train students for government work. Tution is free, but graduates will be required to fulfill a five-year committment in the government sector. I think it's a great idea, and will undoubtedly bring more prestige, intellect, and energy to the public sphere. I've been following the Academy for a while, and it's gotten a lot of media attention recently. Keep your eyes peeled.

I have a love-hate relationship with Twitter. Mostly I love it, but there was a time when I was less than convinced about the wonders of the 140-character-or-less networking site. But whenever I stumble upon an awesome Twitter profile, like that of a fake Dr. Tobias Funke of Arrested Development, I fall in love all over again.

Speaking of loving people I don't know, my girl over at Dooce is preggo again. Just another good reason for you to start reading her too. (Hi, Meaghen.)

Paul recently reminded me of the wonderful oral history project, StoryCorps, through which people interview family and friends and ask them to tell a story about their lives. Thousands of stories that would otherwise be lost will be recorded for everyone to hear and stored in the Library of Congress. I heard one on the radio over the winter, in which a popular NPR reporter interviewed his mother. Her story was simple and sweet, but by the end of it, I was weeping behind the wheel of the minivan. Call me a softy, but I hope you find one that touches you too.

In honor of Valentine's Day, the International Herald Tribune is encouraging commenters to write "limericks of love" to their favorite public figures. They write, "Now's your chance to submit a cheering rhyme to a lonely public figure. It can be a sonnet, a love letter, or an ode to Alistair's eyebrows." Y'all know how much I love haikus and penning the occasional epic rhyme. I think it's great fun when papers do things like this.

And hey you, tell me what you've been reading.

Book Review: On Writing Well

It's impossible to teach someone how to be a good writer. You can explain split infinitives, dangling modifiers, and talk about the importance of a good opening until you're blue in the face, but you'll never be able to tell them exactly how to write something great. As a journalism major, I am frustrated by the intangibility of a "craft" that is so subjective and abstract. If this is something that takes a lifetime to get good at, how can it be a college major?

But I love to write, and though I've mostly abandoned the idea of doing it professionally, I'll always have that creative itch to share what I see, hear, and think. My love of writing extends to reading about writing, and for anyone who's with me, I'd like to point you toward William Zinsser's On Writing Well.

This is the most cleanly written, accessible guide to writing available. If only Newhouse professors could teach like Zinsser. He covers all of bad writing's most egregious faults: clutter, poor usage, lack of unity, you name it. The best part is he tells you exactly how to fix them. He makes the case for clean, simple prose and shows the difficulty in reading verbose, flabby writing. Every time I read this book, it makes me want to go through everything I've ever written to prune and re-arrange it. Maybe that's just me.

Any writer, whether professional or recreational, will love Zinsser's dedication to the principles and methods of writing. But my favorite chapter is titled "Enjoyment, Fear, and Confidence." One enduring memory of my j-school classes will be when a magazine professor told us that every writer doubts herself, and that at one point or another, is convinced everything she has ever written is crap. That came as a relief to me. Zinsser echoes my professor's sentiment, and offers advice about sticking it out in order to get good. He emphasizes the importance of writing about what really interests you, and staying curious. A favorite quote: "Living is the trick. Writers who write interestingly tend to be men and women who keep themselves interested. That's almost the whole point of becoming a writer." This also sounds to me like an excuse for freelancers to step away from their computer and go to the beach. Living is the trick.

So, to all my dear friends who are sallying forth into the journalism world, read this book if you haven't already. I am slightly ashamed to say this is one of my favorite things to read before bed, because it eases me into a tranquil state of contentment. As impossible as it is to teach writing, Zinsser comes as close to perfect as humanly possible. I'd offer to let you borrow my copy, but I love it too much.

Songs that make your heart sing: Big Band edition

This song is my default ring tone. "Sing, Sing, Sing" by Benny Goodman. Also known as "The Chips Ahoy Song."

Antiquated jobs I wish I could have

The abysmal state of the economy, combined with my crippling lack of professional self-efficacy has led me to consider some alternative career options. Unfortunately, we are no long living in the 1800s, and many of these desirable occupations are no longer available. Nevertheless, here's a short list. Let me know what you think I'd be best at, and whether modern alternatives exist.

1) Apothecary- I frequently wax poetic about my desires to perform complex medical procedures. For some reason I thought it would be more worth my time to spend four years getting two almost worthless degrees instead of going to nursing school or something similar. So here I am, 21 years old, clutching my reporter's notebook in one hand, and an Excel spreadsheet in the other, but all I want to do is see how quickly I could perform a rudimentary appendectomy. My interest extends into all areas of medicine, and back in the days of yore, local apothecaries did everything from mixing and prescribing medications, to delivering babies and doing surgery. Heaven, is that you calling?

2. Town crier- I don't consider myself a particularly gossipy gal, but imagine how wonderful it would be to stand in the town square, dispensing the day's news and tidbits. I could perform in haiku, or take up the banjo and sing, or perhaps attempt delivering some stories in interpretive dance. In these days where no news exists anymore, and we know everything on the front page before the paper even goes to press, wouldn't it be nice to get your news the old fashioned way? That is, from a vaguely homeless looking girl with a penchant for puns and a knowing gleam in her eye?

3. Telegraph Operator - Another way for me to be all up in people's business, but also under the guise of a legitimate profession. Also, after I transmitted a message, I could save the handwritten copy for my own personal collection. Remember that time I wrote about how much I loved to read other people's mail? This is exactly like that.

Is it fate or the gingersnap?

I, like everyone, have my quirks. One of these involves a family tradition passed down from my maternal Scottish ancestors. Perhaps you've heard of making wishes on lost eyes lashes, or birthday candles. My family? We make wishes on gingersnaps.

It's okay if you need to read that twice. Go ahead, I'll wait.

Let me explain how this works. You select a cookie, hold it in the palm of one hand, and use your elbow to break it, making a wish while you do so. If the gingersnap breaks into three pieces, your wish is granted! Don't do this with Oreos, or Girl Scout cookies, or anything else. Only gingersnaps provide the robust texture that make cracking it into three pieces such a satisfying challenge.

I have been known to eat entire boxes of gingersnaps in a day waiting for my cookie to crumble just right. My mother taught this tradition to me, and I've taught it to my friends here at school. My explanations are often met with alarm, but also curiosity, as everyone puts their fate in the hands of Nabisco. It is strangely exhilarating.

This is really my only superstition. Every time I eat gingersnaps, I have to make at least once wish, and more than once, I have credited a certain happy event to a three-part fortuitous fragmentation. My grandmother broke an elbow making wishes on ginger snaps. We don't mess around.

Please tell me some of your awkward family traditions in the comments to make me feel better about my own.

What do carbon monoxide, sandra bullock and halibut have in common?

I picked a bad time to launch another 20 posts in 30 days initiative. Schoolwork picked up, my computer lost its mind, and I took ill with a particularly draining head cold. But I’m here now. I hope you all appreciate the blood, sweat and tears I put into this frivolous exercise I call blogging. Nevertheless, I’m pessimistic about meeting my goal, but I hope you’ll still support me in my effort.

As promised, here’s my TOP FIVE LIST OF (MOSTLY IRRATIONAL) FEARS.

5. Sustaining injury to my right eye. I am legally blind in my left eye. If someone shoots an arrow and it lands in my good eye, or I contract some sort of David Patterson-esque infection that ruins my optic nerve, I’m screwed. I can see somewhat out of my left eye, but I couldn’t read, drive, or do most things I take for granted now. It’s possible my vision would strengthen if my left eye was all I had, but it gets increasingly unlikely as I get older. Would anyone be my Anne Sullivan?

4. Gas leaks. As a child, I watched absurd amounts of Rescue 911. Stories of old people dying from gas leaks in their motor homes were featured frequently, and I became preoccupied with buying a carbon monoxide detector for our house. I tried to drop casual hints to my mother, but she felt a lot less threatened by the silent, odorless gas than I did. Consequently, every night before bed, I would open my window and hungrily gasp in as much fresh air as I could. I figured if I started the night with clean air in my lungs, I would be more likely to survive an overnight leak. Sometimes, when I was very afraid, I even slept with the windows open in the dead of winter. This fear is a lot less intense now, but the radiator in my First Aid class hisses maniacally, and I can’t help feeling like we’re about to blow up, or maybe someone will come up to our remote fourth-floor classroom and discover 15 dead bodies.

3. Driving a bus. Whenever I tell people about this fear, they always say, “Oh, so you’ve seen Speed?” No, I haven’t seen Speed and now I know I never should because it could be years before I get another goodnight’s sleep. In order to drive a bus and do it well, you must drive so close to objects that it seems like you’re going to hit them, and you must have an incredible sense of the size of the vehicle you’re controlling. I consider myself a good driver, but I know the bus is entirely beyond my capabilities. It’s unlikely this scenario will ever present itself, but if it does, I hope all of the other cars are off the road that day. What if I am driving a bus with a gas leak? That would be the worst day ever.

2. Having an intersexed child. I have seen many a documentary when a child was born with ambiguous genitalia, or due to a medical error, had his genitals damaged. It was a common procedure to “turn” the child into one sex or another by surgically altering whatever was there into girl or boy parts. This method was met with disastrous results when children grew up feeling that they were born in the wrong body, and identified with the opposite gender. The psychological and physical torture that results is incomprehensible, and I am terrified that I could be faced with the decision to determine a child’s gender. As many as 4 in 1,000 children are born with issues like these. Luckily, medical knowledge and technology have improved a lot since cases like Dr. Money’s infamous experiment, but the fact remains that you can’t raise a genderless child, and difficult choices get made. Just another reason to adopt!

1. Fish. This is probably the most illogical of my fears, and that is saying something when you look at this list. Strangely, sharks, sting rays, and other legitimately threatening aquatic creatures do not bother me in the least. Instead, it is guppies, trout, and those hellish demons that look like oceanic dinosaurs that make my skin crawl. I hate fish. They are barely even animals. You can ask my brother Michael B., and he will tell you that I ruined his first ever catching time a fish because I had an anxiety attack the second he reeled it in. We were fishing in Maine when he snagged a little sunfish, brought it into the canoe to admire it, and it flopped off the hook and directly under my feet. My screams echoed through the cove while he paddled furiously back to our dock. Pictures of the event show my terrified face, ankles raised high in the air, paralyzed by the idea that the fish would somehow jump onto my face. So no, I do not like fish. And don’t get me started on restaurants that think it’s charming and serene to put a 50-gallon fish tank next to my table. I’d rather find a spider in my food.

Losing faith in humanity, finding it , then losing it again

I'll be the first person to rail against the newslessness of cable news. CNN even managed to dampen my inauguration enthusiasm with their CONSTANT!!!! REMINDERS!!!!! THAT THIS!!!!!! IS THE BIGGEST DEAL EVER!!!!!!!!!! for weeks before Obama's big day. But I must admit that every time I turn on a 24-hour cable news station, I come across a story I wouldn't have read in the papers or online. Yesterday's items:

First, some soulless bottomfeeder named James Salcedo thought it would be a good business venture to make a Caylee Anthony Doll, fashioned in memory the murdered two-year-old whose remains were found in December. He probably thought he could get away with it because he planned to donate $3 of the $29.95 pricetag to charity. Apparently the doll was designed intentionally to look nothing like Caylee, and Salcedo said he hoped it would raise awareness. Awareness for what, exactly? I think we can all agree this is one of the worst, most insensitive ideas ever. Thank you for letting me know about it, MSNBC.

Then, I turned to my attention to the next television on the Headline News Channel, and saw this story about a group of firefighters in Massachusetts who saved a struggling deer from icy waters. I was only watching the screen and reading the headlines because my headphones were not tuned to that channel. I thought it was a happy story, but my fact-checking has indicted otherwise. Read to the bottom of the article, and you'll find out they shot the deer because she had a broken leg. There is no where for rehabbing deer to go? Fun fact: Audrey Hepburn had a pet deer!

Needless to say, I experienced quite the roller coaster of emotions during a few short moments on the elliptical machine. I can provide no moral for this anecdote, except to tell you all to be on the lookout for all the WTF moments you experience in your daily consumption of TV news, and please tell me about them, so I can yell about how watching people yell at each other is never informative.

I'd also like to announce the kick-off of a new 20 posts in 30 days blogging blitz. I hope you'll join me in another round of regular posts, filled with all sorts of information you never knew you wanted to read until I wrote it, and even then, you weren't really so sure. Check back soon for my Top 5 Biggest Fears. They will surprise you.