many things make a post
March 10, 2009
* From the "I don't think that means what you think it means" dept: Christian salt.
* John Hodgman's piece on Cuervo man is unexpectedly moving.
* This WaPo piece on parents who accidentally kill their kids by leaving them in hot cars** will rip your heart clean out of your body but is one that you should read anyway. And to quote Patrick Nielsen Hayden, brace yourself first. The ending is a kicker.
* "Sita Sings the Blues" has been linked all over the place but the Hub and I watched it over the weekend on the stupidly large new TV and were completely won over by it. I have some quibbles about the pace. Still, the visuals are gorgeous.
* Love Katha Pollitt. And Hawthorne can suck it.
* This guy's finacee is a keeper.
* An even-handed look at what college kids read. I'm trying to remember what the hot books on campus were in '93, which is when I graduated. I'm drawing a blank. Anyone?
* Further proof that DST is evil.
* Why kids need bedtimes. That may be the one thing the Hub and I have gotten right -- but are motives are primarily selfish because that hour or two between their turning in and ours is delicious.
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** If you think this can't happen to you, you are delusional or don't have kids. End of discussion.
Dear God, the WaPo piece. I'd like to say I can't imagine, but truthfully, I can imagine. At least well enough.
So grateful that mine has reached an age where she can unbuckle her own carseat, and is virtually never asleep in the car. Still.
Posted by: Shelley | March 10, 2009 at 12:22 PM
I remember reading all the Anne Rice books - both the witch series and the vampire series and then the intertwining of the two when I was in college ('93 grad). Still vampires and beasties, but not what I'd call chaste!
Posted by: susan | March 10, 2009 at 12:27 PM
That WaPo piece will break your heart -- however it is one of the best reported pieces I've read in quite some time.
Maybe college kids just love vampires?
Posted by: Adrienne | March 10, 2009 at 01:19 PM
I don't think we had any hot books. Folks would go through individual phases (the "beat phase" was a popular choice), but I don't recall any new work that burned its way through the student body.
And unlike either commentator mentioned in the article, I think this has nothing to do with politics, either left or right. It's because since the 60s, the idea of the value of the ideas, let alone the idea of intellectual progress inherent in the idea of the 'hot book on campus,' has vanished from our culture.
Which I don't think is a bad thing. But then, I'm a nihilist and, despite knowing better, an intellectual.
-D*
Posted by: Dave* | March 10, 2009 at 03:02 PM
I remember Anne as well as Stephen King being the books to read in college. I think the big. new. book. was Donna Tartt's Secret History, which I still adore and read occassionally.
Best selling fiction books 1993
http://www.listafterlist.com/tabid/57/listid/4219/Books/Fiction+Bestsellers+1993.aspx
Non fiction 1993
http://www.listafterlist.com/tabid/57/listid/4221/Books/Nonfiction+Bestsellers+1993.aspx
Article about how long a best seller has dropped dramtically in how long it stays that way.
http://www.lulu.com/static/pr/05_19_06.php
Posted by: anj | March 10, 2009 at 03:08 PM
The WaPo article was well researched and written. I'm ashamed to admit I judged a local man who left his young son in a locked car. I'm older and more compassionate now, and, yes, this can happen to anyone. I think the more publicity this issue gets, the better. This article is just heart breaking.
Posted by: Debra | March 10, 2009 at 04:37 PM
My husband and I forgot our 6 month old in a car one evening. It was the night before he was headed in for very major surgery; I had put a large dent in our car earlier in the day; I was tired and completely sleep-deprived; and we had stopped at the cheap hair cuts place and were wrangling a cranky 3yo inside. Five minutes later I realized she wasn't with us--and she was fine--but there but for the grace of ? goes I. I have only compassion for those poor people whose children have died.
Posted by: Katy | March 10, 2009 at 07:57 PM
I opened the car piece but I can't read it. I live in fear of something like that and/or running over my child since my mom lives next door and keeps her while I work (in my nightmare my daughter runs out of the house and I don't see her).
Posted by: mamatried | March 10, 2009 at 09:58 PM
Debra - I did the same when there was a case of a local restaurant owner forgetting (and killing) his baby in a locked car. But I'm older now, too, and hope I'm more compassionate.
This is not anywhere near the same scale but I was driving from Syracuse to here a couple of months back and completely forgot that Maddy was in the car until she said something, which scared the bejeezus out of me -- both being broken out of my Interstate reverie and because I forgot about her.
MamaT -- that's one of my big fears, too. The other, oddly, is drowning, especially in a muddy body of water where you can't see the bottom. Gives me shivers just thinking about it.
Posted by: Adrienne | March 11, 2009 at 09:16 AM
The stupidity of people (kosher salt) will never cease to amaze me. You'd think I'd have been convinced how ignorant ppl can be, but apparently I will forever hold out hope.
Posted by: Anna | March 11, 2009 at 09:47 AM
A nihilist? Well, fuck me. I mean, say what you want about the tents of National Socialism, at least it's a ethos.
I believe that you have a child named after an author whose book was huge in '92-93. In the Lit Crit world, Terry Eagleton was all the rage.
Posted by: matthew | March 11, 2009 at 01:03 PM
I remember writing up a piece about the NASA engineers' child safety tech and talking with one of the inventors. It was incredibly simple and seemed like it would be incredibly effective. (http://archives.sensorsmag.com/articles/0702/12/main.shtml if you're interested in a quickie description of how it works.)
It continues to just madden me that things like this that could definitely help don't get picked up because of litigious wankery. ::gnash::
Posted by: Melanie | March 11, 2009 at 04:47 PM
Yeah, that article was astonishing. By the end of it I was in tears and thinking about every time I have driven the wrong way when i meant to do something else and shivering. And I don't even have kids.
Plus I keep thinking - this is what newspapers CAN do.
Posted by: Juno | March 13, 2009 at 05:03 PM
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Posted by: Yaehoo | April 30, 2009 at 06:42 PM