Category Archives: Americana

A pet peeve: F**K

Americana, Current Affairs

A couple of weeks ago, linguist Geoff Nunberg talked about pet peeves on Fresh Air. He was advocating that a pet peeve is only a pet peeve if it is particular to the peeved. It is not a pet peeve if everybody, or most people – at least – have it. For example not liking people who poison dogs is not a pet peeve.

The other day, I ran across one of my biggest pet peeves. A quote in Time magazine in which in the quote they had f**k. WTF? Why? I think they should either say fuck or @#%&. If they consider themselves a magazine that children, too young to read the word fuck, read; then they should not put it in, they should either put in @#%& or put in an innocuous word like gosh. But everybody but those small children know that f**k means fuck, so who are they kidding – why not just put in fuck.

The New Yorker puts in fuck when it is in a quote and, even occasionally, when it is deemed appropriate by the author. They seem to feel they are dealing with a mature reader. (As an aside, one of my favorite bits in the New Yorker was Anthony Lane’s  in which he says: Also, while we’re here, what’s with (Yoda’s) screwy syntax? Deepest mind in the galaxy, apparently, and you still express yourself like a day-tripper with a dog-eared phrase book. “I hope right you are.” Break me a fucking give.end aside.)

But Time magazine, among others, just want to be cute and, I guess, not offend anybody but adults.

 

The cows are back

Americana, San Mateo County

Behind Stanford in the area known as The Dish, every winter, somebody brings in cows to graze. I have read in the local paper that the last people to graze their cows said It is impossible to make money
grazing. and quit – or, atleast threatened to quit. But, the cows are back. Usually, there are only trees, parallel cow trails along the steep hills and impossibly green grass. 

Cows are back

Cows are back-2

 But once again, there are seemingly very happy cows.

Cows are back-3

Gays in the military 2: Obama as a Jedi master

Americana

Now, General Ray Odierno, the commanding general of the U.S. forces in Iraq, says that he is OK with gays serving in the military. (Seeing here giving Stephen Colbert a haircut.)

Odierno 

It is like the Chinese water torture (enhanced interrogation?) – only in reverse – every week some new commander comes out saying that they are OK with gays serving in the military.

The Mysteries of the Web….Immigration Edition

Americana

A couple of days ago, I put up a post on Immigration and Citizenship. I know I did because it showed up on my Facebook page; but, now, it is gone. I have no idea how it happened, or, even, what exactly happened. The post just disappeared. Maybe it is hiding somewhere in cyberspace, maybe it it just gone. But I do know it once existed because the shadow is still there on Facebook.

Anyway, now that it is gone, I can safely saw that it was a great post. Accompanied by one of my favorite pictures.  

Marianna- citizen-7485-2

One of the themes that seems to be emerging in this blog is that the greatness of the United States of America (hereafter known as America) is our openness to immigration and our acceptance and assimilation of immigrants. Not just in the past, but today. 

About a month ago, there was an article in the Economist that started:  A Ponzi scheme that works.…The greatest strength of America is that people want to live there. The article went on to talk about how quickly foreigners become Americans.

Yesterday, I saw an article in the Atlantic entitled How America Can Rise Again and, sort of in passing, it said The day before the dinner, three U.S. citizens
had been named the winners of the Nobel Prize for physiology or
medicine. The day after, three more would be named winners of the Nobel
Prize for physics. All the more impressive for America’s attractive
power, four of the six winners had been born outside the country—in
China, Canada, Australia, England—and had taken U.S. citizenship.

Yesterday, on the way to a class, Michele and I stopped for dinner. The choice was between Mexican, Vietnamese, or Chinese because they were the most convenient  restaurants on the way. Since Michele had had Chinese for lunch and we had last gone to the Mexican place, we went to the Vietnamese restaurant. Not Nobel caliber, but very tasty. (Although I did not care for the "very American" Thomas Kincaid pictures on the walls.)

Long live the new America.