Worth reading

An exploration of the press's responsibility in the face of hypocrisy, by Roy Peter Clark of the Poynter Institute.


Good discussion going on in the comments, too. Worth checking out.

Rushing to judgment

Some things are just right, or wrong. Some things, it's not quite so clear-cut.

Take, for instance, criminals. You've heard of them. They're bad people. They do bad things and they go to jail. They break the laws of our land, and they get their just punishments, and they deserve our contempt.

But: Let's say you know the person behind the rap sheet. Does that make things any different?

Let's first walk through a completely hypothetical situation.

Nasty car accident. Other person dies. Sad all the way around, isn't it? We're not talking about an out-of-the-ordinary car accident; just your basic collision, but at just the exact miles-per-hour or angle that caused one of the drivers to die. We feel terribly sorry for the surviving driver; imagine bearing that guilt? In some ways, he or she is a victim too.

OK. Now let's look at the surviving driver's driving record:

4/85: Failure to yield, non-injury accident
4/87: Speeding
4/87: Speeding
6/87: Speeding
10/88: Failure to yield, non-injury accident
6/90: Speeding
10/93: Speeding
9/96: Failure to yield, no accident
6/97: Speeding
4/00: Speeding
10/01: Lane usage violation
11/05: Failure to change lanes when officer is on side of road
6/06: Speeding, construction zone.

Suddenly, that's no accident. That's vehicular homicide. This driver was clearly a menace and probably should never have been on the road. Sumbitch should be locked up and never allowed behind the wheel again. Perspective changes a bit, yes?

Well, now, let's change the perspective again: That's my driving record.

Those who know me know that I'm not a dangerous driver, other than that I've had a lifelong tendency to view speed limits as guidelines. But those who don't know me would not give me the benefit of that doubt. They'd want me locked up.

You, who know me, would argue vigorously against locking me up. After all, it was an accident, and excessive speed wasn't even involved. But somebody reading about my hypothetical wreck in the paper -- or in a manila folder on a bench wearing a funny robe -- would hypothetically recommend I spend some time in a hypothetical prison.

Now let's walk through a real situation.

In a really cryptic post below, I refer to a "good person who's done a bad thing." The good person is a former co-worker of mine. He was the person assigned to make me feel at home when we first moved to the Edge of America 11 years ago. He did the same job as I did at the paper, and did it pretty well. He was extremely helpful, and became a good friend. He was funny and talented and fun-loving, and kept the entire department laughing even during times of the highest stress.

I haven't talked to him in years; we each moved on in our careers, in different directions.

He stands today accused of a pretty heinous felony. Nobody got hurt, and there was no real possibility that anyone would have been hurt, but it was likely very scary for the victims just the same.

I knew he treated himself occasionally to substances that were a bit stronger than Bud Light. Word is he's been treating himself lately to substances stronger yet, substances that have ruined his career and are likely responsible for the position he's in today.

I want him to get help. I know he needs to be punished. I know the general public thinks he's just another criminal. I think that sucks. But I can understand why.

If you've known somebody or had a family member who found himself on the wrong side of a correctional facility, you understand the conflict in emotions it causes. It throws off the whole right-and-wrong, don't-do-the-crime-if-you-can't-do-the-time simplicity of it all. I have some pretty solid ideas on right and wrong; I still stand by my contention, for instance, that anybody who does hard drugs deserves whatever he or she gets, whether it be rehab, prison or untimely death.

And maybe it all really is that simple. But I'm not convinced of that.

This week's desktop background

During our trip to Colorado, we rented Jeeps from this fellow in a hotel parking lot in Frisco. His business model is pretty simple: "Here's the keys, here's a map, trust your Jeep, have fun."

The words "Trust your Jeep" rang in my head frequently as I drove my wife and two younger children over small boulders, through creeks, up and down hills on this path that bore some resemblance to a road. We were in low-range 4-wheel drive for nearly 40 miles on the odometer. It was the most fun I've ever had covering 40 miles in 7 hours.

Here's one of the hundreds of fantastic views from that trip. This was at about 13,500 feet, somewhere between Keystone and Breckenridge. To the right you'll see the road we were on; that was the smoothest, safest part of it:



Happy Friday. I'm headed for the mountains, if only in my mind.

First-day jitters

It's nice to see that, nearly 18 years after I was actually last in a classroom, I still have insomnia on the Sunday before the first day of school.

I'm not going to school tomorrow, except to make sure my first-grade daughter and third-grade son get there safely. The eighth-grade daughter has a bus; she's on her own, mostly.

Outfits are selected and have been modeled. Lunches have been planned. Forms have been filled out. Summer 2007 is officially over here on the Western Edge. It's been a good one; I think I'm gonna miss it.

Life's ugly turns

I'm sad today. A bad side of a good man I knew was exposed to the world in an ugly way earlier this week. I'm going to keep the details to a minimum, for now, and hope that this person I know gets the help he needs.

Road warrior loses battle

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa -- I'm sure, after a good week of getting the system ready to unveil for the users after months of work and setup, I'll feel better about things. After a week of clicking here and having good stuff happen up there on the screen, I'll stop bitching.

But until then, if I ever get on an airplane again, it will be too soon.

Wh- wh- wha - ... ?

ERLANGER, Ky. -- I'm not supposed to be waking up in Greater Cincinnati this morning. Yet, somehow, I am. Thanks, Delta.

Whew

Good news: Doctors say they got it all, and no bad drugs or nuclear options are necessary. All indications are a full recovery lies ahead.

It doesn't get any better than that. A big thank you is due to the medical professionals who made it happen, and to St. Stepmom, who once again is the rock on which my dad and all her family lean.

Update No. 1: Week 2

RALEIGH, N.C. -- I just spent probably two full minutes trying to put a title up there. That's a good sign that you should just hit the tab key and start writing. So I will.

It's been two weeks of bullshit and bliss, two weeks of heart-warming and heart-pounding. Two weeks of wonder and two weeks of fear.

Each week was highly emotionally charged, for completely different reasons. At some point soon, I'll write about each.

I'm going to write about them in reverse, and separately.

The thing which I kind of glossed over earlier for Week 2 was this:

My father was diagnosed with colon cancer. He had surgery Aug. 2.

Right now, all is as well as it can be. The upsides are that he's relatively young (57) and it was found relatively earlier. The downside is that he's profoundly disabled as a result of a 1987 car accident, and that adds a serious level of complication to, well, everything. Oddly, even that has an upside; because of his disability, they were able to remove more of the parts that might be cancerous because they didn't have to worry about his future mobility; to put it simply, they could safely remove more of him and leave more of him disassembled 'cause he wasn't using it anyway. Or something like that.

We await results of testing to determine whether the cancer had spread to his lymph nodes. Those results were supposed to be available Monday. We're still waiting.

The rest of the family is waiting back in Anytown; The Wife and our kids wait in Florida, and I wait in North Carolina this week and Iowa next week.

The Wife, the Mini-Humans and I arrived home from Colorado in the single-digit hours of July 31. In the single-digit hours of Aug. 1, we had deposited the kids with a friend and were on another plane to Missouri. I've driven nearly 2,000 miles in the last 20 days, none of which were in my car.

I don't know how everything is going to turn out, but I have no reason to believe it'll be anything other than OK. We're survivors; my dad and his brothers have cheated death in some highly creative and stunning ways, and my dad's parents lived way longer than any actuarial tables would have expected them to. So we wait, and try to keep the worry to a minimum as things move on.

But I can tell you this: I've never wanted to go home more than I do right at this very second. Never.

I'll go back and write that head now, and do Week 1 later. Something tells me I should be sleeping now.

Altitude adjustment

BRECKENRIDGE, Colo. -- We're now on Day 4 of our mountain adventure. The Mini-Humans have seen a lot of very cool things for the first time.

We spent the weekend at the home of The Wife's grandmother in Colorado Springs. We spent a fair bit of time driving west on U.S. 24 from there. We saw Cave of the Winds, the Indian Cliff Dwellings, and Manitou Springs, a very well-kept little mountain town with a serious dose of weird. Had some great Mexican food at a place across the street from the hemp shop.

We drove up the mountain Monday to the cabin in which we are staying with 13 of The Wife's relatives. This is an emotionally volatile group, for reasons both valid and otherwise. The occasion is Grandma M's 80th birthday (which is actually in October, but you don't want to be in a cabin in the mountains in October, I'm told.) It's a highly charged atmosphere, and some sparks are flying already.

But when you look past those, you see a group that is deeply devoted to each other underneath some of the stinging insults and thinly veiled judgmentalness (is that a word? It is now). It's an interesting case study into the role of the matriarch, a role which might be dying out with our generation.

Grandma M is probably the biggest influence in my wife's life, and there could be no better role model. She's a woman who carries herself with class and dignity while at the same time also being a helluva lot of fun. She cares about nothing more than the happiness of her family, and in an age where it seems there's suddenly a whole lot of things about which to care, she still keeps her priorities focused. She's a beautiful woman, and it's a beautiful thing to be able to watch her be her first-hand.

It's just before 9 a.m. Tuesday up here in the mountains right now. We're getting ready to gather for a family photograph and then will scatter off to various mountain-y places. I'm going to go take a few (really deep) breaths and continue the acclimation process.

All I never wanted

Getting ready to head out on a non-vacation vacation on Saturday.

Week 1: Colorado, shuold be a semi-delightful trip to place I haven't seen in 20 years and my kids haven't seen at all. Can't wait to see their reaction.

Week 2: Well, more to tell when there's more to tell.

I can say I very much will welcome the break from work.

Eensy weensy tenny weeny yellow polka-dot bikini

Hey, Walden: Need some commentary on this story. My two cents: She's an idiot.

Norteño, sureño

SAN DIEGO -- I slipped away today.

For about 30 minutes, I was completely out of reach of United States authorities. Nobody knew where I was. I had stealthily slipped across the border, and nobody recorded my movements. One minute, I was in the United States; the next, I wasn't.

OK, it wasn't so stealthy. I just walked through a turnstile, and then another, and then I was in Mexico. Apparently, that's all it takes to cross the border in that direction.



I'm a guy who's been held up by zealous Customs agents who thought it was their duty to prevent me from going into Canada. I'm used to having my passport stamped, my picture taken, my iris scanned, everything short of a full body-cavity search.

To get to Mexico, however, all you have to do is pay the guy at the border parking lot $7 to keep an eye on your crappy rental car and walk for about five minutes. One turnstile, two turnstiles, and there you are, in Tijuana.

Frankly, the place kind of freaked me out a bit. I called The Wife as soon as I was across the border. "Don't drink the water, don't drink anything with ice in it, and don't eat anything," she said. "And watch out; the little girls selling beads are actually pickpockets." Just then, a little girl came up to me offering to sell me beads. I politely told her "No," put my hand on my wallet (which I had placed in my front pocket after buying some pesos) and walked on a bit.

In every direction, I saw ... well, I didn't see taco stands; I didn't see souvenir shops; I didn't see restaurants and bars. I saw ... pharmacies. Lots and lots of pharmacies.



This is what Tijuana offers tourists. Not a taste of Mexico, but relief from the fucked-up United States health care system. An opportunity to beat Big Pharma at its own game.

Past the first wave of pharmacies, there was one restaurant, which sported big Corona banners and looked very much like a Mexican restaurant you'd find in St. Petersburg, Fla., or Rockford, Ill. I decided not to walk past the aggressive shopkeepers down to Avenida de la Revolucion. I turned around and headed for the northbound border crossing.

I walked past a long line of folks who I presumed were waiting to cross the border. I kept walking, though, following the gringo family that seemed to know where it was going. After about 150 people, I determined the line was for the U.S. immigration office. This is where people who were not carrying U.S. passports had to wait. I walked past all those people and went on through Customs, where I was subject to the wary eyes of the agents, a scan of my passport, and a muttered admonition to "have a good day."

We're trying so hard to keep those people out. They're trying so hard to get here. Why? It's not because we have more pharmacies. It's because they believe in the promise of a better life in the U.S. And many of them are willing to work their asses off for it.

Take a look the next time you drive past a strawberry patch or a construction site. Listen to the Spanish flowing from the tongues of the workers. Say "hola" to the woman who's cleaning your toilet at the next hotel you stay in. Then, take a look at the guy with the sign standing in the median. Bet he doesn't speak Spanish. Now tell me who has the sense of entitlement.

These people come over, and we give them jobs. We give them jobs because it helps us balance our books better. We give them jobs because, in the words of The (Holy Crap, This Dumbass is the) Leader of the Free World, "they'll do jobs that Americans won't do." You want to prosecute somebody? Don't prosecute the illegal workers; prosecute the companies who hire them illegaly. Yeah, that's gonna happen.

All I needed to go south was to spin two turnstiles. All they need to go north is to stand in line for hours, days, weeks, years, and beg for permission.

As I emerged from the border crossing, safely back on American soil, with my steps having been scanned and noted by the Department of Homeland Security, I crossed the pedestrian bridge over Interstate 5 in the San Ysidro neighborhood of San Diego. The first thing you see at the foot of that bridge? An outlet mall. God bless America.

Don't talk to me, and nobody gets hurt

SAN DIEGO -- I was an asshole this morning. In my defense, it was completely justified.

I have a very well-defined System that takes me from one place to the other with maximum efficiency. It's very important, for a guy like me who goes from one place to the other with great frequency, to have an efficient System. That's how I get from one place to the other without losing things like my passport or my credit cards or my right ear.

Part of the system involves how I carry my bags. I have a basic roll-aboard suitcase, and a backpack that plays the part of "small personal item," despite the fact that it basically has the contents of an Office Depot inside. The backpack is strapped to the suitcase. On cross-country flights, such as the one I was on Monday morning, I strap one of those neck pillows to the suitcase-backpack rig.

So I'm getting ready to board the shuttle that takes me from landside to airside at the Home Airport when a salesman-looking guy spies the rig. You know the Salesman Guy: Tall, in good shape, mid-40s, polo shirt, black Dockers. Being a Salesman Guy, he has a pathological need to make small talk. "So, you got your pillow; you're all ready."

Now, he doesn't know that I'm pathologically opposed to small talk; he doesn't know that before 7 a.m., I can be violently opposed to small talk. I gave it my best, "ha-ha, yeah, I got a long flight."

He doesn't get the message. "So, you got a blanky packed away in there, too?"

I gave him a look of utter contempt, and just barely by the skin of my tongue stopped myself from saying, "Man, shut the fuck up." I proceeded to untie my shoes; this is part of the System, also. I have a hard time finding shoes I like, given that I wear a size 6 1/2, and all the shoes I own have laces.

"Ah, yes, you'll learn someday," he said. "Slip-ons for travel. You don't do this very often." He continued to leer.

By now, I'm openly fuming. He's attacking my Travel Skill. "I travel a lot," I said, through a fake smile, "and I like these shoes." I then gave him the Shut-the-Fuck-Up look again. This time, he did.

I needed THAT start to my day at 7 a.m. when I was faced with sitting in a middle seat from the Western Edge to Phoenix. Fucker.

Later, after some soothing music, I realized the guy is just one of those people who have perpetual diarrhea of the mouth. Well-meaning, but possessed with a belief that people want to hear what they have to say. Poor guy couldn't have been more wrong at that particular moment, but hey, everybody has his weakness.

I tried to get some of the good travel karma back. I managed to get an aisle seat for the second leg of my trip, but gave it up so a woman's 6-year-old daughter could sit next to her. I was also excrcuiatingly nice to the person sitting to my left in the new seat; her headphone thingy wasn't working, so I let her string the headphone wire across me to my seat so she could watch the movie. Having already had my Asshole card punched for the trip, it was the very least I could do.

Bombs away

Never one to miss a chance to participate in an apparent Google-bombing attempt, I must make reference to a Hairy gymnast. Don't ask. I don't know, and I'm probably better off not knowing.

Somebody else's bad day in the air

I've been in New York's Kennedy Airport once. It was awful. Apparently not as bad for me, though, as for these people. Particularly liked the part about how the guy's wife called Delta to ask about the status of her husband's delayed flight, and Delta said "it took off hours ago," and the wife said, "well, no it didn't, I just talked to my husband," and Delta said, "well, fuck you." Or something like that.

So we've been pretty hard on American Airlines in this forum. Now it's Delta's turn. Who's next?

13

I'm the parent of a teenager, as of today.

The Old Daughter is 13. I'm not sure we're ready for that. I know we don't get a choice.

She is 100 percent as perfect as one can expect a 13-year-old girl to be. Which is to say that she's often a pain in the ass, but not so often that it's the first thing you say about her. She's smart, which is to say that in some moments, she's not as smart as she thinks she is, and at others, she knows way more than she gives herself credit for. She's beautiful, which is to say she's beautiful.

I'm the parent of a teenager. I need a few minutes to digest that.

Buying their memories

As a frequent air traveler, I have a lot of time to read. And, of course, I buy most of my books at airport bookstores. Looking through the selections wadded up in my backpack, it appears my taste has gone toward contemporary memoir.

I just finished "Bright Lights, Big Ass," by Jen Lancaster. Over the last year, I've also read all of the offerings from Laurie Notaro, Augusten Burroughs and David Sedaris, who apparently doesn't have a web site.

Quick reviews:

Lancaster is mostly very funny, but the footnote thing got old after a while.

Notaro is constantly flat-out hilarious. Her life would be a good stand-up act.

Augusten Burroughs: David Sedaris for the rest of us.

Sedaris needs to stop whining, and we need to stop enabling him.

What do these four essayists have in common? They all write about their basically mundane, everyday lives, and a large audience seems to enjoy reading about them. Also: None of them are heterosexual men.

Which leads me to believe: There must be no way to make the life of a heterosexual man interesting to a mass audience. (I suppose, if there was, I'd be writing more about it.)

I'm not sure why I enjoy reading other people's navel-gazing. I know I'm partial to funny women, which explains Lancaster and Notaro. Sedaris is wildly popular among people who are much smarter than me, and I picked up "Me Talk Pretty One Day" and "Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim" based on the recommendations of said smart people. I guess my disdain for him must indicate that I'm not all that smart. Burroughs? Meh. He's a slightly less insufferable version of Sedaris.

That said, I keep buying the books. I'm headed out now to get Lancaster's first book, "Bitter is the New Black," and the new Notaro tome (which is actually a memoir disguised as a novel), "There's a (Slight)Chance I Might Be Going to Hell." There's a (slight) chance I might be a sucker.

The times that try the media's souls

This guy asks whether bloggers should be protected by the First Amendment. He poses a question:

There's no specific definition of "press" in the 45 words of the First Amendment. So who might be bound by responsibilities that go along with the role of a free press? Are bloggers and other Web users part of a broadly defined "press" even though they certainly could not have been envisioned by the Colonial-era Founders who wrote the First Amendment?

Uh, wait a minute ... the Founders not only envisioned such a thing as bloggers; one of the Founders, Thomas Paine, essentially was one. His pamphlet, "Common Sense," laid the foundation for the Declaration of Independence. He was by no means a reporter or columnist in the traditional sense either then or now. If Paine was writing 210 years later, his stuff would probably appear at commonsense.blogspot.com (dude needs to give up that blog name, by the way; now, I want it.)

The Internet is a powerful and, alas, often-misused tool. Nobody's quite figured it out yet. This has been a big problem for established media, who had just figured out how to gain control of their own environments.

For better or worse, free, unfettered communication is the thing that will save America as we know it. No president, no Congress, no judge can subvert the will of an informed people. We have more information available with which to evaluate candidates and make decisions than ever before. We just have to learn how to use it.

And yes, it should be protected. The same law that protects purveyors of porn needs to protect purveyors of opinion, belief, and fact. Nothing less than the survival of the Republic depends on it.

An open letter to contractors

Dear Contractors of the World:

I have deep respect for most of you. My role in this economy is to make enough money to be able to pay you to provide your services to me. You have skills that I lack, and I have come around to being OK with that. Without you, my family would have no air conditioning, no indoor plumbing, and a swimming pool full of green, fetid malodorous swill. I thank you for your work, both in words and in cash (or, sometimes, American Express.)

But: The fact that you have skills that I lack does not give you license to steal money from me. At least not anymore.

So: Please note below the conditions under which from this point you will be allowed the privilege to work in my house and profit from its imperfections and our lack of ability/desire to maintain it ourselves. If you meet these conditions, you also get the privilege of speaking to my wife, who handles all the financial matters in the house and is usually good for a few one-liners. (She's also really hot, so keep that in mind. It's not often in our neighborhood you run into a woman who's attractive and pleasant to be around).

Everything is in writing. Everything. There will be itemized statements of work, and if we opt to not have a particular item completed, we will not pay for it.

Your time is valuable. So is our money. Payment terms will be as follows: No more than 40 percent upon signing the above-mentioned statement of work. Final payment will not be provided until we are completely satisfied that the work has been done to its completion. Your need to pay your subcontractors or suppliers is not our problem until such time as said subcontractors have finished their work. That is what in the real world is known as "the cost of doing business," and said cost is borne by the business person, not by us. We're not business people. You are.

We're big fans of helping out the little guy. We'd rather have a talented individual or small company handle a task than, say, Lowe's or Home Depot. But: We'll treat you the same way we'd treat them. You will be accountable for completing the work on time and within budget, and if you don't, we'll find someone who does.

We will be reasonable in setting a schedule for the completion of the project. We realize we aren't your only customer. (At least, we hope we're not.) We do expect that schedule to be met, short of extremely extenuating circumstances.

If you are responsible for obtaining the materials for our job, you are responsible for ensuring said materials are of sufficient quality at the time at which they are obtained, not 20 minutes before you are to start our job. Further, if it turns out you obtained crappy materials, and it will cost you more money to obtain non-crappy materials, that is also not our problem. If you're willing to lose a $15,000 job over a few hundred dollars, we're willing to take the job from you.

Did we mention everything will be in writing? If you say it will cost $6 a square foot to lay tile floor, that means $6 a square foot, not $6.01. Or $7. Or "oops, that doesn't include taking the old floor away." It is your responsibility to figure your profit before you present us a quote, not after.

Final decision about whether we like the work lies with us, particularly The Wife. If she's not satisfied, we're not paying. She's the person to whom you need to be nice, not me. I couldn't tell you within $500 how much we have in our checking account at any given moment. She controls whether you get paid, and if she likes you, she might contract with you for extra work (which means more money for you.) Me, well, I hate you. I hate you because you can do things I can't do, and because, by default, I think you're stealing my money until proven otherwise. You'll never win me over. Don't talk to me. Talk to her.

Thank you again for sharing your skills with us and for allowing us a place to put some of this excess cash that we would otherwise waste on food or toys or something.

Sincerely,

RJ