Actually, yes. Sort of anyway. My wife's cousin has a white mom and his dad is from Nigeria. When he visits his relatives there, they all call him "white boy".

Ha! No worries and honestly, I wish I were one of these 'young folk' you refer to. I haven't been described that way in decades. I struggle with some of these things too, but I've come around to a more optimistic view gradually. If I might suggest a couple interesting books (feel free to disregard, I'm not…

The BBC already had a decent version with Stephen Mangan as Dirk. It wasn't perfect, but he captured a decent balance between the character's kinda anti-social tendencies and messiness. I was sad it didn't get more episodes.

I saw Aliens at a young age and the scene where they are tracking the movements and note that the aliens are now past the doorway freaked me out beyond belief. "That can't be. That's inside the room …"

You could very well be right. There weren't very many characters in the book and it felt very much to me like a throwback to those mysteries where the killer is THE ONE YOU LEAST SUSPECT. Dum dum dummm! And after a while I figured out there was only one character that she didn't paint as a real suspect until late, so…

Eh, alright. I guess I'll stop after this. I'm not going to "google it" because that's not really a way to engage in a discussion. I guess I agree in a sense, because that is what we teach kids, especially in this culture. Obey your parents. Listen to your teachers. Follow the rules. These are all forms of an external…

Students have always identified strongly with certain stances, in ways that they themselves later see as naive or even absurd. That's their right and honestly, that's what they do. Colleges are a place for them to work this out. One of those things being worked out is identity and I don't really see that as a huge…

Wait, what? have you read anything about the various college protests this last year? They were asking for (among other things) professors to be banned from campus. That's a far cry from "… unquestionably following their professors …" Also, criticizing college students for being singly focused and having a black/white…

I finished the book with a solid 'meh'. It didn't help that the killer was kinda obvious about 1/2 into it. I actually thought this was pulpy enough that a movie adaptation might be an improvement.

I live in fear of being asked to recite the alphabet backwards. I couldn't do that stone cold sober, in the light of day, in a no-pressure situation with the letters right in front of me. At night with a cop staring at me? I wouldn't get farther than z.

In a very special twist, it was all organized by … JACK BAUER.

Yeah, I wonder as well. People like to spout about how "NEVER in all my YEARS ON THIS EARTH!! Have Americans been so divided!!" I like to remind them that once we were so divided that we fought a war over our differences.

Well, Willa Paskin on Slate thought it was awful. So split the difference and say … C+?

Hand-cock, amiright? Anyone?

Upvoted for making me think of Dennis Quaid.

It's a holdover from the time that all contractions were considered improper. For a long time it was not considered any better or worse than other contractions. Geoff Nunberg told me about it: http://people.ischool.berke…

And if you SEE them getting out an obsidian dagger AT ANY POINT, do your best to RUN AWAY.

Darth Vader's Personal Massager.

Christ, how creepy.


My second reaction: I would really like to hear about the knife-fight …

It's definitely more true for women, but I've avoided doing things out of fear of rudeness as well. Thinking back, some of them still make me cringe. It's good that as I've gotten older I care less how I come across and (like to think) I would not hesitate to tell off aholes.